sociocultural practices that accompany the existing conceptions,
bearing in mind that in another kind of historical study the relevant
practices should occupy a much more prominent role.
1.5. Parts of Recognition
As promised above, I present here a differentiation of the heuristic
conceptions of recognition. While this task needs to be accomplished
to define my position in philosophical discussions, the differentiation
does not have decisive bearing on my historical and theological
results and can also be bypassed.
In the following, I deconstruct the process of recognition into its
‘parts’. The concept of parts refers to the volitional and cognitive
interactions that together constitute a full-fledged process of recog-
nition. It also refers to Forst’s view that an idea like toleration should
be assumed to consist of what he calls‘free pieces’,^93 by which he
means that the relevant parties at stake must make their moves in
some sense voluntarily. In the following, we assume a relative lack of
compulsion in each‘part’, while also realizing that the parts are only
heuristically distinct. This means, for instance, that volitional parts
must employ cognitive components.
If we manage to define a certain number of such heuristically
distinct parts and treat them as distinctive features of recognition,
we may identify corresponding conceptions built on the various
combinations of the parts. The parts are like voluntary moves and
cognitive stances within a larger whole, often only making sense as
parts of this larger whole to which they belong. They are not free
pieces in the sense of autonomy.
Let us define the core of recognition as an act in which
A recognizes B. Let us call this R1. The conception of recognition in
question depends on the relative hierarchy between A and B. Let us
define R1U as upward recognition in which A recognizes B as some-
thing like a lord or master, and R1D as downward recognition in
which A recognizes B as an object over which A can exercise power.
R1E signifies recognition among equals. All these acts refer to
(^93) Forst 2003, 40–1.
Introduction 35