The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas

The Ethics of Deconstruction, Simon Critchley's first book, was originally published to great acclaim in 1992. The first book to argue for the ethical turn in Derrida's work, it powerfully shows how deconstruction has persuasive ethical consequences that are vital to our thinking through of questions of politics and democracy.

Moving away from using deconstruction to find the contradictions inherent in any text, Critchley concerns himself with the philosophical context the ethical impetus Derrida's ethics to be understood in relation to his engagement with the work of Levinas, and lays out the details of their philosophical confrontation.

New for this edition: A new preface where Critchley reveals the origins, motivations, and reception of The Ethics of Deconstruction, plus three new appendices, which reflect upon and deppend the book's argument.