ABSTRACT
What is it that makes us unique as persons? And how does this influence or even determine what we do and how we live? How can we put ourselves in a relation to ourselves and encounter, explore, and form who we are? What roles do others play in this process? These are questions that might not be known as the most prominent ones in Husserl’s research program. They are, however, central for his self-understanding as a philosopher and for the broader, ethically transformative project of his transcendental phenomenology. This chapter examines Husserl’s writings on ethics and his late writings on “border problems,” as well as Ideas II to explore the connection between personhood and practical agency. By focusing on the issues of uniqueness, freedom, and unity, special attention will be paid to the ruptures and challenges of an overarching identity as well as to the constant interrelatedness of passivity and activity, given and formed personality.
