Filosofía de la historia, Juan Bautista Vico.--Consideraciones sobre el cristianismo.--Antecedentes para la inteligencia de la cuestión de Oriente.--Discurso acerca de las relaciones de España con otras potencias.--Discurso sobre la dictadura.--Cartas relacionadas con el discurso sobre la dictadura.--Discurso sobre la situación general de Europa.--Discurso sobre la situación de España.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Ideas 63.2 (2002) 283-302 [Access article in PDF] Maistre, Donoso Cortés, and the Legacy of Catholic Authoritarianism Alberto Spektorowski According to the late Isaiah Berlin, the origins of fascism can be found in Joseph de Maistre's political thought. 1 This well-known thesis was anticipated by Carl Schmitt, a conservative Catholic intellectual who served as one of the most prominent jurists of the (...) Third Reich. He rescued the intellectual contributions of Joseph de Maistre and Donoso Cortés from obscurity by identifying them as the forerunners of his own non-normative theories of dictatorship. I suggest that by advancing such a claim Carl Schmitt paved the way toward a theoretical understanding of the notion of political authoritarianism characterized by what he defined as "non-normative decisionism." By interpreting Maistre and Cortés in this way, Schmitt was preparing his own political shift away from Catholic conservatism towards political authoritarianism, fascism, and National Socialism. At the same time, by removing the legitimacy of political decisionism embedded in traditionalist political thought, he eliminated the possibility of that middle road between fascism and liberalism known as traditionalist authoritarianism.The purpose of this study is to represent the Maistre-Donoso Cortés theoretical synthesis, in contrast to the thought of Carl Schmitt, as the cornerstone of a type of traditionalist political authoritarianism which paradoxically opposes Schmitt's idea of authoritarian rule. I suggest that Maistre could hardly be considered a non-legitimate decisionist or a prophet of fascism, since despite surpassing Maistre's defense of monarchical restoration, Donoso Cortés could hardly be connected to Schmitt's fascist decisionism. Moreover, precisely the model of traditional authoritarianism advocated by Maistre and [End Page 283] Donoso Cortés—or what I have labeled the synthesis of the Church and sword—not only did not generate fascism but because of its reliance on Providential legitimacy and the idea of transcendence, set an epistemological barrier against fascist development. For both Maistre and Donoso Cortés, in other words, the notion of legitimacy was never ignored.At first sight this claim, which releases Maistre and Donoso from any connection to non-normative decisionism and fascism, could be interpreted as a suggestion that the two theorists prefigured the idea of Christian Democracy of modern times; but nothing could be further from the truth. In contrast to other conservatives who endorsed democratic theory, Maistre and Donoso did not believe that any society could exist without authoritarian rule. However, there is a great difference between their traditional authoritarianism and secular authoritarianism. Traditional authoritarianism is based on Providential legitimization, the only source of legitimacy recognized by Maistre and Donoso. Although neither Maistre nor Donoso Cortés construed traditional authori-tarianism as a government of priests, they distinguished between political and religious authority and rejected the idea of political authority as severed from moral "religious" legitimacy. This is very different from secular authoritarianism which is a modernist reaction against liberal "chaotic" society emerging from the democratic revolutions and which leads to fascism, the worst type of modern dictatorship. Thus traditional authoritarianism should be distinguished from and even opposed to fascism, which epitomized a modern form of populist authoritarianism and is the highest representation of Schmitt's theory of the idea of non-normative decisionism. Although both authoritarian formulas are anti-liberal and anti-democratic, the ideological roots and political implications of both trends should be differentiated, just as scholars differentiate between liberal and social-democracy or between Marxist-Socialism and Lenin-ism. 2Maistre's intellectual activity is exemplified by his reaction to the bland, naturalistic optimism of the Enlightenment, whose validity the fashionable philosophers of the age, particularly in France, seemed to take wholly for granted. He identified the central sin of modern thought as the belief that the world could be understood by the sovereign human mind, and he perceived the dissolution of social bonds in the Europe of his time as a deviation from the divine injunction of society. Protestantism encouraged human pride to revolt against authority. Philosophy and science continued along the... (shrink)

This essay proposes an examination of Carl Schmitt’s thought by placing at its core the influence from Juan Donoso Cortés. Donoso Cortés has been largely forgotten over the centuries, and his influence on Schmitt’s thought has been overlooked as well. This essay advocates a reevaluation of their intellectual relationship by focusing on the defence of dictatorship as counterrevolution by both Schmitt and Donoso Cortés. To achieve this, the essay first presents the counterrevolutionary philosophy of (...) Donoso Cortés framing him as a philosopher of counterrevolution. Second, it examines the concept of dictatorship in Schmitt’s thought as articulated in his Dictatorship. Finally, the essay presents evidence of the influence that Donoso Cortés’s thought has had on Schmitt’s ideas. Thus, the essay suggests, firstly, that Donoso Cortés’s impact on Schmitt should be reassessed considering more aspects of their thought and secondly, it argues that the concept of dictatorship as articulated and defended by both Donoso Cortés and Schmitt could also be viewed as counterrevolutionary. (shrink)

Esta tesis estudia el pensamiento del conservador español Juan Donoso Cortés (1809- 1853). Más precisamente, se ocupa de responder cómo resuelve el problema de la decadencia de la autoridad monárquica en Europa a partir de las revoluciones de 1848. Para abordar este objetivo general elaboramos dos objetivos específicos. El primero busca señalar las continuidades y discontinuidades de la obra donosiana, escindida generalmente en dos períodos: el juvenil, con un Donoso Cortés liberal, y el maduro, que luego (...) de una “conversión religiosa” se vuelca hacia el catolicismo reaccionario. El segundo objetivo hace foco en el concepto de dictadura, bajo la sospecha de que en esta noción reside la clave de su proyecto conservador. Con esto en mente construimos dos hipótesis. La primera afirma que nuestro autor es consciente de la imposibilidad de restituir el proyecto monárquico. La segunda, sugiere la presencia de una fórmula parcialmente decisionista como alternativa a dicho proyecto. Luego de un trabajo de lectura de primera mano de los textos donosianos, las conclusiones confirman las hipótesis y observan que existe una continuidad estructural en las ideas del español, pero también que hay discontinuidades, de las cuales la más importante es su particular noción de dictadura, que denominamos dictadura catolizante. (shrink)

Es preciso penetrar en los motivos que impulsan a Donoso a su interpretación del pensamiento viquiano, comprender su perspectiva filosófica que le hace recibir a Vico como el fundador de la Filosofía de la Historia. El interés básico se halla en el objeto de esa "filosofía de la historia" que con Vico toma consistencia científica: ciencia del mundo humano. Pero aún más, Vico ofrece a Donoso el método de la filosofía de la historia. Sin embargo, hay que preguntarse (...) por qué el Donoso "maduro" se separa del Vico abrazado por el "joven" Donoso; y con ello se entenderá mejor no sólo el desarrollo del pensamiento histórico donosiano sino también la recepción de Vico en España.It is necessary to find out the causes that impel Donoso to his interpretation to the thought of Vico, to understand his philosophical perspective that makes him consider Vico as the founder of the Philosophy of History. The basic interest lies in the aim of that "philosophy of History" that thanks to Vico receives scientific consistency: science of the human world. But even more, Vico offers Donoso the method of the philosophy of History. Nevertheless, one has to wonder why the "mature" Donoso separates from the Vico embraced by the "young" Donoso and having achieved this, one will fully understand not only the development of the historical thought of Donoso but also Vico's reception in Spain. (shrink)

Resumen en español. En esta tesis indagamos en el pensamiento de tres autores contrarrevolucionarios europeos de la primera mitad del siglo XIX (1789-1848): Edmund Burke (1729-1797), Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821) y Juan Donoso Cortés (1809-1853). A partir de un estudio de sus obras principales, destacamos las limitaciones de las caracterizaciones contemporáneas sobre el pensamiento conservador y proponemos una clasificación alternativa ajustada a los orígenes políticos de dicha corriente: la distinción entre un conservadorismo como sustantivo y un conservadorismo como (...) adjetivo. Delineada esta distinción, que funciona como hipótesis de trabajo, demostramos su capacidad heurística para conceptualizar el conservadorismo de los autores escogidos. Concluimos destacando las ventajas del punto de vista propuesto para definir a esta corriente de la teoría política y su capacidad de extenderse a otros autores, períodos y corrientes. (shrink)

En este artículo, discuto el decisionismo dictatorial de Donoso Cortés, teniendo en cuenta dos hipótesis. En la primera de estas se sostiene que la decisión dictatorial en la filosofía política de Donoso es inseparable de una concepción teológica dogmática. En otras palabras, su reflexión política sobre la dictadura tiene como fundamento una serie de supuestos católicos incuestionados. En la segunda hipótesis se sugiere que es justamente este fundamento católico, que se expresa en una filosofía de la historia (...) pesimista, la que puede llegar a hacer irrelevante la necesidad de la decisión. (shrink)

El presente artículo reflexiona sobre el pensamiento de Juan Donoso Cortés, a partir de una discusión con sus principales líneas interpretativas. Dichas líneas serán clasificadas de acuerdo a la respuesta que brinden a dos problemas clásicos de la historiografía donosiana: la cuestión de la conversión, que indaga sobre la relación entre los escritos del joven Donoso Cortés y del maduro y, por otro lado, la pregunta por el lugar de la tradición en su obra. Se llegará (...) así a tres corrientes básicas: la tradicionalista, la schmittiana o decisionista y la “moderatista”. Seguidamente, se procederá a ponerlas en diálogo, marcando las críticas que se hicieron entre sí. Hacia el final, el trabajo buscará ponderar los puntos fuertes y débiles de cada una de las posiciones, con el objetivo de ensayar una interpretación alternativa sobre el autor, que hemos denominado “decisionismo moral”. (shrink)

Mucho se ha escrito sobre la imposibilidad de representar el Holocausto como quiebra en el proceso civilizador. Sin embargo, la convocatoria al silencio pronto fue rota por una controversia de relatos que difieren en sí sustancialmente. Desde entonces, el debate sobre la pertinencia de narraciones de corte realista, melodramática o cómica, cuando no fantástica, su legitimidad o ilegitimidad y el uso de material de archivo en los filmes sigue generando importantes dudas a la hora de abarcar la representatividad del horror. (...) Precisamente, al ser una cuestión de extremada sensibilidad para la historia en general y la europea en particular, el Holocausto no deja de interpelarnos con nuevos y antiguos interrogantes. Preguntas que se agudizan más si cabe a la hora de seleccionar fragmentos o filmes para trabajarlos desde el aula.. (shrink)

El autor sigue desplegando su línea interpretativa de la recepción de Vico en España a la luz de una lectura diferencial. Como continuación a su anterior estudio "Nuevos aportes (históricos y filosóficos) para la fortuna de Vico en el siglo XIX español" (Cuadernos sobre Vico, 5/6, 1995-96), se realiza una relectura de la modernidad viquiana a través de la recepción en Juan Donoso Cortés, proponiendo una clave hermenéutica mediante la cual es posible comprender además de la imagen moderna (...) de Vico, reflectada tanto en la asunción cuanto en el abandono del napolitano por Donoso, también la bifronte posición donosiana frente a su siglo: un "primer Donoso", ilustrado, liberal y ecléctico; y un "segundo Donoso", reaccionario y tradicionalista. El mismo caso de la recepción de Vico se muestra así concluyente como un elemento más con el que poder interpretar el siglo XIX español a través de los dos lenguajes de tradición y progreso. (shrink)

For the theorists of crisis, the revolutionary state comes into existence through violence, and due to its inability to provide an authoritative katechon (restrainer) against internal and external violence, it perpetuates violence until it self-destructs. Writing during extreme economic depression and growing social and political violence, the crisis theorists––Joseph de Maistre, Juan Donoso Cortés, and Carl Schmitt––each sought to blame the chaos of their time upon the Janus-faced postrevolutionary ideals of liberalism and socialism by urging a return to (...) pre-revolutionary moral and religious values. They are united by three counterrevolutionary principles, all of which are purported to remedy revolutionary violence: traditional constitutional fidelity, the philosophy of the decision, and opposition to bourgeois liberalism. This essay is followed by the first complete English translation and publication of Donoso’s letter of October 24, 1851, which contains Donoso’s only reference to the “discussing class,” a political entity later popularized by Schmitt in his 1922 work Political Theology. (shrink)

This is the first complete English translation and publication of Donoso’s carta de 24 de octubre, 1851, a letter encapsulating many of his views on revolution and decision. This remarkable letter, sent as a diplomatic missive while he was serving the Spanish crown in Paris, describes how Napoleon III––stuck between the 1848 constitution’s prohibition against his election and his impending coup that will crown him emperor––must gain the support of the liberal bourgeoise middle class if he is to maintain (...) his rule over France. The letter is also of great importance to Donoso and Schmitt scholars because it contains the first and only time Donoso uses the complete term “las clases discutidoras,” which, through Schmitt’s injudicious and repeated misspellings as “una clasa discutidora” has become famous for its characterization of the liberal bourgeoisie as the “discussing” or “disputing” class that is incapable of action at the precise historical moment when a decision is most direly needed to save the constitution from inner or outer existential threats. (shrink)

En su anterior estudio sobre la recepción de Vico en el s. XIX español, el autor analizó los casos de importantes intelectuales como Juan Donoso Cortés, Jaime Luciano Balmes, Juan Valera, Marcelino Menéndez Pelayo, Alfredo Adolfo Camus y Nicolás Serrano. Con ello se cumplió parte del plan de desmontar la tesis frecuentemente aceptada de una "ausencia" de Vico en España. Este plan se viene a desarrollar ahora con una nueva aportación investigadora en la que el autor muestra y (...) analiza tres importantes casos más de recepción viquiana: la del ecléctico historiador Fermin Gonzalo Morón, la del renovador neoescolástico Ceferino González, y la del fundador de la escuela jurídica catalana Manuel Durán y Bas. Con ellos el autor confirma su tesis de que Vico es apreciado, tanto desde la recepción positiva como desde la crítica, como un pensador modemo y heterodoxo de considerable valía.In his former paper on Vico’s reception during the XIX century in Spain, the author reviewed such significant intellectuals as Juan Donoso Cortés, Jaime Luciano Balmes, Juan Valera, Marcelino Menéndez Pelayo, Alfredo Adolfo Camus and Nicolás Serrano. In so doing, the task of dislodging the thesis so frequently held that there is a Vico’s "absence" in Spain was partially accomplished. This task is taken up again in a recent investigation where the author analyzes and assesses three further important cases related with the Spanish Vichian reception: that of eclectic historian Femín Gonzalo Morón, the neo-scholastic Ceferino González and finally the Catalan legal school founder Manuel Durán y Bas. With those examples the author aims to validate his claim that Vico was indeed acknowledged both as a modern and heterodox thinker by the positive as well as by the critical reception. (shrink)

Each chapter in Christianity and Political Philosophy addresses a philosophical problem generated by history. Frederick D. Wilhelmsen discusses the limits of natural law; Cicero and the politics of the public orthodoxy; the problem of political power and the forces of darkness; Sir John Fortescue and the English tradition; Donoso Cortes and the meaning of political power; the natural law tradition and the American political experience; Eric Voegelin and the Christian tradition; and Jaffa, the School of Strauss, and the Christian (...) tradition. Wilhelmsen is convinced that mainstream philosophy's suppression of the Christian experience, or its reduction of Christianity to myths, deprives both Christianity and philosophy. He argues that Christianity opened up an entirely new range of philosophical questions and speculation that today are part and parcel of the intellectual tradition of the West. Wilhelmsen remains relevant because political philosophy in America today is following the historic cycle of political philosophy's importance: as things get worse for the nation because it is internally riven by ideological and spiritual conflicts, there is a greater need for the political philosopher to raise and explore profound questions and reassert forgotten truths about man and society, the soul and God, and good and evil, as well as the ground of political order. This is the latest book in Transaction's esteemed Library of Conservative Thought series. (shrink)

An important source for 19th century church history is conserved in the Acta Episcoporum Brugensium of the Archive of the Diocese of Bruges. The Acta of Bishop Jean-Baptist Malou contain the transcripts of some letters and a rather lengthy report, dated July 10, 1852: Notes sur les erreurs nouvelles, contraires à la religion révélée, à ses dogmes, à sa morale. Ecoles qui méritent une attention spéciale. It appears that this text was to be sent to the Consultors on the Fornari (...) Commission in Rome, who at that time were preparing a draft for the Bull on the Immaculate Conception, and who wanted to insert a solemn condemnation of modern errors. Towards that end, the Commission contacted several outstanding scholars all over Europe. Though the identity of these scholars is known, the response of the marquis Donoso Cortes was the only one known until now. The particular contribution of this article is to also make known the full text of the response of the Bishop of Bruges, and the related correspondence. In addition, when compared with the documentation already known, these documents help to clarify the rather confusing history of the earliest efforts to draft a Syllabus Errorum. For example, it appears that immediately after the revolution of 1848, some of the scholars contacted by the Commission in June of 1852, and by Fornari in August of the same year, were not prepared at that time to devote their efforts to a condemnation of errors. Secondly, it seems that a substantial discussion of what was intended to be the second chapter of the Bull unduly delayed the proclamation of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception, and so the Syllabus project was subsequently postponed. (shrink)

De geopolitieke spanningen aan het begin van de eenentwintigste eeuw hebben een nieuwe interesse in het werk van Carl Schmitt gewekt. Dat geldt ook voor zijn benadering van het vraagstuk van de relatie tussen religie en politiek. Schmitt zoekt hierbij aansluiting bij zulke uiteenlopende en incompatibele auteurs als Juan Donoso Cortes en Thomas Hobbes. Vooral recent onderzoek heeft duidelijk gemaakt dat Schmitts juridisch-politieke denken inderdaad steunt op een aantal politiek-theologische premissen. Toch moeten we de actualiteit van zijn werk vooral (...) zoeken bij zijn politiek-filosofische probleemstelling die aanhaakt bij Thomas Hobbes. Schmitt kan ons vooral leren dat de privatisering van de religies als middel voor hun politieke neutralisering haar grenzen heeft, vooral in een democratische politieke orde. (shrink)

Whereas traditional abolitionist arguments call for putting an end to capital punishment, French-Algerian philosopher Jacques Derrida emphasizes its survival, writing that “even when it will have been abolished, the death penalty will survive.” My dissertation interprets this perplexing claim by attending to the specificity of Derrida’s discourse on survival or survivance, contending that the death penalty serves an irreducible role in the constitution of the (individual or collective) subject, such that, even in the event of its abolition, some form of (...) the death penalty must continue. Through close readings of Heidegger, Kant, Nietzsche, Freud, Michel de Montagne, and Victor Hugo, as well as Shakespeare, linguist Émile Benveniste, Hungarian psychoanalysts Abraham and Torok, and the nineteenth-century political theorist Juan Donoso Cortés, the dissertation provides an account of the function of the death penalty as a specific institution within the modern penal system of a collective political body and as the legacy of ancient political economies based on sacrificial rites. This analysis interprets the death penalty both structurally and specifically, accounting for the indissociable relationship between the institution and its conceptual structure more broadly. Survivance, I argue, only ever occurs through an other, leaving open the question of the survival of the death penalty to the dissemination of indefinite and unpredictable forms that could consist in its abolition. (shrink)

This "festschrift" brings together authors from various countries who are specialists in different disciplines within the humanities and who share a common vision of human life. These essays in philosophical speculation, political theory, literary criticism, and historical analysis are rooted in the western cultural heritage and Christian religious tradition. Major figures examined include Aristotle, Aquinas, Thomas More, John of the Cross, Donoso Cortes, and the Spanish Carlists. The interdisciplinary and cosmopolitan nature of this "festschrift" reflects the approach and style (...) of the man honored, Dr. Frederick D. Wilhelmsen. A special feature of the volume is a selection of critical studies of Professor Wilhelmsen's own work. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Social Justice and Subsidiarity: Luigi Taparelli and the Origins of Modern Catholic Social Thought by Thomas C. BehrPatrick Auer JonesSocial Justice and Subsidiarity: Luigi Taparelli and the Origins of Modern Catholic Social Thought by Thomas C. Behr (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2019), ix + 259 pp.The status of Leo XIII's Rerum Novarum as the origin point of what has come to be called Catholic Social (...) Teaching (CST), or Catholic social doctrine, has been reinforced on the magisterial level by the commemorations of the encyclical by Pius XI, Paul VI, and John Paul II. It should be noted, then, that the tradition of CST is comparatively recent. Indeed, it is nearly coextensive with the twentieth-century. Nevertheless, this short tradition already calls for a ressourcement. As Russell Hittinger has pointed out, reflections on CST often move swiftly to the particulars of social issues without an adequate grasp even of its basic concepts: subsidiarity, solidarity, the common good, and the dignity of the person. Further, historical [End Page 1101] developments have had dramatic impact upon the ways in which these principles have been received and developed in the course of this young tradition.In his book Social Justice and Subsidiarity: Luigi Taparelli and the Origins of Modern Catholic Social Thought, Thomas C. Behr provides a major contribution to just such a ressourcement. He does this by presenting an introduction to the thought of the Jesuit scholar whose revival of Thomistic thought in a modern register formed the basis for Leonine social teaching. As Behr explains, Taparelli has remained a somewhat hidden figure in accounts of the genesis and development of CST. He goes unmentioned in the major social encyclicals of Leo and Pius, despite the fact that Leo himself was Taparelli's student. Because of his rhetorically and philosophically potent critique of Enlightenment thought and its effect on mid-nineteenth-century Europe, available to a popular audience through his frequent contributions to the Jesuit periodical La Civiltà Cattolica, Taparelli's name carried baggage for a Church that sought to move beyond the posture of reaction to liberal political orders.However, as Behr shows in the introduction, Taparelli hardly rejected the methods and insights of modern political thought tout court. Behr describes Taparelli's system as a "realist social science." This terminology speaks to the promise which Taparelli found in the sociological analysis of Montesquieu in particular. Though Taparelli judged that Montesquieu held a questionable preference for a republican political form, he greatly admired Montesquieu's ability to, as Behr puts it, "bring political theory into relationship with social theory and historical contingency" (8). Though Taparelli was not familiar with the work of Alexis De Tocqueville, Behr also notes the resonances between Taparelli's work and Tocqueville's political sociology and defense of "intermediary institutions." Yet Taparelli makes up for what the sociological approaches of Montesquieu and Tocqueville lack in the way of natural, teleological principles of politics. Behr alerts the reader from the very beginning of his work that, in approaching Taparelli, he will not find a simple recapitulation of Thomas, but rather a creative approach to political thought which aims to set what is worthy in the modern empirical methodologies on firmer foundations through the recovery of Thomistic-Aristotelian principles.In chapter 1, "Taparelli and the Age of Ideology," Behr situates Taparelli within the political conflicts of the early nineteenth century. Behr sets the scene for Taparelli's renovated Scholasticism by explaining the opposition between Catholic traditionalism (represented especially by Joseph De Maistre and Donoso Cortés) and Catholic liberalism (represented especially by Henri Dominique Lacordaire and his more radical associate Felicité de Lammenais). While the Catholic liberals aimed to convince both [End Page 1102] the ecclesiastical hierarchy and the anticlerical, postrevolutionary governments of Europe that Christianity upheld liberal and republican ideals, the traditionalists argued that Europe's moral and political derangement was the result of a rejection of the norms of tradition—especially of papal and monarchical authority. Remarkably, Taparelli entered neither of these camps. In the opening chapter, Behr stimulates the contemporary reader's interest by showing how Taparelli responded to a crisis of ideologies—progressive and... (shrink)

In a famous article published in 1900, Cardinal Mercier drew up a philosophical balance sheet of the previous century. While still showing respect for modern developments, he severely criticized anything that strayed too far from the neo-Thomistic horizon. It is very characteristic that the first object of his criticism is De Bonald’s traditionalism. Mercier says that this type of philosophy is so greatly influenced by the impotence of reason that it hurls itself into the arms of faith. But, “an act (...) of faith cannot be the primordial act of human reason. An individual could not believe unless he first saw that it was reasonable to believe.”It is philosophy that must articulate this rationality. Philosophy must then be a real science; it must pursue rational insight into reality. Unfortunately, some do not believe that philosophy is a science. Instead, they think its task lies elsewhere; it must try to speak where science remains silent. In that case, it is no longer part of science, but belongs to the domain of imagination, faith or dreams. Mercier argues that whoever accepts this, supports Comte’s positivistic prejudice that only the observed positive fact can lie at the basis of a rational and scientific discussion.Mercier stands at the end of a century of unlimited optimism. From a military point of view, the century had been calm. The new sciences that had so intrigued Mercier were marking their first big successes. The century’s optimism is recognizable in the 1889 charter establishing the Thomistic Higher Institute of Philosophy, which Mercier served as president: “far from bringing dogmas in danger, scientific insights stimulate a wondrous growth in enlightened insight; for they both come from the same God, origin of both revelation and universe.” Mercier’s tonality lies not far distant from Renan’s L’avenir de la science, where he complains that there are people who choose bon ton, superstition and frivolity above meticulous research, but predicts that their success is ephemeral and that the time of rationality will dawn.The next century, however, took an unexpected turn. Who would have thought in 1900 that history, which had been set so firmly on the track of reason, would derail so terribly? No great philosopher predicted the coming catastrophes. The only warnings came from a few nineteenth-century traditionalist Cassandras who went to extremes in linking modernity and decay: Donoso Cortes, Joseph de Maistre and Louis De Bonald. Who predicted the arrival of enlightenment criticism in intellectual history? Who predicted that we would not see history becoming reasonable, but reason historical? Who could have predicted twentieth-century contextualism and its claim that reason is not the criterion of culture but only one element within culture indebted to an entire sociocultural context? All this can be found in De Bonald’s traditionalism that has proven paradoxically more up-to-date than the naïve trust in rationality found in Mercier and Renan.Yet, De Bonald did not intend to preach a form of irrationalism. His purpose was to accent reason’s dependence, and by extension, humankind’s intellectual solidarity: thought is impossible without language, language does not exist without a listener, there is no listener without education, there is no education without social life. Using this reasoning, De Bonald ultimately wants to prove that reason intrinsically refers to revelation, since in this chain, the first word cannot come from humankind.He supports this with an epistemological argument that contextualizes reason in a way that is almost contemporary: “A person has to think his word before saying it. Therefore, he cannot find without thinking, and cannot think without signs. He is compelled to have recourse to something other than the human.” Leuven’s variant of this traditionalism emphasizes that reason develops only in and through language, thus by being included in a community. By comparison, Mercier’s realistic concept of rationality sounds old-fashioned. It is traditionalism that best fits with the contemporary accent on reason’s historicity and culture-related status.The development of ethics also runs counter to Mercier’s expectations. There has been no growth in rationality but a growing insight into the historicity of reason. In the article already cited, Mercier criticizes Kant for not being sufficiently foundational, since he does not rely on a speculative-metaphysical foundation: “What kind of ethic is it that cannot be theoretically justified?” In our time, the roles are reversed. Many ethicists condemn Kant because he tries to find this foundation! How are we to understand this turn-about in ethics? (shrink)

El libro estudia las ideas sociales y los referentes de la generación de políticos y pensadores peruanos que se denomina "Generación del 9i00", centrándose en "Carácter de la literatura en el Perú independiente" (1905) de José de la Riva-Agüero, connotado pensador político y polígrafo peruano, Se ve la influencia del pensamiento reaccionario, la Escuela teológica y el maurrasianismo en el quehacer intelectual peruano del periuodo que aparece en la cubierta.

In his struggle against Weimar, Geneva, and Versailles, Carl Schmitt enlisted a number of political thinkers as confederates—Machiavelli, Hobbes, Joseph de Maistre, Louis de Bonald, Juan Donoso Cortés, Benjamin Constant, and Hegel. The legitimacy of this claim has gone unchallenged except in the case of Hegel. Many have felt that his liberal credentials, most clearly manifested in his conception of civil society and his allegiance to the reformist policies espoused in Prussia by H.F.K. von Stein, K.A. von Hardenberg, (...) and Wilhelm von Humboldt, were compromised by Schmitt, who appears to have opposed liberalism and contributed to the demise of the Weimar republic. Schmitt’s attempt to tie Hegel’s views to the political outlook of Hobbes and de Maistre also discredits his speculative stance. Jean-François Kervégan’s extraordinary book seeks to extricate Hegel from this troubling association and attempts both to defend Hegel’s liberalism and confirm the philosophical nature of his argument. Without diminishing Schmitt’s Hegelian debt, his exhaustive comparative study, supported by impeccable scholarship, attempts to show that Schmitt distorted Hegel’s liberalism by disregarding the dialectical intent of his philosophy. In the process, Kervégan aims to preserve the Hegelian legacy from any contamination that might accrue to it from association with Schmitt. (shrink)

The climate crisis has implications for the idea of justice. The paper explores this idea to inquire whether climate change wrongs animals and, if it does, how these wrongs are constitutive of an injustice. The first question is answered in the positive to then propose an answer to the second question through an account of climate injustice articulated as a problem of distribution of ecological space. On that basis, the general conclusion of the paper is that at least some harms (...) suffered by animals are constitutive of climate distributive injustices. They are cases of wrongful appropriation of ecological space, that is, of the benefits that the Earth’s life-support systems and its physical resources provide to sentient animals. These are wrongs against animals that should be condemned, prohibited and redressed. (shrink)

This paper starts by establishing a prima facie case that disadvantaged groups or individuals are more likely to get a chronic disease and are in a disadvantaged position to adhere to chronic treatment despite access through Universal Health Coverage. However, the main aim of this paper is to explore the normative implications of this claim by examining two different but intertwined argumentative lines that might contribute to a better understanding of the ethical challenges faced by chronic disease health policy. The (...) paper develops the argument that certain disadvantages which may predispose to illness might overlap with disadvantages that may hinder self-management, potentially becoming disadvantageous in handling chronic disease. If so, chronic diseases may be seen as disadvantages in themselves, describing a reproduction of disadvantage among the chronically ill and a vicious circle of disadvantage that could both predict and shed light on the catastrophic health outcomes among disadvantaged groups—or individuals—dealing with chronic disease. (shrink)