Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
One of the world's leading radical philosophers analyses the failure of the Syriza experience in Greece
In a series of seven trenchant interventions Alain Badiou analyses the decisive developments in Greece since 2011. Badiou considers this Mediterranean country -a sort of open-air political lesson-, with much to tell us about the wider situation. Greece is exemplary of -our fundamental contradictions in Europe, which are also ultimately the fundamental contradictions of the world such as it is--the world served up to the authoritarian anarchy of capitalism.-
Notwithstanding the Greeks' heartening opposition to the financial markets' hegemony, Badiou considers it also important to address the reasons why this opposition failed. -Movementist- politics may arouse widespread sympathy, but for the French philosopher they have -absolutely no effect other than to temporarily trap the movement in the negative weakness of its affects.-
Badiou argues that a consequential opposition inspired by the emancipatory politics of the past--or by what he calls -the communist hypothesis---should set its compass by the -orienting maxims- proposed in this book, defining a direction for political action.
Synopsis
One of the world's leading radical philosophers analyses the failure of the Syriza experience in Greece Over the last six years, Greece has provided the world with "an open-air political lesson." The country's deep economic and social crisis has exposed the fundamental contradictions of the European Union, and indeed the capitalist world as a whole. It has been a test case for movements seeking to put an end to the authoritarian anarchy of neoliberal capitalism. The Greek resistance to EU institutions and financial-market hegemony offered a beacon of hope. Yet the "movementist" politics of 2011 could not build anything lasting, and Syriza's efforts as a party of government soon led to impasse. For Alain Badiou, it is not enough to mourn this defeat--we must understand why such a vigorous opposition could fail.
Greece and the Reinvention of Politics argues that an opposition of real consequence must revive the "communist hypothesis," the vision of an alternative state structure. The "orienting maxims" that this hypothesis provides light the way for effective political action. Written in the storm of the crisis, the interventions collected in this book offer a path out of our contemporary powerlessness.