ABSTRACT
Civil Society, therefore, stands between family life and the political state. What is the principle which governs this abstraction? Hegel takes up the stance of the ‘concrete person’, the newly independent adult who is striking out on his own, pursuing his own ends, or, more likely, the head of a family, pursuing the welfare of his family.3 He is seeking these private or domestic ends in a social world where others are similarly engaged. The institutions of Civil Society which Hegel goes on to describe are those which are formed in the course of this pursuit or explained as necessary for its success. The first principle of Civil Society, the governing principle of the abstraction, is that of the self-interested satisfaction of natural needs and arbitrary desires (§182). But this cannot be a solitary achievement, since concrete persons make their way in a world inhabited by other concrete persons and their dependants. For a variety of reasons, persons find themselves locked into systems of interpersonal dependency. The private ends of individuals cannot be satisfied without structures which ensure that persons are ‘simultaneously satisfying the welfare of others’ (§182A). Thus particularity, the first principle of Civil Society, is mediated by universality, which is the second principle of Civil Society:
The selfish end in its actualization . . . establishes a system of all-round interdependence, so that the subsistence and welfare of the individual and his rightful existence are interwoven with, and grounded on, the subsistence, welfare, and rights of all, and have actuality and security only in this context.
