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  • Editor’s Note

annual special issue

During the 1970 and ’80s, there was growing agitation in the former Communist states of Eastern and Central Europe for civil society. Figures such as Václav Havel in the former Czech Socialist Republic and Adam Michnik in the People’s Republic of Poland called for the freedom to assemble and exchange ideas. They were willing to cede authority to govern to the state, but in return, they wanted the opportunity to interact, express ideas, and offer criticism that would be taken seriously as an intervention intended to improve society. Eventually the spirit of their agitation won out, as the momentous events of 1989 led to a mostly bloodless revolution in that part of the world. Many thought this was the dawning of a new age of tolerance and understanding that would lead to freer, more inclusive societies. That hope was not realized. The last quarter century has seen a proliferation of ethnic wars, campaigns of ethnic cleansing, a discouraging onslaught of racial targeting, jihad, and a pronounced inability to accommodate difference, all of which have contributed to a major global problem of recognition. Moreover, it is a problem partially defined by the intersection of philosophy and rhetoric: the meaning of identity, rights, institutional guarantees, freedom of expression, and a call for meaningful (and appropriate) response, along with the place of ongoing public discussion and debate in providing, even performatively guaranteeing, recognition. At stake are such questions as the conditions of subjectivity and ethical life and the bearing of these questions on understanding and intervening in the world and more fundamentally on the rhetorical contours that might permit the subject of recognition to be raised. I am grateful to Sarah Burgess for responding to my call to assemble a collection of articles that explore the problematic of recognition through the intersections of philosophy and rhetoric that bear on it. Burgess has assembled an international panel of scholars who have produced a volume I am delighted to have appear as the 2015 special issue of Philosophy and Rhetoric, and I look forward to the discussion it promises to provoke.

Ed. [End Page 1]

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