Josiah Royce in Focus (review)

Kegley, a deservedly well-known and -respected Royce scholar, continues her scholarship in Josiah Royce in Focus . In this, her most recent book, Kegley furthers lines of thought developed in her earlier work, such as Genuine Individuals and Genuine Communities: A Roycean Public Philosophy and "Grace, the Moral Gap, and Royce's Beloved Community." She situates herself in contemporary Royce scholarship, including work by Frank Oppenheim, Randall Auxier, and Dwayne Tunstall, but carves a unique space with her newest project. Kegley understands Royce as a systematic thinker devoted to numerous fields of study including metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, religion, logic, mathematics, psychology, social and political philosophy, history, and literature, and she acknowledges the thorough and meticulous work done by her colleagues in many of these areas. However, she chooses to focus on Royce the person, as a model thinker and teacher, as well as his psychology, ethics, philosophy of religion, and social philosophy. While focusing on these aspects of Royce's work, Kegley attempts to re focus our understanding of Royce, arguing that his work in these areas is particularly applicable in contemporary society. She argues that Royce is a "bridge builder" from whom we can still learn today.

Josiah Royce in Focus is organized around the selected themes listed above and includes chapters devoted to each. In the first chapter, Kegley weaves a tapestry of Royce's philosophy using the threads of his family life (as both a child and an adult), his educational development (again as both a child and a young adult), his geographical locations, his experiences as a teacher, and his early training in religion. By focusing on his character as much as his writing, she convincingly establishes Royce as both a "bridge builder" and a "seeker of insight" (1), both traits she suggests we would all do well to cultivate. In the chapter dedicated to Royce's psychology, Kegley argues that Royce was a cutting-edge psychologist, predating Freud's work in many ways, and explicates Royce's understanding of the self and how it is developed, both of which are accomplished only socially. In the chapter on ethics, Kegley establishes Royce's critiques of ethical idealism, realism, and skepticism and explicates his thoughts on loyalty as a way to harmonize individual and communal interests. Turning to Royce's philosophy of religion, Kegley begins by using the work of Paul Tillich and J. B. Phillips to illuminate Royce's understanding of God or the Absolute and then moves on to address Royce's treatment of the problem of evil, sin, guilt, salvation, and the meliorating role of the community. In the fifth chapter Kegley directs her attention more specifically to Royce's community. Here she explicates the necessary conditions for a genuine community and the process of interpretation, as well as elucidates the dynamic balance between individual and community (a theme present in earlier chapters but fully developed here). She examines Royce's work on race and international politics, providing sympathetic readings of "The Destruction of the Lusitania ," "Reflections After a Wandering Life in Australia," and "Race Questions and Prejudices," among others. Here again, Kegley draws our attention to community as the means by which individual and social interests are harmonized and balanced.

Though Kegley claims to "look at Royce through contemporary interests and needs" (xiv), she also views these contemporary interests and needs through a Roycean lens. In the final chapter, Kegley uses the theory developed in the earlier chapters to address current academic and social problems. I hesitate to use the word apply in my description of this final chapter; that is, I hesitate to claim that she "applies" Royce's work to current problems in order to obtain sufficient solutions. Instead, Kegley is true to the title of the book and views, formulates, analyzes, and addresses contemporary problems through a Roycean philosophy, though she rightfully stops short of claiming that answers are easy and apparent for any of these issues. She urges us to rethink of Royce...