| If prevailing attitudes put forward by recent cultural, social and political theory can be trusted, modernity does not appear to have much of a future. This dissertation considers the future of modernity by exploring the future in modernity, by exploring, in other words, the future orientation characteristic of modernity. Following a brief theoretical overview that establishes a contrast between the temporality of the ancient and medieval worlds (a future orientation hemmed in by past experiences and practices) and the temporality specific to modernity (a future orientation unshackled from past experiences and practices), diagnostic readings of some important writings of Kant, Hegel, and Marx are offered to elucidate that which emerged as a problem for modern temporality, namely, the need for temporal coordination. This need for temporal coordination could but become acute in a period that witnessed the proliferation of new experiences and practices which could not be easily explained, or contained, by past experiences and practices. The readings offered show how all three political philosophers assemble new, modern ways of connecting the modes of time by recasting the meaning of the past and the significance of the future for the modern present. If considered as moments of modern futurity which, when taken together, provide insight into the problem of modern temporality, then the readings offered should also help to diagnose our current rapport with the future. To this end, it is argued that the problem we face today is not the end of modernity, but the return of a problem that arose with the advent of modernity. |
