The most seminal contribution of Hegel to Political Philosophy is his theory of state. Like Plato, Hagel is a great system builder. His theory of state is rooted in the axiom: “What is rational is real and what is real is rational”. It means that whatever exists in the world is according to Reason and whatever is according to reason exists.
Hegel’s theory of state is based on the basic premise about the gradual unfolding of Reason or Spirit or Absolute Idea through a dialectical process, Reason gets its perfect realisation in the state. Thus, the state is Reason personified. State is rational, state is real; therefore what is rational is real.
Here, real does not only mean that which is empirical but that which is fundamental. In fact, Hegel distinguishes between real and that which merely exists. That which merely exists is only momentary and mere surface manifestation of underlying forces which alone are real. Thus, Hegel sought to bridge the gap between the rational and the real. The real is nothing but the objective manifestation of spirit.
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This implies that for Hegel all states are rational in so far as they represent the various states of unfolding of Reason. By doing so he took a conservative position because it tantamounts to saying that whatever happens is manifestation of unfolding of Reason. No event ever occurs unless ordained by Reason. So every event takes place according to a rational plan. He considered the state as “March of God on Earth” or the ultimate embodiment of Reason.
State, for Hegel, is the highest manifestation of Reason because it emerges as a synthesis of family (thesis) and civil society (antithesis). Family fulfils man’s
Biological needs food, sex and love. It is the first manifestation of spirit but it cannot fulfill the higher or more complex needs for which we need a civil society.
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While the basic feature of family is unity based on love the civil society is necessary for the fulfilment of his competitive self-interest and for the satisfaction of diverse human needs, particularly the economic needs which the family cannot fulfil. The civil society is organised on the basis of individual’s material needs, which are not wholly private and yet are primarily self- regarding. It is less selfish than the family.
It is saved from disintegration because men begin to realise that their needs can be met only by recognising the claims of others. Civil society educates the individual where he begins to see that he can get what he needs only by willing what other individuals need. It is not a complete organic unity. Such unity is realised only when the tension involved in the contradiction between family and civil society is transcended in the final synthesis of the state.
The civil society looks after the material needs of human beings and therefore, Hegel sees it as state in its embryonic form. The state looks after the universal interests of the whole community and it acquires art organic character.