Russia’s warfare towards Ukraine, and particularly Ukrainians’ heroic willpower to defend their homeland, has sparked a full of life curiosity in such ideas and phenomena as self-sacrifice, braveness and political freedom. How can we clarify this willpower within the case of Ukrainians, and lack thereof within the case of Europeans? Does Europe possess an mental capability and satisfactory vocabulary to seize the essence of sacrifice?
Sure doubts concerning this have been conveyed by the well-known German thinker Jürgen Habermas who, in a textual content written 2 months after Russia’s all-out invasion of Ukraine, argued that though Europeans admire Ukrainians’ resolve and braveness, they can not totally empathize with them as a result of the previous are within the grip of what he known as “the post-heroic mentality”. It’s an echo of an argument Habermas made a very long time in the past when he wrote that “Enlightenment morality does away with sacrifice”.
In a purely rational universe the place equally rational brokers meet one another to deliberate and search compromises, there isn’t any want any extra for battle, battle, risk-taking, heroic deeds, radical choices and excessive, life-and-death conditions. That is the rationale why it’s so tough for a lot of within the West to rise to the decision of accountability and totally respect the broader which means of Ukraine’s sacrifice. What precludes the identification of the phenomenon of sacrifice and its moral-existential import? How can we clarify the present misalignment between the political elites in Western Europe and Central-East Europe?
Many within the West have change into complacent after the autumn of the Berlin Wall and Francis Fukuyama’s declaration that the top of historical past was reached. The Western elites noticed liberal democracy because the unrivalled pinnacle of human improvement, the final cease within the march of progress, and accordingly, historical past and politics have been willingly abolished in favour of economics, commerce, worldwide legislation and summary morality. No actual choices or sacrifices wanted to be made anymore. On this post-historical period, folks don’t even must domesticate any “conventional” virtues anymore, particularly braveness – why on earth would you want braveness on this post-historical paradise?
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The entire of Europe is seen as a giant secure area the place you solely meet like-minded liberals, at most respectful opponents who hear to one another and aspire to seek out frequent floor and ultimately search consensus. On this image of social actuality, not solely politics and historical past change into out of date, however the which means of freedom invariably adjustments – it turns into disentangled from accountability.
Freedom turns into purely detrimental – don’t contact me, don’t intrude, avoid me, I’m pursuing my very own pursuits, and nobody can inform me something. That is the rationale why in Lithuania, and plenty of different European international locations, it’s nonetheless very tough to speak about conscription – folks consider that another person will sacrifice for his or her homeland in instances of disaster; why ought to or not it’s me? How can the state presume that it has the appropriate to take me out of my life, and to “smash my profession”?
Ukraine’s reward to Europe
The prevalence of this selfish worldview confirms the truth that we’re shedding the sense of constructive freedom – not freedom from, however freedom to, freedom to do one thing significant, to take care of this frequent world of ours, to behave responsibly, to construct and creatively challenge our future. I consider that that is exactly Ukraine’s reward to all of us immediately: a novel likelihood to change into historic and accountable brokers as soon as once more, to rise as much as the decision of accountability, to change into engaged actors as a substitute of passive and frightened spectators, or, worse, detached customers.
On this context, it’s worthwhile to return to the wealthy ethical and political philosophy of two seminal thinkers of the twentieth century: German-Jewish thinker Hannah Arendt and the Czech thinker Jan Patočka.
Arendt is understood for her try to retrieve an unique idea of politics, which stems from the Greek phrase polis that refers to a novel type of political life developed by historic Athenians. It was a lifestyle that centred round day by day energetic participation on the a part of the citizenry in day by day affairs of town. Athenians created an area of look the place they might meet as equals and talk about with one another, persuade each other and challenge their frequent future. The general public area was a site the place speech and persuasion reigned supreme, moderately than violence and manipulation. Athens even paid their residents to participate in political life and sit on the juries.
They’d not solely elections and fixed rotation of residents by numerous places of work, but in addition established the precept of lottery, which confirmed an enormous belief in all extraordinary residents (everybody may change into a Justice of the Peace), a degree of belief unimaginable immediately. Rotation and lottery have been expressive of Aristotle’s concept that democracy is a regime the place “all residents rule and are dominated in flip”. Because of this emphasis on energetic participation and direct engagement in politics, residents developed an acute sense of civic accountability for the world which they inhabited. They understood themselves as half of a bigger complete to which they made a fairly important contribution.
If you perceive your self as half of a bigger complete, self-transcendence turns into a key existential orientation in your life. You’re then reaching outwards, not being caught in your personal life with its slender pursuits and desires, however continuously reaching ahead in a gesture of care and solidarity with others. As Pericles says in his well-known Funeral Oration: “we don’t say {that a} man who takes little interest in politics minds his personal enterprise – we are saying that he has no enterprise right here in any respect.”
Hannah Arendt and political braveness
In politics, the moral notion of self-transcendence interprets into braveness and willingness to self-sacrifice. Accordingly, for Arendt, braveness turns into crucial political advantage: “Whoever entered the political realm had first to be able to danger his life, and too nice a love for all times obstructed freedom, was a positive signal of slavishness.” (1) Political accountability requires from us to transcend our personal pursuits for the sake of the frequent world.
In genuine politics, concern for the destiny of the world takes priority over satisfaction of organic, financial or shopper wants. It takes braveness to depart the protecting safety of 1’s personal sphere and to dedicate oneself to the affairs of town, exposing oneself to the sunshine of publicity and judgmental gaze of others, together with one’s adversaries.
Ukrainians who embody braveness, sacrifice and perception in sure ideas give us uncommon an opportunity to get up, to be shaken out of our cosy, snug, recurring worldview
That’s why, as Arendt writes: “Braveness liberates males from their fear about life for the liberty of the world. Braveness is indispensable as a result of in politics not life however the world is at stake.” (2) It’s a moderately strict distinction between life and world, the place life is known as personal and organic, and world as intersubjective and cultural-political. This distinction is similar to one other Arendtian distinction between personal and public. Arendt says that for a real citizen, the destiny of the world is extra essential than private acquire or particular person happiness. She takes inspiration from Machiavelli, who, as she writes, “was extra curious about Florence than in salvation of his soul”. (3)
Public happiness vs. particular person happiness
This type of political self-transcendence provides delivery to a really peculiar feeling that Arendt, following the American Founding Fathers, characterised as “public happiness”. For political actors, participation in public affairs isn’t a burden or a nuisance, however a type of enjoyment which they know can’t be skilled wherever else besides in public with others. Public happiness, once more, refers to one thing that can not be diminished or assimilated to particular person happiness. This raises the query for us immediately: will we acknowledge this notion of “public happiness”? It appears to me that kind of everybody immediately feels merely particular person happiness. This can be a clear signal of our depoliticized mindset.
One of many deep issues immediately is that we have a tendency to pay attention completely on the wants of personal life and neglect the world and the general public. Arendt associates privateness with work, bodily survival and satisfaction of fundamental wants, and publicity with freedom, motion, speech and solidarity. Within the public realm, we emerge as distinctive individuals who, confronted with totally different views on the identical world, continuously check ourselves and thus type our distinctive worldviews. This facet will be defined by the ontological class of plurality – a recognition that the world is inhabited by totally different individuals who convey their very own distinctive viewpoints to the desk.
As Arendt writes: the general public curiosity is “the frequent good as a result of it’s localised on this planet which we’ve got in frequent with out proudly owning it.” (4) In different phrases, the world isn’t given solely to me, my mates and comrades, however is moderately created and sustained by a mess of people that, by the range of standpoints, set up the world as a typical area of look. This imaginative and prescient of politics is nourished not solely by plurality, but in addition by natality – a human capability to create one thing utterly new and surprising.
Recreating a public area
Right this moment within the West, many individuals don’t really feel as residents, as plural and natal beings. Modern life is constructed on the primacy of economics, work, profession, and leisure. The dominance of social media and algorithmic governance alienates us from one another, from strangers, and finally from ourselves. For most individuals, public participation boils right down to clicking the like or hate button on social media, at most – casting a poll each 4 or 5 years. We’ve change into passive spectators at greatest, and apathetic, detached people at worst. That’s why I believe that immediately we must always attempt to retrieve the materiality of the general public area (be it city halls, councils, public discussions or one thing of that kind) – to recreate a public area as an area of look.
On-line world lacks this factor of direct, eye-to-eye engagement with one’s friends that’s attribute of a human dialog. Direct engagement, particularly if nourished by a willingness to hear, is a civilising observe that enables for nuances to spring up within the means of dialog and ultimately mitigate one’s ideological fervour, whereas on-line tweeting and commenting tends to erase the presence of actual humanity, and due to this fact sharpens the tribal lens by which we view phrases on screens. However how can we recapitulate this materials facet of a public area in current circumstances – that’s, in fact, an open query.
The sacrifice of Jan Patočka
Jan Patočka was a thinker who not solely wrote in regards to the which means of sacrifice within the technological age, however in truth himself embodies the morality of sacrifice. In 1977, on the finish of his life, Patočka determined to take a danger and change into a spokesperson of the well-known Constitution 77 dissident motion in Czechoslovakia. When Václav Havel approached him with this request, Patočka hesitated for some time due to his superior age and failing well being, however ultimately he dared to just accept the problem. He took a number one function within the motion and, inside a few months, revealed two essential texts within the underground highlighting and explaining the Constitution’s ethical goals and broader non secular which means.
These texts put ethical ideas, particularly human rights, forward of political calculations, and thus supplied a normative, ethical dimension which was lacking within the official manifesto. The circulation of those texts by Patočka within the underground additional strengthened the resolve of the dissidents, but in addition intensified the regime’s assaults on Patočka. He was repeatedly interrogated, and after the final interrogation, which lasted about 12 hours, his well being deteriorated quickly, and he died just a few days later. Since then, Czech dissidents and Constitution fellows assigned a martyrological connotation to Patocka’s demise, deciphering it as a sacrifice for freedom and better ideas.
Ukraine’s reward to all of us immediately: a novel likelihood to change into historic and accountable brokers as soon as once more, to rise as much as the decision of accountability, to change into engaged actors as a substitute of passive and frightened spectators, or, worse, detached customers
In two influential Charta 77 texts, Patočka forcefully argues that there are specific issues, sure ideas or ethical beliefs value dying for. His personal actions embody a uncommon prevalence in mental life when the phrases and deeds of an mental in truth go collectively. Excessive-sounding rhetoric turns into empty if it’s not backed up and corroborated by expertise and concrete actions. As he writes in a type of Charta texts: “Our folks have as soon as extra change into conscious that there are issues for which it’s worthwhile to undergo, that the issues for which we’d need to undergo are these which make life worthwhile, and that with out all of them our arts, literature, and tradition change into mere trades main solely from the desk to the pay workplace and again.”
What mattered to Patočka was the truth that the technological (or, has he known as it, „technoscientific“) worldview prevents us from acknowledging and appreciating the ethical which means of self-sacrifice. From a technological, financial or scientific perspective, sacrifice is unattainable – it’s only utilization of assets. That’s why there’s a lot cynicism immediately within the West concerning Ukraine: Ukrainians are robbed of subjectivity, regarded solely as cogs, statistics, small items in a large geopolitical chessboard. Ukrainian troopers and residents are seen as assets, a standing reserve of power subsequent to tanks and weapons.
The solidarity of the shaken
On this context, it turns into very tough to generate what Patočka calls “the solidarity of the shaken”, solidarity of co-sufferers who discover themselves within the frequent scenario of fragility and vulnerability, an amazing and tragic encounter with evil. Such solidarity is missing when folks and nations care solely about themselves. That’s why Patočka and Arendt have been so vital of the notion of sovereignty – it creates an phantasm of self-sufficiency, self-mastery and complete management. It may possibly solely result in nationwide egoism and harmful goals of enlargement. Arendt brazenly claims that true freedom can solely be skilled underneath the circumstances of “non-sovereignty”, or plurality.
Sadly, regardless of all of the horrors of Russia’s warfare on Ukraine, it has nonetheless not shaken Europe existentially. And a part of the blame goes to know-how once more, particularly to international media and social media, which is considered one of prime examples of up to date know-how. If you see warfare footage within the information, it turns into routiniseed, just one information piece amongst many different information, and progressively we change into de-sensitised, ambiguous, and at last detached. Indifference: it’s an important moral time period. When formulating his idea of sacrifice, Patočka says that sacrifice is a return of non-indifference, of a way that there are larger and decrease issues in life.
Know-how, in contrast, makes us consider that there’s solely pure immanence, pure horizontality, the place nothing actually issues, every little thing is relative, whereas Peter Pomerantsev famously stated “nothing is true and every little thing is feasible”. Ukrainians who embody braveness, sacrifice and perception in sure ideas give us uncommon an opportunity to get up, to be shaken out of our cosy, snug, recurring worldview, what Patočka typically calls “everydayness”, typically “bondage to life”. Ukrainians give us an opportunity to make a leap from the shallow anonymity and tedium to a degree of authentically human existence the place we start to care about one thing extra, one thing that surpasses and overcomes our enslavement to materials issues and consumption.
Europe, the knight and the bourgeois
I additionally strongly consider that we, intellectuals, have a really clear obligation immediately: to hearken to Ukrainians, to Ukrainian voices. They have to be heard as loudly as potential, and we have to perceive what they’re telling us. That’s why I wish to finish with two quotes by well-known Ukrainians. Ukrainian thinker Volodymyr Yermolenko argues that there are two hearts of Europe, two totally different ethics or moralities that are distinctive to Europe:
“One is the ethics of the agora. It presumes an ethics of alternate. Within the agora, we give away one thing to get greater than we had. We alternate items, objects, concepts, tales and experiences. The agora is a positive-sum recreation: everybody wins, though some attempt to win greater than others.
The opposite moral system is that of agon. Agon is a battlefield. We enter agon to not alternate, however to combat. We dream of profitable however are additionally ready to lose – together with to lose ourselves, even within the literal sense of dying for an important trigger. This isn’t the logic of a positive-sum recreation; there will be no “win-win”, as a result of one of many sides will definitely lose.
Europe has constructed itself as a mix of agora and agon. It bears the picture of each the knight and the bourgeois. Europe’s cultural legacy is unthinkable with out the ethics of agon: whether or not it’s medieval novels with their cult of chivalry and loyalty, or early trendy dramas whose characters stand to die for his or her ideas and passions. However Europe can also be unthinkable with out the tradition of the agora, of dialog, compromise, of softness.”
Yermolenko rightly asserts that immediately’s Europe needs to observe completely the ethics of agora. There’s a palpable disequilibrium between these two ethics immediately. The ethics of agon, the ethics of braveness and sacrifice – that is what Europeans want to recollect immediately, and to offer it adequate weight and consideration. Not being afraid of questioning the “post-heroic” mentality that defines Europe, as Habermas claims.
However I wish to finish with an optimistic word. The well-known Ukrainian historian Yaroslav Hrytsak writes in his newest ebook Ukraine: The Forging of a Nation: “Ukrainian historical past supplies a basis for a restricted however defensible optimism. It’s not distinctive in that sense. Simply consider David and Goliath, the Greco-Persian wars, the autumn of fascism and communism, the tales of Frodo and Harry Potter. It doesn’t matter whether or not these tales are fictional or actual. What issues is that they remind us that the satan – within the Bible or in historical past – is a pathetic creature. He can destroy, enslave and corrupt, however he can’t win.”
Footnotes
1) Hannah Arendt, The Human Situation
2) Hannah Arendt, Between Previous and Future
3) Hannah Arendt, Duty and Judgment 1959-1975
4) Hannah Arendt, Public rights and personal pursuits
This textual content is the transcription of the lecture Simas Čelutka gave at a convention organised by the Lithuanian cultural evaluation Kulturos Barai and Eurozine in Vilnius, October 2024.
