Le “forme” dello Spirito: itinerari fisiologici nella filosofia politica di Hegel

The following essay consists of three parts. The first delves into the Hegelian analysis of phrenology and physiognomy included in the Phenomenology of Spirit, where these pseudo-sciences are considered completely unsuitable for the definition of the essence of individual consciousness. The second part deals with some passages of the Encyclopaedia of the Philosophical Sciences in which Hegel, in order to outline the ways of self-determination of the Spirit, seeks to use anatomical, ethnological and even craniological assumptions which in turn seem to lead to qualitative human differences on a racial basis. The third and last part, underlying the incomplete compatibility between the two previous perspectives, aims to examine the presence and weight of a theory of race in the Hegelian vision of the philosophy of history.