Emmanuel Levinas and the politics of non-violence / Victoria Tahmasebi-Birgani.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Tahmasebi-Birgani, Victoria, 1961-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Lévinas, Emmanuel--Criticism and interpretation.

Lévinas, Emmanuel.

Nonviolence--Political aspects.

Nonviolence.

Nonviolence--Moral and ethical aspects.

Nonviolence--Philosophy.

Criticism and interpretation.

Physical Description:

xii, 201 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Toronto : University of Toronto Press, [2014]

Summary:

The problematize the relationship between the ideas of "good" and "evil" is immediately to delink the hitherto unproblematic relationship between justice and liberation; it means pausing over the ethics of political struggle and asking questions such as these: What is it that makes a political struggle against injustice a just praxis? Do we need to justify our political struggle, or in the injustice of the system one rebels against itself the justification of that rebellion? Are the criteria for justifying one's rebellion independent of the forces against which one fights? Book jacket.

Contents:

1 Levinas' Ethicopolitics: Beyond the Western Liberal Tradition 14

i Levinas and the Political: General Discussion 14

ii An Alternative Reading of Ethics and Politics in Levinas 24

iii The Problem of me Third and Justice in Levinas 27

The Third and Justice: Two Conceptions of Justice in Levinas 31

Me, the Other, the Third, and (In)Justice: Ethical Justice and Liberatory Political Praxis 35

iv Levinas and Liberalism 41

Levinas and the Liberal Conception of the Individual 42

Levinas and the Liberal Peace 43

Levinas and the Liberal Economic Arrangement 48

Conclusion 51

2 Radical Passivity, the Face, and the Social Demand for Justice 53

i Oneself: Subject as Radical Passivity of the Sensible 54

Maternity as a Praxis Grounded in Radical Passivity 63

ii The Irreducible Other: The Face as a Social Demand for Justice 67

iii Self and the Other 72

Peace with the Other as Being Responsible for the Other's Suffering and Death 75

Conclusion 79

3 Substituting Praxis and Political Liberation 81

i Substitution in Radical Passivity 81

ii Substituting Praxis as a Liberatory Struggle 83

iii The Contours of Substituting Praxis 92

Substituting Praxis: Liberation in Pre-Intentional Proximity 92

Substituting Praxis: Liberation and Freedom 94

Substituting Praxis: Liberation and the Spirit of Sincerity and Youth 98

Substituting Praxis: Liberation and Non-Violence - The Third as Persecutor 105

Conclusion 112

4 Levinas and Gandhi: Liberatory Praxis as Fear for the Other 115

i Levinas and Gandhi: Can There Be a Dialogue? 115

ii Parallels between Levinas and Gandhi 117

Subject in Levinas and Gandhi 117

Gandhian Selfless Service and Levinasian Irreplaceable Responsibility 120

iii Entry into Non-Violence through Eschatology 123

iv Gandhi: Non-Violent Revolt and Eschatological Peace 126

v Levinas: The Event of Speech and Eschatological Peace 131

Ethical Love as the Principle of the Social and the Political 132

Political Opponent as Interlocutor 136

vi Gandhi: Political Enemy as Interlocutor: Peaceful Struggle as Speech 138

vii Liberation as Substitution: Fearing for the Other Instead of Fearing from the Other 143

Conclusion 151.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

144264284X

9781442642843

OCLC:

870257363