Philosophy
In A Time Of Terror: Dialogues with Jurgen Habermas and Jacques
Derrida Giovanna Borradori
The University of Chicago Press
ISBN 0-226-06664-9
Most
people find philosophers abstract and difficult to understand. They
would have some doubts about whether they have anything worthwhile
to say about the important events of our times, such as the 9/11
attacks and the subsequent ‘war on terror’ for example.
The interest of this book is that it shows that philosophy has a
valuable contribution to make to the understanding of phenomena
like ‘terrorism’ and ‘war’. The editor has interviewed
the two most important philosophers still alive, Jacques Derrida
and Jurgen Habermas. In two interviews Habermas and Derrida expose
their entire philosophical framework to interpret the 9/11 events
in an accessible manner. Each interview is followed by an essay
by Giovanna Borradori, contextualising the arguments developed by
the two thinkers.
Derrida
Derrida’s
interview is the longest, and probably the most interesting. His
project is known as ‘deconstruction’. It pays close attention
to language to expose the rhetorical strategies at work within philosophy.
In the words of the editor, the dialogue presents in an accessible
and concentrated manner Derrida's 'unmatched ability to combine
inventiveness and rigor, circumvention and affirmation' and clearly
shows his extreme sensibility to the subtleties of language.
For
Derrida, an event like 9/11 calls for a philosophical response which
questions at their most fundamental level, the most deep-seated
conceptual presuppositions of our discourse about the likes of ‘war’
and ‘terrorism’.
"The
concepts with which this 'event' has most often been described,
named and categorised, are the products of a 'dogmatic slumber'
from which only a new philosophical reflection can awaken us, a
reflection on philosophy, most notably on political philosophy and
its heritage. The prevailing discourse, that of the media and of
the official rhetoric, relies too readily on received concepts like
'war' or 'terrorism' (national and international)."
It
is necessary to be vigilant given the uncritical use of words like
‘terrorism’ in the discourse that dominates public space
and the media in this age of 'war on terror'. This is something
relevant for us here: for example, were the so-called 'Troubles'
a 'war' or 'terrorism', did they involve 'gangsters' or 'guerillas'?
Derrida calls for a deconstruction of all those terms and distinctions.
The purpose of being attentive to rhetoric, to where concepts come
against their limits, is "not in order to isolate ourselves
in language", as Derrida as often been accused of, "but
on the contrary, in order to try to understand what is going on
precisely beyond language". This is not an abstract question
given the political and legal effects those words have.
"Semantic
instability, irreductible trouble spots on the borders between concepts,
indecision in the very concept of the border; all this must not
only be analysed as a speculative disorder, a conceptual chaos or
zone of passing turbulence in public or political language. We must
also recognise here strategies and relations of force. The dominant
power is the one that manages to impose and, thus, to legitimate,
indeed to legalize (for it is always a question of law) on a national
or world stage, the terminology and thus the interpretation that
best suits it in a given situation."
For
Derrida, the task of the "philosopher-deconstructor"
is to "reflect in a responsible fashion on those questions
and demand accountability from those in charge of public discourse,
those responsible for the language and institutions of international
law." The deconstruction of those concepts is not simply
a critical enterprise or nihilism, but one of refoundation. "Reflection
(of what I would call a 'deconstructive' type) should thus, it seems
to me, without diminishing or destroying these axioms and principles,
question and refound them, endlessly refine and universalise them,
without becoming discouraged by the aporias such work must necessarily
encounter."
Habermas
The
interview with Jurgen Habermas has less to offer in terms of insights
into the significance of 9/11 and its consequences. His theory of
‘communicative action’ is about giving foundations to
ethics and politics through argumentative procedures, based on the
idea that commitments to truth, sincerity and rightness are normative
presuppositions of human communication. Philosophy's aim is to reconstruct
the conditions that make communication not only possible, but also
effective and productive. This enables philosophy to become a critical
tool to criticize the distortions in communication. For Habermas,
international terrorism and 9/11 are ultimately a result of a communicative
pathology: "The spiral of violence begins as a spiral of
distorted communication that leads through the spiral of uncontrolled
reciprocal mistrust to the breakdown of communication."
Habermas
calls on Western countries to build channels of communication, and
to increase public participation and encourage dialogue. Mutual
understanding and consensus are the key to resolving international
tension.
There
is something very abstract in the ideas developed by Habermas in
this interview. As the editor notes in her essay, the turn toward
communicative action causes Habermas's focus to shift from historically
and sociologically founded analyses to a formal approach in which
the investigation of institutional processes and argumentative structures
is given more importance than material conditions. Habermas may
have discovered 'normative foundations', but those remain purely
linguistic, and remain disconnected from historical realities. Historical
situations like 9/11 and the ‘war on terror’ are judged
in terms of an unhistorical ideal speech situation.
Liberalism
The
actual content of Habermas' and Derrida's political positions is
not particularly original. Both defend a banal liberalism and argue
for reform of international laws and institutions. They differ however,
in so far as Habermas is fairly apologetic of existing institutions
such as the European Union or The Hague Tribunal, whereas Derrida
defends a kind of empty transcendence and a formalistic messianism
about an utopian 'democracy to come', believing "that it
is faith in the possibility of this impossible" that must
govern all our political decisions.
Language
has a central place in the reflection of both thinkers. However,
their understanding of the nature of language is very different.
If Habermas puts the emphasis upon the ideal of transparent communication,
Derrida is more attentive to the contradictions, tensions and conflicts
that make mutual understanding and dialogue difficult in practice.
Such a perspective is far more suited to the reality of international
relations. He reminds us of the permanent semantic instability of
concepts like ‘terrorism’ or ‘war’, whose meaning
will always be negotiated and renegotiated. His call for people
to be vigilant about how such concepts are used is more than timely
in an age where there is so much talk about ‘terrorism’.
P
r e v i e w
Issue 428
Whose
Irish News? The
rumour mill had been going overtime in Belfast for ages - the west
Belfast-based Andersonstown News was planning to go daily and the
long-established Irish News was “bricking it’’ as
one well-known journalist so succinctly put it. As it turned out,
the planned daily was not as close to hand as the Irish News feared.
by
Pól Ó Muirí
Meaning
What You Say Most
people find philosophers abstract and difficult to understand. They
would have some doubts about whether they have anything worthwhile
to say about the important events of our times, such as the 9/11
attacks and the subsequent ‘war on terror’ for example.
The interest of this book is that it shows that philosophy has a
valuable contribution to make to the understanding of phenomena
like ‘terrorism’ and ‘war’. The editor has interviewed
the two most important philosophers still alive, Jacques Derrida
and Jurgen Habermas. In two interviews Habermas and Derrida expose
their entire philosophical framework to interpret the 9/11 events
in an accessible manner. Each interview is followed by an essay
by Giovanna Borradori, contextualising the arguments developed by
the two thinkers.
by Liam O Ruairc
The
Fortnight Interview:
Dark but funny and transformative 'Nuala
Ní Dhomhnaill, at the moment, looks the most likely of the brilliant
constellation of Irish-language poets of her generation to be mentioned
in history in the same breath as Ó Rathaile', commented Bernard
O'Donoghue in the Irish Times. Praise indeed. To which it could
be added that she is also one of this country's foremost writers
in any language. But Ní Dhomnaill has chosen to write in Irish.
by Liam Carson
S
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