Early in Edith Stein's philosophical output stands her doctoral dissertation defended in 1916 at Freiburg-im-Breisgau. "On the Problem of Empathy" is the fruit of several years' of work with the founder of phenomenology and the director of the dissertation itself, Edmund Husserl.

Stein both follows the reflections of Husserl in Volume 2 of his "Idea", but in several regards she adopts an independent stance of her own. Her works takes into consideration problems dealt with the philosophers of her period like Wilhelm Dilthey, Maw Scheler and Maurice Merleau-Ponty. This book offers clear analyses, as it delves into questions that continue to concern philosophers today. The translator is the grandniece of Edith Stein