French philosopher and Talmudic commentator Emmanuel Levinas (1906–1995) has received considerable attention for his influence on philosophical and religious thought. In this book, Victoria Tahmasebi-Birgani provides the first examination of the applicability of Emmanuel Levinas’ work to social and political movements. Investigating his ethics of responsibility and his critique of the Western liberal imagination, Tahmasebi-Birgani advances the moral, political, and philosophical debates on the radical implications of Levinas’ work.
Emmanuel Levinas and the Politics of Non-Violence is the first book to closely consider the affinity between Levinas’ ethical vision and Mohandas Gandhi’s radical yet non-violent political struggle. Situating Levinas’ insights within a transnational, transcontinental, and global framework, Tahmasebi-Birgani highlights Levinas’ continued relevance in an age in which violence is so often resorted to in the name of “justice” and “freedom.”
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Review
“ Emmanuel Levinas and the Politics of Non-Violence is valuable in that it adds to a still limited amount of published work that tackles head on one of the greatest problems in Levinasian studies: the relation of face-to-face ethics to politics. The author develops an original argument that links Levinas’ concept of man’s ‘substitution’ and gratuitously infinite responsibility for his neighbour’s suffering to a politics of ‘justice’ via the idea of ‘non-violent ethico-political praxis.’”
(Marinos Diamantides, School of Law, Birkbeck, University of London)
About the Author
Victoria Tahmasebi-Birgani is a Women and Gender Studies Assistant Professor in the Department of Historical Studies at the University of Toronto, Mississauga.

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Tahmasebi-Birgani, Victoria

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1, 2014

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Cover 1
Contents 8
Acknowledgments 10
List of Abbreviations 12
Introduction 16
Ethical Subject and Political Praxis: A Theoretical Background 18
1 Levinas’ Ethicopolitics: Beyond the Western Liberal Tradition 27
(i) Levinas and the Political: General Discussion 27
(ii) An Alternative Reading of Ethics and Politics in Levinas 37
(iii) The Problem of the Third and Justice in Levinas 40
The Third and Justice: Two Conceptions of Justice in Levinas 44
Me, the Other, the Third, and (In)Justice: Ethical Justice and Liberatory Political Praxis 48
(iv) Levinas and Liberalism 54
Levinas and the Liberal Conception of the Individual 55
Levinas and the Liberal Peace 56
Levinas and the Liberal Economic Arrangement 61
Conclusion 64
2 Radical Passivity, the Face, and the Social Demand for Justice 66
(i) Oneself: Subject as Radical Passivity of the Sensible 67
Maternity as a Praxis Grounded in Radical Passivity 76
(ii) The Irreducible Other: The Face as a Social Demand for Justice 80
(iii) Self and the Other 85
Peace with the Other as Being Responsible for the Other’s Suffering and Death 88
Conclusion 92
3 Substituting Praxis and Political Liberation 94
(i) Substitution in Radical Passivity 94
(ii) Substituting Praxis as a Liberatory Struggle 96
(iii) The Contours of Substituting Praxis 105
Substituting Praxis: Liberation in Pre-Intentional Proximity 105
Substituting Praxis: Liberation and Freedom 107
Substituting Praxis: Liberation and the Spirit of Sincerity and Youth 111
Substituting Praxis: Liberation and Non-Violence – The Third as Persecutor 118
Conclusion 125
4 Levinas and Gandhi: Liberatory Praxis as Fear for the Other 128
(i) Levinas and Gandhi: Can There Be a Dialogue? 128
(ii) Parallels between Levinas and Gandhi 130
Subject in Levinas and Gandhi 130
Gandhian Selfless Service and Levinasian Irreplaceable Responsibility 133
(iii) Entry into Non-Violence through Eschatology 136
(iv) Gandhi: Non-Violent Revolt and Eschatological Peace 139
(v) Levinas: The Event of Speech and Eschatological Peace 144
Ethical Love as the Principle of the Social and the Political 145
Political Opponent as Interlocutor 149
(vi) Gandhi: Political Enemy as Interlocutor: Peaceful Struggle as Speech 151
(vii) Liberation as Substitution: Fearing for the Other Instead of Fearing from the Other 156
Conclusion 164
Conclusion 170
Notes 176
Bibliography 192
Index 200

<p>French philosopher and Talmudic commentator Emmanuel Levinas (1906&ndash;1995) has received considerable attention for his influence on philosophical and religious thought. In this book, Victoria Tahmasebi-Birgani provides the first examination of the applicability of Emmanuel Levinas&rsquo; work to social and political movements. Investigating his ethics of responsibility and his critique of the Western liberal imagination, Tahmasebi-Birgani advances the moral, political, and philosophical debates on the radical implications of Levinas&rsquo; work.</p><p><em>Emmanuel Levinas and the Politics of Non-Violence</em> is the first book to closely consider the affinity between Levinas&rsquo; ethical vision and Mohandas Gandhi&rsquo;s radical yet non-violent political struggle. Situating Levinas&rsquo; insights within a transnational, transcontinental, and global framework, Tahmasebi-Birgani highlights Levinas&rsquo; continued relevance in an age in which violence is so often resorted to in the name of &ldquo;justice&rdquo; and &ldquo;freedom.&rdquo;</p>

2025-10-27