European Identity - Individual, Group and Society - HumanitarianNet

302 EUROPEAN IDENTITY. INDIVIDUAL, GROUP AND SOCIETYreason of nature thrown upon the world, which is a mere programmeof dispositions), due to the unsociable sociability which nourishesdevelopment. In fact, the resistance of individuals, each facing the rest,the competition between many who want the same for themselves,etc., expresses unsociability; but at the same time it awakens thedevelopment of its strengths, the effort to reach goals, the stimulipromoting the progress of culture and civilization 6 .The development of the arts, of techniques and sciences, the greatdynamic of economic development characteristic of European society untilthe 18 th Century, is woven by that game, which provokes interchanges,the creation of institutions, regulations, the elaboration of fairer laws... Inall that, the good of reciprocal recognition and the advance of the senseof human dignity are involved; in short, all kinds of expressions of thefreedom leading that march. To summarise, “thanks be given to themaliciously competitive vanity and to the excessive pride or desire to rule”—amongst many other manifestations of “unsociability”— withoutwhich the dispositions of reason would be eternally asleep. Everythingconspires in favour of civilization, Kant tries to tell us.Kant has needed to approach human life in search of the intentionthat directs it, in order to understand the meaning of human actions asa whole, to interpret its time according to human actions, and in orderto engage human actions, throughout time, in the future commitmentsthat they enclose and in the design to which they owe themselves.(This thought is not pure abstract philosophy.)Assuming all of this, let us firstly say the following: Having skilfullydescribed the trajectory of European culture, Kant points out the keyagent for the mobilization of his society: the autonomous citizen,capable of thinking by himself (sapere aude!), politically active, andfinally, creator or constructor of the State which symbolises him andsustains him.6To begin with, it is convenient to bear in mind that Kant establishes a triple level ofhuman action: 1. Level of ability associated with technical disposition. 2. Level ofprudence associated with the pragmatic disposition in which happiness is pursued. 3.Level of the wisdom-morality associated with moral disposition.Ability, prudence, morality are the doctrines which correspond to the diversenational rules of procedures which govern action in each case. Ability is directed toproduction of external things; prudence, to the interaction of men with what is human,i.e. with other lives; and Wisdom-morality...where are they directed to?These three levels are projected in the design of human fulfilment as threematuration levels: Culture-Civilization-Moralization. In terms of maturation levels, eachone is surrounding the whole of the dispositions. Only that, as it happens with clothing,humanity has not as yet manufactured the perfect clothing integrating the tripleperfection.