avineri, shlomo - labor, alienation, and social classes in hegel's realphilosophie

7/27/2019 Avineri, Shlomo - Labor, Alienation, And Social Classes in Hegel's Realphilosophie

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Labor, Alienation, and Social Classes in Hegel's Realphilosophie'

Shlomo Avineri

Philosophy and Public Affairs, Vol. 1, No. 1. (Autumn, 1971), pp. 96-119.

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SHLOMO AVlNERl Labor, Al ien ation , a n dSocial Classesin Hegel's Rea lphi losoph ie '

The two sets of lectures given by Hegel during his period at Jena andgenerally known as Realphilosophie I and Realphilosophie I1 occupya unique place in the development of his ~ y s t e m . ~ealphilosophie 11,with its far more extensive section dealing with Geistesphilosophie,is the more important for any attempt to reconstruct the stages ofHegel's philosophy of society and state. Rosenzweig saw in it Hegel'sfirst detailed attempt to describe the middle zone between the stateand prepolitical man, the zone Hegel will later call "civil ~ociety."~Marcuse sees here Hegel's first discussion of the historical realizationof the free subject and the various spheres of integration through

I . This is a slightly abridged version of a paper presented at the MarquetteHegel Symposium, 2-5 June 1970.

2 . For the problems of the status of the texts, see the publisher's remarks onthe new edition of R e a l p h i l o s o p h i e 11, in G.W.F. Hegel, J e n a e r R e a l p h i l o s o p h i e ,ed. Johannes Hoffmeister (Hamburg, 1967)~pp. v-vi. Though the publisher de-nies that the text originally designated by Hoffmeister as R e a l p h i l o s o p h i e I isan earlier version of an attempt a t a comprehensive system, we shall, for thesake of convenience, continue to refer to the two texts as R e a l p h i l o s o p h i e I andR e a l p h i l o s o p h i e 11. All quotations from R e a l p h i l o s o p h i e I refer to Hoffmeister'soriginal edition (Leipzig, 1g32), while quotations from R e a l p h i l o s o p h i e I1 referto the 1967 edition mentioned above. All English translations of quotationsfrom these two texts are my own.

For the complex problem of dating Hegel's manuscripts of the Jena period, seeHeinz Kimmerle, "Zur Chronologie von Hegel's Jenaer Schriften," H e g e l - S t u d i e nIV (Bonn, 1967)~pp. 125-176. See also Richard Kroner's Introduction to Hegel'sE a rl y Th eo lo gic al W ~ i t i n g s Chicago, 1948), esp. pp. 28-43.

3. Franz Rosenzweig, H e g el u n d d e r S t a a t (Munich and Berlin, I ~ Z O ) ,, 178.


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Labor, Alienation, and Social Classesin Hegel's Realphilosophie

which consciousness has to pass.4 And to LukAcs the Jenenser Real-philosophie signifies Hegel's construction of man's own self-creation,"die Menschenwerdung des Mens~hen."~

It is indeed a remarkable set of texts. The theme first propoundeda few years earlier in the System der Sittlichkeit, the self's struggle forrecognition through the other, leading to the emergence of objectivespirit in the form of social and political institutions, is here developedin detail. It has thus become accepted that the Realphilosophie, to-gether with the preceding Jenenser Logik, Aletaphysik und Natur-philosophie, set the scene for the Phenomenology.

But beyond this, there arises the question of the relationship be-tween the Realphilosophie and Hegel's Plzilosophy of Right. In a senseHegel tried all his life to write one book, and the System der Sittlich-keit, the Realphilosophie, the Phenomenology, and the Philosophy ofRight are different versions and drafts of the same opus. It is thisaspect of the Realphilosophie that I would like to bring out here. Itwill be my intention to show both the rare achievement of Hegel'sunderstanding of modern society and some serious flaws in his claimto integrate the inherent tensions of this society into a comprehensivesocial philosophy.

Various writers, notably LukAcs, juxtapose Hegel's radicalism in theRealphilosophie with the quietism of the Philosophy of Right, andthus oppose a young, radical, and critical Hegel to the author of thelater Rechtsphilosophie, who limits himself to Nach-denken at thefalling of dusk. It will be my argument that the Realphilosophie com-bines a radical analysis of modern society with a spirit of resignationand acquiescence, and that Hegel's political and social solutions in theRealphilosophie do not differ fundamentally from those proposed inthe Philosophy of Right. The dialectical continuity of Hegel's thoughtseems to me to be vindicated by such a critical reading of the Real-philosophie. Since his earliest writings Hegel had always been hauntedby what he calls "positivity" in his Bern manuscripts and "destiny" insome of the Frankfurt fragments: the dialectical necessity of com-

4. Herbert Marcuse, Reason. and Revolution, 2nd edn. (Boston, 1960), p. 73.5. Georg LukBcs, Der junge Hegel (Zurich and Vienna, 1948), p. 415. See

also Jean Hyppolite, Studies on Marx and Hegel, trans. John O'Neill (London,1969), PP. 70-92.


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bining the process of man's creation of his own world and his aliena-tion is the main theme of the Realphilosophie. Yet when Hegel has toface the extremity of alienation-poverty-he is at a loss: poverty inthose texts is as insoluble as it is in the Philosophy o f Rig ht , whereHegel bluntly admits that "the important question of how poverty isto be abolished is one of the most disturbing problems which agitatemodern society"6-and leaves it at that. But despite the fact that Hegelis as reluctant to give instruction as to what the world ought to be inthe Realphilosophie as he will later turn out to be in the Preface to thePhilosophy o f Right , the Realphilosophie manages to raise a numberof crucial questions which continued to agitate nineteenth-centurythought. The text abounds in motifs anticipating Feuerbach's religiouscriticism and Marx's social critique-though neither Feuerbach norMarx was acquainted with these texts. Yet it is these same motifsthat later appear in the Philosophy o f Right and thus serve as a linkbetween the young Hegel and the young Marx.The Realphilosophie deals with the philosophy of nature as well aswith the philosophy of man; but since the themes of social and politi-cal criticism figure so prominently in any contemporary discussion ofHegel's legacy, it seems to me appropriate to discuss at some lengththose texts of Hegel where these issues are examined most extensively.Hegel does come back to these problems in the Philosophy o f Right ,but in a much more cryptic way. He sometimes uses what looks like acode or a cipher to refer to issues settled by his earlier analysis of thesubject. Without knowing what he is referring to one sometimes can-not fully grasp his intention.

For the purpose of this discussion a general acquaintance with thePhilosophy o f Right will be assumed, and I shall keep references to itto a minimum. It should, however, be understood that at the back-ground of the argument the relationship to the Philosophy o f Rightwill always be present, though the discussion will generally limit itselfto the analysis of the Realphilosophie, and particularly to the secondsection ("Geistesphilosophie") of Realphilosophie 11. The parallel sec-tion in Realphilosophie I is much shorter and more condensed, and

6. G.W.F. Hegel, Philosophy of Right, trans. T. M. Knox (Oxford, 1958).Addition to 8244.


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since its main argument is brought out far more clearly in the laterversion, the references to this earlier version will necessarily be fewer.

The struggle for recognition through the other, after finding its ini-tial articulation in speech, comes up against the world of materialobjects. In his earlier System der Sittlichheit Hegel has already shownhow necessary the feeling of being separated from the objective worldis, and how through desire and its satisfaction one achieves the tran-scendence of this separation on the immediate leveL7

This need to assert oneself through the other is expressed veryclearly at the outset of the section of the Realphilosophie dealing withthe objective world. Through recognition by the other, the subjectattains universality, his existence has a meaning for subjects outsidehimself: hence the transition to objective spirit, "wirklicher Geist."*Intersubjective relations attain this u~iiversalityalso through the de-vice of contract, which elevates individual will to a universal object:"The universal is the substance of the contract.""n breaking a con-tract, one is injuring not only the immediate incidental subject whohappens to be the other party to it, but a universal, objective, andsocial arrangement. Society, not the individual, is hurt, and punish-ment thus expresses the general will and not merely the will of theinjured party.

The same universality appears in property. Hegel makes an initialdistinction between possession and property; this distinction followsthe traditional line, but then Hegel adds to it another aspect whichbrings out the centrality of recognition in the constitution of property.While possession pertains to my relation to the object, property sig-nifies my relation to other subjects who recognize my possession ofthat object: "The right of possession relates immediately to things, notto a third party. Man has a right to take into possession as much ashe can as an individual. He has this right, it is implied in the conceptof being himself: through this he asserts himself over all things. But

7 . G.W.F. H e g el, S c h ~ i f t e n u ~ o litik u n d R e c h ts p h il o so p h ie , e d . G eo rg L as -s o n ( L e i p z i g , 1913)~. 422.8. Realphi losophie 11, p. 210: " E v er y o n e w a n t s t o c o u n t f o r t h e o t h e r ; i t i severyone's purpose to perceive h im se l f in t he o t her . Everyone i s ou t s ide h i m se l f. "9. Ibid. , p . 219.


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his taking into possession implies also that he excludes a third. Whatis it which from this point of view binds the other? What may I takeinto my possession without doing injury to a third party?"1

It is from these considerations that Hegel derives the transsubjec-tive, nonindividual nature of property: property pertains to the personas recognized by others; it can never be an intrinsic quality of theindividual prior to his recognition by others. Whereas possession re-lates to the individual, property relates to society: since possessionbecomes property through the others' recognition of it as such, prop-erty is a social attribute. Thus not an individualistic but a social prem-ise is at the root of Hegel's concept of property, and property willnever be able to achieve in his system an independent stature. Thisis significant because Hegel's description of the economic process istaken from classical political economy, yet on the basic nature ofproperty he holds a totally different view. Property always remainspremised on social consensus, on consciousness, not on the mere factof possession.

Yet there still remains an element of accidentality in possession,even when turned into property, since the objects of possession relateto this or that individual in a wholly arbitrary way. It is only throughlabor that "the accidentality of coming into possession is transcended[aufgehoben]," maintains Hegel.ll By thus being central to Hegel'sviews on property, labor also becomes a focus for his conception ofthe self.

It has already been pointed out by several writers that Hegel owesmany of his views on labor to his early acquaintance with the writingsof Adam Smith and James Steuart.I2 LukAcs has, however, remarkedthat the way labor appears in Hegel's system integrates it more pro-foundly into speculative philosophy, for it is here "that the active prin-

10. Ibid . , p. 207. Cf. Realph i losophie I, p. 240, on the transition from posses-sion to property: "The security of my possession [becomes] the security of thepossessions of all; in my property, all have their property. My possession hasachieved the form of consciousness."

11. Realph i losophie 11, p. 217.12. See esp. Paul Chamley, E co n o m i e p o l it iq u e e t p h i lo s o p h ie ch ez S t eu a r t e tHeg e l (Paris, 1963), as well as his article "Les origines de la pensCe Cconomique

de Hegel," Heg e l - S t u d i en 111 (Bonn, 1965), pp. 225-261. Also LukBcs, Der jungeH e g e l , pp. 410-420; Marcuse, R ea s o n a n d R evo l u t io n , pp. 76ff; Rosenzweig, Hegelu n d d er S ta a t , I , 159.


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ciple (in German idealism, Thought, the Concept) must learn to re-spect actuality as it is."13 It is through the instrumentality of labor thatHegel constructs his paradigm of a society differentiated according totypes of labor, and it is on this stratification, based on a division oflabor, that he later builds his political edifice. In this discussion oflabor Hegel comes closest to motifs to be found later in Marx, andthese motifs appear again in the Philosophy of Right in those para-graphs ($5241-246) which seem to pose a question mark to the fun-damental conservatism of the whole book.

Labor first appears in the Realphilosophie as an indication of man'sgrowing awareness of his confrontation with and differentiation fromnature. We have already seen how the establishment of property in-stitutionalizes man's relations to other human beings through its inte-gration and incorporation of the objective world into consciousness:nature becomes part of the natural history of man. In a parallel waylabor is the transformation of the appetites from an initially annihila-tive to a constructive relationship with the objective world. Whereasprimitive man, like the animals, consumes nature and destroys theobject, labor holds up to man an object to be desired not throughnegation but through creation.14

Hegel's achievement in describing the movement of labor has adouble edge: on one hand, he shows how labor is necessarily con-nected with alienation. Alienation to Hegel is not a marginal aspect oflabor which can be rectified or reformed. It is fundamental to and im-manent in the structure of society; it cannot be dispensed with, andthe conditions of alienation and misery cannot be abolished within theexisting society. While thus closing the door on any rosy belief in easyreforming solutions, Hegel's radical criticism of labor in society doesnot, on the other hand, result in any radical call for activism or rebel-lion: his insights into modern society call for an integration of thisexperience through political mediation, not through radical upheavaland disruption.

This vision of the workings of modern society comes to Hegel notthrough any empirical study of social and economic conditions in his

13. LukBcs, Der junge Hegel, p.414.14.Realphilosophie I, p. 220.Cf."Sy stem der Sittlichkeit," Schriften zur Poli-

tik,pp. 422f.


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contemporary Germany; these conditions he had analyzed in TheGerman Constitution, and his description certainly does not presenta vital, active, and productive society. His views on modern societyare far more a distillation of the Smithian model, raised to the level ofa philosophical paradigm.15

Labor to Hegel is the positive outcome of nian's confrontation withthe natural, external, objective world. The process of labor is an objec-tification of man's subjective powers, and it is through the instrumen-tality of work on an object that man, a subject, becomes an objectiveactuality: "I have done something, I have externalized myself; thisnegation is positive; externalization [Entausserung] s appropriation."16

Hegel has earlier perceived a similar externalization in exchange,where the alienation of one's claims to an object makes one's relationto it actual.17 Yet in exchange, consciousness still accepts the externalworld as given, whereas in labor it is creating this world while simul-taneously relating to other human beings: "Only here has appetite theright to appear, since it is actual [wirklich], i.e., it has itself general,spiritual being. Labor of all for all and the satisfaction of all. Every-one serves the other and sustains him, only here has the individualfor the first time an individuated being; before that it has been onlyabstract and untrue."'"

Labor is thus of necessity social labor. Contrary to the atomistic,individualistic view of labor, which sees labor as primary and exchangeas secondary and derivative, based on a surplus, labor for HegeI isalways premised on a reciprocal relationship, subsuming exchangeunder its cognitive aspects. No one produces for himself, and all pro-duction presupposes the other-hence a basic element of recognitionis always immanent in labor.

15. This aspect of Hegel was realized very early on by Marx in his E c o n o m i c -P h i l o s o p h i c a l M a n u s c r i p t s , where he says: "Hegel's standpoint is that of modernpolitical economy. He conceives labor as the e s s e n c e , the self-confirming essenceof man." Yet because Marx bases his resume of Hegel on the P h e n o m e n o l o g y ,and because the R e a l p h i l o s o p h i e remained unknown to him, he ends up with afaulty conclusion: "He [Hegel] observes only the positive side of labor, not itsnegative side." See Karl Marx, E a r l y W r i t i n g s , trans. T . B. Bottomore (London,19631, P. 203.16. R e a l p h i l o s o p h i e 11, p. 218.

17. Ib id . , p. 217.18. Ib id . , p. 213.


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While the goal of production is recognition through the other, itsmotive is need. Consciousness, by desiring an object, moves man tocreate it, to transform need from a subjective craving and appetiteinto an external object. Labor is therefore always intentional, not in-stinctual; it represents man's power to create his own world.lg Produc-tion is thus a vehicle for reason's actualization of itself in the world:in a passage which prefigures his later dictum about the rational andthe actual, Hegel remarks that "Reason, after all, can exist only inits work; it comes into being only in its product, apprehends itself im-mediately as another as well as itself."20

There is, however, another link between need and production, andthis one is more problematic. Though every human need is concrete,the totality of needs for which the totality of production is undertakenis abstract and cannot be concretely expressed prior to the completionof the process of production and distribution. Production thus becomesabstract and the division of labor relates to the needs of productionand not to the needs of the producers. Man produces not the objects ofhis own specific needs, but a general product which he can then ex-change for the concrete object or objects of his needs: he producescommodities, and the more refined his tastes become, the more objectshe desires which he cannot produce himself but can achieve throughthe production of more objects, which he then exchanges. There thusappears a universal dependence of each human being on the univer-sality of the producers and the character of labor undergoes a basicchange :

Because work is being done for the need as an abstract being-for-itself, one also works in an abstract way. . . . General labor is thusdivision of labor, saving. . . . Every individual, as an individual,works for a need. The content of his labor [however] transcendshis need; he works for the satisfaction of many, and so [does] every-one. Everyone satisfies thus the needs of many, and the satisfactionof his many particular needs is the labor of many others. Since hislabor is thus this abstraction, he behaves as an abstract self, or ac-cording to the way of thingness, not as a comprehensive, rich, all-19.Realphilosophie I, p. 236; 11, p. 214.20. Realphilosophie I, p. 233.


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encompassing spirit, who rules over a wide range and masters it. Hehas no concrete work: his power is in analysis, in abstraction, in thebreaking up of the concrete into many abstract aspects. . . .21The dialectical nature of social labor is thus evident. On one hand,

it creates sociability, a universal dependence of each on all, and makesman into a universal being-the characteristic of civil society, as laterdescribed in the Ph ilo so p hy o f R ig h t ( 5 8 I 82-183). On the other hand,this reciprocal satisfaction of needs creates a hiatus between the con-crete individual and his particular and concrete needs. By working forall, the individual no longer works for himself; an element of distanceand a need for mediation are thrust between his work and the sat-isfaction of his needs. Social labor hence necessarily entails alienation :"Man thus satisfies his needs, but not through the object which is beingworked upon by him; by satisfying his needs, it becomes somethingelse. Man does not produce anymore that which he needs, nor doeshe need anymore that which he produces. Instead of this, the actual-ity of the satisfaction of his needs becomes merely the possibility ofthis satisfaction. His work becomes a general, formal, abstract one,single; he limits himself to one of his needs and exchanges this for hisother ne~essi t ies ."~~

The more labor becomes divided and specialized, the more com-modities can be produced; the further labor becomes removed fromthe immediate satisfaction of the producer, the more productiveit becomes, Man thus achieves ever-greater comfort at the price ofever-greater abstraction and alienation in the process of productionitself: "His labor and his possessions are not what they are for him,but what they are for all. The satisfaction of needs is a universaldependence of all on all; there disappears for everyone the securityand the knowledge that his work is immediately adequate to his par-ticular needs; h is particular need becomes universal."23

The process of labor-originally the vehicle for man's recognitionthrough the other, intended to create for each his own objective world-becomes a process over which man loses all control. Man is far frombeing integrated into the objective world through creative conscious-

2 1 . Realph i losoph ie 11, pp. 214-215.22 . Realphiloscrphie I, pp. 237-238.23 . Ib id . , p. 238.


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ness, i.e., labor; the abstract nature of labor, together with the divisionof labor, make him totally alien to this objective world. Hence Hegelcomes to be troubled by the real conditions of factory labor, and hisgeneral anthropology of labor becomes social analysis. Referring toexamples given by Adam Smith, Hegel says:

The particularization of labor multiplies the mass of production; inan English manufacture, 18 people work at the production of a nee-dle; each has a particular and exclusive side of the work to perform;a single person could probably not produce 120 needles, perhapsnot one. . . . But the value of labor decreases in the same proportionas the productivity of labor increases. Work becomes thus absolutelymore and more dead, it becomes machine-labor, the individual'sown skill becomes infinitely limited, and the consciousness of thefactory worker is degraded to the utmost level of dullness. The con-nection between the particular sort of labor and the infinite massof needs becomes wholly imperceptible, turns into a blind depend-ence. It thus happens that a faraway operation often affects a wholeclass of people who have hitherto satisfied their needs through it;all of a sudden it Limits [their work], makes it redundant and use-less.24This analysis thus makes Hegel into one of the earliest radical crit-

ics of the modern industrial system. He goes on to point out the neces-sary link between the emergence of machinery and the intensificationof alienation, and here again he takes a middle position between theidealizers of the machine and the machine-smashers : while recogniz-ing the alienation caused by the introduction of the machine, he seesit as a necessary element in the anthropological determination of mod-ern society based on ever-increasing production. Originally, Hegel con-tends, tools were simply the mediation between man and his externalworld;25as such, they always remain a passive object in the hands ofthe producer. But

In the same way, [the worker] becomes through the work of themachine more and more machinelike, dull, spiritless. The spiritual24. I b i d . , p. 239.25. Rea lph i l o s oph i e 11, pp. 197-198.


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element, the self-conscious plentitude of life, becomes an emptyactivity. The power of the self resides in rich comprehension: thisis being lost. He can leave some work to the machine; his own doingthus becomes even more formal. His dull work limits him to onepoint, and labor is the more perfect, the more onesided it is. . . .

Man abolishes his own formal activity and makes the machinework for him. But this deception, which he perpetrates upon nature. . . takes vengeance on him. The more he takes away from nature,the more he subjugates her, the baser he becomes himself. By proc-essing nature through a multitude of machines, he does not abolishthe necessity of his own labor; he only pushes it further on, removesit from nature and ceases to relate to it in a live way. Instead, heflees from this negative livingness, and that work which is left tohim becomes itself machinelike. The amount of labor decreasesonly for the whole, not for the individual: on the contrary, it is be-ing increased, since the more mechanized labor becomes, the lessvalue it possesses, and the more must the individual toil.26We thus have here, in one of the more speculative documents of

German idealist philosophy, one of the most acute insights of its timeinto the workings of modern industrial society. From an a priori philo-sophical anthropology, Hegel moves on to incorporate the conse-quences of political economy into a philosophical system-an attemptalmost identical in its systematic structure with Marx's program fortyyears later. How many of Marx's later conclusions are already to befound, explicitly or implicitly, in Hegel's earlier texts, however, re-quires a separate discussion.

Commodity-producing society also needs, according to Hegel, a uni-versal, abstract criterion that can mediate between labor and the sub-ject. This is money: "These multiple labors of the needs as things must

26. R e a l p h i l o s o p h i e 1, pp. 232, 237. The parallels with Marx's description inthe E c o n o m i c -P h i l o s o p h i c a l M a n u s c r i p t s are, of course, striking ( E a r l y W r i t i n g s,pp. 120-134). The major difference, however, has already been pointed out byLukgcs: while to Hegel alienation is a necessary aspect of objectification, Marxbelieves that alienation resides not in the process of production, but i n its con-crete conditions. For Hegel objectification and alienation are identical, for Marxthey are separable. Therefore Marx believes i n the possibility of ultimate redemp-tion, whereas for Hegel one will never be able to dissociate the rose from thecross of the present. Philosophy can only interpret the world, not change it.


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also realize their concept, their abstraction: their universal conceptmust also be a thing, just like them, but [it must be] a universal, whichrepresents all. Aloney is this materially existing concept, the form ofthe unity of the potentiality of all the things relating to needs. Needand labor are thus elevated into this universality, and this creates ina great nation an immense system of comrnunality [Gemeinschaftlich-keit] and mutual dependence, a life of death moving within itself [einsich in sich bewegendes Leben des Toten]. This system moves hitherand thither in a blind and elemental way, and like a wild animal callsfor strong permanent control and

But before Hegel constructs the agencies intended to limit the freeplay of the forces of the market, he goes into some detail regard-ing the sociological aspects of commodity-producing society. Classdomination figures in a very prominent way in Hegel's descriptionwhen he expresses his awareness of the fact that the wealth of na-tions can be built only at the expense of the poverty of whole classes:"Factories and manufactures base their existence on the misery[Elend] of a class," he Aad in another context his descrip-tion is no less brutal in its candor: "[Tl~is ower] condemns a multi-tude to a raw life and to dullness in labor and poverty, so that otherscan amass fortunes, so that these can be taken away from them."2Q

This sinking into poverty and barbarity is seen by Hegel as beingcaused by the rapid expansion of the market and of production. Sociallabor not only satisfies needs; it is constantly creating new needs,tastes, and fashions. Again, in a rare insight into the dialectics of ever-changing demand creating pressure for ever-increasing production,Hegel says : "Needs are thus multiplied; each need is being subdividedinto many; tastes become refined and differentiated. One demands alevel of finish which carries the object ever nearer to its use."30

27. R e a l p h i l o s o p h i e I, pp. 239-240. Cf. 11, pp. 215-216. Again the parallel withMarx's fragment on "Money" ( E a r l y W r i t in g s , pp. 189-194) is very close.28. R e a l p h i l o s o p h i e 11, p. 257; c f p. 232: "A mass of the popula tion is con-demned to stupefying, unhealthy, and precarious labor in factories, manufac-tures, mines, etc."

29. Ibid . , p. 238. The last sentence refers already to Hegel's justification ofproperty taxes, and Hegel goes on to say that "the inequality of property causesit to be accepted on the condition that high taxes are imposed."

30. Ibid . , p. 231-232. The slightly censorious tone evokes echoes of Rousseau.


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Fashion becomes the determinant of production, and Hegel is thusone of the first thinkers to grasp the immanent logic of constantlychanging fashions and fads and its function within the productiveprocess. The constant disquiet of concrete life in industrial society ishere described from the consumer's point of view as well: "But thisplurality creates fashion, the versatility and freedom in the use ofthese things. The cut of clothes, the style of furnishing one's homeare nothing permanent. This constant change is essential and rational,far more rational than sticking to one fashion, thinking to find some-thing permanent in such particular forms. The beautiful is not orderedby one fashion; but here we have to do not with free beauty, but withbeauty that attracts. . . . Hence it has accidentality in it."31

These fluctuations in taste have a bearing on the basic lack of secu-rity which characterizes modern society. Whole sectors of the popula-tion live by the whim of a changing mode, and Hegel's description ofthe conditions of life of these classes sinking into poverty is trulyamazing when one reflects that he reached his conclusions throughan immanent development of the consequences of the theories of po-litical economy :

Whole branches of industry which supported a large class of peoplesuddenly fold up because of a change in fashion or because thevalue of their products falls due to new inventions in other coun-tries. Whole masses are abandoned to poverty which cannot helpitself. There appears the contrast between vast wealth and vast pov-erty-a poverty that cannot do anything for itself. . . .

Wealth, like any other mass, makes itself into a power. Accumu-lation of wealth takes place partly by chance, partly through theuniversal mode of production and distribution. Wealth is a pointof attraction. . . . It collects everything around itself-just as alarge mass attracts to itself the smaller one. To them that have,shall be given. Acquisition becomes a many-sided system which de-velops into areas from which smaller businesses cannot profit. Thehighest abstraction of labor reaches into the most particular typesof labor and thus receives ever-widening scope. This inequality31. Ibid., p. 232.


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Labor, Alien ation, an d Social Classesin Hegel's Realphilosophie

of wealth and poverty, this need and necessity, turn into the utmosttearing up [Zerrissenheit] of the will, an inner indignation [Em-porung] and hatred.32It is precisely here that any possibility of a radical transformation

of society presents itself to Hegel-only to be discarded. This possibil-ity remains an "inner indignation," not an act that has to be external-ized. At the height of Hegel's critical awareness of the horrors of in-dustrial society, he remains quietistic and seeks a solution throughintegration, not through disruption-an aspect which Lukhcs tends tooverlook.

For the passage that immediately follows this critical analysis ofindustrial society deals with the emergence of the state as a power reg-ulating and integrating economic activity within a political frame-work, transcending the forces of the market. In the course of develop-ing this idea, Hegel adds some further touches to his picture of indus-trial society when he sees in the state an instrument ensuring eco-nomic expansion overseas :

Government comes onto the scene and has to see to it that everysphere is preserved. . . . [It has to look for] ways out, for channelsto sell the product abroad, though this makes it more difficult, sinceit is to the detriment of the others. [But] freedom of commerce re-mains necessary, interference must be as inconspicuous as possible,for this is the sphere of arbitrariness [Willkiir]. The appearance ofpower must be prevented, and one should not try to save that whichcannot be saved, but try to employ the remaining classes in anotherway. Government is the universal overseer; the individual is buriedin the particular. The [particular] occupation will admittedly be32. bid . , pp. 232-233.It is extremely interesting to note that E m p o r u n g

("inner indignation") is the same term Hegel uses in the Addition to $244 ofthe Phi losophy o f R igh t , where he says that "Poverty in itself does not make maninto a rabble; a rabble is created only when there is joined to poverty a disposi-tion of mind, an inner indignation against the rich, against society, against thegovernment, etc." Moreover, the only oblique reference in Marx to Hegel's dis-cussion of poverty in the Phi losophy o f R igh t is a fleeting hint that E m p o r u n gis not enough; see Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, T h e H ol y F a m i ly , trans. R.Dixon (Moscow, 1956), p. 51.


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abandoned by itself, but with the sacrifice of this generation and anincrease in poverty, poor taxes and institutions are required.33The state thus appears at the moment when society seems to be

heading for disruption and chaos: it is the reintegration of the selfinto itself as a universal being after economic life has particularizedand atomized it and made its activity into an abstraction. The basicscenario of Hobbes is in a way being reenacted here within a contextpresenting a synthesis of specrllative philosophy and political econ-omy: the abstraction of b ellu m o m n i u m c o n t ~ a m n es becomes con-crete in terms of human activity and consciousness.

Hence, while stressing the minimalist function of the state in thoseof its activities impinging upon economic life ("freedom of commerceremajns necessary, interference must be as inconspicuous as possible.. . . The appearance of power must be prevented), Hegel can at thesame time point to the immanence of political life: "The individualhas his supposed right only in the universal. The state is the existence,the power of right, the keeping of contract and . . . the existing unityof the

This ambivalent status of the state will later enable Hegel to con-struct the realms of art, religion, and philosophy as spheres transcend-ing the state yet functioning within its context. The state, while incor-porating the individual in a universal unity, does not subsume hisactivities under its existence. Because on one hand the individual usesthe state as an instrument for his own particular ends, while on theother the state is the individual's true being, the classical means/endrelationship between individual and state is being transcended: "Thisunity of individuality and universality exists then in a double way; inthe extreme of the universal, which is itself an individuality-as gov-ernment. This is not an abstraction of the state, but an individualitywhich has the universal as such as an end, while the other extremehas the individual person as an end."35

33. Realphi losophie 11, p. 233. LukAcs misses the whole point about the com-plex place of the state in Hegel's system when he dismisses this minimalist viewof governmental intervention in Hegel as one of his "illusions" (D e r j u ng e He g e l,p 423 ) .34. Realph i losoph ie 11, p. 234.

35. Ibid. , pp. 248-249.


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The general will thus appears in Hegel's system in a radically dif-ferent way than in Rousseau. Hegel points out in several instancesthat any social contract theory is a petitio principi, because it takesconsensus, the readiness to abide by the terms of the contract, forgranted. Just as there could be no right in the state of nature, so thegeneral will could not be perceived as the constitutive aspect of thebody politic.36The general will for Hegel is not the premise on whichthe state is being founded, historically or logically, but the emergentoutcome of the lengthy process of Bildung, which created the politicalconsciousness through differentiation and opposition, out of the di-verse elements of man's struggle for r e c ~ g n i t i o n .~ ~he general will isthe will of the individuals made into an object within the institutionsof the state: "The general will is the will of all and each. . . . It hasfirst of all to constitute itself as general out of the will of the indi-viduals so that it will appear as the principle and element, but on theother hand it is first and essential. The individuals have to make them-selves into a universal through negation of themselves, through exter-nalization and education [Entausserung und B i ld~ng] . ' ' ~~

This objectification of the individual will as it appears in the generalwill, in the state, entails the recognition by the individual that whatappears as something alien and external-political power-is nothingother than the externalization of his own will. The law is this objzc-tification of the subjective will: "The rule of law is not meant to be anact of legislating as if the others did not exist: they are there. Therelation is the movement of the person educated to obey toward thecommonwealth. . . . The second element is the trust that appears, i.e.,that the individual knows himself to be in it as his own presence, thathe finds himself preserved in it."39

This need for external limitations on the individual's will is theessence of what Hegel calls Polizei. The possible misunderstandingsconnected with this term in the Philosophy of Right, emanating as it

36. I b i d . , pp. 205, 245-247.37. O n B i l d u n g , see George A. Kelly, Id e a l i s m , P o l i t i c s a n d H i s t o r y (Cam-

bridge, Eng., 19691, PP. 341-348.38. R e a l p h i l o s o p h i e 11, pp. 244-245.39. Ib i d . , p. 248. Cf. the definition of "right" (p. 206): "Right is the relation

of the person to another, the universal element of i ~ sree being or the determina-tion and limitation of its empty freedom."


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were from its present usage, can be at least partly cleared up whenwe recall that for Hegel Polizei comes "from politeia, public life andrule, the action of the whole itself."40This public authority is neces-sary because in caring for himself alone and enjoying the-quiet blissof his property rights, the individual may hurt another by simply dis-regarding the impact his own actions may have on the life of another.An element of L is t de r V e r n u n f t comes into the picture when Hegeldescribes how the state is willed by the individuals for their own self-preservation and better protection, while it also represents an actual-ity transcending this interest: "The general f o m is this turning of theindividual into a universal and the becoming of the universal. But itis not a blind necessity, but one mediated through knowing. In otherwords, each is an end to himself, i.e., the end is the motive, each indi-vidual is immediately the cause. It is his interest that drives him [tothe state], but it is likewise the universal which has validity, is themiddle, allies him with his particularity and a~tuality."~~The state is the transcendence of the individual in the universalityof the law; the externalization of the will makes the individual into aperson because only in this way does he achieve actuality for the other.This universal power is the commonwealth, where the actions of theindividual, because they can impinge on the lives of everyone else,achieve objective, universal substance.42

The fact that the state is both instrumental and immanent is rep-resented in the individual by his dual role as a particular being anda universal one. In one of his most pointed expressions of this idea,which prefigures his own mature thought as well as Marx's later argu-ment against it, Hegel says that man is both a member of civil societyand a citizen of the state and has to strike a balance between thesetwo aspects of his existence: "Both individualities are the same. The[individual] takes care of himself and his family, works, signs con-tracts, etc., and at the same time he also works for the universal and hasit as an end. From the first viewpoint he is called bourgeois, from thesecond ~ i t o y e n . " ~ ~

40. Ibid., p. 259. 41. Ibid., p. 243.42. Realphilosophie I, pp. 232-233; 11, pp. 237, 244.43. Realphilosophie 11, p. 249. The French tenns appear in Hegel's original

German text. For Marx, of course, the splitting of man into citoyen and bour-geois is the measure of his alienation in modern, post-1789 society. Cf. "On theJewish Question," Early Writings, pp. 13-31.


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These two aspects of human activity lead to Hegel's discussion ofsocial classes. The crucial point is, of course, that Hegel does not seethe antinomy between man as bourgeois and as citoyen as somethingto be overcome in a total, new unity: i t is part of the dialectical prog-ress of man toward self-recognition. This should be kept in mind, sinceone of the common errors in discussing this problem in Hegel is tobe carried away by the apparent similarity between Hegel's discussionof civil society and some aspects of Marx's analysis. The truth of thematter is that Hegel's point of departure is the exact opposite ofMarx's. For Marx classes are aggregates formed by types of sociallabor, linked together by the common relationship of their membersto the means of production, seeking a political articulation for theirsocio-economic interests. The class nature of political power is toMarx a sin against the state's claim to express the universal as againstthe particularism and egotism of civil society. For Hegel, the institu-tionalization of class relationships into the political structure is themeans by which the atomism of civil society is integrated into a com-prehensive totality. The different classes represent to Hegel not onlymodes of production, but modes of consciousness which are relevantto a society differentiated in its structure according to criteria takenfrom his general system. While for Marx classes represent a divi-sion of labor that has to be overcome, for Hegel they stand for theintegration of this division, regrettable yet necessary, into a meaning-ful whole. For Hegel, classes always remain estates, in the sense thatthey represent a legitimized differentiation (interestingly enough,Hegel uses the term "class" only when referring to those directly in-volved in labor). Each estate stands for a different mode of con-sciousness :44 the principle of immediate trust and obedience is repre-sented in the peasantry, the principle of law and order in the middleclasses, and the principle of universality in the bureaucracy, the uni-versal class. Though the principle of classification is similar to that ofthe Philosophy of Right, the internal division of each estate is morecomplex and represents a slightly more sophisticated awareness ofclass differentiation than the neat divisions Hegel would adopt later.Furthermore, in the Realphilosophie the form of labor performed byeach class figures more prominently, and thus the connection betweenclass and the anthropology of labor is brought out much more clearly.

44. Realphilosophie 11, p. 253.


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114 Phi losophy G Publ ic Af fa i rs

The peasantry is distinguished by being the class of immediate la-bor, whose concrete work relates to a natural object (land) and notto a product. It thus represents a low level of consciousness, not yetdifferentiated from substantiality. On a social level this is reflected inthe peasantry's acceptance of its work and role as they are, withoutmuch questioning; the peasantry is the class of immediate trust, un-reflective consciousness :

The estate of immediate trust and raw concrete labor is the peas-antry. . . . The peasantry is thus this trust lacking in individuality,having its individuality in the unconscious individual, the earth. Asfor labor, [the peasant's] work does not have the form of abstractlabor: he takes care, more or less, of almost all his needs. . . . Theinterrelationship between his purpose and its realization is uncon-scious, natural. He ploughs, sows, but it is God who ordains that itwill thrive; it is the seasons and his trust that [ensure] that it willbecome by itself what he had put into the ground. The activity isunderground. He pays taxes and tributes because that's how it is;these fields and cottages have been situated in such a way fromtime immemorial; t h a t ' s h o w it i s , and that's all. . . .

Concrete labor is elemental, substantial subsistence. In war, thisestate makes up the raw mass.45

When Hegel goes on to the second class, he distinguishes betweenthe burghers ( B u r g e r s t a n d ) and the class of businessmen ( K a u f m a n n -s t a n d ) . The Burgers tand is made up mainly of artisans, its labor beingcharacterized by adaptation of nature; the business class, on the otherhand, is distinguished by its being engaged in exchange. Both the arti-sans and the businessmen see in law and order the principle of theirexistence : property, acquisitiveness, and social mobility are the pillarsof their being. In a striking description of the social ethos of theB u r g e r s t a n d , Hegel gets at the root of many of what are unmistakably

45. I b i d . , pp. 254-255 In the P h i lo s o ph y o f R i g h t Hegel includes in the "agri-cultural class" both the peasantry and the nobility, and there thus emerges aslight idealization of the virtues of agricultural life which is totally lacking here.Here it is only the peasantry that is being described, and the similarity to Marx'sjudgment on the "idiocy of village life" and the basically asocial mode of pro-duction of the peasantry is again striking.


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Labor, Alienation, and Social Classesi n Hege l's Realphilosophie

middle-class values: "[The burgher] knows himself as an owner ofproperty not only because he possesses it, but also because it is hisright-so he assumes; he knows himself to be recognized by his par-ticularity. Unlike the peasant, he does not enjoy his glass of beer orwine in a rough fashion, as a way of elevating himself out of hisdullness . . . but because [he wants] to show by his suit and the fineryof his wife and children that he is as good as the other man and thathe has really arrived. In this he enjoys himself, his value and hisrighteousness; for this did he toil and this has he achieved. He enjoysnot the pleasures of enjoyment but the joy of his self-esteem."46

In the business class, on the other hand, a higher degree of abstrac-tion is achieved: "The work of the businessman is pure exchange, nei-ther natural nor artificial production and formation. Exchange is themovement, the spiritual the means, liberated from utility and need aswell as from working, from immediacy. . . ."47

The mode of existence of the businessman calls forth the emergenceof money as a commodity by itself:The object itself is being divided into two: the particular thing, theobject of commerce, and the abstract, money-a great invention. Allneeds are reduced to this unity. The object of need has become amere image, unusable. The object is here something that has mean-ing purely according to its value, not for itself, not in relation to theneed. . . . A person is real to the extent that he has money. . . . Theformal principle of reason is to be found here-it is the ab s t r ~ t i o nfrom all particularity, character, historicity, etc. of the individual.The disposition [of the businessman] is this harshness of spirit,wherein the particular, now completely alienated, does not countanymore. [There exist] only strict rights. The bill of exchange mustbe honored-he himself may be destroyed-his family, welfare, life,etc. may go to pieces-total lack of mercy. . .Again, what stands out here is not only the striking similarity to

Marx, but the fact that no radical call for action follows this harshanalysis: the nature of modern society is grasped with an amazing

46. R e a l p h i l o s o p h i e 11, p. 256. 47. I b i d .48. Ib id . , pp. 256-257.


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Philosophy G. Public Affairs

lucidity given the period in which these texts were written. But all isbeing incorporated within the integrative functions of the state. Norebellion, or deviation.

The integration is carried out through the mediation of the universalclass: "The public estate works for the state. . . . Its disposition ofmind is the fulfillment of its d u t ~ . " ~ V h eusiness class expresses al-ready a sort of universality-the universality of the market-but it isstill abstract. Universality becomes concrete only in the class of publicservants who represent "the intervention of the universal into all par-ticularity"; the civil servant is likened to the arteries and the nervesthat run through the body though they are not, of course, identicalwith it.50

The universal class is at the apex of the social pyramid not onlybecause of its universal intentionality, but also because it is the onlyclass of society whose objective is knowledge itself, not nature, arti-facts, or abstraction, as is the case with all other classes. The specificacademic background of the German bureaucratic tradition is verymuch in evidence in this concept of the universal class as an educatedestate, including not only civil servants in the narrow sense but alsoteachers, doctors, lawyers: "This pure knowledge has to be realized,has to give a content to itself out of itself, a free content, which is atthe same time also an uninterested object. . . . This is science gen-erally. Spirit has here an object with which it deals without relatingto appetite and need. It is fulfilled thought, intelligence that knowsitself "51

This concept of science as noninstrumental knowledge, knowledgeknowing itself, then enables Hegel to relate the state to the realms ofart, religion, and philosophy, which are beyond objective spirit butneed the state for their proper functioning. In the universal class,this is already hinted at, and thus Hegel can close his discussion of theestates and the state and move on to these spheres-exactly as he closesthe Philosophy of Right moving in this direction.A consideration of Kunst, Religion, and Wissenschaft is outside the

scope of this discussion. Suffice it to say that in the Realphilosophie,just as in Hegel's later writings, the edifice of the state is simply aninfrastructure for absolute spirit-never an end in itself. For the pur-

49. Ib id . , p. 259. 50. b id . , p. 257. 51. Jbid., p. 260.


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pose of our analysis, however, a crucial point must be raised, and thishas to do with what appears as a gap between Hegel's discussion of theworkings of modern society and the kind of integrated solution he en-visages for this society through the system of estates. Pointing to theFrench Revolution, Hegel incorporates it into his system here in thesame dialectical way in which he deals with it in the Phenomenologyand elsewhere. It is the integrative side of the Revolution that he ac-cepts, while rejecting what he calls its negativity and abstractness. Ina footnote Hegel remarks that the French Revolution did indeed abol-lish class privileges, but "the abolition of class differentiation is mereempty talk."52

This is significant, for the society Hegel describes in the Realphilos-ophie is post-1789 society. The aristocracy is not mentioned-contraryto the Rechtsphilosophie, where it appears as the upper crust of "theagricultural class." While emphasizing that the privileges of the aris-tocracy as to taxation, etc. have to be abolished,53Hegel sticks to thenecessity of meting out different treatment to different classes. Heeven suggests, for example, a different, rougher and more immediate,penal code for the peasantry as compared to the middle class; taxesshould rest primarily on the burgher class, commercial law should ap-ply in all its severity to the business class only, and even marriage lawsshould be modified when applied to different estates.54

Yet while Hegel thus tries to give each estate its due place in thehierarchy of consciousness, the system of estates seems to exclude theclass of people who are at the root of commodity production. Had henot described the conditions of life of the worker in civil society, itwould have been beside the point to ask him for a solution to his prob-lem. But once Hegel did grasp, and with so much insight, the socialimplications of commodity production, the complete absence of thisclass of people in his integrated system of social estates is a serious

52. Ibid.53. Realphilosophie 11, p. 238: "An aristocracy that does not pay taxes runs

the great risk of losing violently."54. Ibid., p. 258.The reference to different marriage laws is probably intended

to mean that the system of inheritance, which is part of marriage law, should bedifferent when applied to landed property as against movable property. In thePhilosophy of Right Hegel similarly advocates primogeniture for the landedgentry.


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Phi lo sophy G Pub l i c A f fa i r s

defect: for Hegel's social system includes the peasants, the Biirgerstandand the K a u f m a n n s t a n d , the civil service; but nowhere does the workerappear as being integrated into the social system.

Lukics attributes the fact that Hegel saw the central figure of com-modity-producing society in the businessman, rather than the captainof industry, to the limitations of his age. For Lukics this proves thatHegel's views of civil society are yet crude and un d a ~ e lo p e d . ~ ~hiscriticism seems to make sense, yet one wonders whether it is as cogentas it sounds; at least, from our present vantage point we can perhapssee Hegel's description as having more relevance than Lukics creditsit with. The captain of industry, the traditional entrepreneur, turnedout, after all, to be a phenomenon of relatively short duration. Withthe extension of the market, the traditional industrialist is almost com-pletely disappearing, while it is the businessman who remains at thecenter of the commodity-producing society, though it may be the cor-porate rather than the traditional private businessman. Here Hegel'sinsight, basing the nature of modern society far more on the organi-zation of exchange than of pure production, is perhaps more profoundthan that of Marx (and LukAcs).

But Hegel's failure to integrate the worker-whom he had discoveredearlier in the manufacture and the factory-into his system of estatesis a failure of far greater magnitude. It reappears in the P h i l os o p h y o fR i g h t , where, after discussing pauperization and the failure of civilsociety to integrate the poor into the industrial system, Hegel leavespoverty an open question, without suggesting any solution. Both in theRea lph i lo soph ie and the P h il os o ph y o f R i g h t , the worker remains forHegel in civil society, but not of civil society.

Thus Hegel's imposing synthesis of a radical critique of modernsociety with a system of integration through consciousness is left witha serious flaw at its center. Hegel's political solution in the Realphi los-o p h i e is the same as in the Phi losophy o f R igh t . He sees in the monarchthe focal point of subjective liberty, which he raises to be the principleof the modern age: in the monarchy, subjectivity is represented andvindicated.js Again, there is no way to confront a later, monarchistHegel with an earlier, radical one : in I 805, as in I 818, monarchy is

55 . LukLcs, Der junge Hegel , p. 427,56. Realphi losophie 11, p. 250.


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the form of government integral to modern society according to Hegel.This monarchy is to Hegel the expression of public opinion, and

thus the mean between innovation and preservation. The dialectics ofcontrolled change are never better expressed by Hegel than when hesays: "Today, one rules and lives differently in states whose consti-tution has remained nonetheless the same-and this constitutionchanges according to the times. Government must not come forwardon the side of the past and defend it obstinately; but similarly it shouldalways be the last one to be convinced to introduce changes. . .

All the quietism of the Preface to the Philosophy of Right appearshere, and Hegel's inability to jump over Rhodes is perhaps after all atthe root of his failure to integrate his insights illto modern society intoa system within which every group or class would be able to find itsfulfillment. In this way, Hegel's failure paradoxically brings out hisown dictum that when it comes to giving instruction as to the worldas it ought to be, philosophy always comes on the scene too late. Hegel'sgreat achievement in the Realphilosophie-later to be incorporated intothe Philosophy of Right-was to hold up to a society in its infancy amirror in which it could see its image as it would look in maturity.

Hegel's breakthrough has been truly impressive : he can now be saidto be among the first modern thinkers to articulate the specific differ-ence of contemporary society, and his achievement calls for a reevalu-ation of the traditional view of Hegel as a philosopher lost in "abstract"speculations. But the society Hegel understood so well did not haveand could not have at that time a solution to the structural problem ofpoverty, "one of the most disturbing problems which agitate modernsociety." The problem could be conceived, but not its solution. Andif the grayness of the philosopl~er'smirror failed to show a solutionthat the grayness of life has not yet brought forth, surely Hegel wouldbe the last one to blame the philosopher.

57. Ib id . , p. 251.

avineri, shlomo - labor, alienation, and social classes in hegel's realphilosophie

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