There is a major division in the interpretation of Kant, between traditionalists and revolutionaries. Traditionalists tend to assimilate Kant to predecessors such as Leibniz, Hume, or Berkeley. Revolutionaries take more seriously Kant's vehement repudiation of all the earlier empiricist, rationalist, realist, idealist, skeptical, and dogmatic doctrines.

Heidegger's connection with Nazism is well known and has been exhaustively debated. But we need to understand better why Heidegger believed National Socialism to be the best cure for the ills of modern society. In this book Christopher Rickey examines the internal logic of Heidegger's ideas to explain how they led him to become a powerful critic of liberalism and a Nazi supporter. Key to Rickey's interpretation is the radically antinomian conception of religiosity he finds at the core of Heidegger's (...) challenge to modernity. Heidegger responds to the crisis of modernity with a philosophy attuned to the fundamental need for humans to live with the proper stance toward the divine. Inspired by Lutheran and mystical theology, Heidegger outlines an essentially religious conception of authentic human being. Like his radical Lutheran forerunners, Heidegger politicizes the radical strains of Luther's theology to create a potent revolutionary brew: the revolution of the saints. Rickey traces out the ways in which these currents fundamentally shape Heidegger's thought: the Lutheran background to his critique of modern science and the technological rationality it spawns; his transformation of Aristotle's prudential conception of practical wisdom into the total revelation of being that lays the basis for revolutionary political action; and his mystical and sectarian understanding of authentic community. Rickey shows how this political-theological vision forms the basis of Heidegger's concrete political action, and concludes with an analysis of the fundamental problems this vision poses to our political thinking today. (shrink)

Revolutionary Changes in Understanding Man and Society provides a fascinating analysis of these new trends which lead into the 21st Century, together with a ...

Examines the relationship between time and sexual difference in the work of French feminists Julia Kristeva and Luce Irigaray. This book is the first to examine the relationship between time and sexual difference in the work of Julia Kristeva and Luce Irigaray. Because of their association with reproduction, embodiment, and the survival of the species, women have been confined to the cyclical time of nature—a temporal model that is said to merely repeat itself. Men, on the other hand, have been (...) seen as bearers of linear time and as capable of change and progress. Fanny Söderbäck argues that both these temporal models make change impossible because they either repeat or repress the past. The model of time developed here—revolutionary time—aims at returning to and revitalizing the past so as to make possible a dynamic-embodied present and a future pregnant with change. Söderbäck stages an unprecedented conversation between Kristeva and Irigaray on issues of both time and difference, and engages thinkers such as Simone de Beauvoir, Jacques Derrida, Sigmund Freud, Judith Butler, Hannah Arendt, and Plato along the way. “Revolutionary Time makes a distinctive contribution to contemporary feminist and continental philosophical thought. By engaging Kristeva and Irigaray in depth alongside one another, and making time the guiding thread for reading their work, the author generates insights that are not to be found elsewhere in the existing literature. Through its development of the concept of revolutionary time, the book offers rich resources for thinking about temporalization in its existential, ontological, and political dimensions, in ways that are particularly valuable for feminist projects of change and political transformation.” — Rachel Jones, author of Irigaray: Towards a Sexuate Philosophy. (shrink)

The modern world is characterised by the juxtaposing forces of hope in unlimited expansion on the one hand, and scepticism at the state of the world on the other. Society is in many ways in a state of distrust, uncertain of how to exist in an inherited world of opportunity and turmoil, optimism and confusion. As the rationality of the economy and its ability to fairly distribute resources is being called into question in current times, technological development in the service (...) of no end continues in a seemingly uncontrollable fashion. In economic rationality, everything is reduced to effectiveness, but for whom? And for what end? This paper, motivated by the writings of Cornelius Castoriadis, explores the inherited state of philosophy today and offers a call towards self reflective autonomy. It outlines the process underpinning social being and doing through Castoriadis‟ notion of the social-historical, which involves a world of significations instituted for the subject by the social imaginary. I suggest that the future for the thinking individual and the autonomous society is seen in revolutionary praxis, involving a radical calling into question of the institution of society and collective praxis to transform the given. This paper will conclude by arguing that philosophy is the key site of promise for the future – philosophy in its truest sense, which encompasses all domains of thought, seeks to break open the closure of the world, ultimately forming creative, reflecting and deliberating subjects. For, as Castoriadis‟ argues, humanity has a genuine future, and this future is to be made. (shrink)

Since the decidedly bleak beginning of the twenty-first century, art practice has become increasingly politicized. Yet, few sustained defenses of the avant-garde have been put forward. Revolutionary Time and the Avant-Garde is the first book of its kind to look at the legacy of the avant-garde in relation to the deepening crisis of capitalist non-reproduction. An invigorating revitalization of the Frankfurt School legacy, Roberts's book is unique in its penetrating definition and defense of the avant-garde idea, providing a refined conceptual (...) set of tools that critically engages with the most advanced art theorists of our day, such as Hal Foster, Andrew Benjamin, Alain Badiou, Jacques Ranciere, Paolo Virno, Claire Bishop, Michael Hardt, and Toni Negri. (shrink)

Britain in the fin de siècle was home to many significant communities of political émigrés. Among Russian revolutionaries who made London their home were Sergei Stepniak and Feliks Volkhovskii, forced to flee Russia as a result of their revolutionary activities in the 1870s. Britain became a symbol of liberty in their writings as a source of comparison with tsarist rule. These comparisons also supported their justifications of the use of terrorism by Russian revolutionaries when writing for audiences with (...) concerns about the use of terrorism in Britain. The emphasis on Russian otherness in these comparisons also helped to justify their opposition to Russian imperialism, while at the same time praising a benevolent imperialism rooted in social and cultural activism. Their thought represents a blending of liberal and socialist ideas employed to place the Russian experience beyond the scope of modernity and liberal political understanding. (shrink)

The works of Paul K. Feyerabend, Norwood Russell Hanson and Thomas S. Kuhn have come to occupy a central place in the annals of contemporary philosophy of science. Some of their contemporaries,, tend to regard them as the vanguard of a new “revolutionary” intellectual movement. Reacting against the views of their positivist predecessors, they embrace and propagate the idea that “pervasive presuppositions” are fundamental to scientific investigations. Thus, Feyerabend thinks that, “... scientific theories are ways of looking at the world; (...) and their adoption affects our general beliefs and expectations, and thereby also our experiences and our conception of reality”. This is in stark contrast to the positivist view that the aim of science is the systematization of experience that exists independently of any scientific theories. This new view of scientific theories also involves a “radical” conception of the nature of theoretical change. Rejecting the positivist notion of any constant element through such change, Kuhn regards a basic theoretical change as a conceptual revolution and “wants to say that after a revolution scientists are responding to a different world”. Hanson uses the phrase ‘theory-loaded’ to give expression to a view of the semantic content of observation statements that follows from this general position. (shrink)

This paper looks to Hannah Arendt's thinking about freedom and revolution to shed light on the "revolutionary jurisprudence" of South African Constitutional Court Justice Laurie Ackermann. As Arendt understands it, revolution is the coincidence of the idea of freedom and the experience of a new beginning. Arendt insists that only a government that harbors the revolutionary spirit can secure a stable space for freedom in the modern world. In asking what institutional spaces of exist that might preserve a space of (...) freedom in modern society, Arendt settles upon the Constitution and its institutional Praetorian guard, the Supreme Court. And yet, Arendt argues that the democratic and scientific trends have eroded the Supreme Court's freedom have threatened to eradicate freedom from the American public sphere. The paper looks to Justice Ackermann's jurisprudence as a way to reinvigorate Constitutional jurisprudence as a space for freedom. (shrink)

While the meta-ethical error theory has been of philosophical interest for some time now, only recently a debate has emerged about the question what is to be done if the error theory turns out to be true. This paper argues for a novel answer to this question, namely revolutionary expressivism: if the error theory is true, we should become expressivists. Additionally, the paper explores certain important but largely ignored methodological issues that arise for reforming definitions generally and with a vengeance (...) in the context of a radical error theory about all practical normative judgements, and suggests how these issues can be resolved. (shrink)

I examine the citation patterns to a revolutionary scientific paper, Hess’ “History of Ocean Basins”, which played a significant role in the plate tectonics revolution in the geosciences. I test two predictions made by the geoscientist Menard (in Science: growth and change. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1971): (1) that the peak year of citations for Hess’ article will be 1968; and (2) that the rate of citations to the article will then reach some lower level, continuing on accumulating citations at (...) some regular but unimpressive rate. Drawing on data covering the period from 1962 to 2019, I show that Menard was close with respect to the first prediction. But I also show that things are less clear with respect to the second prediction. I explain why the data are less clear with respect to the second prediction. (shrink)

The what next question for moral error theorists asks: if moral discourse is systematically error-ridden, then how, if at all, should moral error theorists continue to employ moral discourse? Recent years have seen growing numbers of moral error theorists come to endorse a wider normative error theory according to which all normative judgements are untrue. But despite this shift, the what next question for normative error theorists has received far less attention. This paper presents a novel solution to this question: (...) revolutionary normative subjectivism. Along the way, two primary contributions are advanced. First, a non-normative methodology for answering the normative error theoretic what next question is developed. Second, revolutionary normative subjectivism is presented and defended in accordance with the proposed methodology. (shrink)

This paper analyses rhetorics of scientific and corporate enthusiasm surrounding nanotechnology. I argue that enthusiasts for nanotechnologies often try to have it both ways on questions concerning the nature and possible impact of these technologies, and the inevitability of their development and use. In arguments about their nature and impact we are simultaneously informed that these are revolutionary technologies with the potential to profoundly change the world and that they merely represent the extension of existing technologies. They are revolutionary and (...) familiar. In debates surrounding possible regulation of these technologies it is claimed both that their development is inevitable, so that regulation would be fruitless, and that increased research funding and legislative changes are necessary in order that we can enjoy their benefits. That is, they are inevitable and precarious. An increased awareness of these rhetorical contradictions may allow us better to assess the likely impact and future of nanotechnology. (shrink)

While most of Gramsci's party work is well known to education scholars of Gramsci, and the educational aspects of his writings have been repeatedly analyzed, what remains a constant in education‐based Gramsci studies is the nearly universal minimization of this work for what it was, namely party work. For Gramsci, it would have been unthinkable to consider this work outside the framework of a revolutionary party. Yet, for contemporary educational scholars it seems unthinkable to consider Gramsci's work within the framework (...) of a revolutionary party. The goals of this article are to outline Gramsci's interrelated conceptualization of the roles of the revolutionary party; the nature of education within and by the revolutionary party; and the aims of party education. For considerations of space, I limit this analysis to Gramsci's pre‐prison praxis, the period of his active militancy in the PSI and the PCI. I conclude the article with what I consider to be lessons with continued relevance from Gramsci's praxis for the socio‐political economic context faced by today's radical educators. (shrink)

In this paper I establish an alliance between the thought of Frantz Fanon and Gilles Deleuze's Philosophy of Difference. In light of Fanon's critique of Sartre's characterization of the place of the Negritude movement in terms of dialectic, I point to the inherent limitations of modern humanism's dialectical accounts for enabling genuine historical change. Alternatively, I appeal to Deleuze's distinction between history and becoming, and his concomitant idea of intensive becoming-revolutionary. I conclude that such an alliance with Deleuzian metaphysics holds (...) far greater promises for effecting Fanon's revolutionary project of the creation of a new humanity (and therefore, of a new ethics and a new politics) than his traditional assimilation to Phenomenology and Existentialism. (shrink)

On "Revolutionary Road": A Proposal for Extending the Gricean Model of Communication to Cover Multiple Hearers The paper addresses the problem of multiple hearers in the context of the Gricean model of communication, which is based on speaker meaning and the Cooperative Principle, together with its subordinate maxims, legitimately flouted to yield implicatures. Grice appears to have conceived of the communicative process as taking place between two interlocutors, assuming that the speaker communicates meanings, while the hearer makes compatible inferences. A (...) thesis propounded here is that this dyadic account must undergo a number of fundamental modifications to cover a variety of hearer types, both ratified and unratified, partaking in polylogic interactions. (shrink)

This paper responds to John Burgess's ‘Mathematics and _Bleak House_’. While Burgess's rejection of hermeneutic fictionalism is accepted, it is argued that his two main attacks on revolutionary fictionalism fail to meet their target. Firstly, ‘philosophical modesty’ should not prevent philosophers from questioning the truth of claims made within successful practices, provided that the utility of those practices as they stand can be explained. Secondly, Carnapian scepticism concerning the meaningfulness of _metaphysical_ existence claims has no force against a _naturalized_ version (...) of fictionalism, according to which our ordinary standards of scientific evidence may show that we have no reason to believe the mathematical existence claims made within the context of our mathematical and scientific theories. (shrink)

'It would ... be a pity if the sketch of religious controversy in the 1670s contained in Richard Ashcraft's bold and exhilarating attempt to reconstruct the argument and intellectual framework of Locke's political thinking and activity should be thought to represent the entire debate accurately.' (Spurr 1988, 567 n. 17).

From social theorist and psychotherapist Rabbi Michael Lerner comes a strategy for a new socialism built on love, kindness, and compassion for one another. _Revolutionary Love_ proposes a method to replace what Lerner terms the "capitalist globalization of selfishness" with a globalization of generosity, prophetic empathy, and environmental sanity. Lerner challenges liberal and progressive forces to move beyond often weak-kneed and visionless politics to build instead a movement that can reverse the environmental destructiveness and social injustice caused by the relentless (...) pursuit of economic growth and profits. Revisiting the hidden injuries of class, Lerner shows that much of the suffering in our society—including most of its addictions and the growing embrace of right-wing nationalism and reactionary versions of fundamentalism—is driven by frustrated needs for community, love, respect, and connection to a higher purpose in life. Yet these needs are too often missing from liberal discourse. No matter that progressive programs are smartly constructed—they cannot be achieved unless they speak to the heart and address the pain so many people experience. Liberals and progressives need coherent alternatives to capitalism, but previous visions of socialism do not address the yearning for anything beyond material benefits. Inspired by Herbert Marcuse, Erich Fromm, and Carol Gilligan, _Revolutionary Love_ offers a strategy to create the "Caring Society." Lerner details how a civilization infused with love could put an end to global poverty, homelessness, and hunger, while democratizing the economy, shifting to a twenty-eight-hour work week, and saving the life-support system of Earth. He asks that we develop the courage to stop listening to those who tell us that fundamental social transformation is "unrealistic.". (shrink)

"This is one of the most significant contributions to Locke studies in the twentieth century.

This article examines Hannah Arendt’s bold and provocative proposal to institutionalize civil disobedience. First, I argue that the proposal follows from Arendt’s peculiar interpretation of this mode of protest. She sees it as an unexpected yet welcome echo of the revolutionary spirit that accompanied the foundation of the American republic. In seeking to bring civil disobedience into government, she aims to embed this spirit within the very institutional fabric of the polity. Second, I suggest that we have strong reasons to (...) take the proposal seriously as an account of how the constitutional state should respond to dissenting minorities. The call to institutionalize civil disobedience can be defended as an approach that is different to — and ultimately more appealing than — familiar liberal and democratic perspectives on this issue. (shrink)

Helen Macfarlane, revolutionary social critic, feminist and Hegelian philosopher was the first English translator of Karl Marx and Fredrich Engel's theCommunist Manifesto. Her original translation is included in this edition. Marx publicly admired her as a rare and original thinker and journalist. This book recreates her intellectual and political world at a key turning point in European history.

Generally, saying: ‘feminist’, is revolutionary enough in this day and age, it's far more of a statement now than it was back in the eighties. And no, I wouldn't say I was a Revolutionary Feminist now ‘cos I'm less separatist than I was at that time and I think it's got overladen with such baggage that I'd have to spend about ten minutes defining what I meant. (Interview with Al Garthwaite, Leeds, 20 January 2012).

The edited collectionMarxism and Feminismtraces both the conceptual divides and political affinities between feminism and Marxism. Utilising a keywords-, or core-concepts approach, the book fleshes out the tensions and contradictions that organise and orient Marxist and feminist theories and practices of social transformation. The concepts discussed inMarxism and Feminismdo not try to bridge divergent theories of exploitation or oppression; rather the tensions between feminism and Marxism are used to generate new terrains of investigation. Although the topics discussed vary widely, the (...) book is held together by a commitment to dialectical-materialist investigation and revolutionary social transformation. (shrink)

Zou Rong received a classical education but, uninterested in an official career and frustrated by the irrelevance of his schooling to the day's issues, traveled to Japan in 1901 to further his studies. There he wrote The Revolutionary Army, which was published in Shanghai after his return to China in 1903. The Revolutionary Army, which was scathingly critical of the Manchu rulers of China, enraged government authorities who sought his immediate arrest. Zou was protected by authorities of the International Settlement (...) in Shanghai, and eventually sentenced to only two years in jail. Be this as it may, Zou contracted an illness in prison and died in April of 1905. The Revolutionary Army is far more than an anti-Manchu racist tract. It advocates political and social revolution, and Zou's account of the justification for and goals of these revolutions rests in no small part on natural rights and independence, as discussed in the two chapters from the work that we translate here. (shrink)

This is the first collection of the writings of Edmund Burke which precede Reflections on the Revolution in France, and the first to do justice to the connections and breadth of Burke's thought. A thinker whose range transcends formal boundaries, Burke has been highly prized by both conservatives and liberals, and this new edition charts the development of Burke's thought and its importance as a response to the events of his day. Burke's mind spanned theology, aesthetics, moral philosophy and history, (...) as well as the political affairs of Ireland, England, America, India and France, and he united these concerns in his view of inequality. In the writings in this edition Burke indicated how societies embodying revealed religion and social hierarchy could sustain civilisation and political liberty. These thoughts reached their apogee in Reflections on the Revolution in France. This edition provides the student with all the necessary information for an understanding of the complexities of Burke's thought. Each text is prefaced by a summary and notes to the texts elucidate the literary and historical references. An introduction and biographical and bibliographical essays help place these works in the context of Burke's thought as a whole. (shrink)

The Western democracies of the twentieth century have witnessed an unprecedented upheaval in their popular cultures' normative behaviour concerning gender roles and sexual identities. Concurrently, there has been a marked proliferation in the nature and distribution of erotic images and material. From the statistics concerning divorce to the legal accommodation of same-sex relationships, evidence of the impact of this sexual revolution is manifold. Perhaps this profound shift is most clearly reflected in the entertainment and advertising industries. The sitcom, that most (...) quintessential format of American television, has gone from idealizing a `nuclear family' to a celebration of openly gay lifestyles. Images that only a few decades ago would have been considered pornographic now adorn bus shelters as racy advertisements. A nexus of events has contributed to this radical expansion of accepted behaviour, and multiple modes of evaluation are possible. This paper will examine a single mid-century articulation from this century of sexual revolution.In 1951, Herbert Marcuse began a series of lectures which would ultimately be published in 1955 as Eros and Civilization: A Philosophical Inquiry into Freud. By the 1970s, this text had become one of the most widely known and influential manifestos of the on-going sexual revolution. In more recent years, Marcuse's work has fallen into caricature. Nevertheless, fathoming Marcuse's views is important for three reasons. First, it is arguable that Marcuse's interpretation of Freud's notions of Eros and Thanatos is more widely known than Freud's own views. Second and more importantly, in successfully explaining the links between psychoanalysis, philosophy, economics, and politics, Marcuse laid the foundations for what by the end of the twentieth century had become the politics of sexuality and alternative lifestyles.Yet for Marcuse the revolution would not simply affect people's sexual norms. Revolutionary Eros would change the way they work and play. This is the third reason why Marcuse is still relevant. The obvious changes in societies' sexual norms can overshadow the more subtle changes in economic relations. Marcuse explicitly and consistently insists upon a direct and appreciable relation between individual erotic and the organization of labour. Thus Marcuse provides the criteria for a reflection upon the state of the `sexual revolution'. Middle-class morality has changed since Marcuse's call to revolution. But has the lot of workers undergone a similar transformation? To answer this question, we must first broadly investigate what it was that Marcuse meant by Eros and its relationship to civilization.Eros has been an important notion concerned with self-reflection since at least the institutional practice of initiation into the ancient mysteries. Plato brought the discussion of Eros into public, albeit not in the agora. Rather at an intimate gathering of philosophically minded friends the nature of Eros was famously discussed. But while Plato succeeded in making Eros a philosophical question, the notion itself exhibits a recalcitrant independence from any particular discourse. Its nature remains somewhat mysterious and thought provoking. Marcuse was aware of the long and diverse traditions surrounding Eros. His essay Eros and Civilization is written and reads as a philosophical inquiry into Freud and therefore the psychoanalytic meaning of Eros and its associated Freudian vocabulary is employed. But Marcuse's use of the term Eros is more philosophical than strictly psychoanalytic. Indeed, as we shall see when investigating Marcuse's presentation of Orphic mythology, Eros is a complex notion whose historical nuances stretch back before even philosophy. (shrink)

In recent years much has been written about the contemporary revolutionary democracy of Afro-Asian countries, particularly in connection with the new experience of noncapitalist development or socialist orientation. Serious study of the revolutionary process in former colonial and semicolonial countries would be inconceivable without the formulation of this problem. Under the conditions of the general crisis of capitalism and the growing influence of scientific socialism, conceptions of the departure from capitalism, of the adoption of a non-capitalist path of development and (...) of a socialist orientation in domestic and foreign policy, are developing and maturing in various Eastern countries as a result of the evolution of the ideas of national liberation and social justice and the fact that the leading champions of independence and progress are beginning to embrace scientific socialism. Study of the experience of the movement of Asian and African countries along the noncapitalist path shows that they have made major socioeconomic progress, but also reveals significant objective and subjective difficulties in the policies of the revolutionary democratic forces. (shrink)

This paper explores the possibilities of the recognition and valuation of care by implementing an unconditional basic income and presents a feminist redefinition of the concept of a UBI. The author proposes the notion of a caring revolutionary transformation as a process of institutionalising the social and economic conditions for recognition of care which is a cornerstone of struggles for women’s emancipation and gender equity. It is a process of practically realisable transformative steps which together with their combined and mutually (...) reinforcing effects enable more radical social changes beyond a mere reform. The author argues that these transformative steps have to address two conditions embedded in the institutionalised structures of late modern capitalist society: the limited understanding of meaningful work as paid employment; and the liberal ideal of the independent and autonomous individual. Whereas a UBI can challenge the first condition, a public model of care questions the second condition by shifting the primary responsibility of care from the family towards a social solidarity. While insufficient when introduced separately, the combination of these two remedies has the potential to radically alter social structures on which gendered inequalities rest. (shrink)

Urban spaces, often emerging outside formal, recognized boundaries, underscore the pivotal role women play in shaping these environments. Despite the enduring influence of patriarchal and hierarchical structures that render these spaces overtly gendered, it is within these contexts that women’s actions become particularly transformative. Drawing from feminist urban theories of the global south, this paper investigates informal placemaking, feminist urban activism, revolutionary placemaking, online protest movements, and the networks that support women’s solidarity groups. Employing a mixed-methods approach that includes case (...) studies, interviews with activists, and social media analysis, this research focuses on Iran, with a specific emphasis on the recent ‘Women, Life, Freedom’ movement. This study not only highlights how women navigate, contest, and reshape urban spaces through feminist urban activism and informal revolutionary placemaking but also anticipates the broader implications of these actions for urban planning and policy. By analyzing and comparing these case studies, we aim to uncover the commonalities, differences, challenges, and opportunities between informal/formal, state-led/bottom-up, and revolutionary feminist placemaking practices in Iran. The findings of this paper are expected to contribute valuable insights into the dynamics of feminist urbanism and suggest avenues for future research in enhancing the inclusivity and responsiveness of urban spaces to gendered needs and activism. (shrink)

Uygar Abaci presents a comprehensive study of Immanuel Kant's theory of modality - of the notions of possibility, actuality, and necessity. Abaci argues that Kant redefined these notions as ways in which our representations of objects are related to our cognitive faculty and thus as irreducibly subjective, relational, and conceptual.

This essay examines several works that contribute to an understanding of the nature of contemporary Chinese capitalism and its historical development. Core issues include the character of the bureaucracy, which has had a distinctive relationship to capital formation, and the character of the working class. The periodisation of Chinese capitalism and the relation between the pre- and post-reform periods are pressing political and analytical concerns. This essay suggests the advantages of a clearer focus on the dynamics of depoliticisation in understanding (...) the transition. The contemporary left-intelligentsia in China has in large part pinned its hopes on achieving some form of ideological hegemony within theccp, maintaining that it still operates within its revolutionary tradition. This represents a questionable strategic gamble. Acknowledging the important contributions made by Au’s book and other recent characterisations of China’s political economy from the left, this essay suggests that there remains much to be done. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Revolutionary Christianity: The 1966 South American Lectures by John Howard Yoder, and: John Howard Yoder: Spiritual Writings by John Howard YoderJohn C. ShelleyRevolutionary Christianity: The 1966 South American Lectures John Howard Yoder. Edited by Paul Martens, Mark Thiessen Nation, Matthew Porter, and Myles Werntz eugene, or: cascade books, 2011. 193 pp. $18.00John Howard Yoder: Spiritual Writings John Howard Yoder. Selected with an Introduction by Paul Martens and Jenny (...) Howell. Modern Spiritual Masters Series maryknoll, ny: orbis, 2011. 172 pp. $20.00For more than sixteen years after his death in late 1997, John Howard Yoder has provoked, challenged, and inspired a new generation of theologians, ethicists, and pastors—including the editors of these two volumes—many of whom never met Yoder nor heard him speak. Now, just as this new generation prepares to preserve and enlarge his legacy, a series of revelations detailing Yoder’s repugnant behavior against women and against administrators of the Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary (AMBS) in Elkhart, Indiana, compromises that legacy. It has been widely known that in 1992, after some initial resistance, Yoder submitted to a disciplining process initiated by his home congregation for inappropriate advances to women and that he had been reconciled and reunited in worship shortly before his death.1 The new allegations, which have become broadly public only since 2013, are considerably more serious and include coercive—indeed, “violent”—advances toward a number of women over three decades, including many students and others in subordinate positions. Further, Yoder abused the power of his reputation by intimidating the president and other administrators of AMBS, compelling them to keep the matter quiet as he slipped away to a more prestigious appointment at Notre Dame in 1984.2 According to some witnesses, this inappropriate behavior continued at Notre Dame. [End Page 210]These revelations have complicated the process of writing even a simple review.3 Were Yoder an astrophysicist with groundbreaking discoveries regarding dark matter, we would be disappointed with his behavior, but we would not challenge on those grounds the veracity of his discovery. With Christian ethics, the issue is more complicated, especially for someone of Yoder’s stature whose persona suggested that he was committed to and embodied, however imperfectly, what he proclaimed. Reading these volumes a second time has brought several jarring moments. For example, in both volumes, Yoder defines in almost identical language the temptation of “egocentric altruism”:The real temptation of good people like us is not the crude, the crass, and the carnal as those traits are defined in Puritanism. The real refined temptation, with which Jesus himself was tried, was that of egocentric altruism, of being oneself the incarnation of a good and righteous cause for which others are to suffer, of stating our self-justification in the form of a duty to others.(Revolutionary Christianity, 83; Essential Writings, 144)Consider also the following statement on religious liberty, which is certainly prescient in view of the current conflicts being played out in the courts: “Religious liberty is not only a necessary limitation upon the power of the state; it also marks a voluntary renunciation by the church of any capacity to coerce” (Revolutionary Christianity, 11). At the very least, then, perhaps we should read Yoder’s misdeeds as a warning: even we may be tempted by the crude and the carnal as well as by egocentric altruism; when threatened, even we may resort to coercion.The fourteen lectures in Revolutionary Christianity, published here for the first time, are organized into three sections—“The Believers Church,” “Peace,” and “Church in a Revolutionary World”—roughly the order of presentation to predominantly Mennonite and Anabaptist groups in Montevideo and Buenos Aires in May–June 1966. Written and delivered when Yoder was only thirty-eight and not yet a full-time faculty member, it is remarkable how fully they anticipate his later work. Clearly he mined them for later writings. The four lectures titled “The Believers Church” may be the best theological introduction available to the Anabaptist/Mennonite tradition. Yoder’s description of the church as a community of forgiveness, discernment, grace; of the mandate to share; and of a morality of participation and community... (shrink)

The social thought of Castoriadis and Lefort address Old World constellations. Yet both are positioned in a critical relationship to the Enlightenment and Romanticism, and pose questions about power, the political and citizenship relevant to different civilizational settings. Two political philosophies that emerged in the era of revolutionary critique are examined in this paper alongside Castoriadis and Lefort. Thomas Jefferson’s philosophy of republic and empire and Simon Bolivar’s creed of independence were American visions that connected with the political imaginary. Each (...) set down traditions open to interpretation and mythologisation. Both invoked an older rivalry of two images of the New World, as American or as Colombian, which was really a rivalry of Spanish and British Empires and their civilizational influences. Where earlier republican visions developed at the cusp of virtue and interest cultures had posed a particular range of questions about democracy, civic constitution and independence, American states now contained democratic and authoritarian potential. Even though Castoriadis and Lefort did not make these American contexts the centre of their work, each conceive the political and politics in ways that are relevant to American modernities. A key argument put in this paper with respect to Castoriadis and Lefort is that Castoriadis’s conception of creation is more salient to the republican revolutions more generally, while Lefort’s notion of political imaginary finds a strong case in the North American revolution. (shrink)

This article discusses Leo Tolstoy’s view of the Russian revolutionary movement. Taking as a focal point the writer’s lifelong interest in the Decembrist uprising of 1825 and particularly in the personalities of the gentry revolutionaries, the article argues that Tolstoy’s fascination for these figures was due to their superior moral qualities, rather than to their political and socioeconomic doctrines. Following Alexander Herzen, Tolstoy came to regard the Decembrists as full-fledged individualities and “beautiful souls”. Thus, Tolstoy’s much debated “conversion” and (...) subsequent attempts to transform literary art into a medium of religious and moral reform can also be viewed as extensions of his project of self-understanding and self-formation according to the model of kalokagathia provided by Russia’s aristocratic revolutionaries. (shrink)

The 1790 Fête de la fédération in the early French Revolution evoked the memory of the taking of the Bastille while tamping down on the simmering social forces that had erupted on 14 July 1789. How to do both? As an official architect put it, through the festival, ‘the sentiment of each becomes the sentiment of all by a kind of electrification, against which even the most perverse men cannot defend themselves’. This paper argues that a new language of revolutionary (...) electricity came into being with the French Revolution. It argues that revolutionaries drew upon concepts of medical electricity developed in the 1780s to analogize the literal electricity of the ether to the revolutionary electricity of collective political sentiment. Though historians have associated electricity with radical politics, this paper argues that in the hands of bureaucrats and festival planners, electricity entered revolutionary discourse as a powerful mechanism for exercising authority and control over an unruly revolutionary public. (shrink)

This article argues that by recognizing the fundamental relationship between praxical time and dwelling as a matrix of interweaving modes of being, society can subvert the potential reification of humanity by technology. This can only be achieved through a democratic process that involves participatory agents not only at the design level but also in the event of naming future innovations. By looking at the work of Alain Badiou, it is shown how a fusion of Heideggerian-inspired phenomenology and speculative ontology is (...) critical for the advancement of social theory, as revolutionary technologies become increasingly immersive. (shrink)