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A decade prior to his main publications in political philosophy, Kant presented his views on the topic in his 1784 course lectures on natural right. This Critical Guide examines this only surviving student transcript of these lectures, which shows how Kant's political philosophy developed in response to the dominant natural law tradition and other theories. Fourteen new essays explore how Kant's lectures reveal his assessment of natural law, the central value of freedom, the importance of property and contract, the purposes and powers of the state, and the role of individual autonomy and the rights of human beings. The essays place his claims in relation to events and other publications of the early 1780s, and show Kant in the process of working out the theories which would later characterize his influential political philosophy.
List of contents
Introduction Frederick Rauscher; 1. A brief guide to Achenwall's natural law: the textbook for Kant's lectures on legal and political philosophy Pauline Kleingeld, Michael Gregory and Fiorella Tomassini; 2. The many ends of natural law Larry Krasnoff; 3. Absorbing natural right into the Kantian system Howard Williams; 4. Kant's search for a metaphysics of morals: the Feyerabend lectures Allen W. Wood; 5. Innate right: Kant and the natural law tradition Paul Guyer; 6. Kant's critique of Achenwall's account of property in his Feyerabend lectures Kenneth Westphal; 7. The economy in the Feyerabend lecture notes on natural right Lucy Allais; 8. Our rights to ourselves and others: marriage, sex, and slavery in the Feyerabend lectures Jordan Pascoe; 9. States of nature as theories of normativity: Kant and his predecessors Macarena Marey; 10. Fundamental aspects of public right Luigi Caranti; 11. Freedom of religion and thought in the Feyerabend lectures on natural law: the development of Kant's conception of enlightenment Monique Hulshof; 12. Happiness, paternalism, and social welfare: unexpected insights from the Naturrecht Feyerabend Sarah Holtman; 13. Kant's retributive turn: punishment and autonomy in the Feyerabend lectures on natural right (and later writings) Susan Meld Shell; 14. Death and the limits to state coercive power Frederick Rauscher; Bibliography; Index.
