ScholarOne - The Role and Function of Recognition for Fanon's Conception
of Freedom
Abstract
Frantz Fanon is often seen as both a proponent and radical critic of the
politics of recognition. This article seeks to reconcile Fanon’s project
of freedom as both being foundationally concerned with establishing the
conditions for recognitive reciprocity and providing an alternative to
the recognition paradigm. While it is argued that misrecognition poses a
threat to freedom insofar as it consists in the objectification of an
otherwise free and self-conscious subject, Fanon nonetheless identifies
three freedom-disabling forms of recognition: i) recognition-seeking as
a form of bad faith, ii) essentialist recognition of group identity, and
iii) recognition as falsely equated with freedom itself. Ultimately,
Fanon avoids these obstacles by articulating freedom as
self-constitution, for which recognition is a necessary but insufficient
condition.