POLITICAL AND LEGAL IDEAS IN GERMAN CLASSICAL PHILOSOPHY

Abstract

In current conditions, a crisis of the ideas of democracy, the political subject of the national state and economic structures is observed. On the other hand, there is a growing demand for rights and new forms of recognition, not to mention the emergence of mass movements seeking greater political participation and generating new collective subjectivities. The relevance of the research lies in the fact that radically challenging traditional philosophical categories, Kant, Fichte and Hegel provided a new and insightful understanding of the most significant problems of our time. They represent the concept of practical rationality and its numerous manifestations, which is necessary for a philosophical understanding of our modern world. The academic paper analyzes the philosophical and legal doctrines of German classical philosophy’s representatives. In particular, Kant’s conclusions about moral right or the categorical imperative formed the basis for establishing the rule of law. The imperative of mutual restriction of citizens’ freedom as a condition for ensuring the free existence of people was proposed by Kant and Fichte. Hegel’s ideas about the distinction between essence and phenomenon in law became fundamental to justify the principle of the rule of law as a phenomenon that distinguishes right from the positive right. The primary purpose of the research is to address the philosophical and legal views and theories (ideas and principles) of German classical philosophers in order to identify the basic (fundamental) laws of developing their content. The analysis of philosophical and legal doctrines has shown that the authors’ views on legal provisions are represented as an expression of rational selection, on the basis of which social interactions were rationally demanded and built by dividing and limiting models of social behavior. What is more important, the analysis showed that the only effective mechanism and creation of a culture of all mankind capable of guaranteeing the safe existence and development of a person is the law and its understanding, based on the imperative of preserving human nature and implemented in the context of state regulation of social relations.