304 Derrida 1963–1983
us call them theoretico-political aims that interested me, yes,
and that interested you too, I think. [.. .] It would just need
you no longer to be convinced for that to be a suffi cient reason
for abandoning it; in addition, I’d also be following the most
‘natural’ tendency of my tastes and my rhythm.^12In spite of this ‘natural tendency’, Derrida felt obliged to take
up the cudgels again on behalf of philosophy. Although the Haby
Reform had been passed in June 1975, it had been delayed, though
not abandoned. It was meant to be implemented at the start of the
new academic year 1981; so it was high time to react. In March 1979,
twenty-one well-known fi gures (including François Châtelet, Gilles
Deleuze, Jean-Toussaint Desanti, Élisabeth de Fontenay, Vladimir
Jankélévitch, and Paul Ricoeur) launched an ‘Appeal’ for a meeting
of the Estates General of philosophy. Roland Brunet initiated the
process, but things would never have become as far-reaching as
they did without the constant involvement of Derrida. The Appeal
rapidly attracted over 2,500 signatures.
The Estates General opened on the morning of 16 June in the
grand amphithéâtre of the Sorbonne. About one thousand, two
hundred people took part, from all over France. The only downside
was that few students turned up; admittedly, the dates chosen were
not very practical for them. Vladimir Jankélévitch, who had shown
his solidarity ever since the start of the Greph and its struggles,
opened the proceedings. Stating clearly that ‘the teaching of philoso-
phy is threatened in its very existence’, he hailed ‘the far-sightedness
and courage’ of Roland Brunet and Jacques Derrida. Of course, for
the time being, the danger was covert rather than explicit: ‘Nobody
apparently wants anything bad to happen to philo sophy, everyone
wants it to do well: they want to “modernize” it, dust it down, open
its windows to “the modern world”.’ But behind ‘these suave prom-
ises’, the aim was gradually to diminish the place of philosophy and
to reduce the number of those who taught it.^13
Derrida then spoke, presenting ‘in a personal capacity’ what
the philosophy of these Estates General should be. Naturally, he
spoke against the Haby Reform and in favour of the preservation
of a minimum of four hours of philosophy for all pupils in termi-
nale, but in particular he developed the idea that he felt to be of
the most importance, that of ‘the extension of philosophy teaching
to the whole second cycle in lycées’. Unfortunately, he could not
stop himself reopening an old quarrel, that which over the past two
or three years had set philosophers in the universities against the
young trendies. Derrida refrained from naming his adversaries, but
everyone found them all the easier to recognize because Bernard-
Henri Lévy had made another noted appearance on Apostrophes
two weeks before the Estates General: