Alienation

by Rahel Jaeggi, Frederick Neuhouser, Alan E. Smith (Translator)

Overview

The Hegelian-Marxist idea of alienation fell out of favor during the post-metaphysical rejection of humanism and essentialist views of human nature. In this book Jaeggi draws on phenomenological analyses grounded in modern conceptions of agency, along with recent work in the analytical tradition, to reconceive of alienation as the absence of a meaningful relationship to oneself and others, which manifests itself in feelings of helplessness and the despondent acceptance of ossified social roles and expectations.

A revived approach to alienation helps critical social theory engage with phenomena, such as meaninglessness, isolation, and indifference, which have broad implications for issues of justice. By severing alienation's link to a problematic conception of human essence while retaining its social-philosophical content, Jaeggi provides resources for a renewed critique of social pathologies, a much-neglected concern in contemporary liberal political philosophy. Her work revisits the arguments of Rousseau, Hegel, Kierkegaard, and Heidegger, placing them in dialogue with Thomas Nagel, Bernard Williams, and Charles Taylor.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780231537599
Publisher:	Columbia University Press
Publication date:	07/15/2014
Series:	New Directions in Critical Theory
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	304
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

Rahel Jaeggi is professor of social and political philosophy at the Humboldt University in Berlin. Her research focuses on ethics, social philosophy, political philosophy, philosophical anthropology, social ontology, and critical theory.

Table of Contents

Foreword, by Axel Honneth
Translator's Introduction, by Frederick Neuhouser
Preface and Acknowledgments
Part 1. The Relation of Relationlessness: Reconstructing a Concept of Social Philosophy
1. "A Stranger in the World That He Himself Has Made": The Concept and Phenomenon of Alienation
2. Marx and Heidegger: Two Versions of Alienation Critique
3. The Structure and Problems of Alienation Critique
4. Having Oneself at One's Command: Reconstructing the Concept of Alienation
Part 2. Living One's Life as an Alien Life: Four Cases
5. Seinesgleichen Geschieht or "The Like of It Now Happens": The Feeling of Powerlessness and the Independent Existence of One's Own Actions
6. "A Pale, Incomplete, Strange, Artificial Man": Social Roles and the Loss of Authenticity
7. "She but Not Herself": Self-Alienation as Internal Division
8. "As If Through a Wall of Glass": Indifference and Self-Alienation
Part 3. Alienation as a Disturbed Appropriation of Self and World
9. "Like a Structure of Cotton Candy": Being Oneself as Self-Appropriation
10. "Living One's Own Life": Self-Determination, Self-Realization, and Authenticity
Conclusion: The Sociality of the Self, the Sociality of Freedom
Notes
Works Cited
Index

Editorial Reviews

07/01/2014
Jaeggi (social and political philosophy, Humboldt Univ. of Berlin) offers a comprehensive philosophical analysis of the concept of alienation. She calls alienation a "relation of relationlessness" and shows that there have been two customary ways of analyzing this concept. One of these, found in Karl Marx, looks at alienation as interference with the powers of the human species to find expression. The other, found in Søren Kierkegaard and Martin Heidegger, emphasizes the inability to lead an authentic life. Jaeggi next turns to phenomenology, offering a description of several people who led alienated lives. With this preparation, the author is now in position to present her own view of alienation: she sees it as an inability to appropriate one's own life. In developing her view, Jaeggi discusses the views of leading analytic philosophers such as Thomas Nagel and Richard Rorty. She finds in Rorty too sharp a separation between the private "authentic" self and the self in its social relations; it is clear that for her the relation of self and society is central to understanding alienation. In taking this view, she has been influenced by Georg Wilhem Friedrich Hegel, and her book can in part be read as a reworking of Hegel's thought. VERDICT This insightful and learned book will appeal to anyone interested in social philosophy.—David Gordon, Bowling Green State Univ., OH

Library Journal

08/04/2014
This lucid first book from Jaeggi reconceives the philosophical concept of alienation, claiming that alienation is not the absence of a relation but rather is "a relation of relationlessness." This intervention is coupled with the provocative assertion that the subject does not contain a true inner self. Instead, identity is realized through one's participation in the world and with others, through actions, commitments, projects, and relationships. Alienation is the inability to properly appropriate these engagements or identify with one's own life. Through the question of alienation the book opens a broad philosophical inquiry into what it means to be a human being and to have sovereignty over one's life. Jaeggi develops her thesis through an array of phenomenological descriptions and case studies, bolstering the work through a rich dialogue with the history of alienation from its Marxist-Hegelian conception to formulations in contemporary analytic and continental philosophy. Although succinct, at points the book's clarity sacrifices a more thorough investigation of certain lines of thinking (possibly because the book is a revised version of Jaeggi's dissertation), though in the foreword Axel Honneth avers that this shortcoming is rectified in her second (as yet untranslated) book. Nevertheless, Jaeggi's treatise is an intriguing contribution to the study of alienation. (July)

Publishers Weekly

Rahel Jaeggi's Alienation is an important contribution to – and rejuvenation of – the philosophical literature on the phenomenon of alienation.

Marx & Philosophy Review of Books

Jaeggi's scholarship and writing in this book is excellent, and the resuscitation of the concept of alienation in critical social theory is a welcome event in the literature.

Matthias Fritsch

[A]n excellent representative of the work of a new generation of German philosophers who...seem well positioned to reanimate Western philosophy.

Frederick Neuhouser

Alienation, the concept Hegel and Marx made so central to European political and social thought, has receded in importance in recent political philosophy. Like self-deception and weakness of will, it is extremely resistant to analysis even though it continues to be a major theme of modern life and accounts for the features of contemporary life. Jaeggi's great accomplishment is to provide the outlines of a new theory of an old term and thereby show its linkage to major ethical and political concerns. With this book, an entire tradition of political and social philosophy receives a new lease on life.

Terry Pinkard

Through a compelling combination of acute analysis and rich phenomenological description, Rahel Jaeggi brings alienation back to the center of political philosophy. She argues alienation concerns a failure to appropriate oneself in the right way, a problem with how one comes to be what one is, rather than an inability to realize some pregiven identity. Jaeggi is not only thoroughly learned in both the continental and analytic traditions. She does what is quite rare: she brings these traditions into a highly productive synthesis. A very impressive achievement.

Daniel Brudney

With this masterful reconstruction of the concept of alienation, Jaeggi opens fruitful new avenues for critical theory. She also claims her place as a powerful exponent of social philosophy and a thinker of the first rank. Her book is a tour de force of cogent argumentation and rich phenomenological description.

Nancy Fraser