Lubica Ucnik

This edited volume highlights the continuing relevance of Husserl's phenomenology, through a selection of work from members of the Organization of Phenomenological Organizations. As their papers amply demonstrate, contemporary phenomenology retains its critical focus, even as the discipline continues to expand and diversify. The book consists of four sections. In the first, authors focus on the contemporary implications of Husserl's critique of natural science and the problem of meaning; in the second, they draw upon phenomenological insights to help us understand present day social and ecological crises. The third includes contributions on the relationships between phenomenology, hermeneutics, literature and art; while in the final section, authors take up the work of prominent post-Husserlian phenomenologists to think through issues of language, interpretation, philosophy, religion and the history of ideas. In sum, the variety of approaches these thinkers take in order to understand issues that currently confront us richly demonstrates the enduring significance of Husserlian phenomenology for 20th- and 21st-century philosophy.

In this paper, I outline Kant’s attempt to account for the category of relations, which is concomitantwith his effort to prove that atomism cannot describe human experience. Kant’s journey from the FirstCritique to his last work the Opus Postumum is a struggle against atomistic versions of the world. Inthe last instance, it is a transit from I think to I act; and it is also recognition that to act can only beperformed in a relational manner in community with others. In order to substantiate his explanation ofreal forces in the world, Kant rethinks and extends his understanding of the subject from the subject asthe unity of apperception to the self-positing subject living in the world with others. In order to defend‘the being in the world’ who ‘has rights,’ I argue that we need to return to Kant’s general account ofrights for all humans in the world