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The Conflict of the Faculties and the Knowledge Industry: Kant's Diagnosis, in his Time and Ours

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 October 2008

David Evans
David Evans
Affiliation:
Queen's University Belfast
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Abstract

Kant's short essay is a reflection on the contemporary structure of academic studies; he examines this structure in terms of the functions of the State and of the Universities which form part of it. His analysis links the empirical facts with conceptual distinctions, in ways that are familiar from his more general and abstract philosophy. His main aim is to ground a distinction between legitimate and illegitimate ways in which different Faculties of the University may approach intellectual issues that are of common interest to them. I then consider to what extent and how a Kantian analysis might be applied to our contemporary University situation. Despite the societal and intellectual differences between Kant's environment and ours, I argue that significant parallels exist between the two cases and that Kant's proposals and strictures for his own time have application for us today.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy , Volume 83 , Issue 4 , October 2008 , pp. 483 - 495
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 2008

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References

1 That University closed in 1945, when Russia captured Königsberg and renamed it Kaliningrad. The Kaliningrad State University has recently rebranded itself as Immanuel Kant State University of Russia; and in a number of places and ways the modern city has begun once again to celebrate its most famous son.

2 Funding is only one element in the relation between Universities and government; and I shall say more about this when I come to comment in detail about today's Universities. What is really important for Kant's argument, and for my contemporary adaptation of it, is the phenomenon of governmental authority and thereby control, rather than financial direction as such.

3 The work can be read in The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant: Religion and Rational Theology, transl. Allen Wood and George di Giovanni (Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 233–327. That translation is based on the work of Mary Gregor (New York: Abaris Books, 1979). The German text, with Russian translation, was published by the Immanuel Kant State University of Russia in 2003.

4 Critique of Pure Reason A339–40/B397–8.

5 I summarise the argument of Critique of Practical Reason (Akademische Ausgabe 5: 110–119).

6 This paper was first given, in my regretted absence, at UNESCO World Philosophy Day in Istanbul in November 2007. Thanks to Bill McBride for presenting it there. Subsequently I gave it at Glasgow University and benefited from comments especially from Alan Weir, Alan Carter, Michael Brady and Stephen Bostock.