The Thematic of War and Peace, Love and Hate: An Introduction

GLOBAL CONVERSATIONS: An International Journal in Contemporary Philosophy and Culture
Volume V, Number 01 (2022): 07-09

Editorial
The Thematic Perspective of War and Peace, Love and Hate, andthe Current Entries: An Introduction
In times of war we naturally long for peace, but we often ignore the extent to which humanity’s
overall state depends on the prevalence of love or hate among its ranks. Mother Teresa isreputed to have said saying that “works of love are works of peace.” Regrettably, in our time,with the heaviest military combat in Europe since the World War Two, this statement comes tosuggest that we have given in too much to love’s opposite; that is, hate. For all who care, now
the question that looms is How can we retain love while keeping hate at bay to secure peace
and prosperity for humanity today and in the future? As love and hate take many forms and thesame is true for war and peace, the rationale appears to be that, if we are able to account forthem and their interrelations sufficiently, we might be able to come up with a reliable
perspective on both the chances of peace against war and the future of humanity. Whilerealizing that this will be an open and ever incomplete task, and thus far from accomplishable
in a research volume, we still believe that continuing to work on this through multiple
investigative perspectives is worthwhile regardless of any possible setbacks.
The majority of critical theorists today will likely agree that a due apperception of theinterrelations of war and peace, love and hate inevitably goes through a certain perspective on
what in the philosophical and socio-political thought of the last century came to be known as
the Other. Taken always in its relation to the self as a reflecting and knowing capacity, the Other
has been construed in the perspective of the self in various ways. In ethics, socio-politicalresearch, and literary criticism, such constructions have placed the Other in the range between
friend and enemy, neighbor and stranger, guest and intruder, lover and hater, peacemaker andwarmonger, amongst others. This however has not always contributed, and certainly not yetachieved, the vindication of love and peace around the globe, as much as has been wished.
Indeed, a critical perspective on the relation between the self and the Other suggests that it is
the antagonistic construction of the Other that fails the self in its aspirations to a meaningful
approach to co-existence and thus to all that helps achieve the desired world of love and peace.
It must, therefore, be acknowledged that much in the construction of the Other depends
on the self itself and its capacity to open itself for the otherness of the Other. Thus, those who
genuinely work for the promotion of peace and love around the globe would generally find it
wise to also both know better and work timely on themselves and their ability to welcome,appreciate, and be ready for the Other. What this amounts to on individual and communal levels,in addition to self-knowledge and self-betterment, is adopting a concernful ethics anddemocratic politics, respectively. This means eschewing extremism in all its forms (includingwar and hate) on behalf of a due inclusion of all that may appear as ‘Other’ to serve theGLOBAL CONVERSATIONS

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objectives of a humane and productive co-existence (including peace and love). And to those
who would demand specifics on what could be possibly meant by ‘the Other’, we can just saythat it includes all other individuals, communities, societies, and cultures (regardless of race,gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, social status, religion, ability, age, etc. among their ranks),
as well as nature, environment, and the planet as a whole.
This thematic issue cover topics in philosophy, socio-political theory, literary criticism,aesthetics, as well as transcultural studies, and includes original articles and a translation.
Articles focus directly on the theme of “War and Peace, Love and Hate,” which they address ina markedly objectivist perspective; whereas the translation with notes draws attention to a
poetic philosophy which addresses the theme on an individual personal or subjective level.
Alexandra Preitschopf discusses aspects of anti-communism in Pyotr Krasnov’s novel
Endless Hate (Nenavist), which was published in France and Germany in the 1930s. Krasnov,a White Russian émigré, who fought the Red Army commanding Cossack military forces before
moving to Western Europe in 1919, devoted his life and works in the interwar period to stirring
anti-communist and anti-Bolshevik sentiment – portraying the life and politics in the Soviet
Union exclusively in dark terms while glorifying the “old Russian virtues” and achievements.
As he became a fascist and Nazi supporter in the process, Preitschopf is interested most of allin throwing light on the possibility for the instrumentalization of emigrant literature forpurposes of anti-communist and far right propaganda which utilizes hate in various directions,
including anti-democratic, racist, and anti-Semitic, amongst others.
Drawing on the thought of Søren Kierkegaard, Jacques Lacan, and Watsuji Tetsurō,
Thomas Diesner endeavors to assemble a common perspective for apperception of what he sees
as a special relation of aggressivity, anxiety, and the third. He links aggressive actions, as well
as a number of problems of social, political, and therapeutic nature, to a bipolar structure, inwhich anxiety grows due to a lack of mediation between its two poles. Diesner maintains thatsuch problems can be resolved by securing in the relational structure a place for a mediating
third party, whose role essentially consists in keeping that structure open to and preserving
difference, and whose aspects he identifies in the perspectives of these three thinkers, despiteother their differences.
In a time of resurgence of populist and far right ideologies, David Casciola’s article
focuses on the capacity of art to disrupt the political project of fascism. The author utilizes
viewpoints of Umberto Eco and Sven Reichardt to identify as key and essential feature offascism its synthetico-paradoxical character – its ability to accommodate within its aesthetic
and political perspectives contradictory elements and positions without being disrupted by thatas a whole. Whereas this peculiar resilience of fascism has posed a challenge to its critics andopponents, Casciola finds elements of support in the works of Jacques Rancière and Walter
Benjamin, amongst others, to assemble a perspective on art that maintains its capacity forpolitical disruption – in (what appears to be) a postmodernist fashion – by challenging the senseof self-recognition of the particular individual.
Yasemin Karaağaç discusses Kamila Shamsie’s novel Home Fire which presents uswith challenges faced by two Pakistani British families finding themselves in different social
situations in modern day Great Britain but with nonetheless intertwined lives. As members ofone of the families appear to have strong links to jihadist movements, whereas a member of theGLOBAL CONVERSATIONS

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other holds a key governmental office with special responsibilities in what came to be known
as West’s war on terror, complex and tumultuous relationships between different characters
involving also a conflict between politics and feelings of love and hate come to a tragic end.
Karaağaç convincingly traces a parallel between Shamsie’s novel and Sophocles’ tragedy
Antigone, representing the dramatic tension between state law and personal feelings within
Giorgio Agamben’s perspective on sovereign power and state of exception.
Catherine MacMillan discusses J. M. Coetzee’s novel Life and Times of Michael K withthe aim of identifying the sense of Roberto Esposito’s concepts of community, immunity, andthe impersonal within the events and relationships presented in the plot. Coetzee portrays theeponymous character as dwelling in a partially democratized South Africa which however isstill ruled by the white minority in a way that at the bottom remains racialized anddiscriminatory, and at some point pushes the fate of the black majority protagonist into a prison
camp. Drawing most of all on the thought of Esposito, but also of Gilles Deleuze & Felix
Guattari and Giorgio Agamben amongst others, MacMillan insightfully juxtaposes the concepts
in her focus with elements of Coetzee’s narrative to advance a vision of community of tolerance
and diversity without exclusion.
In continuation with our previous issue, we end up with another selection from the songsof Lalon Fakir, the unique Bengali poet-philosopher from the 19th century, again translated andwith notes by Sayed Muddashir Hossain. Lalon’s verse is highly metaphorical, philosophic, andinsightful, whereas the songs selected here dwell most of all on the topic of the self or soul,
which has had a long and vital presence in the cultural tradition of the Indian subcontinent.
Hossain’s notes prove informative and helpful for the uninitiated reader to enter and appreciate
the moral-philosophical world of this poetic thinker.
We hope you find in these texts something valuable for yourself. Thank you for yourtime and enjoy!

Rossen Roussev

GLOBAL CONVERSATIONS

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