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January 12, 2004

Conversation with Richard Wolin: Derrida, Habermas, and 'Kerneuropa'

by Nader Vossoughian

In what follows, I ask for a reaction to this statement, what it means both philosophically and politically, from noted intellectual historian Richard Wolin.

Q. To what extent can the recent joint statement by Habermas and Derrida be seen as extensions of their respective philosophies? Does their statement represent a revival of the idea of the engaged intellectual -- in the tradition of Sartre, say?

A. In recent interview with Stony Brook philosopher Eduardo Mendieta, Habermas has made clear that the political rapprochement with Derrida is more of a tactical alliance than a philosophical one – which, after all, only stands to reason. Derrida’s point of departure is the later Heidegger’s “critique of reason” – reason as “logocentric,” as an “onto-theological” encumbrance. The fulcrum of Habermas’s “discourse ethics” is “discussion oriented toward mutual agreement” or “consensus.” The gap between these two conceptions remains cavernous. Nevertheless, as is well known, during the last ten years Derrida has made a laudable effort to address a wide spectrum of political questions: European unity, immigration, “justice,” tolerance, the relevance of Marxist thought, and so forth.

As far as their joint political statement against US unilateralism goes (“February 15, or What Binds Europeans Together: A Plea for a Common Foreign Policy, Beginning in the Core of Europe”) – let’s not forget that this was a Habermas “initiative” (i.e., he wrote it and conceived it); Derrida co-signed but did not co-author the text.

As most people know, for almost fifty years Habermas has been the Federal Republic of Germany’s quintessential “public intellectual” – to a point where one could not write the history of postwar Germany if one failed to take his name into account. Historically speaking, the same cannot be said of Derrida. Hence, I’m wondering if his political interventions carry the same weight and force.

You raise the question of Sartre’s status as an “engaged intellectual.” Next year (2005) will be his centennial. Sartre’s influence and talents were incomparable. No one excelled in as many fields of literary and philosophical endeavor as he. Yet, for better or for worse, his reputation has been tarnished in France as a result of his many egregious political misjudgments: from his pro-Stalinist fellow-traveling during the early 1950s to his uncritical 1960s third-worldism to his astonishing claim, in a 1973 interview, that the French Revolution failed because the Jacobin dictatorship did not kill enough people! Intellectual humility is the order of the day.

Q. The policy recommendations that Derrida and Habermas make in their article – the articulation of a unified European foreign policy, greater investment in intergovernmental organizations like the UN, further promotion of international financial institutions like the IMF, the World Bank, and the WTO -- sound remarkably moderate. How would you account for the fact that neither calls for more revolutionary changes? Why do they stake their hopes in the promise of a "Kerneuropa" -- a unified European Union -- rather than in the insurgent protest movements that have taken root around the world over the last three or so years? Couldn't one reproach these figures for being elitist?

A. As far as the concrete proposals found in the May 31, 2003 joint statement: Habermas, for his part, has never been a “revolutionary” but a solid social democrat and partisan of “radical reform.” Derrida’s political leanings are much more difficult to read. Frankly, I am alarmed by his denigration of “rule of law” (e.g., the claim, found in many texts, that “law” and “justice” are antipodes) and his frequent employment of arguments drawn from the political thought of Carl Schmitt (1888-1985), a right-wing jurist who during the 1930s enthusiastically supported the Nazis. Conversely, the Frankfurt School tradition has always supported the idea of the “rule of law” as a “magic wall” that separates “fairness” from despotic government.

In the aforementioned interview with Eduardo Mendieta, Habermas freely admits that the May 31 text has not garnered the reactions he had hoped for. The idea was that a unified Europe – bound together by a constitution and exercising a common foreign policy – could serve as a geopolitical (and moral) bulwark to offset the dangers of American unilateralism. But, unfortunately, there are many centrifugal forces at work undermining these prospects. Last month, plans for a common European constitution collapsed ignominiously on the thorny question of whether smaller nations could maintain their disproportionate political representation. France and Germany simply put down their foot.

In retrospect, many of the claims advanced in the May 31 text seem utopian. Time and again we have seen that the smaller nations are averse to being bullied by France and Germany. The February 15, 2003 pan-European protests (against the impending war in Iraq) were largely predicated on anti-Americanism. But in the future how will Europe remain unified in the absence of a common antagonist (this was the negative function the Soviet Union played during the cold war)? Let’s not forget that the Baltic nations and Poland freely supported the American campaign in Iraq because of their own histories of political oppression. Basically, they identified with the Iraqi people who, for over 25 years, had been brutally subjected to Saddam Hussein’s repressive dictatorship.

There is nothing “elitist” about the idea of multilateral world governance. Historically, since 1789, democratic claims have always been filtered through the lens of representative institutions. The more this proceeds on a global scale (via international treaties and institutions such as the Hague-based International Criminal Court), the better.

Q. In your view, has Derrida's thinking attempted to become more accountable, socially and politically speaking, since the early 1990s (when, as you put it, Derrida “…deconstruct[ed] into nonexistence the gravity of Heidegger's Nazism” and defended Paul de Man against charges of anti-Semitism)?

A. I think you’re right to suggest that Derrida’s sensitivity to political questions has increased since the Heidegger and de Man affairs, which unquestionably represented deconstruction’s darkest hour. But, as I mentioned before with reference to Derrida’s reliance on Carl Schmitt, there are aspects of deconstruction that are very difficult to square with the demands of democratic politics. In a nutshell: from Heidegger (and, more recently, via Schmitt) Derrida has inherited a fundamental cynicism about “reason” and “norms.” Heidegger once observed that “reason is the most stiff-necked adversary of thought”! And Schmitt famously remarked that “whoever says ‘humanity’ lies” (this was his way of dismissing the claims of human rights and international law). So, in my view, there’s a fundamental rift between Derrida’s metatheory (deconstruction) and his new found allegiance to political democracy. To be meaningful and effective, democracy must be predicated on rule of law, deliberative decision-making, proceduralism, and a fundamental respect for what John Rawls called the norms of “public reason.” Derrida has more or less predicated his career as a philosopher on vigorously opposing these incorrigibly “logocentric” ideals and norms. Hence, whether he can get to where he wants to go politically on the basis of his “anti-epistemology” or “hermeneutics of suspicion” (I mean these as euphemisms for “so-called deconstruction”) is dubious.

To read an abbreviated version of the Derrda/Habermas statement in the original German, visit the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung website.

Richard Wolin is Distinguished Professor of History and Comparative Literature at the City University of New York Graduate Center. He is the author of The Heidegger Controversy: A Critical Reader (1991), Labyrinths: Explorations in the Critical History of Ideas (1996), Heidegger's Children: Hannah Arendt, Karl Lowith, Hans Jonas, and Herbert Marcuse (2003), and The Seduction of Unreason: The Intellectual Romance with Fascism from Nietzsche to Postmodernism (forthcoming spring 2004).