Symposium : the 200th Anniversary of the Publication of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right : Concept of Ethical Life (Sittlichkeit) and Present Day : Ethnic Diversity and the Unity of State : Hegel’s Cultural Pluralism

This essay tries to clarify Hegel’s distinctive “cultural pluralism” in his Philosophy of Right （1820）. Though his ethical thought was devised in the formative period of the so-called “German-Nationalism”, it did not insist on the rule by a racial majority to the others, rather demonstrated that the ethnic diversity is not obstacle to the political integration of the modern state. The reason for Hegel’s view is that any inhabitant is able to become a citizen （Bürger） through the self-education in a civil society, and then, to fulfill his obligations and to obey to the political order as a national member （Volk）, in so far as the state has the universal will to secure the rights to pursue well-being for all people. Because every cultural tradition and the racial purity become thin through the accumulation of generations in modern society. Needless to say, such idea cannot be identified with the present political thought of “multi-culturalism” has its origin on the criticism to the nation-state in which the discrimination and racial dispute have been supposed to repeat without end. However, for Hegel, one’s excessive attachment to his own root is symptom of the failure of his self-education which comes from distrust of the corrupt political powers