Hegel's socio-philosophical ideas /part 3/
According to Hegel, the idea of law goes through three stages:
Abstract law - this is a stage that is connected with the idea of ownership, that everyone has the right to possess some property and to agree with the rest of the people to guarantee that property. Abstract law has a formal character, inasmuch as it gives the individual a legal status of property.
Hegel pays great attention to private property. According to him, a person becomes a person thanks to the ability to own property.
As it is unacceptable to ban private property, it is also inadmissible to turn the man himself into property.Moral - this is a higher degree in the development of law. Here the abstract law is filled with content. There is a conscious attitude of man towards his actions. In morality one is guided by his inner thoughts and considerations. From this point of view, morality may conflict with abstract law.Morality is related not to external prescriptions but to the inner thoughts of man. At this level, the individual's freedom consists in doing a conscious act according to their own thoughts.
The highest degree in the development of the idea of right is morality. Man acquires moral freedom through and in communicating with people. One compares the common goal with their individual goals.Civil society and the state, according to Hegel, are equivalent. Civil society is understood to be a system of mathematical needs of people arising from the development of industry and trade (Hegel calls bourgeois civil society).Hegel depicts civil society as the arena of fighting all against all. However, this is not the natural state of man, but it arises at a certain stage related to the affirmation of private property.
Civil society is divided into three branches - agricultural, industrial and general (including administration, civil service). As a result of the unification of these three occupations, peaceful cohabitation can not be guaranteed. That is why power is needed like the state.
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