Solidarity Rights and Community: The Oeuvre of the Intersubjective Paradigm (original) (raw)
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This article investigates the model of the transnational cosmopolitan moral-legal community of limitless communication. This model, using philosophical means, appears as an attempt to underscore the impossibility of authoritarian monopolies of power which resulted in the dictatorial regimes and national (pro)totalitarian communities of the 20th century. I will reconstruct this model of the supranational community, and analyze the mode of morally-oriented intersubjective interactions within this community. I will show that the differentiation of limits between the “interior” (subjective) and the “exterior” (intersubjective) worlds is an essential communicative and ethical problem in Habermas’ theory. According to this differentiation, subjective “verity” of an individual/local community may be defined and justified by purposes, axiological preferences, and tastes of a particular individual/community; while a claim pretending to be an intersubjective norm should be justified and voluntary accepted by all concerned with this norm. The non-differentiation of limits between what one believes to be “veritable”, and what one claims others should accept as a norm (or imposing on others one’s particular axiological position as a universal norm) underlies most social, (geo)political, ethnical, confessional conflicts, and communicative deformations. Until recently, academic literature did not pay much attention to this key aspect of Habermas’ theory. At the same time, it is this differentiation between the subjectively “veritable” and the intersubjectively valid that makes Habermas’ community anti-totalitarian, and reveals the deep political significance of intersubjective limits.
Solidarity as Necessity: Subject, Structure, Practices
Unchaining Solidarities: Reflections on Cooperation and Mutual Aid" edited by Petr Kouba, Catherine Malabo, Dan Swain and Petr Urban. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2021
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At a time when neoliberal capitalism is responsible for intensified exploitation, dispossession, repression, and contempt towards the peoples of the Global South, the expressions of struggle and resistance that emerge from Indigenous peoples have become a reference point for various social groups who share the goal of building a world in which many worlds fit. Within this context, some of us in organised civil society are experimenting with ways to support these emancipatory processes while at the same time seeking to learn how to reimagine our own urban realities and create our own vision of autonomy. With this photo essay, the Centre for Research into Community Communication (CICC by its Spanish initials) aims to share its experiences with readers. CICC is a Mexican non-profit organisation made up of individuals of Indigenous and mestizo backgrounds, who have chosen to practise solidarity in an activist way. Throughout our journey we have found in art and culture a light that, even in the most challenging of moments, illuminates the possibility of another world. Keywords solidarity, support and accompaniment, Indigenous peoples, art, culture Resumen En un tiempo donde el capitalismo neoliberal ha intensificado la explotación, el despojo, la represión y el desprecio hacia los pueblos del sur global, las expresiones de lucha y resistencia que emana de los pueblos indígenas se convierte en una referencia para grupos sociales multidiversos que compartimos el objetivo de construir un mundo donde quepan muchos mundos. En este contexto, desde la sociedad civil organizada, experimentamos formas de acompañar estos procesos emancipatorios, buscando aprender para imaginar sobre nuestros territorios urbanos, formas y modos propios de autonomía. Con este foto ensayo, queremos compartir la experiencia del CICC, una organización sin fines de lucro integrada por hombres y mujeres, indígenas y mestizos, que hemos elegido ejercer la solidaridad de forma militante, y que en nuestro andar hemos encontrado en el arte y la cultura, una luz que en los momentos más difíciles, muestra la posibilidad de otro mundo.
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In this paper I am presenting a theoretical approach wh ich is based on social constructivism as conceived of by Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann in their "Social Construction ofReality" (1966). Social constructivism has been subject to same criticism in previous years. Although much cf this criticism addresses a popularized nation of soda! constructivism which omits the theory of Berger and Luckmann (Hacking 1999), some arguments hint at real shortcomings of this theory, particularly with respect to the transformation of society sil1Ce the publication of the book. Like their teacher Alfred Schutz, Berger and Luckmann start, for example, from the assumption that "immediate interaction" in the "faceta- face-situation" constitutes a dear anthropological reference point for all sodal interaction. However, as reeent technological developments c1early demonstrate, interactions can crisscross between immediate and mediated interaction. It is quite obvious then that basic categories of the theory of sodal constructivism are affected by societal changes which require an adaptation of the theory. This paper, therefore, tries to link these two levels. On the level of basic social theory, I draw on Habermas' notion of communicative action wh ich is derived from "social action" (the latter being suggested by Weber as the basic category of sociology and adapted by Berger and Luckmann). I shall, however, avoid Habermas' contrast between "communicative" and "instrumental action:' The substi ~ tution of sodal action with communicative action results in a transformation of the theory of sodal construction to which we refer by the name communicative construction. This move on the level of social theory is related to some massive societal transformations. As the main thrust of these transformations lies in the ways we communicate, the transformations will be categorized according to the notion of communication society.
The problem of intersubjectivity in Western philosophy: Boundaries of the communicative approach
6th International e-Conference on Studies in Humanities and Social Sciences: Conference Proceedings, 2020
The article defines the meaning of the phenomenological approach to the analysis of the concept of intersubjectivity in the context of social and philosophical problems of the balance of the Self and the Other. The discourse is based on the correlation of phenomenological orientation and communicative action in determining the mechanisms of identity of the Self in relation to the Other in the inseparability of social reality. A sequential analysis of prerequisites and research approaches aimed at testing the problem of intersubjectivity is carried out. The focus is placed on social phenomenological research of A. Schutz and the theory of communicative action of J. Habermas, which are aimed at understanding the correlation between the peculiarities of human existence, his life-world and the area of social relations or the inevitability of establishing overindividual patterns. Relevance of the research lies in elaborating the issue of establishing intersubjectivity under the fundament...
In the first part of this paper I am addressing the struggle of cultural identity between the dichotomies, of what Ferdinand Toennies defined as two types of social relations - society (Gemeinschaft) and community (Gesellschaft), between Liberalism and Communitarianism, discussing the controversy between the two forms and the need to find the common place for overcoming the contradictions and conflicts in intercultural identity’s relationships. The major conflicting values for ethnical cultural identities involve the rights of the individual and the good of the community, and it seems impossible to respect both of them in certain situations. The proposition that dialogue based on Habermas’s notion of discourse ethics, may be regarded as a possible synthesis of two approaches, is discussed and concluded that Habermas’s ethical theory does not prescribe any norms prior to the discussion, nor does it deal with the justification of moral norms in general. The immediate positive effect of introducing the methodology of discourse ethics and the paradigm of dialogue into the philosophy and practice of intercultural relationships need formulation of the contradictions between community and society, liberalism and communitarianism, between identity and identities in a new way. In the second part of my paper I am proposing A Topological Philosophy as an approach to what is “between” the dialoque, discussing the topological notion of ‘recollection’ (through Hegel’s Vorstellung - [of ‘common places’] as ‘before’ (vor) the ‘place’ (stellen) of the law or the norm, beyond the ‘right’ and the ‘good’, beyond normative ethics, as beyond [the being] in the sense of Emmanuel Levinas. This manifold [of] recollection represent an opportunity for us to build a Ethical Analysis Situs (topological ethics - applied ethics as conceptual tool for situational analysis and situation design) after Spinoza’s “Ethics, Demonstrated in Geometrical Order”, which is quite different from the discourse ethics model of dialogue (Habermas) and can be applied in reality. My claim is that Topological Vorstellung could be applicable to the notions such as identity, dignity and well-being. The proposed Topological Approach implements the novel conceptual tool of Topological Notion of Qualitative quantity, build on Hegel’s fourfold of infinities: 1. Quantitative quantity; 2. Quantitative quality; 3. Qualitative quantity and Qualitative quality, into the philosophical problematic of notions of Identity and Identities. In addition to Hegel’s Qualitative quantity, I offer short discussions on topological philosophy presented in Fichte, topological ontology of Husserl, Heidegger’s topology, topological ethics in Emmanuel Levinas’s 'Aborder Autrui’, concluding with the model of topological Cobordism (Henri Poincare, Rene Thom), proposing it as specific and novel implementation of philosophical (categories) and mathematical (models) sides of topological philosophy and philosophical topology. Linking in the novel way the dialectics of qualitative quantity with the particular part of the catastrophe theory (butterfly), I recall Rene Thom solution: We need to slow down .. (topologically).. as the possible meaningful way, the malignity of human attractor. Key words: cultural identity, social relations, society, community, dialogue, toposes. Liberalism, Communitarianism, Habermas’s discourse ethics, topology, topological philosophy, “between”, ‘recollection’, ‘common places’, Ethical Analysis Situs, Topological ethics, Topological Notion of Qualitative quantity, Hegel’s fourfold of infinities: Quantitative quantity; Quantitative quality; Qualitative quantity, Qualitative quality, Fichte, Husserl, Heidegger’s topology, Emmanuel Levinas’s 'Aborder Autrui’, Cobordism, Henri Poincare, Rene Thom, novel implementation of philosophical (categories) and mathematical (models).
Communicative Action in Practice: Intersubjectivity and New Social Movements
Political Studies, 1995
Critical theory has two distinct aims: the analysis and critique of particular existing oppressions, and the more emancipatory or reconstructive method or goal needed to move beyond current conditions. But often critical theory is too preoccupied with the first moment to consider the second. This essay examines the evolution of the notion of communicative action and a number of current debates surrounding especially Habermas's theory. It then examines two existing social change movements which incorporate aspects of communicative action into their everyday practices - the Alternative Dispute Resolution movement and the Direct Action movement-and illustrates how certain theoretical dilemmas are actually played out. The argument is that the practices of communicative action can help illuminate academic debates. Critical practice is not only an expression of critical theory, but can be used as an ongoing reflective guide for that theory.