Levinas!
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Levinas and Anarchy
S. A. O.
From a reading of the works of Emmanuel Levinas, a political philosopher is able to see that Levinas’ radical take on ethics is radical not only in the sense that it encourages a new conception of ethical philosophy, but that it is highly compatible with the views of today’s modern anarcho-individualists. Indeed, it would appear that if one is to take Levinas’ works at face value, the only political route one can ethically pursue is that of the anti-authoritarian.
Levinas’ ethics as first philosophy begins at the essential first meeting with the Other. To encounter another person as another person and not merely as a vague interaction is the first step on the road to doing ethics properly. The Other can only be appreciated, really encountered, by the Self Being after a series of phenomenological steps; beginning with insomnia, moving on to the contemplation of death and the crispation thereof of the Self Being, whereupon the Self Being is prepared for its encounter with the infinity of the Other.
This encounter yields upon the Self Being many consequences, the most primary of which is the command; “You Shall Not Commit Murder.” From this encounter with the infinite, ineffable Other, the Self Being has placed upon it a great responsibility; that is, the life and preservation of the Other. It arises here a question; is it not the case for an ethical code to have as its origin a command, an order from an authority outside of the Self Being, for it to fail to be in line with an anarchic political system? To this, one must reply that an anarchic system is not opposed to authority of all kinds, but rather illegitimate or coercive authority. In addition, it seems that if an individual is to find the command of the Other, “You Shall Not Commit Murder,” to be coercive or illegitimate, then it would seem that individual would prefer to kill rather than to preserve a life - and this is not the sort of individual whose place belongs in any society, anarchic or otherwise.
This command, this primary command, must be seen to have a broader meaning than merely a restriction against life-taking. This is due to Levinas’ take on murder itself; that is, “To kill is not to dominate but to annihilate; it is to renounce comprehension absolutely. Murder exercises a power over what escapes power,” but the power which the Self Being holds is insufficient to engage in this ‘true’ form of murder, due to the hold of the “epiphany of the face,” resulting in what Levinas calls the “impossibility of killing.”
Given the impossibility of actually murdering the Other, we must take a second look at the primary command; “You Shall Not Commit Murder,” if phenomenological murder is impossible, is an empty statement, equivalent perhaps to “Water is wet” - that is, not a command but a simple statement, a simple ‘is.’ If this were the case, one would imagine that Levinas would have refrained from calling it a command, or perhaps worded it “You Can Not Commit Murder.”
In an attempt to retain the initial meaning of the primary command, that is, as a command, we must then move to the assumption that the command in fact is a command against violence. Perhaps a command such as “You Shall Not Attempt to Commit Murder.” This is easily interpreted, then, as simply a command against violence in general.
Here is where we begin to see Levinas’ route to anarchism. For he shows the reader that he finds possession, and the resulting consumption, to be violent and reductive in nature; “To be sure, in the satisfaction of need the alienness of the world that founds me loses its alterity: in satiety the real I sank my teeth into is assimilated, the forces that were in the other become my forces…” For Levinas, the need to possess creates a desire within the possessor-to-be, a desire to not just own things, but to possess them in a violent, reductive sense: ‘the real,’ that is, that which is outside of the possessor, that which is mysterious and unknowable, consumed, to become unmysteried , merely a single cog within the machine of the possessor, set away from its unknowable alterity and instead used as fuel to perpetuate the goals of the possessor. If the Self-Being engages in possession of this sort against the Other, the violence is clear.
The command, then, needs to be broadened from “You Shall Not Commit Murder,” to “You Shall Not Commit Violence,” to, finally; “You Shall Not Possess.” This command, we must remember, is not merely a soft reminder for Levinas’ Self Being. Rather, it becomes an entirely internalized responsibility. Armed with this newly reworded primary command, we are able to approach the text of Totality and Infinity in a new, and more fruitful, way. Let us examine the second paragraph of Part D:
The possession of things proceeding from the home, produced by labor, is to be distinguished from the immediate relation with the non-I in enjoyment, the possession without acquisition enjoyed by the sensibility steeped in the element, which “possesses” without taking. In enjoyment the I assumes nothing; from the first it lives from… Possession by enjoyment is one with enjoyment; no activity precedes sensibility. But to possess by enjoying is also to be possessed and to be delivered to the fathomless depth, the disquieting future of the element.
In order to begin our work upon this passage, we must interpret Levinas’ use of symbolism; and briefly discuss the importance of these symbols. Levinas utilizes the idea of ‘home’ or ‘dwelling’ when referring to the body of the Self Being: “The body is my possession according as my being maintains itself in a home…a home conditions the very possession of my body.” In the passage, it is clear that Levinas, in referring to ‘things proceeding from the home, produced by labor,’ is referring to that which emerges from within the individual, those feelings of accomplishment and satisfaction which come from within when the Self Being engages in the types of labor that are in line with the primary command. These are rewards apart from any material rewards which one may achieve for one’s labor. It is, as he says, “…as if work itself were salary, as if work were no longer cursed but free.”
This ‘curse’ which prevents the freedom of labor, which prevents the Self Being from experiencing the rewards from within, is the ‘non-I in enjoyment, the possession without acquisition,’ that is, the rewards which the Self-Being experiences independently of the labor which is done in the name of the primary command. It is enjoyment which originates outside of the individual, outside of the ‘home’ or ‘dwelling’ of the Self Being. This enjoyment cannot truly become a possession of the Self Being, and rather comes to possess the Self Being.
In summary, Levinas refers to the Self Being as home; the things which we find within ourselves, that is, things from within the Self Being which are brought forth by labor, labor which is committed in line with the internalized command of the Other, need to be distinguished from that which produces un-acquired, in fact, un-acquirable, and even acquiring, enjoyment - that is, the enjoyment which comes to possess the Self Being. These enjoyments, which come from without the home, from outside of the Self Being, come to possess and denigrate the Self Being into becoming what Levinas calls ‘the element’.
As the Self Being becomes ‘the element,’ the Self Being finds alienation from labor; before, when the enjoyments of labor came from within, came from ‘the home,’ the rewards were genuine, as they were produced in line with the internalized primary command of the Other. However, as ‘the element,’ one finds oneself becoming possessed, rather than possessing. This possession “…masters, suspends, postpones the unforeseeable future of the element - its independence, its being.”
The Self Being as element becomes alienated from itself; it comes to become a possession of ‘the hand.’ The hand is that which comes to possess the element, “by taking hold of things, by treating being as a furnishing…it disposes the unforeseeable future in which being’s ascendancy over us was portended; it reserves this future for itself.” That is, the hand comes to possess the Self Being in the form of the element, and comes to curtail the transcendent, infinite nature of the Self Being. This curtailment comes in the form of labor, and turns the Self Being’s attention away from the primary command, and toward the perpetuation of the hand’s dominance, until this new perpetuation has internalized ‘over’ the prior internalization of the Other, until resistance is unthinkable: “…it does not endure only as a state of mind; it affirms its power over time, over what belongs to nobody - over the future.” The only rational existent which can be represented by the hand is the coercive power of the State.
The State de-mystifies the Self Being, it pulls the Self Being from its primary command and replaces that command with its own; this is why this alienation occurs, why the Self Being loses sight of the Infinite Other and instead sets its sights upon a State-defined goal: “The power of the hand that grasps or tears or crushes or kneads relates the element, not to an infinity by relation to which the thing would be defined, but to an end in the sense of a goal, to the goal of need.” This goal is the goal of the hand, specifically the perpetuation and internalization of it and its goals, over those goals which are posited by the primary command.
The State’s denial of the home, of the Self-Being’s place as part of a larger body of citizenry rather than an infinitely explorable individual, is especially important for Levinas. To apply his symbolism more broadly, we look at the following.
“We are told that each of the just shall have his home. Isn’t the proletarian condition, the alienation of man, primarily the fact of having no home? Not to have a place of one’s own, not to have an interior, is not truly to communicate with another, and thus be a stranger to oneself and to the other.”
Here, then, is our first immediate link between Levinas’ ethics and political philosophy. If one carries over the idea of the home as the body, as it would appear to, the above passage takes on a new meaning. In addition, it reinforces the sense that the State denies the Self Being access to the primary command; this ‘strangerness’ that is imposed is just to that effect. It is in place to replace the command of the Other with the command of the State. From ‘Do Not Possess’ to ‘Be Possessed, Perpetuate the Possession.’ This is a radical reversal of the command of the Other.
Levinas refers, at different times, to labor as beneficial and then as a negative form of control by the State. It must be the case that he is referring to two different forms of labor. The distinction he appears to draw is between labor which originates within the Self Being, through the internalization of the primary command, and that labor which originates from without the individual, in pursuit of the un-acquired enjoyments of the hand, of the State .
When the State transplants the origin of one’s labor from within one’s Self Being to the clutches of the hand, the Self Being loses not only its autonomy, but in fact its very consciousness. “Action…is the feat of commencing, that is, of existing as an origin…Consciousness is a mode of being such that beginning is what is essential in it.” To deny the Self Being its status as originator is to deny its consciousness - which, for the hand, is not a negative: what better method of perpetuation than that of mindless, homeless, Otherless plebes? This type of labor, from here called negative labor, is harmful to the Self Being on many levels; it reduces the Self Being to that alone which it can do to perpetuate the power of the State, it denies the Self Being a home, both literally and phenomenologically, it alienates the Self Being from its labor and offers it rewards which arise from false commands, and, possibly worst of all, it denies the Self Being access to the Other: not only the ineffable Other that can be found within other Self Beings, but the infinity of adventure and possibility that lie within the Self Being itself.
This is sharply opposed to the type of labor which the Self Being pursues in the name of the Other, in line with the primary command. Levinas refers to this type of labor as the only path through which individuals can change the world around them positively; “ ‘He who knew how to continue his task until evening’: he who believed in a better world, in the efficacy of the good, despite the skepticism of men and the lessons of history; he who did not despair, who did not go to the tavern to free himself from the responsibilities of his service as a man.” Here, it is clear; not only is the labor from which one finds reward within oneself the best way to fulfill one’s responsibilities to the Other, but also to fulfill that which he owes himself. It is, in fact, one’s responsibility to all those who surround him to do his work in this way. We will refer to this as positive labor.
So we have found a connection between Levinas’ phenomenological ethics and political philosophy. It is clear that Levinas believes not in the power of this type of coercive state which denies the Self Being its own Otherness and access to the Otherness of the Other. For a follower of Levinas’ ethics, the importance of being responsible for the Other is paramount, and stands before all else.
Here, the thoughtful reader may question my result; after all, is Levinas really leading us to anarchism? In particular, individual anarchism? Is it not the case that many kinds of socialism will satisfy the requirements he lays down? In fact, wouldn’t socialism’s focus on the working-class, and its labor, nicely complement Levinas’ ideas of positive labor?
The easiest reply to this is from Levinas himself: “Revolution must be defined by its content, by values: revolution takes place when one frees man; that is, revolution takes place when one tears man away from economic determinism. To affirm that the working man is not negotiable, that he cannot be bargained about, is to affirm that which begins a revolution.” While it may appear that this passage in fact affirms Levinas as a socialist, a closer look shows that, in fact, he is opposed to the socialist setup. To ‘tear away from economic determinism’ is to reject socialism. A centrally controlled economy is about as close to economic determinism as one can imagine. To assert a governmental control over the economy of a nation-state is in fact to affirm that the working man is negotiable, as his choices have been removed and his fate has been reduced to a number upon a drawing-board. A command economy will also deny the Self Being its status as originator, and thus the only type of labor which socialism can offer the Self Being is negative labor. This is precisely the type of act in which the hand, the coercive State, would partake.
Levinas tells us that it is not necessary to battle these political evils on their own terms, to engage with the hand as a hand, as a rival possessor, to fight reductive destruction with reductive destruction. Rather, if one truly wishes to escape the element and return to the home of the Self Being, of the Other-interaction, “one must not enter the realm of political violence to combat Evil. It is possible to reject the political realm.” Here, at last, we see the anarchic conclusion of Levinas’ phenomenology. If we are to accept our responsibility to the infinite Other, our responsibility to not do violence to the Other, to not possess the Other, one must refuse to allow one’s Self Being to be possessed by the coercive hand of the State. One must reject the political, one must free oneself into a world where one may fully engage with the Other. Centralized governments of all kinds will fail to truly allow us to live up to the responsibilities which the infinity of the Other places upon us. Thus, while Levinas himself may not claim to be an anarchist, if we wish to live by his teachings, we ourselves must embrace anarchism.
Levinas and Anarchy
S. A. O.
From a reading of the works of Emmanuel Levinas, a political philosopher is able to see that Levinas’ radical take on ethics is radical not only in the sense that it encourages a new conception of ethical philosophy, but that it is highly compatible with the views of today’s modern anarcho-individualists. Indeed, it would appear that if one is to take Levinas’ works at face value, the only political route one can ethically pursue is that of the anti-authoritarian.
Levinas’ ethics as first philosophy begins at the essential first meeting with the Other. To encounter another person as another person and not merely as a vague interaction is the first step on the road to doing ethics properly. The Other can only be appreciated, really encountered, by the Self Being after a series of phenomenological steps; beginning with insomnia, moving on to the contemplation of death and the crispation thereof of the Self Being, whereupon the Self Being is prepared for its encounter with the infinity of the Other.
This encounter yields upon the Self Being many consequences, the most primary of which is the command; “You Shall Not Commit Murder.” From this encounter with the infinite, ineffable Other, the Self Being has placed upon it a great responsibility; that is, the life and preservation of the Other. It arises here a question; is it not the case for an ethical code to have as its origin a command, an order from an authority outside of the Self Being, for it to fail to be in line with an anarchic political system? To this, one must reply that an anarchic system is not opposed to authority of all kinds, but rather illegitimate or coercive authority. In addition, it seems that if an individual is to find the command of the Other, “You Shall Not Commit Murder,” to be coercive or illegitimate, then it would seem that individual would prefer to kill rather than to preserve a life - and this is not the sort of individual whose place belongs in any society, anarchic or otherwise.
This command, this primary command, must be seen to have a broader meaning than merely a restriction against life-taking. This is due to Levinas’ take on murder itself; that is, “To kill is not to dominate but to annihilate; it is to renounce comprehension absolutely. Murder exercises a power over what escapes power,” but the power which the Self Being holds is insufficient to engage in this ‘true’ form of murder, due to the hold of the “epiphany of the face,” resulting in what Levinas calls the “impossibility of killing.”
Given the impossibility of actually murdering the Other, we must take a second look at the primary command; “You Shall Not Commit Murder,” if phenomenological murder is impossible, is an empty statement, equivalent perhaps to “Water is wet” - that is, not a command but a simple statement, a simple ‘is.’ If this were the case, one would imagine that Levinas would have refrained from calling it a command, or perhaps worded it “You Can Not Commit Murder.”
In an attempt to retain the initial meaning of the primary command, that is, as a command, we must then move to the assumption that the command in fact is a command against violence. Perhaps a command such as “You Shall Not Attempt to Commit Murder.” This is easily interpreted, then, as simply a command against violence in general.
Here is where we begin to see Levinas’ route to anarchism. For he shows the reader that he finds possession, and the resulting consumption, to be violent and reductive in nature; “To be sure, in the satisfaction of need the alienness of the world that founds me loses its alterity: in satiety the real I sank my teeth into is assimilated, the forces that were in the other become my forces…” For Levinas, the need to possess creates a desire within the possessor-to-be, a desire to not just own things, but to possess them in a violent, reductive sense: ‘the real,’ that is, that which is outside of the possessor, that which is mysterious and unknowable, consumed, to become unmysteried , merely a single cog within the machine of the possessor, set away from its unknowable alterity and instead used as fuel to perpetuate the goals of the possessor. If the Self-Being engages in possession of this sort against the Other, the violence is clear.
The command, then, needs to be broadened from “You Shall Not Commit Murder,” to “You Shall Not Commit Violence,” to, finally; “You Shall Not Possess.” This command, we must remember, is not merely a soft reminder for Levinas’ Self Being. Rather, it becomes an entirely internalized responsibility. Armed with this newly reworded primary command, we are able to approach the text of Totality and Infinity in a new, and more fruitful, way. Let us examine the second paragraph of Part D:
The possession of things proceeding from the home, produced by labor, is to be distinguished from the immediate relation with the non-I in enjoyment, the possession without acquisition enjoyed by the sensibility steeped in the element, which “possesses” without taking. In enjoyment the I assumes nothing; from the first it lives from… Possession by enjoyment is one with enjoyment; no activity precedes sensibility. But to possess by enjoying is also to be possessed and to be delivered to the fathomless depth, the disquieting future of the element.
In order to begin our work upon this passage, we must interpret Levinas’ use of symbolism; and briefly discuss the importance of these symbols. Levinas utilizes the idea of ‘home’ or ‘dwelling’ when referring to the body of the Self Being: “The body is my possession according as my being maintains itself in a home…a home conditions the very possession of my body.” In the passage, it is clear that Levinas, in referring to ‘things proceeding from the home, produced by labor,’ is referring to that which emerges from within the individual, those feelings of accomplishment and satisfaction which come from within when the Self Being engages in the types of labor that are in line with the primary command. These are rewards apart from any material rewards which one may achieve for one’s labor. It is, as he says, “…as if work itself were salary, as if work were no longer cursed but free.”
This ‘curse’ which prevents the freedom of labor, which prevents the Self Being from experiencing the rewards from within, is the ‘non-I in enjoyment, the possession without acquisition,’ that is, the rewards which the Self-Being experiences independently of the labor which is done in the name of the primary command. It is enjoyment which originates outside of the individual, outside of the ‘home’ or ‘dwelling’ of the Self Being. This enjoyment cannot truly become a possession of the Self Being, and rather comes to possess the Self Being.
In summary, Levinas refers to the Self Being as home; the things which we find within ourselves, that is, things from within the Self Being which are brought forth by labor, labor which is committed in line with the internalized command of the Other, need to be distinguished from that which produces un-acquired, in fact, un-acquirable, and even acquiring, enjoyment - that is, the enjoyment which comes to possess the Self Being. These enjoyments, which come from without the home, from outside of the Self Being, come to possess and denigrate the Self Being into becoming what Levinas calls ‘the element’.
As the Self Being becomes ‘the element,’ the Self Being finds alienation from labor; before, when the enjoyments of labor came from within, came from ‘the home,’ the rewards were genuine, as they were produced in line with the internalized primary command of the Other. However, as ‘the element,’ one finds oneself becoming possessed, rather than possessing. This possession “…masters, suspends, postpones the unforeseeable future of the element - its independence, its being.”
The Self Being as element becomes alienated from itself; it comes to become a possession of ‘the hand.’ The hand is that which comes to possess the element, “by taking hold of things, by treating being as a furnishing…it disposes the unforeseeable future in which being’s ascendancy over us was portended; it reserves this future for itself.” That is, the hand comes to possess the Self Being in the form of the element, and comes to curtail the transcendent, infinite nature of the Self Being. This curtailment comes in the form of labor, and turns the Self Being’s attention away from the primary command, and toward the perpetuation of the hand’s dominance, until this new perpetuation has internalized ‘over’ the prior internalization of the Other, until resistance is unthinkable: “…it does not endure only as a state of mind; it affirms its power over time, over what belongs to nobody - over the future.” The only rational existent which can be represented by the hand is the coercive power of the State.
The State de-mystifies the Self Being, it pulls the Self Being from its primary command and replaces that command with its own; this is why this alienation occurs, why the Self Being loses sight of the Infinite Other and instead sets its sights upon a State-defined goal: “The power of the hand that grasps or tears or crushes or kneads relates the element, not to an infinity by relation to which the thing would be defined, but to an end in the sense of a goal, to the goal of need.” This goal is the goal of the hand, specifically the perpetuation and internalization of it and its goals, over those goals which are posited by the primary command.
The State’s denial of the home, of the Self-Being’s place as part of a larger body of citizenry rather than an infinitely explorable individual, is especially important for Levinas. To apply his symbolism more broadly, we look at the following.
“We are told that each of the just shall have his home. Isn’t the proletarian condition, the alienation of man, primarily the fact of having no home? Not to have a place of one’s own, not to have an interior, is not truly to communicate with another, and thus be a stranger to oneself and to the other.”
Here, then, is our first immediate link between Levinas’ ethics and political philosophy. If one carries over the idea of the home as the body, as it would appear to, the above passage takes on a new meaning. In addition, it reinforces the sense that the State denies the Self Being access to the primary command; this ‘strangerness’ that is imposed is just to that effect. It is in place to replace the command of the Other with the command of the State. From ‘Do Not Possess’ to ‘Be Possessed, Perpetuate the Possession.’ This is a radical reversal of the command of the Other.
Levinas refers, at different times, to labor as beneficial and then as a negative form of control by the State. It must be the case that he is referring to two different forms of labor. The distinction he appears to draw is between labor which originates within the Self Being, through the internalization of the primary command, and that labor which originates from without the individual, in pursuit of the un-acquired enjoyments of the hand, of the State .
When the State transplants the origin of one’s labor from within one’s Self Being to the clutches of the hand, the Self Being loses not only its autonomy, but in fact its very consciousness. “Action…is the feat of commencing, that is, of existing as an origin…Consciousness is a mode of being such that beginning is what is essential in it.” To deny the Self Being its status as originator is to deny its consciousness - which, for the hand, is not a negative: what better method of perpetuation than that of mindless, homeless, Otherless plebes? This type of labor, from here called negative labor, is harmful to the Self Being on many levels; it reduces the Self Being to that alone which it can do to perpetuate the power of the State, it denies the Self Being a home, both literally and phenomenologically, it alienates the Self Being from its labor and offers it rewards which arise from false commands, and, possibly worst of all, it denies the Self Being access to the Other: not only the ineffable Other that can be found within other Self Beings, but the infinity of adventure and possibility that lie within the Self Being itself.
This is sharply opposed to the type of labor which the Self Being pursues in the name of the Other, in line with the primary command. Levinas refers to this type of labor as the only path through which individuals can change the world around them positively; “ ‘He who knew how to continue his task until evening’: he who believed in a better world, in the efficacy of the good, despite the skepticism of men and the lessons of history; he who did not despair, who did not go to the tavern to free himself from the responsibilities of his service as a man.” Here, it is clear; not only is the labor from which one finds reward within oneself the best way to fulfill one’s responsibilities to the Other, but also to fulfill that which he owes himself. It is, in fact, one’s responsibility to all those who surround him to do his work in this way. We will refer to this as positive labor.
So we have found a connection between Levinas’ phenomenological ethics and political philosophy. It is clear that Levinas believes not in the power of this type of coercive state which denies the Self Being its own Otherness and access to the Otherness of the Other. For a follower of Levinas’ ethics, the importance of being responsible for the Other is paramount, and stands before all else.
Here, the thoughtful reader may question my result; after all, is Levinas really leading us to anarchism? In particular, individual anarchism? Is it not the case that many kinds of socialism will satisfy the requirements he lays down? In fact, wouldn’t socialism’s focus on the working-class, and its labor, nicely complement Levinas’ ideas of positive labor?
The easiest reply to this is from Levinas himself: “Revolution must be defined by its content, by values: revolution takes place when one frees man; that is, revolution takes place when one tears man away from economic determinism. To affirm that the working man is not negotiable, that he cannot be bargained about, is to affirm that which begins a revolution.” While it may appear that this passage in fact affirms Levinas as a socialist, a closer look shows that, in fact, he is opposed to the socialist setup. To ‘tear away from economic determinism’ is to reject socialism. A centrally controlled economy is about as close to economic determinism as one can imagine. To assert a governmental control over the economy of a nation-state is in fact to affirm that the working man is negotiable, as his choices have been removed and his fate has been reduced to a number upon a drawing-board. A command economy will also deny the Self Being its status as originator, and thus the only type of labor which socialism can offer the Self Being is negative labor. This is precisely the type of act in which the hand, the coercive State, would partake.
Levinas tells us that it is not necessary to battle these political evils on their own terms, to engage with the hand as a hand, as a rival possessor, to fight reductive destruction with reductive destruction. Rather, if one truly wishes to escape the element and return to the home of the Self Being, of the Other-interaction, “one must not enter the realm of political violence to combat Evil. It is possible to reject the political realm.” Here, at last, we see the anarchic conclusion of Levinas’ phenomenology. If we are to accept our responsibility to the infinite Other, our responsibility to not do violence to the Other, to not possess the Other, one must refuse to allow one’s Self Being to be possessed by the coercive hand of the State. One must reject the political, one must free oneself into a world where one may fully engage with the Other. Centralized governments of all kinds will fail to truly allow us to live up to the responsibilities which the infinity of the Other places upon us. Thus, while Levinas himself may not claim to be an anarchist, if we wish to live by his teachings, we ourselves must embrace anarchism.