Abstract

In Kant's Metaphysics of Morals, Part I: The Doctrine of Right (in the last section of the Conclusion),⁴⁹ cosmopolitan right takes the shape of international political right rather than as the whole of civil rights of the world citizen. In a general instancethe establishing of universal and lasting peace is the ultimate end of all international right. Perpetual peace is called a metaphysically sublimated idea of reason and remains incapable of realization (§ 61). In a manner, like the general idea of right, it does not qualify for direct empirical actualization. An indirect symbolic representation of this sublime idea of perpetual peace needs empirical instigation, as it applies the paradigm of power to the conceptualization of the idea of right. The construction of itsconcept is made by analogy with the possibility of free movement according to the law of equality of action and reaction. In the realm of international law a cosmopolitan constitution whose laws have power, obviously entails the establishment of mutual and equal coercion between interrelated states. This will lead to a continuous approximation ofthe highest political good: perpetual peace. However, the question must be asked how the compulsory character of law and the construction of the idea of right relate to practical reason (duty) as such and to natural necessity. In the end, does mechanical logic only elucidate practical reason, or should the idea of freedom be normative? It rather seems that neither of both can cancel the other. The sublime character of cosmopolitanism implies an abiding element of unrepresentability and therefore a permanent impracticability to this idea. "Man justly can conceive himself as citizen of a nation and at the same time as a full member of the cosmopolitan community. That is the most sublime idea which man can have about his destiny." (Reflexionen 8077) In this permanent tension consists the sublime character of what by experience never can be confirmed as an established realm