On the (Im)possible Relation Between the Universal and the Relative: The Aporia of Community
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Roshan de Silva-Wijeyeratne
Roshan de Silva-Wijeyeratne is a Lecturer in Law, School of Humanities, Social Sciences and Law, University of Dundee, Scotland, UK.
Abstract
‘British values’ have recently been invoked by the Right in Britain – both in the Conservative Party and outside by the Reform Party led by the Right insurgent and public school educated (Dulwich College) ‘man of the people’ Nigel Farage. Such values are directed at communities of colour, as well as those communities that stand apart from the logic of ‘phallologentricism’. Factions of the secular Left too have engaged in an iteration of ‘culture wars’ by targeting Jewish communities who may not share Hamas’s desire to eradicate Israel in favour of a monistic Palestinian State. At the heart of these contested cultural terrains is an overarching issue: namely, the question of the universal, and how the universal informs the States’ politics of representation (the “General Will”, the “nation”, “citizen” etc…). Derrida reminds us that “the social” – let alone the State and the polity it brings to life – can never be reduced to a single meaning, that the nature of community will always be subject to contestation contra the telos of monism.
About the author
Roshan de Silva-Wijeyeratne is a Lecturer in Law, School of Humanities, Social Sciences and Law, University of Dundee, Scotland, UK.
© 2024 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Miscellaneous
- Possession
- Editorial
- Introduction: Nomos, Theos and Cultures of Violence
- Focus
- State Violence, Divine Abuse
- Inoperativity and Destituent Power in Benjamin, Agamben and Spinoza
- On the (Im)possible Relation Between the Universal and the Relative: The Aporia of Community
- Violent México: The War on Drugs, the Persistence of Oligarchies, and Gender Issues
- Want to Build a Death Camp? Call in the Lawyers: Obtaining Legal Title to the Land for the Killing Camp at Auschwitz
- “I Want to Judge! I Have to Judge!”: Judg-mentaility and the Theopolitics of the Apocalypse
- Research
- “She Would Get all of Them. Every Last One”: Carrie and the Jouissance of Revenge
- Book Review
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Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Miscellaneous
- Possession
- Editorial
- Introduction: Nomos, Theos and Cultures of Violence
- Focus
- State Violence, Divine Abuse
- Inoperativity and Destituent Power in Benjamin, Agamben and Spinoza
- On the (Im)possible Relation Between the Universal and the Relative: The Aporia of Community
- Violent México: The War on Drugs, the Persistence of Oligarchies, and Gender Issues
- Want to Build a Death Camp? Call in the Lawyers: Obtaining Legal Title to the Land for the Killing Camp at Auschwitz
- “I Want to Judge! I Have to Judge!”: Judg-mentaility and the Theopolitics of the Apocalypse
- Research
- “She Would Get all of Them. Every Last One”: Carrie and the Jouissance of Revenge
- Book Review
- Matteo Nicolini: Legal Geography, Comparative Law and the Production of Space
