Alienation

This lucid first book from Jaeggi reconceives the philosophical concept of alienation, claiming that alienation is not the absence of a relation but rather is "a relation of relationlessness." This intervention is coupled with the provocative assertion that the subject does not contain a true inner self. Instead, identity is realized through one's participation in the world and with others, through actions, commitments, projects, and relationships. Alienation is the inability to properly appropriate these engagements or identify with one's own life. Through the question of alienation the book opens a broad philosophical inquiry into what it means to be a human being and to have sovereignty over one's life. Jaeggi develops her thesis through an array of phenomenological descriptions and case studies, bolstering the work through a rich dialogue with the history of alienation from its Marxist-Hegelian conception to formulations in contemporary analytic and continental philosophy. Although succinct, at points the book's clarity sacrifices a more thorough investigation of certain lines of thinking (possibly because the book is a revised version of Jaeggi's dissertation), though in the foreword Axel Honneth avers that this shortcoming is rectified in her second (as yet untranslated) book. Nevertheless, Jaeggi's treatise is an intriguing contribution to the study of alienation. (July)