From Cogito to the Imaginary: The Lacanian Critique of the Cartesian Subject in the Context of Kojève's Neo-Hegelianism

This article offers a new approach to studying the influence of Hegelian thought on Lacanian psychoanalysis, examining the philosophy of Alexandre Kojève — a key influence on Lacan — and proposing that it can be interpreted as a radical rethinking of the Cartesian model of the subject. We analyse Kojève’s 1936 manuscript, written during his collaboration with Lacan, and other texts focusing on the critique of Descartes. Based on this analysis, we reconstruct Kojève’s argumentation, which enables us to reconsider the supposed immediacy of the cogito as an experience of mediated Hegelian self-consciousness and to challenge Descartes’ subsequent, “hasty” conclusions. Kojève distinguishes between the subject and the ego on ontological grounds and proves the fundamental epistemological opacity of the subject to self-consciousness. It is argued that, in its key points, Lacan’s critique of the cogito is equivalent to Kojève’s, and plays a significant role in the formation of the register of the Imaginary. Given this correspondence, it is suggested that Lacan’s connection to Kojève is not merely formal, but substantive; it extends beyond the adoption of a quasi-Hegelian vocabulary to the implicit borrowing of Kojève’s conceptual framework for understanding the subject. This enables us to view Lacanian psychoanalysis as an extension of Kojève’s interpretation of NeoHegelianism. In doing so, this paper clarifies the origin of the philosophical principles of Lacanian theory, offering a more rigorous historical and philosophical perspective with which to analyse the place of the Lacanian project within the tradition of French Neo-Hegelianism.