Can we decolonialize the Kantian heritage?

Abstract

The article analyzes the understanding of morality provided by Kant in his Foundation of the Metaphysics of Morals, in order to examine its possible contribution to a critical philosophy of knowledge with a colonial matrix. To this end, it distinguishes the Kantian attempt to rescue the claim of universal validity of our moral statements and the universal contents fixed by the colonial philosophical tradition, of which Kantian philosophy is one of the main pillars. Then, they propose a reconstruction of the Categorical Imperative and a redefinition of the individuals to whom we owe respect or moral consideration, capable of expanding the scope of morality to all human beings, non-human animals, and other complex functional systems such as the environment and works of art. In this way, the article seeks to suppress hierarchies that to this day support the subordination of various individuals or groups to supposedly rational and free beings, whose characteristics have been naturalized and elevated to the top of a hierarchy of knowledge and power.