Fichte's Social Division of Labour and Its Relation to His Idealism

Bibliographic Data

ID14949467
AuthorsDavid James (0000-0001-5168-4690, Department of Philosophy University of Warwick Coventry UK, corresponding author)
Year2025
Volume33
Issue3
Pages942-957
Publication date2025-09-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueEuropean Journal of Philosophy (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0966-8373 • E-ISSN: 1468-0378
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/ejop.13069
OpenAlexW4409183121
LanguageEN
References cited7

I argue that Fichte’s account of the type of subject presupposed by idealism entails that certain individuals engaged in mechanical tasks within a social division of labour would be alienated from their own activity even while fulfilling their vocation as human beings, despite how this vocation is incompatible with the reduction of human beings to parts of a machine. Avoiding or overcoming this alienation would require a strong form of moral identification with one’s own activity within a social division of labour. Although this solution is compatible with Fichte’s theory of duty, it is shown to be difficult to reconcile with his commitment to the moral equality of human beings, because some individuals will be required to make a greater sacrifice in relation to the human vocation than others. Another assumption is that certain individuals, the scholar among them, make a greater contribution that offsets the advantage of not having to engage in forms of activity whose alienating character requires a stronger form of moral identification than is demanded of them

Arithmetic · Division of labour · Epistemology · Idealism · Political science · Sociology · Computer Science · Humanities and Social Sciences · Kantian Philosophy and Modern Interpretations · Law · Mathematics · Philosophical Ethics and Theory · Philosophy

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