b/ Second Judgment of the Doxa: There Is a Crisis of Values

It is often said that our world faces a crisis of values, and daily events seem to bear this out. A. Léonard, for instance, lists symptoms of this crisis from a Catholic perspective: The over-armament of the great powers and the rising debt of the Third World, the sharp decline in birth rates in the West and the advent of artificial reproduction technologies, abortion and contraception, experimentation on the human body and invasion of privacy, human rights both championed and violated, the relentless pursuit of comfort and the persistent unhappiness… ¹.

Likewise, R. Misrahi, writing from a more Spinozist standpoint, echoes this sombre picture of present-day challenges: At the dawn of the 21st century, the world appears fractured by crises as grave as those at the start of the previous century. Wars may no longer be 'global,' but conflicts now permeate every continent under new forms, whether as religious wars disguised as national conflicts or battles over interests masked as national struggles. The collapse of totalitarian regimes has bred hatred and localized conflicts, while technological advancements have generated poverty and unemployment... Thus, dominated by hardship, violence, and misfortune, much of the population seems to exist in a state of perpetual crisis ².

Yet we might well question whether current events truly reveal the deeper essence of an era. Wars, poverty, and unemployment have afflicted every age, yet these conditions alone have never sufficed to warrant claims of a crisis in values. Why should the post-modern era be considered 'in crisis' when earlier periods, such as the Classical age of Descartes, faced comparable calamities?

If there is indeed a crisis of values, it is not, in my view, attributable to current events, which seem rather to confirm King Solomon's saying: Nothing new under the sun. The most superficial way of understanding our time is perhaps to interpret it solely through the lens of isolated historical events, such as 9/11.

On the contrary, one could argue that ethical concerns have never been more prominent than they are today. The laws of war now restrict state conduct, and most breaches of international law are swiftly exposed by the media. Ethics committees are proliferating; ethical reflection is spreading across all fields of activity; and dedicated 'ethics' sections are appearing in university libraries. Works on ethics are no longer confined to the 'philosophy' shelves, as though ethics were outgrowing its status as a branch of philosophy and establishing a distinct presence of its own.

Nonetheless, we might question whether this surge in moral discourse truly reflects an ethical revival, or whether it signals a deeper unease. The flood of books and the proliferation of ethics committees look like responses to a profound underlying problem—for only a truly fundamental problem could generate so many answers. Or, to put it differently: the sheer number of responses suggests that the problem itself remains unresolved.

This expansive growth in the field of ethics may, in fact, be a troubling sign of its impending decline.
We might recall Hölderlin's words: But where the danger is, also grows the saving power ³. If ethical works are accumulating to hold moral disorder at bay, then the danger itself must be growing—that this disorder is swelling beyond control.

So what underlies this post-modern anxiety?

What is the source of this deep unease?

[Go to the next chapter]

1. Le fondement de la morale, Cerf, Paris, 1991, p. 11
2. Qu'est-ce que l'éthique ? Armand Colin, Paris, 1997, Introduction, p.5
3. Wo aber Gefähr ist, wächst/ Das Rettende auch (Patmos -At Hombourg, 1803-1806).