Abstract

Onora O’Neill has contributed enormously to moral philosophy (broadly speaking, including both ethics and political philosophy) by identifying Kant’s unique and powerful form of normative constructivism. Frederick Neuhouser has contributed similarly by showing that all of Hegel’s standards of moral rationality aim to insure the complete development of three distinct, complementary forms of personal, moral and social freedom. However, Neuhouser’s study does not examine Hegel’s justificatory methods and principles. The present article aims to reinforce and extend Neuhouser’s findings by explicating Hegel’s basic principles for justifying practical norms. Surprisingly, Hegel’s basic principles of normative justification are rooted in Kant’s constructivism, as explicated by O’Neill. Hegel’s adaptation and development of Kant’s constructivism results in a powerful form of constructivism about moral principles which merits contemporary interest because it is more powerful and more objectivist than familiar contemporary forms of constructivism. (Slightly revised English translation by the author of „Objektive Gültigkeit zwischen Gegebenem und Gemachtem. Hegels kantischer Konstruktivismus in der praktischen Philosophie“)