One is tempted here to use that old Levi-Straussian term ‘symbolic efficiency’: the appearance of égaliberté is a symbolic fiction which, as such, possesses an actual efficiency of its own.
not really sure what it means here tbh
Isn’t one of the topoi of Western liberalism the elevation of the Other as leading a life that is more harmonious, organic, less competitive, and aiming at cooperation rather than domination?
‘Postcolonial’ critics like to emphasise the insensitivity of liberalism to its own limitation: in defending human rights, it tends to impose its own version of them onto others. However, the self-reflexive sensitivity to one’s own limitation can only emerge against the background of the notions of…
[...] Liberalism itself thus privileges a certain culture: the modern Western one. As to freedom of choice, liberalism is also marked by a strong bias. It is intolerant when individuals of other cultures are not given freedom of choice – as is evident in issues such as clitoridectomy, child bridesh…
The basic opposition on which the entire liberal vision relies is that between those who are ruled by culture, totally determined by the lifeworld into which they are born, and those who merely ‘enjoy’ their culture, who are elevated above it, free to choose it. This brings us to the next paradox: …
