AGONISTIC DEMOCRACY AS OPPOSED TO POLITICAL NARCISSISM: AGAINST HATRED AS A WAY OF DOING POLITICS

Abstract

Objective: This article aims to: 1) point out how self-centeredness and selfishness are a fundamental culture that makes democratic politics unfeasible and, ultimately, corroborates hatred as a way of doing politics; and 2) to indicate agonistic democracy, as proposed by Chantal Mouffe, from a debate with Carl Schmitt, as a way of making politics more in line with pluralism and, therefore, with the assent of otherness as constitutive of political making itself.

Methodology: To achieve the proposed objectives, the article is based on the hypothetical-deductive method, through bibliographic research in texts dealing with the theme.

Results: Individuality and pluralism are central features of the modern world. However, the excessive assertion of individuality has produced situations in which an attempt is made to supplant pluralism in the name of sectarianism. A background culture of ego reinforcement seems to fall into many moments towards a strong egocentricity and a brutal individualism. In the political aspect, this institutes practices allergic to otherness that go beyond the commitment to democracy, opening space for hatred as a way of doing politics. In opposition to this perspective, the article indicates the agonistic model of democracy, as supported by Chantal Mouffe. In dialogue with Carl Schmitt, Mouffe argues that democratic politics is a field of inevitable conflict, however this conflict must not take the form of an antagonism where the one who thinks differently is taken as an enemy to be destroyed. Instead of antagonism, it proposes agonism, which means a permanent democratic struggle, but in conditions in which the other is not seen as an enemy, but as an adversary.