September 8, 2012

Hegel and American Exceptionalism

In college my assigned reading included parts of H's Philosophy of History. I remember hardly any of it except the statement that when a country formulates a model of its place in history, its leading role is drawing to an end.

It's something to keep in mind when viewing the chest-beating, especially on the Right, about American exceptionalism and about how we are the only country ever founded on an idea. It's especially something to keep in mind given the blatant discrepancy between such rhetoric and the country's performance.

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