Kantian Dignity and Its Difficulties

The Kantian notion of universal human dignity has become a mainstay in contemporary liberal societies. But it was not always so, and even now it faces criticism and threats from a variety of sources. In this work, Karl Ameriks traces the long, winding road the Kantian ideal of dignity took to get to its current prominence, scrutinizing the various ways it was, after being formulated by Kant, taken up, interpreted (and often misinterpreted), or added to by other influential historical thinkers. Ultimately, Ameriks concludes that, properly understood and adhered to, it remains a forceful and worthwhile ideal with continuing progressive potential.The work consists of an introduction and eight chapters, as well as an afterword.Chapter 1 introduces the Kantian understanding of dignity, discussing and refuting some of the misguided charges that have been levied against it, as well as taking up some controversies within current Kant scholarship, engaging especially with recent works by Richard Dean and Paul Formosa. Ameriks defends what he calls the “‘mainline interpretation’ of Kant’s basic concept of dignity as an unconditional, all-or-nothing, and inviolable feature of all human beings, one that deserves universal respect” (16).Chapter 2 contrasts Kant and Herder, arguing that much is to be gained by complementing Kant’s emphasis on necessity and universality with Herder’s keen eye and sensitivity for the importance of particularity, diversity, and historical contingency. Ameriks argues that the views of Herder and Kant are nonetheless closer and more readily combinable than is often thought, and he explores how their different foci influenced later authors.Chapter 3 takes up the question of Kant’s racism and his influence on fascism, paying special attention to the historical role played by Houston Stewart Chamberlain and his distorted interpretation of Kant. Though Ameriks emphasizes that the way Chamberlain and the Fascists construe Kant is wholly untenable, the chapter ends in a rather damning evaluation of Kant’s person, arguing that, though he never denied the dignity of any person, regardless their race, and made a point of making his respect for various Jewish scholars public, he did maintain many highly objectionable views typical of his time about the abilities of different groups and expressed these prejudices in very disparaging terms, thus making it all too easy for the Fascists to later distort his philosophy and use it to their own nefarious ends.Chapter 4 examines the fact that Kant never seemed to have shown much interest in the American Revolution or the political thought of the Founding Fathers. This omission is particularly glaring as Kant did engage directly with the later French Revolution and generally paid close attention to the international developments of his day. Ameriks deems this neglect a momentous failure on Kant’s part, both because the Founding Fathers were particularly astute political thinkers and because they shared Kant’s emphasis on the special status of the individual human being. Ameriks ascribes this oversight to hubris and narrow-mindedness on the part of Kant, before going on to link this to Kant’s views on colonialism more broadly and criticizing Kant for not having paid more attention to the fact that the Königsberg area was once subject to a kind of colonizing project itself. Ameriks argues that if Kant had been less narrow-minded on these and related topics, he could have prevented many of the more unfortunate turns of later German philosophy and history.Chapter 5 continues the theme of Kant’s neglect of contemporary thinkers who argued for positions similar to his own, focusing on the figure of Richard Price. Ameriks compares several aspects of Kant’s and Price’s practical philosophy, before putting special emphasis on the notion of self-evidence in its connection to the equal dignity of every human being. In doing so, Ameriks again emphasizes Kant’s personal failings, and Price is presented as the person who in many regards succeeded most in living up to the ideal of human dignity.The last three chapters focus on the person of Thomas Mann. Mann is worth studying, Ameriks argues, not just because as a highly influential public intellectual he played a notable role in the way universal human dignity became a central fixture of democratic life, but also because of the intellectual road he traveled. Mann came to properly appreciate the importance of universal human dignity only relatively late, holding more achievement-oriented and chauvinistic views in his early years. In discussing Mann’s intellectual journey, many other influential thinkers are surveyed, including the Early Romantics, Hegel, Kierkegaard, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, and Whitman. Mann’s life personifies, as Ameriks puts it, “an example of how a surprising positive reversal in philosophical orientation is possible even after a long period of being committed to deep-seated errors” (155).When evaluating the work as a whole, I confess to remaining of two minds. Professor Ameriks displays a tremendous knowledge of historical authors and their intellectual context that few will be able to rival. Moreover, the book is organized in a highly original fashion, recounting the history of the ideal of human dignity through various influential authors who simultaneously serve more or less as archetypes—the flawed messenger (Kant), the irredeemably corrupted villain (Chamberlain), the hero (Price), the redeemed sinner (Mann). This provides a narrative arc that supports the work’s central message: the Kantian ideal of universal human dignity remains worth striving for, however often we personally or collectively fall short of it. Thus, the book is both original and informative, as well as skillfully crafted.This narrative strategy also comes with a significant drawback, however, as it means that the historical figures discussed are not only relevant for their philosophical positions but also serve as exemplars of the various ways one can fail to live up to the ideal of dignity. Thus, a considerable amount of effort is put into highlighting and seeking explanations for their personal shortcomings. Indeed, a recurring theme in the book is how to explain why Kant failed so often (in Ameriks’s view) to live up to the implications of his own philosophy. This inevitably involves a significant amount of psychologizing speculation and conjecture, and passing judgment over historical persons’ character in this way is not very considerate of their personal dignity. Though Ameriks regularly emphasizes that the worst charges that have been levied against Kant’s person cannot be sustained, his verdict often remains very uncharitable, especially in instances where Kant fails to rise above the prejudices of his time and/or expresses himself in ways that conflict with the reigning attitudes and preoccupations of our own time.The double feeling the book gives rise to can perhaps best be illustrated by chapter 4, which laments Kant’s disinterest in the American Revolution. The chapter makes several points I fully endorse: the American Founding Fathers had very similar views to Kant regarding the dignity and importance of the individual human being; they indubitably included some of the most perspicacious political-philosophical minds in history; and bringing their political philosophy together with Kantian thought on dignity is a most worthwhile and promising endeavor for us to pursue. But Ameriks does not stop there: he regards it as a blameworthy and baffling failure on Kant’s part that he did not himself do this. Since Kant did deem the French Revolution worthy of his attention, Ameriks attributes this neglect to Kant’s arrogance and narrow-mindedness toward colonial matters. To further emphasize the unforgivable flaws in Kant’s character, Ameriks also accuses Kant of not paying sufficient attention to Prussia’s own colonial past, at one point even suggesting that Kant failed to fully grasp and respect his own identity because he did not attend to the possibility that he may have had some Sambian ancestors, thereby “suffer[ing] from a self-incurred loss of cultural autonomy” (101).These charges are highly questionable in many respects. The purported analogy between transatlantic colonialism and the German conquest of parts of the Baltic appears rather anachronistic. To demand that someone base his sense of self on his ancestry similarly is to project (rather dubious) present-day ideas and preoccupations on bygone times. The suggestion that one should link culture to genetics or bloodline seems especially unpalatable. Most importantly, however, it is a bit odd to fault a philosopher for choosing not to write about something: one of the fundamental features of academic freedom is that we may freely choose what to write about and what not, and we owe no one an explanation or justification for these choices—one may simply not fancy a given topic, or think that one has little to contribute on it, or be too busy with other things one happens to find more interesting, pressing or promising, and so on. Even if some such reasons were to prove mistaken in hindsight, that remains a far cry from indicating a serious character flaw.Moreover, concerning the American and French Revolutions, there are good reasons to believe that Kant’s own philosophical commitments naturally made him more interested in the latter. Despite some superficial similarities, the two revolutions were radically different in character. Where the American Founding Fathers explicitly sought to improve, but also build on, the received political wisdom of the ages, effectively advocating a modernized version of the ancient doctrine of the mixed constitution, the French Revolution was much more an attempt to remove all that was there and start anew from scratch, based on, among other influences, Rousseauian ideas about the unerring and unconstrained will of the people. Even though Kant’s political philosophy is much more restrained than Rousseau’s, it remains heavily influenced by Rousseauian ideas, and hence it should come as no surprise that Kant found the French Revolution more philosophically interesting than the American one. Indeed, one need only look at Federalist 10, with its focus on competing interested and impassioned factions as the quintessence of political freedom, to see how fundamentally different the Founding Fathers’ political outlook was from Kant’s.Thus, even though I agree with Ameriks that the cause of human dignity would be furthered by combining insights from Kant and the American Founding Fathers, I see no reason to jump to anti-colonial narrow-mindedness or other character flaws on Kant’s part to explain why he chose not to write about the American Revolution. At the very least, more charitable interpretations are available—especially since Kant appears to have shown similarly little interest in other titans of political thought like Machiavelli or Montesquieu, who advanced views more akin to those of the Founding Fathers.In sum, there is much to agree with in Ameriks’s book as to its main message regarding the importance and difficulties of living up to the Kantian ideal of universal human dignity, and readers will find many interesting facts and observations in it. At the same time, in its zeal to save Kantian dignity from its detractors, the work is perhaps a little too eager to impugn Kant’s personal dignity as a means to this end.