Ricœur's Ethics of Politics and Democracy

Abstract

IntroductionPolitics is process to organise how we live together in a society.1 And however a society is organized, it is established with a view to some good,2 for is certainly chief end, both of individuals and of states.3 John Locke echoes this Aristotelian idea when he says that men unite into a community, so as to live together comfortably, safely, and peaceably, in a secure enjoyment of their properties and a greater security against outsiders.4 Aristotle, therefore, reckons that best political community is one that best realizes ideal of a good life.5 These thoughts of Aristotle move Ricoeur to argue that the concept of 'good life' mutually implicates politics and ethics.6In contemporary political theory, democracy is deemed to have embodied these ideals of Aristotle. It has been drummed up as ideal political system. It is also almost universally commended in contemporary politics and sometimes related to anything humanly good.7 This ideal political system is anchored on projection that in a democracy actual institutions are organized at different decision-making sites so that participants are encouraged or even required to deliberate with others about what is for good of all.8 Most importantly, optimism about democracy lies in its noble task, which, Kaplan says, makes sure that in good sense controls power in bad sense.9 Hence for Ricoeur, democracy is of good government.10Nevertheless, these musings remotely reflect political uncertainty of a fledgling democracy confronted with low productivity growth, a fragile macro- economy, widening social inequality and a frayed social fabric, not to mention weak institutions.11 Thus, what is at stake here is that formal definition of democratic system is in itself insufficient to provide substantive and material conditions for a society to'live well,' for if democracy is deemed to be epitome of good government, how is it possible that these abominable conditions happen in a democracy?Paul Ricoeur thinks that problem in these situations has to do with essential dissymmetry between one who acts and one who undergoes, culminating in violence of powerful agent.12 Thus, understanding and effecting a possible alternative to address this problem need revisiting of very idea of politics and political process. Understanding nature of politics is helpful in conceptualization of an effective democratic governance, one that can take place even under conditions of a fragile democratic state. Paul Ricoeur, I believe, is in best position to help us in this quest as he understands politics to be eminently prone to evil because of its reference to violent dimension of power;13 yet he argues that it must be curbed.I. Politics as a ParadoxBasically, Ricoeur views politics as a paradox due to the two-sided nature of po- litical power14-rationality and violence. Though state's being governed by a constitution essentially expresses its rationality, its violent inception hounds it as well.15 He explains that this statement is based on belief that there is prob- ably no state that was not born out of violence, whether by conquest, usurpation, forced marriage, or wartime exploits of some great assembler of territories.16 Nevertheless, Ricoeur believes that rationality will gradually eliminate if not reduce to a minimum violence that goes with exercise of political power. Ricoeur expounds this point citing numerous implications of this rationality:[F]irst of all, fact of ensuring territorial unity, in other words geographi- cal unity of jurisdiction of apparatus of laws; next, ensuring a time-span greater than that of ephemeral existence of a human being . . . accom- plishing deferral of mortality; finally, of permitting . . . intergenerational integration, that is to say, meshing a received tradition with projects engaging future of historical community considered as a whole. …