Search results for ""author g. de schrijver""

Besides their insistence on praxis and the application of the Word of God to a given situation, Liberation Theologies make ample use of tools of analysis to uncover root causes of oppression. Now, it is precisely with respect to these tools that Liberation Theologies today find themselves on shifting grounds. In intra-ecclesiastical circles cultural concerns have come to replace socio-economic analysis, whereas after the implosion of the East Bloc the liberationists proper also pay more attention to the issues of gender, ecology, and indigenous movements. The contributions to this volume, originating from various continents, discuss to what extent this shift in emphasis is desirable, and acceptable, and conclude that the cultural focus cannot possibly invalidate but only enrich and complete the socio-economic analysis. They, moreover, try to assess the developments in light of globalization (economics, informatics), on the one hand, and postmodernity on the other. Given the impact of western culture politics, the question arises as to whether the native cultures will succeed in keeping up their religious core values and structures of solidarity - two elements so indispensable for liberative commitments.

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A genuine political ethics seems to require a universal perspective, and yet we are told that the postmodern age eschews universal perspectives. In this book, Georges De Schrijver argues that the leading proponents of postmodernity have not, as is commonly assumed, abandoned the search for universals. Rather they have sought to reshape the concept in ways that account for postmodernity's critique. Examining the thought of both Jean-Francois Lyotard, who prophesies the end of the grand stories, and Jacques Derrida, the leading proponent of deconstruction, De Schrijver comes to the conclusion that each, in his turn, is still in search of the universal. Taking his lead from Kant's unpresentable Idea, Lyotard holds out hope for a universal expressed through respect for heterogeneity, whereas Derrida arrives at this impossible dream through a critical study of Husserl's phenomenology. The common bond for Lyotard and Derrida is their quest of the unpresentable. For Lyotard, this comes through a sublime sadness urging him to side with the silenced party in legal disputes. For Derrida, the same quest is expressed through a yearning for the impossible things to come: a justice that goes beyond legality, a reshaping of the international juridical order, and a hospitality that is truly unconditional in its reach. Underlying the thought of both men is a profound appreciation for their Jewish ethical inheritance, an appreciation they learn from Emmanuel Levinas. In passing judgment on the new world order, both authors go decidedly beyond Kant - and thus beyond modernity - in reaching for a truly transcultural perspective in this era of globalization.

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