Negating negation: A century of revision in the reception of Hegel’s political philosophy

Abstract

In this article I consider a variety of contemporary opinions on the question of the nature and relation between Hegel’s metaphysical and political thought. I interrogate the intellectual forces and climate that have demanded the division of these two aspects against Hegel’s view of their practical and logical interdependence. Hegel’s image as either an unabashed proto-Nazi Prussian statist or mystic prophet and harbinger of twentieth-century totalitarian collectivism has largely been dispatched. However, I argue that the stain and strain of the process of his defence have had an indelible and deforming impact on how we nowadays conceive of Hegel’s political thought and its autonomous capacity to speak to us in the present. © 2017, Imprint Academic. All rights reserved.