Social and Political Theory

[published in Routledge's "Philosophy and Method in the Social Sciences" series]

This study starts from a simple premise:  human practices are a fundamental constituent — arguably “the” fundamental constituent — of social reality.  It then poses the following question:  What would social scientists’ research look like if they took this insight quite seriously?

That, of course, would depend on what practices are in fact like:  what their generic features are, how they are constituted, how they might be identified and characterised and explained, how they function in concrete contexts, how they might change across time and space.  These are the kinds of questions that this book tries to tackle, insisting that their answers hold important implications for the effective practice of social science.

The book thus attempts to build a philosophical infrastructure for the empirical study of practices in the social sciences and humanities.  At the same time, it also tries to explore the implications of this ontology of human practices for issues in social theory and in the philosophy of the social sciences.  The book thus stands at the intersection of the philosophy of social science, social theory, and the social sciences.

The author takes up Karl Marx's and Herbert Marcuse's investigations into the characteristics of, and the conditions of possibility for, expanding the experience of freedom and play. The essay begins with an analysis of three possible approaches to resolving the labor question. Finding each approach ultimately unsatisfactory, the essay goes on to argue that theoretical and practical attempts to render necessary work superfluous in the interests of free play must reckon with the limits of Marx's original formulation of the possibility as well as the problematic aspects of Marcuse's attempts to fuse the spheres of work and play together. The political question of navigating necessity remains central to all investigations concerned with expanding the possibility of free play. Inverting Marcuse's reading of Freud through Marx, this essay concludes by speculating on the arational character of desire and the potentially risky and unpredictable consequences that could result from taking such an understanding of desire seriously. To what extent do particular social relations condition desire? Given non-repressive social conditions, does desire necessarily overcome irrational or socially destructive manifestations?

My nine-year-old son, .feremy, once told me that when he grows up and becomes a doctor, he wants to use the money he makes to promote anarchism. Naturally, I replied that this was a wonderful aspiration, especially since so few doctors that I know devote their considerable incomes to such noble causes.

This is a final draft of the article published in Environmental Ethics 11 (Fall 1989): 243-258. This assessment of  the Promethean dimension of Marx's thought is accurate, but though it mentions Marx's more dialectical side and its potential implications, this aspect is seriously neglected in the article . A more balanced assessment is presented in "Marx's Natures," a draft version of which can be found on this site. This article should be read in connection with the latter one.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau: Fundamental Political Writings includes the Social Contract, Discourse on the Sciences and the Arts, Discourse on the Origins of Inequality, and “Preface to Narcissus.” Each text has been newly translated, and includes a full complement of explanatory notes. The editors’ introduction offers students diverse points of entry into some of the distinctive possibilities and challenges of each of these fundamental texts, as well as an introduction to Rousseau’s life and historical situation, from his early years in Geneva to his final years in relative solitude. Each text is accompanied by images from the original editions. The volume also includes annotated appendices that help students to explore the origins and influences of Rousseau’s work, including excerpts from Hobbes, Pascal, Descartes, Mandeville, Diderot, Voltaire, Madame de Staël, Benjamin Constant, Joseph de Maistre, Kant, Hegel, and Engels.

"Reading Elizabeth Strakosch’s incisive account of the procedural mechanisms whereby neoliberal settler colonialism seeks to reduce the politics of conquest to a welfare issue reminds me of second-wave feminism’s transformative insistence that the personal is political. Lucidly, methodically and with great intelligence, Strakosch shows how, in the twenty-first century, the technical has become political, as she uncovers the technocratic ruses whereby Australian governments have sought to convert the unresolved question of Indigenous sovereignty into a depoliticised managerial agenda, the preserve of service delivery rather than international relations.  The implications of this astute analysis are immediate and profound".
Patrick Wolfe, La Trobe University, Australia.

Europe, an effective confederal municipalist Green movement in the u.s. could demonstrate an alternative way forward. Social Ecology is a comprehensive holistic conception of the self, society, and naturei. It is, indeed, the first ecological pHlosophy to present a developed approach to all the central issues of theory and practice. It sets out from the basic ecological principle of organic uni$ in dfuersity, affirming that the good of the whole can be realized only through the rich individuality and complec< interrelationship of the parts, and it applies this fundamental insight to all realms of erperience. ln affirming such a holistic approach, Social Ecology rejects the dualism that has plagued Western civilization since its beginning;s: a dualism that sets spirit against mattet soul against body, humanity against nature, subjectivity against ofiectivity, and reason against feelings; a dualism that is intimately related to the social divisions that are so certral to the history of civilizationruler versus ded, rich versus poo4 urban versus rural, "civilized" versui "savagef'male versus femalq in short, the dominant versus the dominated. ln opposition to this dualism, Social Ecology proposes a principle of ecological wlnleness, which Bookchin defines as 'a dynamic unity of diversity" in which "balance and harmony are achieved by wer-changing differentiation." As a result, "stability is a function not of simplicity and Iahn

"Representations", N. 129, Winter 2015.

The essay analyzes the project of maintaining the body of V. I. Lenin in the Mausoleum in Moscow for the past ninety years, focusing on the unique biological science that developed around this project, and the unexpected political role this body has performed.

It's very striking to juxtapose Buddhism and Stirner on the topic of "individual thought," since Buddhist philosophy teaches the doctrine of anatman or anatta, which means "no-self," while Stirner, on the other hand, puts the self, which he refers to as "I," the "unique" or the "ego," as the center of everything. Some Stirnerites object to a focus on the concepts of "ego" and "egoism" in Stirner. Yet, there are over three-hundred instances of der Egoist, egoistisch, der Egoismus, etc. in Stirner's major work. So let's let Stirner be Stirner. We end up with the stark and diametrical opposition: no-self vs. egocentrism.

This study addresses the complex and often fractious relationship between liberal political theory and difference by examining how distinctive liberalisms respond to human diversity. Drawing on published and unpublished writings, private correspondence and lecture notes, the study offers comprehensive reconstructions of Immanuel Kant's and John Stuart Mill's treatment of racial, cultural, gender-based and class-based difference to understand how two leading figures reacted to pluralism, and what contemporary readers might draw from them. The book mounts a qualified defence of Millian liberalism against Kantianism's predominance in contemporary liberal political philosophy, and resists liberalism's implicit association with imperialist domination by showing different liberalisms' divergent responses to diversity. Here are two distinctive liberal visions of moral and political life.

Les trois essais présentés dans cette brochure ont été traduits de l'américain par M.V. Ramariavelo ; traduction revue et corrigée par Ronald Creagh. Nous tenons à les remercier ainsi qu'André Bernard pour l'aide qu'ils nous ont apportée. (première édition : 1993) Merci à Maureen P. pour ses corrections et son aide. Atelier de création libertaire BP 1186, F-69202 Lyon cedex 01 Tél/fax : 04.78.29.28.26 site Internet : http://www.atelierdecreationlibertaire.com

Militant democracy is an attempt to defend democracy against totalitarian parties that would use democratic procedures to rise to power. This article is focused on the consistency of the concept of 'militant democracy' . I argue that what militant democracy defends is not the democratic procedure itself but rather certain rights and the rule of law, and that those elements may in fact be compromised by democracy. This applies both if the democratic procedure is concerned and if democracy is interpreted as a reflection of the will of the people. Those elements may be upheld, but democracy is to be mitigated rather than fortified in order to do so.

Hobbes’s political philosophy starts from a number of premises that are supposed to be self-evident, supplemented by various observations from experience. These statements are examined critically and in their interrelatedness in order to find out to what extent Hobbes provides a convincing system of thought. The importance of the basis of man’s actions, his self-interest, is inquired, since it serves as the basis of his practical philosophy. After this, Hobbes’s views on ‘moral’ notions are expounded. As it turns out, Hobbes maintains a number of concepts that have such a connotation, but interprets these in a specific way. The article is concluded with a modest systematic reconstruction of Hobbes’s main thoughts in practical philosophy.

The task to reshape governments in the countries confronted with the Arab Spring prompts the question whether there are necessary conditions to realize a stable society that simultaneously seeks to eliminate the elements that have led to the uprisings. Acknowledging some constitutional rights seems indispensable in such a process. I argue that such a state of affairs is indeed the case, at least now that the ‘old’ justifications to differentiate between people do not suffice anymore. That is not to say that the countries involved will have identical laws in each respect, but merely that a common basis has to be realized, manifested in political and legal equality, so this given does not derogate from the fact that each country’s specific legislation needs to be shaped in the light of its own history. Such a basis has no ‘moral’ character, but is simply a necessary condition to prevent sedition.

Cette étude part de l'observation que les sociétés fictives de Game of Thrones, Wiedźmin (Sorceleur) et The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt sont dans un grand état de désordre social, et propose d'étudier les différentes façons par lesquelles leurs habitants tentent de rétablir l'ordre dans la société et/ou d'améliorer certains aspects de la société.
Il s'agira notamment de questionner les représentations et directions politiques de la dark fantasy de ces dernières années, à travers trois de ses représentants les plus populaires - et ainsi de réfléchir aux influences que celle-ci peut exercer sur ses consommateurs, mais aussi et surtout quelles propositions elle nous fait en matière de changement social.

The discussion of issues in political ecology has expanded greatly in recent times, above all as the result of growing concern about far-reaching ecological problems that seem to require an effective political response in the near future. These problems include global warming, ozone depletion, species extinction, desertification, loss of topsoil, depletion of global fisheries, disposal of nuclear waste, global population growth, environmentally-related illness, acid rain, and decline in air and water quality. Concern about disruptions caused by global climate change and the massive global loss of biodiversity has been a major impetus to debates in political ecology.

F*ck May 68, Fight Now: Exploring the Uses of the Radical Past from 1968 to Today

Session 1: History is a Weapon

June 8, 2018

Department of History, University of Liverpool

https://archive.discoversociety.org/2018/09/04/circumnavigating-the-past-foreclosing-the-future-commemoration-of-the-radical-past-in-the-amnesiac-present/

The status of ‘international law’ is examined critically. In the first section, the basis of (national) legislation is described. This consists of an inquiry into a credible meaning of ‘natural law’. It is focused on the question whether universal principles exist and, if so, of what kind. Section 2 deals with the issue of enforcement. National legislation invariably realizes this, but this is not obvious at the international level. Section 3 deals with human rights. It is discussed whether their presence points to the existence of ‘international law’. To this end, a possible reason for these rights to have developed is expounded.

Dialogue, Debate, Discourse: Studies on Márton Szabó's Discursive Political Science (ed. by Szilvia Horváth and Attila Gyulai). Budapest: L'Harmattan - Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Institute of Political Science, 2019. --
Szabó Márton a magyar politikatudomány iskolateremtő tanára és kutatója. A nevéhez fűződő diszkurzív szemlélet, amely a politika nyelvi, jelentéses világát helyezi előtérbe, az elmúlt évtizedekben számos pályatársat és tanítványt inspirált. Mára a hazai politikatudományban a nemzetközi trendekhez hasonlóan elterjedtté váltak a diszkurzív kutatások, legyen szó a politika nyelvi megjelenésének empirikus világáról vagy politikaelméleti és politikafilozófiai értelmezésekről. 2017 őszén az MTA Társadalomtudományi Kutatóközpont Politikatudományi Intézetében a 75 éves Szabó Márton tiszteletére tartottak konferenciát munkatársai és tanítványai. E kötet tanulmányai a konferencián elhangzott előadásokon alapulnak, elemezve, továbbgondolva vagy éppen vitatva Szabó Márton munkáit. A kötet címe - Dialógus, vita, diskurzus - éppúgy a politika nyelvének sokrétűségét hivatott kifejezni, mint ahogyan tükrözi a Szabó Mártonnal folytatott tudományos beszélgetés összetettségét is.

Interculturalism, in its two forms, critiques multiculturalism. A European version emphasises cultural encounter and novelty, and is relatively apolitical except for its disavowal of the national in preference for the local and the transnational. In contrast, its Quebecan counterpart gives significance to the idea of the right of a national community to use state power to reproduce itself. Whilst the former is a recognisably cosmopolitan vision I ask if the latter represents a distinctive mode of integration. The core of the article is a textual examination of two recent publications by leading public intellectual scholars in Quebec, Gerard Bouchard and Charles Taylor, respectively, including a lengthy discussion of the former’s concept of ‘majority precedence’. I conclude that while such thinkers rightly press multiculturalists to think about the normative significance of the majority, the arguments for ‘majority precedence’ are flawed. Moreover, multicultural nationalism is well placed to balance the normative identity claims of the majority and the minorities that these authors seek when they emphasise the importance of mutual recognition, reciprocity and balance, though they tend to go astray when they express this as ‘majority precedence’.

This essay focuses on a paradoxical transformation that happened within Soviet ideological discourse at the very end of perestroika, around 1990-91. The Party's attempts to revitalize Soviet ideology by returning to the original word of Lenin unexpectedly produced the opposite result. The unquestionable external Truth from which Soviet ideological discourse drew its legitimacy-and that had always been identical with Lenin's wordsuddenly could no longer be known. This shift launched a rapid unraveling of the Soviet communist project. At the center of this unexpected transformation was the search for the true Lenin-a kind of Lenin that Soviet party theorists, bureaucrats, historians, and scientists hoped was still hidden in the midst of his unpublished texts and unknown facts of his biology, life, and death.

In the spring of 1987, Donald Davis, an environmental sociologist at the University of Tennessee arranged a talk there by Murray Bookchin. At the time, I was working very closely with Bookchin, and I went there to meet with him and Davis, who had been a student and staff member at the Institute for Social Ecology. During the visit, Bookchin showed me the proofs for an article entitled "Thinking Ecologically: A Dialectical Approach," a large part of which was an attack on deep ecology, systems theory, Asian thought, and the radical environmental organization Earth First! I was disturbed by what I read. I found it to be seriously lacking in careful analysis or nuance, and often to be unfair to the objects of attack. I suggested that he rewrite it, making sure that he did not over-generalize or misrepresent any positions. He replied, rather unconvincingly, that it was too late to make any changes, and he did not respond in any way to the content of my suggestions. 1 What I did not know at the time was that he had recently written a much more extreme attack on deep ecology, in which he had parodied, and, indeed, The Trumpeter

This essay will examine Oppenheimer’s sociological concept of the state. In doing so it shall discuss the origin of the state from the perspective of some scholars juxtaposed to how Franz Oppenheimer traces the origin of the state. Likewise the various stages of the emergence of the state according to Oppenheimer will be espoused as well as man’s means of acquiring satisfaction and the future of the state.

Psychoanalysis has produced an ensemble of institutions, expertise, procedures, and practices for rendering the psychoanalytic subject legible and, through this, psychic life as an actionable site of intervention, dislocation, and struggle. This article examines how diverse psychoanalytic communities in Buenos Aires have produced unique grammars that influence how individuals articulate ideas about health and well-being. Descriptive, culturally specific, historically informed, and always provisional, this grammar is empirically grounded in lived experience. Through presenting several case studies, I flesh out how this grammar, as a deictic expression of/for the unconscious is deployed, reworked, and embodied in everyday interactions. I demonstrate how psychic life is enmeshed within social and political experience. In doing so, I consider how interpersonal, existential, environmental, social, and political contingencies shape divergent notions of well-being and structure desires of what it means to live "a good life." [psychoanalysis, psychic life, well-being, Lacan, Buenos Aires]