Subjekt och agentskap. Seyla Benhabib och Judith Butler

Abstract

In this article I begin with a summary of the discussion between Seyla Benhabib and Judith Butler on subjectivity and agency published in Feminist contentions (1995). Then I try to state their views even more clearly, taking other texts by each author into consideration, and to compare them with each other. Finally I criticize them both for not being able to fulfill their purposes: both Benhabib and Butler want to formulate plausible concepts of subjectivity and agency that allow their theories of humans and actions to avoid determinism. Unfortunately none of them gives any sort of definition or explanation of determinsim, and we will have to guess why they both consider determinism and feminism incoherent. Benhabib accuses Butler's foucauldian notion of the subject of being determined by the discourses (it is constituted by discourses), while Butler points out that the humanist subject of Benhabib, deeply situated in its context, though with a degree of genuine intentions (if not even with a free will), is already conceptually connected to a certain political theory, which has proved to be antifeminist. This controverse sounds more radical than it is, both authors seek a midposition: the subject is seen as situated or constituted but still has some kind of agency. The constitutedness of the subject does not - here I agree with Butler - have to imply that the subject is determined by discourses. But the kind of agency left in Butler's own theory is problematic: it looks as if feminists will have to rely on mistakes and other unintended variations in the embodiment of norms and ideals. On the other hand, Benhabibs position is unintelligible. Why is neatly summoned up in Butler's rethorical question: what does it mean to situate a transcendental subject? The rethinking of subjectivity and agency has only started.