Naturalizing Kant's Politics.

Kant's city of words is a tremendous source of ideas and strategies for contemporary political theorists. Yet the theoretical foundation of Kant's practical philosophy, the doctrine of transcendental idealism, advances a two-world metaphysics that seems hard to square with modern science. How it is possible to naturalize Kant's politics? That is, how is it possible to advance Kantian politics after Darwin? This essay shows how John Rawls and Gilles Deleuze blend Kant's and Hume's doctrines to forge philosophies that both transcend and originate within the given. Initially, I show how Rawls and Deleuze recast the concept of reason to overcome the dualityâ??between rationalism and sensualismâ??that characterizes Enlightenment historiography. Then, I present Rawls's and Deleuze's argument that naturalizing Kant's politics today means rethinking the terms of political pluralism. This position is not consonant with Kant's aim to formulate a pure moral philosophy that grounds both Kant's doctrines of right and virtue, but it does resonate with the Kantian project of criticizing the ideas and practices of one's age. Finally, I show how Rawls and Deleuze conceive the relationship between common sense and philosophy. Both Rawls and Deleuze agree with Kant that philosophy becomes practical through engaging and criticizing common sense. Yet Rawls's basic sympathy for democratic common sense, and Deleuze's philosophic antipathy towards common sense as such, marks the basic difference between Rawls's and Deleuze's post-Kantian political theories. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]