ABSTRACT
This chapter begins by comparing the political thought of Rawls and that of Hegel by stressing what remains, no doubt, the fundamental difference between them: their respective stances in regard to metaphysics in general. Hegel viewed his political philosophy as but one subpart of his more comprehensive metaphysical system, as set forth in his Enzyklopaedie. Whereas for Rawls, philosophy aims for a "reflective equilibrium" between our most deeply held moral principles and a theory which purports to generate them, Hegel's philosophical method—the political employment of the infamous "dialectic" — may similarly be so described. The chapter shows that Rawls, with the method of "reflective equilibrium", attributes to practical reason a similar, if mitigated function. Perhaps the leading criticism which the German idealists have leveled at the utilitarians is that the latter operate with an inadequate conception of the person and of human dignity; utilitarianism conceives of the person as little more than a container of homogeneous desires bent on maximization.
