Kant's Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Aim

by Amélie Oksenberg Rorty (Editor), James Schmidt (Editor)

Overview

Lively debates about narratives of historical progress, the conditions for international justice, and the implications of globalisation have prompted a renewed interest in Kant's Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Aim. The essays in this volume, written by distinguished contributors, discuss the questions that are at the core of Kant's investigations. Does the study of history convey any philosophical insight? Can it provide political guidance? How are we to understand the destructive and bloody upheavals that constitute so much of human experience? What connections, if any, can be traced between politics, economics, and morality? What is the relation between the rule of law in the nation state and the advancement of a cosmopolitan political order? These questions and others are examined and discussed in a book that will be of interest to philosophers, social and political theorists, and intellectual and cultural historians.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780511738883
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	05/29/2009
Series:	Cambridge Critical Guides
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	499 KB

About the Author

Amélie Oksenberg Rorty is Lecturer in Social Medicine, Harvard University and Visiting Professor in Philosophy, Boston University.

James Schmidt is Professor of History and Political Science at Boston University.

Table of Contents

Introduction: history as philosophy Amélie Rorty and James Schmidt; Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Aim Immanuel Kant; 1. Teleology and history in Kant Henry E. Allison; 2. The purposive development of human capacities Karl Ameriks; 3. Reason as a species characteristic Manfred Kuehn; 4. Good out of evil: Kant and the idea of unsocial sociability Jerome Schneewind; 5. The unsociable sociability of human nature Allen Wood; 6. The crooked timber of mankind Paul Guyer; 7. A habitat for humanity Barbara Herman; 8. Cosmopolitanism and the final end of history Pauline Kleingeld; 9. The hidden plan of nature Eckart Förster; 10. Providence as progress: Kant's variations on a tale of origins Genevieve Lloyd; 11. Norms, facts, and the philosophy of history Terry Pinkard; 12. Philosophy helps history Rüdiger Bittner; Bibliography; Index of names and works.