APPON Volume 16 Number 1 2026

ETHICAL RESPONSIBILITY TOWARDS THE OTHER IN PAUL RICOEUR'S PHILOSOPHY: FROM SELFHOOD TO SOLICITUDE

Emmanuel Egbe Ukata
Abstract

This study discusses ethical responsibility toward the Other in Paul Ricoeur's philosophy, Tfocusing on the dynamic movement from selfhood to solicitude. The aim is to critically examine how Ricoeur situates ethics within the context of human relationality, highlighting how responsibility to the Other emerges not in opposition to selfhood but as a deepening of it. The central problem addressed is the contemporary ethical deficit marked by individualism, depersonalization, and a weakening of interpersonal accountability in both private and public spheres. In a world increasingly driven by self-interest and instrumental rationality, Ricoeur's ethical framework offers a timely intervention that re-centers the moral subject in relation to others through narrative identity and mutual recognition The significance of this study lies in its capacity to recover and apply a nuanced philosophical ethics to today's fractured social relationships, where the Other is too often reduced to anonymity or utility. The justification rests on Ricoeur's contribution to bridging phenomenology and hermeneutics with a practical ethical orientationone that connects the narrative construction of the self with a lived responsibility for others. Methodologically, this research adopts a critical-analytical approach, engaging primary texts such as Oneself as Another and The Course of Recognition, alongside secondary literature that situates Ricoeur within broader ethical and existential discourses. The study concludes that for Ricoeur, ethical responsibility is not an imposed duty but a response born of self-understanding and recognition of the Other's vulnerability. From this perspective, solicitude becomes the ethical culmination of selfhood in a shared human condition.

Keywords: Alterity, Ethics, Hermeneutics, Narrative Identity, Paul Ricoeur, Recognition, Responsibility, Selfhood, Solicitude, Vulnerability.
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