Hegelian Dialectic & Democratization Process
Understanding the Two Philosophical Concepts
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An examination of the history of philosophy will show that the great age of scholastic philosophy was an outcome of the reforms of the eleventh century. the reaction to the reforms evolved to modern philosophy. According to Russel, the conflicts of different philosophies continue to evolve in the thoughts of the first century. Therefore, without insight into the philosophy of earlier centuries, the intellectual atmosphere of the twenty first century can hardly be understood. I am of the opinion that an understanding of Hegelian dialectic will shed more light into the history of philosophy. To attempt this project of going through the history of philosophy, in the first section of the book I systematically formulated a way to go through historical development of Hegelian dialectic principle in relation to the times it has helped to form. As an attempt to cover at length the historical dimension of the Hegelian theory of dialectics, it became necessary to be selective on what and whose views to take into account from the existing pool of philosophers of his time such as; John Locke, Jacques Rousseau, George Bryon, John Dewey and William James, as well as other Idealists, empiricists, utilitarians and pragmatists. In the second section, I have picked democratization process to advance an analysis of Hegelian dialectic as a common because of some of Hegel's work faintly pointing to democratic concept as a system of State governance. In his lectures before the publication of his work "Philosophy of Right", Hegel discusses the principle of opposition; and in the book "Philosophy of Right" he conceived the State basically in terms of unity. According to him, conflicts appear at the level of the civil society where parochial aims are pursued; nevertheless, they are superseded and reconciled rationally at the level of the State where disagreements are solved by rational communication, a process better understood from dialectic perspective of thesis, antithesis, synthesis. The main focus of the this book can be formulated as a reflection to the question; "WHAT HAS BEEN THE EFFECT ON SOCIETY FOR 200 YEARS OF HEGELIAN DIALECTIC SINCE ANCIENT TO MEDERN TIMES?"
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About the Book
Everything is always changing—our ideas, wills, and opinions. What is true today may not be true tomorrow; whatever we see as “true” at a given moment is not objectively so but rather represents the victory of a particular will and opinion against the others working within us. We are constantly changing goal posts and competing for dominance. A number of philosophers have asserted that an in-depth study of the history of philosophy reveals bitter enmities among philosophers arguing for their ideas from which emerge conflicting philosophies in the form of thesis, antithesis, synthesis. As clearly traced in this book, it started with the philosophies of Heracleitus against Parmenides, Plato against the Sophists, Descartes against the empiricists, Catholic scholastics and Hume against Descartes, Kant against Hume. The line continues to African philosophers against Western philosophers, to the utilitarians against pragmatists. This book, presenting one of the most in-depth studies on Hegelian dialectic, illustrates in a very unique way that the disagreement between various philosophers and their philosophies—when adequately understood—illustrates not conflict but the growth and development of philosophy toward objective and absolute truth. One needs to understand how Hegelian dialectic works in its triadic movement to be able to grasp how it is inherent in every sphere of life, the most being in politics and evolution of the forms of governance that is at the center of discussion in this must-read book.
About the Author
The Author of this work, Jonathan Kathenge, is an educator who has taught High school, colleges and universities. He holds BA, MA and PhD in Philosophy, BA in Theology, MBA in Business Administration. He did his dissertation on Hegel and grew a keen interest to look into Hegel’s dialectic concept which resulted to the production of this book. He is a contemporary philosopher who believes philosophers have a role to play in educating and creating favorable environment and better systems to support current and future generation.