Sartre as Champion of Ethical Responsibility

• Authors: Schoenherr-Mann H.-M.
• Languages of publication: PL

Abstracts

EN

It is taken for granted that in a pluralistic social structure normative ethics loses its basic authority. As a witness to this moral degradation J.-P. Sartre formulated the concept of general moral responsibility. A quarter of a century after Max Weber who had defined an ethics of responsibility restricted, however, to politically or economically leading persons only, Sartre widened the scope of responsibility to include everyone. Each person, he believed, was responsible for her whole life and the world around her. Today this sounds like a classic modern conception, when compared with the ethics of Hans Jonas and Emmanuel Lévinas. In fact, it is difficult to see a direct contact between the latter two and Sartre's philosophy. But in his interview granted to Benny Lévy 'L'Espoir maintenant' Sartre came close to the position that after the demise of the belief in progress the only hope remaining must centre on ethics. Subsequently he came to believe that he had failed in constructing a credible general ethics. But it is altogether uncertain that in fact he failed. More probably before his death he tended to neglect what he defended in 'L'Etre et le Néant' where he already arrived at a position of ethical responsibility that surpasses all other ethical proposals of the past decades.

Keywords

EN

ETHICS; LEVINAS EMMANUEL; MORAL RESPONSIBILITY; SARTRE

Discipline

• PHILOSOPHY: PHILOSOPHY

• Publisher: Polska Akademia Nauk
• Journal: Przegląd Filozoficzny. Nowa Seria
• Year: 2005
• Volume: 14
• Issue: 4(56)
• Pages: 265-273
• Document type: ARTICLE

Contributors

author

Schoenherr-Mann H.-M.

• H.-M. Schoenherr-Mann, Geschwister-Scholl-Institut fuer Politische Wissenschaft der Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitaet Muenchen, Oettingen Str. 67, 80538 Muenchen Zi 172, Bundesrepublik Deutschland

Identifiers

CEJSH db identifier

06PLAAAA01232809