Naturalism and Social Philosophy: Contemporary Perspectives

Can societies fall ill? Can institutions die, or social practices degenerate? Must social norms be embodied? To what extent is social action habitual? Is social life part of nature or does it transcend it? This book explores the meaning and many facets of naturalism in social philosophy. It investigates the consequences of concepts such as ’second nature’ and ’forms of life’ for social philosophy. It analyses the ways in which social action, gender, work and morality are embodied. It surveys the conceptions of nature at play in social criticism. It provides students and experts of social philosophy with both an overview and critical analyses of the many facets of naturalism in social philosophy from Hegel to contemporary critical theory.
Contributors: Louis Carré, Fabian Freyenhagen, Martin Hartmann, Axel Honneth, Thomas Khurana, Steven Levine, Sabina Lovibond, Arvi Särkelä, Barbara Stiegler, Mariana Teixeira, Italo Testa

Martin Hartmann is professor of philosophy at the University of Lucerne, Switzerland. He focuses on political philosophy, social philosophy, philosophy of trust, Critical Theory, and the philosophy of emotions. He has published books on trust, John Dewey, the philosophy of emotions and articles on Critical Theory, pragmatism, trust, David Hume, Adam Smith, and the philosophy of emotions.

Arvi Särkelä is a postdoctoral researcher at ETH Zürich, Switzerland. He focuses on social philosophy, philosophy of culture, philosophy of nature, and the history of philosophy. He has published many articles on Adorno, Dewey, Hegel, Nietzsche and Wittgenstein. He is the author of the book Immanente Kritik und soziales Leben: Selbsttransformative Praxis nach Hegel und Dewey and co-editor of John Dewey, Sozialphilosophie (with Axel Honneth), John Dewey and Social Criticism (with Federica Gregoratto and Just Serrano) and Pathologies of Recognition (with Arto Laitinen).