Civilité : un concept en dialogue

Abstract

This paper aims to address the different meanings of the word “civility”, and its different cultural anchorings in Europe and in Asia. In Western societies, opinion agrees in diagnosing a crisis of civility. It seems that nothing like this exists in Taiwan and researchers invited to observe the literature and the artistic and even political productions of the island in the light of this concept come up against several difficulties. However, their difficulties and analyzes prove to be very instructive for rethinking the emergence of civility in Europe. On the one hand, the importance of the Confucian reference, with its “Five Relations”, can help identify the importance of sociability governed by respect and deference, still very significant in France under the Old Regime, and to distinguish it both from the sociability governed by the civility of Erasmian origin studied by Norbert Elias and from the political civility defined by Jurgen Habermas for the 18th century. Conversely, the interest identified for forms that transgress this Confucian “facade civility” (for example, the success of the novel Moderato Cantabile by M. Duras) makes it possible to circumscribe, over the long term of Western history and can – to be on an anthropological level, the value of “familiarity”: openness or disputing impoliteness, but also the threat of social anomie if it engulfs civility and deference. We conclude that the ultimate meaning of democratic civility consists in maintaining several references at the same time and ensuring their translatability.