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California State University, Dominguez Hills
University of Wisconsin, Parkside
Created: May 29, 2004
Latest Update: May 29, 2004
jeannecurran@habermas.org
takata@uwp.edu

Complicity: Local to National to International

This discussion piece is based on an article in the New York Times on Saturday, May 29, 2004: Proposal to Adopt a Palestinian City as a 'Sister' Creates a Family Feud for Madison by Jo Napolitano, at p. A9.The article brings up some important issues of answerability, accountability, and complicity.

First, let's review some working definitions of these issues:

I hasten to remind the reader that these are our interpretations. For any scholarly analysis of Bakhtin and his use of answerability you will need to consult further sources. That fits with our goal of bringing such concepts and issues to the attention of those who are just beginning their advanced studies, or those who pursue such interests as continued learning. Our objective is not to offer an alternative to the actual study of Bakhtin, but to provide sufficient understanding of some of the basic concepts that students can choose knowledgeably among the many alternative paths to theory and understanding, which to pursue in more depth.

For purposes of our discussions of complicity as it can be understood on many levels: local, national, international, the definitions we offer here suffice. Those who wish to attack this issue will be able through this introduction to find their way to more advanced discussions.

• Answerability:

  We use this term in accordance with our understanding of Greg Nielsen's interpretation of Bakhtin's concept of answerability, the ability of each human to voice an answer to whatever is said in his/her dialog with other humans. That means, in our interpretation, that humans are gifted with voice, or the ability to express their feelings, reactions, and ideas. But the skills to use that gift vary among persons and communities, and the skills themselves are learned.

  Nielsen describes Bakhtin's approach to dialog as asking the question, what shall I say when the Other can answer? In other words, Bakhtin fully accepted the dialogic approach in which there is an Other in every dialogic transaction, and in which the Other's reaction or response will interact with the original speech of Person to create the social environment in which their inter-relationship will develop. Bakhtin saw community as composed of the many inter-relationships of the individuals who are part of that community.

  So answerability is the gift of expression as possessed by every human = voice, and answerability entails the skill of communication, which is a learned component. We use the concept of answerability to understand that even when silenced by some authority, legitimate or not, which denies an individual's expression, the expression and feelings and ideas do not disappear because of that silencing. They are merely suppressed, and may eventually find voice.

  Franz Fanon dealt with this concept in post-colonialism, when he said that the natives from whom land had been taken and who had been forced into slavery, wanted more than fair wages, they wanted the land the land-lord had stolen (conquered) and all the wealth it had produced. He was saying that long years of imposed silence erupted with a voice that could not be expected to want a fair portion in which "fair" failed to account for the long years of exploitation and enslavement and silence that had been suffered unwillingly, and that anger over that injustice needed to erupt.

  Hal Pepinsky speaks of that same need for such anger over unjustly imposed silence to erupt before healing can begin in relationships. His work is in the area of criminology, delinquency, and child abuse, where enforced silence occurs on a more individual level. This suggests that answerability is an issue that must be taken into account in parental, spousal, educational, mentor relationships. Essentially, the issue will crop up in every power relationship, for if the one with power, be it legitimate or illegitimate, uses that power to silence the Other, the inter-relationship is altered, and the community is altered by the difference in the inter-relationships of which the community is formed.

  Bakhtin's question, what shall I say when the Other can answer? indicates a good faith attempt to recognize the validity claim the other makes. It means that I must take the Other into account when I choose what I say. Not in a political correctness sense, but in the sense that the Other is a human just like me, and has ideas and feelings, just like me, and has a voice to express them just like me. So, if what I say harms the Other, I need to consider how that will affect our inter-relationship, and how that inter-relationship, if multiplied many times, will affect the community of which we find ourselves a part.

  And this leads us back to Maria Pia Lara's discussion of illocutionary discourse and it's role in the Habermasian model of democracy. In Habermas' scheme, the law is the most important sphere, for that sphere is where we give each citizen a good faith hearing of any validity claim he/she has. To do that, Habermas imagines public discourse, in which every citizen is represented, and in which all claims are given fair consideration. One of the problems with that process is that for many years, we have lost the skills of public discourse, if we ever had them as Habermas supposes.

  This is where Maria Pia Lara comes in. She focuses on illocutionary, as opposed to instrumental. discourse. In instrumental discourse we are trying to convince someone of our point of view, or get something we want. There is a purpose to our argument, something we want. In governance discourse, that is discourse aimed at making those decisions of how to manage our resources, of who gets what, of what gets built and what doesn't, we are reasoning instrumentally. We're giving our side of the argument to persuade others to give us what we want, or to give our group what it wants. In illocutionary discourse we drop the instrumental purpose and the discourse focuses instead on trying to understand what the Other is saying, expressing, how he/she could have come to that position, and how it relates to our own position. To do that honestly is to listen to the Other in good faith.

  Pia Lara comes at this from feminist theory. One of the major focuses of feminism has been to make us aware that women have been silenced, and that that silencing has prevented a good faith hearing of their perspectives, ideas, and feelings. We add one more requirement to good faith hearing of illocutionary discourse: that of lending our skills at communication to help the Other express his/her validity claim when we recognize the need for clear understanding. That means we can't just sit by and watch Other explain something that we could get over very quickly. The reason we insist upon this addition is that our society has become so compulsively adversarial that we can't resist wanting to win an argument just for the sake of winning. Our collaborative skills are rusty. We have forgotten that this isn't an equal playing field when move to issues that require illocutionary discourse.

  • Gift of voice belongs to each human
  • Skill in using voice is learned skill

    • Suppression does not prevent the answering, only renders it silent
    • Anger and frustration over silencing may erupt into some form of expression
    • Eruption may be violent
    • For healing to begin suppressed anger must be released