___________________________________ ___________________________________

The Ethical Meaning of Money in the Thought of Emmanuel Levinas1

Roger Burggraeve

In the view of the Franco-Jewish philosopherEmmanuel Levinas money has a multitude ofanthropological and ethical meanings, not exclud-ing contradictions2. For money functions on dif-ferent levels, namely on that of the I and theeffort of its being, that of the relation with theother and that of the ‘third’, that is to say on thesocio-economical and judicial level.

The Economy of Self-interest and Money

To begin with, money functions on the level ofthe ‘natural’ I in its spontaneous dynamic ofexistence as self-interested attempt to be (conatusessendi). As a finite and needy creature, man notonly persists in his attempts to keep a tight holdon his being, but also draws the other to himselfas a function and means for realizing his ownproject of existence, of which the own ‘self’ issubject (source) as well as object (aim). He standsinexorably for himself (responsibility in the firstperson). Here responsibility becomes a synonymof freedom, that is to say as free self-develop-ment and self-unfolding which, so far as possible,tries to overcome each form of constraint andalienation, namely by disengaging itself fromevery form of totalizing participation, and that atthe same time develops its own possibilities asmuch as it can in function of itself as ‘ideal’.

This autonomy-based and directed responsibil-ity includes an extension to and a making usefulof its surrounding world, precisely in so far asman is a needy being who can not find in himselfevery source for his ‘enduring in his being.’ Hisfullness as independent event is not fullnessalone, but also finitude and lack. His ‘natural’existence then also executes itself as ‘economy’in the broad sense of the word, namely as reshap-ing of the world into nourishment, dwelling andmeans to ‘be’ and ‘to be ever better’. In this

sense, economy always implies a self-interestedconnection between man and world.

In this economy of self-interest money playsan eminent role, for it makes it possible to obtainthe goods for the satisfaction of our needs andextension of our identity. Notice that nothing hasyet been said about the specific status of money,namely its social ground structure, about whichmore will be said further. In the till now stillsimple (in fact, simplistic) explanation of moneyas a means (like other means) to the self-unfold-ing of an I which is already structurally autono-mous and dynamically striving toward autonomyin the world, this social status is supposed. For‘to obtain’ supposes not only a direct grasp and aself-appropriation of the world, but also the medi-ation of others from whom I, thanks to money,buy goods.

However, in our healthy drive toward self-unfolding we meet not only with the world, butalso with other people. We need others, too, forour happiness. We therefore spontaneously extendour economic situation over against the world tothe interhuman plane and we make the othersubservient to our effort at being. It is frequentlyto this end that the riches and power that we haveassembled around ourselves is instated. Above all,money can be used, or rather misused to bringthe other to us, to manipulate, intimidate and buyhim, in short to subdue him -without directlyevoking the impression of brutal tyranny or slav-ery. In its extreme form, this lust for power runsall the way to a denial of the other, of whichmurder is only the physical incarnation.

The Economy of Giving and Money

According to Levinas, it is this very possibility ofmurder, that is to say this ethical evil, that consti-tutes the kernel of ethical experience. Confronted

________________________________________________________________________________________

Ethical Perspectives 2 (1995)1, p. 11

___________________________________ ___________________________________

with the other, I come to the realization that my‘healthy’ self-interest, which I must unfold inorder to live (and to live well), at the same timecontains a fundamental threat to the other. I expe-rience my self-interest as ‘temptation to murder’,to reduce the other to myself. For Levinas, this isalso the kernel of the racism which admits to the‘Same’ and everything which is reducible to the‘proper,’ and therefore precisely rejects the‘other’ or the ‘strange’ and tries to destroy it.

In the ‘attraction to violence’, however, Irealize that what can be the case in fact, in princi-ple may not. Through the appearance of the na-ked and vulnerable other I feel myself shockedand placed in question as to my self-sufficiencyand the endurance of my being. This is the kernelof the experience of the other as ‘face’, or as thecommand ‘You shall not kill’ (to be understoodas the ‘wordless word’ that calls upon me as anunconditional categorical imperative). Hence is itevident that man is irreducible to the self-interest-ed dynamic of his existence. He is more than hisown effort at being, or better he is ‘otherwisethan being’ (autrement qu’être), since he is ‘sen-sible’ to what overflows that effort and places itin question. This ‘being-by-and-for-the-other’ wemust designate as the absolute novelty of man onearth, as “le miracle de l’humain”, according toLevinas’ striking formulation.

“You shall not kill” means that we are respon-sible for the other, not on the grounds of our ownpreference or choice, but because the other by thenudity of his face has a right to our attention andmercy (responsibility in the second person).When we stand eye-to-eye with the other, it isour calling (the categorical imperative understoodas ‘appèl’) not to leave the other to his fate. This‘aid’ can come only in a concrete worldly man-ner, through the act of giving. My hunger isselfish, but the hunger of the other is sacred. Inthis respect, the answer to the face which appealsto me can only be an ‘economic’ one, whichimplies an ethical revision of our understandingof economy. And money, as a rational modality

of economic existence, then also receives a fun-damental meaning on the level of the ‘being-by-and-for-the-other’. However, since it receives anethical meaning, it can just as well become ameans to immorality, to ‘murder’ in the sense setout above. In the ethical rejection of the othermoney can, precisely in virtue of its so-calledobjectivity and neutrality, of which more will besaid below, be easily used or, rather, misused tocancel out the other’s alterity and thus in one oranother manner kill him by instrumentalizing himand functionalizing him, by buying and sellinghim as nothing more than a ‘means.’

The ‘Thirds’ in Space and Timeand Social Justice

But responsibility for the other does not stop withthe unique you with whom I stand eye-to-eye. Itis not only us two in the world, but there aremany. Moreover, there are not only those closeby but also many far away (as we learned directlyfrom our confrontation with the so-called ‘thirdworld’), not only present but also future others(through whom ecology and, among other things,the consequences of nuclear energy for a ‘thou-sand generations remote’ confront us in a dramat-ic way). In short, there is the ‘third’, who alsofalls under my responsibility and through whichresponsibility in the second person extends itself‘infinitely’ (responsibility in the third person). Wemust take account not only of this unique other,but of everyone: the second and the third. It istherefore necessary for us to judge, make distinc-tions, calculate and weigh on the basis of priori-ties and urgency, and so create a just coexistence,or society. With the entrance of the third, respon-sibility must become justice.

There is still more. Since we can not takeadequately into account those who are distant orin the future while we remain here and now, wemust realize justice via ‘mediation’. It is possibleto concretize our care for others only by inserting‘intermediaries’ between ourselves and the absent

________________________________________________________________________________________

Ethical Perspectives 2 (1995)1, p. 12

___________________________________ ___________________________________

thirds. Through them we are able to take indirectbut nonetheless real account of those thirds.These intermediaries are of all sorts of social,economical, juridical and political structures,institutions, organizations, instances and systems,infra-national as well as national, internationaland worldwide.

Economic Justice and Money

Economic mediation proceeds concretely through‘works’, that is to say the goods and services thatwe produce and that we can barter, exchange buyand sell, in short deal in (economy in the strictsense of the word). Well then, money is whatmakes this ‘dealing’ possible on the level of thethird. Only through setting a price on goods andservices payable in money can we make availablethe products of our labor, not only to the individ-uals nearby, but also and above all to the count-less many who are far away or absent. Moneyfulfills an intermediary function, or better, asmiddle term it is mediation par excellence. Here,we only touch on the specific meaning of moneythat was already presupposed in its functioningon the level of the effort at being and the other.Strictly speaking, money emerges only on thelevel of the third, and only then can it be tiedinto the economy of selfishness or giving. Themost important part of this approach to the prob-lem is, however, that money has primarily andfundamentally a positive ethical meaning. It is anessential modality of an economic justice in ahumane socio-political society which tries asmuch on the micro- and meso- plane as on themacro- to do justice to everyone, the near and thefar, the present and the future other. Money asmeans of greed and corruption is than also merelya perversion of its original ethical meaning.

Economic and Monetary Stalinism

Yet money as means of an economic and socio-political system of justice can never have the last

word. An economic order of justice can never bea definitive regime, since it always realizes justicein a deficient and provisional manner. Options,priorities and balanced accounts always createnew injustices. For this reason there will alwaysbe a need for improved economic justice. Theduty to justice for everyone here and away, todayand tomorrow, requires that we build up a flexi-ble economic and monetary system, one that willdare to question and correct itself, to put itselfradically in question, to ascertain whether it stillfulfills its fundamental duty to justice. When aneconomic-monetary system raises itself up into adefinitive regime, it falls into the same mistakesas the political Stalinism whose historical end weseem to have lived to see. Then it presents itselfas an all-encompassing and comprehensive order,to which extent it exhibits a Stalinist tendency,although -in our democratic system -it does ev-erything it can to obscure this totalitarian charac-ter. But howsoever ‘soft’ and ‘disguised’ (‘a wolfin sheep’s clothing’), still it remains a terrible andmenacing form of Stalinism worthy of horror.

Jurisdiction and Money: An Ambiguous Relation

The need for an ever improved justice on thesocio-political and economic plane is evident instill another way. Use of the ethical terms ‘jus-tice’ and ‘improved justice’ equally implies -precisely because they rest on ethical or ‘desir-able’ possibilities -the ‘factual’ possibilities ofevil, namely injustice and perverted or ‘inferiorjustice’. Moreover, these possibilities are directlyconnected to the natural style of existence of theeffort of being, which, in confrontation with theface of the other and the commandment ‘youshall not kill’ can become a fundamental ethicalchoice for immoral self-interest. In building upsocio-political and economic justice, one mustthus be realistic and reckon with the ‘charm’ ofethical evil and the ‘allure’ of mischief, that is tosay with the absolutizing desire for self-indul-gence, power and wealth -all being expressions of

________________________________________________________________________________________

Ethical Perspectives 2 (1995)1, p. 13

___________________________________ ___________________________________

‘nature’, of the healthy but not yet ethically quali-fied striving to be of the I. Concretely, this ethi-cal realism implies that one must try to prevent orchannel the possibility of real evil as much as hecan. He must limit it and correct it without there-by annulling ethics itself, that is to say withoutannulling human freedom by falling into an ‘ethi-cal totalitarianism’ which bypasses human respon-sibility in its willingness to root out evil by anymeans. From the thirds today and tomorrow, andfrom the categorical imperative to a just socio-economic and political order which tries to do asmuch justice as possible to everyone, it is unac-ceptable that anyone be oppressed, abused, mo-lested or persecuted -in short, treated unjustly orintimidated. This is, according to Levinas, whysanctions against criminals, whether individuals,groups or states, are justified. It is violenceagainst the other and the third that justifies retri-bution, or that requires society to judge and op-pose violence and evil. Notice that retributionhere means none of the personal vengeance whichincludes so much ambiguous satisfaction andpassion. On the contrary, it must be understoodas a law functioning only on the social level andin a legal system. Only a judge may adjudicate orcondemn, in which case retribution is in its strict-est sense a ‘law of retribution’. Where violencecalls for more violence, this chain reaction mustbe brought to an end. This is precisely whatjurisdiction aims at, trying to retain grievousoffence within the disputations of civil order.

At the same time, the judge takes seriously theevil that has been done, which is precisely thepurpose of the sanction pronounced as repayment.By condemning evil and pronouncing punish-ment, it becomes impossible for man to takelightly human affairs and evil. To rob anyone oflife can not be taken seriously enough. In a soci-ety where only tenderness, love and forgivenessrule, people run the risk of excessive meeknessbefore evil. Therefore Levinas sees -in line withthe Jewish ‘jus talionis’ (‘an eye for an eye, atooth for a tooth’) -the principle of ‘proportion’

as the basis for criminal law. Often it is onlywhen we ‘are paid with the same coin’ or whenwe feel the evil that is done with our own fleshthat the seriousness of what we do onto otherssinks in on us. In this sense the principle of pro-portion takes most seriously the evil that abidesbetween people.

Still, proportionality is not without problems.Equal repayment, for example the death penaltyfor homicide, introduces a new form of violence.Thus does society have the urgent task of makingjurisdiction and in particular criminal law hu-mane. Proportional retribution can never be adefinitive judicial regime: humanizing punishmentis an ethical necessity, which for example meansdoing away with the death penalty. One veryconcrete manner of carrying out this humanizati-on is to ‘calculate’ the wrong that has been doneso that one can arrange ‘repayment’ in the formof ‘compensation’. We have need not only of ajustice without passion, an objective and impartialjurisdiction, but also a judicial system without anexecutioner -one that tries to restore damages bytransposing them into ‘economic value’. Thedamage caused by a crime can be ‘measured’, asfor example the loss of wages or income, the lossof health and even the loss of honor or beauty.Though Marx considered calculation of the eco-nomic value of humans to be in principle unac-ceptable, still this economic calculability of mandoes offer a positive opportunity for humanizingthe inexorable harshness of retribution and pun-ishment. It is clear that in such a humanizingcalculus, which must lead to a non-violent, orrather less violent form of reparation and ‘ex-change’, money comes once again to the forefrontas the eminent means of ‘damage compensation’.

One must nevertheless stay clear of misunder-standing and not lose sight of the fundamentalambiguity of money. Indeed, Marx was rightwhen he maintained that, notwithstanding thewages by which the worker receives some recog-nition, the calculation of his economic worthincludes an objectivization which is thus in fact

________________________________________________________________________________________

Ethical Perspectives 2 (1995)1, p. 14

___________________________________ ___________________________________

non-recognition of the worth of a human beingand thus a scandal. Man is not reducible to hiseconomic worth! This holds as well for the evilcommitted. A murder remains a murder, and noamount of money in the world can set it right orundo it. It is and remains a scandal that the otherforms of evil occurring between people are alsotranslated into economic quantities and measur-ability. Financial reimbursement for a crime isnot only a form of humanizing jurisdiction, it isalso a form of literal ‘un-concern’ with the injus-tice committed. Even if something is made goodwith money, it is still not wiped away. Accordingto Levinas, it is in this respect that proportionalitymust be retained in principle, even though inapplication, which is to say in jurisprudence, itmust be nuanced, if one is to avoid making lightof injustice and wrongdoing.

And there is another reason why materialcompensation via money can not be the ultimateprinciple of jurisdiction. The fundamental replace-ment of the principle of proportion by moneywould lead directly to an economic perversion ofjustice itself, which we have in fact often seenoccur in our society. Whoever has much moneycan easily pay the penalty that is imposed. Andthis would imply that the rich can go unpunishedfor criminality with respect to the other and thethird much more easily than can the poor or thosewith less means. When money is or becomes thebasic principle of damage compensation, punish-ment loses its inhibiting force over the economi-cally well-off, and its ethical significance. Even-tually, people would also stop taking seriously theevil that they can do to one another. In short, ifmoney were to take the place of requital andcompensation, there would result a class justice,which would not only introduce an unjust divi-sion between poor and rich, but would also pro-vide the rich with an easy conscience.

Such ambiguous functioning of money injurisdiction then also implies that the objectivecalculation and transposition of evil into moneycan not suffice as a definitive order of justice,

since its inherent injustice must in turn be extend-ed toward an ‘ever better justice’, that is to saytoward an ever better judicial system that is evermore just and thus also ever less unjust.

Small Kindnesses and Money

Moreover, there is not only need for an everbetter socio-political, economical and monetaryjustice. The ‘iron-clad determinism’ of general-ized universality and distantiated objectivity inthe economic-monetary system, or for that matterin every social, juridical and political system, ismarked by an inherent ‘structural violence.’ As asystem, it fails to take into consideration theunicity of the other. There are ‘tears’ that can notbe seen by any economic administration or mone-tary institution -these are the tears of the uniqueother. For this reason, the responsibility of eachfor every other remains indispensable. But indi-vidual consciences are also necessary in a justeconomic-monetary system, for they alone candetect the violence that follows from the properfunctioning of even economic-monetary rationali-ty. Only the singular, responsible I is capable ofvigilance for the ‘secret tears’ of the unique otherwhich are brought about the good working ofeconomic-monetary institutions, organizations andstructures as such. This is the necessity of the‘small kindnesses’ (la petite bonté) that wieldmoney as a possibility for doing the unique otherunconditional justice. Only the ‘small kindness ofunreserved gratuity’ can save the economic-mone-tary structure from the violence that adheres to itsown forms of justice.

Conclusion

It will have become clear that Levinas’ philo-sophical approach to money not only offers aphenomenological description, but also expresslyformulates an ethical and thus normative dimen-sion. It not only tries to understand what ‘is’ (the‘factual’), but also opens up perspectives on what

________________________________________________________________________________________

Ethical Perspectives 2 (1995)1, p. 15

___________________________________ ___________________________________

‘should be’ (the ‘desirable’). It is thus not a neu-tral, disengaged analysis, but literally a ‘pro-vo-cative’ or ‘calling-forth’ approach that therebycalls the factual praxis of money critically intoquestion regarding its ethical quality, or its hu-manity. This ethical approach lays bare not onlythe different sense but also the ambivalences andcontradictions of money. In this respect, money is

never a self-evident ‘good’ about which a naivesort of metaphysics or entrenched ‘doctrine ofbeing’ could be developed, but a literally ‘ambi-valent’ middle term that not only can enter theservice of evil but, precisely through its so-calledneutral objectivity, can bring to this same evil theseductive and misleading charm of the good.

Notes

1. This article was translated from Dutch by Jeff Bloechl.2. E. LEVINAS, ‘Socialité et argent’, 25 années groupement Belge des Banques d’Epargne: 1961-1986. Allocutions

Séance Académique - 25 jaren Belgische Spaarbankenvereniging: 1961-1986. Toespraken Academische Zitting,(Brussels, Belgische Spaarbankenvereniging/Groupement Belge des Banques d’Epargne: 1987) p. 13-19. Reprintedin Tijdschrift voor Filosofie, 50(1988), p. 415-421; J. HALPERIN, G. LEVITTE (eds.), L’Argent. Données et débats(Actes du Colloque des intellectuels juifs de langue française). Paris, Ed. Denoël, 1989, p. 215-222; C. CHALIER, M.ABENSOUR (eds.), Emmanuel Lévinas. Paris, Ed. de l’Herne, 1991, p. 134-138. See also R. BURGGRAEVE, ‘L’argentet une justice toujours meilleure. Le point de vue d’Emmanuel Levinas’, A. VAN PUT (ed.), Les Banques d’EpargneBelges. Histoire, Droit, Fonction Economique et Institutions. Tielt, Lannoo, 1986, p. 23-44. For a further study indepth, see R. BURGGRAEVE, Levinas over vrede en mensenrechten. Leuven, Acco, 1990, p. 103-172.

________________________________________________________________________________________

Ethical Perspectives 2 (1995)1, p. 16