Jacques Derrida on the Aporias of Hospitality

The book systematically presents Derrida’s views on hospitality, as reflected in his texts and lectures from 1995 until his death in October 2004. Derrida’s engagement with hospitality is perhaps the most important and extensive philosophical attempt to respond critically to the growing hostility of many governments worldwide towards specific categories of foreigners, such as refugees and immigrants. Particular emphasis is placed on the ‘aporetic’ nature of hospitality that Derrida describes: namely, that, on the one hand, the provision of hospitality brings us face to face with the hyper-ethical ‘law’ of ‘unconditional hospitality,’ which requires the unconditional reception of the other, i.e. the provision of hospitality to the foreigner without conditions, restrictions or expecting anything in return. On the other hand, the provision of hospitality forces us to face the ‘conditional’ laws of hospitality, which, while establishing a right to and a duty of hospitality, simultaneously restrict hospitality by setting conditions for the arrival and stay of the foreigner. The book also analyses the ‘decision’ and the ‘event’ of hospitality, as well as the unresolved ‘aporia’ at the heart of the ethics of hospitality (or of ethics in general), an aporia or contradiction related to the fact that we cannot be hospitable towards a singularity without ‘sacrificing’ some other singularities. Attention is paid to Derrida’s attempt to open the provision of hospitality beyond humans, that is, to other living beings. Derrida’s views on hospitality are examined in the book in the light of the philosophical thought of Emmanuel Levinas, Immanuel Kant and René Schérer. Acknowledgments Contents Abbreviations Chapter 1: Introduction Chapter 2: Jacques Derrida on Unconditional and Conditional Hospitality 1 A ‘Venomous Expression’: Crime of Hospitality 2 Civil Disobedience: Justice Versus the Law 3 The Law of Unconditional and the Laws of Conditional Hospitality 4 Kantian Hospitality as an Example of Conditional Hospitality 5 Should We Ask a Foreigner’s Name? 6 Invitation and Visitation 7 The Risk of Hospitality 8 The Pervertibility of the Law of Unconditional Hospitality 9 The Inseparability of the Law and the Laws of Hospitality 10 The ‘Negotiation’ 11 Excessive Hospitality 12 The Relationship Between Utopia and Hospitality 13 Does Hospitality Lead Us Beyond the State? 14 The ‘Impossible’ Gift of Hospitality 15 Questioning Jacques Derrida’s Identification of Unconditional Hospitality with ‘True’ or ‘Real’ Hospitality Chapter 3: Is Unconditional Hospitality a Regulative Idea of Reason? 1 Immanuel Kant’s Regulative Ideas of Reason 2 Derrida’s Reservations Concerning the Concept of Regulative Idea of Reason Chapter 4: The Hyper-Ethics of Hospitality 1 The Unconditional Ethics of Hospitality 2 Unconditional Hospitality as a Categorical Imperative 3 Hospitality Beyond Duty and Debt 4 Responsibility 5 Bad Conscience Chapter 5: The Decision of Hospitality 1 The Decision Is Always the Other’s Decision in Me 2 Decision Without Knowledge 3 Undecidability as a Condition of Possibility of Decision and Responsibility 4 The Aporetic Structure of the Responsible Decision of Hospitality Chapter 6: The Event of Hospitality 1 The Radical and Impossible Event of Hospitality 2 An Event of Hospitality Cannot Be Told or Foretold 3 The Event of Hospitality Cannot Be Planned 4 The Absolute arrivant 5 Hospitality Beyond Invitation: The Visiting Other as an Unplanned Pregnancy 6 The Event Beyond the Performative 7 When Can a Decision Cause an Event? Chapter 7: Aporias of Responsibility: Sacrificing Others in the Name of the Other 1 Derrida’s Reading of the Sacrifice of Isaac: Ethics as ‘Irresponsibilization’ 2 The Αbsolute Duty 3 Sacrifice Is a Condition for Every Decision Chapter 8: The Necessary Contamination of the Unconditional Ethics of Hospitality by Its Other: Sacrificing the Other in the Name of Others 1 The Ethical Relationship According to Emmanuel Levinas 2 Can Hospitality Be Integrated into a General Principle of Justice Or Law? 3 The Third 4 The Birth of Equality 5 Perjury: Derrida’s Reading of Levinas in Adieu 6 From the Non-Ethical Component of the Face-to-Face Relationship to the ‘Non-Ethical’ Dimension of the Ethics of Unconditional Hospitality 7 The Perversion of Ethics as Hospitality by the ‘Worst’ Chapter 9: The Aporetic Relationship Between the Unconditional Ethics of Hospitality and Politics 1 From Ethics to Politics and Law 2 The Political Decision 3 ‘Beyond in’ Politics 4 Beyond Levinas’ Conceptualization of Politics Chapter 10: Hospitality and Non-Human Beings 1 Offering Hospitality to a Snake: Jacques Derrida’s Reading of D. H. Lawrence’s Poem ‘Snake’ Bibliography Index