De-Europeanization of Europe

Excerpt from Yuk Hui's book "Post-Europe"

They have been saying for a long time that Europe is going through a crisis, and for just as long they have been proposing various ways to help overcome this crisis. Another attempt is made by the Hong Kong philosopher Yuk Hui, who believes that we need to move “not by neutralizing differences, but through individuation aimed at overcoming the oppositions between logos and technē, East and West, home and homelessness.” We publish an excerpt from his new book.

All of us, since February 24, 2022, have found ourselves in the face of advancing barbarism, violence and lies. In this situation, it is extremely important to preserve at least the remnants of culture and support the values ​​of humanism - including for the sake of the future of Russia. Therefore, the editors of Gorky will continue to talk about books, reminding our readers that there is still a place for thought and fiction in the world.

Yuk Hui. Post-Europe. M.; Vladivostok: Hell Marginem Press, 2025. Translation from English by Denis Shalaginov. Content

It can be argued that Europe still exists as a political entity in the form of the European Union, but today it is fragmented at a fundamental level. This can be seen in the differences between member countries of the European Union, as well as in the differences between countries already in the EU and those not yet integrated into it or planning to leave. Eastern European countries distinguish themselves from Western European countries and sometimes view themselves as subjects of post-colonialism: in the eyes of non-Europeans, the countries of Eastern Europe are part of the colonial force, while these countries themselves perceive themselves as victims of Western European colonization. Therefore, any statement about European philosophy must first of all recognize the plurality and irreducibility of the various ways of thinking that exist within it. There were ancient Greek, German, French, British philosophies, but they were all manifestations of the European spirit. That is why Valery, Husserl and Patocka could talk about the crisis of the European spirit and about Europe as an Idea. According to Stiegler, French philosophy is an accident in the spiritual life of Europe, since it represents the appropriation of something non-French, namely German philosophy: Kant, Hegel, Nietzsche, Heidegger, etc. However, what makes French philosophy necessary (for all its accident) to the history of philosophy is its ability (especially in the school of Derrida) to clarify the role of technology in the European spirit.

If the essence of French philosophy is not that it is nationalistic, the reason is that, compared with its German predecessor, it succeeded in advancing the European spirit further than its contemporaries. It represents the singularity of the development of European philosophy, and this singularity arises in the process of individuation. However, French philosophy may well turn into nationalist if it fails to individuate itself in the future. In other words, she can turn into a defender of Frenchness, which exists only as a simple national identity.

Thus, if European philosophy is to have a future—if Europe, according to Stiegler's diagnosis, is to remain philosophical—it will have to take advantage of the technological accident of its globalization. Immediately after the passage quoted in the epigraph to this chapter, Stiegler continues:

“In short, Europe is called to become global (exist on a global scale) with its own philosophy, which is only possible by “de-Europeanizing” itself - otherwise it will perish. There will be no place for her in this world to come; it will, in other words, lose its future if it fails to transform its philosophy into something global and thereby impart to thought an internally contingent character—and, moreover, an internally non-European character to Europe and its future.”

But hasn't European philosophy already become global? What does Stiegler mean when he talks about the transformation of philosophy into something global? And where should a philosopher living in a globalized world look for his Heimat?

If there is an underlying anti-Eurocentrism in Stiegler's thinking, it may be worth defending it as follows: Stiegler does not pretend to bring philosophy home, because Heimat is nothing more than an accident. However, there is a process that made this random event necessary, the name of this process is the history of Western philosophy. Now, having recognized the accident of its origin, Europe will have to step back from the Heimat illusion and raise the question of de-Europeanization. But what exactly will this mean? Will this mean becoming a heimatlos? In other words, would it mean becoming different, like an Asian or an African?

The above quotation ends with a reference to Marc Crépon's book Alterités de l'Europe (2006) without further comment. Just as Derrida in L'autre Cap (1991) calls any homogeneous genealogy (of Europe) a mystification, in Alterités de l'Europe Crépon proposes to look at Europe from the perspective of otherness, that is, to stop seeing Europe as a history that smoothly passes from Greece to the Roman Empire and then to Christianity. This position is both a criticism of Valéry and a polemic with him, since when asked who the Europeans are, he answered: “I would consider as Europeans all those peoples who in the course of history have been subject to three influences,” namely Roman, Greek and Christian. On the contrary, according to Crepon, within Europe itself there is a certain otherness, which it tries in every possible way to deny; an otherness inseparable from Greece, Troy, Anatolia, etc. These non-European elements of Europe must be recognized - or realized - as a condition of de-Europeanization. This becoming-conscious, or awareness (prise de conscience), must be considered not only as recognition, but also as what we will call below the condition of individuation of thinking.

In a chapter entitled "Alterités de l'Europe" (as well as the book), Crépon turns to Jan Patočka's reflections on Europe and emphasizes the threat of nationalism and totalitarianism, which can be seen as something intrinsic to Europe, as well as the threat of Eurocentrism, which insists on the universal character of European rationality and exports it to non-European countries. This universal rationality, as Crepon argues, is a one-dimensional and linear universality, which became the source of the crisis of the European spirit.

Although there are similarities in Stiegler's and Patočka's interpretations of the crisis of the European spirit, they differ radically in their understanding of the role that technology plays in the spiritual life of Europe. At one point, Patočka wonders whether techno-civilization is leading to decline. He then spends a whole chapter of his Heretical Essays (1975) trying to prove that this is indeed the case, although in the end his conclusions can be described as ambiguous and indecisive. Indeed, as we will see below, Patočka's understanding of technology oscillates between Husserl's critique of European science and Heidegger's critique of Gestell. In Heretical Essays, Patočka, although he admits that technocivilization “makes possible what no civilization before it could provide: a life without violence and with far-reaching equality of opportunity,” and admits that the very question of whether technocivilization is decadent may not be posed entirely correctly, Patočka sees in the emergence of modern science and technology a turning point in the history of the decline of the European mind:

“The greatest turning point in Western European life seems to have been the 16th century. From now on, in contrast to the theme of caring for the soul, a new theme comes forward, which subjugates politics, economics, faith and science and transforms them in accordance with the new style. It is not at all a concern for the soul, not a concern for being, but a concern for having, a concern for the external world and mastering it, becomes dominant.”

Patocka returns to the ancient Greek "care of the soul" as a fundamental issue in European philosophy. He argues that there are two different ways (Gestalten) of caring for the soul: one (Democritus) seeks the totality of knowledge, the other (Socrates and Plato) strives for the highest development of the soul. The first image - namely, atomism - gives rise to a universal science, whose goal is to overcome the delusion of the soul by seeking the truth of things, and the second image creates the doctrine of the inner life, or philosophy. Philosophy deals with the question of how to live, and knowing how to live is tantamount to knowing how to “take care of the soul.” Post-Europe, according to Patocka, requires a return to this foundation of philosophy, which was obscured and lost in the course of technoscientific modernization.

For Patočka, post-Europe primarily means Europe's loss of status as a world power after World War II; this Verlust requires reflection both on the future of Europe and on overcoming the decline of its techno-civilization. However, this statement is quite ambiguous, since it can be seen as Eurocentric as well as anti-Eurocentric. It may be anti-Eurocentric because it implies the loss of Europe’s status as the center of the world, and Eurocentric because, according to Patočka, “there is no history other than European.” On the other hand, as a student and connoisseur of Husserl, Patocka also absorbs Husserl’s critique of scientific rationality: post-Europe is a state in which the lifeworld is increasingly reduced to objectivity and calculation. The care of the soul emerges as a candidate for the main motive of post-European philosophy, as Crépon summarizes:

“Caring for the soul does not imply any value system that refers to authorities or institutions, whatever they may be. On the contrary, if Patocka, in his reflections on the European heritage, really seeks a “unifying formative activity” that is not reducible to the dominance of Europe in the past, then caring for the soul meets all the criteria necessary for it.

The later Stigler might have agreed with the importance of care, since for him the question of panser (what Dan Ross translates as “care”) is of paramount importance, but care for him is unthinkable without technology. Patočka understands that modern globalized technology represents an exclusive reduction to what Kant calls understanding (Verstand)—as opposed to self-reflective reason (sich verstehende Vernunft). This critique of technology echoes Stiegler's critique of modern digital technologies, since the latter have analytical powers but should not be confused with reason in the Kantian sense.

In other words, for both Patočka and Stiegler, post-European philosophy must take technology seriously and understand it in a thorough manner. However, there are fundamental differences between their two positions that can be traced back to two insightful readings of Heidegger. Patočka's two key texts on technology are represented by a lecture given in September 1973 entitled "The Dangers of Technization in Science according to E. Husserl and the Essence of Technology as a Danger according to M. Heidegger" (also known as the Varna Lecture), and the subsequent seminar in Prague in October 1973. In his lecture, Patocka compares Husserl's and Heidegger's thoughts on technology and favors Heidegger's “more radical” approach. Patočka understands Heidegger's diagnosis of Gestell as a way of comprehending being that excludes others, but sees in art the possibility of access to truth that is different from Gestell: a different configuration of existence and the possibility of unconcealment of being. This reflection on art, which Heidegger himself directly addressed in “The Source of Artistic Creation” (1935/1936) and “The Question of Technology” (1949/1953), is considered by Patočka as das Rettende - the “saving” of which Hölderlin spoke. However, neither art nor philosophical reflection are capable of achieving a sufficiently deep transformation. The primary thing for Patočka is a return to the soul and to the classics, where the soul is the condition of the possibility of philosophy itself, of truth. Philosophy, unlike art, does not require complete involvement, as in dance, but rather requires distance: “a distance that indicates that everything is a mystery. It is from this mystery that the question “what is this?” arises, the meaning of which will become the subject of philosophical reflection.” The negativity of modern technology requires a distance, which Patocka calls sacrifice. The saving grace lies in resisting the temptation of technological totalization for the sake of clarifying the basis for the phenomenon.

“Can we, however, understand this great revolution, which historically manifests itself in the willingness of so many to sacrifice themselves for another, better world, simply as the will to settle within the framework of the manageable, within the framework of our power and calculation? <...> Sacrifice means precisely the removal from reality of that which can be controlled and ordered, and a clarifying attitude towards that which, not being anything active, serves as the basis for the appearance of everything active and in this sense rules everything.”

This may be reminiscent of what is today called "anti-growth", despite the fact that the theory of anti-growth does not address the question of being. Nevertheless, we can say that through sacrifice a new relationship between man and technology will appear.

On the other hand, according to Stigler, the “saving”, oddly enough, can be found in technology itself. Stiegler's gesture is "tragic" in the sense that it aims to overcome Gestell through technology - just as Nietzsche wanted to overcome nihilism through nihilism - and art is the appropriation of technology by turning it into something unusual. Thus, Stiegler agrees to some extent with Patočka in his appreciation of art and that the unusual can be found in a work of art; but he does not agree that a return to the soul or to art alone will be the solution to the problem. According to Stiegler, the main question of philosophy is not the soul, but technology, since the soul itself is technoesis, because to the extent that noesis is possible, it depends on memory as a condition of thought. If das Rettende really exists, then, paradoxically, we should look for it in technology.

In other words, technology is the central issue of post-European philosophy. Post-European philosophy will not be sustainable unless it recognizes the question of technology as its source and its future. Heidegger was clear on this point, since technology occupies a central place in his philosophy, and this line is even more clearly traced in Stiegler’s thinking, while for Patočka the care of the soul is something that “in its very essence is not technological […] not simply instrumental.” And this remains a blind spot in Patočka's thinking about post-Europe, as well as in his assessment of technology. As mentioned above, the difference between Stiegler and Patočka lies in their proposed concepts of the future of Europe and its relationship to technology. This fundamental difference can be analyzed by returning to the elementary question of geometry. In Plato and Europe, Patocka pointed out that geometric elements such as a straight line or a circle, defined as something without width, do not exist in the world. Patocka found the answer in a special place of mathematics in the anatomy of the soul:

“In mathematics there are numbers, lines, planes, polyhedral bodies. There are four geometric spatial representations in total. But these four spatial representations, taken vertically, at the same time form a hierarchical model of existence: below is the material world, then the mathematical one, acting as an intermediary between the material world and what is above, and, finally, the archetypes of the connection between the unknown and the unit - the idea. The mathematical is inextricably linked with ideas, and this mathematical is at the same time the soul.”

Mathematical, or number, is an intermediary between the world of things and the world of ideas. However, according to Stigler, phenomenology was never able to resolve the question of the ideal nature of a point, line or circle: phenomenology for the most part remains at the level of ideation, but does not reach idealization. Starting from the example set out in Plato's Meno with a young slave who is able to draw in the sand, thereby solving a geometric problem, Stiegler argues that idealization always requires a technical addition - a means of anamnesis. A point, by definition, has no dimension. However, we have never encountered this in practice, nor have we seen a straight line that has only one dimension. A point and a straight line can only be conceived through something other than their definitions - for example, when a young slave draws a straight line in the sand, this is already a two-dimensional plane. Patocka also noted that by “drawing a geometric figure on the sand,” Democritus was able to move from the visible to the invisible, however, despite this, Patocka ignored the question of technology and immediately moved on to caring for the soul. We might say that Patocka remains the Husserlian par excellence in both his diagnosis of the problem of Europe and his response to it, while Stiegler views phenomenology and Europe through the lens of a Derridean deconstruction of Husserl's Elements of Geometry. Our task, however, is not to deconstruct Patočka, but rather to understand what is at stake in the concept of post-Europe.

Stiegler believes that techno-logos is European par excellence and invites Europe to discover a new opportunity in the process of globalization. Однако, когда речь заходит о европейском духе, его превосходстве и доминировании, возникает риск сознательно или бессознательно скатиться в европоцентризм. Остается вопрос: какую роль в становлении европейского духа играют неевропейские культуры? «Европейское» по сути своей техно-логично (techno-logos) и философично в том смысле, что оно возникает из необходимого недостатка, восполняемого (компенсируемого) технологией, и способности мыслить технологию одновременно как возможность и необходимость развития разума. Если считать, что неевропейцы пребывают за пределами разума, как говорил Гегель о Сибири в своих «Лекциях по философии истории», то неевропейцы, даже обладая некоей «домодерной» технологией, не могут быть частью европейского духа, поскольку не играют никакой роли в истории Духа. Пост-Европа в понимании Паточки рискует оказаться сценарием, в котором Другой — лишь свой Другой, а не абсолютный Другой; как в гегелевской диалектике, этот Другой будет затем признан своим Другим и в конце концов снят. Эту двусмысленность можно обнаружить и в мышлении Стиглера.

В таких прочтениях есть риск принять мировую проблему за европейскую, и в этом случае пост-Европа будет просто означать потерю Европой контроля над этим миром. Слепое пятно тут состоит в том, что, покуда технологическая глобализация продолжается, она также расширяет европейский дух, поскольку сам техно-логос является европейским. То же слепое пятно мы видим в статье Генри Киссинджера 2018 года «Как завершается эпоха Просвещения», где Киссинджер утверждает, что Просвещение распространяло свою философию при помощи технологии и что теперь, с началом глобальной конкуренции в области ИИ, Просвещение подошло к концу и необходима новая философия. Киссинджер не понимает, что в идею современной техники встроены эпистемологические и онтологические допущения, неотделимые от европейского духа; однако он отчетливо осознает, что в эпоху, наследующую проекту Просвещения, Запад нуждается в новой философии техники. Возможно, попытка Хайдеггера определить смысл конца философии в статье 1964 года «Конец философии и задача мышления» была наиболее четкой. В этой работе Хайдеггер предполагает, что «конец философии», во-первых, означает ее реализацию или завершение в кибернетике, то есть в наиболее полно актуализированном принципе Gestell, согласно которому все понимается как петли обратной связи. Во-вторых, конец философии носит не только онтологический, но и геополитический характер: он означает, по словам самого Хайдеггера, «начало основывающейся в западноевропейском мышлении мировой цивилизации». Этот смысл конца философии часто упускается из виду интерпретаторами Хайдеггера. Вездесущность и всемогущество европейской техники — факт, который непросто отвергнуть; вопрос, который еще только предстоит решить, состоит в том, куда направится эта мировая цивилизация и куда она сможет прийти. С точки зрения Паточки, пост-Европу можно увидеть в доминирующем положении Соединенных Штатов и американской культуры, то есть в образе Европы, потерянной в собственном планетаризме, — в то время как я, соглашаясь с Хайдеггером, предлагаю рассматривать планетаризацию не как конец Европы, а как начало ее проекта планетаризации.

В документальном фильме «Истер» Стиглер смело утверждает, что даже японская техника — греческая по своему происхождению: «Все прошлое — греческое. Даже для японца, потому что техника — греческая». Это замечание является любопытным, если не откровенным, выражением европоцентризма. Учитывая исторические и археологические данные, Стиглер не мог не быть осведомленным о том, что греческая технология пришла в основном с Ближнего Востока, а Япония по большей части была не известна европейцам до XVI века. Почему же тогда он говорит, что все прошлое — греческое, даже для японца? Разве у Японии нет прошлого, разве у нее не было техники? В отсутствие Стиглера над этой загадкой можно лишь поразмышлять, но не разрешить ее. Возможно, он считал, что в угоду европейской технике Япония отказалась от собственной или пошатнула ее основы. В таком случае Япония — нечто европейское или японское? Стала ли Япония европейской благодаря тому, что апроприировала европейскую технику? Или дезориентировалась в этом процессе и теперь не принадлежит ни Востоку, ни Западу? А ведь Япония действительно хотела стать частью Европы. Однако в ходе колонизации и глобализации Европа уже вышла за рамки простого географического понятия и распространилась повсюду. Сегодня не только Япония, но и практически все страны Азии и Латинской Америки становятся Европой. Но вопрос о том, насколько для неевропейских стран желанно такое европейское будущее, широко обсуждался в XX веке и продолжает быть предметом обсуждения в XXI веке.

C Японией Стиглер был в некоторой степени связан благодаря Исиде Хидэтаке, и, подобно большинству французских философов, он был очарован японской эстетикой. В Китае он впервые побывал в 2008 году, но более глубокое знакомство с ним началось лишь с 2015 года. Поскольку Китай для Стиглера ассоциировался прежде всего с марксизмом, изначально он не проявлял особого интереса к китайской мысли. В то же время, приезжая в Китай, он много работал. В ходе месячного пребывания в стране он возил с собой два больших чемодана с книгами и все время работал в своей квартире или в гостиничных номерах. Лишь значительно позже Стиглер стал более открытым к китайской мысли и именно в эти поздние годы его жизни наши беседы стали более продуктивными. Весной 2019 года он рассказал мне, что читает «Дао дэ цзин», и попросил порекомендовать синологов, занимающихся этим текстом. Правда, все это случилось слишком поздно и сопровождалось спешкой, поэтому он не успел возвести свою случайную встречу с Китаем и пять лет преподавания в степень чего-либо необходимого. Два последних года его жизни мы провели в долгих беседах о технической тенденции и техническом факте — понятиях, предложенных палеонтологом и антропологом Андре Леруа-Гураном. Однако нам так и не удалось отыскать вескую причину для спора.