Dufourmantelle

‘’In contrast, Derrida speaks of an unconditional hospitality which does not demand that the guest’s identity is maintained as, for instance, a foreigner with a motive of asylum, but signifies a radical openness to an absolute, indistinguishable other. In this way it breaks with the law and the (asylum) right, and does not refer to duty. In this perspective the guest is viewed as a liberator that brings the keys to the prison of the nation or the family. In this sense the host is the deficient being who views himself as a parasite – and eagerly encourages the awaited guest to step inside as the host of the host.

This does not mean that classical hospitality, for instance the struggle for the right to asylum for certain migrants, should be discredited. Or that the unconditional hospitality, which cannot be sustained and inscribed in the law, floats freely in the realm of ideas. It must keep its relation to conditional hospitality and be manifested in concrete law, and right – which on the other hand has to seek inspiration in unconditional hospitality. The policy that has lost its relation to this has lost its relation to justice’’.

        Anne Dufourmantelle