Main theoretical and methodological approaches to understanding power: dialectics versus metaphysics

Author(s):  S.S. Chernykh, Platov South-Russian State Polytechnic University (NPI), Novocherkassk, Russia, s.s.chernykh@mail.ru

Issue:  Volume 43, № 3

Rubric:  Thesis

Annotation:  Power as a special form of human activity, realized through a certain culture and specific knowledge and skills specific for its implementation, was already examined in detail in ancient philosophy, primarily in the writings of Plato and, in part, Aristotle. During the subsequent long historical period (several millennia), power was interpreted from the metaphysical position (sub specie aeternitatis), that is, as power, power and glory originating from the higher (eternal) transcendental source. The article presents a comparative philosophical analysis of the metaphysical and dialectical approaches to understanding power in the anthropological perspective. It is noted that in the era of modern times there has been an opposition between the two approaches to the interpretation of power, which is connected in many respects with the change in the culture of the correlation of such concepts as "eternity" and "time" that occurred against the background of a qualitative growth of the productive forces of mankind and the class struggle

Keywords:  the metaphysics of power, the dialectics of power, the disenchantment of the world, modernity, the anthropology of power, alienated labor

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