Talk: Sarah Holtman (University of Minnesota)

Sarah Holtman (University of Minnesota, Twin Cities) will present, “Civic Action, Idealization and Kantian Citizenship”

Both Kant’s critics and his friends often highlight two features of his characterization of citizenship in a just state. The first of these is the seeming passivity of the Kantian citizen, who apparently must meticulously insure that she does not transgress rigid prohibitions – on lying, political violence and other demands of mutual respect — in any reform-minded challenges she might be moved to pursue. The second is what we might call the Kantian citizen’s participation in idealization, her commitment to viewing herself and her fellows as embodying qualities of freedom, equality, independence and responsibility and to enacting laws appropriate for a community of such citizens.

Here, I offer a reading that challenges these characterizations and explore its implications both for our understanding of Kant’s political theory and for contemporary applications of it. When fully realizing their role within the just state, I contend, citizens as Kant describes them in fact must be actively involved in the development, adoption, employment and ongoing evaluation of laws and related institutions. They must also shape their actions in pursuit of justice in light of the world as it is, a world in which realization of civic ideals is highly imperfect at best. Appealing to a more contemporary example, I further explore potential problems with this reading as well as the more practical consequences of its application.

Central to my textual argument are: 1) Kant’s essay on the right to lie (which may seem both to endorse citizens’ appeal to unrealized ideals and to encourage their passivity); and 2) his Rechtslehre discussions of innate right, of the features that characterize the citizen and of the distinction between “active” citizens and “passive” ones. My investigation of practical consequences considers the rescue efforts undertaken by the people of Le Chambon-sur-Lignon in Nazi-occupied France. For in this case arguably idealistic commitments to honesty and nonviolence seem to have walked hand-in-hand with wise sensitivity to context and the active pursuit of justice.

November 5, 2015

2:00 p.m.

Caldwell 103