{"title":"Heir and Bastard (Notes on the Social Genesis of Ressentiment)","authors":"L. Fishman","doi":"10.30570/2078-5089-2021-103-4-145-162","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"The article focuses on redefining the social genesis of ressentiment. The concept of ressentiment, widely used today in the form shaped by Friedrich Nietzsche and fine-grained by Max Scheler, turns out to be both overly and insufficiently connected to the social structure of the societies, for the analysis of which it is used. The reason is that although Nietzsche’s and Scheler’s ideas about ressentiment refer to the socio-structural aspects of its genesis, they do so in a contradictory and incorrect manner. Without noticing their own contradictions, both thinkers elevate genesis of ressentiment to the moral standards of the lower classes. Using the examples of younger heirs and bastards of the medieval aristocratic families, as well as the examples of other relatively privileged social groups, the author shows that one should rather seek the genesis of ressentiment within higher social strata. At the same time, the author shows that the moral feelings and behavioral strategies germane to ressentiment can be adopted and are adopted by representatives of other classes. In this form, it attracts attention in times when the oppressed classes obtain real opportunities to change their position, or, at the very least, they receive reasons to believe that they could achieve more if such an opportunity had been given to them.","PeriodicalId":47624,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Political Philosophy","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":2.9000,"publicationDate":"2021-12-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Journal of Political Philosophy","FirstCategoryId":"98","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.30570/2078-5089-2021-103-4-145-162","RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"ETHICS","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
The article focuses on redefining the social genesis of ressentiment. The concept of ressentiment, widely used today in the form shaped by Friedrich Nietzsche and fine-grained by Max Scheler, turns out to be both overly and insufficiently connected to the social structure of the societies, for the analysis of which it is used. The reason is that although Nietzsche’s and Scheler’s ideas about ressentiment refer to the socio-structural aspects of its genesis, they do so in a contradictory and incorrect manner. Without noticing their own contradictions, both thinkers elevate genesis of ressentiment to the moral standards of the lower classes. Using the examples of younger heirs and bastards of the medieval aristocratic families, as well as the examples of other relatively privileged social groups, the author shows that one should rather seek the genesis of ressentiment within higher social strata. At the same time, the author shows that the moral feelings and behavioral strategies germane to ressentiment can be adopted and are adopted by representatives of other classes. In this form, it attracts attention in times when the oppressed classes obtain real opportunities to change their position, or, at the very least, they receive reasons to believe that they could achieve more if such an opportunity had been given to them.
期刊介绍:
The Journal of Political Philosophy is an international journal devoted to the study of theoretical issues arising out of moral, legal and political life. It welcomes, and hopes to foster, work cutting across a variety of disciplinary concerns, among them philosophy, sociology, history, economics and political science. The journal encourages new approaches, including (but not limited to): feminism; environmentalism; critical theory, post-modernism and analytical Marxism; social and public choice theory; law and economics, critical legal studies and critical race studies; and game theoretic, socio-biological and anthropological approaches to politics. It also welcomes work in the history of political thought which builds to a larger philosophical point and work in the philosophy of the social sciences and applied ethics with broader political implications. Featuring a distinguished editorial board from major centres of thought from around the globe, the journal draws equally upon the work of non-philosophers and philosophers and provides a forum of debate between disparate factions who usually keep to their own separate journals.