against the very nature of self-interest

Behavior and arguments in interest conflicts are not notorious for their “rationality.” Nothing, unfortunately, has so constantly been refuted by reality as the credo of “enlightened self-interest,” in its literal version as well as in its more sophisticated Marxian variant. Some experience plus a little reflection teach, on the contrary, that it goes against the very nature of self-interest to be enlightened. To take as an example from everyday life the current interest conflict between tenant and landlord: enlightened interest would focus on a building fit for human habitation, but this interest is quite different from, and in most cases opposed to, the landlord’s self-interest in high profit and the tenant’s in low rent. The common answer of an arbiter, supposedly the spokesman of “enlightenment,” namely, that in the long run the interest of the building is the true interest of both landlord and tenant, leaves out of account the time factor, which is of paramount importance for all concerned. Self-interest is interested in the self, and the self dies or moves out or sells the house; because of its changing condition, that is, ultimately because of the human condition of mortality, the self qua self cannot reckon in terms of long-range interest, i.e. the interest of a world that survives its inhabitants. Deterioration of the building is a matter of years; a rent increase or a temporarily lower profit rate are for today or for tomorrow. And something similar, mutatis mutandis, is of course true for labor-management conflicts and the like. Self-interest, when asked to yield to “true” interest—that is, the interest of the world as distinguished from that of the self—will always reply, Near is my shirt, but nearer is my skin. That may not be particularly reasonable, but it is quite realistic; it is the not very noble but adequate response to the time discrepancy between men’s private lives and the altogether different life expectancy of the public world. To expect people, who have not the slightest notion of what the res publico, the public thing, is, to behave nonviolently and argue rationally in matters of interest is neither realistic nor reasonable.

Hannah Arendt, On Violence (III)

On the natural history of duty and right

Our duties – these are the rights others have over us. How did they acquire them? In that they assumed us capable of contract and requital, in that they took us to be similar and equal to themselves and, as a result, entrusted us with something, educated, reproved, and supported us. We fulfill our duty – that is to say: we vindicate that conception of our power according to which everything was bestowed upon us, we give back in the same measure as was given to us. It is thus our pride that bids us do our duty –whenever we counter something others did for us with something we do for them, we are seeking to reestablish our own majesty of self – for with their deeds those others have intervened in our sphere of power and would continually have their hand in it if we did not practice, in the form of "duty," a counter-requital, in other words, an invasion into their power. The rights of others can refer only to what lies within our power; it would be irrational if they wanted something from us that did not belong to us proper. More precisely, one must say: only to what they believe lies within our power, assuming it is something we believe also lies within our power. The same error could easily exist on both sides: the feeling of duty re­sults from our having the same belief as everyone else regard­ing the extent of our power: namely, that we are capable of promising certain things and of obligating ourselves to them ("free will"). – My rights: these are that part of my power that others not only have conceded to me but also wish me to maintain. How do these others come to such a point? First: through their prudence and fear and circumspection: maybe they expect something similar from us in return (protection of their rights), maybe they consider a battle with us to be dan­gerous or inexpedient, maybe they view every diminution of our strength as a disadvantage because we then become un­suitable as an alliance with them against a hostile third power. Then: through donation and cession. In this case the others have enough, and more than enough, power to be able to sur­render some of it and to vouchsafe him to whom they donated the surrendered portion: one presumes thereby an inferior feel­ing of power on the part of the person who permits himself to receive the donation. Thus do rights arise: as recognized and guaranteed degrees of power. The moment power relation­ships shift significantly, rights disappear and new ones are established – as is evidenced in the perpetual disintegration and re-formation of rights among nations. The moment our power decreases significantly there occurs an alteration in the sentiment of those who have heretofore guaranteed our power: they calculate whether they can restore us to our former plenitude – if they don't feel in a position to do so, then from that point on they disavow our "rights." Likewise, if our power increases considerably, there occurs an alteration in the senti­ment of those who heretofore acknowledged it and whose ac­knowledgment we no longer need: no doubt they attempt to suppress our power to its former dimension; they will want to intervene and in the process they appeal to their "duty," – but that is merely useless verbiage. Wherever a right prevails, a con­dition and degree of power are being maintained, a decrease and increase being averted. The rights of others constitute a concession by our feeling of power to the feeling of power of these others. If our power appears to be profoundly shaken and broken, then our rights cease to exist: on the other hand, if we have become much more powerful, the rights of others such as we have conceded them heretofore cease to exist for us. The "fair-minded" person constantly requires the subtle tact of a balance: in order to weigh the degrees of power and right, which, given the transitory nature of human affairs, will in­ variably remain suspended in equilibrium only for a short time, but for the most part will sink or rise: consequently, to be fair­ minded is difficult and demands a lot of practice, [a lot of] good will, and a whole lot of very fine spirit.

Friedrich Nietzsche, The Dawn 112

religion is responsibility or it is nothing at all

     According to Patočka [in his essay "Is Technological Civilization a Civilization in Decline, and If So Why?") one can speak of religion only after the demonic secret, and the orgiastic sacred, have been surpassed [depasse, also "outstripped," "outmoded"]. We should let that term retain its essential ambiguity. In the proper sense of the word, religion exists once the secret of the sacred, orgiastic, or demonic mystery has been, if not destroyed, at least integrated, and finally subjected to the sphere of responsibility. The subject of responsibility will be the subject that has managed to make orgiastic or demonic mystery subject to itself; and has done that in order to freely subject itself to the wholly and infinite other that sees without being seen. Religion is responsibility or it is nothing at all. Its history derives its sense entirely from the idea of a passage to responsibility. Such a passage involves traversing or enduring the test by means of which the ethical conscience will be delivered of the demonic, the mystagogic and the enthusiastic, of the initiatory and the esoteric. In the authentic sense of the word, religion comes into being the moment that the experience of responsibility extracts itself from that form of secrecy called demonic mystery.

     Since the concept of the daimon crosses the boundaries separating the human, the animal, and the divine, one will not be surprised to see Patočka recognizing in it a dimension that is essentially that of sexual desire. In what respect does this demonic mystery of desire involve us in a history of responsibility, more precisely in history as responsibility?
     "The demonic is to be related to responsibility; in the beginning such a relation did not exist" (110). In other words, the demonic is originally defined as irresponsibility, or, if one wishes, as nonresponsibility. It belongs to a space in which there has not yet resounded the injunction to respond; a space in which one does not yet hear the call to explain onself [repondre de soi], one's actions or one's thoughts, to respond to the other and answer for oneself before the other. The genesis of responsibility that Patočka proposes will not simply describe a history of religion or religiousness. It will be combined with a genealogy of the subject who says "myself," the subject's relation to itself as an instance of liberty, singularity, and responsibility, the relation to self as being before the other: the other in its relation to infinite alterity, one who regards without being seen but also whose infinite goodness giver in an experience that amounts to a gift of death [donner la mort]. Let us for the moment leave that expression in all its ambiguity.

 

Jacques Derrida, The Gift of Death (1995: 2-3)