Herméneutique et philosophie pratique de l'histoire : la question de l'application

Abstract

Gerard Raulet, Hermeneutics and the Practical Philosophy of History : the Question of its Application ; Inseparable from the constitution of sense, the moment of application poses the question of the contribution of hermeneutics to a practical philosophy of history. Critical theory has tried to clarify the articulation of knowledge and practical interests, thus making the historical dimension of this application the real vehicle of synthesis and of objectivity. This socialization of hermeneutics implies, however, its materialization. The transcendental affinity resides in the already historical figures of the man-nature dialectic. The importance of this « objective-real » hermeneutics is revealed when the hermeneutics of social interests fails to produce a consistently normative orientation. In this « post-modern » context of the decomposition of sense, the objective-real hermeneutics offers a way out : confronted with a history which becomes once again a « natural history », it continues to see allegories of sense and redirects the practical philosophy of history on a philosophical foundation of symbolic forms.