The Kantian Revolution and the New Perfectionism Lecture by Douglas Moggach

• In-Person event
• 303, Paterson Hall, Carleton University
• 1125 Colonel By Drive, Ottawa, ON, K1S 5B6

• Contact
• Geoffrey Kellow, GeoffreyKellow@CUNET.CARLETON.CA

The Kantian Revolution and the New Perfectionism

Douglas Moggach

The Kantian revolution in ethics springs from Kant’s critical appropriation of Leibniz, especially the idea of freedom as spontaneity or self-initiated action. Kant’s adaptation of this idea in the Groundwork and Critique of Practical Reason reshapes the ethical domain, but also transforms political debate in the German territories, on the state, rights, coercion, and economic intervention. Extending Kant’s critiques, Wilhelm von Humboldt, Schiller, Fichte, Hegel, and the Hegelian School (including Marx) work out divergently the relations among freedom, justice, and progress, establishing a new current in political thought, ‘post-Kantian perfectionism’.

Douglas Moggach is Distinguished University Professor, University of Ottawa; Honorary Fellow, St. Catharine’s College Cambridge; and Honorary Professor, Department of Philosophy, University of Sydney. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, and most recently, author of Freedom and Perfection. German Political Thought from Leibniz to Marx (Cambridge University Press, 2025).