Jean-Luc Nancy, French philosopher and one of the most influential contemporary thinkers, died on August 23, 2021 at the age of 81. He graduated in philosophy in 1962 at the University of Paris ...(Sorbonne), and began his academic career as an assistant at the Institute of Philosophy of the University of Humanities in Strasbourg (also: Marc Bloch University).
Rad se bavi različitim filozofijskim aspektima pojma slušanja u svezi s oblikovanjem i obustavljanjem totalitarnih zajednica. Tradicionalna filozofija uglavnom je kritički nastrojena prema čulnom ...znanju, dok se suvremena misao usmjerava na slušanje kao značajan i kompleksan fenomen koji može biti promatran kao kognitivna kategorija i kroz različite filozofijske perspektive (politika, etika). Za Heideggera, slušanje ima egzistencijalni status i predstavlja jedno od Daseinovih obilježja. Po njegovu mišljenju, slušanje je razumijevanje onoga tko nam je blizak (koga nosimo u sebi) – prijatelja. U Heideggerovoj filozofiji slušanja, Derrida prepoznaje mogućnost oblikovanja zajednice istih i bliskih. Aludira na homogenizaciju i neprijateljstvo. Napuštajući Heideggerovu tezu o slušanju prijatelja, Derrida piše o mogućnosti slušanja sablasti koja predstavlja afirmaciju egzistencije apsolutne drugosti. Slušanje sablasti jedina je ispravna etika putem koje se uspostavlja udaljenost i izbjegava totalitarnu zajednicu. Poput Derridaa, Nancy vidi opasnost u oblikovanju totalitarne zajednice u istosti i bliskosti članova društva. Način izbjegavanja mogućnosti oblikovanja takve zajednice Nancy vidi u izravnom (čulnom) dodiru sa svijetom. Za Nancyja, slušanje je dodir sa svijetom neposredovan označavanjima i razumijevanjima. Slušanje predstavlja metaforu otpora prema aspiracijama predstavničkih političkih sustava u oblikovanju potpunih i zatvorenih zajednica. Predstavljajući nekoliko suvremenih filozofijskih pojmova, ovaj rad pokušava demonstrirati da slušanje, osim stvaranja bliskosti, može održavati nemoguću zajednicu karakteriziranu nepredstavništvom i heterogenošću te, što je važnije, može funkcionirati kao otpor prema totalitarnim sustavima.
Die Arbeit behandelt verschiedenartige philosophische Aspekte des Begriffs des Hörens bezüglich der Schaffung und Auflösung totalitärer Gemeinschaften. Die traditionelle Philosophie steht dem sinnlichen Wissen zumeist kritisch gegenüber, während der zeitgenössische Gedanke auf das Hören als ein belangvolles und komplexes Phänomen ausgerichtet ist, welches sich als kognitive Kategorie und aus differenten philosophischen Perspektiven (Politik, Ethik) betrachten lässt. Das Hören hat für Heidegger einen existenziellen Status und repräsentiert eine der Eigenschaften des Daseins. Seines Erachtens ist Hören das Verständnis desjenigen, der uns nahesteht (den wir bei uns tragen) – des Freundes. In Heideggers Philosophie des Hörens erkennt Derrida die Möglichkeit, eine Gemeinschaft der Selben und Nahen zu formen. Er macht Anspielungen auf Homogenisierung und Feindseligkeit. Indem er Heideggers These vom Hören des Freundes verwirft, schreibt Derrida über die Möglichkeit, einem Gespenst zuzuhören, welches die Affirmation der Existenz absoluter Andersheit abbildet. Dem Gespenst zuzuhören ist die einzig richtige Ethik, durch die Distanz hergestellt und eine totalitäre Gemeinschaft vermieden wird. Ebenso wie Derrida sieht Nancy die Gefahr in der Schaffung einer totalitären Gemeinschaft aufgrund von Selbigkeit und Nahekommen der Gesellschaftsmitglieder. Einen Weg, der Eventualität der Formung einer solchen Gemeinschaft auszuweichen, sieht Nancy in direktem (sinnlichem) Kontakt mit der Welt. Für Nancy bedeutet das Hören eine nicht durch Signifikationen und Verständnisse vermittelte Berührung mit der Welt. Das Hören stellt eine Metapher für den Widerstand gegen die Aspirationen der repräsentativen politischen Systeme dar, vollkommene und geschlossene Gemeinschaften zu gestalten. Indem es mehrere zeitgenössische philosophische Begriffe vorstellt, versucht dieses Paper zu demonstrieren, dass das Hören, abgesehen von der Schaffung einer Nähe, auch eine unmögliche Gemeinschaft aufrechtzuerhalten vermag, die durch Nichtrepräsentativität und Heterogenität gekennzeichnet ist, und nicht zuletzt als Widerstand gegen totalitäre Systeme fungieren kann.
Ce travail aborde divers aspects philosophiques du concept de l’écoute lié à la formation et au renversement des communautés totalitaires. La tradition philosophique relève principalement d’une critique envers la connaissance sensorielle, alors que la pensée contemporaine a trait à l’écoute, en tant que phénomène significatif et complexe, qui peut être considérée comme une catégorie cognitive, et peut également être analysée à travers diverses perspectives philosophiques (politique, éthique). Pour Heidegger, l’écoute a un statut existentiel et présente l’une des caractéristiques du Dasein. Selon lui, écouter c’est comprendre celui qui nous est proche (celui que nous portons en nous) – l’ami. Dans la philosophie heideggérienne de l’écoute, Derrida voit la possibilité de former une communauté des mêmes et des proches. Il fait allusion à l’homogénéisation et à l’hostilité. En rupture avec la thèse heideggérienne sur l’écoute de l’ami, Derrida écrit sur la possibilité de l’écoute du spectre qui présente l’affirmation d’une existence de l’altérité absolu. L’écoute du spectre est l’unique éthique juste au travers laquelle se constitue la distance et s’évite la communauté totalitaire. À l’instar de Derrida, Nancy voit un danger dans la formation de communautés totalitaires dans l’identité et la familiarité. La manière d’éviter toute possibilité de formation d’une telle communauté, Nancy la voit dans le contact direct (sensoriel) avec le monde. Pour Nancy, écouter c’est être en contact avec le monde sans l’entremise de significations et de compréhensions. Écouter présente une métaphore de résistance envers les aspirations des systèmes politiques représentatifs à former des communautés entières et fermées. En présentant quelques concepts philosophiques contemporains, ce travail s’applique à démontrer que l’écoute, hormis créer des affinités, peut préserver une communauté invraisemblable caractérisée par le non-représentationnel et l’hétérogénéité, mais aussi, et ce qui est bien plus important, peut fonctionner comme une force de résistance envers les systèmes totalitaires.
This paper deals with various philosophical aspects of the notion of listening correlated with forming and disabling of totalitarian communities. Traditional philosophy is mainly critical towards sensual knowledge, whereas contemporary thought is concentrated on listening as a significant and complex phenomenon that can be observed as a cognitive category and through various philosophical perspectives (politics, ethics). For Heidegger, listening has existential status and represents one of Dasein’s characteristics. According to him, listening is understanding the one who is close to us (whom we bear in ourselves) – a friend. In Heidegger’s philosophy of listening, Derrida recognises the possibility of forming a community of same and close. It alludes to homogenisation and enmity. Abandoning Heidegger’s thesis about listening to a friend, Derrida writes about the possibility of listening to the spectre representing an affirmation of the existence of absolute otherness. Listening to the spectre is the only correct ethics by which distance is made and totalitarian community avoided. Like Derrida, Nancy sees the danger of forming a totalitarian community in the sameness and closeness of society’s members. The way of avoiding the possibility of forming such a community Nancy sees in immediate (sensual) contact with the world. For Nancy, listening is a contact with the world not mediated by significations and understandings. Listening represents a metaphor of resistance towards aspirations of representative political systems in forming complete and closed communities. By presenting several contemporary philosophical concepts, this paper tries to demonstrate that listening, apart from creating closeness, can maintain an impossible community characterised by irrepresentability and heterogeneity and, more importantly, can function as the resistance toward totalitarian systems.
Sloboda bez bratstva Harbaš, Bernard
Znakovi vremena,
07/2023, Letnik:
XXVI, Številka:
94-95
Journal Article
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Theoretical analyses have traditionally related the notion of freedom to politics, law and economy. An individual was perceived free only if he had the right to act politically as equal with other ...individuals in community. This thesis, which originates from the time of Aristotle, shows that freedom can be understood only in the context of politics. Traditionally, freedom was related to an individual’s economic activities, too. Liberal theorists believed that freedom lies exclusively in the free production and possession of the products of one’s own work. This idea influenced the development of the concept of free market and liberal economy as the foundations of a free society. Hannah Arendt transposed this theory by claiming that freedom must be interpreted beyond any natural necessity and, even more importantly, reciprocity. Following Arendt’s, but also Heidegger’s, line of thought, poststructuralist theoreticians Nancy and Derrida hold that freedom should be interpreted from freedom itself without referring to other experiences of human activity. For Derrida, freedom is breaking up with every conditionality and reciprocity. It cannot be subsumed under the notion of equality but must be understood as the possibility of the other to remain the other in his dissimilarity and secrecy. Key words: freedom, brotherhood, incommensurability, equality, the political.
Even though Freud and Lacan didn’t deal with political philosophy, their theories made a significant influence on poststructuralist political theory. Freud’s myth on the killing of the father is ...fundamental for understanding the emergence of modern state, democratic and organized society. Namely, according to this myth, Father and the leader of the horde appropriates all women of the horde for himself, whereas out of fear of being left without them, he banishes all male children from the family community. Jealous brothers return to the horde, kill the father, dismember his body and each of them appropriates a wife for himself. Because of the killing of the father brothers start to feel quilt which leads Freud to conclude that the dead father becomes stronger when dead then while he was alive. One can perceive from this theory the way in which monogamous relations replace the polygamous ones and absolutism is transformed into an equal participation of all citizens in the government. In other words, this tells us about the transformation of a disorganized society into a modern and organized state. Lacan’s theory shows that the main characteristic of the subject is deficiency which is the consequence of entering the figure of father into the relationship between a child and a mother and his prevention to realize their desire. Since the father prevented this relationship, the subject remains forever marked by the principle of desire he was denied realizing. In Freud’s theory about the killing of the father and his understanding of the excessive closeness and equality among brothers, Jacques Derrida notices traces of democracy. However, democracy that emerged on the fundaments of fraternocracy excludes all those who do not belong to the order of brothers (for examplesisters or brothers from another family). Democracy accepts only those who are same and who can be subsumed under the order of male principle. Derrida therefore assumes that the classic definition of democracy which considered its members equal and close should be transformed into political order based on distance. Namely, according to Derrida, along with the fraternity, notion of friendship is also crucial for democracy. It represents the fundament of a political community, but also a stumbling stone of contemporary political theory and democratic social order. A friend is the one who is close and who is appropriated. According to ancient theories, a true friend should have his own duplicate or a copy in a friend. It means that friends are similar, same, or close, and in order that two people be friends, they cannot differ from each other. Derrida thinks that friendship as fraternity and excessive closeness causes conflict. Fraternity creates hatred towards those who do not belong to the order of brothers. Because of that, fraternal relationships and excessive friendship should be reconsidered because they lead to wars and conflicts. True democracy without potential conflict is the one which excludes brothers and friendship and accepts hatred and distance. Like Derrida, Jean-Luc Nancy claims that authentic community is the one which includes distance and particularity. Namely, he analyses Lacan’s statement that “there is no sexual relation” as a state in which both subjects have their own perception of sexual phantasy. According to Nancy, Lacan’s statement explains in the best way the concept of community in which there is no possibility of identification. “There is no sexual relation” does not only mean that each subject has its own desire which cannot be imbedded into the desire of the other subject – partner, but that each individual is unique and different. Because of their uniqueness and otherness there is no possibility of forming a communion, but only a community in which individuals live without closeness and sameness.
Practice of remembering is important for those cultures which experienced major crimes, and, in that respect, it serves not only for us to remember events, but also to preserve the identity of the ...community which was the victim. Through this practice, victims are being instrumentalized for the purpose of preserving and strengthening the identity of the community. Communities which maintain institutionalized remembering of crimes committed against them have religious and ethnic character. Victims of criminal expeditions, like homosexuals or kulaks, do not have organized remembrance and their identity and sacrifice are thus irrelevant for state politics. Culture of remembrance creates sacralization of the victim and thus only crimes committed against the nation that experienced them are emphasized, whereas the others become less important. Remembrance is egoistic because it appropriates the person we mourn and remember, since we transform him into the speech. By using the pronouns “I” and “we” in necrologies and commemorations, we selfishly appropriate the one we remember and, so to say, kill him once again. Culture of remembrance must be interrupted through the practice of forgiveness. Such forgiveness should be unconditional and the one that asks nothing in return. It must be extraordinary because, with it, we must forgive what cannot and must not be forgiven, like the greatest crime.
APORIJE DEMOKRATIJE Harbaš, Bernard
Logos – časopis za filozofiju i religiju,
2020, Letnik:
8, Številka:
1
Journal Article
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This article deals with postmodern understanding of the problem democratic politics is facing. Throughout history, democracy has had different determinations and thus cannot have a universal ...definition. Since in democracy everybody’s voice count, it should also support the one who rejects it, and thus this order, in its full realization, creates autoimmunity (Derrida). For Jacques Ranciere, democracy cannot be defined as agreement, but on the contrary, as hatred and disagreement, because only that way fundamental democratic principles and procedures can be respected. Since agreement and equality lead to passivity and annul ability of critical individual thinking, resistance towards democracy itself is necessary in an authentic democracy. For Alain Badiou, democracy means a possibility for everyone to do what he wants and without any criteria i.e., that everybody expresses his opinion without argumentation. Therefore, he understands such order as a space for fulfilment of petty needs. Jean-Luc Nancy understands democracy not only as political order, but a way in which existence appears. He prefers neither direct nor representative democracy but looks at it as a singular plural appearance of the sense. Contrary to some postmodern theoreticians, Chantal Mouffe considers democracy can be realized only in its representative form, but that it also needs to consist of dispute and discussion. When the disputable dimension of democracy disappears, we entre into the post-political state characterized by agreement and passivity. Purpose of this article was to present and analyse some of the characteristics of democratic principles such as conflict, dispute, agreement, indeterminacy but also to point out possibilities of thinking democracy not only as political order, but also as a way of living.
This article departs from Carl Schmitt’s understanding of the notions of the political and enemy and their interpretation in contemporary social and political theory. Concept of the political implies ...a multitude of grouped and opposed yet not necessarily conflicting parties. The political can be understood as a confirmation of political unities’ existences, as well as the strength of their inner coherence. In other words, the political is a strengthening of ties within a political community because beside and opposed to it there is another (hostile) community. In contemporary philosophy, Schmitt’s understanding of the political is, among others, interpreted from the theory of identity standpoints. In that sense, enemy represents a confirmation that there is the other who is opposed, independent and different from the ‘same’. Talal Asad is of the opinion that with the emergence of Enlightenment Europe formed the identity of modern and secularized community which simultaneously brought about outlining of clear demarcation with religious East which, from the Western standpoint, remained undeveloped because it didn’t undergo the process of secularization. Similar thesis is brought forward by Gil Anidjar who states that Europe constitutes and strengthens its identity through the enmity towards the religious East. According to Chantal Mouffe, enemy is understood as a constitutive outside, i.e. as the condition for forming the identity. For Derrida, Schmitt’s concept of the enemy can be understood as ‘the other’ who is not only different but significant since, because of its otherness, opposition and distance, it prevents ethnic homogenization and thus creation of new enmities. The article shows that Schmitt’s the political doesn’t necessarily has to be understood as a concept which supports absolutist power and necessarily enmity. On the contrary, through contemporary (especially poststructuralist) interpretations one can see that enmity is unavoidable element in constituting the identity and, even more importantly, foundation for every authentic friendship.
Tijela zajednice Harbaš, Bernard
Filozofska istraživanja,
07/2008, Letnik:
28, Številka:
2
Journal Article
Recenzirano
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Ovaj se rad bavi problematikom tijela u filozofiji Jean-Luc Nancya. Za razliku od Husserla i Merleau-Pontya, Nancyeva je namjera govoriti o pluralnoj tjelesnosti kao temelju političke zajednice. Nije ...više riječ o fenomenološkoj, već o ontološkoj dimenziji razmatranja tjelesnosti. U osnovi naše egzistencije stoje tijela i dodir kao temelj našeg su-bivstovanja, a tjelesnost se shvaća kao stanovito su-bivstvovanje, jer pretpostavlja pluralitet i mnoštvenost.
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