Recognition and Freedom

Abstract

Axel Honneth incorporates his political theory of democratic ethical life in „Das Recht der Freiheit“ (RdF), 2011, (English title: Freedom’s Right – The moral grammar of social conflicts) within intersubjective recognition theory as found in his „Kampf um Anerkennung“ (KuA). 1994, (English title: The Struggle for Recognition – The social foundations of democratic life) as a revised model of the basis of recognition. Against the three forms of intersubjective recognition (KuA) stand five new spheres of institutionalised recognition (RdF). In RdF „intersubjective recognition“ no longer acts as the central concept of social theory but instead „social freedom“. Despite explicit and emphatic support of the freedom model for the recognition concept the precise conceptual connection between freedom and recognition in RdF remains essentially only fragmentarily explained. This suggests that the conceptual relationship between recognition and freedom remains unclear and so the connection between recognition theory and political social theory can be called into question. In respect of discussion of Honneth’s revision of the recognition concept this argues that the recognition model as the foundation for his theory of democratic ethical life becomes a complementary instead of a substitute interpretation. On the basis of the separation of the spheres of democratic public life I argue that paying regard to the three original forms of recognition, especially with regard to social appreciation, is indispensable for a consistent theory of democratic ethical life. As a condition of social freedom in democratic public life the form of recognition of social appreciation constitutes a bridge between the individual and the plane of political institutions.