PRINCIPLE AND PREJUDICE: BURKE, KANT AND HABERMAS ON THE CONDITIONS OF PRACTICAL REASON

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PRINCIPLE AND PREJUDICE:

BURKE, KANT AND HABERMAS

ON THE CONDITIONS OF PRACTICAL REASON

Louis Hunt1

Abstract: This paper examines the role of practical reason in connecting moral prin-ciples and historical traditions. It looks first at Habermas attempt to construct a model ofcommunicative reason that can bridge the gap between the justification of moral princi-ples and their application in practice. The paper then turns to an older debate between

Burke and Kant on the relation between theory and practice in the French Revolution. Itargues that Burkes account of practical reason as dependent on the cultivation of moralsentiments within a specific historical tradition is superior to the efforts of both Kant andHabermas to incorporate a moral dimension within reason itself.

Introduction

This paper examines the role of practical reason in connecting universal moral

principles with particular historical traditions. It looks at two different epi-

sodes in the history of modern social and political thought in which the prob-

lematic relation between moral universalism and historical particularism

figures prominently. It first examines the argument of Jrgen Habermas that

the legitimacy of the modern state requires developing institutions that effec-tively embody universal principles of justice. Habermas articulates his

account of the legitimating role of moral principles in the modern state against

the backdrop of the rise in Germany and elsewhere in Europe of new forms of

ethnic nationalism. This resurgent nationalism locates the source of social and

political solidarity not in the acceptance of universal principles of justice but

in attachment to particular cultural and historical traditions. Habermas

responds to the challenge of this new historical particularism, with its vehe-

ment rejection of the moral universalism of the Enlightenment, by developing

an account of the normative character of reason that attempts to accommodate

historical and social conditions. Habermas notion of communicative reason

is an attempt to develop a conception of practical reason that can answer the

traditionalist critique of the abstract rationalism of the Enlightenment without

abandoning its moral and political aims.

To get a clearer sense of what the alternatives are in this debate, the second

part of the paper turns to an older, and largely unexplored, controversy

between Edmund Burke and Immanuel Kant on the relation between moral

theory and political practice at the time of the French Revolution. This discus-

sion takes as its main texts Burkes Reflections on the Revolution in France,

which was first published in 1790 during the early stages of the French

HISTORY OF POLITICAL THOUGHT. Vol. XXIII. No. 1. Spring 2002

1 James Madison College, Michigan State University, 317 S. Case Hall, East LansingMI 488251205, USA. Email: [email protected]

Copyright (c) Imprint Academic 2011For personal use only -- not for reproduction


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Revolution, and Kants essay On the Common Saying: This May be True in

Theory, but it does not Apply in Practice, which first appeared in 1793, the

year of the Jacobin Reign of Terror in France.2 Burkes Reflections is a classic

indictment of the danger of relying on abstract theory for guidance in political

life, and a spirited defence of the need to root political practice in the soil of a

particular historical tradition. Kants less well known, but equally important,

Theory and Practice rejects the Burkean appeal to historical precedent and

tradition as a source of moral and political guidance and defends instead the

primacy of moral principles over political practice. A consideration of the

controversy between Burke and Kant helps to clarify our understanding of the

obstacles confronting Habermas attempt to mediate between the opposingclaims of moral universalism and historical particularism. It suggests that

Habermas is able to achieve such mediation only at the price of minimizing

both the normative demands of moral universalism and the human need for

roots in a particular historical community.

Habermas on Critical Theory and Social Solidarity

Habermas account of the role of universal moral principles in legitimating

the modern social and political order should be seen in the context of recent

political developments in Germany and the rest of Europe. In particular,

Habermas strong defence of moral universalism, and his highly critical

stance towards the postmodern critique of Enlightenment rationalism, must

be understood in part as a response to the reemergence in Germany, and else-

where in Europe, of the idea of history as a source of national identity.3 Before

turning to an examination of the philosophical basis of his discourse ethics, it

is helpful to look briefly at the political context in which Habermas developed

his ideas.

In the mid-1980s there was an impassioned public debate in West Germany

about the appropriate attitude the German people should take towards their

problematic history. In the Historikerstreit, as this debate came to be called, a

number of prominent West German historians argued that forty years after the

end of the Second World War it was time to put the experience of Nazi rule

and the Holocaust in a broader historical context and recognize that German

history was not exhausted by these terrible events. Some of these historiansargued for a relativization of the experience of Nazi tyranny and genocide in

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2 Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France (Indianapolis, 1987).Immanuel Kant, On the Common Saying: This May be True in Theory, but it does notApply in Practice, in Kant: Political Writings, ed. Hans Reiss (Cambridge, 2nd edn.,1991), pp. 6192.

3 For his views on postmodernism, see Jrgen Habermas, The Philosophical Dis-course of Modernity (Cambridge, MA, 1993). The idea of history as a source of nationalidentity has long been part of German historiography. There is a good account of thistopic in Georg G. Iggers, The German Conception of History: The National Tradition ofHistorical Thought from Herder to the Present(Middletown, CT, 1983).



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BURKE, KANT & HABERMAS PRACTICAL REASON 119

the light of the horrors of twentieth-century politics generally. In their view, it

was a mistake to treat the experience of Nazi genocide in isolation from the

rest of modern history, as if it were a wholly unprecedented occurrence. The

Nazi genocide should be understood in its historical context, especially that of

the prior experience of Stalinist tyranny and mass murder in the Soviet Union.4

Apart from the apologetic tendency of such revisionist history with its

implication that the crimes of the Nazis are somehow mitigated by being

shown to have had historical precedents there is a side to this debate that

deserves serious consideration. Underlying much of the debate was a question

that continues to haunt educators in Germany: How does one teach young

people in Germany about their past? How does one enable them to understandthe moral enormity of the Nazi period without also burdening them with an

intolerable feeling of guilt at being German? Part of the problem is that Ger-

many does not seem to have what one might call a usable past a past that

can effectively counterbalance the experience of Nazism. The crimes of

National Socialism cast their shadows back over the last two centuries of Ger-

man history, tainting everything with the suspicion of having prepared the

ground for Auschwitz. One way of understanding the Historikerstreit is to see

it as an attempt to supply Germans with such a usable past. As one of the major

figures in this debate, the historian Michael Strmer, wrote: In a land without

history, whoever fills memory, coins the concepts, and interprets the past,

wins the future.5

In the view, however, of Jrgen Habermas, who was one of the main con-

tributors to the Historikerstreit, this lack of a strong national identity, this dis-

tance from and suspicion in the face of the claims of historical traditions

which Strmer and others deplored as a threat to social cohesion was an

important and praiseworthy feature of post-war West German society. In

Habermas view, the experience of Nazism and the Holocaust had rendered

untenable the primal anthropological trust on which the transmission of his-

torical traditions depended.

Tradition means . . . that we unproblematically continue what othersbegan and have taught us. We usually imagine that, were we to meet theseforebears face to face, they would not completely deceive us . . . In my view,it was precisely this basis of trust that was destroyed before the gas cham-bers . . . The monstrous occurred, without interrupting the steady respirationof everyday life. Ever since a self-conscious life has no longer been possiblewithout suspicion of those continuities that are sustained unquestioningly,and which seek to draw their validity from their unquestionability.6

4 The major documents of the Historikerstreitare collected in Historikerstreit: dieDokumentation der Kontroverse um die Einzigartigket der NationalsozialistischeJudenvernichtung, ed. Ernst Reinhard Piper (Munich, 1987).

5 Michael Strmer, Geschichte in geschichtslosem Land, Historikerstreit, p. 36.6 Jrgen Habermas, The Limits of Neo-Historicism, in J. Habermas, Autonomy and

Solidarity (London, 1992), p. 238.



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In Habermas view, the historians in Germany who longed for a usable

past were appealing to a concept of tradition, and a related model of social

solidarity, which was incompatible with the conditions of modern life. In a

discussion of this question in an interview on Life-Forms, Morality and the

Task of the Philosopher, Habermas briefly entertains the notion that a tradi-

tional culture whose mores were at odds with our modern conception of uni-

versal human rights might after all be defensible, so long as it were genuinely

self-sustaining. (He uses the stock example of the ritual burning of widows in

India and raises the question of whether the British were perhaps wrong to

interfere with this custom.) Habermas quickly goes on to argue, however, that

[t]here could be no analogy to this example today, because there are no suchtraditional cultures left after three hundred years of capitalism.7 According to

Habermas, there is no longer any alternative to universalistic value orienta-

tions in a world characterized by increasing global economic interdepen-

dence and the growth of world-wide communication networks.8 In this sense,

Habermas regards the appeal to historical continuity as futile. By the time a

particular historical tradition has become sufficiently aware of itself, suffi-

ciently self-conscious, to feel threatened by criticism, it is already too late to

save it. In the modern world, the proponents of historical tradition will always

be in the unenviable position of defending a lost cause.

In rejecting the search for a usable past in Germany, Habermas argues that

the only kind of national identity or patriotism that is still possible for Ger-

mans after Auschwitz is what he calls, following the German political scien-

tist Dolf Sternberger, constitutional patriotism. This is a form of political

allegiance rooted not in the specific historical traditions of a nation but in uni-

versal conceptions of justice, democracy and human rights. Habermas con-

nects the idea of constitutional patriotism with what he calls a post-traditional

or post-conventional identity a notion he borrows from the developmental

psychology of Kohlberg and Piaget. Habermas means by these terms the

capacity of the individual to evaluate his beliefs and attitudes, not only on the

basis of the traditional or conventional norms of his society, but also from an

impartial (and implicitly universal) standpoint. The capacity to take a dis-

tanced and critical stance towards the traditions of ones society, far from

undermining social solidarity, is a necessary precondition for the develop-ment of a constitutional patriotism as the only satisfactory basis for such soli-

darity in the modern world.9

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7 Habermas, Autonomy and Solidarity, p. 204.8 Ibid., p. 240.9 On the concepts of constitutional patriotism and post-traditional identity, see

Jrgen Habermas, Historical Consciousness and Post-Traditional Identity: The Fed-eral Republics Orientation to theWest, in J. Habermas, The New Conservatism (Cam-bridge, MA, 1989), pp. 24867. Also Jrgen Habermas, Citizenship and National Iden-tity, in J. Habermas,Between Facts and Norms (Cambridge, MA, 1996), pp. 491515.



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Habermas defence of the modern project of replacing traditional alle-

giances with a rational attachment to universal moral norms is not, however,

entirely free of misgivings. In his reflections on the role of critical social

theory in the modern world, Habermas articulates both the emancipatory

promise and the potential moral threat inherent in the Enlightenment project

of social and political reform. On the one hand, in the face of contemporary

scepticism about the very idea of progress, Habermas argues that the desire

for emancipation from oppressive social and political institutions is not

merely the product of our current historical circumstances but an intrinsic fea-

ture of the human situation.

I cannot imagine any seriously critical social theory without an internal linkto something like an emancipatory interest . . . This is not just a contingentvalue-postulate: that people want to get rid of certain sufferings. No, it issomething so profoundly ingrained in the structure of human societies . . . sointimately built into the reproduction of human life that I dont think it canbe regarded as just a subjective attitude.10

Critical social theory is both possible and necessary if human beings are to

be capable of arriving by rational deliberation at independent norms of moral

and political conduct. Habermas draws a clear distinction between the univer-

sal and necessary validity that attaches to genuine moral norms and the

brutely factual acceptance of particular social conventions and historical tra-

ditions. Unlike mere conventions, which bind, so to speak, in a groundlessfashion by custom alone, moral norms derive their validity from the claim to

rest on good reasons.11 Habermas defence of a cognitivist and universalistic

moral theory lends crucial support to his belief that the Enlightenment project

of moral and social reform should be completed rather than jettisoned as some

of its postmodern critics have suggested.

On the other hand, Habermas is concerned to correct the pathologies inher-

ent in a one-sided technocratic view of the Enlightenment as the triumph of a

purely instrumental conception of reason over customary morality and reli-

gious belief. In his view, the emancipatory project of the Enlightenment is jus-

tified only if it makes possible a social and political order that supports the

moral dignity of ordinary human beings. He recognizes, however, that the

process of emancipation from tradition in the modern world has often had the

effect of liberating human beings from traditional moral and religious

restraints on their acquisitive and self-regarding passions, without supplying

them with any compensatory source of moral orientation. Moreover, the very

character of critical social theory tends to exacerbate this problem.

A social theory can do nothing to overcome the fundamental perils ofhuman existence . . . It could even be said that a consciousness of the radical10 Habermas, Autonomy and Solidarity, pp. 1934.11 Jrgen Habermas, Justification and Application: Remarks on Discourse Ethics

(Cambridge, MA, 1993), p. 151.



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absence of consolation is fostered in the first place by theories which informus about the stages of social formation . . . The problem is one which facesall modern societies once the religious traditions that point beyond thepurely human realm have largely lost their former authority.12

Critical social theory is a double-edged sword insofar as it tends to disen-

chant, in Max Webers phrase, all social conventions and historical tradi-

tions, including those that serve to provide moral orientation to ordinary

human beings when faced with the fundamental perils of human existence.

If Habermas moral universalism lends support to his hopes for social and

political reforms, his awareness of the role of at least some historical tradi-

tions in sustaining ordinary moral decency leads him to worry about the dis-ruptive effects associated with such reforms.

This tension in Habermas account of critical social theory reflects a more

general dilemma inherent in the very conditions of modern social and political

life. On the one hand, the self-consciously pluralistic character of modern life

renders suspect any direct appeal to social conventions or historical traditions

as a source of moral and political legitimacy. As Habermas notes: Under

modern conditions of life none of the various rival traditions can claim prima

facie general validity any longer.13 On the other hand, the emancipation of

modern human beings from the tutelage of such conventions and traditions

has not been accompanied by any rational consensus about the moral norms

that ought to govern the social and political order. Habermas must show notonly that we can arrive at such moral norms but also that they can function as

effective standards of moral and political practice.

Justification and Application in Habermas Discourse Ethics

The self-conscious pluralism of modern social and political life undermines

not only the authority of unquestioned traditions but also the normative role

of reason in guiding practice. As Habermas remarks, the modern conception

of practical reason as a subjective capacity has the disadvantage of detach-

ing practical reason from its anchors in cultural forms of life and socio-

political orders.14 Unlike the Aristotelian notion of practical reason, which

was, in Habermas view, closely tied to the accepted social and politicalnorms of the Greek polis, the modern conception of practical reason is not

embedded in a specific historical and cultural framework. The modern con-

ception of practical reason has the distinct advantage, however, that practical

reason . . . [is] related to the freedom of the human being as a private subject

who . . . [can] also assume the roles of member of civil society and citizen,

both national and global.15 This modern individualistic conception of practical

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12 Habermas, Autonomy and Solidarity, pp. 601.13 Habermas, Justification and Application, p. 151.14 Habermas, Between Facts and Norms, p. 1.15 Ibid.



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reason contains an implicit dimension of moral universality that transcends in

principle the boundaries of ones particular political community. The freedom

of the individual as a private subject is distinct from his public role as a citi-

zen of a particular state. The modern notion of practical reason as a subjective

capacity of the individual is intrinsically more cosmopolitan and universal-

istic than its classical Aristotelian predecessor.

Habermas distinction between the Aristotelian and the modern conception

of practical reason draws on his earlier debate with Hans-Georg Gadamers

hermeneutical account of practical reason.16 In Truth and Method, Gadamer

criticizes the view, which he regards as distinctive of the Enlightenment, that

reason and tradition are simply opposed to one another. He argues that oppos-ing reason and tradition so starkly fails to account for the historical rootedness

of human understanding and ascribes to critical reason a radical autonomy

from prejudice that is incompatible with the conditions of human finitude.17

Moreover, this opposition obscures the possibility that tradition itself may be

the bearer of truths deserving rational acceptance and recognition. Most cru-

cially, to conceptualize reason and tradition solely in adversarial terms is, in

Gadamers view, to subvert the conditions that make practical reason pos-

sible. Following Aristotle, Gadamer argues that practical reason is not a mat-

ter of applying abstract moral principles to particular practical dilemmas but

of articulating the knowledge of the concrete situation implicit in the actions

of successful moral and political practitioners. Modifying Aristotle in the

light of Heideggers analysis of the historicity of human existence, Gadamer

argues that such practical knowledge is always rooted in and made possible by

the beliefs and practices of a given historical tradition.

In his debate with Gadamer, Habermas does not take issue with the view

that one always engages in reflection on moral and political matters from

within a specific historical standpoint. He does not mean to resurrect the

Kantian idea of a transcendental ego, unmoored from historical and social

context. He rejects, however, the view that practical reasoning cannot or

should not attempt to transcend its historical context and appeal to universal

moral and practical principles. In the first place, for reasons already men-

tioned, Habermas agrees with the Enlightenmentphilosophs that suspicion is

the right attitude towards the claims of tradition. For Habermas, Gadamersattitude towards tradition betrays the same nostalgic longing for historical

16 The HabermasGadamer debate has been the subject of considerable discussion inthe scholarly literature on both thinkers. For a good overview of the original debate froma Habermasian standpoint, see Thomas McCarthy, The Critical Theory of JrgenHabermas (Cambridge, MA, 1984), pp. 16993. A more nuanced account of Gadamersposition can be found in Ingrid Scheibler, Gadamer: Between Heidegger and Habermas(Lanham, MD, 2000), pp. 970. See also Richard Bersteins Beyond Objectivism andRelativism: Science, Hermeneutics and Praxis (Philadelphia, PA, 1991) for an assess-ment of the philosophic implications of this debate.

17 Gadamer, Truth and Method(New York, 2nd revised edn., 1993), pp. 27785.



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continuity with the past later evinced by the conservative historians in the

Historikerstreit. In the second place, Habermas argues against Gadamer that

moral and political criticism of tradition which Gadamer, of course, does

not mean to exclude does require the possibility of formulating genuinely

universal moral standards. In Habermas view, Gadamers historicized

Aristotelianism cannot supply any independent criteria for distinguishing

between the defensible and indefensible features of a particular tradition. Like

Kant, Habermas insists on the need for some form of higher normative tribu-

nal that stands above the mores of a particular historical tradition and political

culture.

In Habermas view, Gadamers Aristotelian model of practical reason isill-suited for addressing the problems of moral and political judgment in the

modern world. The greater complexity of the modern state, its division into a

number of partially independent spheres and the consequent proliferation of

social roles, requires the development of morally reflective individuals who

are capable of justifying their beliefs and actions in terms of universal moral

norms rather than particular social customs or mores. This complexity also

facilitates the development of such capacity for independent moral reflection,

insofar as it tends to detach the individual from traditional cultural, ethnic and

religious allegiances. At the same time, however, Habermas notes that the com-

plexity of modern social and political life also hinders the effective applica-

tion of such universal moral norms. The modern social and political order has

taken on a life of its own that is increasingly unresponsive to the moral con-

cerns of individuals. The rise of modern individualism, which makes such

moral reflection possible, has been accompanied by both the development of

the anonymous power of the market economy and a vast increase in the size

and complexity of the government bureaucracy. The greater moral freedom of

the individual in the modern world is thus shadowed by a growing sense of his

own powerlessness in the face of modern economic and political conditions.

Habermas presents his own attempt to bridge the gap been moral theory and

practice the gap between justification and application, as he puts it as a

response to the earlier failures of the great nineteenth-century thinkers Hegel

and Marx to overcome the limitations of the liberal individualist tradition.

Habermas argues that the philosophies of history of both men can best beunderstood as ultimately futile attempts to answer the problem of the practical

insufficiency of individual reason in the modern state by substituting a

macro-subject (the world spirit or the proletariat) for the individual sub-

jects of liberal social contract theory. The cunning of reason in history and

the class struggle were supposed to accomplish what the reason of the indi-

vidual was unable to do bridge the gap between theory and practice. But, as

Habermas notes, the philosophy of history can only glean from historical

processes the reason it has already put into them with the help of teleological

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concepts.18 The dilemmas inherent in the modern individualistic conception

of practical reason cannot be solved, but only displaced, by appealing to a col-

lective subject of history.

Habermas proposes to resolve these dilemmas in his discourse ethics by

dropping the subject-centred conception of reason that is common, he

believes, to both the liberal social contract tradition and its HegelianMarxist

critics, for a communicative conception of reason based on an ideal of lin-

guistic interaction between a plurality of subjects.19 In doing so, however,

Habermas abandons the idea that reason itself can supply any substantive ori-

entation for managing practical tasks.20 The conception of communicative

reason, which Habermas puts forward as the successor to practical reason,articulates the linguistic and pragmatic presuppositions on the basis of which

one can deliberate with others about practical matters, but it does not itself

provide any concrete answer to the question of how one should act.

[Communicative reason] has normative import only in the broader sense thata communicatively acting subject must accept pragmatic counterfactualpresuppositions. He must make certain idealizations for example, ascribeidentical meanings to linguistic expressions, make context-transcendingvalidity claims for his utterances, or regard his addressees as accountablesubjects.21

Communicative reason constrains the results of practical deliberation

only in the sense that it establishes the semantic and pragmatic ground rulesfor any form of reasonable discourse. The advantage of this argument is that

it locates a universal and context-transcending dimension in language itself

as an everyday medium of communication and social coordination. The dis-

advantage is that the normative character of communicative reason is too

broad to serve as a direct guide to action. The norms of social interaction that

follow from the idealizing presuppositions of ordinary communication are

necessarily very general, and are summed up in the following formal principle

of universalization: Only those norms may claim to be valid that could meet

with the consent of all affected in their role as participants in a practical dis-

course.22 Moreover, not only are the norms presupposed by the exercise of

communicative reason very general, but they are also weak in the sense of18 Habermas, Between Facts and Norms, p. 2.19 See Jrgen Habermas, An Alternative Way out of the Philosophy of the Subject:

Communicative Reason versus Subject-Centered Reason, in J. Habermas, The Philo-sophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge, MA, 1987), pp. 294326.

20 Habermas, Between Facts and Norms, p. 5.21 Habermas, Justification and Application, p. 81. For a concise account of the steps

leading to the idea of communicative rationality, see Habermas, Between Facts andNorms, pp. 917.

22 Jrgen Habermas, Morality and Ethical Life: Does Hegels Critique of KantApply to Discourse Ethics?, in J. Habermas,Moral Consciousness and CommunicativeAction (Cambridge, MA, 1995), p. 197.



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lacking the power to motivate the will directly. In Habermas words, such

norms bind the will but do not bend it . . . they lack the impulsive force of

empirical motives.23 Communicative reason discloses the presuppositions of

valid moral argumentation but can neither obligate one to engage in moral

argumentation nor motivate one to act on moral insights.24 Moral insight

requires the support of complementary social and political institutions in

order to be effective in practice.

In rejecting the central thesis of Kants moral theory that pure practical rea-

son can determine the will independently of empirical motives, Habermas is

compelled to provide an account of the social and political institutions that

can supply an affective basis for a universalistic morality. As Habermas notesin a discussion of Hegels critique of Kantian morality, any universalistic

morality is dependent upon a form of life that meets it halfway.25 The affec-

tive basis of a universalistic morality can be developed only with the support

of appropriate forms of socialization and education. While the theoretical jus-

tification of moral norms requires the capacity to detach oneself from the spe-

cific institutions and practices of a particular social and political order, the

practical application of such norms relies on psychological propensities that

must be fostered by these very institutions and practices. It is possible to com-

bine the opposing conditions of justification and application only if the insti-

tutions and practices of ones society already embody universal principles to a

sufficient extent. Moral norms can thus be genuinely effective only under the

conditions of what Habermas calls a post-conventional society. This is a

society in which the unreflective authority of tradition has been supplanted by

the reflective acceptance of impartial legal norms as the principal source of

social and political order.

In Habermas view, the conditions for the emergence of a post-conventional

social and political order have already been achieved to a significant degree in

the modern Rechtsstaator constitutional state. Where the rule of law has been

established as a prominent feature of the political culture of a society positive

law and post-conventional morality complement each other and together

overlay traditional ethical life.26 The citizens of a fully fledged modern con-

stitutional state derive their sense of communal solidarity not from an attach-

ment to its particular historical traditions but from the legal and moralreciprocity developed in the course of public deliberation about the shape of

its fundamental laws and institutions. Insofar as the citizens of a modern

constitutional state genuinely succeed in internalizing the principles that sup-

port the constitutional order (as they must do if they are to develop a post-

conventional identity), they can be regarded as free and equal participants in a

126 L. HUNT

23 Habermas, Justification and Application, p. 41.24 Ibid., p. 33.25 Habermas, Morality and Ethical Life, p. 207.26 Habermas, Justification and Application, p. 155.



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common discourse about justice rather than as the mere inheritors of a particu-

lar historical tradition.

It is important to remember, however, that the citizens of a modern consti-

tutional state are the inheritors of a particular historical tradition, insofar as

they are the beneficiaries of a centuries-long struggle to realize these univer-

sal principles of justice in institutional form. For Habermas, moral universal-

ism is not a fact of reason, in Kants sense, not a timeless moral truth, but a

historical result. Without ascribing this result to the dictates of a predeter-

mined historical teleology, Habermas nonetheless argues that the last two or

three centuries have witnessed the emergence . . . of a directed trend toward

the realization of basic rights. This positive historical judgment about theprospects for the realization of human rights in the modern world is a crucial

component of Habermas argument, since, as we have seen, his defence of

moral universalism depends crucially on the existence of appropriate social

and political institutions.

In this respect, Habermas partially agrees with the well-known Hegelian

criticism of the failure of Kantian moral theory to provide an adequate

account of the social and political conditions of individual moral autonomy.

Habermas argues that his discourse ethics can answer this Hegelian objection

because it reformulates Kants metaphysical and subjective concept of

moral autonomy in non-metaphysical and intersubjective terms. Like Hegel,

Habermas argues that the moral autonomy of the individual can be realized

only in a concrete social and political order. Unlike Hegel, however, for

whom the realization of universal human rights in the institutions of the

modern state was the necessary culmination of the unfolding of reason in his-

tory, Habermas intimations about the gradual embodiment of moral princi-

ples in concrete forms of life remain tentative and subject to historical

contingency.27 Faced with the rise of new forms of ethnic nationalism in post-

Communist Europe, Habermas can only appeal to the weak motivating force

of good reasons in support of the fragile institutions of constitutional democ-

racy that make possible a life in accordance with these reasons. 28

Habermas model of communicative reason is thus exposed to criticism

from two camps. To postmodern defenders of the perspectival and historically

rooted character of human thought, Habermas appeal to the universal normsallegedly underlying any effort at communication appears merely to reflect

his dependence on a specific (and now outmoded) historical tradition. For

such critics, Habermas claim that the modern Rechtstaat represents a post-

conventional form of social and political order in which universal moral and

political norms have replaced particularistic traditions is specious. The moral

intuitions that underpin Habermas discourse ethics are themselves no more

27 Ibid.28 Ibid., p. 53.



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than the contingent moral conventions of a particular political culture.29 To

more robust defenders of moral universalism (and there are still some about),

Habermas reformulation of Kants categorical imperative as a procedural

method for public moral and political deliberation achieves universality only

at the price of weakening the normative force of practical reason. By rejecting

the central claim of Kants moral philosophy that practical reason can move

the will to act independently of empirical motives, Habermas makes the effec-

tiveness of practical reason dependent on the historical development of sup-

porting moral and political institutions. In the absence of a plausible

philosophy of history that establishes the necessity of such historical develop-

ment, Habermas account of the conjunction between moral universalism andthe institutions of the modern state appears to be no more than an (increas-

ingly) disputable empirical hypothesis. His discourse ethics is able to bridge

the gap between historical traditions and moral universalism only by seriously

underestimating the claims of both.

Burke and Kant on Theory and Practice in the French Revolution

The problematic relationship between moral universalism and historical

particularism is central to the controversy between Burke and Kant on the

French Revolution. BurkesReflections is a critical examination of the origins

and probable course of the French Revolution that traces its descent into des-

potism to the pernicious influence of what Burke calls political metaphysics,i.e. to the political ideas of the radical French Enlightenment and its inheritor

and critic, Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Kants Theory and Practice was written in

part to combat the growing influence of Burkes Reflections which had

been translated into German by Kants former student Friedrich Gentz, the

future secretary of Metternich on the conservative opponents of the French

Revolution in Kants native Prussia. Kant wrote this essay under the watchful

eye of the Prussian censor and was thus careful to avoid any direct reference to

Burke or his work. There is, however, a clear allusion to Burke in the Preface

to Theory and Practice. Kant refers to a certain worthy gentleman who

admonishes academic theorists to stop meddling in politics and return to their

classroom with a phrase from Vergils Aeneid (referring to Aeolus, Romangod of the winds): Let him lord it there in his own court! This is the very pas-

sage from the Aeneidwith which Burke in the Reflections consigned the po-

litical metaphysicians of the French Revolution to their classrooms.30 Kant,

128 L. HUNT

29 Cf. Richard Rorty, Habermas and Lyotard on Postmodernity, in Habermas andModernity, ed. Richard Berstein (Cambridge, 1985), pp. 16175.

30 Burke, Reflections, p. 51; Kant, Theory and Practice, p. 63. Paul Wittchen firstnoted this allusion to Burke in Kant und Burke, Historische Zeitschrift, XCIII (1904),p. 25. Frederick Beiser also emphasizes the importance of Burke as a target of Kantspolemic in The Politics of Kants Critical Philosophy, in Frederick Beiser, Enlighten-ment, Revolution, and Romanticism (Cambridge, MA, 1992), p. 39. For an unpersuasive



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in opposition to Burke, proposes to defend the moral philosopher from the

criticisms of the practising politician that he is a mere pedant who, unfitted

for practical affairs, merely stands in the way of their experienced wisdom.31

Kant rejects the appeal to historical tradition as a way of determining the

legitimacy of a proposed moral or political reform. To appeal to historical pre-

cedent as the test of a proposed reform is not to avoid the abstractions of theo-

ry but to condemn a new and untried theory in the light of the defects of a

previous theory. What the Burkean defender of tradition regards as a perma-

nent feature of the human condition may well prove to be nothing more than

the impermanent result of a bad theory.32 Moral and political progress is pos-

sible only if one does not let historical experience have the last word.Burkes defence of tradition is not, however, merely a blind sanctioning of

the status quo. To understand Burkes defence of the moral and political role

of tradition, we must see it in the context of his critique of the French Revolu-

tion. Burke regarded the French Revolution as an event of world-shaking pro-

portions, a kind of watershed in human history, because he saw in it the advent

of a new sort of politics: the politics of ideological conflict. As he wrote in his

Thoughts on French Affairs:

The present Revolution in France seems to me . . . to bear little resemblanceor analogy to any of those which have been brought about in Europe, uponprinciples merely political. It is a Revolution of doctrine and theoretic

dogma. It has a much greater resemblance to those changes which havebeen made upon religious grounds . . . The last revolution of doctrine andtheory, which has happened in Europe, is the Reformation.33

The crucial fact about the French Revolution, in Burkes view, was that it

was based not merely on political quarrels local to France but on ideas (such

as equality, liberty and fraternity) that claimed to be universal in application.

This is clear from the very wording of the title of his work: Not Reflections

on the French Revolution, but Reflections on the Revolution in France. For

Burke, the French Revolution was a universal event with a local habitation

and name. Like the Protestant Reformation, which divided Europe into war-

ring religious camps, the French Revolution divided people in every country

in Europe into partisans for and against the principles of the revolution.

Moreover, the more radical of the French Revolutionaries thought of them-

selves as making a decisive break with historical traditions for the sake of a

new, purely rational political order. In their eyes, the institutions of the past

attempt to downplay the significance of this allusion, see Dieter Henrich, On the Mean-ing of Rational Action in the State, inKant and Political Philosophy, ed. Ronald Beinerand William J. Booth (New Haven, CT, 1993), p. 114 n.7.

31 Kant, Theory and Practice, p. 3.32 Ibid.33 Edmund Burke, Thoughts on French Affairs, in E. Burke, Further Reflections on

the Revolution in France (Indianapolis, IN, 1992), p. 208.



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were hopelessly corrupt and the slate had to be wiped clean before a new soci-

ety could be built. It was this ambition to remake society from scratch that

most disturbed Burke about the French Revolution. He saw this ambition as

the fundamental error of revolutionary politics. In the Reflections he admon-

ishes the French in the following terms:

You chose to act as if you had never been molded into civil society, and hadeverything to begin anew. You began ill, because you began by despisingeverything that belonged to you. You set up your trade without a capital.34

This economic metaphor of the institutions and mores of ones society as a

kind of inherited capital an inheritance that the French Revolutionaries

have foolishly squandered recurs in another passage from the Reflections,

where Burke speaks of what is most distinctive about the English sensibility:

. . . in this enlightened age I am bold enough to confess that we are generallymen of untaught feelings, that, instead of casting away all our old preju-dices, we cherish them to a very considerable degree, and to take moreshame to ourselves, we cherish them because they are prejudices . . . We areafraid to put men to live and trade each on his own private stock of reason,because we suspect that this stock in each man is small, and that the individ-uals would do better to avail themselves of the general bank and capital ofnations.35

Burkes critique of the French Revolution is thus a defence of the politics of

prejudice. But what does Burke mean here by prejudice? We often contrastprejudice with reason: a prejudiced person is one who is either incapable

or unwilling to submit his views and preferences to rational evaluation. It is

important to note, then, that Burke does not mean to oppose prejudice to rea-

son as such, but merely to the reason of the isolated individual, the individual

who claims to be wholly detached from the traditions of his society.36 By

prejudice Burke here means the stock of common beliefs of a society a

stock that is always more extensive than any single individual can encompass.

In Burkes view, the long-standing prejudices of a people like the English, far

from being simply a testament to the persistence of irrationality in human

affairs, are the repository of a great deal of practical wisdom. They are the pre-

cipitate of centuries of moral and political experience. By contrast, the reason

130 L. HUNT

34 Burke, Reflections, p. 31.35 Ibid., p. 76.36 Burkes account of the positive role of prejudice in practical judgment is strikingly

similar to that of Gadamer, although the political implications are more pointed in thecase of Burke. Gadamer is most concerned with showing the limitations of the Cartesianmodel of reason as total freedom from presuppositions. For Burke, the essence of Jaco-binism was the attempt . . . to eradicate prejudice out of the minds of men, and the curefor Jacobinism was the recognition of the latent wisdom of prejudice. Gadamer, Truthand Method, pp. 2788; Burke, The Correspondence of Edmund Burke (Chicago,195878), Vol. VIII, p. 129.



15/24


of an individual person is an inherently limited and fallible instrument that

cannot claim to be authoritative in its own right.

Burkes defence of prejudice rests on his acceptance of the view, derived

from the great theorists of the passions in the Scottish Enlightenment, David

Hume and Adam Smith, that reason can be effective only in proper conjunc-

tion with the imagination and the passions.37 Like Hume and Smith, Burke is

concerned to refute on both moral and psychological grounds the Hobbesian

view that human beings are driven solely by self-interest and the fear of death.

In Burkes view, this Hobbesian psychology leads to a conception of the

political community as a mechanism devoid of public affections, in which

laws are to be supported only by their own terrors and by the concern whicheach individual may find in them from his own private speculations or can

spare to them from his own private interests.38 The radical Jacobin project of

reconstituting political society on a purely rational foundation appears to be

both chimerical and symptomatic of an impoverished and reductive under-

standing of human life. It is in this light that Burkes defence of prejudice and

the pleasing illusions of pre-Revolutionary society must be understood.

Reason by itself is incapable of moving human beings to any positive action.

But reason in the service of a purely materialistic conception of the ends of

human life threatens the moral beliefs and habits that support a decent social

and political order. In Burkes view, the Enlightenment hope that the deliber-

ate calculation of collective benefits will eventually supplant the irrational

attachments of prejudice is profoundly misguided: that sort of reason which

banishes the affections is incapable of taking their place. The emancipation

of individual reason from common prejudice is simply a prelude to its

enslavement to the individuals baser needs. In the hands of its radical propo-

nents, reason has proved to be an effective tool not so much for elevating

human beings above their narrow prejudices as for stripping them of their

humanity by exposing their underlying animal nature. In Burkes notorious

pronouncement: On this scheme of things, a king is but a man, a queen is but

a woman; a woman is but an animal, and an animal not of the highest order.39

37 Burkes debt to the empiricist analysis of the passions is most evident in his earlyessay on aesthetics,A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublimeand Beautiful(1757). Foran overview of the place of Burkes thought in the British empiri-cist tradition, see James Conniff, The Useful Cobbler(Syracuse, NY, 1994), pp. 1951.There are some interesting reflections on the relation between the moral and politicalviews of Hume, Smith and Burke in David Miller, Philosophy and Ideology in HumesPolitical Thought(Oxford, 1981). In a letterto Smith on The Theory of Moral Sentiments,Burke praises thework notonly for itspowerful reasoning butalso for itselegantpaint-ing of the manners and passions (Correspondence of Adam Smith, ed. E.C. Mossner andI.S. Ross (Indianapolis, IN, 1987), pp. 467).

38 Burke, Reflections, p. 68.39 Ibid., p. 67.



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The common prejudices of a nation are superior to the reason of the individ-

ual, not only because they are the repository of the practical wisdom of previ-

ous generations, but because such prejudices engage the mind more

effectively than do rational precepts alone. Reason by itself is not sufficient to

guide the mind in a steady course of wisdom and virtue. The practical deci-

sions of life are better met by relying on settled prejudice than on rational cal-

culation. In Burkes words: Prejudice renders a mans virtue his habit, and

not a series of unconnected acts. Through just prejudice, his duty becomes a

part of his nature.40

This conception of the role of prejudice in practical judgment and character

formation is strikingly similar in some ways to Aristotles account of thenature of prudence or practical wisdom. Like Aristotelian prudence, Burkean

prejudice involves the capacity to act appropriately and reliably in the particu-

lar and varied circumstances of practical life. Where Burke differs from Aris-

totle is in placing the locus of such practical wisdom not in the individual

human being of exemplary prudence, but in the historical traditions of a peo-

ple. In Burkes view, prudence is not so much the direct attribute of the indi-

vidual statesman as a reflected quality of the historical tradition of which he is

the caretaker.41 The task of the statesman is thus principally conservative. His

goal should be to preserve as much as possible the continuity of the traditions

of the community to which he belongs. Of course, Burke does not mean to

exclude the possibility of political change. On the contrary: A state without

the means of some change is without the means of its conservation.42 But

Burke thought it the duty of a prudent statesman to cloak even the most radical

departures from the constitutional order in the guise of a return to the ancient

fundamental principles of our government.43 The indispensable role of preju-

dice in moral and political judgment requires preserving at least the sem-

blance of historical continuity even in times of revolutionary upheaval.

Kants disagreement with Burke (and his German followers) concerns both

the moral legitimacy and the political efficacy of the appeal to prejudice and

tradition in the modern period. It is important to see where the crux of this dis-

pute lies. Kant does not take issue with Burkes argument that rational princi-

ples alone are insufficient to provide guidance in moral and political matters.

Like Burke and Aristotle, Kant recognizes that moral and political practice isnot merely a matter of following certain abstract rules of conduct, for such

rules are empty unless they can be applied to particular cases. Kants term for

this activity of relating general principles to particular cases is judgment,

Urteilskraft. In the Preface to Theory and Practice, Kant notes that the act of

132 L. HUNT

40 Ibid., pp. 767. My emphasis.41 Again, the similarity to Gadamers historicist reading of Aristotles notion of pru-

dence is striking.42 Burke, Reflections, p. 19.43 Ibid., p. 22.



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judging cannot itself be governed by rules, since this would require an infinite

regress of meta-rules to account for the application of each previous rule. The

gap between theory and practice cannot be bridged by theory alone but

requires the informed judgment of individual practitioners.44

While Kant thus agrees with Burke on the need for practical judgment, the

conclusion he derives from this point is the opposite of Burkes. Burke took

the need for practical judgment to be evidence of the irrelevance, or even the

positive harm, of abstract principles in moral and political life. Kant, on the

contrary, takes the need for practical judgment to be evidence of the illegiti-

macy of judging theories solely in terms of their practical implementation. A

doctor who lacked practical judgment would certainly be of much less help indelivering a baby than would a practiced midwife, but that as such is no reflec-

tion on the science of medicine. The fault here lies not with the theory but with

the person using it. To take another example of Kants: an artilleryman who

criticizes the mathematical theory of ballistics . . . since experience in apply-

ing it gives results quite different from those predicted theoretically simply

reveals thereby his ignorance of the need to supplement the theory of ballistics

with a theory of air resistance in order to arrive at the correct empirical results.

In this case, what is needed is more, not less, theory.45 The gap between theory

and practice, which practical judgment fills, means that it is possible for an

accomplished practitioner in a particular field to do relatively well in the

absence of much theoretical knowledge, and for a competent theoretician to

be a practical bungler, but it does not permit the honest practitioner to scorn

advances in theoretical comprehension that can aid his practice. In Kants

words, no-one can pretend to be practically versed in a branch of knowledge

and yet treat theory with scorn, without exposing the fact that he is an ignora-

mus in his subject.46

The objection may be raised, however, that Kants examples of the relation

between theory and practice are all taken from the applied sciences such as

agriculture, economics, medicine and applied physics. Whether or not Burke

would agree with Kants account of the role of theory in the development of

44 Kant, Political Writings, pp. 61 ff. The prevalent misconception that Kantian

morality is excessively rule-bound and ignores the need for moral judgment derives fromtaking Kants Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals as the final word in his moralphilosophy. The emphasis in that work on the role of maxims and the Categorical Impera-tive gives a one-sided picture of Kantsmoral concerns. As Kant emphasizes, thepurposeof the Groundwork is not to provide a complete moral philosophy but to seek out andestablish the supreme principle of morality (Immanuel Kant, Akademie-Textausgabe(Berlin, 1968), Vol. IV, p. 392). Even in the Groundwork Kant notes that moralityrequires anthropology, i.e. a knowledge of human nature, in order to be applied tohuman beings (ibid., p. 412). For a treatment of the topic of moral judgment in Kant, seeBarbara Herman, The Practice of Moral Judgment(Cambridge, 1993).

45 Kant, Political Writings, p. 62.46 Ibid.



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such scientific and technical knowledge, he would certainly question the rele-

vance of such examples to moral and political judgment. Kant himself

acknowledges that there is a problem with his initial choice of examples when

he notes that

. . . a theory which concerns objects of perception is quite different from onein which such objects are represented only through concepts, as withobjects of mathematics and of philosophy. The latter objects can perhapsquite legitimately be thoughtof by reason, yet it may be impossible for themto be given. They may merely exist as empty ideas which either cannot beused at all in practice or only with some practical disadvantages. 47

This point is a familiar one to readers of Kant: reason goes astray if it isallowed to follow its own lead, without attending to the conditions of pos-

sible experience, which include the necessary relation of our concepts to the

material supplied by the senses. Philosophers are especially subject to the

temptation of constructing a house of cards out of ideas that, although logi-

cally consistent with one another, have no possible empirical application. But

Kant does not conclude from this point that moral philosophy (and political

philosophy insofar as it involves the concept of duty or obligation) must take

its guidance from experience. On the contrary, it is precisely here that Kant

insists the most strongly on the primacy of theory to practice, for to recognize

a course of action as a duty or obligation is to imply that it is possible to

engage in that course of action. In Kants words, it would not be a duty tostrive after a certain effect of our will if this effect were impossible in experi-

ence (whether we envisage the experience as complete or as progressively

approximating to completion).48

The concept of duty is unique in that it implies the empirical realizability of

the actions that it enjoins. Moreover, the test of such empirical realizability

cannot be previous experience, since, as we have already noted, such experi-

ence may simply signal the failure of previous theory to employ genuine

ideas in the process of legislation. The proper relation of reason to experience

in Kants practical philosophy is the opposite of that which holds in his theo-

retical philosophy. While the argument of the Critique of Pure Reason is

directed against the pretensions of rationalist metaphysicians to arrive at

knowledge of reality without the mediation of empirical conditions, the argu-

ment of the Critique of Practical Reason is directed against the view of empir-

icist philosophers, like Burke, that reason can be practically effective only

insofar as it is empirically conditioned.49

The political consequences of Kants position are worth noting. In his view,

the mistake of the French Revolutionaries was not, as Burke thought, that they

134 L. HUNT

47 Ibid.48 Ibid.49 Cf. Dieter Henrich, Ethics of Autonomy, The Unity of Reason: Essays on Kants

Philosophy, ed. Richard Velkley (Cambridge, MA, 1994), pp. 934.



19/24


were too principled, but that they were not principled enough. They acted on

the basis not of the formal principle of right [Recht], but of the empirical end

of happiness. Kant defines the formal principle of right as the restriction of

each individuals freedom so that it harmonizes with the freedom of everyone

else and public right as the distinctive quality of the external laws which

make this constant harmony possible.50 Kant contrasts this formal definition

of public right in terms of the legal coordination of independent free agents

with the idea of happiness as a goal at which all human beings by nature nec-

essarily aim (although there is no single end that all human beings acknowl-

edge as constituting happiness). The revolutionary, according to Kant,

justifies his violent overthrow of the legal order in terms of the welfare of thepeople, i.e. in terms of furthering their happiness. He ignores the formal and

certain character of right for the sake of the empirical and uncertain end of

happiness. But, in destroying the legal order, he thereby destroys the only

framework within which individuals can safely pursue their happiness as they

see fit. The revolutionary turns out to be the mirror image of the paternalistic

despot, who justifies the denial of fundamental rights to the people on the

grounds that they are incapable of looking out for their own happiness. In

Kants words,

The sovereign wants to make the people happy as he thinks best, and thusbecomes a despot, while the people are unwilling to give up their universal

human desire to seek happiness in their own way, and thus become rebels. Ifthey had first of all asked what is lawful (in terms of a priori certainty,which no empiricist can upset), the idea of a social contract would retain itsauthority . . . as a rational principle for judging any lawful public constitu-tion whatsoever.51

Kant proves to be more adamant than Burke in denying the right of a people

to revolt against an oppressive, but legally constituted, government. He

argues that revolution is absolutely prohibited, even in cases where the ruler

has violated the original contract by authorizing the government to act tyran-

nically.52 In Kants view, there can be no middle ground between legitimacy

and illegitimacy. To follow the natural-law tradition and formulate an empiri-

cal criterion for the subjects justified use of force against his superiors (for

example, in terms of the length and severity of the injustices suffered by a peo-

ple) is to make all lawful constitutions insecure and produce a state of com-

plete lawlessness (status naturalis) where all rights cease to be effectual.53

50 Kant, Political Writings, p. 73.51 Ibid., p. 8352 Ibid., p. 81.53 Ibid., p. 82. Kant refers here to theviews of GottfriedAchenwall (171972), whose

workIus naturae in usum auditorum was used by Kant as a textbook for his lectures onnatural law.



20/24

The only legitimate recourse for the subject of an oppressive power is the

freedom of the pen. While denying the right of the subject to overthrow his

ruler by force, Kant insists on the right of the subject to arrive at his own judg-

ments on the measures taken by the ruler and to express these judgments pub-

licly. In Kants view, just as the people must be shown that civil freedom

requires the existence of coercive laws and a sovereign power strong enough

to enforce them, so rulers must in turn be persuaded that they have nothing to

fear from permitting their subjects to discuss freely and openly the justice of

their actions. This right of publicity, as Kant calls it, cannot be guaranteed

by anything other than the respect that the ruler has for public opinion.

Kants strategy for addressing the political crisis inaugurated by the FrenchRevolution thus differs fundamentally from Burkes. While Kant agrees with

Burke in repudiating the methods of the French Revolutionaries, he is much

more sympathetic than Burke was to their ultimate aims. In Theory and Prac-

tice, Kant makes every effort to disassociate the universal principles of the

Enlightenment from the bloody deeds of the French Revolution. Taking direct

issue with Burkes analysis of the causes of the revolution, Kant argues that

the revolutionaries committed their worst excesses not because they were

guided by abstract and universal principles, but because they neglected such

principles for the sake of the delusory goal of directly furthering the happiness

of the people. Kant suggests that, if the revolutionaries had been truer to their

ideals, they would have been more patient with the slow pace of political

reform, and less ready to resort to violence. Moreover, unlike Burke, who

argued that abstract ideas have no place in politics and called for the clear sep-

aration of political power from intellectual accomplishment, Kant praises the

philosophic Frederick the Great for telling his subjects: Argue as much as

you like and about whatever you like, but obey!54 Kant places his own hopes

for political reform neither in revolutionary violence nor in pious traditional-

ism, but in the gradual spread of public enlightenment under the protection of

a benevolent despot.

Reason, Tradition and the Nature of Practical Judgment

Kant characterizes the modern period as an age of criticism. In such an age,Burkes appeal to traditional prejudices, far from serving to legitimate moral

and political institutions, can only awaken just suspicion, and cannot claim

the sincere respect which reason accords only to that which has been able to

sustain the test of free and open examination.55 Kants fundamental criticism

of the Burkean position is that it fails to recognize the self-critical character of

modern moral and political life. Habermas views are in accord with this

136 L. HUNT

54 Immanuel Kant, An Answer to the Question: What is Enlightenment? ,PoliticalWritings, pp. 55, 59.

55 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (New York, 1965), Preface to the FirstEdition, p. 9.



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Kantian formulation of the problem facing any appeal to tradition in the mod-

ern world. He criticizes his opponents in the Historikerstreit precisely for

relying on a conception of historical continuity that is incompatible with such

reflective self-criticism. The arguments of both Kant and Habermas suggest

that the Burkean appeal to tradition is necessarily self-defeating under the

conditions of modern social and political life.

It is certainly true that the particular political institutions defended by

Burke in the Reflections a mixed regime consisting of a landed aristoc-

racy, an established Church hierarchy with substantial property holdings, and

a hereditary monarchy are now as dead as the dodo. Moreover, it is undeni-

able that the tone of the Reflections often betrays a melancholy awareness ofcoming too late on the scene: the age of chivalry is gone. That of sophisters,

economists, and calculators has succeeded; and the glory of Europe is extin-

guished forever.56 Burkes argument in the Reflections, however, is not sim-

ply an exercise in ineffectual nostalgia. On the contrary, Burke presents a

powerful case for a new kind of post-revolutionary politics, in which the pru-

dent statesman, having learned from the catastrophic events of the French

Revolution the danger of relying on abstract and universal principles in moral

and political affairs, deliberately embraces and defends the particular histori-

cal traditions of his nation. Burke is a peculiarly self-conscious and reflective

conservative. A closer examination of his rhetoric in the Reflections reveals

that he was very much aware of the self-critical character of modern political

life to which Kant and Habermas call attention. His appeals to tradition are

always hedged by an awareness of the constructed character of these tradi-

tions and of the need for political imagination to sustain them. As Burke

writes in a typical passage:

We have derived no small benefit from considering our liberties in the lightof an inheritance. Always acting as if in the presence of canonized fore-fathers, the spirit of freedom, leading in itself to misrule and excess, is tem-pered with an awful gravity.57

In the same passage, Burke speaks, in deliberately paradoxical terms, of a

choice of inheritance, implying that the acceptance of historical traditions is

never simply passive or uncritical. Just as Kant admits the need for practicaljudgment and sensitivity to historical context in the application of moral and

political norms, Burke acknowledges that the continuation of a tradition is

invariably selective and involves a critical break with some elements of the

past. For Burke, the historical continuity of the past with the present is not a

gift but an achievement.

The dispute between Burke and Kant on the relation between theory and

practice does not turn therefore on the need for contextual judgment in the

application of moral and political principles, but rather on the question of the56 Burke, Reflections, p. 66.57 Ibid., p. 30. My emphasis.



22/24

necessary conditions for such practical judgment. In Burkes view, the

attempt to emancipate oneself completely from the conventions and traditions

of ones society in order to attain an independent critical standpoint from

which to exercise such judgment is ultimately self-destructive, since there is

no Archimedean point that can support such independence from historical tra-

dition. We need to foster and protect the conventions and traditions of our

society precisely in order to cover the defects of our naked, shivering

nature.58 Burkes defence of tradition is rooted not in an unreflective piety

towards the past, but in a disillusioned recognition of the human need for illu-

sions. Kant, on the other hand, is more optimistic about the ultimate prospects

for moral and political reform, because he believes his moral philosophy pro-vides an independent standard of moral judgment that does not require such

conventional support. As Kant tells us in the Groundwork of the Metaphysics

of Morals, the morally good will shines like a jewel by its own light as some-

thing which has full value in itself.59 Emancipation from the customs and tra-

ditions of ones society is justified, in Kants view, so long as it is guided by

the polestar of the moral dignity of man.

In judging the debate between Burke and Kant it should be kept in mind that

they are both post-Enlightenment thinkers. Their dispute rests on a common

awareness of the disenchantment of traditional sources of authority in the

modern world. Moreover, they agree in ascribing the primary cause of such

disenchantment to the instrumental and materialistic character of modern nat-

ural and political science. Despite their agreement as to the nature of the prob-

lem, however, they propose as solutions two quite different models of

practical judgment.

Kants proposed solution to the problem involves nothing less than a com-

plete revision of the modern conception of reason. The modern instrumental

conception of reason is deficient because it is unable to supply an intrinsic end

or goal for human life. Instrumental reason is at the mercy of whatever contin-

gent ends the desires and passions imposed on the individual. In Humes

well-known formulation: Reason is, and ought only to be a slave of the pas-

sions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey

them.60 Moreover, the lack of any intrinsic end or goal of human life means

that the pursuit of the ends established by the desires and passions has nointelligible limits. In Kants view, the unintended consequence of the

emancipatory project of the Enlightenment is the enslavement of human

beings to their own ever-expanding passions.61 It is possible to avoid this

138 L. HUNT

58 Ibid., p. 67. For an insightful account of the scepticism underlying Burkes defenceof tradition, see Michael Mosher, The Skeptics Burke:Reflections on the Revolution inFrance, Political Theory, 19 (3) (1991), pp. 391418.

59 Kant, Akademie-Textausgabe, Vol. IV, p. 394.60 David Hume, Treatise on Human Nature, ed. David Fate Norton and Mary J.

Norton (Oxford, 2000), p. 266.61 Cf. Richard Velkley,Freedom and the End of Reason (Chicago, 1989),pp. 4460.



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consequence only if reason (at least in its moral employment) can be shown to

generate ends independently of empirical motives. The concept of the autono-

my of pure practical reason as the capacity of the moral will to act on such

ends is thus not a dispensable metaphysical appendage to Kants moral intu-

itions (as Habermas takes it to be), but is rather a necessary component in

Kants account of the self-legitimation of the modern social and political

order.

Unlike Kant, Burke has no quarrel with the view that reason depends for its

practical efficacy on the assistance of the lower faculties of the imagination

and the passions. In opposition to the calculating and individualistic rational-

ism of the Enlightenment philosophs, however, Burke argues that thedependence of reason on the passions requires that the reason of the individual

be grounded in the common life of a particular historical community. Because

reason is unavoidably an instrument of the passions, it is crucial to provide the

passions themselves with moral direction, and this can be accomplished only

by moral habituation within the confines of an established political commu-

nity. Burkes proposed solution to the emancipation of instrumental reason in

the modern period is to engage in a rhetorical defence (which is always also a

reconstruction) of the threatened common traditions of his society. While

acknowledging that the innovative spirit of modern science has seriously

damaged the continuity of moral and political traditions in the modern state,

Burke sees no alternative but to attempt a partial restoration of such traditions

by means of self-conscious political rhetoric.

The issues that Burke, Kant and Habermas raise are central to an under-

standing of our contemporary moral and political dilemmas. We have neither

a rationally defensible account of tradition nor a morally effective conception

of practical reason. The instrumental conception of reason bequeathed to us

by the Enlightenment is both corrosive of traditional sources of authority and

incapable of providing autonomous moral and political guidance. Kants

attempt to develop an account of reason that accords better with our experi-

ence of moral freedom addresses this lack of moral guidance, but founders on

his untenable metaphysical dualism. Habermas attempt to ground a Kantian

conception of practical reason in a non-metaphysical account of the pragmatic

presuppositions of rational discourse avoids reliance on a noumenal self, butonly at the price of weakening drastically the normative authority of practical

reason. Moreover, in his laudable desire to repudiate the virulent nationalism

of the recent German past, Habermas fails to address adequately the human

need for particular communal and historical identity. His discourse ethics

founders on an overestimation of the capacity and willingness of human

beings to act on the basis of abstract principles of right, and a consequent

underestimation of the role of habit, prejudice and tradition in guiding the

lives of ordinary human beings.



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In the end, Burkes account of the positive role of tradition and prejudice in

guiding moral and political judgment may prove to be more resilient than its

critics have supposed. Stripped of its merely nostalgic elements, Burkes

argument that reason depends for its moral and political efficacy on the prior

cultivation of the passions and sentiments is more plausible psychologically

than the elaborate attempts of Kant and Habermas to incorporate moral norms

into the concept of reason itself. Burkes frank recognition that reason is pri-

marily an instrument of the passions points to the indispensability in the for-

mation of practical judgment of an education addressed to our sentiments as

well as our reason. Unlike Kant and Habermas, Burke does not make the mis-

take of burdening the frail reed of human reason with tasks it is unable to carryout alone.

Louis Hunt MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY

140 L. HUNT

PRINCIPLE AND PREJUDICE: BURKE, KANT AND HABERMAS ON THE CONDITIONS OF PRACTICAL REASON

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