Note 57 — III. GENERAL

Fragmente aus dem Nachlasse (Werke (Hartenstein), viii. p. 624). Cf. below, pp. 577-8. Kant claims for all men equality of political rights, and in his treatise on Perpetual Peace maintains that wars are not likely to cease until the republican form of government is universally adopted. He distinguishes, however, between republicanism and democracy. By the former he means a genuinely representative system; the latter he interprets as being the (in principle) unlimited despotism of majority rule. Kant accordingly contends that the smaller the staff of the executive, and the more effective the representation of minorities, the more complete will be the approximation to the ideal constitution. In other words, the less government we can get along with, the better.