| This dissertation accomplishes two objectives. First, focusing on the Science of Logic, I offer a novel interpretation of Hegel's theory of determinacy, which shows that it relies on a theory of the negativity of form and not only on a theory of the socio-historical development of norms. Second, through an engagement with Axel Honneth's work, I establish the significance of Hegel's formal theory of determinacy for thinking the logic of critique.;My reading of Hegel extends the interpretive tradition that has shown that Hegel's theory of determinacy is best understood as a theory of normativity, which in turn establishes the revisability of norms by showing how norms gain and lose authority over time. Hegel's emphasis on negativity is accordingly read as stemming from the ways in which authority fails, is contested, and prompts revision of the most significant commitments of a society. I argue, however, that Hegel's emphasis on negativity must be traced to his theory of form. That negativity is constitutive, rather than an effect of intersubjective contestation, follows from what Hegel analyzes as the inseparability of form and content. Form is nothing but the negation of immediacy. Negation, then, requires content in order to be negation, to negate a fixed determinacy. Conversely, the positive that results from negation is an alternative determination. This inseparability of form and content, I argue, is the fundamental insight of Hegel's idealism.;I develop the notion of dialectical reversibility, which proposes to think the sociohistorical revisability and the constitutive negativity of norms together. I clarify the stakes of dialectical reversibility in conversation with Honneth's work, which has been concerned with justifying the normativity of the category of recognition. Ethical categories are socio-historical institutions. As such, they are subject to contestation and revision in light of new material conditions. Yet they are also reversible: they retain the possibility of reverting to their opposite and generating both positive and negative effects even when they enjoy normative authority. I show that dialectical reversibility calls for a shift in the way that critical and justificatory practices are understood within the Frankfurt School tradition. |
