1. ročník doktorandské filosofické konference

Abstrakt příspěvku

The Concept of the Other as a Condition of Ethical Universality. Limits of Criticism of Recognition Theory

Ekaterina Shashlova
FHS UK Praha

While contemporary philosophy remains rooted in the Modernity project, it shifts focus from the Subject to the Other. Through reflection or construction of the Other, ethical and political theory formation occurs, which includes Theory of recognition.

The presentation proposes to explore two versions of Recognition theory found in contemporary philosophical discourse. The first version is the universalist theory of recognition, or pragmatic theory of recognition, which utilizes the concept of the Other to justify the ethical and logical universality for addressing political and moral issues (Brandom, 2019; Renault, 2021). The second version is the relativist theory of recognition, presented as decolonial criticism of all forms of subject universalization. In this second version, the Other serves as an ontological basis for rejecting universality, which is merely an illusion created by the hierarchy and domination of some subjects over others. While the universalist theory emphasizes the essence of ethics and logic as an intersubjective phenomenon (Apel, 1998) surpassing national and cultural differences (Nussbaum, 2019), the relativist theory grounds universalism as «a trap» of coloniality formed in the era of Modernity. Demonstrating the political and authoritative nature of forming the universal Subject of modernity and considering the recognition process as a false symmetry of subjects and disregarding the differences in cultural experience, relativists (Maldonado-Torres, 2004; Maesschalck, 2016) criticize any universalist project, including the ethics and politics of cosmopolitanism.

The report suggests the necessity of a universalist theory of recognition for realizing local struggles for justice. Every Other that we recognize as subject is a bearer of the same virtues as ourselves. We share with other people not only objective knowledge, the laws of logic, but also the intersubjectivity of morality.

Keywords: recognition, misrecognition, normative ethics, cosmopolitanism, decolonization

References

  • Apel, K.-O. (1998) The apriori of the communication community and the foundations of ethics: the problem of a rational foundation of ethics in the scientific age. In: Towards a Transformation of Philosophy. Milwaukee: Marquette University Press. 1998.
  • Brandom, R. B. (2019). A spirit of trust: A reading of Hegel’s Phenomenology. The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.
  • Maesschalck, M. (2016). Contre le postulat de symétrie. Éthique décoloniale et subjectivation. In C. Cicotti & S. Cuoghi (Eds.), La rencontre avec l’autre, 45–73.
  • Maldonado‐Torres, N. (2004). The topology of being and the geopolitics of knowledge: Modernity, empire, coloniality. City, 8(1), 29–56.
  • Nussbaum, M. (2019) The Cosmopolitan Tradition: A Noble but Flawed Ideal, Harvard University Press.
  • Renault, E. (2021). Doit-on opposer approches françaises et allemandes de la reconnaissance ? Les Cahiers Philosophiques de Strasbourg, 50, 131–146.