The theory of recognition is now a well-established and mature research paradigm in philosophy, and it is both influential in and influenced by developments in other fields of the humanities and social sciences. From debates in moral philosophy about the fundamental roots of obligation, to debates in political philosophy about the character of multicultural societies, to debates in legal theory about the structure and justification of rights, to debates in social theory about the prospects and proper objects of critical theory, to debates in ontology, philosophical anthropology and psychology about the structure of personal and group identities, theories based on the concept of intersubjective recognition have staked out central positions. At the same time, contemporary theories of recognition are strongly, perhaps indissociably, connected to themes in the history of philosophy, especially as treated in German idealism. This volume compromises a collection of original papers by eminent international scholars working at the forefront of recognition theory and provides an unparalleled view of the depth and diversity of philosophical research on the topic. Its particular strength is in exploring connections between the history of philosophy and contemporary research by combining in one volume full treatments of classical authors on recognition Rousseau, Kant, Fichte, Hegel, Marx, Freud with cutting edge work by leading contemporary philosophers of recognition, including Fraser, Honneth, and others."

Daniel Brudney traces the development of post-Hegelian thought from Ludwig Feuerbach and Bruno Bauer to Karl Marx's work of 1844 and his "Theses on Feuerbach," and concludes with an examination of "The German Ideology," Brudney focuses on the transmutations of a set of ideas about human nature, the good life, and our relation to the world and to others; about how we end up with false beliefs about these matters; about whether one can, in a capitalist society, know the truth about these matters; and about the critique of capitalism which would flow from such knowledge.

Brudney shows how Marx, following Feuerbach, attempted to reveal humanity's nature and what would count as the good life, while eschewing and indeed polemicizing against "philosophy"--against any concern with metaphysics and epistemology. Marx attempted to avoid philosophy as early as 1844, and the central aims of his texts are the same right through "The German Ideology," There is thus no break between an early and a late Marx; moreover, there is no "materialist" Marx, no Marx who subscribes to a metaphysical view, even in "The German Ideology," the text canonically taken as the origin of Marxist materialism. Rather, in all the texts of this period Marx tries to mount a compelling critique of the present while altogether avoiding the dilemmas central to philosophy in the modern era.