{"id":903196,"date":"2026-09-17T16:07:51","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T14:07:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/grundlinien.de\/?page_id=903196"},"modified":"2026-09-17T16:07:52","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T14:07:52","slug":"what-does-hegel-hold-against-liberals","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/grundlinien.de\/en\/what-does-hegel-hold-against-liberals\/","title":{"rendered":"What does Hegel hold against liberals?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In brief:<\/strong> More agreement than one expects, and one objection that hurts. Hegel holds the freedom of the individual to be the principle of the modern world and says so as emphatically as almost any liberal. He denies only that it can carry itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The agreement<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The sentence that separates Hegel from the conservatism of his time stands in \u00a7 260<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The principle of modern states has this immense strength and depth: that it allows the principle of subjectivity to perfect itself into the self-sufficient extreme<\/em> of personal particularity, and at the same time brings it back to substantial unity<\/em>, thereby preserving that unity within subjectivity itself.<\/p>\nGroundlines, \u00a7 260<\/a><\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

\u201eSelf-sufficient extreme\u201c is no concession. Hegel demands that particularity live itself out fully<\/em> \u2013 choice of occupation by one\u2019s own decision (\u00a7 206<\/a>), conscience (\u00a7 137<\/a>), property (\u00a7 45<\/a>), freedom of the press<\/a> (\u00a7 316<\/a>\u2013\u00a7 319<\/a>), publicity of the deliberations of the estates<\/a> (\u00a7 314<\/a>\u2013\u00a7 315<\/a>). In \u00a7 206<\/a> note the absence of this freedom of choice is expressly declared a deficiency \u2013 in Plato as in the Indian castes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The charge that Hegel sacrifices the individual to the whole likewise founders on \u00a7 260<\/a>: \u201ethe universal neither holds good nor is accomplished without particular interest, knowledge, and will, nor do individuals live merely for the latter as private persons\u201c. Both halves are meant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The objection<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It has two parts. First: a society consisting only of contracting parties produces poverty out of itself, and systematically \u2013 \u00a7 243<\/a>\u2013\u00a7 245<\/a>. The market does not solve this problem because it brings it forth. Second: whoever takes freedom for mere arbitrary will<\/a> \u2013 being able to do what one wants \u2013 does not yet have the concept of freedom. \u00a7 15<\/a> note calls the notion \u201ethat freedom in general consists in being able to do what one wants<\/em>\u201c evidence of \u201ea complete lack of intellectual cultivation\u201c. Free, for Hegel, is not the one who can choose but the one who wills what he can see to be right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From this follows the uncomfortable consequence: the state is for Hegel not the referee of the competition but the condition of there being private persons at all. \u00a7 258<\/a> note is expressly directed against determining the state by \u201ethe security and protection of property and personal freedom\u201c \u2013 not because that is unimportant, but because being a member of the state would then be \u201esomething optional\u201c.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Where one need not follow him<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

At three points the liberal objection to Hegel has not been refuted to this day. The argument for the hereditary monarch in \u00a7 279<\/a> convinces almost nobody any more. The assembly of estates in \u00a7 301<\/a>\u2013\u00a7 311<\/a> is not a parliament and expressly not a representation of individuals. And the rejection of universal suffrage in \u00a7 303<\/a> note rests on a premise \u2013 that the many as individuals are merely a \u201eformless mass\u201c \u2013 which two hundred years of lived democracy may dispute.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What remains, though, is the question from which Hegel derives these constructions: on what does an order of free individuals live, if it wills nothing but freedom itself? Whoever answers \u201eon itself\u201c should read \u00a7 185<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sources.<\/strong> Groundlines \u00a7 15<\/a> note (arbitrary will), \u00a7 45<\/a>, \u00a7 124<\/a> note, \u00a7 185<\/a> and note, \u00a7 206<\/a> and note (choice of occupation), \u00a7 243<\/a>\u2013\u00a7 245<\/a>, \u00a7 258<\/a> note, \u00a7 260<\/a>, \u00a7 279<\/a>, \u00a7 301<\/a>\u2013\u00a7 319<\/a> (assembly of estates, publicity, freedom of the press). \u2013 In the glossary: Subjective Freedom<\/a>, Arbitrariness<\/a>, Civil Society<\/a>. \u2013 Literature.<\/strong> Shlomo Avineri, Hegel\u2019s Theory of the Modern State<\/em>, Cambridge 1972; Charles Taylor, Hegel<\/em>, Cambridge 1975; Axel Honneth, Leiden an Unbestimmtheit<\/em>, Stuttgart 2001.<\/p>\n\n\n\n