Rights, Bodies and Recognition

The German philosopher, Johann Gottlieb Fichte, has long been recognized as an important and original figure in the history of philosophy and Western thought and as a seminal influence upon the Romantic tradition. This book focuses on Fichte's contributions in political theory as set out in his Foundations of Natural Right. The essays, which examine such issues as Fichte as a social contract theorist, his theory of gender relations and his theories on punishment and the criminal law among many other topics, remedy what has been a striking lacuna in the existing scholarly literature.

Contents: Introduction; Is Fichte a social contract theorist?, Wayne M. Martin; Fichte's impossible contract, Michael Baur; Recognition, right and social contract, Robert R. Williams; On the fundamental connection between moral law and natural right in Fichte's Contribution (1793) and Foundations of Natural Right (1796/97), Violetta L. Waibel; Fichte's hypothetical imperative: morality, right, and philosophy in the Jena Wissenschaftslehre, Yolanda Estes; The role of the human body in Fichte's Grundlage des Naturrechts (1796-97), Angelica Nuzzo; Fichte's Foundations of Natural Right and the mind-body problem, Gÿnter Zöller; Fichte's materialism, Bruce Merrill; The 'mixed method' of Fichte's Grundlage des Naturrechts and the limits of transcendental Reellephilosophie, Daniel Breazeale; An aesthetics of influence: Fichte's Foundations of Natural Right in view of Kant's third critique, F. Scott Scribner; Fichte's theory of gender relations in his Foundations of Natural Right, Bÿrbel Frischmann; Political obligation and the imagination in Fichte's Naturrecht, Jefferey Kinlaw; The universality of human rights and the sovereignty of the state in Fichte's Doctrine of Right, Hans Georg von Manz; Schelling's aphorisms on natural right (1796/97): a comparison with Fichte's Grundlage des Naturrechts, Michael G. Vater; Transcendental conditions and the transcendence of conditions: Fichte and Schelling on the foundations of natural right, Steven Hoeltzel; Fichte, Heidegger and the Nazis, Tom Rockmore; Rights, recognition, and regulative ideas: on the relationship between Fichte's theory of rights and contemporary liberation philosophies, Arnold Farr.