The first systematic exploration of Kant's anthropology to highlight the significance of his theories for the genesis and development of sociological thought.
While previous attention has been given to the role played by David Hume, Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Johann Gottfried, Kant's contribution to the beginnings of sociology tends to be neglected. In this interdisciplinary and innovative work, Alexey Zhavoronkov sheds light on the sociological dimension of Kant's anthropology. He conveys that from the mid-1780s, Kant narrowed the scope of his pragmatic anthropology to focus on the social world, understanding it as the sum of human relations and interactions.
Zhavoronkov identifies the socially-relevant core elements in Kant's thought and discusses the meaning of three specific notions: 'unsocial sociability', enlightenment, and cosmopolitanism. He demonstrates how the often-overlooked anthropological aspects of Kant's concept of Spiel ('play'/'game') impacted George H. Mead's social interactionism, and draws on the work of Popper, Latour, Schatzki, Lindemann, and Moreno to highlight gaps in contemporary sociology.
By presenting Kant's unique and independent role in the emerging social sciences, this much-needed study underlines the impact Kant's anthropological ideas continues to have on contemporary debates. It is an in-depth examination of the relevance of Kant's insights in crucial debates on the relationship between theoretical analysis and empirical research in social sciences.
