Repoliticizing the Differences. Derrida and the Speech Act Theory [Repolitizando las diferencias. Derrida y la teoría de los actos de habla].

Abstract

The aim of this article is to analyze why the interpretation and even the misinter-pretation that Jacques Derrida did of the speech act theory is political. I will expose four aspects that distance Derrida from Austin’s theory that allow a political reading of performativity: the notion force, the origin of the convention, the idea of subjectivity and finally the way in which Derrida reads performativity and the political through his notion of promise under-stood as an event that exceeds all convention and contract, denying deontological interpre-tations of the speech act.