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Derrida’s deconstructivism is assuredly the most influential post-modern movement inphilosophy. It represents the absolute primacy of difference in the ontological,semiological, sexual, cultural, political and individual realms. The name itself,“deconstructivism,” leads us directly to Heidegger’s phenomenological “destruction.” Inseveral polemical essays, Hans-Georg Gadamer had indeed already shown that Derrida’sand Heidegger’s positions were not to be equated to one another in spite of a certainresemblance. However, Gadamer did not submit his own position to methodical criticism.He was satisfied with passing comments on what maybe corresponded to Derrida’s earlierphilosophical style. According to the present author, the object of Derrida’s deconstructivistcriticism presents itself as the very sense of historicity, above all with regardto the “fact” that it remains immanent in philosophical thinking, especially in a phenomenologicalone, which is the basis for Husserl, Heidegger and Gadamer. 14 Accordingto Derrida, the philosophical propensity to historicity characterizes an aspiration forreturning to the original and a demand to the effect that the original should return.Together with psychoanalysis, Derrida exposes the constructed character of this aspiration.His criticisms aim both at the transcendental return to the original grounds and at a pure“transcendental project” (Heidegger). For Derrida, only a negative reduction of thehistorical sense is itself possible, but not a positive reduction of history in any sense, i.e.,there is no identity; only difference is.Such an account of deconstructivism appears to be contemporary. In the humanities itis used as a theoretical foundation of post-modernistic views. At the same time, itcircumvents the dimension of historicity and tradition. Everyone does firstly so, as onedeals these solely on the level of the “production of symbols.” According to this, then,every transcendental project of tradition has already lost its own historical effectiveness.If it appears to us only in its function as a symbol, it is impossible for us to appropriatelyundedrstand any philosophical essay, any work of art, and any religious proclamation, i.e.,it can only appear in one or another determinate function. In the closest connection withthis, we must also remark that -- if any criticism can be offered by deconstructivists at all --a heretofore “constructive” historical fluency of tradition must already exist. 15 However,it cannot function purely as a symbol since it cannot merely be assumed philosophically.It requires an explicit significance, or else our standpoint on tradition becomes itself“centrifugal.” However, hermeneutics tries to shun away from precisely this.To some extent, Gianni Vattimo agrees with Derrida’s deconstructivist challenges, buthe also rejects them, partially, which is directly due to the fact that he recognizes theimportance of moderating such an exclusive point of view on tradition. His demandstoward a “weakening” of thinking must also be understood in this way. Vattimo calls foran ethics of interpretation. In spite of a lot of suggestions and because he is somehoweclectic, his thinking offers mostly no systematic support for the identification of an accessto the problems of historicity and tradition, in contradistinction with the hermeneuticcomplement of phenomenology, which does. In particular, Vattimo has not sufficientlythought through the question that he actually posed himself, with regard to the situationof the ethics of interpretation within the era of a society of information. The transmissionof every shape of knowledge doesn’t strictly happen through and via tradition, whichwould be open to interpretation, but by means of the information that remains neutral to14See also János Békési, ‘Denken’ der Geschichte. Zum Wandel des Geschichtsbegriffs bei JacquesDerrida (München: Fink, 1995).15Cf. Daniela Vallega-Neu, Die Notwendigkeit der Gründung in Zeitalter der Dekonstruktion: ZurGründung in Heideggers ‘Beiträgen zur Philosophie’; unter Hinzuziehung der Derridaschen Dekonstruktion(Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1997).199