Abstract
This paper intends to propose a Hegelian critique of the republican theory. Theoreticians of the republican tradition, such as Skinner, Pettit, Sandel or Taylor, to mention at least the most prominent ones from both the neo-Athenian and neo-Roman tradition, despite their significant mutual differences, would agree with a substantial conception of freedom that one can only be free in a free state.
Although Hegel, too, is in agreement with this republican definition of freedom, for him it remains too abstract and merely formally correct. For this reason, it loses its persuasiveness and - as my argument goes - cannot convince especially those of us who, as modern citizens, suffer from a division of subject object, spirit nature, citizen state, etc.
In this modern, alienated predicament, the concept of republican freedom becomes obsolete, although it is formally correct. When encountering the republican concept of freedom, a modern citizen cannot but ask a naïve though profound question: if the state is alienated from me, how can I recognize the state as free at all? This kind of questioning represents the starting point of Hegel's Elements of Philosophy of Right.
This is the main reason why we propose that only the return to Hegel's political philosophy can bring the republican concept of freedom up-to-date again.