In His Essay 'on Perpetual Peace' Kant Makes An Interesting... part 1 Essay - 4,217 words

In his essay 'On perpetual peace' Kant makes an interesting remark about the role of the differences between religions in the course of world history. According to Kant world history is moving towards a growing community of nations. But this process, however positive for excluding the possibility of war in the future, has a dangerous side. A universal monolithical political system could arise which, according to Kant, can only mean that despotism will rule the world. The call for unity should be counterbalanced by something else: 'But nature wills it otherwise, and uses two means to separate the nations and prevent them from intermingling linguistic and religious* differences. These may certainly occasion mutual hatred and provide pretexts for wars, but as culture grows and man gradually moves towards greater agreement over their principles, they lead to mutual understanding and peace.


And unlike that universal despotism which saps all man's energies and ends in the graveyard of freedom, this peace is created and guaranteed by an equilibrium of forces and a most vigorous rivalry.' One should not think that the call for unity is an idealistic appeal: 'On the other hand, nature also unites nations which the concept of cosmopolitan rights would not have protected from violence and war, and does so by means of their mutual self?interest.' Kant thinks that the spirit of commerce takes hold of every people in the end and that this spirit cannot exist side by side with war. Sometimes Kant is reproached for not having seen the possibility of economic wars. But Kant considers a future system of economic relations in which there exists a mutual dependency from which nobody can escape. This mutual dependency of nations, like the mutual dependency of individuals within a particular society, produces the necessity of a cooperation to which we are at the same time morally obliged: 'In this way, nature guarantees perpetual peace by the actual mechanism of human inclinations. And while the likelihood of its being attained is not sufficient to enable us to prophesy the future theoretically, it is enough for practical purposes. It makes it our duty to work towards this goal, which is more than an empty chimaera.' Kant is, of course, thinking of a world union of nation states based on mutual dependence.


The historical situation of mutual dependence obliges to the transformation of this situation into a morally reasonable whole. Kant's theory of the coming worldsociety, is established on the same principles as his theory about the constitution of a particular society. Every society is based on the development of individual talents through a basic antagonism between the individuals. Due to this antagonism the society, formed by a social contract that overcomes the antagonism, is a developed, mature society and not a dead embryo. Religious differences have the same function in the constitution of the worldorder as the differences between individuals and their talents in a particular society. They give life and colour to the whole as a harmony of unity and otherness.


Kants seems to see positive what everybody deplores who is concerned about intercultural and interreligious relations: the devastating effects of religious wars. His intention is clear. He underlines the positive value of the fact that differences cannot tolerate each other. Different religions have to fight with each other. Within a gradual approach towards greater agreement on principles that will produce peace, societies with different religions develop their antagonistic forces in interaction. By doing so the coming worldsociety is not based on the extinction of differences, but on the contrary, on the preservation of differences.


Other than Rousseau, whose theories form the background of his thinking, Kant values struggle as a positive force in the history of human civilization. But is struggle the last word? Does Kant really think that there are fundamental religious differences that should be preserved at all costs? Is this the way Kant considers religious differences? Let us have therefore a closer look at what Kant says about religious differences. Let us look at the asterisk he puts in the expression 'religious* differences'. 1.Differences, religion and morality Kant's asterisk keeps us from the interpretation of religious differences as a real plurality: 'Religious differences - an odd expression! As if we were to speak of different moralities. There may certainly be different historical confessions, although these have nothing to do with religion itself but only with changes in the means to further religion, and are thus the province of historical research. And there may be just as many different religious books (the Zendavesta, the Vedas, the Koran etc.) But there can only be one religion which is valid for all man and at all times.


Thus the different confessions can scarcely be more than the vehicles of religion; these are fortuitous, and may vary with differences in time or place.' 'Different religions' is as strange an expression as different moralities, because according to Kant, morality is the basic content of religion and without any doubt morality is one. Morality being one, different religions cannot exist. Existing differences therefore can only be superficial differences regarding space and time. Is Kant again becoming an ethnocentrist by claiming the existence of only one morality? Does he not again produce the despotic monoculture and monoreligion that he is afraid of? Doesn't he, in fact, absolutize something specifically European, the morality of the pure heart towards something universal? Shouldn't we become suspicious? International commerce - that is Western capitalism - creates mutual dependence. On this basis we should advocate an international society of contractual societies, that is Western democracy. In the end we should understand religion in a typically Western way as the morality of the pure heart, which again is a modern, Western conception of ethics. Eventually our universalist thinker Kant is just an ordinary Western ethnocentrist. I want to defend Kant against this reproach, especially in order to defend his concept of morality.


However he himself is not quite aware of the problems he creates. Or, perhaps one should say that he is not quite aware of the depth of the problems he sees. The content of morality is good will and respect. Good will does not mean the propaganda of a pure he ...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

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Essay Tags: kant, morality, aesthetic, mutual, judgment

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