Alain Badiou
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.Blog
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An Introduction to Radical Thinkers at the ICA - Preliminary readings
The following extracts, free to download, accompany An Introduction to Radical Thinkers: a fortnightly series of events begining 9th April at the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA), London.
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The Essential Verso Undergraduate Reading List
If you think the latest tome of Giddens’ Sociology is the one textbook you need to get you through your undergraduate days, think again. Impress your tutor and learn something beyond the lecture theatre with these essential Verso titles.
Bolster any politics, philosophy, economics, literature, sociology or history essay with one of these books and not only score the grade, but begin your lifelong love affair with radical writers.
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Concept and Form: Miller writes to Hallward and Badiou responds
Following the publication of Concept and Form, a two-volume edition examining the work and legacy of the philosophy journal the Cahiers pour l’Analyse, writer and psychoanalyst Jacques-Alain Miller wrote an open letter to editor Peter Hallward. Below we publish the response from philosopher Alain Badiou.
Books
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Rhapsody for the Theatre
by Alain Badiou -
Reflections on Anti-Semitism
by Alain Badiou, Eric Hazan, et al. -
Wittgenstein's Anti-Philosophy
by Alain Badiou
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Ethics
by Alain Badiou -
Philosophy for Militants
by Alain Badiou -
The Adventure of French Philosophy
by Alain Badiou
Discussions
Discussions occur on book pages throughout the site. The most recent discussions about the works of Alain Badiou are listed below.
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Alain Badiou's political writings, such as his recent Communist Hypothesis, are marked by their association with his theory of the Event (characterised by some as akin to a miracle) and the notion of a politics "at a distance from the state". This has led to criticisms regarding the abstraction of Badiou's politics and the lack of organisational mediations. For example, Luke Evans in Socialist Review says: "Badiou's conflict between the "Event" and the "State" leaves no space for how the immediate struggle for reforms may change gradually over time and become a revolutionary movement as the working class begins to realise its own power. Rather Badiou's revolution is a sudden movement of force. Revolutions don't seem to be able to emerge as a result of the obvious struggles and conflicts that we all see and live through right now." In the face of pressures pushing in the direction of political "realism" and even electoralism, is Badiou's stance a necessary corrective, or rather a replay of classic debates on abstentionism, ultra-leftism and so on?