Bulletin n. 3/2010
January 2011
CONTENTS
  • Section A) The theory and practise of the federal states and multi-level systems of government
  • Section B) Global governance and international organizations
  • Section C) Regional integration processes
  • Section D) Federalism as a political idea
    • Fine Robert
    Nationalism, Postnationalism, Antisemitism: Thoughts on the Politics of Jürgen Habermas
    in Oesterreichische Zeitschrift für Politikwissenschaft , 2010/4 ,  2010 ,  409-420
    Nationalism, Postnationalism, Antisemitism: Thoughts on the Politics of Jürgen Habermas This paper explores some of the ways the question of antisemitism figures in the political writings of Jürgen Habermas. It pays tribute to Habermas' determination to confront the legacy of European antisemitism in his reconstructive politics, especially in relation to his vision of the postnational constellation. It also addresses the limitations of an approach to antisemitism which grants key analytical status to a national-postnational dichotomy. The last part of the paper concerns the transmutation of the content of postnational theory: from offering a critical engagement with the legacy of European antisemitism into a standard of judgment that contrasts an idealized image of Europe as a postnational political community with a particularised image of Israel as the incarnation of the defects of nationalism. I argue that this is an uncritical turn. It is not the product of any change in Habermas? own work but of a misappropriation of his theory that nonetheless has roots in what it misappropriates. The paper calls for more attention to be given to the symbolic universe through which antisemitism functions.
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