Synopses & Reviews
'We know that communism is the right hypothesis. All those who abandon this hypothesis immediately resign themselves to the market economy, to parliamentary democracy'"'"the form of state suited to capitalism'"'"and to the inevitable and 'natural" character of the most monstrous inequalities.''"Alain Badiou
Alain Badiou"s formulation of the 'communist hypothesis' has traveled around the world since it was first aired in early 2008, in his book The Meaning of Sarkozy. The hypothesis is partly a demand to reconceptualize communism after the twin deaths of the Soviet Union and neoliberalism, but also a fresh demand for universal emancipation. As 'third way' reforms prove as empty in practice as in theory, Badiou"s manifesto is a galvanizing call to arms that needs to be reckoned with by anyone concerned with the future of our planet.
Review
"Shaking the foundations of Western liberal democracy." Cleveland Plain Dealer
Review
"Now, more than ever, one should insist on what Badiou calls the 'eternal' Idea of Communism." Slavoj Zizek
Review
"An heir to Jean-Paul Sartre and Louis Althusser." Lucy Wadham
Review
"One of the saddest, funniest books of the the past twenty years ... he writes in a daft reverie." New Statesman
Synopsis
A new program for the Left after the death of neoliberalism.
About the Author
Alain Badiou teaches philosophy at the École normale supérieure and the Collège international de philosophie in Paris. In addition to several novels, plays and political essays, he has published a number of major philosophical works, including Theory of the Subject, Being and Event, Manifesto for Philosophy, and Gilles Deleuze. His recent books include The Meaning of Sarkozy, Ethics, Metapolitics, Polemics, The Communist Hypothesis, Five Lessons on Wagner, and Wittgenstein’s Anti-Philosophy.