Publication Details

Abstract

The paper identifies four models of social involvement in Kierkegaard’s treatise The Single Individual. These models are embodied in four figures discussed by Kierkegaard: the professional leader of the crowd, the truth-witness, the politician who loves being a human being and loves humankind, and Kierkegaard himself as an author. The paper explores the motives, stances, activities and goals of these figures. It analyses their attitudes to the single individual and the crowd, as well as to politics. The investigation develops against the background of Martin Buber’s claim that Kierkegaard makes a demand on the single individual to withdraw from political life and renounce any ambition to form it.