Saba Mahmood made immensely important contributions to the critical understanding of secular power and its operations, without which the field would be significantly impoverished. Tragically cut short by her untimely death, her scholarship offers especially powerful insights into the critical turn in secularism studies: first and foremost that secularism is a modality of governance involved […]
'Sovereignty' tag archive
The poetry and prose of the Russian elections
Commentary The poetry and prose of the Russian elections Svetlana stephenson Between 10 December 2011, the day of the first mass protest against fraud in the recently held Russian parliamentary elections, and 4 March 2012, the day of the presidential vote, Moscow was a transformed place. The suffocating atmosphere of Putin’s rule was disturbed as […]
Political theology, religious fundamentalism and modern politics
Political theology, religious fundamentalism and modern politics Marilena chauí In order to define a single and indivisible sovereign political power, Western modernity needed to separate itself from the ecclesiastical power that impeded this unity and indivisibility. Consequently, public expressions of religion were placed under the control of rulers and intimate expressions were relegated to the […]
Globalization?
COMMENTARY Globalization? Simon Bromley , Forecast: global gales ahead.’ Thus were BBC Radio 4 listeners warned by Paul Kennedy of coming storms in the world economy. Their size and vigour, he predicted, would endanger the prosperity, the social contracts, and possibly even the political democracy of the advanced capitalist world. And Kennedy is not alone […]
Friend or enemy? Reading Schmitt politically
Friend or enemy? Reading Schmitt politically Mark Neocleous The debates concerning a ‘crisis’ in social theory in recent years have been partly generated by those socialists for whom old certainties now appear naive and the theoretical foundations of a socialist approach to history and society obliterated. In this context some have looked to new approaches […]
Politics Re-entered
Politics Re-entered: The State in its Place Tony Skillen Though we cannot turn our backs on it or imagine, or wish, that it will wither away, the idea that the state is by definition the sole locus of politics seems Increasingly archaic. The price of retaining ‘the statist conception of politics’ seems to me that […]
Michel Foucault
PRISON TaLK: an interview with Miehel Foueault Introduction This interview dates from June 1975 when Michel Foucault published Surveiller et Punir (Surveillance and punishment), subtitled: Naissance ‘de la Prison (Birth of the Prison). This book can be seen as forming a trilogy with Foucault’s Madness and Civilisation (1961) and Birth of the Clinic (1963); each […]
Globalization and Exceptional Powers
The fate of the body politic
Whatever happened to the idea of the body politic? For those interested in social and political thought this is a pertinent question, since these fields have in recent years become saturated with discussions of the body. The loss of confidence in previously established categories has provoked a widespread return to the body as the basis […]
The exemplary exception
The exemplary exception Philosophical and political decisions in Giorgio Agamben’s Homo Sacer Andrew norris rights. More specifically, the Nazi death camps are not a political aberration, least of all a unique event, but instead the place where politics as the sovereign decision on life most clearly reveals itself: ʻtoday it is not the city but […]
Antonio Negri and Danilo Zolo
Empire and the multitude A dialogue on the new order of globalization Antonio negri and danilo zolo danilo zolo For a long time I resisted the calls, from many quarters, to publicly debate Empire, the book you co-authored with Michael Hardt, which has prompted a debate of exceptional scope and intensity on both sides of […]
Vocabulary of European Philosophies, Part 1 (Subject)
Étienne Balibar, Barbara Cassin, Alain de Libera Introduction by Peter Osborne.
The promise of justice
The promise of justice Howard caygill Breaking the promise of justice is an act peculiarly repugnant to reason. It implies a double betrayal: not only of the promised justice but also of the justice of the promise. Nevertheless, how is it possible to do justice to the promise of justice? Especially when this very promise […]
The absent philosopher-prince
The absent philosopherprince Thinking political philosophy with Olympe de Gouges Ariella azoulay Since the publication of Olivier Blanc’s biography of Olympe de Gouges and the first collection of her texts, compiled and edited by Benoîte Groult, [1] dozens of articles on various aspects of de Gouges’s work have been published. All of them share the […]
Sovereign democracy
sovereign democracy Dictatorship over capitalism in contemporary Russia Julia svetlichnaja with james heartfield Economists tell us that Russia is on its way to completing the transition to capitalism. The only problem remaining now is a political one – the paradise of a fully fledged ‘free-market’ economy is suspended by the lack of liberal democracy, while, […]