Why was Jacques Derrida’s honorary doctorate from the University of Cambridge controversial in 1992?

In 1992, the University of Cambridge proposed awarding an honorary doctorate to Jacques Derrida, which sparked significant controversy within the academic community. The opposition was so intense that the university took the rare step of holding a vote among its dons to decide the matter, which Derrida ultimately won.1

The controversy was driven by a group of 19 philosophers from around the world who published a letter of protest against the honor. These critics argued that Derrida’s writing was incomprehensible and contended that his major philosophical claims were either trivial or false. Beyond this specific protest, other critics frequently characterized Derrida’s work in deconstruction as nihilistic and antirational, viewing his approach as an attack on the standards of serious philosophical inquiry.1