> "Consideration of the general historical patterns that characterize
> the
> twenbtieth century, then, calls into question the post-strucutralist
> understanding of history as essentially contingent. This does not,
> however, necessarily involve ignorning the critical insight that
> attempts to deal with history contingently -- namely, that history,
> understood as the uhfolding of immanent necessity, should be
> understood
> as marking a form of un-freedom." Moishe Postone, "Theorizing the
> Contemporary World: Robert Brenner, Giovanni Arrighi, David Harvey,"
> in
> Robert Albritton, Roberet Jessop and Richard Westra, eds., _Political
> Economy and Global Capitalism: The 21st Century, Present and Future_
> (London & New York: Anthem Press, 200u), p. 8
Why must the idea of history as "the unfolding of immanent necessity ... be understood as marking a form of un-freedom"? Where history is understood as the development, through a series of "necessary" because internally related "educational" stages, of a rational "subject" with the developed capabilities required for feeling, thinking and acting "universally" and, in this sense, in accordance with "necessity," "the unfolding of immanent necessity" is the unfolding and actualization of "freedom" understood as fully rational self-determination.
The ontological and anthropological ideas underpinning this idea aren't refuted by merely pointing out their inconsistency with the ontological and anthropological ideas dominant in Western thought since the 16th century, ideas inconsistent with any idea of self- determination let alone this one.
Ted