Freedom and Democracy: From Kant to Derrida

Abstract

The notion of freedom is synonymous with Kant, but where is it located, and what is the significance of its location for our understanding of democracy today? In this essay, an answer will be sought to these questions by way of Heidegger’s reading of Kant in The Essence of Human Freedom, followed by an exploration of Derrida’s radicalization of Heidegger’s reading in Rogues. If “freedom” is located beyond Being, as contended by both Heidegger and Derrida, a re-naming thereof is perhaps called for, a renaming, which would at the same time allow us to look beyond the variety of forms taken by democracy today, toward the democracy to come, which would no longer be characterized by mastery, sovereignty, and power, but instead by a welcoming of the unforeseeable and incalculable event.

I. Introduction

Kant was an unequivocal defender of freedom, in a transcendental, a moral, and a politico-legal sense, but not equally so of democracy. ¹ There is nevertheless space in Kant’s thinking for democracy. The republican constitution, prescribed by practical reason, is characterized by the recognition of lawful freedom, formal equality, and the independence of citizens, as well as by the separation of powers and representative government, and is reconcilable with all the different kinds of state, that is, autocracy, aristocracy, and democracy. ² The demand by practical reason that freedom must be protected necessarily means the prohibition of war, both in the state of nature and between free, sovereign states. ³ The protection of freedom, therefore, requires not only a republican state, which provides for the greatest possible protection of the external freedom of the individual, but also a federation of states, and cosmopolitan law, which regulates the conditions of hospitality to be afforded to strangers. ⁴

Today, freedom and democracy are under threat in many parts of the world, even where a commitment thereto has for a long time been taken for granted. In view of this threat, the current essay explores the link between freedom and democracy, in an effort to rethink these concepts, as well as their relation to sovereignty. The latter, as we will see, is nothing but a species of the traditional conception of freedom. Freedom, understood thus, not only founds democracy and protects it (as sovereignty), but also poses a threat to it. In exploring the link between freedom and democracy, the essay enquires into Derrida’s “reading” of Kant in respect of freedom, and the way in which Derrida links freedom to democracy, specifically in Rogues. ⁵ This requires a detour through Heidegger and Nancy, as Derrida does not in any of his published texts engage directly, or at least not in detail, with a reading of Kant in respect of freedom. This analysis, which will include a close reading of specific texts, that is, of Heidegger’s The Essence of Human Freedom ⁶ and Derrida’s Rogues, with Derrida’s reading of Freud in the background, arguably allows for a better understanding not only of freedom in Derrida’s thinking, but also of its peculiar relation to the democracy to come.

Our enquiry into freedom will therefore start with an analysis of Heidegger’s reading of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, ⁷ the Groundwork for a Metaphysics of Morals, ⁸ and the Critique of Practical Reason. ⁹ In The Essence of Human Freedom, Heidegger focuses specifically on Kant because, as he puts it, “Kant brings the problem of freedom for the first time explicitly into a radical connection with the problems of metaphysics.” ¹⁰ In other words, the way in which Kant approaches freedom allows for a philosophical enquiry, which involves not simply going-after-the-whole, but at the same time a going-to-the-roots. ¹¹ Stated differently, it allows one to ask not simply what beings are, but what they are as such, or what beings are as beings, and therefore also what Being is, or what the essence is of Being. ¹² At stake here is not an objective scientific enquiry, but an enquiry which enquires into the one who enquires, into the roots of his or her existence. ¹³ Heidegger’s main concern in The Essence of Human Freedom is thus with what Kant, in contemplating human freedom, is by implication saying about that which exists—that is, about the Being of beings. How does Kant, in other words, understand Being, and how does this assist us in contemplating the essence of freedom? We will see that Heidegger is critical of the “narrowing’” that takes place in Kant’s engagement with freedom. ¹⁴ A central theme in this respect is causality, specifically its relation to freedom in Kant’s texts. As noted, Kant implicitly enquires into Being, but does so in terms of beings. He consequently views freedom as a form of causality, and thereby fails to appreciate the essence of Being as well as the relation between freedom and Being. In Heidegger’s reading, transcendental (cosmological) freedom and practical (moral) freedom in Kant are clearly linked, with the latter being dependent on the former. ¹⁵ Heidegger’s reading in other words shows, inter alia, that transcendental freedom—that is, freedom as self-causation—as compared to the causation of nature, lies at the foundation of the Kantian system, and thus of guilt, morality, and rights. ¹⁶ If freedom is, however, understood as preceding Being (and time), this has important implications for human freedom as well as for responsibility. Freedom is then no longer something possessed by human beings, but something that possesses them instead, and responsibility is no longer toward a maxim, but the essence of the self. Although the main focus in the first part of this essay is on Heidegger’s reading of Kant in The Essence of Human Freedom, some attention will also be given to Heidegger’s analysis of Schelling’s Treatise on the Essence of Human Freedom, as well as Heidegger’s engagement with freedom in later texts.

In the second part of the essay, we will proceed to Derrida’s interpretation of freedom, primarily in Rogues, as well as in an interview focusing on freedom, which was published in For What Tomorrow. ¹⁷ Derrida, at the same time, explores the concept and structure of democracy, both as conceived traditionally, and as can be conceived in collaboration with a rethinking of freedom. As noted, Derrida does not in Rogues directly confront the analyses of freedom by Kant or even by Heidegger. He instead proceeds by returning to the Greek origins of these notions, as well as via Nancy, whose analysis of freedom is itself strongly influenced by Heidegger. Nancy seeks to rethink the Western tradition of freedom in a radical sense, yet—and here the difference between Derrida and Nancy emerges—he wants to retain the word “freedom.” We will see in our analysis that Derrida, somewhat similar to Heidegger in his later thinking, seeks to take a certain distance from the word freedom, as it seems “to be loaded with metaphysical presuppositions that confer on the subject or on consciousness – that is, on an egological subject – a sovereign independence in relation to drives, calculation, economy, the machine.” ¹⁸ Derrida instead detects a certain freedom in the “excess of play in the machine.” ¹⁹ Freedom should thus, according to Derrida, be thought as beyond Being, that is, in terms of an incalculable event,

an arrivance that would surprise me absolutely and to whom and for whom, to which or for which I could not, and may no longer, not respond – in a way that is as responsible as possible: what happens, what arrives and comes down upon me, that to which I am exposed, beyond all mastery. ²⁰

At stake here is what can also be referred to as a pure or unconditional hospitality, or as the democracy to come, which welcomes what or who comes without the imposition of any limitations. ²¹

II. Heidegger

As indicated in the introduction, the main focus of Heidegger’s reading of Kant’s analysis of freedom, is its relation to Being. This discussion takes place primarily in Part Two of The Essence of Human Freedom. Part One, which, for reasons of space, cannot be discussed here in detail, revisits some of the key elements in Heidegger’s thinking as explored in Being and Time, ²² including the need for the re-awakening of the question of Being in Western philosophy, which has throughout its existence implicitly understood Being as constant presence; the primordial relation between Being and time; the privilege to be accorded to Dasein in the understanding of Being; and the significance of finitude or death in Dasein’s encounter of Being, that is, Dasein’s being-toward-death. ²³ The discussion that follows will engage first with Heidegger’s analysis of transcendental freedom, as discussed in Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, and then with practical freedom, as it finds expression in Kant’s Groundwork as well as his Critique of Practical Reason.

1 Transcendental Freedom

In the discussion of transcendental freedom in this section, we will proceed by seeking answers to the following questions that arise in Heidegger’s reading of Kant:

•  What are the main aims of the Critique of Pure Reason?

•  How does Heidegger proceed, or which questions does he seek answers to?

•  What are the limits of the Kantian analysis?

•  What perspective does Kant nevertheless open for us?

According to Kant, all experience of nature is subject to the law of causality. Everything that occurs must in other words be the result of something else, which itself must have been caused by something else. In nature, one could say, nothing is the cause of itself. ²⁴ By contrast, absolute spontaneity, or what Kant refers to as “freedom of causality,” has no previous cause. This is not however something we experience—that is, it is not observed in nature. ²⁵ The question to which an answer is sought in the Critique of Pure Reason is whether there is still a place for freedom, despite the overwhelming evidence of the experience of causation. ²⁶ Kant believes that this question is to be answered in the affirmative, and he thus seeks to show that not everything in nature is subject to natural processes, necessity, or the law of causation, that is, a prior state leading to another according to a (natural) law. He ultimately wants to show that there are beings within the world who, although subject to the laws of nature, act freely themselves.

Heidegger is specifically interested in how Kant treats the relation between freedom and causality. In other words, is freedom merely a kind of causality or is it to be understood in a more radical sense? ²⁷ This question lies behind Heidegger’s reading of the “Analogies of Experience” as well as the “Antinomy of Pure Reason” in Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. The importance of the “Analogies of Experience” lies in the fact that these “rules which are always pre-represented in every human experience,” and which contain the rules of the necessary temporal determination of everything present, are ultimately “ontological principles concerning the being-present of that which is present.” ²⁸ In his discussion of Kant’s “Antinomy of Pure Reason,” Heidegger is first interested in the location of the idea of freedom in Kant’s thinking. For Kant, freedom is a metaphysical issue, yet he does not lodge the problem of freedom in the soul or in God, but in the world—“the totality of present beings as accessible to finite human knowledge.” ²⁹ Second, despite his critique that Kant also in this section treats freedom in terms of natural causality, he finds the Kantian argument attractive insofar as it seeks to resolve the antinomy (freedom must exist versus there is only natural causality) by way of the distinction between the noumenon and the phenomenon. We thus only have access to beings insofar as they are given to us in appearance, that is, given to us in space and time. ³⁰ The attraction of this argument for Heidegger lies in the fact that it acknowledges the finitude of knowledge, which is in turn necessarily linked to human finitude. ³¹ The distinction between noumenon and phenomenon furthermore makes clear that it is not a question of either nature or freedom, but of both at the same time. It opens the possibility of an intra-temporal being, apart from having intra-temporal causes, also having other causes “which themselves and in their causation are extra-temporal.” ³² According to Kant, this problem cannot be resolved at a general ontological level, but only in relation to a specific being, that is, man as an ethically acting person. ³³ Man’s freedom would thus be only one instance of cosmological freedom. ³⁴ As we will see below, freedom is furthermore noticeable specifically in the will. ³⁵ This is because of a particular kind of self-knowledge which characterizes man, which takes place by way of what Kant terms “pure apperception.” ³⁶ The latter refers to “actions and inner determinations which [a human being] cannot regard as impressions of the senses.” ³⁷ Because of the way in which Kant treats the relation between causality and freedom, Heidegger however concludes that causality in Kant “remains the fundamental ontological characteristic.” ³⁸

There are thus, in Heidegger’s reading, certain clear limits to the Kantian analysis. Causation is understood by Kant in terms of temporal succession: a cause–effect relation that involves priority and outcome or, one could say, “the succession of that which is in time.” ³⁹ Kant’s thinking in respect of causality is ultimately determined by the metaphysics of presence, specifically in the way in which he thinks permanence or duration, which is said to be central in all experience. At stake in causality is thus some permanent thing which merely changes states, in such a way that one state follows from a prior state—that is, everything arises from something that is already present. ⁴⁰ There is, according to Kant, something permanent in every appearance: the object itself is permanent. ⁴¹ This is also the case with time, which cannot be perceived in itself, but within which everything present is placed and their specific locations determined. ⁴² Time expresses this permanence. Indeed, for Kant, no experience of objects in time (succession and/or simultaneity) would be possible unless experience is grounded in something permanent and abiding. ⁴³ Permanence ultimately serves as a condition of possibility for causality. Alteration, a sequence of different states of the same object after one another, is perceivable only if, “beforehand, something permanent is experienced. For it is only upon the basis of, and in relation to, something permanent, that a transition from one state to another can be perceived; otherwise there would be nothing but total displacement of one thing by another.” ⁴⁴ The centrality of permanence can also be seen in Kant’s analysis of freedom, where such permanence is located in the acting person. ⁴⁵ The idea of permanence is namely tied not only to the experience of beings, but also to the human being’s own experience of him- or herself—of his or her “ownmost self-being, self-hood and self-constancy [des eigenen Selbstseins und seiner Selbigkeit, Beständigkeit, Selbst-ständigkeit].” ⁴⁶ Human finitude does not therefore play a sufficiently important role in the Analogies. It should, according to Heidegger, have been fundamental in Kant’s analysis, seeing that the Analogies furnish “rules which hold up, for every possible experience.” ⁴⁷ Being is consequently not understood in its essence by Kant, but in terms of beings, and more specifically, as constant presence. ⁴⁸ Even though Kant furthermore describes freedom and natural causality as mutually incompatible concepts, he nonetheless refers to both as causalities. Natural causality furthermore remains dominant, and freedom is determined in terms of the former, that is, as being present. ⁴⁹ Heidegger expresses his objection in this respect as follows:

But freedom is the fundamental condition of the possibility of the acting person, in the sense of ethical action. Thus the existence of man, precisely through the characterization of freedom as causality (albeit as one kind thereof) is conceived basically as being-present. This turns freedom into its complete opposite [eben doch grundsätzlich als Vorhandensein aufgefaßt und damit völlig ins Gegenteil verkehrt]. ⁵⁰

The human being’s way of being cannot “be primarily defined as being-present [Vorhandensein].” ⁵¹ Kant should instead have treated the causality of freedom primordially and in its own terms, and not, as he tends to do, from the perspective of natural causality. Heidegger shows that, also when Kant engages with action—specifically the action of a free being who brings about an event, this is viewed in terms of cause and effect, that is, natural causality. ⁵² Here too, Kant thus views freedom in terms of natural causality. He, in other words, “fails to pose the question concerning the particular way of being of beings which are free” and thus to “unfold the metaphysical problem of freedom in a primordial manner.” ⁵³ By viewing freedom in terms of causality, Kant does not succeed in enquiring into the essence of the human being or the Being of Dasein. ⁵⁴ As we will see below, this has inevitable consequences for how one views freedom as well as democracy.

Finally, despite the limitations of the Kantian analysis—for example, the fact that he remains within the metaphysical tradition by viewing freedom in terms of causality—he does so in a more radical manner than anyone before him. ⁵⁵ Kant further regards the concept of freedom as primary and ultimate in philosophy. ⁵⁶ He opens up the possibility of viewing (transcendental) freedom as first cause, which sets in motion natural causality, as well as the possibility of beings in the world also acting by virtue of freedom. ⁵⁷ Kant further acknowledges a certain incomprehension in respect of freedom: How such freedom becomes possible is as impossible to explain as it is to explain the possibility of natural causality. ⁵⁸ Kant finds support for this thesis (of freedom as first cause) in the philosophers of antiquity who similarly posited a “first mover for the explanation of motions in the world, i.e., a freely acting cause, which begins this series of states first and from itself,” Aristotle’s unmoved mover being an example. ⁵⁹ By showing that freedom is not simply a characteristic of the human being, but his or her essence, Kant moreover reveals something about the Being of Dasein. At stake here is in other words a characterization of Being, or rather, as we will see, something that precedes Being and time. ⁶⁰

Remaining with the perspective opened by Kant, it is to be noted that his depiction of the event in terms of causality will be important in the subsequent development of this notion by Heidegger (das Ereignis) and Derrida (L’événement). An event (Begebenheit) for Kant is at stake when something actually happens. ⁶¹ Something actually happens when it begins to be. Such a beginning is not, however, to be understood as an origination from nothing, but merely as an alteration. At stake is thus, as we saw earlier, some permanent thing which merely changes states, in such a way that one state follows from a prior state, that is, everything arises from something that is already present. Nothing arises from an empty time, but always from a fulfilled time, that is, in relation to something already present. An event is furthermore not just something that actually happens; it also happens in time, at a particular time. In analyzing the event, Kant uses the example of an existing house which is being perceived and of a ship moving downstream. The latter is an example of the perception of an event, not the former. Kant here shows that when we perceive a ship moving downstream, we necessarily position the ship at an earlier point upstream. This shows that the location of beings encountered in experience by virtue of the necessity of the temporal succession of apprehensions, must be made possible by time itself, which provides a (causal) law for this experience of succession. As Heidegger puts it, “this [provisional] law is . . . the condition of the possibility of us at all encountering events as such.” ⁶² Heidegger signals the possibility of a very different understanding of an event (as not determined by causality), when he notes the need to take account here of the essence of appearance, finite knowledge, finitude, and transcendence. This would make possible a thinking of “freedom as the interrogative ground of the possibility of event [Freiheit . . . als fragender Grund der Möglichkeit der Begebenheit].” ⁶³

2 Practical Freedom

Although there is a continuity between the Critique of Pure Reason and Kant’s texts on practical reason, he does not analyze practical freedom as a kind of causality, but as a specific characteristic of the human being as a rational being, or as we saw above, as the essence of the human being. ⁶⁴ As in the case of transcendental freedom, the existence of practical freedom cannot be proved, although, as we saw, its possibility was confirmed through Kant’s enquiry into transcendental freedom. ⁶⁵ The reality of freedom can nonetheless be experienced, not in the same way as natural causation, but through practical, will-governed action or the practical laws of pure reason. ⁶⁶ Earlier, in the discussion of transcendental freedom, Heidegger remarked that the (free) will is a very specific kind of being, that is, not one that we encounter in the mere representation of a present being. “Instead, it must be given to us [sondern das uns gegeben werden muß].” ⁶⁷ At stake here is the goodwill that Kant in the Groundwork speaks of, which is not concerned with its own effects or ends. ⁶⁸ Heidegger refers to it as a case of willing one’s own essence, pure willing, or the law of the pure will. ⁶⁹ It is thus not about realizing certain values, but “the actual willing to take responsibility,” “the decision to exist within this responsibility.” ⁷⁰ As finite beings inevitably are affected by other motives, this law is expressed as a command, an “ought.” This ought is not conditional, that is, dependent on attaining certain results, but unconditional (bedingungslos), a categorical imperative, as Kant refers to it. ⁷¹ Heidegger points out that, according to Kant, we become conscious of the moral law when we construct maxims for the will, and that the categorical imperative impresses itself upon us. Heidegger at this point takes a distance from Kant, contending that the categorical imperative, and the notion of a maxim that could serve as universal legislation is a product of the Enlightenment and the Prussian state at the time, being a “specific sociologically determined philosophico-ethico ideology.” ⁷² He, however, notes that Kant nowhere posits the categorical imperative as a fact, different from the moral law, which is a “fact” in a specified sense. Heidegger thus retains the Kantian idea expressed in the Critique of Practical Reason that we become immediately conscious of the (fact of the) moral law when we formulate maxims of the will for ourselves. ⁷³ This is not about making an effort to will. Actual willing entails “the willing of nothing but the ‘ought’ of one’s there-being [will nichts anderes als das Sollen seines Da-seins].” Even when we do not decide, or when we shirk deciding, or hold forth false motives for our actions, we have actually decided, that is, to turn away from the “ought.” In this turning away from the “ought” lies the strongest experience of the “ought” as a fact. ⁷⁴

Returning to the categorical imperative, Heidegger points out that the basic law of pure reason cannot be equated with the formulation of the categorical imperative that we find in Kant. Following the moral law is thus to be distinguished from the Kantian formula. The latter is one of many possible philosophical interpretations thereof and Kant himself adopted various interpretations. ⁷⁵ One of the formulations of the categorical imperative in the Groundwork reads as follows: “Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in any other person, always at the same time as an end, never merely as a means.” ⁷⁶ At stake here in Heidegger’s reading is the personality that constitutes for Kant the essence of the human being as a person, that is, that in the human being which makes possible accountability and responsibility. The categorical imperative as formulated here thus says that in one’s actions, one should always be “essential in one’s essence [wesentlich in deinem Wesen].” ⁷⁷ At stake is a certain self-responsibility (Selbstverantwortlichkeit), not in an egotistical way and in relation to the accidental I, but a responsibility “to bind oneself to oneself [sich an sich selbst. . .binden],” which Heidegger later refers to as “an originary self-binding [ursprüngliches Sichbinden],” “binding as letting oneself be bound [Bindung als für sich verbindlich sein lassen].” ⁷⁸ The understanding of the moral law is thus not about getting to know a formula, a value, or a rule. It is instead about learning to understand the character of the peculiar reality of that which becomes and is a reality in action and as action. Despite the fact that Kant did not develop this insight any further, one can indeed say that Kant had a fundamental experience of the “peculiarity of the willing real as fact [Eigenart des willentlichen Wirklichen als Tatsache],” and by virtue of this experience determined the problematic of practical reason within the limits that he regarded as possible and necessary. ⁷⁹

The proof of the practical reality of freedom consists in and can solely consist in understanding “that this freedom only exists as the real will of the pure ought [daβ diese Freiheit nur ist als wirkliches Wollen des rein Gesollten].” ⁸⁰ This means that the essence of practical freedom is itself legislation, pure will, autonomy. Practical freedom thereby reveals itself as the condition of possibility of the factuality of pure practical reason. Practical freedom as autonomy is, as we saw, self-responsibility, which is the essence of the personality of the human person, the real essence, the humanity of man. ⁸¹ Pure will, pure practical reason, legislation of the basic law of actual action, responsibility, personality, and freedom are thus all the same. They are the same not in the sense of an undetermined, flowing unity, but the same in the sense of in themselves necessarily belonging together. Thereby pure practical reason and freedom acquire their own conditional relationship. Practical reason and its (moral) law are “the condition . . . under which we be become aware for the first time of freedom [as autonomy]”—that is, the moral law is “the ground of possibility of the knowledge of freedom (ratio cognoscendi).” ⁸² Conversely, “freedom is the ground of possibility of the being of the law and its practical reason, the ratio essendi of the moral law.” ⁸³ Heidegger concludes the section by quoting from the Critique of Practical Reason where at stake is the interrelationship between freedom and the moral law, or what Kant refers to as the “unconditional practical law [unbedingtes praktisches Gesetz],” indicating, in Heidegger’s reading, that they are identical. ⁸⁴

3 Freedom, Causality, and Being

We saw above that, for Heidegger, the aim of his reading of Kant is to arrive at the essence of human freedom. Although Kant, especially in respect of practical freedom, goes very far in this regard, he does not ultimately enquire into the essence of the human being, and thus fails to view freedom adequately as a problem of Being. ⁸⁵ Kant’s analysis of practical reason, we can also say, remains lodged within the transcendental freedom of the Critique of Pure Reason, which as we saw, remains a form of causality. The human being, although “free,” thus ultimately remains stuck within a fate-like structure of causality. ⁸⁶ In order to contemplate freedom in its essence, not only the location, region, or field thereof is thus of importance, but also its position within this field. ⁸⁷ The answer as to location seems obvious—in the human being; yet, the latter’s nature is enigmatic and at stake is not simply a particular characteristic or property of the human being, but his or her essence, which precedes any such determination. “We can only gain insight into the essence of freedom if we redirect our gaze, that is, if we seek freedom as the ground of the possibility of Dasein, as something prior even to being and time [Das Wesen der Freiheit kommt erst dann eigentlich in den Blick, wenn wir sie als Grund der Möglichkeit des Daseins suchen, als dasjenige, was noch vor Sein und Zeit liegt].” ⁸⁸ This means that causality, movement, and Being would all be grounded in freedom. Freedom is therefore “not some particular thing among and alongside other things, but is superordinate and governing in relation to the whole [vorgeordnet und durchherrschend gerade das Ganze im Ganzen].” ⁸⁹ When we seek out freedom as the ground of the possibility of Dasein (Grund der Möglichkeit des Daseins), this has the further implication that:

freedom must itself, in its essence, be more primordial than man [in ihrem Wesen ursprünglicher als der Mensch]. Man is only an administrator [Verwalter] of freedom, i.e. he can only let-be the freedom of the free in the way it falls upon him [der die Freiheit von Freien in der ihm zugefallenen Weise Freiheit sein lassen kann], so that through man, the whole contingency [ganze Zufälligkeit] of freedom becomes visible.

Human freedom now no longer means freedom as a property [Eigenschaft] of man, but man as a possibility of freedom [der Mensch als eine Möglichkeit der Freiheit]. Human freedom is the freedom that breaks through in man and takes him upon itself, thereby making man possible [sofern sie im Menschen durchbricht und ihn auf sich nimmt, ihn dadurch ermöglicht]. ⁹⁰

Heidegger thus wants us to understand freedom as “the ground of the possibility of existence, the root of Being and of time [Grund der Möglichkeit des Daseins . . ., die Wurzel von Sein und Zeit].” ⁹¹ This means that the human being, grounded in freedom, whose essence is to be found in freedom, is the site and occasion (Stätte und Gelegenheit), as well as the being through which the Being of beings and the understanding of Being comes to the fore. ⁹² Heidegger here describes the human being as monstrous (ungeheuerlich) and at the same time the most finite (Endlichste). In this finitude appears the extant gathering of the conflict (die existente Zusammenkunft des Widerstreitenden) within the sphere of beings and thus the occasion and possibility of the breaking apart (Auseinanderbrechens) and breaking up (Aufbrechens) of beings in their diversity. ⁹³ Freedom is thus to be understood as the condition of possibility for the disclosure of the Being of beings, of the understanding of Being. ⁹⁴

What appears from these passages, and what will be of particular importance in our reading of Derrida, is a thinking of freedom as a certain abyss from which Being arises, and which at the same time poses a radical challenge to the human being by placing an excessive demand on him or her. In the essay “On the Essence of Ground,” Heidegger similarly notes that freedom is not itself a ground, but the origin of ground in general (Ursprung von Grund überhaupt), the freedom for ground (Freiheit zum Grunde). ⁹⁵ “In grounding,” Heidegger further notes, “freedom gives and takes ground [Gründend gibt Freiheit und nimmt sie Grund].” ⁹⁶ Later, in the same text, he refers to freedom as “the unity of excess and withdrawal [der Einheit von Überschwung und Entzug]” and as “the abyss of ground in Dasein [der Ab-grund des Daseins].” ⁹⁷

The notion of das Freie, translated variably as “the Free,” the “domain of freedom,” the “free space,” “the Open,” or the “open realm” is already alluded to in The Essence of Human Freedom and in Schelling’s Treatise, but it becomes more prominent in later texts, especially in Contributions to Philosophy. ⁹⁸ This terminology does not appear to be a departure from the earlier reflections on freedom, but a continuation, as Heidegger likewise links this notion to (the truth of) Being, inter alia its concealing, revealing, and sending. ⁹⁹ There is furthermore clearly a resonance between the notions of freedom and the Free on the one hand, and what Heidegger refers to in some of his texts as the sending of, the gift of, or the Ereignis (event) ¹⁰⁰ of Being, on the other. ¹⁰¹ In The Event, Heidegger for example comments that “[t]he event can be experienced only ‘in’ Da-seyn, which is itself the essential occurrence of the event [Das Ereignis ist nur zu erfahren »im« Da-seyn, das selbst ist die Wesung des Ereignisses].” ¹⁰² The relation between Being and event in Heidegger nevertheless remains complex. He, for example, speaks on the one hand of Beyng which “essentially occurs/unfolds as event [Das Seyn west als das Ereignis],” which suggests that they are essentially the same. ¹⁰³ On the other hand, he speaks of the two modes of event, that is, of expropriation and of consignment/appropriation (der Ver-eignung und der Übereignung), which is suggestive of a split or division, even if it occurs in Being itself. ¹⁰⁴ Different from what we saw in Kant earlier, the event understood thus, that is, as “preceding” and thereby “giving” Being, would not be causally determined, it would not be “something” that is experienced in time and as a present being. It would instead point to the “location” of a certain battle between forces (the eventuating of Being and its withdrawal, which Derrida refers to as différance), and which as we saw above, calls for a self-binding to take place in the human being who, as Heidegger notes in The Event, is “dispropriated of the last possibility of his or her essence [ist der letzten Möglichkeit seines Wesens enteignet]” in the withdrawal/abandonment of beings by Being. ¹⁰⁵

III. Derrida

Heidegger’s thought-provoking re-interpretation and relocation of freedom has the potential of reshaping constitutional theory. This can specifically be said in respect of the understanding of freedom as the essence of Being, as abyss or as event, as prior to and as root of Being and time. In relation to human beings, freedom is, as we saw, understood as being more primordial, and as not something that belongs to human beings. Human beings are instead possibilities of freedom, belonging to and grounded in freedom, mere “administrators” of freedom. Freedom and the moral law are furthermore indistinguishable. This law claims the human being in his or her essence, calls on him or her to take responsibility in the sense of an originary self-binding, and places an unconditional demand on him or her. Derrida’s analysis of freedom in Rogues and For What Tomorrow is, as we will see, very close to that of Heidegger. He appears to agree with Heidegger about the need to “dis-locate” freedom, not only for the reasons identified by Heidegger, but also because Derrida doubts that freedom and morality as defined by Kant, as well as Heidegger’s conception of Being and of the Free, manage to escape from the economy of the same. ¹⁰⁶ He thus goes beyond Heidegger’s analysis through a further radicalization. In view of the inherent relation between freedom and democracy, recognized since Plato, the enquiry into Derrida’s analysis of freedom will enable us to rethink democracy as well, specifically the relationship between democracy and sovereignty. ¹⁰⁷

1 Freedom as Exposure Beyond Mastery

We saw above that Heidegger reconceives freedom in close association with Being, that is, as an event in his later texts, and Derrida follows suit, but through a further radicalization. In Chapter 4 of Rogues, Derrida focuses on Nancy’s The Experience of Freedom, yet different from Nancy, and as noted earlier, he wants to maintain a certain distance from the word “freedom” because of the associations traditionally coupled to this word, that is, the power, faculty, ability to act, the force to do as one pleases. Following Nancy, Derrida argues that if the word freedom is to be maintained, it should not be simply understood in terms of mastery or measure, as the autonomy of a subject in control of him- or herself, or even more broadly, in the traditional philosophical sense, as related to power, force, possibility, ability, and sovereignty. ¹⁰⁸ Freedom is instead to be understood, in Nancy’s words, in a pre-subjective or pre-cratic sense, in terms of an ipseity being “constituted by and as sharing,” or as “spacing.” ¹⁰⁹ It is to be understood as without power, as an exposure beyond mastery, sovereignty, and autonomy; as absolute generosity, the gift beyond Being; as a welcoming of the unforeseeable or incalculable event, of who or what may come or arrive, that is, as a compromising of the self, an opening of the self to its own destruction. ¹¹⁰

Derrida prepares the ground for the above analysis of freedom, as well as for the analysis of democracy to follow, in Chapter 1 of Rogues, where he analyses ipseity, sovereignty, and freedom with reference to the wheel, involving movement, repetition, a return to itself around a fixed or relatively immobile axis. We will focus here specifically on the analysis by Derrida of Aristotle’s prime mover, the figure par excellence of ipseity, sovereignty, and freedom, which appears to operate in a similar fashion as democracy, as described for example, by De Tocqueville. ¹¹¹ As we saw earlier, Kant invokes Aristotle’s prime or unmoved mover in the context of a discussion of the relation between causality and freedom in the Critique of Pure Reason. Kant there notes that “all the philosophers of antiquity saw themselves as obliged to assume a first mover for the explanation of motions in the world, i.e., a freely acting cause, which began this series of states first and from itself.” ¹¹² The first mover here, in other words, appears as the figure of ipseity, freedom, and sovereignty. When Derrida in Rogues invokes the figure of the unmoved mover, he points, different from Kant, to the complexity of the movement at stake here, which entails not only a movement of the self toward itself, but at the same time a turn against the self. Derrida here reads and comments on the relevant passages in Aristotle’s Metaphysics Book XII. ¹¹³ The actuality of this pure energy does not itself move, and is not moved by anything, yet sets everything in motion, in a circular motion of return to the self. This first motion is in Aristotle’s analysis induced or inspired by a drive or desire (un désir). ¹¹⁴ God, or the pure actuality of the first mover, is at the same time erogenous and thinkable. Aristotle describes God in this respect as desirable, the first desirable, as well as the first intelligible, as thinking itself, thought thinking thought. ¹¹⁵ This “principle,” on which the heavens and nature depend, is furthermore referred to by Aristotle as a “life,” comparable to “the best which we enjoy, and enjoy but for a short time.” ¹¹⁶ This life, which is lived in a constant, continuous, and unending fashion, is for us impossible (adunaton). ¹¹⁷ The energeia of this pure activity is moreover characterized by Aristotle as “pleasure” (jouissance/hēdone), or as Derrida puts it, “the circle of a taking pleasure in oneself.” ¹¹⁸ The energy of God is thus at the same time “desired, desirable (erōmenon, to proton orekton), and partaking in pleasure [à la fois désirée, desirable. . . .et jouissant]. ¹¹⁹ A taking pleasure in the self [Jouissance de soi], a circular and specular autoaffection that is analogous to or in accordance with the thinking of thought (noēsis noēseōs).” ¹²⁰ A passing remark at this point about the relation between (conscious and unconscious) desire and pleasure on the one hand and the political on the other, in particular the democratic, shows what is at stake here. Such desire and pleasure, Derrida points out, give rise to “calculation and the incalculable [du calcul et de l’incalculable].” ¹²¹ By noting here the relation between desire and pleasure, the calculable and the incalculable, Derrida incorporates his own detailed analysis of Freud’s Beyond the Pleasure Principle in The Post Card into the analysis of freedom and democracy. ¹²² There, as here, it was a question of pleasure, being inherently without bounds or limits, that is, without measure, limiting itself, binding itself, in order to obtain mastery of itself as pleasure. ¹²³ Pleasure (jouissance), is in other words, what makes possible the movement toward the self at stake in ipseity and sovereignty, ¹²⁴ yet not simply like a wheel turning around its own axle, but rather like a free wheel. The free wheel (la roue libre), that is, the title of Chapter 1, does not involve a repetition of the same, but an incessant haunting, threatening, and persecution of the self, by the search for an unbound pleasure. ¹²⁵ At stake here, as was the case in Heidegger’s rethinking of freedom, is the relation to death, yet not as a being-toward death, but a Freudian drive toward death.

Derrida continues the analysis of Aristotle’s Metaphysics in Rogues by showing the close relation between sovereignty and the movement of the circle. The energeia of the prime mover, itself unmovable, eternal (but not infinite), indivisible, and separate from sensible things, thus puts in motion an imperishable substance that is characterized by eternal movement, circular return, and finitude. ¹²⁶ Before concluding this analysis, Derrida quotes Aristotle to the effect that “the prime mover, which is immovable, is one both in formula and in number; and therefore so also is that which is eternally and continuously in motion.” ¹²⁷ He then notes that in the final paragraph of Book XII, Aristotle quotes Homer’s the Iliad (book II), thereby invoking Homer’s (sovereign) authority on the need for a single ruler. In the relevant passage, Athena, daughter of Zeus is present, as well as Odysseus, who is compared to Zeus. When Odysseus speaks, he expresses such preference for one ruler instead of mob rule, rule by many, or what Derrida refers to as “the dispersion of the plural.” ¹²⁸ As Derrida points out, kings derive their authority from Zeus, who is in turn the son of Cronos, and the latter of Ouranos. Through a ruse and with the help of his mother, Zeus had tricked and defeated his father (time), as did Cronos. Freud’s Oedipus complex and his related story of the primal horde, with the sons killing the father, loom large here. ¹²⁹ Ancient and modern political theology can both be said to reflect this structure of sovereignty, which Derrida characterizes as phallo-paterno-filio-fraterno-ipsocentric. ¹³⁰ This structure can however be imposed only through the suppression of a certain pre-origin, that is, of absolute desire, of pleasure (jouissance).

2 Freedom and Democracy

For Nancy, as Derrida points out, freedom is to be understood in terms of a who being free. This who is no longer a subject in charge of its will and decisions. The who “exists free,” without necessarily “being free.” ¹³¹ Freedom is furthermore not limited to human beings, but “is extended to everything that appears in the open. . . .to the event of everything in the world.” ¹³² Similar to Heidegger, Nancy speaks of freedom in terms of a “(transcendental) force.” ¹³³ This conception of freedom has the potential of displacing the power or sovereignty (-cracy) located in democracy itself. In Rogues, Derrida, in a similar vein, compares democracy, conceived as the ipseity of the One, a return to the same, with democracy conceived of in terms of “heterogeneity, the heteronomic and the dissymmetric, disseminal multiplicity, the anonymous ‘anyone,’ the ‘no matter who,’ the indeterminate ‘each one,’” i.e. the free wheel. ¹³⁴ If the human being is no longer to be understood as the privileged place for the unfolding of freedom (as Heidegger still seemed to think), ¹³⁵ this also raises questions about the scope of democracy, that is, the limits that are traditionally imposed on it and by it. Should it end at the limits of the nation-state, be restricted to only human beings, or even to only the living? ¹³⁶

These questions are raised in view of the analysis of Plato’s Republic in Chapter 2 of Rogues where two conceptions of freedom as well as two corresponding conceptions of democracy are at stake, that is, “the good of democratic liberty or freedom and the bad of democratic license [la liberté démocratique et. . .la license démocratique].” In the Republic, Plato discusses democracy as a regime and as Derrida notes, the democratic man is brought forward for judgment, that is, his way of being, acting, and speaking. Certain young men (referred to as the akolastoi) are said to be characterized by indiscipline, licentiousness, intemperance, delinquency, and wasteful expenditure, and what is more, no one acts against or disciplines or corrects these rogues by way of the law; there is a complete loss of authority. ¹³⁷ The oligarchs have an economic interest in maintaining this debauched life: in order to eventually acquire their estates, they lend money against the property of these men to enrich themselves even further through speculation. The akolastoi are in debt, do not work, and are plotting a revolution against the oligarchs and the other citizens. ¹³⁸ Plato associates the democratic man with freedom (eleutheria), which is in turn linked to license (exousia), that is, whim, free will, freedom of choice, leisure to follow one’s desires, the faculty to do as one pleases. ¹³⁹ As Derrida points out, Plato reports this as a commonly held view about democracy, that is, this is what we are told about it: that democracy entails being free (eleuthoroi), a place where freedom (eleutheria) reigns, and freedom of speech, as well as the license to do as one likes (exousia). The inherent link between freedom (in its two forms) and democracy is thus posited here: freedom and democracy as self-rule, as the faculty or power (kratos) to do or decide as one likes, but also as self-destruction, that is, a general abdication, a complete loss of authority, lawlessness, a conception from which Plato wants to take a certain distance. ¹⁴⁰ Aristotle likewise speaks of freedom (eleutheria) as a condition that is generally attributed to democracy, and which includes living as one likes, tied to the claim not to be governed by anyone, or failing that, to govern and be governed in turn. ¹⁴¹ The link between freedom and democracy posited here is important for Derrida, as well as the link between a certain understanding of freedom (as license) and the abovementioned self-destructive nature of democracy. Freedom in Plato and Aristotle is, however, still linked too closely to a faculty or power. Derrida ultimately wants to go beyond these seemingly opposing conceptions of freedom and of democracy, thereby providing a different kind of “ground” for a likewise very different understanding of democracy, that is, as “to come.” ¹⁴² In anticipation of the development in Chapter 4 of this different conception of freedom, which is no longer associated with mastery, power, faculty, or force, Derrida in Chapter 2 again invokes the free wheel, both in respect of freedom and democracy. At stake here is “the semantic vacancy or indetermination at the very center of the concept of democracy that makes its history turn.” ¹⁴³ This indetermination or freedom of play (une liberté de jeu) is already to be found in Plato when, in the Republic, he does not speak about democracy as a specific type of constitutional form, but as an all-inclusive “form,” as a beautiful multicolored patchwork, which seduces and provokes, like a roué. ¹⁴⁴ This patchwork, thinking also of its modern forms and including regimes that present themselves as such, would include inter alia monarchic democracy, plutocratic democracy, tyrannical democracy, parliamentary democracy, popular democracy, direct or indirect democracy, liberal democracy, Christian democracy, social democracy, and military, or authoritarian democracy. ¹⁴⁵ One can thus say, as Derrida will point out later, that there is in Greek no proper, stable, and univocal meaning of the democratic. ¹⁴⁶ It appears to rather be characterized by mutability, plasticity, and indeterminacy, being a concept without concept.

Plato’s characterization of democracy provides the opportunity for rethinking the two component elements of democracy—demos and kratos—and to separate them: to think a demos without kratos (or at least without a force belonging to the people), the latter (kratos) being a remainder of the onto-theological dimension of sovereignty despite its secularization. It is therefore necessary to rethink the structure of democracy in line with the stricture of différance. ¹⁴⁷ With reference to Algeria, France, Germany, and the USA, and proceeding in a manner similar to Freud in Beyond the Pleasure Principle in analyzing the strange repetition compulsion, Derrida shows the autoimmune or suicidal structure of democracy, that is, its tendency to destroy itself. There is in other words a certain weakness located within democracy. This can, for example, be seen in the “by or taking turns” of democracy, its regular elections, which open up the possibility that an undemocratic party (e.g., the Islamic Salvation Front, the National Front, the National Socialist German Workers’ Party) can gain power and thereafter abolish democracy. The 1991–1992 elections in Algeria, for example, show how sovereignty can be relied on to avert this risk, that is, to protect democracy from its autoimmune nature, but not without in the process itself destroying democracy. This weakness (the perversion of the democratic by sovereignty), and the contrast between sovereignty and democracy can also be seen in the USA, where the latter can be said to have opened itself through its democratic hospitality (as well as the supply of weapons to “freedom fighters” in protecting/advancing its own sovereignty) to the 9/11 attacks, and the (sovereign) suspension of democratic rights and freedoms in (protective) response. These phenomena—of democracy destroying itself—are in other words made possible by the structure of democracy, its essence, that is, by the taking of turns, by allowing criticism of itself up to the point of its own abolition, its own hospitality, the placing of itself at risk. Democracy in its pure form, that is, without power, and thus extending a welcome to all, even to the enemies of democracy, remains deferred. Yet for democracy to have a future it has to be thought in terms of this openness, this weakness within its own structure.

IV. Kant, Freedom, and Democracy

Kant’s engagement with freedom, as we saw, starts with The Critique of Pure Reason. Here it is for Kant about showing that human beings rise above natural causality and that, different from animals, they therefore enjoy a certain freedom from their natural inclinations. In the Groundwork and the Critique of Practical Reason, freedom again comes to the fore in raising the question of morality. Human beings not only have the ability, in comparison with animals, to rise above their natural inclinations: they live under the obligation to deny or sacrifice these inclinations, in obeying the moral law. Freedom as it appears in Kant’s thinking, is thus to be understood in two senses: as transcendental (cosmic) freedom, and as practical (moral) freedom, the latter being dependent on the former. Freedom yet again comes to the fore in the Metaphysics of Morals, where the question arises inter alia how freedom should be conceived of within a republican state. For Kant, ethics or virtue (the terrain of internal freedom), as well as the whole politico-legal system (the terrain of external freedom) is based on and made possible by (transcendental) freedom. ¹⁴⁸ If freedom as conceived by Kant is rethought in line with the readings of Heidegger, Nancy, and especially Derrida, what would be the implications for politico-legal systems?

We saw above that Kant, in Heidegger’s reading, indeed treats (transcendental) freedom in an ontological sense, and thus as an issue that concerns Being. Kant nevertheless remains within the metaphysical tradition, and thus contemplates Being in terms of beings, without enquiring into the essence of Being itself. Kant therefore views Being as constant presence, which in turn determines the way in which he understands freedom, that is, as a form of causality, and as a property of human beings. By enquiring into the essence of Being, it becomes clear that freedom is not grounded in causality, but causality in freedom. This is because freedom has an essential relation with Being, preceding both Being and time. Human beings, in Heidegger’s analysis, can therefore no longer be said to possess freedom, but to instead be administrators of freedom, the latter being more primordial than they are. Freedom, in this sense, is synonymous with the moral law, which Heidegger understands as an unconditional, pure ought, and that calls upon human beings to will their own being or essence, to bind themselves to themselves.

Derrida follows Nancy in further radicalizing Heidegger’s reading. If freedom is indeed prior to Being, that is, the event or gift of Being, then one can hardly speak of “freedom” any longer. Ipseity, the mastery of the self, the return to oneself in freedom, does not amount to a circular economy, but is the result of the binding of absolute pleasure, pleasure being inherently without bounds or limits, exceeding any economy. At stake here is thus no longer the being or essence of human beings, as one finds in Heidegger’s reading of Kant, but their lack of essence, absolute a-stricture, unbinding. This also applies to the people (demos) in a democracy, who can no longer be viewed as a (collective) subject characterized by mastery or sovereignty, but instead by the welcoming of the unforeseeable or incalculable event. The welcoming injunction of the democracy to come prevents the ineradicable drive to sovereignty, ¹⁴⁹ the presumed foundation of the politico-legal system, from simply returning to itself in a calculating fashion. This injunction precedes, conditions, and undermines all restrictions and exclusions imposed by the modern politico-legal system, that is, of the “unlike,” the “dissimilar,” ¹⁵⁰ thereby challenging the legitimacy of the phallo-paterno-filio-fraterno-ipsocentric democratic tradition in its core.