O Outro e a Relação. O contributo das fenomenologias da intersubjectividade

Historically, phenomenology started to face the phenomenon of intersubjectivity as an objection to its own transcendental aspiration to constitute apodicticity. In fact, since Husserl’s very influential Fifth Cartesian Meditation, the risk of solipsism threatened the possibilities of a genuine phenomenology of the other. This problem ‘s discussion was continued by all of the most significant phenomenologists, such as Max Scheler, Sartre, Merleau-Ponty, Marc Richir, Ricœur, Lévinas, and others, all having made explicit reference to that starting reflection by Husserl in The Cartesian Meditations.

In this paper, I will approach the problem of intersubjectivity, not by attending to the already mentioned traditional phenomenological motive, but, instead, by trying to bring to light the variety of ways of how relationships to others are faced phenornenologically, and its implications for a debate about the psychotherapeutic relationship. Under the assumption that there is no psychotherapy without a psychotherapist/client relationship, it is particularly relevant the contribution of phenornenologies of intersubjectivity to the effort of answering the question «What do our relational experiences with others mean?»