Peripheral Reconstructions of the Lord-Bondsman Dialectic: Beauvoir, Fanon, and the Political-epistemological Dimensions of Subalternity

Abstract

In spite of the growing interest, in recent years, in thematizing the possible connections between Hegel's philosophy and feminism or post-colonial studies, a systematic effort has yet to be made to develop a comparative analysis (and a cross-fertilization) between these critical reconstructions, as well as to understand their contrast with, and possible connection to, appropriations of the Hegelian dialectical method with a Marxist inspiration, including Critical Theory. This research project is intended to fill this gap and examine the Wirkungsgeschichte of a figure of Hegel's philosophy that has proved particularly fruitful to several critical thinkers: the lord-bondsman relationship present in the Phenomenology of the Spirit. But the aim is not only to contribute, at the level of the history of theory, to understand the Hegelian legacy in recent strands of social and political philosophy, pointing out the contrasts, intersections and possible collaborations between the German and French traditions of critical thought inspired by Hegel (in the figure of Axel Honneth on the one hand, and Simone de Beauvoir and Frantz Fanon, on the other). The research also aims at providing theoretical insights into the current debates about the interconnection between different emancipatory struggles - such as feminism, anti-racism, and struggles against economic and social inequality - to the extent that it thematizes the motivational potential or emancipatory interest (in both the political and epistemological dimension) common to the experiences of injustice of different peripheral subjects. We hope, therefore, that this research contribute to the theoretical-conceptual articulation between the subgroups that make up the FAPESP Thematic Project n. 2014/11611-3 ("Public Sphere and Reconstruction: On the Constitution of a Reconstructive Paradigm within Critical Theory"), to which this research proposal is linked.