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HEGEL AND
EMPIRE
From Postcolonialism
to Globalism
M.A.R. Habib
Hegel and Empire
M.A.R. Habib
Cover illustration: Pattern adapted from an Indian cotton print produced in the 19th century
Hegel’s views on cultures beyond Europe raise some very disturbing ques-
tions. Are his ethnocentric pronouncements concerning the superiority
of Europe grounded in the basic principles of his thought? Or do they
internally shape those principles? In either case, is Hegel representative of
broader traditions of European thought? Did the formulation of a
European identity presuppose a certain model of history? A certain kind
of history of philosophy? These questions continue to generate strife to
this day.
It’s well-known that Hegel occupies a fraught position within postco-
lonial studies. The conventional postcolonial portrait of Hegel is that of
an arrogant, even racist, thinker who was profoundly Eurocentric in his
vision of philosophy, history, and the very nature of humanity. Yet even
this anti-Hegelian discourse, which seeks to “escape” or supersede Hegel,
is itself enabled by Hegelian categories of self and Other, identity and
difference, as well as the Hegelian concept of recognition.
More recent studies of Hegel, especially by philosophers, have
attempted to come to Hegel’s defense. In general, it is clear that scholars
on both sides of this Hegel “war” have produced sophisticated and com-
pelling arguments. However, many of these debates have taken place at a
rather specialized level, which can easily lose the reader who is not deeply
familiar with Hegel’s work. For example, Hegel’s master-slave dialectic is
one of the most complex portions of his account of consciousness; and
vii
viii Preface
Outline of Chapters
The introduction (Chap. 1) gives an overview of Hegel’s dialectic as it
operates in his overall scheme of global history. It argues that this dialec-
tic expresses the movement of capitalist society, whose economics are
intrinsically expansive, ever needing to move outward. Chapter 2
expounds Hegel’s “master-slave dialectic,” explaining why this provides a
necessary framework for approaching Hegel’s views on empire. The next
chapter is devoted to readings of the master-slave dialectic in literary/
postcolonial theory. Chapter 4 examines Hegel’s fiercely-debated views
on Africa, while Chap. 5 analyzes the response to these by postcolonial
Preface
ix
xi
xii Contents
Index 159
1
Introduction: Hegel and History
that its markets ever needed to expand outward. Indeed, in certain pro-
found ways, the foundations of the various narratives of modern imperi-
alism were laid most systematically by Hegel’s philosophy, which
embodies many of the phenomena we see across the world today.3 These
include the wholesale rejection of certain other cultures, the view of
Europe and America as forging the main path of history, the suppression
of women, and the proliferation of parochial thinking as embodied in
anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, and the excoriation of minority groups.4
How, then, can we view him as a proponent of freedom?
Other—which could be its specific other or opposite, but also the rela-
tions which constitute it. Finally, we will arrive at a more comprehensive
conception of our original identity—which is now a mediated identity
integrating those relations.
Hegel’s most renowned exposition of the dialectic occurs in the
Phenomenology, where he characterizes it as a movement from “substance”
to “subject,” a movement that allows us to grasp truth:
everything turns on grasping and expressing the True, not only as Substance,
but equally as Subject … This (living) substance is, as Subject, pure, simple
negativity, and is for this very reason the bifurcation of the simple; it is the
doubling which sets up opposition, and then again the negation of this
indifferent diversity and of its antithesis (the immediate simplicity). Only
this self-restoring sameness, or this reflection in otherness within itself—not
an original or immediate unity as such, is the True. It is the process of its
own becoming, the circle that presupposes its end as its goal, having its end
also as its beginning; and only by being worked out to its end, is it actual.9
Stages of History
(a) The Oriental World
is indeed present at this stage but the subject is not yet fully developed.
Here, ethical life has an “immediate and lawless” character, for this is the
childhood of history. There is a dawning awareness of the principle of
individuality but this awareness is “weak, unconscious, and rooted in
nature; it is a light, but not yet the light of self-conscious personality”
(LPH, 198–199). The Oriental spirit, says Hegel, subsists in the sphere of
intuition, and its relationship to its object—which is the state—is still
“immediate” and not universal. In other words, it cannot conceive of the
state as a rational concept but merely as an external power in the shape of
a single individual, an absolute ruler, who embodies the “totality” of the
state.
This, then, is the “principle” of the Oriental world. The ruler is the
“master” who gives expression to the “substance” of the state and stands
in the relation of a “lawgiver towards the world of particular things.” His
task is to “implement the claims of morality” and to “uphold those essen-
tial commandments which are already established.” In this state, the indi-
vidual “has no moral selfhood” (LPH, 200–201). Since this state does not
have a rational basis, it embodies a destructive antithesis, between perma-
nence and stability on the one hand, and self-destructive arbitrariness or
unrestrained freedom on the other (LPH, 201–202).
This third phase is the era of the Roman Empire, the era of “man-
hood,” which follows neither the arbitrary will of a master nor its own
aesthetic (intuitive) arbitrariness. Rather, its life is one of “arduous labour
and service,” not in the pursuit of its own ends but the universal ends of
the state. Hegel’s description of the late Roman empire in the
Phenomenology has sometimes been compared with the conditions char-
acterizing late capitalism. Here also he describes the Roman state as
assuming a character of abstract universality. It is no longer a “common-
wealth of individuals” such as Athens knew. The interests of the state
become detached from the individual citizens who, in turn, enjoy only an
abstract individuality inasmuch as they have legal rights.
This antithesis between abstract universality and abstract individuality
results in fragmentation, in the mutual isolation of subjects from one
another. The “disintegration of the whole into atoms” can only be
restrained by external force: the state no longer confronts the individuals
as an abstract entity with universal ends but rather as an autocrat who has
power over the individual citizens—the Emperor. This is a world where
individuality is reduced to formal recognition of abstract right, the right
of property (LPH, 204–205). Hence the Emperor, an arbitrary power,
reconciles the antithesis, establishing order and peace. But this reconcili-
ation is purely “worldly and external” in character and is therefore accom-
panied by “absolute internal disunion.” The true reconciliation, which
must be of a spiritual nature, is lacking. The human spirit, driven back
into its “innermost depths, abandons the godless world, seeks the recon-
ciliation within itself, and embarks on a life of inwardness” (LPH, 205).
of the One” (LPH, 206). But this pure spirituality, as embodied in Islamic
monotheism, was abstract and entirely removed from any positive relation
to the world as such, which it looked upon negatively.
It is in the second period of this spiritual empire that the spiritual prin-
ciple is expressed in the world. This principle is the “consciousness and
volition of subjectivity as a divine personality.” As Hegel explains else-
where—especially in his lectures on the philosophy of religion—whereas
Islam saw God as a unity utterly transcending the temporal world,
Christianity saw God as realized in the world through Jesus and the Holy
Spirit. And Hegel indicates here also that in this phase—which occurs in
the modern world—God is not wholly transcendent but reconciled with
individual human subjects, and it is through this reconciliation that the
individual achieves “concrete freedom” (LPH, 206).
Notes
1. G.W.F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, trans.
H.B. Nisbet (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980), p. 173.
Hereafter cited as LPH. See also Robert Bernasconi, “With What Must
the Philosophy of World History Begin? On the Racial Basis of Hegel’s
Eurocentrism,” Nineteenth Century Contexts, 22 (2000): 179.
2. This particular formulation was offered by Jean-Luc Nancy in Hegel: The
Restlessness of the Negative, trans. J. Smith and S. Miller (Minnesota:
University of Minnesota Press, 2002), p. 3.
3. Fayaz Chagani puts this very well when he states, “Hegel’s Eurocentrism
is not just a matter of historical curiosity; it is a fundamental feature of
contemporary knowledges. The Hegelian dialectic … has become the
dominant paradigm for thinking about … the relationship between the
West and the non-West,” “With or Without You: ‘Beyond’ the
Postcolonial Hegel,” presented at “Philosophy and the West,” The New
School for Social Research, March 2, 2013.
4. Hegel’s treatment of Judaism (as historically superseded) and Jews
(whose emancipation he supported) has of course provoked much heated
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