The request of recognition is nowadays being raised under strongly varying conditions, as in the name of minorities, collective identities or within feminism. Still growing emphasis on the need of recognition is based on the assumption of the certain links existing between recognition and identity, where the identity is used to specify human self-understanding. The first part of the study tries to follow the argumentation in support of the social and cultural recognition theory. While interpreting this theory, the authoress focuses on the works of contemporary influential recognition theory of the philosophers, namely Ch. Taylor and A. Honneth. The second part of the study explores the relationship between the recognition of the collective identities and the ideal of individual autonomy.
The aim of the study is to analyze two basic stories of human freedom, that of Kant and that of Kierkegaard. In its first part the author tries to uncover the basic motives of both philosophical stories using the film 'Minority report' as the background of his discussion. While according to Kant ethics is the basic manner of true self-understanding, Kierkegaard on the other hand suggests to suspend ethics in order to achieve authentic identity of the Self. Does a universal commitment to oneself exist at all, or is this commitment the basic problem in the search for an authentic freedom?
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