Article

Philosophy and Social Criticism

37(5) 605–619
Terrorism and trauma: ª The Author(s) 2011
Reprints and permission:

Negotiating Derridean sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav

DOI: 10.1177/0191453711399253
psc.sagepub.com
‘autoimmunity’

Marguerite La Caze
University of Queensland, Australia

Abstract
I begin by examining the logic of autoimmunity as characterized by Jacques Derrida, ‘that strange
behaviour where a living being, in quasi-suicidal fashion, ‘‘itself’’ works to destroy its own
protection, to immunize itself against its own immunity’ (Borradori, 2003: 94). According to
Derrida, religion, democracy, terrorism and recent responses to the trauma of terrorism can
be understood in terms of this logic. Responses to terrorism are ‘autoimmune’ and increase
the trauma of terrorism as well as risking democratic values. I argue that the risks of
autoimmunity can be negotiated in better ways if we see how autoimmunity relates to another
important Derridean concept, hospitality.

Keywords
autoimmunity, democracy, Jacques Derrida, hospitality, terrorism, trauma

But we must recognize that defenses and all the forms of what is called, with two equally
problematic words, the ‘war on terrorism’ work to regenerate, in the short or long term, the
causes of the evil they claim to eradicate. (Jacques Derrida, in Borradori, 2003: 100)

Jacques Derrida’s distinctive reworking of the medical concept of autoimmunity as

the logic of terrorism and of recent responses to the trauma of terrorism helps us to
understand the risks taken in opposing terrorism and recovering from terror attacks.
He characterizes autoimmunity as ‘that strange behaviour where a living being, in
quasi-suicidal fashion, ‘‘itself’’ works to destroy its own protection, to immunize itself
against its own immunity’ (Borradori, 2003: 94). I begin by examining the logic of auto-
immunity and how this logic enables us to comprehend why terrorism is terrifying and

Corresponding author:
Marguerite La Caze, University of Queensland, St Lucia QLD 4072, Australia
Email: m.lacaze@uq.edu.au

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606 Philosophy and Social Criticism 37(5)

traumatic, drawing on Derrida’s view that this trauma is focused on the future and
Sigmund Freud’s understanding of anxiety concerning traumatic moments and of
mourning as a project to come to terms with the reality of loss (1964, 1957). Derrida
links the destructive processes of autoimmunity with a failure of psychic responses to
terror. His view is that our responses to terrorist attacks thus far have blocked the work
of mourning needed to recover from the trauma because they undermine individual
immunity. They have also continued to undermine national immunity, or the democratic
political systems and ways of life that terrorism is also perceived to threaten.
My interpretation of the immunity Derrida refers to is that it involves the integral pro-
tections that we find both in the individual psyche and in democratic states. I criticize
those interpretations that argue that Derrida cannot distinguish between autoimmunity
and counterproductive actions and those that take autoimmunity to be a kind of militar-
ized defense. While I agree with Derrida that our responses to terrorism can be charac-
terized as ‘autoimmune’ and thus increase the trauma of terrorism, this is not solely due
to the logic of autoimmunity but to the failure to explore better ways to negotiate the
aporias of autoimmunity. Finally I discuss the possibilities of responding to the trauma
of terrorism in ways that do not entirely succumb to this autoimmunitary logic and
show how autoimmunity is related to another important Derridean concept, hospitality.
Derrida, typically, sees both terrorism and responses to terrorism as caught in a paradoxical
logic, a logic I explore in the next section.

Autoimmunitary processes
In an interview with Giovanna Borradori several weeks after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in
the USA, Derrida describes what goes on in responses to terror as a law of an autoimmu-
nitary process: ‘that strange behaviour where a living being, in quasi-suicidal fashion,
‘‘itself’’ works to destroy its own protection, to immunize itself against its own immu-
nity’ (Borradori, 2003: 94).1 His concern is with the reactions of affected individuals and
countries to the threat of terrorism. It should be noted here that Derrida’s understanding
of autoimmunity is more complex than the medical understanding of autoimmunity,
although he locates its source in biology (ibid.: 187, n. 7). The medical definition con-
cerns the way in which the body does not recognize its own cells, so, in other words,
creates immunity against itself. However, Derrida adds a further level of meaning to the
term by saying that autoimmunity is immunity against immunity. In Acts of Religion,
Derrida writes that the process of auto-immunization ‘consists for a living organism’
‘of protecting itself against its self-protection by destroying its own immune system’
(2002a: 80, n. 27). The example he gives is of immuno-depressants that prevent the body
from rejecting organ transplants. The immuno-depressants act against the body’s own
immunity to something from the outside. In this case, autoimmunity contributes to the
body’s health.
In the case of terrorism, anti-terrorist governments fight against what they see as
forces that are attacking what they value. Nonetheless, in attacking those forces, they are
destroying the very condition of what they value – that is, a society that is relatively sta-
ble, orderly and open. Another way to understand a process of autoimmunity is that
responses to terrorism undermine the protections such a society affords, that is,

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La Caze 607

democracy, freedom and the rule of law, for example. I will discuss this possibility in
more detail further on.
This autoimmune response occurs in three ‘moments’, which Derrida says overlap
each other (Borradori, 2003: 100). The first moment is that the United States, which
is supposed to be so powerful and a guarantor of world order, is attacked by terrorists
within its own borders and using its own resources. The attacks in a sense came from
within. This is similar to the autoimmune aspect of the ‘home-grown’ terrorism in the
2005 London bombings and in white converts to Islam being involved in the 2006 plan
to crash aeroplanes taking off from Heathrow Airport.
The second moment starts from the point that the world itself is at risk from an unseen
enemy and focuses on individual subjectivity (Borradori, 2003: 98). Derrida’s view is
that the post-cold war order relies on US stability and thus world stability is threatened
by the attacks, along with our entire system of interpretation and explanation. There is no
longer a balance of terror between two powerful states, but a threat from an unknown
force (ibid.). We cannot understand the nature of this force or how to deal with it. Con-
ventional explanations for the acts of terror beginning with 9/11 in terms of motive, pur-
pose, causes and self-interest appear inadequate.2 Without a clear understanding of these
factors future terrorism cannot be predicted and anticipated. Since we do not understand
the threat we tend to deny, repress, forget it, or get over it, and these strategies them-
selves regenerate the trauma. The alternative to these strategies is to work through the
trauma or do the work of mourning rather than denying or repressing it. Thus Derrida
argues that what was traumatized by 9/11 was the concepts and the system of meaning
and interpretation that would allow us to understand and circumscribe what happened
and so dispel the trauma and practise, in Freud’s terms, a ‘work of mourning’ (Borradori,
2003: 93).
In his classic essay ‘Mourning and Melancholia’ (1957: 243), Freud says that the
work of mourning is to face the reality of the loss, say, in the case of the death of a part-
ner, a home, or even an ideal. We can only be said to have recovered when we accept that
the person is truly gone and are able to love others in his or her place. Not all strategies
for carrying out the work of mourning are successful, because dwelling on the attacks,
for example, can exacerbate trauma. Borradori notes that people often react to trauma
by repetition and that is how people reacted to 9/11 (2003: 147). The repeated screenings
of the twin towers collapsing in the first days after the attacks are a good example of this
phenomenon.3 Freud thought that this sort of repetition was typical in cases of trauma,
because a traumatic experience is one ‘which within a short period of time presents the
mind with an increase of stimulus too powerful to be dealt with or worked off in the nor-
mal way, and this results in permanent disturbances of the manner in which the energy
operates’ (1991: 351).4 Although it is typical, it is not the best way of responding.
Some commentators have suggested that the only reason people are more concerned
about terrorism than heart disease, cancer, or car accidents is that excessive attention to
acts of terrorism serves the interests of politicians and the media (Pogge, 2008: 1–2).
Derrida also observes that the media affect how we feel by circulating a sense of 9/11
through a ‘prodigious techno-socio-political machine’ (Borradori, 2003: 107). However,
he also concedes that the sheer numbers of people killed is not the only factor in our psy-
chic response: ‘The quality or intensity of the emotions provoked (whether conscious or

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608 Philosophy and Social Criticism 37(5)

unconscious) is not always proportionate to the number of victims or the amount of

damage’ (ibid.). To take up Freud’s distinction between realistic anxiety, which is a
response to ‘an expected injury from outside’, and neurotic anxiety, which seems point-
less, it is often thought that anxiety about terrorist attacks is neurotic or a neurotic pro-
longation of realistic anxiety (1964: 81–2).5 Freud says that in both realistic and neurotic
anxiety what we fear is either a traumatic moment or ‘a signal threatening a repetition of
such a moment’ (ibid.: 95). The features of recent terrorist attacks have an indefiniteness
that means our anxiety hovers between realistic and neurotic anxiety.
Another factor intensifying the trauma of 9/11 comes from fear of a future chem-
ical, bacteriological, or nuclear attack that will be much worse than 9/11 (Borradori,
2003: 97–8). Derrida’s conception is supported by the fact that the nature of terrorist
attacks continue to change: from hijacking planes to use as bombs, to bombing trains,
to using home-made bombs to bring down planes. Derrida notes that we try to reas-
sure ourselves that it’s all over when in fact it is not (Borradori, 2003: 188–9) and
warns of much worse terrorism to come in the form of more devastating attacks.
We have a traumatic response to terror because it is a danger that is unpredictable and
not amenable to control. In that sense, it is impossible to react to the threat of terror in
the way that Freud believes we should be able to react to realistic anxiety, by simply
avoiding the danger (1964: 84). Furthermore, acts of terror could increase in their fre-
quency or intensity at any time.
These features taken together suggest that the trauma and anxiety of terrorism are
likely to be great and to be difficult to resolve. Our inability to control or to under-
stand terrorism means that we have no sense of what could happen in the future and
our anxiety will be neurotic. They also suggest that our actions in response to terror-
ism will be characterized by this neurotic anxiety. For instance, many of the responses
so far, such as increased security at airports, are reactions to previous attacks, even
when it is believed improbable that similar kinds of attacks will occur again. Further-
more, the level of security and surveillance by those states that experienced attacks
continues to increase rather than decrease over time. Thus, while a greater experience
of traumatic response to terrorism compared with other disasters is to some extent
understandable, the extremity of the counter-measures and the increase in their levels
of severity are not necessarily justified.
The strategies of denial, repetition and excessive reaction fall under the logic of auto-
immunitary process as they do not enable development of the strength to deal with the
trauma or successfully carry out the work of mourning, and thus need rethinking.6 There
must be better and worse ways of carrying out the work of mourning or ways that are
more likely to enable us to cope with loss, and I will return to this point. There must also
be better and worse ways of negotiating the logic of autoimmunity.
The third moment of autoimmunity is that responding to terrorism by attacking Iraq
and Afghanistan, for example, provides legitimation for further terrorist attacks, thus the
defense leads to further destruction (Borradori, 2003: 100). Another instance Derrida
cites is that of the saturation publicity of 9/11, which exposes the vulnerability of the
USA in order to justify further aggression (ibid.: 108–9).7 Autoimmunitary logic is para-
doxical, self-deconstructive, because what gives it its basis – concern for the self – also
destroys its basis.8

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There are numerous examples of autoimmunitary logic at work in the West’s response
to terrorism. They include attacks on privacy and human rights: civil liberties being
discarded or eroded by spying, the interception of emails and telephone calls, arrests
without charge, endless detention, the practice of ‘extraordinary rendition’, and a general
increase in torture sanctioned by western governments.9 Other cases are limitations on
personal freedom: on travel, increased security, and restrictions on immigration. These
all feed into increases in personal anxiety. The war on terror itself is an example of auto-
immunity, as it has increased the likelihood of further terrorism. The problem of auto-
immunity is also demonstrated by the treatment of refugees and immigrants in
western countries.10 Claims that certain ethnic and national groups are likely to be ter-
rorists are used to demonize refugees and immigrants and to detain them arbitrarily and
indefinitely.
Interestingly, different countries have responded to terrorist attacks or the threat of
them in quite distinctive ways. One characterization of these differences is that Britain’s
approach is ‘tightening up law enforcement for all its citizens, while trying to ensure that
Muslims feel represented in every step of the process’ and participation in the Iraq war,
whereas the United States ‘has focused on border control and electronic eavesdropping’
and France ‘relies on infiltration and an aggressive investigative judiciary’ (Caldwell,
2006: 3).11 The Australian government introduced control orders, preventative detention
(48 hours), and new powers for the Australian Federal Police, extended sedition laws,
strengthened measures against the financing of terrorism, and provided (limited) support
for the Iraq invasion. Spain reacted differently to the former nations by withdrawing
forces from Iraq and focusing on the arrest and prosecution of terrorists involved in the
Madrid bombing, but it also increased border controls, intelligence, policing, and finance
controls.12 All these strategies have raised concerns about human rights and civil liber-
ties and, I argue, can be understood as falling within the logic of autoimmunity. How-
ever, why they should be understood this way needs explaining, since several
commentators on Derrida’s work have argued that the concept of autoimmunity is inapt
or unclear. Furthermore, the important question of how we should negotiate autoimmu-
nity must be asked.

Autoimmunity and democracy

Derrida develops the concept of autoimmunity much more fully in relation to democracy
in Rogues (2005). Here he argues that his idea of democracy to come (la de´mocratie à
venir), while necessary to reflect on and always hold up as an ‘impossible real’ to guide
our actions, is saturated with autoimmunitary processes. The ‘to come’ does not suggest
something that is of the future but is in the nature of a promise of what cannot be fully
present (2003: 86). What is unique to democracy as a political system is that it is ‘the
only one that welcomes the possibility of being contested, of contesting itself, of criticiz-
ing and indefinitely improving itself’ (ibid.: 121). The democracy to come is the best
way of committing ourselves to justice, which for Derrida is a response to the singularity
of the other, rather than distributive justice, law, or retribution (1994: 22–3). Democracy
takes myriad forms and although Derrida does not challenge any particular state’s legiti-
macy in calling itself a democracy, he believes that the self-critical character of

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610 Philosophy and Social Criticism 37(5)

democracy means that we can criticize democracies in the name of democracy. Derrida
says that we are not completely sure what democracy is; nevertheless he notes that
democracies attempt to balance the conflicting demands of equality and freedom, and
to institute majority rule while maintaining concern for minorities, as he evinces in his
work.
In relation to the technical aspects of voting systems, Derrida states that ‘one will
never actually be able to ‘prove’ that there is more democracy in granting or refusing
the right to vote to immigrants, notably those who live and work in the national territory,
nor that there is more or less democracy in a straight majority vote as opposed to propor-
tional voting’ (2005: 36). Nevertheless, the call for justice embodied in democracy
means that democracy is only an ‘obscene alibi’ while hunger, disease, humiliation and
deprivations of equality and freedom and human rights exist (ibid.: 86). Another aspect
of the democracy to come is the possibility of its spirit pervading international and
intrastate institutions such as the United Nations and the International Criminal Court
(2003: 80). In this way the sovereignty of human rights is pitted against the sovereignty
of nation-states.
In addition, the autoimmune nature of democracy means that we can not only criti-
cize, we can also restrict democracy in the name of democracy. As an exemplification
of this possibility, Derrida discusses the 1992 Algerian election where it was feared that
an Islamist party would abolish democracy if it came to power: ‘they decided in a sover-
eign fashion to suspend, at least provisionally, democracy for its own good, so as to take
care of it, so as to immunize it against a much worse and very likely assault’ (2005: 33).
In this case, democracy is suspended for the sake of democracy. What is interesting about
Derrida’s interpretation of this example is that he presents two criteria for making this
kind of decision in the name of democracy: first, that the autoimmune reaction should
be in order to avert a worse attack on democracy and second, that the attack should
be very likely. These two criteria are at least helpful in considering whether any partic-
ular autoimmune response can be justified or is only a claim to be an act in the name of
democracy. When considering how to negotiate autoimmunity we need to reflect respon-
sibly about the alternatives and whether we are in fact attacking democracy for democ-
racy’s sake. Before considering this question I want to respond to two criticisms of the
concept of autoimmunity.
The philosopher Nick Smith criticizes Derrida’s account of autoimmunity, writing:
‘Derrida does not distinguish . . . between suicide and imprudent, short-sighted and
counterproductive policy. Intentionality should be the operative distinction, and
these events lack suicidal deliberateness unless conspiracy theorists are correct and
September 11 was orchestrated to justify adopting the Project for a New American
Century. But even this would describe a sacrifice and change in strategy rather than
suicide’ (2003: 342).13 Here Smith appears to be taking the concept of suicide completely
literally, thinking that any measures against terrorism must actually involve an intention to
destroy the entire country. However, Derrida is referring to self-destructive tendencies,
specifically destructive of what keeps us safe, in strategy, what he calls ‘quasi-suicidal’
(Borradori, 2003: 94).14 He is also assuming that autoimmunity works on both the con-
scious and the unconscious levels. That counter-productivity Smith refers to is a form
of self-destructiveness and thus can properly be understood as autoimmunity if it is an

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La Caze 611

attack on essential aspects of democracy. For example, a misguided policy that had a
slightly adverse economic effect would not properly be called self-destructive or autoim-
mune. Autoimmunity is characterized by an attack on aspects of our society and political
organization that constitute its essential positive features.
A more pertinent criticism is made by Samir Haddad, who says that Derrida fails to
take advantage of the resources of the concept of autoimmunity in his discussion of
democracy. Haddad understands the ‘broad’ definition of autoimmunity as any attack
on a part of democracy, say, for the sake of the whole, whereas the ‘specific’ definition
concerns an attack on immunity. Yet if we apply the specific definition of autoimmunity
to democracy, then we have an account of democracy that is very unappealing, he argues.
Haddad claims that Derrida is deliberately ambiguous about the use of the term in the
case of religion, in Acts of Religion (2002), because he believes that religion is funda-
mentally structured around the defense of the sacred. Thus any part of religion can be
understood as the specific part devoted to immunity and any attack on a part of itself
is an attack on its defenses (2004: 31–2). However, trying to understand democracy in
this way, Haddad argues, is much less convincing, as democracy does not appear to
be essentially concerned with defense (ibid.: 38–41).
I argue that Derrida’s concept of autoimmunity should be interpreted differently. In
my view, Derrida’s use of the concept of autoimmunity should be understood in the spe-
cific sense, as an attack on our defenses or our immune system. Yet it does not follow
from this point that we should see democracy as ‘militarized’ where ‘all of its aspects
– its citizens, laws, its rights and its elections – are devoted to its defense’ as Haddad
claims (2004: 41). If we reflect on the concept of immunity, it is not just defense in a
military sense but a protection built into society. Insofar as democracy embodies certain
values, such as freedom, equality and openness, these values are also a built-in protection
against becoming some other worse political system such as fascism, tyranny, or totali-
tarianism.15 Thus, when democratic governments attack freedoms such as freedom of
movement or attack human rights by engaging in torture, say, they are not just attacking
a ‘part’ of the system for the sake of the whole, they are attacking the immune system of
democracy, those practices and institutions that make democracy robust and enduring.
Attacks on freedom of speech and expression assault what Derrida sees as the very
essence of democracy – the capacity to criticize it. We may criticize other political sys-
tems in their name; for example, someone might (conceivably) criticize a tyranny on the
grounds that it is insufficiently tyrannical. However, democracy is the only system where
if one cannot criticize it, one can complain that is undemocratic.
An important issue Derrida’s account of the logic of the autoimmune raises is how it
relates to the idea he supports elsewhere of negotiating between ethics and politics
(2002b) and of negotiating between the calculable and the incalculable (1992: 28). In
‘Ethics and Politics Today’ Derrida writes that the rule of rules is to find ‘the best (or
in any case the least bad) that would answer to contradictory imperatives in a single ges-
ture’ (2002b: 300). The contradictory imperatives are the unconditional demands of
ethics and the practical problems of politics. In negotiating between them in relation
to the threat of terrorism we have to consider human rights and the rule of law as they
provide our unconditional imperatives and our sense of justice. Derrida does not set out
limits to negotiation; however, I argue that some limitations on decisions follow from his

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612 Philosophy and Social Criticism 37(5)

characterization of democracy. What I mean is that there must be some limits to the
negotiation, that there are ways of compromising democracy that do more than simply
risk what they are designed to protect, because they undermine its basis. For example,
while some restrictions on freedom of speech may be necessary, restrictions that would
make it impossible to criticize democracy would undermine the very idea of democracy.
At the same time, the openness of democracy also exposes it to dangers, such as elec-
tions allowing the possibility of non-democratic powers taking control of government
and making the system undemocratic, as was feared in Algeria and did occur in Germany
and Czechoslovakia, for example. This dual nature of the openness of democracy means
that we must try to understand autoimmunity. We should not just complacently accept it
as the ‘logic’ of democracy or of the psyche. We have to consider whether what is done
for the sake of democracy and in the name of democracy is negotiated in the best or bet-
ter way. I will discuss these possibilities further in the next two sections.

Negotiating autoimmunity
There is ample evidence to suggest that Derrida has located an important process at work
in recent responses to terrorism. However, does this autoimmunitary logic have to oper-
ate in every case? Could it not be argued that some moves to, say, restrict civil liberties
are necessary and will have the desired effect? The idea here is that some restrictions do
not ‘destroy’ a democratic way of life or immunity and they can be effective in prevent-
ing terrorism. Against this point, one could argue that there are certain principles, such as
privacy, freedom of movement, a right to a free trial and the presumption of innocence,
which must never be transgressed. One might support Derrida’s claim by suggesting that
any small attack on freedoms will inevitably lead to their being undermined in some fun-
damental way.16
While Derrida forwards the view that there is an inevitable logic of autoimmunity,
some of his other comments suggest that we can evade or negotiate this logic. His under-
standing of September 11 is that it must provoke us to a reflection on philosophical con-
cepts such as war and terrorism: ‘The concepts with which this ‘‘event’’ has most often
been described, named, categorized, are the products of a ‘‘dogmatic slumber’’ from
which only a new philosophical reflection can awaken us, a reflection on philosophy,
most notably on political philosophy and its heritage’ (Borradori, 2003: 100). For example,
Derrida argues that the war on terrorism does not fit past definitions of war (ibid.: 101–2) and
terrorism is not rigorously defined, and that it is hard to distinguish between national and
international terrorism (ibid.: 104–5).17 These reflections and a demand for ‘account-
ability from those in charge of public discourse, those responsible for the language and
institutions of international law’ (ibid.: 106) will help us to negotiate the paradoxes of
autoimmunity.
I interpret Derrida as suggesting that we think about these questions much more care-
fully and do not resort to relativism about terrorism, although some of his comments
might suggest that is his view, as when he says ‘rightly so, [that] terrorists might be
praised as freedom fighters in one context (for example, in the struggle against the Soviet occu-
pation of Afghanistan) and denounced as terrorists in another’ (Borradori, 2003: 104).18

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La Caze 613

However, Derrida implies a distinction between terrorism that cannot be justified and
forms of terrorism that could be.
Derrida’s criticism of terrorism pursued in the name of Osama bin Laden goes like
this:

What appears to me unacceptable in the ‘strategy’ (in terms of weapons, practices, ideology,
rhetoric, discourse, and so on) of the ‘bin Laden effect’ is not only the cruelty, the disregard
for human life, the disrespect for law, for women, the use of what is worst in technocapitalist
modernity for the purposes of religious fanaticism. No, it is, above all, the fact that such
actions and such discourse open onto no future and, in my view, have no future. (Borradori,
2003: 113)

The implication flows from the fact that this characterization applies only to such kinds
of terrorism. Other kinds, which aim to institute a new state or to maintain an existing
one, do open onto a future and are concerned with perfectibility, the perfectibility that
Derrida admires in democracy. Furthermore, Derrida makes the point that he aligns him-
self with the side that speaks in the name of democracy and international law and insti-
tutions (Borradori, 2003: 114). This leaves open the possibility that he might not
wholeheartedly condemn terrorist actions that aim at bringing about a democratic state.
Derrida would condemn the killing of innocents in any case as he finds ‘disregard for
human life ... unacceptable’ (ibid.: 113), which itself is a way of closing off the future
for them. However, that is not the only form that terrorism may take; terrorist actions
can involve destruction of property without any loss of life. As I noted above, Derrida
discusses the need to negotiate with the non-negotiable (2002b) so such a possibility
is not ruled out in advance.
Democracy opens on to a future on Derrida’s account because the concept of democ-
racy is ‘the only one that welcomes the possibility of being contested, of contesting itself,
of criticizing and indefinitely improving itself’ (Borradori, 2003: 121) as I noted. Thus,
Derrida’s criticism of Al Qu’aeda-style terrorism implies that terrorism that has no future
is worse than terrorism that institutes or maintains democracy, in addition to thinking
that it is unacceptable to disregard human life. W. J. T. Mitchell criticizes Derrida on this
point, saying that whether we like it or not, bin Laden does have a vision of the future,
‘one in which the U.S. would leave the middle East, would withdraw all its forces,
military, economic, and political, making room for the revival of an Islamic kingdom
of God, a caliphate in which justice (by their lights) would prevail and become identical
with the law’ (2007: 70). Thus, Derrida’s claim needs to be nuanced to make his position
clearer. I believe he implies that din Laden’s terrorism does not open on to an open future
that has the perfectibility and self-criticism built into itself that democracy does.
Both terrorism and acts of counter-terrorism can be criticized on the grounds that they
try to undermine the possibility of self-criticism that is essential to democracy.
In a lengthy discussion of democracy and immunity, Michael Naas suggests that the
only ‘thing’ that can be immune is kh ora, because it does not have an identity and is not a
thing (2006: 25–6). Democracy to come can also play this role, it is claimed, as it is a
hope or promise of a future possibility rather than a system or an ideal (Derrida,
2005: 82). However, I argue that a defense of democracy that is not self-destructive is

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614 Philosophy and Social Criticism 37(5)

one that is open and flexible enough to adapt without losing sight of basic freedoms,
rather than a non-thing. Many thinkers conceive defense in this way, by suggesting that
what is needed to counter terrorist actions is attention to world poverty, strengthening of
international institutions such as the UN and the International Criminal Court, the uphold-
ing of human rights, and dialogue between Muslims and non-Muslims, for example.19
Jürgen Habermas, in his interview with Borradori, similarly recommends a focus on
human rights, as well as ‘improvement of living conditions, through a sensible relief from
oppression and fear’ (Borradori, 2003: 36). Furthermore, Derrida makes such suggestions
himself, both in Philosophy in a Time of Terror and in Rogues. He recommends question-
ing and refounding the principles of international law, and an ‘intervening force’ to back
up the UN’s decisions (ibid.: 114–15). One worry concerning Derrida’s position here is
that his view of the need for negotiation and decision does not rule out any particular
decision that may violate human rights; he only says that we must always keep them
in mind.20 It could be argued, as I have above, that there are some essential features
of democracy that we cannot reasonably justify undermining. However, Derrida’s view
cannot be used to rule out, for example, extraordinary rendition as a practice. We could
argue that such practices are worse than allowing a risk that suspects have vital informa-
tion and that there is little likelihood that the practices are effective. We can limit the
risks of autoimmunity by negotiating in responsible ways that take the characteristics
of democracy seriously. They suggest better ways of negotiating autoimmunity on a
practical level.

Autoimmunity and hospitality

Derrida also suggests that we reconceptualize the concept of terrorism and that of the war
on terrorism, which can enable us to negotiate autoimmunity on a theoretical level. My
argument is that his work on hospitality is extremely useful to gaining a better under-
standing of autoimmunity in relation to these issues. He recommends in Philosophy in
a Time of Terror that we reimagine Enlightenment ideals, an Enlightenment that he
associates very closely with Kant. The point Derrida focuses on in the Enlightenment
is the alteration in the relation between religious doctrine and the political that he sees
as distinctively European even if that separation has been incompletely carried out
(Borradori, 2003: 117). He does not recommend uncritical support for Enlightenment
ideals, such as cosmopolitanism and sovereignty; according to him, they should be ques-
tioned in the light of their philosophical and religious context (ibid.: 124).21 Derrida
believes his idea of ‘democracy to come’ goes beyond cosmopolitanism, but we still
need to focus on extending citizens’ and human rights to everyone (ibid.: 130–1). He also
sees it as essential for writers and thinkers to unite against violence and to advocate
tolerance, although he has some concerns about the term ‘tolerance’ because of its religious
roots (ibid.: 125).22
Derrida concludes that ‘Peace would thus be tolerant cohabitation’ (Borradori, 2003: 127)
but compares tolerance unfavorably with unconditional hospitality, claiming that ‘Tolerance
is a conditional, circumspect, careful hospitality’ (ibid.: 128). Unconditional hospitality
is where we welcome the Other without even asking questions about her or his identity or
origins, whereas conditional hospitality is restricted and regulated by the state (Derrida,

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La Caze 615

2000: 75–6).23 The authentic openness to the Other of unconditional hospitality also
leaves us open to possible abuse. Conditional hospitality demands that the Other act
in certain ways, that his or her time as a visitor is limited, and that she or he recognizes
our sovereignty. On the face of things, tolerance and hospitality appear to be very
different concepts. One could suggest that they are both involve welcoming the other,
but hospitality is a much less guarded welcoming as tolerance inevitably involves
conditionality, premised on the Other’s acting in a certain way.
We can also compare hospitality and immunity. Immunity is a form of conditional
hospitality where we are able to protect ourselves from the other and we assert and
defend our sovereignty. However, autoimmunity is not precisely parallel to uncondi-
tional hospitality as that hospitality is a complete defenselessness in the face of the Other
rather than an eroding of our defenses through our own decisions to protect ourselves. To
put the point another way, autoimmunity could involve undermining or destroying an
aspect of our defense system in order to allow something from outside in. Nevertheless,
autoimmunity shares with hospitality the feature of receptivity or susceptibility to what
is unexpected. Derrida insists that suspending the immunity, understood as conditional
hospitality, that protects me from the other could be life-threatening (Borradori,
2003: 129). In other words, it could open me up to possible abuse just as unconditional
hospitality does.
However, I argue that upholding immunity could also be life-threatening. By refusing
to allow new others and a diversity of ideas to become part of the state, for example, in
order to maintain our immunity, we are likely to threaten its well-being by becoming too
homogenous. Just as conditional hospitality always has to refer itself to pure or uncondi-
tional hospitality, our immunity has to open itself to change, to the Other, to immigrants
and to new ideas. To return to the medical model, we need things from outside in order to
stay healthy, certain bacteria, for example, as well as the ability to recognize threats and
danger. This is equally true of subjectivity, where we cannot maintain a rigid sovereignty
that does not allow any challenges to it or vulnerability in the form of new ideas, and of
possible harm by others we trust and love. Not all psychic difficulties involve a response
to threats to the psyche from the outside. Psychic health requires openness to others, an
ability to absorb and respond to harm, and a basic self-respect. And to a certain extent,
‘threats’ in the form of insults and hurt are essential to developing a healthy ego. Trauma
develops when the individual is not able to respond to the traumatic events in the usual
way by freeing herself or himself from the emotional pain she or he is suffering (Freud,
1964: 90).
Interestingly, in Rogues, Derrida modifies his position concerning autoimmunity by
saying that ‘autoimmunity is not an absolute ill or evil. It enables an exposure to the
other, to what and to who comes – which means that it must remain incalculable. Without
autoimmunity, with absolute immunity, nothing would ever happen, or arrive; we would
no longer wait, await, or expect, no longer expect one another, or expect any event’
(2005: 152). An example like this is similar to the immunity against the body’s rejection
of a needed organ. The way to understand what Derrida means here is that absolute
immunity means we are completely protected from the other, whereas autoimmunity
means we are affected by what happens outside of us, that our protection is breached.
If we were able to completely repel any possible danger, then we would be unaffected,

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616 Philosophy and Social Criticism 37(5)

isolated and unhealthy. This situation would be similar to a conditional hospitality that
never allowed any ‘surprise’ visitor at all.
We not only threaten to attack ourselves by trying to defend ourselves, we may
deprive ourselves of possible enrichment. Then the implication must be that striving for
immunity risks autoimmunity, but that risk itself has its positive features. Although most
of the examples of autoimmunity I have discussed involve restrictions on freedoms that
are undesirable and destructive of freedom in general, it is possible that some restrictions
could be interpreted as important and creating other freedoms, such as anti-racial vilifi-
cation legislation. That could be an instance of ‘positive’ autoimmunity or an attempt to
defend the self that does not destroy the self. Another instance of positive autoimmunity
or hospitality is an openness to different ideas about the nature of democracy, to different
cultures, to refugees, to immigrants. The attempt to repel these perceived threats to
immunity is a worse way of negotiating autoimmunity than a more hospitable one.

Conclusion
My view is that we are not inevitably trapped in the logic of autoimmunity or that at least
we can negotiate autoimmunity in better ways than we have done thus far. By reflecting
on the effects and possible effects of strategies to combat terrorism and deal with trauma,
we can develop a vigorous immunity that is open and risks autoimmunity rather than
being completely committed to repelling all outside influences. As psychoanalysis
allows, not all responses to anxiety and trauma need be repressive or wholly repressive.
On an individual psychic level, many of the political strategies adopted by governments
in their unlimited war on terror increase anxiety and make working through mourning
very difficult. However, strategies for dealing with terrorism that do not sacrifice democ-
racy or exaggerate the threat could help to deal with psychic difficulties and avoid the
worst excesses of the logic of autoimmunity. The likelihood of terrorism can be
decreased without destroying democracy or making it meaningless. Derrida’s account
of democracy suggests some ways in which we can limit democracy without completely
undermining it. I have taken his conception further by suggesting ways to negotiate auto-
immunity while keeping hospitality and our other unconditional commitments in mind.
We can risk autoimmunity in our responses to terrorism and trauma without necessarily
being reckless and irresponsible.

Notes
I would like to thank Damian Cox and colleagues at the Australian Society for Continental Philo-
sophy conference for helpful comments on an earlier version of this article. I am also grateful to the
Australian Research Council for their support for my research.
1. Derrida notes that the pharmakon is another form of autoimmunitary logic (Borradori,
2003: 124). Donna Haraway is another contemporary author interested in the uses of ‘immunity’
as an image (1991), as Naas (2006) and Mitchell (2007) note.
2. Robert Pape argues that suicide terrorism has a strategic goal: ‘to compel modern democracies
to withdraw military forces from territory that the terrorists consider to be their homeland’
(2005: 4). However, he is primarily focused on attacks on the United States and does not
consider the Bali or London bombings, which complicate matters. Another suggestion is that

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everything that has happened since 9/11 was foreseen and welcomed by the terrorists with
their ultimate goal being to destabilize the Middle East. I find this idea implausible and based
on a retrospective reading of history.
3. Psychological research suggests that repeated viewings of the 9/11 bombings increased the
likelihood of post-traumatic distress (Cardeña and Croyle, 2005: 79– 82).
4. For a discussion of Freud’s view of trauma and traumatic hysteria and neurosis, see Laplanche
and Pontalis (1988: 465–73).
5. Freud also distinguishes moral anxiety, as related to the super-ego (1964: 85).
6. It should be noted that Derrida believes that mourning is ‘interminable’ and ‘impossible’ so in
that sense the mourning after 9/11 is no different from any other. (2001a: 143–4). He believes
mourning is impossible because we can only try to honour the person we have lost by remem-
bering and making them a part of us, but in doing so the other we are mourning is ‘that which
can no longer be interiorized’ (1988: 34–8).
7. Further on he states that both the West and other world groupings such as Islam are riven by
autoimmunitary conflicts (Borradori, 2003: 115).
8. Borradori notes that autoimmunity functions as the ‘third term between the classical opposi-
tion of friend and foe’ (2003: 151). This is because in the autoimmunitary process we become
our own enemies.
9. ‘Extraordinary rendition’ is the practice of extraditing suspected terrorists from one foreign state
to another in order to allow extreme interrogation methods, used by the USA (Mayer, 2005).
A legal assessment of the practice can be found in Ratner (2007).
10. Ahmed discusses the way terrorism has been used to demonize asylum-seekers in her discus-
sion of the politics of fear (2004: 79–80).
11. Britain also passed laws for arrest for 28 days without charge and a crime of ‘glorifying ter-
rorism’ (Caldwell, 2006: 6–7).
12. Spanish law allows 72 hours of arrest without charge.
13. Project for the New American Century (PNAC) is a think-tank based in Washington, which
has the goal of advancing ‘American global leadership’.
14. Another commentator discussing Derrida’s understanding of democracy, Alex Thomson, feels
that Derrida is not particularly concerned to distinguish immunity from autoimmunity since he
writes: ‘To immunize itself, to protect itself against the aggressor (whether from within or
without), democracy thus secreted its enemies on both sides of the front so that its only appar-
ent options remained murder and suicide; but the murder was already turning into suicide, and
the suicide, as always, let itself be translated into murder’ (2005: 5; Derrida, 2005: 35). In my
judgment, this quotation does not so much suggest that Derrida does not care to distinguish
immunity from autoimmunity but that he sees them as related to each other in a sequence.
In trying to be immune from outside attack, we are likely to attack the very things that protect
and strengthen us. Furthermore, we can be critical of both immunity and autoimmunity, as
I shall argue.
15. When we deduce politics from ethics, we can determine that ‘democracy is ‘‘better’’ than
tyranny’ and ‘‘‘political civilization’’ remains ‘‘better’’ than barbarism’ (1999: 115).
16. Koskenniemi, in his review of Philosophy in a Time of Terror, says that ‘The circle is almost
unbreakable: terrorism and that which it is against are locked in a reciprocal game of destruc-
tion where causes may no longer be distinguished from consequences’ (2003: 9). What I am
interested in here is whether or how the circle can be broken.

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618 Philosophy and Social Criticism 37(5)

17. Referring to the initial use of the term ‘terror’ in the French Revolution, Derrida argues that
state terrorism should be considered genuine terrorism (Borradori, 2003: 103).
18. In her interpretive essay in Philosophy in a Time of Terror, Borradori takes Derrida to be
saying that it is impossible to draw these distinctions and that thus terrorism is ‘ineffable and
enigmatic’ (2003: 153). She makes the same point about his view of forgiveness – that it is
ineffable (ibid.: 144) – and in both cases I believe Derrida’s view is more complex, although
he does say that the meaning of September 11 is ineffable (Borradori, 2003: 86). I argue in my
paper (2006) that Derrida implies that we should forgive radical evil.
19. Benhabib (2002) has a useful discussion of some of these possibilities.
20. In my paper (2007), I argue that Derrida’s position does not allow him to exclude violations of
human rights.
21. Nevertheless, Derrida is very supportive of cosmopolitanism in ‘On Cosmopolitanism and
Forgiveness’ (2001b).
22. See Voltaire’s Philosophical Dictionary (1850) for his discussion of tolerance.
23. In my (2004) paper I discuss Derrida’s account of hospitality in relation to the treatment of
asylum-seekers and refugees in western countries.

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