The Moral Status of Women in Kant’s Political and Ethical Philosophy Krista Hyde, MA I. Introduction Kant’s ethics and political theory are seemingly in tension, given that the focus of Kantian ethics is human autonomy, while his political theory denies autonomy to women.1 As a result, Kant’s moral and political philosophies appear to be inconsistent. I maintain that this apparent conflict can be explained by Kant’s ascription of both humanity and personhood only to a very narrow field of homo sapiens. He maintains that rationality is the basis for human autonomy, but believes it is only present in adult males of European ancestry.2 All other homo sapiens, therefore, are not free, not moral agents, and consequently, not human. Since only relatively few people3 are autonomous, and therefore have humanity, Kant’s moral theory only applies to a small number. Ultimately, my claim is this: Kant associates reason and moral action, then denies that women are rational. Insofar as he links these two, when he denies that women are rational, he 1

In this paper, I will focus on the status of women in Kant’s philosophy, but the reader should understand that my arguments may apply for anyone not an adult European male. 2 A note about Kant on race and related issues: Kant does not write much on slavery, perhaps because he does not believe those “lower” in the racial hierarchy are human beings. Kant’s racial theory mirrors his ideas on gender. “Kant regarded race as a class distinction within species of animals, including humans, which was transmitted by inheritance. He projected onto ‘inferior’ races, such as Africans and American Indians, the same deficient ‘unchanging and unchangeable inferior moral quality’ that he postulated for women.” (Mills, Charles W. The Racial Contract. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1997. pp. 70–71.) Kant made a hierarchy of peoples and cultures, an ordering with Europeans at the pinnacle and Native Americans at the bottom. (O 2:245 (52-62)) “Humanity is at its greatest perfection in the race of the whites. The yellow Indians do have a meagre talent. The Negroes are far below them and at the lowest point are a part of the American peoples.” (PG 9:316 (576)) This statement of racial hierarchy is mirrored in Kant’s “On the Use of Teleological Principles in Philosophy.” (OT 8:175-176 (210-211)) Finally, Kant is famous for having given philosophy its first definition of race, and for being among the first to use scientific principles in his race theory. The definition he gives, “Among the subspecies, i.e., the hereditary differences of the animals which belong to a single phylum, those which persistently preserve themselves in all transplantings (transpositions to other regions) over prolonged generations among themselves and which also always beget half-breed young in the mixing with other variations of the same phylum are called races.” (OD 2:430 (85)) 3 In this paper, I distinguish “people” from animals, humans, and persons. Definitions and an explanation are in Section II.

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excludes them from the moral realm. This entails that a rational agent has no moral obligations to women. Kant also correlates moral action with transcendental freedom, then claims such freedom is that on which one’s humanity hinges. Since he denies women’s moral status, he denies their autonomy. In doing so, he rejects their humanity. So, in denying women’s rationality, Kant has excluded them from being human beings. Kant gives women access to humanity, however, by virtue of legitimate relationship to a rational being. That is, through their husbands, fathers, or masters, women come to obligate moral agents. A husband has duties to his wife not in herself but in her relationship to him, because she is included under his humanity as a part of his household. Once she is not under his control or leaves his sphere of influence, though, her status as a human being is lost and she becomes as property. II. Autonomy and Ethics In his ethical theory, Kant maintains that because rational human wills are autonomous, one must respect the humanity of every person. By rational, he intends that property of the will by which it is a law to itself (independently of any property of the objects of volition). As a result of our autonomy, we have individual humanity by which we are able to set particular subjective ends for ourselves and pursue our personal idea of the good life. Each person forms her own concept of that good life, and is free to aim for her idea of happiness, insofar as her plans do not conflict with those of others. In our attempts to achieve our goals, Kant says, we each adopt maxims (by which he means a person’s universal rule that she has chosen freely, imposed on herself, and by which she wills to conduct herself) to follow that we believe will procure the happiness we have defined for ourselves. The moral law is a limiting condition on what maxims one can choose in one 2 © Krista Hyde, 2013

following one’s plan, or in aiming toward happiness. That is, according to that law, in one’s individual strivings, one may only take upon oneself those maxims which can be willed to be universal. In being universalizable, this “maxim of maxims” requires respect for the humanity in other persons by portraying others as humans with life plans of their own. Those individual plans indicate that we are autonomous, as they are chosen freely. Therefore, for Kant, human dignity and worth are embedded in our status as free rational agents. This theory of Kant’s is rooted in his related theory of humanity and persons. He believes humans have three levels, or components, of their nature: the human animal (homo sapiens), the human being (human), and the human person (person). At the first, animalistic level, humans simply have desires (for food, sex, and domination) and, given the opportunity, pursue those desires. Animality has no reason, as animals are simply focused on the preservation of individual and species. As such, animality is determined. At the second, human (being) level, we are prudentially rational: humans compare desires and rank them, and as such are capable of creating plans and delaying gratification of lower-ranking desires in order to reach the gratification of maximal desires. This is the level in which humans gain practical freedom: in acting freely, one creates and accepts maxims for oneself, to guide one’s behavior. The freedom attained in this level is the ability to live according to whatever maxim one has chosen, rather than simply according to one’s immediate desires. That is, a human can be said to have (practical) freedom insofar as the human’s actions are determined by self-imposed maxims, rather than by sensuous inclination. That human ethical rules are freely chosen indicate that humans can be said to be moral. (The Categorical Imperative shows the bi-conditional relationship between morality and freedom: If there is morality, then there is freedom; if there is freedom then there is

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morality.) The third, personal level, is the moral level. As persons, we consider not only our own maxims but those of others. We are capable of determining whether those maxims are mutually compatible. Persons have pure practical reason, which tries to bring synthetic unity to maxims of all persons. In doing so, persons act only on maxims that could be willed to be universal law for everyone. At this level, humans become persons by using their freedom to choose maxims that respect the humanity of others; this is positive freedom in its fullest sense. Again, humanity has to do with being a free rational agent. Human beings choose their actions, whether good or evil, and their maxims, either lawful or unlawful. This choice is the determiner of human moral nature. Kant rejects the idea that human character can be attributed to nature itself, which would entail that humans are determined, and therefore outside the realm of the moral. (REL 6:21 (71)) As a result, being rational makes us different than animals. As autonomous beings, having positive freedom and able to choose our own maxims, we are part of the moral world and therefore have duties to as well as oblige others. So it is clear that autonomy is essential to Kant’s ethics, because responsibility requires freedom. If an individual is not ascribed responsibility, she is not a person; excusing an action by claiming the agent had no choice is to deny her humanity. III. Kant denies the rationality of women, excluding them from the moral realm I maintain that Kant does not believe women are rational, which he indicates by saying “[T]he fair sex has just as much understanding as the male, but it is a beautiful understanding, whereas [men’s] should be a deep understanding, an expression that signifies identity with the sublime,” and when he claims that women, contrary to the Categorical Imperative, act only from what is “beautiful.” (O 2:242 (51)) That is, Kant maintains that women do nothing because they ought; that is, they do not act from duty or obligation, and further, do not act from maxims. 4 © Krista Hyde, 2013

“It is difficult for me,” he says, “to believe that the fair sex is capable of principles…” (O 2:232 (43)) This entails that women do not exercise freedom to accept and apply their own maxims. Yet, as we know, Kant maintains that doing things for the sake of duty is the first requirement of ethics, and acting from maxims is a sign of reason, which excludes humans and persons from the animal realm. As a result of his denying their rationality, women are thus excluded from the moral realm. IV. Kant correlates freedom with humanity. In denying women’s rationality, Kant excludes them from the category of ‘human being.’ It is the very capacity for taking on principles (maxims) that moves homo sapiens out of the realm of the animal and into that of the human. Human beings, according to Kant, are rational freedoms, fundamentally autonomies. That is, they are capable of self-rule, of establishing their own goals and of directing themselves into attaining those ends. This same ability of self-rule makes them capable of recognizing and appropriating the Categorical Imperative. Taking on the Categorical Imperative as one’s maxim of maxims is the determiner of one’s being a person (rather than a mere human or human animal). If woman are incapable of acting from principles, as Kant puts it, then they are not truly capable of self-rule. If they do not act from duty, then they either do not recognize the Categorical Imperative or are unable to accept it and apply it to their own actions. Regardless, the result is that they neither fulfill the requirements of humanity nor of personhood. Being unable to act from principle, then, seems to indicate that women cannot achieve the Kantian category of ‘human’ and as well, are not truly persons. (MM 6:314 (458)) As a result, it seems clear that Kant at least is divided on whether women provoke moral obligations; women’s dubious rationality entails that they are not included in the moral order, for

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a being without reason doesn’t coerce or commit us, gives no duties, and cannot bind us. So, if women do not have reason, then rational beings have no duty toward them. (MM 6:241 (396)) V. Autonomy and Politics Kant’s political philosophy, further, denies autonomy to women, children, and non-white people. The tension between his ethics, which focuses so sharply on freedom, and his political theory is markedly clear in his theory of property possession. Kant maintains there are three sorts of private property rights, distinguished by their methods of acquisition: original acquisition, acquisition through contract, and acquisition “by principle.” (MM 6:285-86 (433)) That is, by original acquisition, one can acquire by right to something that was previously unowned. Through contract, one can acquire another’s labor through an agreement, as when one hires a servant. Additionally, one can have the right to another person by principle. So, one can come to own things, labor, and people. So, Kant’s political theory allows for the possibility of slavery (owning homo sapiens), which seems at odds with his second formulation of the Categorical Imperative: “Act in such a way that you also treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of another, always at the same time as end-in-itself and never simply as a means.” (GR 4:429 (80)) Further, while Kant maintains that persons’ freedom cannot be removed by contract, he states specifically that a contracted servant has no right to flee, even on being employed to an abusive master. (MM 6:283 (431)) Similarly, he holds that a wife may not flee her husband, as this would be a breach of the marriage contract, and in general, he denies any moral right of coercion. Indeed, the only response Kant allows on behalf of the violent master or husband is reprimand, or exhortation to good behavior. In contrast, a runaway wife must be returned to her husband immediately. So it

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seems Kant does not provide equal recourse to both partners in the contract. This seems problematic, and inconsistent with his ethics, if both partners are of equal status. Now, Kant’s statement in regard to absent spouses might seem somewhat egalitarian, as Kant appears to require both husbands and wives to be returned to fulfill the contract. He says, “...if one of the partners in a marriage has left or given itself into someone else’s possession, the other partner is justified, always and without question, in bringing its partner back under its control, just as it is justified in retrieving a thing.”4 (MM 6:278 (427-428)) Furthermore, he disallows multiple spouses because “in polygamy the person who surrenders herself gains only a part of the man who gets her completely, and therefore makes herself into a mere thing...”4 (MM 6:278 (428)) So it seems possible that marriage, for Kant, is a relation of “equality of possession.” (MM 6:278 (428)) And if this is the case, then Kant may not be guilty of the charge of sexism, or of treating men and women differently when it comes to the judgment of their reason and autonomy. Kant’s beliefs about the status of women, however, become clear when he says “In marital life the united pair should as it were constitute a single moral person, which is animated and ruled by the understanding of the man…” (O 2:242 (51)) He maintains that it is the job of a man to tell his wife “what [her] will is.” (A 7:310 (406)) He agrees that a woman’s “husband is her natural curator,” because he is capable of judging what actions are best. (A 7:209 (315)) Though he claims that the wife may “reign” the household and the husband “govern,” it is in the following context, “The monarch can do all that he wills, but on one condition: that his minister lets him know what his will is.” (A 7:310 (406)) That is, the wife can do whatever she likes, insofar as what she likes is determined by her husband.

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Kant makes similar claims in regard to runaway children. (MM 6:282 (430))

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Given that Kant defines a person as a being who creates plans aiming at his greatest happiness, if a woman’s desires and even her will are to be determined by her husband, it seems clear that in Kant’s understanding, she is not a person. So this is why a wife fleeing her husband has to be returned, on Kant’s theory. One has basic right to do what one wants so long as it isn’t harmful of another, only insofar as one is a rational person. The wife in question, however, is not a person or human. Right of humanity in one's own person is due to autonomy, which hinges on rationality. Lack of rationality, on the part of the woman, entails that she has no humanity in herself. Instead, she only has humanity insofar as she is included under the humanity of her husband.5 Women receive humanity only insofar as they are part of a household with a rational human at its head. Her humanity is his humanity, and her being the type of being to which one has moral obligations, is due to her being included under his personhood. As a result, if a woman falls outside the marriage contract, she is outside the moral order, and has no claim on her husband. Leaving the husband is breaking the contract, so she is simply wayward or lost property, to be returned to him. If she flees, she must be returned as stolen property to its owner if he demands it, without regard for the cause that led her to flee. VI. A potential objection: Women enter contracts While it seems probable, thus far, that Kant rejects the rationality of women, one potential problem arises. That is, how can a woman even enter the contract of marriage, if according to Kant she is not a rational being and therefore not human? Kant states that only persons (rational beings) can enter contracts; if women were not persons under his philosophy, it

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This is true also of the servant, “Servants are included in what belongs to the head of a household and…they are his by a right that is like a right to a thing; for if they run away from him he can bring them back in his control by his unilateral choice.” (MM 6:283 (431) (Emphasis mine.))

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does not seem that they could marry, as Kant holds marriage to be a sort of contract. Kant argues, for example, that a person who entered a contract which took away her freedom (for example, voluntary enslavement) would no longer be a person, and therefore the contract would be void. If this is the case, how may a woman enter the marriage contract? I argue that she does so by means of her access to rationality and humanity, through her relationship to her father. The groom owes duties to his potential wife; she obligates him through her (legitimate) relationship with her father. Indeed, this explanation of women’s status reflects traditional gender roles; a suitor was able to obtain a wife through the head of a household. This could even hold for servants; the master of the house was the “guarantor” of the women in the home. Because the potential bride obligates through her relationship to her father, a daughter who “runs away” to marry someone of whom her father does not approve, could consistently be considered stolen property and “repossessed” by the father or his agents, under the Kantian theory. It is for this reason that Kant argues, in his Metaphysics of Morals, that women (wives), children, and servants are possessed in a way akin to the possession of objects. (MM 6:278 (427), 6:282-284 (430-432)) In accordance with his ethics, Kant does acknowledge that the head of household is not permitted to treat these beings as mere objects to "use up" because while they are under his direction, he has moral obligations toward them; however, this has no bearing on the master or husband’s right to demand their return. While under his authority, they obligate; outside of it, they are animals and therefore property. VII. A second potential objection: A woman is to her husband as a citizen to a tyrant One might argue that Kant’s description of the plight of women and servants under the master of the house as similar to the plight of a citizen under an abusive tyrant. That is, Kant 9 © Krista Hyde, 2013

denies women the right to flee an abusive situation in the same way that he denies citizens the right to revolution. Perhaps it isn’t that he rejects the rationality of women; it may be that Kant is simply maintaining consistency in his application of the right of coercive resistance. One could argue that, just as the wife cannot flee her marriage, under no circumstances is it one’s right to resist the legislative head of state or to rebel on the pretext that the ruler has abused his authority. In regard to the tyrannical political leader, reform must be the result of reason and free press or pen, not through revolution (violence). Kant maintains that one has no legal or moral right against a tyrannical sovereign, because the sovereign by definition is not under law. (MM 6:318-19 (461-62)) He says, “Therefore, a people cannot offer any resistance to the legislative head of a state which would be consistent with right, since rightful condition is possible only by submission to its general legislative will. There is, therefore, no right to sedition, still less to rebellion, and least of all is there a right against the head of a state as an individual person, to attach his person or even his life on the pretext that he has abused his authority…” (MM 319-320 (462-63)). Of course, the ruler is supposed to treat people well, but (as with wives and servants) there appears to be no legitimate means of escape if he does not. However, even if it were obvious that citizens have no right to overthrow an abusive dictator, it is not at all clear that an individual who is the victim of domestic abuse should not be able to legitimately and without moral blame escape, or flee, her situation. After all, Kant’s political theory, which denies the right of rebellion, is less extensive and demands fewer obligations than his ethics. His ethics applies far more broadly, both in its requirements to oneself and to others, than his political theory. (This is because justice deals primarily with negative duties (the harm principle) while morality includes positive ones.) The tyrant is, according to Kantian political theory, above the law, and as such we shall accept for the sake of argument Kant’s claim that he must be heeded and may not be overturned.

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The “head of the household,” however, is not above the moral law. So, it should not follow that one is morally obliged to return the runaway bride, if she were of equal moral status to the husband, on Kant’s moral theory. After all, though Kant maintains that a citizen has no moral or legal right of coercive resistance, he agrees the citizen does have a strict right to use coercion to resist those who would hinder one in one’s rightful external freedom, for example, one’s right to life. He maintains the right of humanity in one’s own person. (MM 6:239-240 (395)) It would be the case, though, if the runaway wife were simply a piece of property and not a person or human, that such “stolen” property should be returned. And thus, the seeming inconsistency in Kant’s political theory becomes clear: persons have rightful external freedom; women, children, and non-Europeans who leave the relationship under which they become moral agents, lose that moral standing.6 As a result, they are treated as property, not as humans or persons to whom one has obligations. It is only in legitimate relation to the rational being, that they come to oblige the rational and autonomous agent, morally. As a result, women, children, and servants cannot resist the authority of the head of household, because without their relationship to him, they are not persons. The citizen under an abusive dictatorship, however, cannot resist the authority of the tyrant because the tyrant is under no law. While the situation of the abused wife and the oppressed citizen share some similarities, the reason for their being bound by their respective situations is different.

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Evidence for the applicability of my argument to children can be found in Kant’s stance toward the bastard child: as the infant has no legitimate relationship toward a head of household, the child has no legal standing, and does not legally obligate us. (MM 6:336 (476-77)) As a result, the law has no say over a murdered illegitimate infant, though the mother was morally obligated toward the child because she is the natural guardian. (A 7:209 (315))

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VIII. Conclusion Kant believes that the “cause” of autonomy, rationality, is present in European adult males. Because they are without rationality or autonomy, women are not within the moral realm. Since they are outside of the moral arena, rational agents have no moral obligations to women. Conversely, women have no moral obligations to others, as duties for a human being are represented in terms of one’s capacity for freedom, in terms of one’s humanity and personality. So we have duties insofar as we have the capacity for freedom, which is what makes us human. However, women can, in the proper relationship to a rational agent, be counted under his moral umbrella. This explication might leave some with a bad taste. After all, is it not anachronistic to accuse Kant of misogyny or chauvinism when he was writing in the 1700s? It is important to remember that Kant believed in an “evolution” or “progress” of reason, and held that human beings had only recently become rational, as reason makes progress in the species. Indeed, though he denies rationality to women, he also denies it to most men. Kant maintained that, eventually, reason would reach a peak. One imagines that, if he saw the successes of women in science, philosophy, and the arts, Kant would probably amend his political philosophy, and he could explain this amendment by means of the progress of reason. If reason began with a few men in the Enlightenment, perhaps with the help of the progress of nature, it could come to free the rest. Though his denial of women’s rationality is indefensible today, it is likely that Kant had extremely limited experience with both women and people of other than European ancestry during his life. As with all prejudices, it is easy to dismiss another when one has no knowledge of her. I say none of this to defend Kant’s bigotry; it cannot be defended. However, he also cannot be judged in the court of contemporary understanding on race and gender.

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Works Cited Kant, Immanuel. “Anthropology from an pragmatic point of view,” abbreviated (A). Robert B. Louden, trans. Anthropology, History, and Education. Eds. Robert B. Louden and Gunter Zoller. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2007. ---. “On the feeling of the beautiful and sublime,” abbreviated (O). Paul Guyer, trans. Anthropology, History, and Education. Eds. Robert B. Louden and Gunter Zoller. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2007. ---. “Physical Geography.” abbreviated (PG). Olaf Reinhardt, trans. Natural Science. Eric Watkins, ed. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2012. ---. “Of the Different Human Races,” abbreviated (OD). Holly Wilson and Gunter Zoller, trans. Anthropology, History, and Education. Guyer and Wood, eds. Cambridge Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2007. ---. “On the Use of Teleological Principles in Philosophy,” abbreviated (OT). Gunter Zoller, trans. Anthropology, History, and Education. Guyer and Wood, eds. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2007. ---. The Metaphysics of Morals, abbreviated (MM), and translated by Mary Gregor (Cambridge, 1991) and included in Practical Philosophy (Cambridge Edition of the works of Immanuel Kant, 1996)). Mills, Charles W. The Racial Contract. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1997.

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