EMMANUEL LEVINAS’ CONCEPT OF INTERSUBJECTIVITY AS INFINITE RESPONSIBILITY

ABSTRACT: Inter-subjectivity as such is at the core of what makes us human. However, this exclusive human potential can either be positive or negative. It is negative when it becomes a tool for the preservation of the “Same” or the “Totality” and the alienation of the “Other”. This alienation has led to stigmatization, isolation, injustices and violence against those perceived to be outside the “in-group. Among the many theories of inter-subjectivity that have been espoused by different thinkers, Levinas’ theory of inter-subjectivity stands out as the only theory that reclaims the “Other” from the maze of totalizing systems that have no regard to the alterity and dignity of the “Other”. Indeed, Levinas’ ethical phenomenology is a sort of Copernican revolution as far as ontology is concerned in the sense that he gives primacy to “Other” over the “totality” and demands infinite responsibility for the former.