Volume 70, Issue 1

The present paper discusses the characteristics of performative speech through three distinct but related episodes: 1. the ancient origins of “convincing speech“ in Homeric and Sophistic discourse; 2. the treatment of linguistic issues through speech by South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission; 3. present-day language as determined and constituted by the plurality of languages, between the Scylla and Charybdis of “Globish” and “ontological nationalism”. John L. Austin’s theory of performative speech acts as laid down in How to do Things With Words serves as a contemporary frame of reference throughout the argument.

The paper addresses the topic of the unavoidability of contradiction in dealing with issues of scepticism – and how coherence can be restored to sceptical arguments and texts. It considers six classic paradoxes in the history of Western thought – of how language works to undermine and derail the coherence of thought. It also theorizes a philosophy of language approach to restore coherence in the classic instances discussed. As its major example, the paper explores how and why the image of successful, long-standing constitutions is a minimalist image through a discussion of the relationship between epistemological scepticism generally and textual scepticism specifically.

If one compares Hans Blumenberg with the dominant contemporary German-speaking characters of philosophy and heads of their own schools, Husserl, Heidegger and Adorno, then one sees that Blumenberg’s understanding of philosophy proves tobe emphatically unemphatic, withdrawn, and deeply stacked. He exchanges the big bills of those philosophies for small coins: Philosophy is attention first, thoughtfulness second, consolation third, and memory fourth. – An introduction is evidence of the reorientation that Blumenberg undertook in the 1950s with regard to his Catholic-theological and Heideggerian philosophical beginnings. This led him to redefine the modern age from one of crisis to one of overcoming the crisis.

This essay analyses three meanings of asymmetry on which talk of asymmetry in German-language care discourse is based: as irreversibility [Unumkehrbarkeit], as imbalance [Ungleichgewichtigkeit] and as one-sidedness [Einseitigkeit]. One result of this analysis is that it currently seems doubtful whether asymmetry can serve as a central concept for care theories. Following this, two questions will be discussed. In systematical terms: how could this doubt possibly be resolved? In discourse-analytical terms: What are the functions of asymmetry in care discourse?

Against the backdrop of contemporary debates about care ethics and care , this article undertakes a re-reading of Foucault’s analyses of the ancient care of the self . While the care of the self has so far been interpreted primarily in terms of an ethics and aesthetics of the self, it argues that the care of the self is constituted by the presence of the Other. This becomes clear as soon as one links the care of the self to parrhesia , which signifies an act of truth-telling through which the individual constitutes herself as the subject of a discourse of truth by confronting the Other with the truth. It is through this connection that the care of the self and parrhesia unfold their critical potential, as can be seen in the examples of Sophocles’ Antigone or the whistleblower Edward Snowden. This makes it possible not only to detach the concept of care from its close entanglement with the private sphere and to reframe it in political terms but also to envisage a critical attitude that is based both on the care of the self and others and on a concern for truth.

This article explores different feminist care discourses and their ethical implications and relates them to the biblical ethos of loving one’s neighbour. The latter is presented as a rich tradition of socio-historical, theological and ethical relevance for contemporaneous debates on the transformation towards a caring society. Nevertheless, it needs tobe liberated from patriarchal attitudes and other exclusive hermeneutics in Christianity (which is exemplified in a case study of Protestant moral discourse and societal practice) as well as from ignorance and prejudice in secular social science, humanities and public discourse. Hence, the article suggests rediscovering the biblical contexts and political implications of the commandment to love thy neighbour: its character as diversified social rights inspired by the Exodus, the concept of sanctification as attention to the world we live in and the prohibition of images as a resource for the development of humane respectful attitudes (integrity of the “other”) and politics of care.

COVID-19 and its social and political consequences have led to increased attention to the sometimes philosophically neglected concept of solidarity. This paper reflects the discourse on solidarity in times of COVID-19 from the viewpoint of the philosophical debate on solidarity. We argue that currently – regarding this debate – the critical potential of solidarity as a political concept is often undermined. Solidarity should rather be used as a social-diagnostic lens to focus on and criticise problematic exclusions caused by current political developments. This applies especially to the cross-border and transnational dimension of political solidarity, which is often neglected in the national constrictions of political COVID-19 strategies. The paper concludes with observations on which levels and in which directions the reflection on solidarity could stimulate both the political and the philosophical debate on global crises such as COVID-19.