In this erudite study, Ross considers the role of the concept of mechanism in the social and political philosophy of G.W.F. Hegel and his immediate predecessors in German political thought.

Nathan Ross is currently on the faculty at DePaul University, and his work as a scholar is concerned with researching the social and political philosophies of Kant, Hegel and the German Romantics. He has published articles in Hegel-Jahrbuch, Idealistic Studies, and is currently researching the political implications of the theory of aesthetic experience in Kant, Schiller, Friedrich Schlegel and Hölderlin.

Abbreviations

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Chapter One: The Critique of Mechanism in the Political Philosophy of Herder and German Romanticism

Chapter Two: The Political Function of Machine Metaphors in Hegel's Early Writings

Mechanism in Religious Practice

Chapter Three: The Mechanization of Labor and the Birth of Modern Ethicality in Hegel's Jena Political Writings

Chapter Four: Mechanism and the Problem of Self-Determination in Hegel's Logic

Chapter Five: The Modern State as Absolute Mechanism: Hegel's Logical Insight into the Relation of Civil Society and the State

Conclusion

Notes

Bibliography

Index