1. Network 13, Philosophy of Education
Kohlberg and (Modern Neo-) Hegelians on the Development of Human Morality
European Conference on Educational Research, Helsinki
August
Network 13, Philosophy of Education
Docent Rauno Huttunen
Dr. of Philosophy, Dr. of Education
Docent of Philosophy of Education
Department of Education
University of East Finland
Finland

2. Das Adam-Smith-Problem
Lawrence Kohlberg (1927–1987) considers that an individual is in the lowest phase of moral development if he thinks only of his own personal interest and has only his own selfish agenda in his mind as he encounters other humans. This lowest phase corresponds well with 16th century British moral egoism which reflects the rise of the new economic order. Adam Smith (1723–1790) wanted to defend this new economic order but he didn’t want to support moral egoism. Contemporary German intellectuals saw a contradiction in Adam Smith’s social philosophy which they called Das Adam-Smith-Problem. On one hand, Smith defends the free market and faceless economic exchange relationships, in which egoistic and rational individuals strive only for their material interests. The sphere of this egoistic economy is called civil society, and there is no place for compassion and humanity in the civil society. On the other hand, Smith claims that human morality is based on such feeling as sympathy and benevolence. According to the interpretation of Nobel Prize winner Vernon L. Smith, Adam Smith considers human nature simultaneously as self-regarding and other-regarding.

3. Family, Civil Society and sittliche State
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831) set as the task of his social philosophy to overcome Das Adam-Smith-Problem. He wanted to create a theory of the social totality in which economic egoism and love are not in contradiction. At the same time, Hegel wanted to create a theory on the Bildung process through which the human spirit develops from moral un-freedom to moral freedom and maturity both on the individual and socio-historical level. Hegel introduces a three-level model of society, which consists of the family, the civil society, and the state. A sittliche state means a community of reciprocally well- behaving and caring citizens. The family is the sphere of love within which man takes care of his beloved. In this sphere, love “rules” and overcomes reason. The civil society is the sphere of private contracts and economic exchange. This sphere is ruled by cold reason and Adam Smith’s invisible hand. Society cannot manage only with these two instances. Hegel calls for a value community called the sittliche state which is ruled by rational feeling.

4. Axel Honneth (love) Civil society (law) State (solidarity) Individual
Object of
recognition
Mode of
Recognition
Individual
(concrete needs)
Person
(formal autonomy)
Subject
(individual
particularity)
Intuition
(affective)
Family
(love)
Concept
(cognitive)
Civil society
(law)
Intellectual intuition
(affect that
has become
rational)
State
(solidarity)

5. Axel Honneth Mode of recognition Emotional support Cognitive respect
Social esteem
Dimension of personality
Needs and emotions
Moral responsibility
Traits and abilities
Forms of recognition
Primary relations
(love, friendship)
Legal relations
(rights)
Community of value (solidarity)
Developmental potential --
Generalizations,
de-formalization
(Materialisierung)
Individualization,
Equalization
Practical relation-to-self
Basic self-confidence
Self-respect
Self-esteem
Forms of disrespect
Abuse and rape
Denial of rights,
Exclusion
Denigration,
insult
Threatened component of personality
Physical
Integrity
Social
integrity
“honor”,
dignity

6. Robert Williams
The immediate self does not know what it is. It is only implicit. It wants (Begierde) to become explicit to itself. The only way for it to become explicit to itself is through the mediation of an other. The self can be present to itself only by mediation through other. That is why Hegel claims that self-consciousness is “doubled” (Verdoppelung). Self-consciousness can become present to itself through mediation by an other. Self-consciousness needs the other to confirm its own self-understanding. The self-knowledge comes from recognition. The encountering of the other is also the genesis of morality (Sittlichkeit). Before encountering the other the self is immediate and in the state of natural egoism. It is the lowest state of morality. In that stage, the self’s own satisfaction is its ultimate end. The natural egoism of the immediate self excludes the other. The encounter of the other brings about the experience of self-transcendence or “self-othering”

7. Robert Williams
In the process of encountering, both parties (master and slave) must “self-overcome” this natural solipsism. The result of this encounter is Geist or “we-spirit”. But in a master-slave relationship this Geist or we-spirit is fundamentally invalid, and moral (sittliche) advancement compared to the natural state is not great. Authentic reciprocal recognition of each other’s self-consciousness does not happen in the relationship between the master and the slave. The master is seeking recognition from the slave, but the slave is unable to give the kind of recognition that the master is seeking because he is only a slave. The slave works hard for earning recognition from the master, but the master can never recognize the slave as an independent consciousness. The relationship between the master and the slave is a monological, not dialogical. The proper reciprocal relationship of recognition is lacking. The social condition of the master and the slave produces two forms of consciousness: master consciousness and slave (servile) consciousness.

8. Robert Williams
Hegel does not provide a solution to this unhappy relationship between the master and the slave in Phenomenology of Spirit. In Encyclopedia Philosophy of Spirit Hegel presents a solution. Now Hegel thinks that the struggle for recognition between the master and the slave is an uncivilized state in human history, although it is better than the previous dead struggle. In the struggle for recognition between the master and the slave, freedom and the reciprocal relationship of recognition are impossible to achieve. The civilized modern bourgeois society, which is divided into family, civil society and state, overcomes the contradiction between the master and the slave. In Encyclopedia the master and the slave reciprocally achieve liberation together. We can find from Encyclopedia three socio-historical levels of moral (Sittlichkeit) development: 1) State of nature (the death struggle) 2) Social condition of master/slave (unjust social contract) 3) True ethical social totality (sittliche state; reciprocal rational affection among all citizens)

9. Robert Williams
There is three phases in the development of self-consciousness. The first phase is immediate, implicit, individual, egoistic, appetitive and abstract self-consciousness. This kind of self-consciousness just consumes material objects and excludes difference and otherness. In the second phase of the development of self-consciousness and its morality arises the relation of one self-consciousness to another self-consciousness. The second phase introduces the other, and thus the self is “othered”. The start of the process is in not promising because it is a battle. At first, the battle is the struggle between life and death. One self-consciousness tries to eliminate the other self-consciousness. The dialectic of the master and the slave is only a little bit better as a social condition. In second phase – when it reaches the master/slave dialectics – morality takes the form of honoring contracts regardless of their nature. In the third phase, self-consciousness reaches the state of universal consciousness which means the sublation (Aufhebung) of otherness. In this formation of social totality the “I” becomes “We”. In this phase the limits of individuality are surpassed and a higher form of selfhood and freedom is achieved. A process of mutual recognition happens without a struggle. This higher form of selfhood and freedom includes autonomy, union, self-overcoming and letting-be (Freigabe).

10. Kohlberg and Williams Level of morality and self-relation
Williams/Hegel
Kohlberg
Strong, weak or non-existent affiliation
First phase
Immediate, egoistic,
appetitive and abstract
self-consciousness
Pre-conventional
Moral consciousness (stages 1-2)
Strong
Second phase
Division of self-
consciousness into servile and master consciousness
Conventional
moral consciousness (stages 3-4)
Servile cons. = stage 3
Master cons. = stage 4
Third phase
Universal self-
consciousness, absolute
Sittlichkeit (State)
Post-conventional
moral consciousness (stages 5-6)
Weak
(strong with stage 7?)

11. Kohlberg and Honneth First phase Second phase Third phase
Level of morality and self-relation
Honneth/Hegel
Kohlberg
Strong, weak or non-existent affiliation
First phase
Self-confidence gained
from experience of love
(family; affection)
Pre-conventional
moral
consciousness
(stages 1-2)
Non-existent
Second phase
Self-respect gained from of rights and autonomy
(civil society; abstract law
cognitive concept)
Conventional
(stages 4)
Good
Third phase
Self-esteem gained from experience of dignity and
solidarity, absolute
Sittlichkeit (State; affect that has become rational)
Post-conventional
(stages 5-6)
Weak
(strong with stage 7?)