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The Soul on Strike

Reconciliation in the Context of Exclusion

André Keet

The Tutu-Jonker Dialogue Series University of the Free State

Faculty of Theology 29 July 2014.

1) Thank you Anlene, and the Faculty for this great and challenging opportunity

to share my thoughts with you in the context of a dialogues series named after

2 great progressive theologians of our country.

2) Allow me to make a few preliminary remarks:

a. Remarks on taking chances, xx

b. I could have prepared this lecture from so many comfortable

perspectives: human rights, historical, political, social, economic,

cultural, etc. I have chosen to stay close to religion, its institutions and

codes; first, because I want to honour the designation of the dialogue

series; and second, because I want to learn in this space. I am a novice.

c. I played around with Willie Jonker’s biography; import some great

ideas from Franco Berardi and Catherine Malabou; then engages with

some of the ideas of Agamben; before concluding with some of Hans

Joas’ reflections …

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d. Also, in this paper I use terms such as muselmann and sacred man

derived from particular writings. I try to use it in a gender-neutral and

plural form/ forgive me if it does sounds odd; it has an etymological

purpose.

3) Everybody knows Desmond Tutu. I did not know Willie Jonker and needed to

read up … my colleague JC gave me a book titled Selfs die Kerk kan verander

written by Willie Jonker … it made for great reading; and also allowed me

personally and partially get to know this sharp and courageous theologian.

4) Reading Jonker’s work reminded me of why I have chosen not to work in the

post conflict categories of perpetrators, victims, beneficiaries and bystanders.

Instead I have chosen to read history as a messy affair that assigns guilt and

responsibility to all of us; differentially and proportionally so … that is why

our work at the Institute proceeds from the emerging theoretical framework of

Shared Complicities; gedeelde aandadigheid … in Afrikaans.

5) Jonker also reminded me of David Bosch, another one of our great

theologians who passed away in 1992; the order of Boabab was bestowed on

him posthumously in 2o13. His son, Dawie Bosch, and his partner Lala Steyn,

studying at the University of Stellenbosch, were crucial in establishing the

local branch and programme of the United Democratic Front in that part of

the country. I owe Dawie and Lala a lot, for various reasons. Willie Jonker, in

his book that I referred to earlier, tells the story of his apology on behalf of the

DRC at the church conference in Rustenburg in 1990. This apology was

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accepted by Tutu, and though not reflected in his book, I heard on good

authority that Russel Botman was one of those who did not agree with Tutu’s

acceptance of the apology. Apart from knowing Russel as the Rector of SUN,

in preparation for this lecture, I was again reminded of his massive

contribution to pre and post 1994 South African society … this talk is in

honour of his memory; if I am allowed to do so.

6) Against the backdrop of our labour Strike Season; the title of this talk is:

The Soul on Strike: Reconciliation in the Context of Exclusion. I

have taken the liberty to frame my task as reflections on the soul on strike.

Allow me to say something about this choice. Generally, the soul, in many

religious, philosophical, psychological, and mythological traditions, is

the incorporeal and, in many conceptions, the immortal essence of a person or

living thing (xx). It has, most certainly, religious and spiritual connotations.

For the purposes of this lecture, I accept this; but add a few interpretive

schemes. Franco Berardi’s work on The Soul at Work is a good starting point.

Here the soul is not beneath the skin. The soul is the angle of the body … it is

the disposition and the rhythm of the body (Jason Smith). The soul is also the

clinamen (xx) of the body. The soul is thus that which explains the slant of the

body; and its rhythms with other bodies; it is thus the SOUL that determines

the slants towards or away from Reconciliation; our socially fragmented

society can thus be perceived as an expression of The Soul on Strike.

Spafford, who tragically lost his four daughters at sea in 1873, penned down

the words ‘It is well with my Soul’ which became a popular hymn since 1876.

Nowadays, ‘it is well with my soul’ may well be regarded as a way to describe

our rhythms with other bodies; the way we slant towards them; the way we

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swerve and change; the way we ‘reconcile’ or do not reconcile. Even if we

believe this soul to be non-corporeal; it nevertheless has a material impact on

the rhythms of our bodies.

7) It is, if you interpret the world from a committed political and social justice

perspective, very easy to critique religion and its institutions. However, I have

listened to too many sermons; and engaged with too many dominees, priests

and imams to allow such folly to enter my mind. I have seen the struggle

within religion, its servants and followers first-hand to know that, despite so

many institutional challenges, religions are crucial for our attempts at

working against the everyday violence in society; to work against the social

dynamics of disrespect; and to find a kind of meaning in one’s own life that

dictates a respect towards others. So yes, I would like to acknowledge the

scholars and practitioners of religion for their work in a difficult world; the

critical praxis within their own institution; and would like to encourage a

much more productive engagement between religion and its customs and

traditions on the one hand; and the major challenges of a divided society with

massive inequalities and poverty on the other.

8) Many of you here will know the varieties of definitions attached to religion;

and the pragmatic and intellectual difficulties that come with it. I will not go

there.

9) Scholars of religion would generally be very critical of George Bataille’s work;

and some may even find it distasteful. However, I regard his definition of

religion “as the so many different attempts to respond to the

universe's relentless generosity” as very instructional. The notion of

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‘generosity’ is central to African moral philosophy; and features strongly in the

idea of Ubuntu. We can, without stretching the imagination, link Bataille’s

definition of religion to traditional African religious practices. If religion is a

set of practices that relates to the belief in a higher authority from which the

ordering of the world emanates; then ‘generosity’ is its defining element … as a

constituting concept; and as a practice. The soul is the rhythm of our bodies;

this rhythm is tuned by ‘generosity’; once the rhythm is detuned away from

generosity, the body’s clinamen is directed away from others; reconciliation

cannot take shape. This is, sadly so, one of the defining features of our time.

10) Descartes, in his last published work in 1649, gives us a way for understanding

the soul via its passions … in The Passions of the Soul. He suggests six

passions: wonder, joy, sorry, love, hatred and desire. The passion of ‘wonder’

relates closely to the idea of ‘generosity’; we should be surprised by our

encounter with others for generosity to find a mooring … but our prejudices

and dogmas dislocate wonder. In fact, scholars are notorious for displacing

wonder; whether it is the wonder for knowledge, students, objects, etc.

Scholars of religion may develop innovative interpretive schemes around

biblical and other sacred texts; but, in general, they have moderated their

own wonder. Willie Jonker rekindled his ‘wonder’ in 1990, after wrestling

with himself; he rekindled a ‘wonder’ about his own realization of the massive

violence of Apartheid ... and the generosity of those violated; which in turn

reactivated his ‘generosity’ … ‘Wonder’, here for Jonker, ‘is the privilege way

in which the spirit affects itself; wonder is the faculty of self-surprising

… the amazement of the mind at itself; to use Catherine Malabou’s

phrasing of Descartes’ work (xx).

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11) Forgive me spending time on this; but the idea of ‘wonder’ and ‘generosity’ is

important for the unfolding logic of my argument on reconciliation in the

context of exclusion. ‘Wonder’ does not simply ‘relate to the ability to be

surprised; but also to be ruptured … the emotional consequence of the

intrusion of alterity into the soul … something else enters soul; the soul

realizes that the self it not alone’ (Malabou, xx). If one reads Jonker’s

account of his actions, one can argue that the wonder or rupture that entered

his soul, provided the clinamen and swerve for his body to share the rhythm of

others. Of course, the other figure is the title of this dialogue, Bishop Tutu, has

shown us on numerous occasions the material expression of the idea of

wonder and generosity.

12) Let us not confuse the soul that is not alone of which I speak with Heidegger’s

dasein and being-with-others. Yes, Heidegger had a sense of being with others

and he is a great thinker on this; but those others were simply his Herrenvolk.

This is similar to how the church created the volk as a collection of culturally

and racially related others during some of the darkest phases of our own

history. The Jonker experience of ‘wonder’ is totally different for it is the

intrusion of an unfamiliar other … the incursion of the other that is not

the volk; and not of the volk. I would appreciate if it we can avoid any

Heideggerian reading of my analysis here; because it would be a

misrepresentation which will saddens me.

13) From wonder, as the first of the six passions of the soul in Descartes’ terms,

generosity emerges as esteem for oneself. Jonker’s 1990 ‘wonder’, which have

probably being formulated years before in conversation with Johann Heyns,

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David Bosch, and many others in this audience as well; develops into esteem

for himself; and therefore esteem for others. Generosity now becomes an

inclination to do good without self-interest; to live free from contempt,

jealousy, envy, hatred, fear and anger; ‘in generosity we recognize the worth of

others’ … ‘so that respect an veneration follow wonder … generosity is a

species of wonder’ (Malbabou, p18).

14) ‘Generosity’, which should be the most profound expression of religious

teachings, seems to be lost in theology’s ideologies. This leaves religion with a

major contradiction; that is, one of its major operating principles,

reconciliation, is killed off by its own teachings.

15) The logic of this argument links with the title of this paper in the following

way.

16) First, we have to ask: Can religion facilitate reconciliation in the contexts of

exclusion? What exclusion, you may ask?

17) Let us for now assume that we talk about a materialist exclusion. We can then

refer to our National Planning Commission Diagnostic Report, released in

June 2011, that sets out South Africa nine primary challenges:

� Too few people work (poverty levels are criminally high)

� The quality of school education for black people is poor

� Infrastructure is poorly located, inadequate and under-

maintained

� Spatial divides hobble inclusive development

� The economy is unsustainably resource intensive

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� The public health system cannot meet demand or sustain quality

� Public services are uneven and often of poor quality

� Corruption levels are high

� South Africa remains a divided society.

18) Thus the NDP (2012) foregrounds ‘social cohesion’ in its six priorities: uniting

all South Africans around a common programme to achieve prosperity and

equity; promoting active citizenry to strengthen development, democracy and

accountability; bringing about faster economic growth; higher investment and

greater labour absorption; focusing on key capabilities of people and the state;

building a capable and developmental state; and encouraging strong

leadership throughout society to work together to solve problems.

19) If reconciliation is overwhelmingly seen in theological and psychological

terms, with all its associated notions of forgiveness, atonement and apology, it

will be incapable of responding to a materialistic conception of exclusion; but

then again: exclusion is not only material.

20) On the other hand, do we necessarily mean that it is only a materialist

conception of religion that can respond to a material reality of exclusion? Can

one speak of a materialist theology that analyzes religious faiths?

21) If the soul is the swerve of the body; it provides a materialist rhythm and slant

for the body; for Tutu and Jonker’s wonder that is extended through

generosity; so that the body can do something material … a wroegende

belydenis met ‘n materiele respons; with the work that has to follow.

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22) At the very moment that religion expresses its material instincts, theology

retreats into its transcendent corner; incapable of finding the interplay

between the immanent and the transcendent. As Zizek (xx) would say: “When

I do a good deed, I do so not with an eye toward gaining God's favor; I do it

because if I did not, I could not look at myself in the mirror. A moral deed is

by definition its own reward. David Hume, a believer, made this point in a

very poignant way, when he wrote that the only way to show true respect for

God is to act morally while ignoring God's existence”.

23) But ignoring God’s existence will be a tall order for followers of religions; and

I. The challenge of course is to root our thinking and doing in materialist

forms not as a rejection of God; but as acts of true fidelity to her. Only then

may we understand that we cannot have a good soul that is not the swerve and

rhythm of our bodies towards the other others. For too long have the

absence of the actual expression of this insight bedeviled the role that religion

can play. Instead, religion gave us such finite perspectives of not only this

world, but also the other worlds. Totality kills ‘wonder’; and generosity

terminates. It is to the credit of the Tutu and Jonker duo that they could still

‘wonder’; and marvel at the material human; against the teachings of their

trade.

24)When the world is complete, as religion would like to have it, gaps that are

experienced are normally filled with ignorance and learned non-knowledge;

for sinners and saints to be classified. Reconciliation in the contexts of

exclusion becomes a near impossibility because the ‘excluded’ is othered; first

materially and then spiritually.

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25) This logic gave rise to one of the most dangerous trends of analyses that are

littering the South African landscape. That is, ‘reconciliation’ gets equated

with ‘equality’ … the lack of reconciliation and social cohesion and the

intensity that accompanies it gets explained in a single-factor analysis of

socio-economic inequalities. The anthropological character of the human

being that emerges is that of a competitive economic beast that will kill

and instigate violence at whim against others simply on the basis of his or her

wants. Not only this, these beasts have also lost any moral compass and

values that are so important for us on the other side; they are, for us the other,

and should remain other. On this basis, xenophobic violence is discursively

justified; and it did not take long for us to mold our reconciliation barometers

on the same silly single-factor logics. It is easy to superimpose a fragmented

social polity onto a landscape of socio-economic inequalities; so easy, you can

draw it with a pencil on tracing paper in less than ten minutes using some

household survey maps. From here our entire praxis in relation to social

cohesion and socio-economic inequalities takes on a charitable flavor; one

that postpones activism. Whereas religion postpones the better life to the

spiritual after-life, this analysis of reconciliation postpones the better life to

the after-life of equality. Both of them are unattainable in this world. The

politics of the future is here: both in religious, political, social and economic

terms. It has little regard for the present.

26)But, as Boltanski argues, the politics of the present is no small matter: “For

over the past, ever gone by, and over the future, still non-existent, the present

has an overwhelming privilege: that of being real”.

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27) A politics of the present will not be cynical about the empirical examples of

solidarities within and across socio-economic divides; we all have experiences

of living in communities where poverty is a maker of solidarity and

fragmentation; at one and the same time: history has zillion examples of this.

But, studies that try to uncover the mechanics of these solidarities are rare.

How people survive and on what basis they support one another in trying

circumstances are worthy of our intellectual interest if we want to be true to

the materialist element of God.

28) Economically strong and stable democracies have expressed social

fragmentation is the same way as struggling new ones; the same goes for

reconciliation.

29)Despite this, the popular analysts insist: When equality comes; we will have

reconciliation…Does this not almost sound like a typical Sunday, Friday or

Saturday message; except that the concepts have been shuffled?

30) Today Matata Tsedu peddled this nonsense again on radio; no social

cohesion among un-equals. The very idea of any relationship disappears;

because no-one is exactly as equal as another.

31) If we believe popular analysts today, we all have to give up our jobs; invest

our whole lives into creating employment for others; and work tirelessly and

exclusively to eradicate inequality … no-one should have a job that does not

contribute to this. This is not a bad idea; but it will create other problems.

However, these analysts, including ourselves, do not have their own jobs in

mind. Rather, not only do they postpone the better life to the future, they also

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assign responsibility for it to actors other than themselves; normally the state.

The state becomes the reference point for what can be achieved. A double-

bind justification for inaction emerges. Along with them we then argue

that the problem is first somewhere else; and second, that it is someone else’s.

32) There are sufficient theoretical and empirical resources to counter these

arguments. Why these arguments remain influential in our daily discourse has

to do with the fact that it justifies our inaction. It is better to think of those

others that are excluded in terms of the structural conditions of our economy;

the cause is an impersonal condition of life that has very little to do with me.

But we know, actually, that this is not true. That is, we know that socio-

economic conditions are influential in all our lives, but they are not the only

factors that work into our understanding of reconciliation.

33) For instance, in The Struggle for Recognition, Honneth (1995: 192-130)

conceived of recognition as consisting of three spheres. These spheres

‘designate the three fundamental types of normative interactions which,

according to Honneth, are necessary for modern subjects to develop their full

autonomy’ (Deranty, 2009: 271-272):

… one through which the subject’s affective life is secured (recognition

through the intimate sphere); one through which the subject is able to see himself as equal to all, as full subject of rights (legal, universalistic recognition); and one through which the subject is able to see her contribution to societal life validated (recognition of the individual’s “performance”) (ibid).

What is framed above as ‘achievement’ in the third sphere, Honneth (1995)

originally articulated as ‘networks of solidarity and shared values within which

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the particular worth of individual members of a community can be

acknowledged’ (Anderson, 1995: xii). The relationships of recognition are not

‘ahistorically given but must be established and expanded through social

struggles, which cannot be understood exclusively as conflicts over interests’

(ibid).

34) This is where the crux of our challenge lies. Not only do we not have

interpretive schemes for exploring solidarities that must emerge from the

swerve of the soul that sets up the passion of ‘wonder’ at the intrusion of the

other that is not my volk or not from my kasi. We also lack a general

sociological theory of solidarity within theology that is linked to recognition;

one that needs to replace popular analysis of reconciliation. We need a theory

that provides, as far as reconciliation is concerned, for democracies of

proximity.

35) Religion and its institutions have too easily become compatible with the

economic and political arrangements of our times; this range from support for

political regimes to justifying oppressive modes of production; and its cultural

spin-offs. Some of the major cultural spin-offs of present day economic life is

individualism, consumerism and relentless competition; even on the back of

those excluded bodies. The authentic human down-cended into these cultures,

emerging only sporadically from it for church services and charitable

humanitarian action to sooth the soul. I am yet to find a systematic

programme rooted in religious practice that challenges the logic of

consumerism and relentless competition in order for us to challenge the

violent arrangements that gave rise to it. The logic of the market with all its

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practices has seamlessly connected with religion’s view of itself; the

competitive beast is simply giving expression to his or her talents handed

down by God. That such exercise constitutes varieties of sin against the other,

is matter of mere collateral damage.

36) The new spirit of capitalism is also the spirit of the religion and its

institutions; creating the hordes of unfortunate human sufferers all around us

so that we can extend a humanitarian hand to them; as an act of innocence-

making. We create the object of our innocence-making, the unfortunate

sufferer, by pursuing a religiously sanctioned set of practices, cultures and

values. Our bread is buttered on both sides; there is no better life than this.

My guilt makes me innocent; I am innocent by guilt. I will return to this

point again.

37) This is where the challenge of religion in relation to reconciliation will find its

kernel.

38) How do we face up to this kernel? Deleuze that the “New can ONLY

emerge through repetition (ibid: 12)”. To repeat a text, author or event, is to

transform it. Betraying the letter is to remain faithful “to (and repeat) the

‘spirit’” (ibid: 12). Conversely, to be faithful to the ‘letter’ is to betray the

‘spirit’; this means betraying the “creative impulse” that authored the letter.

Our constitutional court judgements’ references to the ‘spirit’ of the

Constitution that sometimes overrides contested textual interpretations,

underwrites this complex Deleuzian insight. The court is constantly changing

the balance between the “actuality and virtuality of the past” (ibid: 12). From

this position, the possibilities for theological textual re-readings as ‘real’

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repetitions are infinitely transformative, so is the promise of reconceptualised

(transformed-repeated) notions of ‘reconciliation’. A reading of sacred texts as

repetitions should be transformative; for the inclusion/ exclusion divide to

collapse. In this sense the other will become a constitutive other; this other

makes us; and demands our solidarity, not charity. Charity co-produces

the other; solidarity makes us all other.

39) Charity is an affirmation of exclusion; solidarity is an

assertion for inclusion.

40) Giorgio Agamben, with his wonderful readings of religion and the

church, suggest in, Opus Dei, An Archaeology of Duty, that office and liturgy

transforms “the categories of ontology and of praxis”: “In office or duty, being

and praxis, what a human does and what a human is, enter into a zone of

indistinction, in which being dissolves into its practical effects”. This is

scarcely the case in modern practices; rather, today, the believer and his or her

practices are perfectly separated. Moral disengagement is normalised.

41) Agamben also uses the zone of indistinction in relation to homo sacer, the

scared man: “The sacred man is the one whom the people have judged on

account of a crime. It is not permitted to sacrifice this man, yet he who kills

him will not be condemned for homicide” … the sacred man is created by law;

and inside law; but can be killed without it being called murder, he is

therefore outside of law as well … in a zone of indistinction.

42)This brings me to one of the major arguments I would like to forward in this

paper; that which relate to the Muselman, and reflected upon by Jean Amery,

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a holocaust survivor that argues firmly for the right not to forgive; for

ressentiment as productive.

43) Primo Levi, another camp survivor, describes the muselmann “as the most

extreme figure of the camp inhabitants” … “the person who in camp jargon

was called "the Muslim," der Muselmann -- a being from whom humiliation,

horror, and fear had so taken away all consciousness and all personality as to

make him absolutely apathetic (hence the ironical name given to him). He was

not only, like his companions, excluded from the political and social context to

which he once belonged; he was not only … He no longer belongs to the world

of men in any way; he does not even belong to the threatened and precarious

world of the camp inhabitants who have forgotten him from the very

beginning. Mute and absolutely alone, he has passed into another world

without memory and without grief.

44) Jean Améry, calls the Muselmann “a staggering corpse, a bundle of

physical function in its last convulsions” (RA, 41). Neither human nor animal

… a bare life…it is a zone of indistinction.

45) Let me apologise for this imagery and for using a holocaust experience to

make a different kind of point;

46) The point that I would like to make relates to the negative as

productive.

47) The soul on strike is a negative; the soul at work is its positive. But, isn’t it

true that the metaphor of strike or protest can yield positive results; it can

yield agreements, like the NUMSA agreement yesterday.

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48) If one read Jonker’s wroeging and reflect on the everyday life of Tutu

the soul wants to be at work (Berardi,xx); but need, from time to time, to

strike. It swerves the body so that the non-rhythms can me made visible; so

that the fragmentation and non-reconciliation can take shape; for a politics of

social justice within religion to emerge.

49) The ‘muselmann’ and the sacred man points to ‘bare life’; close to

death. They are the living dead … in-between ontological positions. They are

an other of a very special kind because we tremble at their position … we see

our future selfs in them; and we narcissistically revolt. This is also true of our

encounter with the disabled; and our encounter with the poor whose

forgiveness we seek; not as a political act proper, but as a self-interested desire

for innocence. Jonker, on the other hand, wanted to be guilty.

50) Allow me share the story of Louis Althusser, the last of the great

Marxist philosophers; to link it up with the idea of the muselmann and homo

sacer. My apologies to those who may have heard this many times before.

Althusser’s autobiography, The Future Last Forever, is out of print; it is a

fascinating book but like all books of its kind, the author is obsessed with

himself. He argues that though he felt responsible for and confessed to

murdering his wife on 17 November 1980, he was denied the right to be

guilty. Designated as mentally-ill at the time of the deed, he escaped full

physical and juridical responsibility. He goes on to describe how by being

declared non-responsible for the deed, he ceased to be a right-bearer at that

very moment…he became a member of the ‘undead’, living but still unburied

… in-between ontological positions; like the muselmann and homo sacer.

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51) The bare life of the undead, the ‘muselmann’ and ‘homo sacer’, is that which

frame exclusion … they may as well be those millions who are living in

poverty; stripped of a life worth living. This, I admit, is an extreme position.

Nevertheless, it is not far-fetched as a possibility that we have to work against.

Just as the messianic provides for a concrete hopeful stretch towards the

future; so must be our resolve to avoid an ‘undead’ future for our compatriots

here on earth. The two are linked. The messianic can both be transcendental

and material.

52) The anxiety and the narcissistic revolt that the muselmann engender, is part

of the passions of the soul … ‘sorry’ and ‘hatred’. We are ‘sorry’ for and ‘hate’

the possibility that is being brought to our doorstep; the reality that we too

may simply be part of the undead tomorrow; the undead are our possible

future selfs; a possibility that may become real even five minutes from now.

53) The ‘undead’ also stands in our way of innocence making; because it remains

human and on this very basis provide for the logic of being excluded … you are

excluded from humanity because you are human. Between the muselmann (as

the extreme form of the unfortunate); and the fortunate, (as those who have

most of their rights exercised), we find the poor, the discriminated against; the

unemployed, the homeless and the hungry…in general, the excluded as the

subjects of the conditions for reconciliation.

54) If we then go back to Altusser’s plea for the ‘right to be guilty’, he wants an

incursion of the other into himself … he wants to extend a wonder, an

amazement and a generosity that his disallowed because he can’t be guilty. So

we have to ask; if our entire logic rest on innocence-making, where will the

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activism and desire to work against the making of the muselmann comes

from?

55) It is this working against within which reconciliation in the contexts of

exclusion can become a possibility.

56) Guilt; and Amery’s right to hate; or right not to forgive; sets up the negative

as productive. In the intrusion of the other into the self of Jonker, comes the

guilt from where his productive theology took shape. This intrusion is the

wonder of the self about its awareness that the soul not alone; then comes

generosity; then reconciliation as a perpetual unfinished project … all in a

privileged sequence with one another. The passions of the soul, in Descartes

logic, in their various interplays with one another, must guarantee generosity

as its political angle.

57) The Soul on Strike becomes the Soul at Work, in Berardi’s (xx) terms.

Estrange bodies move in rhythm with another; it is simply this rhythm that

may be called reconciliation; a democracy of proximity is possible.

58)In this context, religion has probably one of the most central roles to play; via

the negative. But is has an even bigger calling. Challenging how the

muselmann is constructed by political, economic and cultural arrangements;

both in terms of the hatred that gets spawned, and in terms of the inequality

that ensues. It cannot escape its responsibility to critique predatory

accumulation. So it must challenge the making of poverty via the principles

and spirit of what has generally been legitimated by religion; the expression of

our ‘god’ given talents for exploitative purposes: greed and relentless

competition reign.

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59) According to Honneth’s latest offering, Freedom’s Rights, in the 1800s, when

Hegel saw the instantiation of our modern institutions, including the market,

he took for granted that solidarity will be the principle on which basis all

actors will be treated fairly and justly.

60) He was wrong; predatory economic arrangements became the most

dominant form of social relations; gave rise to predatory politics; which in

turn gave birth to predatory cultural practices. Corpulent and corrupt politics

across the board are expressions of these social arrangements; we find such

within the social dynamics of our universities as well. Religion, and its

institutions, has been docile over the past 200 years as the building blocks for

today’s society were put in place. We forgot the Buddhist proverb, enough is a

feast, or as Neville Alexander would say: enough is as good as a feast. The

concrete expression of this simple injunction will make our country a very

different place already.

61) Let me conclude: Where Agamben wants to retain the original meaning of the

sacred man as a person that may be killed but not sacrificed, Hans Joas, in a

very recent publication, advances the sacredness of the person; proposing an

affirmative genealogy in which human rights are the result of a process of

"sacralization" of every human being. According to Joas, every single human

being has increasingly been viewed as sacred; within the developments of

human rights.

62)He may be right, I am not sure. Only if we can link human rights with the soul

as work as the shared rhythm of different and strange bodies; where

21

solidarities across socio-economic and cultural divides makes privilege and

poverty part of the same illness of our times; can we speak of the possibility of

reconciliation in the context of exclusion; in the Jonker’s swerve of the body,

his soul, became rhythmic with those of others.

63) Good luck with the dialogue series; and once again, thanks for the invitation.

End

Andre