Deliberation and deconstruction: Two views on the space of a post-national democracy

Canadian Journal of Political Science

Volumn 34, Issue 4, 2001, Pages 763-790

  Morris, Martin ^a  

^a YORK UNIVERSITY   (Canada)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0035564123     PISSN: 00084239     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/s0008423901778080     Document Type: Review

References (93)

1. Sheldon S. Wolin, "Fugitive Democracy," in Seyla Benhabib, ed., Democracy and Difference: Contesting the Boundaries of the Political (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996), 38.
2. Frankfurt School critical theory centre-staged new forms of domination in the "scientization" of politics and the commodification of "democratic" power; see Douglas Kellner, Critical Theory, Marxism, and Modernity (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989); and Jürgen Habermas, Toward a Rational Society: Student Protest, Science, and Politics (Boston: Beacon Press, 1970). Sheldon S. Wolin offers a detailed analysis of the effacement of politics in the "age of organization" (Politics and Vision: Continuity and Innovation in Western Political Thought [Boston: Little Brown, 1960], chap. 10), Michel Foucault analyzes similar processes under the heading "governmentality," whose systematic articulation can be traced back to the rationalization of politics during the medieval renaissance. See Michel Foucault, "Governmentality," in G. Burchell, C. Gordon and P. Miller, eds., The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991), 87-104.
3. Frankfurt School critical theory centre-staged new forms of domination in the "scientization" of politics and the commodification of "democratic" power; see Douglas Kellner, Critical Theory, Marxism, and Modernity (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989); and Jürgen Habermas, Toward a Rational Society: Student Protest, Science, and Politics (Boston: Beacon Press, 1970). Sheldon S. Wolin offers a detailed analysis of the effacement of politics in the "age of organization" (Politics and Vision: Continuity and Innovation in Western Political Thought [Boston: Little Brown, 1960], chap. 10), Michel Foucault analyzes similar processes under the heading "governmentality," whose systematic articulation can be traced back to the rationalization of politics during the medieval renaissance. See Michel Foucault, "Governmentality," in G. Burchell, C. Gordon and P. Miller, eds., The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991), 87-104.
4. Frankfurt School critical theory centre-staged new forms of domination in the "scientization" of politics and the commodification of "democratic" power; see Douglas Kellner, Critical Theory, Marxism, and Modernity (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989); and Jürgen Habermas, Toward a Rational Society: Student Protest, Science, and Politics (Boston: Beacon Press, 1970). Sheldon S. Wolin offers a detailed analysis of the effacement of politics in the "age of organization" (Politics and Vision: Continuity and Innovation in Western Political Thought [Boston: Little Brown, 1960], chap. 10), Michel Foucault analyzes similar processes under the heading "governmentality," whose systematic articulation can be traced back to the rationalization of politics during the medieval renaissance. See Michel Foucault, "Governmentality," in G. Burchell, C. Gordon and P. Miller, eds., The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991), 87-104.
5. Frankfurt School critical theory centre-staged new forms of domination in the "scientization" of politics and the commodification of "democratic" power; see Douglas Kellner, Critical Theory, Marxism, and Modernity (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989); and Jürgen Habermas, Toward a Rational Society: Student Protest, Science, and Politics (Boston: Beacon Press, 1970). Sheldon S. Wolin offers a detailed analysis of the effacement of politics in the "age of organization" (Politics and Vision: Continuity and Innovation in Western Political Thought [Boston: Little Brown, 1960], chap. 10), Michel Foucault analyzes similar processes under the heading "governmentality," whose systematic articulation can be traced back to the rationalization of politics during the medieval renaissance. See Michel Foucault, "Governmentality," in G. Burchell, C. Gordon and P. Miller, eds., The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991), 87-104.
6. Jürgen Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action: Lifeworld and System: A Critique of Functionalist Reason, Vol. 2, trans. by Thomas McCarthy (Boston: Beacon Press, 1987), 332ff.
7. Jürgen Habermas, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society, trans. by Thomas Burger (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1989); and Jürgen Habermas, Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy, trans. by William Rehg (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1996).
8. Jürgen Habermas, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society, trans. by Thomas Burger (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1989); and Jürgen Habermas, Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy, trans. by William Rehg (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1996).
9. Hannah Arendt, The Human Condition (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1958), 73, 199, 202-03.
10. Ibid., 198.
11. Seyla Benhabib, "Models of Public Space: Hannah Arendt, the Liberal Tradition and Jürgen Habermas," in Craig Calhoun, ed., Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992), 79-81.
12. For an insightful and informative discussion of Arendt's "political aesthetic" that, among other things, makes this criticism of Arendt's inadequacy regarding the critique of inequality, see Kimberly F. Curtis, "Aesthetic Foundations of Democratic Politics in the Work of Hannah Arendt," in Craig Calhoun and John McGowan, eds., Hannah Arendt and the Meaning of Politics (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997), 27-52. Acknowledging the limitations of Arendt on social justice, some nevertheless regard her as providing important resources for debates concerning the politics of gender and race identities. For a survey displaying the renewed interest in Arendt's relevance for feminism, see Bonnie Honig, ed., Feminist Interpretations of Hannah Arendt (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1995).
13. For an insightful and informative discussion of Arendt's "political aesthetic" that, among other things, makes this criticism of Arendt's inadequacy regarding the critique of inequality, see Kimberly F. Curtis, "Aesthetic Foundations of Democratic Politics in the Work of Hannah Arendt," in Craig Calhoun and John McGowan, eds., Hannah Arendt and the Meaning of Politics (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997), 27-52. Acknowledging the limitations of Arendt on social justice, some nevertheless regard her as providing important resources for debates concerning the politics of gender and race identities. For a survey displaying the renewed interest in Arendt's relevance for feminism, see Bonnie Honig, ed., Feminist Interpretations of Hannah Arendt (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1995).
14. Habermas, Between Facts and Norms, 298.
15. Ibid., 486.
16. Jürgen Habermas, The Inclusion of the Other: Studies in Political Theory, trans. by William Rehg (Cambridge: MIT, 1998), 44. The emphasis here and in subsequent quotations are in the original.
17. Ibid.
18. Habermas, Between Facts and Norms, 489-90.
19. Ibid., 371.
20. John Rawls, Political Liberalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993), 40-43, 320-23.
21. Habermas, Theory of Communicative Action, 140-45.
22. Jürgen Habermas, "A Reply," in Axel Honneth and Hans Joas, eds., Communicative Action: Essays on Jürgen Habermas' The Theory of Communicative Action (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1991), 218.
23. Habermas, Theory of Communicative Action, 121-26, 182.
24. Ibid., 132.
25. Ibid., 401.
26. Habermas is nevertheless clearly close to both thinkers. He acknowledges Apel's role in developing the transcendental pragmatics that substantially influenced his own position. He has declared in reference to Rawls's work: "I admire this project, share its intentions and regard its essential results as correct," and that his own disagreements with Rawls are "within the bounds of a family quarrel" (Habermas, Inclusion of the Other, 50).
27. Jürgen Habermas, The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity: Twelve Lectures, trans. by Frederic G. Lawrence (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1987), 311, 319-20.
28. Habermas, Inclusion of the Other, chap. 4.
29. Jürgen Habermas, "Struggles for Recognition in the Democratic Constitutional State," in Amy Gutman, ed., Multiculturalism and "the Politics of Recognition" (2nd ed.; Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994), 107-48.
30. These dynamics of identity are specific to the broad notion of the lifeworld and do not properly extend to the identities necessary for systemic functioning. Since Habermas regards instrumental relations with nature or within the economic and bureaucratic spheres to be indispensable not only in order to undergird a correctly functioning democracy, but more generally as the conditions for survival of human society itself, these "survival imperatives" cannot themselves be regarded as open to ethical self-formation in the same manner.
31. We may note that Habermas' concept of the citizen constituted by (morally well-grounded) legal liberties and protective rights can also apply to the international context in the call for the institutionalization of basic rights existing only in relatively weak form in international law. For Habermas' discussion of the newly emerging cosmopolitan order of human rights in the context of a revision of Kant's idea of perpetual peace, see Inclusion of the Other, 165-201. See also David Held, Democracy and the Global Order: From the Modern State to Cosmopolitan Governance (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1995).
32. We may note that Habermas' concept of the citizen constituted by (morally well-grounded) legal liberties and protective rights can also apply to the international context in the call for the institutionalization of basic rights existing only in relatively weak form in international law. For Habermas' discussion of the newly emerging cosmopolitan order of human rights in the context of a revision of Kant's idea of perpetual peace, see Inclusion of the Other, 165-201. See also David Held, Democracy and the Global Order: From the Modern State to Cosmopolitan Governance (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1995).
33. Habermas, Theory of Communicative Action, 126.
34. The reifications attending language, including the problems of grounding representation and acting for the philosophy of consciousness, are insoluble under the model of subject-object relations. The problems related to the epistemological fixation of the philosophy of consciousness fall away for Habermas, however, once identity formation is revealed as an intersubjectively achieved process of communicative action and thus primarily as a practical-political, not an epistemological, affair.
35. There are significant bodies of literature on Habermas' discourse ethics and his debate with postmodern positions on knowledge, language, meaning, validity, politics and ethics relevant to our discussion. For an introduction to postmodern political theory that highlights the tension between the responsibility to act (central to Habermasian theory) and the responsibility to otherness (central to postmodern theory), see Stephen K. White, Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). On philosophical issues relevant to Habermas' critique of postmodernism, see Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves and Seyla Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity: Critical Essays on the Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997). William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity: A Study in the Discourse Ethics of Jürgen Habermas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) and Simone Chambers, Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996) offer sympathetic defences of the discourse ethic for democracy; while J. M. Bernstein, Recovering Ethical Life: Jürgen Habermas and the Future of Critical Theory (London: Routledge, 1995), Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997) and Martin Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn: Adorno, Habermas and the Problem of Communicative Freedom (Albany: SUNY Press, 2001) question the success of Habermas' particular turn to discourse as the proper source of ethical and democratic power. Simon Critchley, The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas (2nd ed.; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), Ethics, Politics, Subjectivity: Essays on Derrida, Levinas and Contemporary French Thought (London: Verso, 1999), John D. Caputo The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Religion, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997) and Drucilla Cornell, The Philosophy of the Limit (New York: Routledge, 1992) all offer explicitly ethical readings of Derrida. The authors in Drucilla Cornell, Michel Rosenfeld and David Carlson, eds, Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (New York: Routledge, 1992), analyze law and justice using deconstruction, while Richard Beardsworth, Derrida & the Political (London: Routledge, 1996) and Thomas Keenan, Fables of Responsibility: Aberrations and Predicaments in Ethics and Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997) attempt to draw out deconstruction's specific implications for politics from perspectives grounded in the humanities. Feminists also find Derrida relevant for political reasons; see Drucilla Cornell, Beyond Accommodation: Ethical Feminism, Deconstruction and the Law (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999); and Nancy J. Holland, Feminist Interpretations of Jacques Derrida (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).
36. There are significant bodies of literature on Habermas' discourse ethics and his debate with postmodern positions on knowledge, language, meaning, validity, politics and ethics relevant to our discussion. For an introduction to postmodern political theory that highlights the tension between the responsibility to act (central to Habermasian theory) and the responsibility to otherness (central to postmodern theory), see Stephen K. White, Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). On philosophical issues relevant to Habermas' critique of postmodernism, see Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves and Seyla Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity: Critical Essays on the Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997). William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity: A Study in the Discourse Ethics of Jürgen Habermas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) and Simone Chambers, Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996) offer sympathetic defences of the discourse ethic for democracy; while J. M. Bernstein, Recovering Ethical Life: Jürgen Habermas and the Future of Critical Theory (London: Routledge, 1995), Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997) and Martin Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn: Adorno, Habermas and the Problem of Communicative Freedom (Albany: SUNY Press, 2001) question the success of Habermas' particular turn to discourse as the proper source of ethical and democratic power. Simon Critchley, The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas (2nd ed.; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), Ethics, Politics, Subjectivity: Essays on Derrida, Levinas and Contemporary French Thought (London: Verso, 1999), John D. Caputo The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Religion, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997) and Drucilla Cornell, The Philosophy of the Limit (New York: Routledge, 1992) all offer explicitly ethical readings of Derrida. The authors in Drucilla Cornell, Michel Rosenfeld and David Carlson, eds, Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (New York: Routledge, 1992), analyze law and justice using deconstruction, while Richard Beardsworth, Derrida & the Political (London: Routledge, 1996) and Thomas Keenan, Fables of Responsibility: Aberrations and Predicaments in Ethics and Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997) attempt to draw out deconstruction's specific implications for politics from perspectives grounded in the humanities. Feminists also find Derrida relevant for political reasons; see Drucilla Cornell, Beyond Accommodation: Ethical Feminism, Deconstruction and the Law (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999); and Nancy J. Holland, Feminist Interpretations of Jacques Derrida (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).
37. There are significant bodies of literature on Habermas' discourse ethics and his debate with postmodern positions on knowledge, language, meaning, validity, politics and ethics relevant to our discussion. For an introduction to postmodern political theory that highlights the tension between the responsibility to act (central to Habermasian theory) and the responsibility to otherness (central to postmodern theory), see Stephen K. White, Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). On philosophical issues relevant to Habermas' critique of postmodernism, see Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves and Seyla Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity: Critical Essays on the Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997). William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity: A Study in the Discourse Ethics of Jürgen Habermas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) and Simone Chambers, Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996) offer sympathetic defences of the discourse ethic for democracy; while J. M. Bernstein, Recovering Ethical Life: Jürgen Habermas and the Future of Critical Theory (London: Routledge, 1995), Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997) and Martin Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn: Adorno, Habermas and the Problem of Communicative Freedom (Albany: SUNY Press, 2001) question the success of Habermas' particular turn to discourse as the proper source of ethical and democratic power. Simon Critchley, The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas (2nd ed.; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), Ethics, Politics, Subjectivity: Essays on Derrida, Levinas and Contemporary French Thought (London: Verso, 1999), John D. Caputo The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Religion, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997) and Drucilla Cornell, The Philosophy of the Limit (New York: Routledge, 1992) all offer explicitly ethical readings of Derrida. The authors in Drucilla Cornell, Michel Rosenfeld and David Carlson, eds, Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (New York: Routledge, 1992), analyze law and justice using deconstruction, while Richard Beardsworth, Derrida & the Political (London: Routledge, 1996) and Thomas Keenan, Fables of Responsibility: Aberrations and Predicaments in Ethics and Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997) attempt to draw out deconstruction's specific implications for politics from perspectives grounded in the humanities. Feminists also find Derrida relevant for political reasons; see Drucilla Cornell, Beyond Accommodation: Ethical Feminism, Deconstruction and the Law (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999); and Nancy J. Holland, Feminist Interpretations of Jacques Derrida (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).
38. There are significant bodies of literature on Habermas' discourse ethics and his debate with postmodern positions on knowledge, language, meaning, validity, politics and ethics relevant to our discussion. For an introduction to postmodern political theory that highlights the tension between the responsibility to act (central to Habermasian theory) and the responsibility to otherness (central to postmodern theory), see Stephen K. White, Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). On philosophical issues relevant to Habermas' critique of postmodernism, see Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves and Seyla Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity: Critical Essays on the Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997). William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity: A Study in the Discourse Ethics of Jürgen Habermas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) and Simone Chambers, Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996) offer sympathetic defences of the discourse ethic for democracy; while J. M. Bernstein, Recovering Ethical Life: Jürgen Habermas and the Future of Critical Theory (London: Routledge, 1995), Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997) and Martin Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn: Adorno, Habermas and the Problem of Communicative Freedom (Albany: SUNY Press, 2001) question the success of Habermas' particular turn to discourse as the proper source of ethical and democratic power. Simon Critchley, The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas (2nd ed.; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), Ethics, Politics, Subjectivity: Essays on Derrida, Levinas and Contemporary French Thought (London: Verso, 1999), John D. Caputo The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Religion, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997) and Drucilla Cornell, The Philosophy of the Limit (New York: Routledge, 1992) all offer explicitly ethical readings of Derrida. The authors in Drucilla Cornell, Michel Rosenfeld and David Carlson, eds, Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (New York: Routledge, 1992), analyze law and justice using deconstruction, while Richard Beardsworth, Derrida & the Political (London: Routledge, 1996) and Thomas Keenan, Fables of Responsibility: Aberrations and Predicaments in Ethics and Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997) attempt to draw out deconstruction's specific implications for politics from perspectives grounded in the humanities. Feminists also find Derrida relevant for political reasons; see Drucilla Cornell, Beyond Accommodation: Ethical Feminism, Deconstruction and the Law (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999); and Nancy J. Holland, Feminist Interpretations of Jacques Derrida (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).
39. There are significant bodies of literature on Habermas' discourse ethics and his debate with postmodern positions on knowledge, language, meaning, validity, politics and ethics relevant to our discussion. For an introduction to postmodern political theory that highlights the tension between the responsibility to act (central to Habermasian theory) and the responsibility to otherness (central to postmodern theory), see Stephen K. White, Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). On philosophical issues relevant to Habermas' critique of postmodernism, see Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves and Seyla Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity: Critical Essays on the Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997). William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity: A Study in the Discourse Ethics of Jürgen Habermas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) and Simone Chambers, Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996) offer sympathetic defences of the discourse ethic for democracy; while J. M. Bernstein, Recovering Ethical Life: Jürgen Habermas and the Future of Critical Theory (London: Routledge, 1995), Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997) and Martin Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn: Adorno, Habermas and the Problem of Communicative Freedom (Albany: SUNY Press, 2001) question the success of Habermas' particular turn to discourse as the proper source of ethical and democratic power. Simon Critchley, The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas (2nd ed.; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), Ethics, Politics, Subjectivity: Essays on Derrida, Levinas and Contemporary French Thought (London: Verso, 1999), John D. Caputo The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Religion, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997) and Drucilla Cornell, The Philosophy of the Limit (New York: Routledge, 1992) all offer explicitly ethical readings of Derrida. The authors in Drucilla Cornell, Michel Rosenfeld and David Carlson, eds, Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (New York: Routledge, 1992), analyze law and justice using deconstruction, while Richard Beardsworth, Derrida & the Political (London: Routledge, 1996) and Thomas Keenan, Fables of Responsibility: Aberrations and Predicaments in Ethics and Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997) attempt to draw out deconstruction's specific implications for politics from perspectives grounded in the humanities. Feminists also find Derrida relevant for political reasons; see Drucilla Cornell, Beyond Accommodation: Ethical Feminism, Deconstruction and the Law (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999); and Nancy J. Holland, Feminist Interpretations of Jacques Derrida (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).
40. There are significant bodies of literature on Habermas' discourse ethics and his debate with postmodern positions on knowledge, language, meaning, validity, politics and ethics relevant to our discussion. For an introduction to postmodern political theory that highlights the tension between the responsibility to act (central to Habermasian theory) and the responsibility to otherness (central to postmodern theory), see Stephen K. White, Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). On philosophical issues relevant to Habermas' critique of postmodernism, see Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves and Seyla Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity: Critical Essays on the Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997). William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity: A Study in the Discourse Ethics of Jürgen Habermas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) and Simone Chambers, Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996) offer sympathetic defences of the discourse ethic for democracy; while J. M. Bernstein, Recovering Ethical Life: Jürgen Habermas and the Future of Critical Theory (London: Routledge, 1995), Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997) and Martin Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn: Adorno, Habermas and the Problem of Communicative Freedom (Albany: SUNY Press, 2001) question the success of Habermas' particular turn to discourse as the proper source of ethical and democratic power. Simon Critchley, The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas (2nd ed.; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), Ethics, Politics, Subjectivity: Essays on Derrida, Levinas and Contemporary French Thought (London: Verso, 1999), John D. Caputo The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Religion, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997) and Drucilla Cornell, The Philosophy of the Limit (New York: Routledge, 1992) all offer explicitly ethical readings of Derrida. The authors in Drucilla Cornell, Michel Rosenfeld and David Carlson, eds, Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (New York: Routledge, 1992), analyze law and justice using deconstruction, while Richard Beardsworth, Derrida & the Political (London: Routledge, 1996) and Thomas Keenan, Fables of Responsibility: Aberrations and Predicaments in Ethics and Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997) attempt to draw out deconstruction's specific implications for politics from perspectives grounded in the humanities. Feminists also find Derrida relevant for political reasons; see Drucilla Cornell, Beyond Accommodation: Ethical Feminism, Deconstruction and the Law (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999); and Nancy J. Holland, Feminist Interpretations of Jacques Derrida (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).
41. There are significant bodies of literature on Habermas' discourse ethics and his debate with postmodern positions on knowledge, language, meaning, validity, politics and ethics relevant to our discussion. For an introduction to postmodern political theory that highlights the tension between the responsibility to act (central to Habermasian theory) and the responsibility to otherness (central to postmodern theory), see Stephen K. White, Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). On philosophical issues relevant to Habermas' critique of postmodernism, see Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves and Seyla Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity: Critical Essays on the Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997). William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity: A Study in the Discourse Ethics of Jürgen Habermas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) and Simone Chambers, Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996) offer sympathetic defences of the discourse ethic for democracy; while J. M. Bernstein, Recovering Ethical Life: Jürgen Habermas and the Future of Critical Theory (London: Routledge, 1995), Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997) and Martin Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn: Adorno, Habermas and the Problem of Communicative Freedom (Albany: SUNY Press, 2001) question the success of Habermas' particular turn to discourse as the proper source of ethical and democratic power. Simon Critchley, The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas (2nd ed.; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), Ethics, Politics, Subjectivity: Essays on Derrida, Levinas and Contemporary French Thought (London: Verso, 1999), John D. Caputo The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Religion, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997) and Drucilla Cornell, The Philosophy of the Limit (New York: Routledge, 1992) all offer explicitly ethical readings of Derrida. The authors in Drucilla Cornell, Michel Rosenfeld and David Carlson, eds, Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (New York: Routledge, 1992), analyze law and justice using deconstruction, while Richard Beardsworth, Derrida & the Political (London: Routledge, 1996) and Thomas Keenan, Fables of Responsibility: Aberrations and Predicaments in Ethics and Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997) attempt to draw out deconstruction's specific implications for politics from perspectives grounded in the humanities. Feminists also find Derrida relevant for political reasons; see Drucilla Cornell, Beyond Accommodation: Ethical Feminism, Deconstruction and the Law (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999); and Nancy J. Holland, Feminist Interpretations of Jacques Derrida (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).
42. There are significant bodies of literature on Habermas' discourse ethics and his debate with postmodern positions on knowledge, language, meaning, validity, politics and ethics relevant to our discussion. For an introduction to postmodern political theory that highlights the tension between the responsibility to act (central to Habermasian theory) and the responsibility to otherness (central to postmodern theory), see Stephen K. White, Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). On philosophical issues relevant to Habermas' critique of postmodernism, see Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves and Seyla Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity: Critical Essays on the Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997). William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity: A Study in the Discourse Ethics of Jürgen Habermas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) and Simone Chambers, Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996) offer sympathetic defences of the discourse ethic for democracy; while J. M. Bernstein, Recovering Ethical Life: Jürgen Habermas and the Future of Critical Theory (London: Routledge, 1995), Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997) and Martin Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn: Adorno, Habermas and the Problem of Communicative Freedom (Albany: SUNY Press, 2001) question the success of Habermas' particular turn to discourse as the proper source of ethical and democratic power. Simon Critchley, The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas (2nd ed.; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), Ethics, Politics, Subjectivity: Essays on Derrida, Levinas and Contemporary French Thought (London: Verso, 1999), John D. Caputo The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Religion, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997) and Drucilla Cornell, The Philosophy of the Limit (New York: Routledge, 1992) all offer explicitly ethical readings of Derrida. The authors in Drucilla Cornell, Michel Rosenfeld and David Carlson, eds, Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (New York: Routledge, 1992), analyze law and justice using deconstruction, while Richard Beardsworth, Derrida & the Political (London: Routledge, 1996) and Thomas Keenan, Fables of Responsibility: Aberrations and Predicaments in Ethics and Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997) attempt to draw out deconstruction's specific implications for politics from perspectives grounded in the humanities. Feminists also find Derrida relevant for political reasons; see Drucilla Cornell, Beyond Accommodation: Ethical Feminism, Deconstruction and the Law (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999); and Nancy J. Holland, Feminist Interpretations of Jacques Derrida (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).
43. There are significant bodies of literature on Habermas' discourse ethics and his debate with postmodern positions on knowledge, language, meaning, validity, politics and ethics relevant to our discussion. For an introduction to postmodern political theory that highlights the tension between the responsibility to act (central to Habermasian theory) and the responsibility to otherness (central to postmodern theory), see Stephen K. White, Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). On philosophical issues relevant to Habermas' critique of postmodernism, see Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves and Seyla Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity: Critical Essays on the Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997). William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity: A Study in the Discourse Ethics of Jürgen Habermas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) and Simone Chambers, Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996) offer sympathetic defences of the discourse ethic for democracy; while J. M. Bernstein, Recovering Ethical Life: Jürgen Habermas and the Future of Critical Theory (London: Routledge, 1995), Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997) and Martin Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn: Adorno, Habermas and the Problem of Communicative Freedom (Albany: SUNY Press, 2001) question the success of Habermas' particular turn to discourse as the proper source of ethical and democratic power. Simon Critchley, The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas (2nd ed.; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), Ethics, Politics, Subjectivity: Essays on Derrida, Levinas and Contemporary French Thought (London: Verso, 1999), John D. Caputo The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Religion, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997) and Drucilla Cornell, The Philosophy of the Limit (New York: Routledge, 1992) all offer explicitly ethical readings of Derrida. The authors in Drucilla Cornell, Michel Rosenfeld and David Carlson, eds, Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (New York: Routledge, 1992), analyze law and justice using deconstruction, while Richard Beardsworth, Derrida & the Political (London: Routledge, 1996) and Thomas Keenan, Fables of Responsibility: Aberrations and Predicaments in Ethics and Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997) attempt to draw out deconstruction's specific implications for politics from perspectives grounded in the humanities. Feminists also find Derrida relevant for political reasons; see Drucilla Cornell, Beyond Accommodation: Ethical Feminism, Deconstruction and the Law (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999); and Nancy J. Holland, Feminist Interpretations of Jacques Derrida (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).
44. There are significant bodies of literature on Habermas' discourse ethics and his debate with postmodern positions on knowledge, language, meaning, validity, politics and ethics relevant to our discussion. For an introduction to postmodern political theory that highlights the tension between the responsibility to act (central to Habermasian theory) and the responsibility to otherness (central to postmodern theory), see Stephen K. White, Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). On philosophical issues relevant to Habermas' critique of postmodernism, see Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves and Seyla Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity: Critical Essays on the Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997). William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity: A Study in the Discourse Ethics of Jürgen Habermas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) and Simone Chambers, Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996) offer sympathetic defences of the discourse ethic for democracy; while J. M. Bernstein, Recovering Ethical Life: Jürgen Habermas and the Future of Critical Theory (London: Routledge, 1995), Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997) and Martin Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn: Adorno, Habermas and the Problem of Communicative Freedom (Albany: SUNY Press, 2001) question the success of Habermas' particular turn to discourse as the proper source of ethical and democratic power. Simon Critchley, The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas (2nd ed.; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), Ethics, Politics, Subjectivity: Essays on Derrida, Levinas and Contemporary French Thought (London: Verso, 1999), John D. Caputo The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Religion, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997) and Drucilla Cornell, The Philosophy of the Limit (New York: Routledge, 1992) all offer explicitly ethical readings of Derrida. The authors in Drucilla Cornell, Michel Rosenfeld and David Carlson, eds, Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (New York: Routledge, 1992), analyze law and justice using deconstruction, while Richard Beardsworth, Derrida & the Political (London: Routledge, 1996) and Thomas Keenan, Fables of Responsibility: Aberrations and Predicaments in Ethics and Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997) attempt to draw out deconstruction's specific implications for politics from perspectives grounded in the humanities. Feminists also find Derrida relevant for political reasons; see Drucilla Cornell, Beyond Accommodation: Ethical Feminism, Deconstruction and the Law (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999); and Nancy J. Holland, Feminist Interpretations of Jacques Derrida (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).
45. There are significant bodies of literature on Habermas' discourse ethics and his debate with postmodern positions on knowledge, language, meaning, validity, politics and ethics relevant to our discussion. For an introduction to postmodern political theory that highlights the tension between the responsibility to act (central to Habermasian theory) and the responsibility to otherness (central to postmodern theory), see Stephen K. White, Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). On philosophical issues relevant to Habermas' critique of postmodernism, see Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves and Seyla Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity: Critical Essays on the Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997). William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity: A Study in the Discourse Ethics of Jürgen Habermas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) and Simone Chambers, Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996) offer sympathetic defences of the discourse ethic for democracy; while J. M. Bernstein, Recovering Ethical Life: Jürgen Habermas and the Future of Critical Theory (London: Routledge, 1995), Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997) and Martin Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn: Adorno, Habermas and the Problem of Communicative Freedom (Albany: SUNY Press, 2001) question the success of Habermas' particular turn to discourse as the proper source of ethical and democratic power. Simon Critchley, The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas (2nd ed.; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), Ethics, Politics, Subjectivity: Essays on Derrida, Levinas and Contemporary French Thought (London: Verso, 1999), John D. Caputo The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Religion, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997) and Drucilla Cornell, The Philosophy of the Limit (New York: Routledge, 1992) all offer explicitly ethical readings of Derrida. The authors in Drucilla Cornell, Michel Rosenfeld and David Carlson, eds, Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (New York: Routledge, 1992), analyze law and justice using deconstruction, while Richard Beardsworth, Derrida & the Political (London: Routledge, 1996) and Thomas Keenan, Fables of Responsibility: Aberrations and Predicaments in Ethics and Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997) attempt to draw out deconstruction's specific implications for politics from perspectives grounded in the humanities. Feminists also find Derrida relevant for political reasons; see Drucilla Cornell, Beyond Accommodation: Ethical Feminism, Deconstruction and the Law (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999); and Nancy J. Holland, Feminist Interpretations of Jacques Derrida (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).
46. There are significant bodies of literature on Habermas' discourse ethics and his debate with postmodern positions on knowledge, language, meaning, validity, politics and ethics relevant to our discussion. For an introduction to postmodern political theory that highlights the tension between the responsibility to act (central to Habermasian theory) and the responsibility to otherness (central to postmodern theory), see Stephen K. White, Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). On philosophical issues relevant to Habermas' critique of postmodernism, see Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves and Seyla Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity: Critical Essays on the Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997). William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity: A Study in the Discourse Ethics of Jürgen Habermas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) and Simone Chambers, Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996) offer sympathetic defences of the discourse ethic for democracy; while J. M. Bernstein, Recovering Ethical Life: Jürgen Habermas and the Future of Critical Theory (London: Routledge, 1995), Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997) and Martin Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn: Adorno, Habermas and the Problem of Communicative Freedom (Albany: SUNY Press, 2001) question the success of Habermas' particular turn to discourse as the proper source of ethical and democratic power. Simon Critchley, The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas (2nd ed.; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), Ethics, Politics, Subjectivity: Essays on Derrida, Levinas and Contemporary French Thought (London: Verso, 1999), John D. Caputo The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Religion, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997) and Drucilla Cornell, The Philosophy of the Limit (New York: Routledge, 1992) all offer explicitly ethical readings of Derrida. The authors in Drucilla Cornell, Michel Rosenfeld and David Carlson, eds, Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (New York: Routledge, 1992), analyze law and justice using deconstruction, while Richard Beardsworth, Derrida & the Political (London: Routledge, 1996) and Thomas Keenan, Fables of Responsibility: Aberrations and Predicaments in Ethics and Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997) attempt to draw out deconstruction's specific implications for politics from perspectives grounded in the humanities. Feminists also find Derrida relevant for political reasons; see Drucilla Cornell, Beyond Accommodation: Ethical Feminism, Deconstruction and the Law (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999); and Nancy J. Holland, Feminist Interpretations of Jacques Derrida (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).
47. There are significant bodies of literature on Habermas' discourse ethics and his debate with postmodern positions on knowledge, language, meaning, validity, politics and ethics relevant to our discussion. For an introduction to postmodern political theory that highlights the tension between the responsibility to act (central to Habermasian theory) and the responsibility to otherness (central to postmodern theory), see Stephen K. White, Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). On philosophical issues relevant to Habermas' critique of postmodernism, see Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves and Seyla Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity: Critical Essays on the Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997). William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity: A Study in the Discourse Ethics of Jürgen Habermas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) and Simone Chambers, Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996) offer sympathetic defences of the discourse ethic for democracy; while J. M. Bernstein, Recovering Ethical Life: Jürgen Habermas and the Future of Critical Theory (London: Routledge, 1995), Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997) and Martin Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn: Adorno, Habermas and the Problem of Communicative Freedom (Albany: SUNY Press, 2001) question the success of Habermas' particular turn to discourse as the proper source of ethical and democratic power. Simon Critchley, The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas (2nd ed.; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), Ethics, Politics, Subjectivity: Essays on Derrida, Levinas and Contemporary French Thought (London: Verso, 1999), John D. Caputo The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Religion, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997) and Drucilla Cornell, The Philosophy of the Limit (New York: Routledge, 1992) all offer explicitly ethical readings of Derrida. The authors in Drucilla Cornell, Michel Rosenfeld and David Carlson, eds, Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (New York: Routledge, 1992), analyze law and justice using deconstruction, while Richard Beardsworth, Derrida & the Political (London: Routledge, 1996) and Thomas Keenan, Fables of Responsibility: Aberrations and Predicaments in Ethics and Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997) attempt to draw out deconstruction's specific implications for politics from perspectives grounded in the humanities. Feminists also find Derrida relevant for political reasons; see Drucilla Cornell, Beyond Accommodation: Ethical Feminism, Deconstruction and the Law (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999); and Nancy J. Holland, Feminist Interpretations of Jacques Derrida (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).
48. There are significant bodies of literature on Habermas' discourse ethics and his debate with postmodern positions on knowledge, language, meaning, validity, politics and ethics relevant to our discussion. For an introduction to postmodern political theory that highlights the tension between the responsibility to act (central to Habermasian theory) and the responsibility to otherness (central to postmodern theory), see Stephen K. White, Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). On philosophical issues relevant to Habermas' critique of postmodernism, see Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves and Seyla Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity: Critical Essays on the Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997). William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity: A Study in the Discourse Ethics of Jürgen Habermas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) and Simone Chambers, Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996) offer sympathetic defences of the discourse ethic for democracy; while J. M. Bernstein, Recovering Ethical Life: Jürgen Habermas and the Future of Critical Theory (London: Routledge, 1995), Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997) and Martin Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn: Adorno, Habermas and the Problem of Communicative Freedom (Albany: SUNY Press, 2001) question the success of Habermas' particular turn to discourse as the proper source of ethical and democratic power. Simon Critchley, The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas (2nd ed.; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), Ethics, Politics, Subjectivity: Essays on Derrida, Levinas and Contemporary French Thought (London: Verso, 1999), John D. Caputo The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Religion, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997) and Drucilla Cornell, The Philosophy of the Limit (New York: Routledge, 1992) all offer explicitly ethical readings of Derrida. The authors in Drucilla Cornell, Michel Rosenfeld and David Carlson, eds, Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (New York: Routledge, 1992), analyze law and justice using deconstruction, while Richard Beardsworth, Derrida & the Political (London: Routledge, 1996) and Thomas Keenan, Fables of Responsibility: Aberrations and Predicaments in Ethics and Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997) attempt to draw out deconstruction's specific implications for politics from perspectives grounded in the humanities. Feminists also find Derrida relevant for political reasons; see Drucilla Cornell, Beyond Accommodation: Ethical Feminism, Deconstruction and the Law (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999); and Nancy J. Holland, Feminist Interpretations of Jacques Derrida (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).
49. There are significant bodies of literature on Habermas' discourse ethics and his debate with postmodern positions on knowledge, language, meaning, validity, politics and ethics relevant to our discussion. For an introduction to postmodern political theory that highlights the tension between the responsibility to act (central to Habermasian theory) and the responsibility to otherness (central to postmodern theory), see Stephen K. White, Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). On philosophical issues relevant to Habermas' critique of postmodernism, see Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves and Seyla Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity: Critical Essays on the Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997). William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity: A Study in the Discourse Ethics of Jürgen Habermas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) and Simone Chambers, Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996) offer sympathetic defences of the discourse ethic for democracy; while J. M. Bernstein, Recovering Ethical Life: Jürgen Habermas and the Future of Critical Theory (London: Routledge, 1995), Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997) and Martin Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn: Adorno, Habermas and the Problem of Communicative Freedom (Albany: SUNY Press, 2001) question the success of Habermas' particular turn to discourse as the proper source of ethical and democratic power. Simon Critchley, The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas (2nd ed.; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), Ethics, Politics, Subjectivity: Essays on Derrida, Levinas and Contemporary French Thought (London: Verso, 1999), John D. Caputo The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Religion, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997) and Drucilla Cornell, The Philosophy of the Limit (New York: Routledge, 1992) all offer explicitly ethical readings of Derrida. The authors in Drucilla Cornell, Michel Rosenfeld and David Carlson, eds, Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (New York: Routledge, 1992), analyze law and justice using deconstruction, while Richard Beardsworth, Derrida & the Political (London: Routledge, 1996) and Thomas Keenan, Fables of Responsibility: Aberrations and Predicaments in Ethics and Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997) attempt to draw out deconstruction's specific implications for politics from perspectives grounded in the humanities. Feminists also find Derrida relevant for political reasons; see Drucilla Cornell, Beyond Accommodation: Ethical Feminism, Deconstruction and the Law (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999); and Nancy J. Holland, Feminist Interpretations of Jacques Derrida (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997).
50. There are significant bodies of literature on Habermas' discourse ethics and his debate with postmodern positions on knowledge, language, meaning, validity, politics and ethics relevant to our discussion. For an introduction to postmodern political theory that highlights the tension between the responsibility to act (central to Habermasian theory) and the responsibility to otherness (central to postmodern theory), see Stephen K. White, Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). On philosophical issues relevant to Habermas' critique of postmodernism, see Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves and Seyla Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity: Critical Essays on the Philosophical Discourse of Modernity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997). William Rehg, Insight and Solidarity: A Study in the Discourse Ethics of Jürgen Habermas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) and Simone Chambers, Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996) offer sympathetic defences of the discourse ethic for democracy; while J. M. Bernstein, Recovering Ethical Life: Jürgen Habermas and the Future of Critical Theory (London: Routledge, 1995), Romand Coles, Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997) and Martin Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn: Adorno, Habermas and the Problem of Communicative Freedom (Albany: SUNY Press, 2001) question the success of Habermas' particular turn to discourse as the proper source of ethical and democratic power. Simon Critchley, The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas (2nd ed.; Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), Ethics, Politics, Subjectivity: Essays on Derrida, Levinas and Contemporary French Thought (London: Verso, 1999), John D. Caputo The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Religion, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997) and Drucilla Cornell, The Philosophy of the Limit (New York: Routledge, 1992) all offer explicitly ethical readings of Derrida. The authors in Drucilla Cornell, Michel Rosenfeld and David Carlson, eds, Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice (New York: Routledge, 1992), analyze law and justice using deconstruction, while Richard Beardsworth, Derrida & the Political (London: Routledge, 1996) and Thomas Keenan, Fables of Responsibility: Aberrations and Predicaments in Ethics and Politics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997) attempt to draw out deconstruction's specific implications for politics from perspectives grounded in the humanities. Feminists also find Derrida relevant for political reasons; see Drucilla Cornell, Beyond Accommodation: Ethical Feminism, Deconstruction and the Law
51. Jacques Derrida, On the Name, trans. by John P. Leavey, David Wood, Jr. and Ian McLeod (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1995), 124-25; emphasis in original.
52. Ibid., 80, 103.
53. Ibid., 80.
54. Ibid., 111, 117, 106.
55. Toril Moi, Sexual/Textual Politics: Feminist Literary Theory (London: Routledge, 1986), 162. Khôra, according to Kristeva, is "a wholly provisional articulation that is essentially mobile and constituted of movements and their ephemeral stases . . . . Neither model nor copy, it is anterior to and underlies figuration and therefore also specularization and only admits analogy with vocal or kinetic rhythm" (Julia Kristeva, La Révolution Du Langage Poétique [Paris: Seuil, 1974], 24, translated by and quoted in Moi, Sexual/Textual Politics, 161).
56. Toril Moi, Sexual/Textual Politics: Feminist Literary Theory (London: Routledge, 1986), 162. Khôra, according to Kristeva, is "a wholly provisional articulation that is essentially mobile and constituted of movements and their ephemeral stases . . . . Neither model nor copy, it is anterior to and underlies figuration and therefore also specularization and only admits analogy with vocal or kinetic rhythm" (Julia Kristeva, La Révolution Du Langage Poétique [Paris: Seuil, 1974], 24, translated by and quoted in Moi, Sexual/Textual Politics, 161).
57. Toril Moi, Sexual/Textual Politics: Feminist Literary Theory (London: Routledge, 1986), 162. Khôra, according to Kristeva, is "a wholly provisional articulation that is essentially mobile and constituted of movements and their ephemeral stases . . . . Neither model nor copy, it is anterior to and underlies figuration and therefore also specularization and only admits analogy with vocal or kinetic rhythm" (Julia Kristeva, La Révolution Du Langage Poétique [Paris: Seuil, 1974], 24, translated by and quoted in Moi, Sexual/Textual Politics, 161).
58. Derrida, On the Name, 97.
59. Ibid., 103.
60. It is a radical openness, the yawning chasm opened by radical indeterminacy. But it should not lead automatically or ultimately to the fear aroused by utter chaos and disorder. As fractal theory and chaos theory show, utter chaos does not exist, since there remain patterns even in what appears to be the most random configurations and events. To gaze into the abyss is not necessarily to succumb to the urge to jump. But it might be. Instead, this experience ought to cultivate a sensitivity to and for the other, for otherness itself. But this sensibility would seem to demand more than what can be expected from the consciousness of utter finitude. It may be that death is a "gift" to which we should be far more ethically responsive and grateful, as Derrida, following Heidegger, has argued elsewhere (Jacques Derrida, The Gift of Death, trans. by David Wills [Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995]), but the inevitability of death can also debilitate our need to criticize that which is responsible for so much death. For that, a far more developed critical social theory is required. Derrida has made some efforts in this direction (Spectres of Marx: The State of the Debt, the Work of Mourning and the New International, trans. by Peggy Kamuf [New York: Routledge, 1994]).
61. It is a radical openness, the yawning chasm opened by radical indeterminacy. But it should not lead automatically or ultimately to the fear aroused by utter chaos and disorder. As fractal theory and chaos theory show, utter chaos does not exist, since there remain patterns even in what appears to be the most random configurations and events. To gaze into the abyss is not necessarily to succumb to the urge to jump. But it might be. Instead, this experience ought to cultivate a sensitivity to and for the other, for otherness itself. But this sensibility would seem to demand more than what can be expected from the consciousness of utter finitude. It may be that death is a "gift" to which we should be far more ethically responsive and grateful, as Derrida, following Heidegger, has argued elsewhere (Jacques Derrida, The Gift of Death, trans. by David Wills [Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995]), but the inevitability of death can also debilitate our need to criticize that which is responsible for so much death. For that, a far more developed critical social theory is required. Derrida has made some efforts in this direction (Spectres of Marx: The State of the Debt, the Work of Mourning and the New International, trans. by Peggy Kamuf [New York: Routledge, 1994]).
62. Ernesto Laclau, Emancipation(S) (London: Verso, 1996), 36.
63. Ibid., 58.
64. Ibid., 42-44.
65. Slavoj Žižek, Tarrying with the Negative: Kant, Hegel and the Critique of Ideology (Durham: Duke University Press, 1993), 1.
66. Habermas, Philosophical Discourse of Modernity, 210.
67. Bonnie Honig's deconstruction of the significance of "foreignness" in democratic thought, especially the foreign "founder," is useful for revealing how central the relationship to otherness "outside" has been for democratic theory (Democracy and Foreignness [Princeton: Princeton University Press], 2001).
68. Habermas, Philosophical Discourse of Modernity, 199. For a good discussion of the Habermas-Derrida debate that focuses on the philosophical context and its historical dimensions, see Christopher Morris, "Deconstruction, Postmodernism and Philosophy: Habermas and Derrida," in Passerin d'Entrèves and Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity, 97-123.
69. Habermas, Philosophical Discourse of Modernity, 199. For a good discussion of the Habermas-Derrida debate that focuses on the philosophical context and its historical dimensions, see Christopher Morris, "Deconstruction, Postmodernism and Philosophy: Habermas and Derrida," in Passerin d'Entrèves and Benhabib, Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity, 97-123.
70. Habermas, Philosophical Discourse of Modernity, 190.
71. Ibid., 204.
72. Ibid., 208, 209.
73. Morris, Rethinking the Communicative Turn, chaps., 4 and 5. However, I do not pose this question in quite the same way in this text.
74. Jürgen Habermas, "Concluding Remarks," in Craig Calhoun, ed., Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992), 466.
75. For a recent assessment of this critique, see Martin Morris, "Contradictions of Postmodern Consumerism, Resistance and Democracy," Studies in Political Economy 64, (2001), 7-32.
76. See, for example, the account of the American conquest in Tzvetan Todorov, The Conquest of America: The Question of the Other (New York: Harper and Row, 1984). Todorov's discussion highlights the disturbing effects on some of the Spanish priests that the enigma of otherness presents. The universalizing discourses of conquest and conversion depend on a projection of superiority and inferiority that is undermined as the dialectic of conversion reveals identitifications between the colonizing Christian culture and that of the discovered peoples. Identities that seek to dominate others must suppress the awareness of such identitifications with the other in order to sustain the coherence of their domination. See also the discussion in William E. Connolly, Identity/Difference: Democratic Negotiations of Political Paradox (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1991), 36-48. For a postcolonial philosophical perspective, see Enrique Dussel, The Invention of the Americas: Eclipse of "the Other" and the Myth of Modernity, trans. by Michael D. Barber (New York: Continuum, 1995).
77. See, for example, the account of the American conquest in Tzvetan Todorov, The Conquest of America: The Question of the Other (New York: Harper and Row, 1984). Todorov's discussion highlights the disturbing effects on some of the Spanish priests that the enigma of otherness presents. The universalizing discourses of conquest and conversion depend on a projection of superiority and inferiority that is undermined as the dialectic of conversion reveals identitifications between the colonizing Christian culture and that of the discovered peoples. Identities that seek to dominate others must suppress the awareness of such identitifications with the other in order to sustain the coherence of their domination. See also the discussion in William E. Connolly, Identity/Difference: Democratic Negotiations of Political Paradox (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1991), 36-48. For a postcolonial philosophical perspective, see Enrique Dussel, The Invention of the Americas: Eclipse of "the Other" and the Myth of Modernity, trans. by Michael D. Barber (New York: Continuum, 1995).
78. See, for example, the account of the American conquest in Tzvetan Todorov, The Conquest of America: The Question of the Other (New York: Harper and Row, 1984). Todorov's discussion highlights the disturbing effects on some of the Spanish priests that the enigma of otherness presents. The universalizing discourses of conquest and conversion depend on a projection of superiority and inferiority that is undermined as the dialectic of conversion reveals identitifications between the colonizing Christian culture and that of the discovered peoples. Identities that seek to dominate others must suppress the awareness of such identitifications with the other in order to sustain the coherence of their domination. See also the discussion in William E. Connolly, Identity/Difference: Democratic Negotiations of Political Paradox (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1991), 36-48. For a postcolonial philosophical perspective, see Enrique Dussel, The Invention of the Americas: Eclipse of "the Other" and the Myth of Modernity, trans. by Michael D. Barber (New York: Continuum, 1995).
79. Jacques Derrida, The Other Heading: Reflections on Today's Europe, trans. by Pascale-Anne Brault and Michael B. Naas (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992), 14-16.
80. Ibid., 9-10.
81. Ibid., 73.
82. Cornell, Philosophy of the Limit.
83. Derrida, Other Heading, 60.
84. Ibid., 18.
85. Ibid., 44-45.
86. Bonnie Honig extends Derrida's call when she considers the educative and political possibilities for democracy presented by encounters with foreignness in "immigrant America" ("Immigrant America: How Foreignness 'Solves' Democracy's Problems," Social Text 56 [1998], 1-27.)
87. James Tully, Strange Multiplicity: Constitutionalism in an Age of Diversity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 201.
88. Cornel West, Keeping Faith: Philosophy and Race in America (New York: Routledge, 1993), 22.
89. Charles Taylor, "The Politics of Recognition," in Gutman, Multiculturalism, 70.
90. Derrida, Other Heading, 12-13.
91. The work of Emmanuel Levinas is clearly relevant here and Levinas' influence on Derrida is essential to understand the latter fully. Asher Horowitz offers a useful critical perspective on the Habermas-Levinas axis that raises important questions relevant to this study ("'How Can Anyone Be Called Guilty'? Speech, Responsibility and the Social Relation in Habermas and Levinas," Philosophy Today 44:3 [2000], 295-317).
92. See the collected exchanges in Diane P. Michelfelder and Richard E. Palmer, Dialogue and Deconstruclion: The Gadamer-Derrida Encounter (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1989).
93. Derrida, On the Name, 28-29.