Publisher's Synopsis
This work takes a basic phenomenological distinction (between the object and the process of consciousness) and examines it both from a historical perspective, and as it applies to the social and political realm. Self-consciousness not only has a cognitive meaning but also constitutes the human subject according to the specific way in which consciousness is grasped. Historically, the author shows that many of the problems that have appeared in the history of the study of human consciousness and self consciousness could either have been avoided altogether or greatly clarified if only both sides of the situation had been seen in conjunction with one another. The author shows how this conceptual clarification can be applied to specific problems concerning the nature of consciousness and to the social and political realm.
