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The Figure of “Rivalry” and Its Function in Kant’s Ethics

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Handbook of the Philosophical Foundations of Business Ethics

Abstract

This essay focuses on the figure of “rivalry” in Kantian anthropological writings, which are mostly not considered in ethical concerns. Even if for Kant “rivalry” does not have the meaning of market competition, it is still structurally the same interaction-based figure – comparable to Smith’s “invisible hand” or Hegel’s “cunning of reason.” Thus, although one cannot discuss Kantian analysis of economic acting or doing business, it is possible to discuss the figure and function of “rivalry” (or competition) in relation to the achievement of earthly morality. To make its systematic role visible, this essay distinguishes strictly – and in accordance with Kant – between the moral “discourse of reason” and the given “conditions of application.” Thus, one can see that Kant was, apart from being a thinker led by principles, also a pragmatic thinker when it came to concrete (political) situations and the question of what to do and what to allow. This essay develops this perspective in three steps, which are followed by a few terse comments for the business ethics debate. First, it outlines the theoretical difference between the a priori justification discourse and the application discourse, which has to consider empirical conditions. Second, it reconstructs the definition of “rivalry” as a consequence of a natural characteristic: it is seen to be a means of nature by which it promotes arts and culture but also coestablishes right. Against this background, it provides a development model which can serve as a dynamic paradigm for application questions. It ends with some comments for the business ethics discourse.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    I would like to thank Galia Assadi, Lisa Herzog and Ingo Pies for important tips and comments, and Christoph Lütge for his judicious rereading of the translation.

  2. 2.

    The writings of Kant are cited in accordance with the Academy Edition of the Brandenburg Academy of Sciences, i.e., the page numbers refer to named standard publications (from 1900) where possible, the English translations are taken partly from the World Wide Web.

  3. 3.

    The literally Latin–French expression concursus can merely be found in Kant’s writings as “assedence or collaboration to an effect within the world of phenomena” ([7], p. 361, note).

  4. 4.

    This “moral glow” is used here for pragmatic reasons, but cannot turn an argument around within the discourse of reason, let alone be used as a justification! See [1], A p. 747/B p. 775.

  5. 5.

    Another short essay shows what such an interpretation of history might look like. In his Alleged Beginning of Human History (1786), Kant reconstructs the biblical expulsion from paradise not as a decline, but as the development of the progress of reason. Here, it does not matter systematically whether Kant’s teleological proposals need to be interpreted theologically, because for him, no doctrine of predestination was provable at all. Therefore, he did not ascribe any grounding argument to it (see his rather negative opinion in [7], p. 362).

  6. 6.

    The laws of freedom as the rule of right derive logically from the implicit and a priori concept of free reason – being conceivable, rational, organizing principles that will not require empirical grounds ([22], pp. 195–215).

  7. 7.

    Verena Mayer has shown that Kant already saw clearly what Wittgenstein called the “paradox of obeying the rules” (Regelbefolgungsparadox). Therefore, the transfer model is to be classified as highly problematic [23].

  8. 8.

    Referring to “sustainability” here, and see especially the texts of talks by Adelheid Biesecker and Ingo Pies, both given on 7 May 2010, and Elena Esposito, given on 5 June 2010, in Berlin, Germany.

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  1. Department of Philosophy, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Ludwigstr. 31, 80539, Munich, Germany

    Dr. Tatjana Schönwälder-Kuntze

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  1. Dr. Tatjana Schönwälder-Kuntze
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Correspondence to Tatjana Schönwälder-Kuntze .

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  1. Peter Löscher-Stiftungslehrstuhl für Wirtschaftsethik, Technische Universität München, München, Germany

    Christoph Luetge

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Schönwälder-Kuntze, T. (2013). The Figure of “Rivalry” and Its Function in Kant’s Ethics. In: Luetge, C. (eds) Handbook of the Philosophical Foundations of Business Ethics. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1494-6_37

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1494-6_37

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