Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Politics. A Systematic Inquiry into Freedom and Determinism in Kant's Political Philosophy

Contemporary liberal trends of thought in social and political philosophy have again brought to the fore the practical scope of meaning of (in se metaphysical) concepts such as freedom and equality of citizens. In the context of (moral) claims for autonomy, self-determination of individuals and cosmopolitical hospitality of world-citizens on the one hand and political national or globalized coercion [by supra-national political/ juridical institutions] on the other, the multi-faced coercive power of 'external' (political) lawgivings has intensified the urgency to rethink the metaphysical foundations of what in fact is shown to be a practical antinomical system of lawgivings. The moral lawgiving based on internal freedom of self-determination is antinomically opposed to the political lawgiving based on external force. Regarding all human beings, how to safeguard within a (global) determining ambience of interests and powers the being an end-in-itself which is of itself absolute object of respect? How to think on an adequate level of reflection, a balanced and consistent schema wherein the antinomical poles of differing lawgivings can be rationally justified? The alleged inconsistency has impelled philosophers to think about the conditions of possibility of a system of equal freedom in which the antinomy between autonomy and coercion might be solved. Immanuel Kant was the one who conceptually and coherently discussed this issue in his metaphysics of freedom, esp. in his dealings with the metaphysical principles of the doctrine of Right. Eager to contribute to the search for a solution to this antinomical political and judicial issue, this thesis builds its argumentation on Kant's metaphysical foundations of the idea of Right and the metaphysical justification of subsequent political action in general. This thesis does have, in my view, a typically innovative ambition, namely, to deductively establish a link between a practical moral/ judicial/political question on autonomy and force [Metaphysics of Morals] with the theoretical ground-form of such a question as elaborated in the Dialectical Part (on Freedom and Determinism) of the Critique of pure Reason. What we are going to highlight is how (our interpretation of) Kant does add surplus reflection in contemporary philosophical debates on the matter. The gist of our research can be expressed in the following (hypo-) thesis: The critical and idealistic way in which Kant in his CrpR has theoretically settled the problem of determinism and freedom (in the Third Antinomy of the Dialectics, B 559-586) does principally and systematically prefigure the way in which he, in his practical philosophy, is settling the - also antinomical - problem of determination and freedom in juridical, resp. political terms. To put it more appropriately: coercively determinative civil laws are, on the one hand of Kant's (resolution of the) antinomy, occupying the place of "empirical character (cfr. CrpR B 567) of a - political - cause" (i.e. the political action of the legislative power of the state as separated from the executive). On the other hand, the "innate" (6.237) or "natural laws" (6. 224) ( Metaphysics of Morals, Part One: Metaphysical Principles of Right, Akademie-Ausgabe vol. 6, hereafter MMR) ("cognized as obligatory a priori by reason even without external lawgiving" (ibid.)) are occupying the place of "intelligible character" of such a political cause ( i.c. juridical laws understood according to their status of "moral laws" (6. 214) issued from the noumenal determination of "the pure will according to the laws of a causality of pure reason" (MMR, 6. 221)). It is H. Heimsoeth's study Freiheit und Charakter (in: Kant. Zur Deutung seiner Theorie von Erkennen und Handeln (Hrsg. G. Prauss), 1973, pp. 292-309 which will be our main guide exploring the link between (external) freedom and the key-concept of character.status: publishe