The suggested project attempts to reconsider the idea of “commonality”. It envisages the concept of a
common ground for society that lies beyond universalistic claims of either liberal or communitarian theories. Research is conducted in an interdisciplinary way,incorporating findings from the fields of philosophy,, political philosophy cultural and literary studies. Its methodological and theoretical approach is shaped by phenomenology and litterary theory focusing a. O. on the works of Arendt, Patocka, Heidegger, Weil, Tischner, Platonov, Havel, Sebald and Lipski, thereby standing out against established ways of interpreting the notion of commonality.
The project aims to investigate the notions of “the common” and the “loss of the common”. These phenomena are particularly analyzed with reference to the political background of 20th century Central and Eastern Europe. The notion of a “groundless common” seems appropriate to describe the historical experiences, as they were expressed by members of civic freedom movements, philosophers and writers whose work was crucial to the political changes of 1989.
On the basis of the expression of this experience, this project will conceptualize historical changes and rethink commonality in today´s societies, which is characterized by markers of uncertainty about the content of the common good.