Economics of gift - Positivity of justice - The mutual paranoia of JacquesDerrida and Niklas Luhmann

Niklas Luhmann and Jacques Derrida start with a common assumption in their analyses of the law and the economy - the foundational paradox of social in stitutions. But then autopoiesis and deconstruction move into opposite dire ctions. Luhmann pursues the question of how de-paradoxification constructs the immanence of social institutions and builds a world of autopoietic soci al systems. By contrast, Derrida's thought aims at the transcendence of soc ial institutions through their re-paradoxification. However, there is a hid den supplementarity of autopoiesis and deconstruction which makes it worthw hile to relate the theories to each other. Derrida's distinction of writing /speech is necessarily blind toward Luhmann's distinction of consciousness/ communication, but is, at the same time, continuously provoked by it. On an other level, the opposite happens. Luhmann's autopoiesis is permanently irr itated by Derrida's differance but is at the same time unable to conceptual ize it. This complementary blindness of their distinctions directrices is a permanent source of mutual: irritation which requires a reformulation of t he social and of the possibility of justice.