Bosanquet's Logic and the Relation between Society and the Individual,

William Sweet, St Francis Xavier University

One cannot understand Bosanquet's precise view of what 'society' and 'the individual' are and how they are related to each other, unless one has some understanding of them as aspects of the 'Absolute.' But Bosanquet's account of this, in turn, is in large part influenced by his notion of a 'whole ' and its 'parts' and the relation of parts to other parts--which is articulated in Bosanquet's logic.

By looking at Bosanquet's account of some aspects of the nature of thought--particularly, on the nature and character of judgement and inference--one can see more clearly why Bosanquet is led to say what he does about the relation of parts to other parts, and of parts to wholes, and (more broadly) of the relation of society and the individual, and the nature of the human person.