The Nature of Political Theory

304 The Nature of Political Theory

reading texts. Undoubtedly, Gadamer incorporates an account concerning how we
read texts, however, as already stressed, his, like Heidegger’s sense of hermeneutics, is
far more than this. He does not conceive hermeneutics as a method. It is an ontological
view. The discussion now turns to the question of how Gadamer’s theory might be
widened into a more general, ethical, and political theory. The crucial concepts to
explore here are those of conversation or dialogue and the notion of understanding
as a fusion of horizons.
For Gadamer, the ideas of conversation and dialogue are fundamental to under-
standing. We converse with ourselves, others, and texts in order to develop our
understanding. Any attempt to understand therefore involves some form of dialogue
or conversation. For Gadamer (unlike Heidegger), dialogue involves a dialectical
growth orBildungof the person. In trying to grasp, for example, a text or a point
of view, we enter into a dialogue, which implies a process of give and take. There
is no sense here in Gadamer that understanding or interpreting is a ‘waiting upon
being’. Further, Gadamer makes a point of associating himself with Hegel’s negative
idea of the ‘bad infinite’—implying something, which is quantitatively endless, an
ad infinitum. All dialogue, and most forms of interpretation, are therefore viewed as
open-ended and infinite. Complete knowledge is impossible. In fact, he describes all
real human experience, inTruth and Method, as intrinsically negative (see Gadamer
1979: 354). To really experience something (and to try to understand it) is often to have
one’s previous knowledge undone. Genuine experience refutes what we thought we
knew. Our finiteness, life-situation, and temporality accounts for much of this. Since
we are contingent upon our historical use of language and our finite cultural situation,
it is inevitable that our perspective will always be open to disconfirmation.^15 There is,
for Gadamer, nothing above or below our prejudices, tradition, and culture. We can-
not step outside these with a ‘view from nowhere’. There is no ultimate knowledge of
our situation. Further, there is no implicit end point to any dialogue or conversation.
If dialogue ends it isnotbecause it cannot continue. As Gadamer comments, ‘every
dialogue also has an inner infinity and no end. One breaks it off, either because it
seems that enough has been said or because there is no more to say. But every such
break has an intrinsic relation to the resumption of the dialogue’ (Gadamer 1977: 67).
Further, for Gadamer, understanding, particularly in the human sciences, is a two
or more-sided event. We depend, to a large degree, on other interlocutors. The point
of dialogue is that interlocutors can and do answer back. In addition, for dialogue to
work, one has to listen. Yet, as stated above, this implies that one becomes open to
alternative interpretations and experiences. Dialogue is not about forcing one’s view
on the other, winning the game, or dominating their perspective. There is therefore
a negativity (as in any real experience), built into all dialogue. Understanding is not
about producing a facsimile of established knowledge. The hermeneutic problem
usually materializes either when there is no tradition able to contain one’s own view,
or, when encountering an unfamiliar or unknown tradition (see Gadamer 1977: 46).
The other dimension to conversation and dialogue is the question of what hap-
pens in conversation such as to facilitate understanding. For Gadamer, importantly,
experience is, as mentioned, negative; further, conversation and interpretations are