Redirecting Radical Democracy
From Antagonism to Alienation
How can radical democracy address today’s problems of alienation, manifested as precarisation?
- Presents a deeper understanding of the challenges that alienation – manifested in particular as precarisation – poses to democracies and democratic movements today
- Brings together leading contemporary work in radical democratic theory and critical theory, in particular the work of Chantal Mouffe and Rahel Jaeggi
- Critically examines the deep assumptions about the individual subject in both radical democracy and the theory of alienation
- Rethinks radical democracy by retrieving elements of the left-wing tradition from which it emerged
Today, alienation manifests itself primarily as precarisation and deprofessionalisation. When the subject’s work security or professional autonomy is undermined, relations – not only to others, but also to one's self – can become inhibited. This book shows that while alienation poses serious problems to modern democracies, it is a form of social suffering that is particularly difficult for democratic theory – preoccupied by the political – to address.
The book highlights that not even radical democracy, which emphasises the importance of social resistance, can include the alienated. Sofia Anceau Helander shows this is not merely due to the historical emergence of radical democracy and its turn away from traditional socialism, but also to a deeper problem in the theory itself. Helander argues that in order to address alienation, radical democracy – as both normative theory and political strategy, must be reformulated starting with its deep assumptions about the subject.
Acknowledgements
Introductioni. From Antagonism to Alienationii. Alienation todayiii. The problem: addressing alienation in a radical and open wayiv. Radical democracy – the strongest answerv. What is missing? The theoretical gapvi. The status of the argumentv. Significance and contribution
Outline: Radical Democracy
1. From the Social to the Political – the Emergence and Disappearance of the Concept of Alienationi. The turn from the economic to the social – the emergence of the concept of alienationii. The turn from the social to the political – the disappearance of the concept of alienation
2. Antagonism or Alienationi. Open and radical – the aims of radical democracyii. A radical democratic concept of alienation?iii. The agonistiv. Conclusion
Alienation
1. Alienation of the Knower, the Producer and the Actori. Hegel’s alienation of the knowerii. Marx’s alienation of the produceriii. The alienation of the actoriv. Open and radical?
Conclusion
1. Towards an Open and Radical Concept of Alienationi.Reconstructing the concept of alienation – resources and challengesii. Appropriation – a conceptual clarificationiii. Impaired appropriation as dominationiv. Impaired appropriation as disorientation
Conclusion
1. Alienation versus Acediai. Defining and distinguishing the concept of alienationii. Radical and open?iii. Alienation versus Acedia
Conclusion: Against Alienation – Redirecting Radical Democracy
1. Reformulating Agonistic Democracy and its Subjecti. Reformulating the subjectii. From antagonism to alienationiii. Is the theory still agonistic?iv. Towards a multi-scalar agonism
2. Redirecting the Radical Democratic Strategyi. The struggle with and against alienationii. Who to include?iii. How to organize?iv. What to demand?
Conclusioni. Lessons for the Radical Democratic Struggleii. Alienation beyond the Process of Precarization
Bibliography
Sofia Helander moves radical democratic theory beyond the implausible assumption of a political subject who is already as flexible, strong and conflict-seeking as neoliberalism demands. By recuperating the concept of alienation, Redirecting Radical Democracy makes agonistic democracy speak more meaningfully to our contemporary social condition of precarity.
