Hegel’s Metaphysics and the Philosophy of Politics, edited by Michael J. Thompson, is an intellectually ambitious and dense analysis of the underappreciated and oft-misinterpreted metaphysical dimensions in Hegel’s political and social philosophy. In a modern scholarly climate where the metaphysical aspects of Hegel’s thought are frequently sidelined or outright discarded, this collection of twelve essays reasserts the indispensable role of Hegel’s metaphysical framework in illuminating his political philosophy. The book underscores a surprising intellectual paradox: as interest in Hegel has surged, particularly within the realms of Anglo-American philosophy and critical theory, the foundational metaphysical structures that Hegel himself deemed essential have been diluted or misrepresented, yielding an incomplete understanding of Hegel’s philosophical project.
The contributors, through rigorous and often technical analysis, aim to reestablish Hegel’s metaphysics as a vital component of his normative insights into modernity, agency, freedom, and rationality. By bringing metaphysics back into conversation with Hegel’s theory of the good, self-determination, and the universal, the authors challenge the prevailing post-metaphysical trend of analyzing political philosophy strictly within the bounds of constructivist and procedural frameworks, as typified by thinkers like Jürgen Habermas and Robert Brandom. These frameworks, which prioritize social pragmatics, intersubjectivity, and the justification of norms through communal agreement, stand in contrast to Hegel’s original vision—a vision that roots ethical life (Sittlichkeit), freedom, and sociality in an ontological structure that transcends mere normativity and provides objective grounding for political and social critique.
One of the central thrusts of the volume lies in examining how metaphysics, for Hegel, was not merely an abstract or antiquated concern but a profound engagement with the nature of reality itself. Hegel’s metaphysics aimed to demonstrate how political and social life are not simply the outcomes of subjective norms or procedural rationality, but rather expressions of a deeper ontological unity that manifests through the dialectical development of Spirit (Geist). Thompson and his contributors argue that Hegel’s metaphysical commitments make it possible to understand concepts like freedom, rational agency, and the good not as contingent upon individual or cultural interpretations but as part of the intrinsic, rational structure of reality. This structuralist vision stands as a challenge to more modern interpretations that reduce social ontology to a mere web of intersubjective agreements or norms.
This emphasis on metaphysics stands in stark contrast to the influential “non-metaphysical” or “post-metaphysical” interpretations that emerged from Klaus Hartmann’s categorial reinterpretation and gained popularity in the 1990s. Hartmann’s approach, echoed by scholars like Robert Pippin and Terry Pinkard, recasts Hegel’s logical categories as mere tools for organizing human cognition rather than categories that express or shape reality itself. Within this framework, Hegel’s political thought is interpreted as a system of social norms and recognitive practices, governed by historically contingent standards rather than by any objective or ontologically grounded notion of the good. As such, the post-metaphysical interpretation emphasizes the importance of social recognition and reason-giving practices within ethical life, while sidestepping any metaphysical commitment to an objective social reality that would ground normative claims in something beyond the consensus of a rational community.
Thompson and his collaborators, however, are skeptical of the adequacy of this approach, arguing that it reduces Hegel’s vision to a form of relativism that undercuts the possibility of genuinely critical judgment. Without a metaphysical basis, they argue, our norms and values remain subject to the prevailing social practices and lose their critical power to transcend cultural or contextual limitations. Hegel’s conception of freedom, then, becomes enmeshed in the historically and socially contingent “space of reasons” without the grounding necessary to critique forms of life that inhibit freedom or rational agency. In this light, metaphysics is not a superfluous or regressive aspect of Hegel’s system but is instead essential to upholding an account of freedom that is both socially situated and universally applicable.
By revisiting Hegel’s metaphysical framework, the contributors also reclaim Hegel as a thinker deeply relevant to contemporary political crises. Hegel’s metaphysical model, they argue, does not merely offer a historical curiosity but provides robust tools for addressing the ethical, social, and political pathologies that characterize modern liberal and capitalist societies. The liberal notion of the individual as an autonomous bearer of rights, severed from the social and ethical whole, is here critiqued as an impoverished conception of selfhood. For Hegel, individual freedom can only be realized within the context of a rational, structured social world that transcends individual intentions and gains meaning through its alignment with a collective ethical life. In this way, the volume positions Hegel’s metaphysics as a counterbalance to the fragmentary tendencies of modern political philosophy, which often fail to provide an adequate account of community, purpose, or shared life.
The metaphysical reconstruction pursued in this book further challenges the practical limitations of contemporary pragmatist approaches to social ontology. Figures like Robert Brandom and Axel Honneth, whose readings of Hegel focus primarily on the importance of social recognition and inferential reasoning, are critiqued for reducing Hegelian sociality to a collection of recognitive practices that lack ontological substance. The authors contend that Hegel’s original project offers a much richer account of the social whole, not as an aggregate of individual actions or intersubjective relations, but as a dynamic totality with its own intrinsic rationality. This interpretation, the contributors argue, provides a more robust foundation for political critique, one that allows us to evaluate and transform social structures based on their objective contribution to freedom and human flourishing, rather than simply on their compatibility with current communal norms or social practices.
The essays collected here demonstrate that an ontologically grounded interpretation of Hegel’s political philosophy can revitalize concepts such as justice, rights, and moral agency by rooting them in a metaphysical understanding of sociality. This perspective opens up new possibilities for understanding Hegelian concepts like self-determination and the universal, positioning them not as contingent constructs of intersubjective consensus but as real, intelligible structures within the fabric of reality. Such an approach, the authors argue, allows us to see Hegel not as a precursor to pragmatic or relativistic thought but as a thinker with a clear commitment to the possibility of objective truth in political and ethical life.
Hegel’s Metaphysics and the Philosophy of Politics offers a comprehensive and compelling reappraisal of the philosophical relevance of Hegel’s metaphysics to his social and political thought. This collection aims to bridge the gap between Hegel’s systematic metaphysical project and his practical philosophy, offering readers a way to navigate contemporary political theory with a Hegelian lens that resists relativism and upholds a vision of objective rationality. The volume will be indispensable to scholars of Hegel, German Idealism, and political philosophy, presenting a provocative and rigorous argument that Hegel’s metaphysical insights remain not only relevant but necessary for addressing the enduring problems of modernity.
Simon Gros 
Leave a comment