3- The Basic Philosophical Themes in Latin American Philosophy up to Independence

Alejandro Vallega defines the point of departure for what is termed ‘Latin American Philosophy’ as follows,

The history of Latin America and its philosophy is marked by the invasion and colonization in the sixteenth century of the continents we know today as the Americas. Therefore, Latin American philosophy has as a critical point of departure the events that begin with the arrival of the conquistadors in 1492; at the same time, it concerns not only the ways of thinking that have followed colonization but also ways of thinking that preceded colonization. (Alejandro Vallega, 2014. “Latin American Philosophy from Identity to Radical Exteriority”).

As a consequence, Philosophy in ‘Latin America’ after the beginning of colonialism has been occupied by two basic concerns: identity and independence. Therefore, we will find that philosophical themes of interest in this period (i.e., up to the end of the nineteenth century) are related to these two basic concerns David Gandolfo describes the centrality of the question of identity in Latin American thought as follows,

The concern for identity in Latin American thought opens up vistas that are not readily available in mainstream Western thought. The latter does not find it necessary to thematize the meaning of “Westernness” or “Europeanness.” It does, of course, ask the question of the meaning of humanness. But the implicit assumption is that the answer to this question would be no different than an answer to the question about European identity. Latin Americans, however, ask both the question of the meaning of being human and the question of the meaning/identity of latinidad. This double consciousness, uncovered by Hegel and formulated from the perspective of the marginalized by DuBois, Fanon, and others, enriches Latin American thought. In the awareness that the meanings of humanidad and latinidad are not coterminous comes the recognition both that humanidad can be validly instantiated in a plurality of ways, and that some people are prevented from exercising the full dignity of their humanity because of oppression of the group with which they identify and are identified. Along with this comes the recognition of the sociohistorical determinations of group identity (the fact that what it means to be “Latin American” has been determined by the social and historical formations that produced the current distribution of power). The radical, atomistic individualism that wants to be the hallmark of Western culture; the disjointed, timeless emphasis on the new, the now, the moment - these are foreign to a consciousness that knows its identity has been shaped by social and historical forces. And the recognition that these forces have built structures that lock people, because of their group identity, into oppression begins the formation of a consciousness concerned with liberation, a task that is inherently more than theory because it grows out of the awareness of sociohistorical, concrete structures of oppression that must be concretely dismantled in social space and historical time - thus a task that inherently involves praxis. Latin American liberation philosophy has taken up this task, and in so doing has forged a unique contribution to philosophy. (David Ignatius Gandolfo. 2013. ‘Liberation Philosophy’)

a-Pre-Columbian Philosophies

Efforts made for preservation of pre-Columbian philosophical thought can be viewed as part of the concerns of the question of identity. James Maffie gives a general description for the basic philosophical views of such thought as follows,

Inca philosophers inherited a vibrant tradition of philosophical reflection from a long line of predecessors in the Andean region. The Inca empire (ca. 1400–1532) – called tahuantinsuyu (“the four parts together or unified”) in Quechua, the lingua franca of the Incas – was merely the last and best known in a series of pre-Columbian Andean cultures including Chavín and Paracas (900–200 BCE), Nazca and Moche (ca. 200 BCE–550 CE), Huari and Tiahuanaco (ca. 550–1000) and Chimú (ca. 1000–1400). There was no single, pan-Andean philosophy shared by all Andean peoples prior to the conquest, and therefore we must distinguish Inca from non-Inca Andean philosophies. “Non-Inca philosophy” refers broadly to the many provincial philosophical views of local ayllus – a Quechua word for a social unit bound together by kinship, lineage, ritual, territorial, political, and economic ties – and ethnic groups in the Andean region. “Inca philosophy” refers specifically to the philosophical views espoused by Inca amautas (singular, amauta), i.e., “sages,” “poet-philosophers,” “priests,” or “thinkers.” Inca philosophy drew upon a wealth of non-Inca Andean philosophical themes while at the same adapting these to Inca imperial purposes and circumstances.

Their many specific differences notwithstanding, Inca and non-Inca philosophies nevertheless shared in common several fundamental metaphysical themes regarding the nature of reality, human beings, and the interrelationships between human and nonhuman realms.

First, Andean philosophy claims that the cosmos along with all its contents is vivified or animated by a single life force (Cobo, 1990; Pachacuti Yamqui Salcamaygua, 1873). In colonial-era documents, this life force is sometimes called camaquen or camac, other times, upani and amaya. Human beings, plants, mountains, water, wind, light, mummified human remains, textiles, and stone structures are infused with this force. It appears to be coextensive with existence as such. It is dynamic, flowing, and constantly circulating throughout the regions and inhabitants of the cosmos. Water, light, rainbows, and the human life–death cycle serve as conduits for its circulation and recycling.

This force also assumes the guise of interdependent, mutually arising, complementary dual forces: e.g., night/day, sun/moon, celestial/terrestrial, above/below, cultivated/uncultivated, insider/outsider, and life/death. Life and death, for example, are cyclically interrelated as well as mutually arising and mutually interdependent. The desiccated remains of the dead serve as seeds for new life. Andean dualities oppose one another but never exclude or contradict one another. Andeans conceived rainbows as double headed serpents that physically embodied this complementary dualism. They regarded double-faced textiles, woven so as to display a single design on both sides but with colors reversed, as visually expressing the concept of a single reality assuming two guises or forms. Dualism also plays an important role in Quechua mathematics’ understanding of odd and even numbers as well as pairs of numbers. These dual forces are also gendered. Day, sun, celestial, above, and cultivated are male; night, moon, below, and uncultivated are female. Domestic, social, political, and economic relations are rooted in this metaphysics and accordingly conceived in dualistic, gendered terms. Invaders are male; original inhabitants, female. Tilling the soil is male; sowing seeds, female.

The foregoing metaphysical picture sets the stage for what we might call an “ethics of reciprocity.” Human beings are in the world and of the world. As such, they are obliged to perform reciprocating actions that maintain the equilibrium and continuing existence of the cosmos and humankind. They are obliged to organize all aspects of their lives according to the norm of reciprocity. Such obligations are simultaneously moral, prudential, and religious. Wisdom consists of knowing how, when, and where to act so as to maintain reciprocity between humans and cosmos. (James Maffie. 2013. ‘Pre-Columbian Philosophies’)

b- Colonial Thought

According to Luis Fernando Restrepo, after the Conquest of America, colonial thought has been occupied by epistemological and ethical Questions that are related to the new state of conquest and colonialism. He describes such a state as follows,

1492 was a traumatic experience for European consciousness, a rupture in Western thought that inaugurated the modern age, as it was unquestionably a catastrophic event for the indigenous peoples of the Americas and subsequently the enslaved Africans forcibly brought to this continent.

Thus, some of the most pressing questions of the time were why was the “New” World not mentioned in the scriptures nor by the great philosophers of antiquity? What was known about and what could be said of a continent that Europeans believed to be with no written history and no authorities to consult? Was the conquest of America just and legitimate? Who were the Indians? What did they know about the world and its origins? Approaching critically the colonial period, we may also consider other fundamental questions that were not asked at the time, such as what did indigenous thinkers have to say about Western culture and thought. And also, how native thinkers as well as those of Afro descent understood the colonization. (Luis Fernando Restrepo. 2013. ‘Colonial Thought’).

From another side, Alexander Stehn defines the topics of debate at this period as follows,

One of the most famous philosophical debates of the early colonial period concerned the supposed rights of the Spanish monarchy over the indigenous peoples of the Indies. Bartolomé de las Casas (1484-1566) debated Ginés de Sepúlveda (1490-1573) at the Council of Valladolid (1550-1551). Sepúlveda, who had never traveled to America, defended the Spanish conquest as an instance of just war, outlined the rights of the colonizers to seize native lands and possessions, and claimed that it was morally just to enslave the Indians, arguing on the basis of Thomism, Scripture, and Aristotelian philosophy. Las Casas countered Sepúlveda’s arguments by drawing upon the same theological and philosophical sources as well as decades of his own experiences living in different parts of the Indies. Las Casas argued that the war against the Indians was unjust, that neither Spain nor the Church had jurisdiction over Indians who had not accepted Christ, and that Aristotle’s category of “natural slaves” did not apply to the Indians. No formal winner of the debate was declared, but it did lead to las Casas’ most influential work, In Defense of the Indians, written from 1548-1550. (Alexander Stehn ‘Latin American Philosophy’)

c- Independence era

During the independent Era, which inaugurated by the beginnings of the 19th century and ended by the end of the century, the main philosophical concern has been following the philosophical system that leads to building the state and advancement of the society.

1-Positivism

The first philosophical position implemented to achieve these goals has been positivism. According to Meri L. Clark,

For nineteenth-century positivists, human society could be perfected through the acquisition of knowledge based on scientific study. Positivists rejected religion and metaphysics as pre-scientific thought and maintained that human thought would surpass these. The word “positive” connotes knowledge based on the observable world. Positivism understood knowledge as that which was produced through a systematic scientific study of phenomena; laws were supposed to derive from this study. Positivists cautioned against theology and metaphysics because these tried to move beyond the observed world to reveal first causes and final ends. Positive philosophy could point to general principles underlying scientific observations, but it did not allow metaphysical speculation. Positivists did not draw a distinction between the physical and social sciences: they took them to share the same basic scientific method. (Meri L. Clark. 2013. ‘The Emergence and Transformation of Positivism’)

Meri Clark describes how, Comtean positivism appealed to Latin American elites facing political turbulence and social disorder during national consolidation.

Auguste Comte’s “positive philosophy,” developed in his Cours de philosophie positive (1830–42) and Système de politique positive (1851–4) among other works, traveled across the Atlantic after the 1850s. Comte’s positivism also represented anti-clericalism and anti-conservative politics to many of his followers and interpreters. These ideas and politics became popular from the 1850s onward, especially in France and Latin America. Brazil adopted positivism in the First Republic (1889–1930); the country’s motto became “Order and Progress.” Nineteenth-century positivism was generally optimistic about the possibility that the scientific method would improve human society. In Latin America, positivism emerged from utilitarianism and utopian socialism. In societies rising from the ashes of war, amalgams of positivism and Catholicism developed in Latin American governments and universities. Elites wanted to establish national sovereignty, defend “civilization,” and “correct” multiracialism. Order and progress became keywords for nineteenth-century Latin American elites. Comte emphasized that the “scientific spirit” and the “spontaneous ability” of “positive politics” would support order and progress. His proposal to achieve this - chiefly, his religion of humanity - did not take off in Spanish America, although in Brazil it did. However, the framework of Comte’s evolutionary theory of society and politics caught on across the Americas. (Meri L. Clark. 2013. ‘The Emergence and Transformation of Positivism’)

From another side, Oscar R. Marti explains the proliferation of positivism in ‘Latin America’ in the nineteenth century as follows,

Latin America, positivism was originally cultivated to encourage the growth of science, and in the hands of liberals like Gabino Barreda (Mexican, 1818–81), as a weapon for breaking the intellectual stranglehold of a conservative colonial mentality and for refuting the claims of scholasticism and of Church dogma. Comte’s positivism appeared first, around mid-century. In Brazil and Chile, it took a definite religious turn; in Mexico, Uruguay, and Argentina it played an important role in educational and economic policies. What was its appeal? First, an alliance with the sciences was meant to give philosophy rigor and a justification, provide it with renewed prestige, and set problems and direction for future discussion. Alternative philosophic viewpoints such as eclecticism or scholasticism, no matter how popular or well entrenched, lacked such strong backing, and offered only beliefs justified by tradition, by abstractions, or by might. Second, positivism offered clear, concrete solutions for solving social problems – for instance, a well-articulated program of general education, the development of science, stimulating industrial growth, fostering national unity by means not of religion but of rational principles. Alternative political views offered only promises based on failed solutions or on the exercise of coercion. Finally, it predicted that in a not too distant future, with the advent of a scientific-industrial society satisfying the material needs of a nation, the right social changes would occur, just as they had in France or Britain. Alternative doctrines offered only otherworldly rewards, the status quo, or a return to colonial dependence on a bankrupt Spain. (Oscar R. Marti. 2013. ‘Early Critics of Positivism’)

However, positivism faced criticism from several intellectual circles,

As positivist thought spread in Latin America, conflicts intensified between positivists and their critics – theologians and conservatives – about the role of religious instruction, the nature of faith, and the place of the Catholic Church in national development. (Meri L. Clark. 2013. ‘The Emergence and Transformation of Positivism’)

2- Krausism

By the end of the century, strong criticism of positivism, due to several causes, developed. According to Oscar Marti,

Toward the end of the nineteenth century two literary figures, José Martí (Cuban, 1853–95) and José Enrique Rodó (Uruguayan, 1872–1917), felt misgivings about some of the main assumptions of positivism and a deep mistrust of its social implications. Positivism is a European doctrine with autochthonous roots that in Latin America had become, by the end of the century, almost an official doctrine. Martí and Rodó believed that positivism considered only the material elements of the world and treated ethics as but a justification for the pursuit of economic gains. Left out were art and poetry, the imagination and ideals, compassion and humanity. Echoing some of these criticisms, philosopher Carlos Vaz Ferreira (Uruguayan, 1872–1958) and scientist José Ingenieros (Argentine, 1877– 1925) undertook a revision of the doctrine that led to a reevaluation of the metaphysics it censured and of the ethics it advocated. (Oscar R. Marti. 2013. ‘Early Critics of Positivism’).

These criticisms to positivism opened the door for other philosophical alternatives. One of these alternatives that gained widespread acceptance was Krausism. Claus Dierksmeier presents Krause’s philosophical theory as follows,

Krause’s theory is best summarized as a metaphysics of freedom (Dierksmeier, 2003a) that relies on an ultimate principle of reality that Krause tries to locate in our self-consciousness. Resulting from this inward journey, Krause develops a philosophy of absolute being; however, he rejected as an “unfortunate conception” the then popular term “the Absolute,” since it transforms (absolute) being linguistically into a subject.

To distinguish his position from both theism and pantheism, Krause coined the term panentheism (All-in-God theory), which suggests that everything exists within (absolute) being; it is not, however, identical (as typically claimed by pantheism) with the life it enables (1828c, p. 419). Nor does (absolute) being (“Wesen”) enter or influence the phenomenal world (as typically in theism), either directly (as in most religions) or by “becoming its other” (as, e.g., in Hegel’s system). Being, conceived absolutely, does not “suffer” from, or under, the various contradictions and failures of finite life; hence, there is no need for dialectics to offer an all- encompassing reconciliation (1828c, p. 392). Krause’s model allows for life to develop and to supersede itself with ever-higher life-forms but nowhere does he dialectically prescribe such progress. The world is not seen teleologically, and hence life need not be interpreted along predetermined stages that a speculative philosophy alone could unveil.

Krause insisted that one cannot generate knowledge by conceptual effort alone (Krause, 1804, p. 85). True knowledge needs to be informed by natural and social phenomena (1828b, p. 273). Dialectical thinking and speculation are a heuristic, not a prescriptive, function. Krause employs them in order to guide empirical observation and to formulate expectations about reality.

While Fichte sees nature in opposition to the human spirit, to its rationality and its freedom – that is, as something that always and in all forms must forcefully be brought under rational domination – Krause does not. He begins his philosophical life with the quest to understand nature in its very own freedom and absoluteness (“in ihrer inneren Freiheit und Absolutheit” (1804, p. 82); from this perspective Krause derives an unusually progressive environmental philosophy.

Krause comes up with the following methodology (1828c, p. 30): Conceptual analysis stirs up antinomies that cannot be solved by analytic tools alone. Synthetic thinking responds with an attempt to reconcile the heretofore incompatible concepts through integrative ideas, which in turn are generated by introspective methods and conceptual constructions.

Krause’s overall concern for marginalized and underrepresented interests shows that his is a liberalism of a different sort. In a number of (neo-)liberal ideologies, respect for others who cannot affect us in return (either positively or negatively) plays merely a secondary role (Dierksmeier, 2007). In Krause’s philosophy it is primary. His regard for otherness and his intention to harmonize antagonistic interests through integrative ideas are not accidental, but originate from deep within Krause’s system. It is due to the integrative metaphysics and participatory methodology of his philosophy that Krause puts so much emphasis on the harmonization of particular (individual and national) interests with the larger and cosmopolitan concerns of the human family (1811, p. 164). In fact, it seems quite plausible that much of the international success of Krausism can be attributed to this very tendency of Krause’s “harmonic liberalism” (Gil-Cremades, 1985, p. 221).

He then describes reception of Krause’s philosophy in Latin America as follows,

Krausism came to Latin America in the form of (mostly French and Spanish) books, through emigrating and traveling Spanish scholars, and, last but not least, through a coterie of Latin American intellectuals who studied in Spain, such as José Martí and Eugenio María de Hostos (Stoetzer, 1998b, p. 205). Through Ortega y Gasset, Martí, María de Hostos, and many others, Krausist ideas had a deep impact on the political history of Latin America in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. A distinct Krausist influence can be attested for Mexico (Krumpel, 2001), Brazil (Paim, 1998), Columbia (Orden Jiménez, 1999), Guatemala (Stoetzer, 1998b, p. 136), Ecuador (Ossenbach-Sauter, 1983), and Peru (Himmelblau, 1979; Vetter, 1987).

(Claus Dierksmeier . 2013. ‘Krausism’, in Susana Nuccetelli, Ofelia Schutte, Otavio Bueno (Ed’s.) “A Companion to Latin American Philosophy”, Wiley-Blackwell.)

Cited Works

Clark, Meri L. 2013. ‘The Emergence and Transformation of Positivism’, in Susana Nuccetelli, Ofelia Schutte, Otavio Bueno (Ed’s.) “A Companion to Latin American Philosophy”, Wiley-Blackwell.
Cooper, William F. 2013. ‘‘Normal’ Philosophy’, in Susana Nuccetelli, Ofelia Schutte, Otavio Bueno (Ed’s.) “A Companion to Latin American Philosophy”, Wiley-Blackwell.
Dierksmeier, Claus. 2013. ‘Krausism’, in Susana Nuccetelli, Ofelia Schutte, Otavio Bueno (Ed’s.) “A Companion to Latin American Philosophy”, Wiley-Blackwell.
Gandolfo, David Ignatius. 2013. ‘Liberation Philosophy’, in Susana Nuccetelli, Ofelia Schutte, Otavio Bueno (Ed’s.) “A Companion to Latin American Philosophy”, Wiley-Blackwell.
Maffie, James. 2013. ‘Pre-Columbian Philosophies’, in Susana Nuccetelli, Ofelia Schutte, Otavio Bueno (Ed’s.) “A Companion to Latin American Philosophy”, Wiley-Blackwell.
Marti, Oscar R. 2013. ‘Early Critics of Positivism’, in Susana Nuccetelli, Ofelia Schutte, Otavio Bueno (Ed’s.) “A Companion to Latin American Philosophy”, Wiley-Blackwell.
Novia, Adriana and Alex Levine. 2013. ‘Darwinism’, in Susana Nuccetelli, Ofelia Schutte, Otavio Bueno (Ed’s.) “A Companion to Latin American Philosophy”, Wiley-Blackwell.