I use part IV of Sen’s book on ‘public reasoning and democracy’ to make an evaluation of South Africa’s new democracy as it was institutionalized in the mid-1990s. I am rather critical about our democracy and about the level of justice attained over the past 18 years.

This article considers Ernst Bloch’s philosophy of hope in terms of its significance for debates in contemporary humanist thought. It is argued that Bloch achieves a commendable balance between, on the one hand, the maintenance of Utopian ideals, and, on the other hand, ethical vigilance towards the vulnerable position of the human individual. Bloch’s Utopian hermeneutics offers a corrective to the limitations and shortcomings of anti-totalitarian humanism. The potential for a constructive dialogue between an interpretation of Bloch’s work and anti-totalitarian (...) authors is explored. Bloch’s phenomenology of death indicates the extent to which his philosophy remains attentive to the existential experiences of the individual human being. The emotion which characterises the individual subject’s realisation of his / her mortality is characteristically one of melancholy over the incomplete work of life. (shrink)

Subject and the realisation of ethical responsibility – The Idea of the In finite in Levinas' Totality and Infinity. In Totality and Infinity Emmanuel Levinas writes about the categorical character of the ethical responsibility that the subject owes to the other. The confrontation with the suffering other puts the subject's natural self-interest into question, and brings him/her to realise an ethical responsibility of which s/he cannot unburden himself/herself. The question arises as to what in the constitution of the subject makes (...) him/her susceptible to the realisation of ethical responsibility. This article illustrates that in order to accentuate ethical responsibility as strongly as he does, Levinas needs to take a quasi- metaphysical step. The “trace of the infinite” that “creation” has left on the finite subject, predisposes the subject to the appeal of the other. Levinas' use of words such as “God”, “the Good”, “creation” and “the Idea of Infinity” does not have a theological or a mystical underpinning. These metaphysical concepts are philosophical figures of speech that Levinas borrows from Plato and Descartes. (shrink)

(2001). Sosiaal-etiese verantwoordelikheid in Suid-Afrika: ’n Perspektief vanuit Levinas. South African Journal of Philosophy: Vol. 20, No. 3-4, pp. 321-338.