Interview: Ernesto Laclau

 December 1, 2007  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

CONFRONTING THE CONFUSION and fragmentation that wrought progressive politics in recent decades, Ernesto Laclau’s work attempts to theorize the path to the construction of a radical democratic politics. Drawing on Gramsci’s concept of hegemony to devise his own theory by that name, Laclau describes the processes of social articulation that creates popular political identities. By redefining democratic politics as the construction of hegemony, Laclau reminds political actors of the work necessary to construct the plurality of democratic structures vital to any emancipatory political project. [Read More]
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The 3 Rs: Reform, Revolution, and "Resistance"

The Problematic Forms of "Anticapitalism" Today

 November 6, 2007  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

A moderated panel discussion and audience Q & A on problems of strategies and tactics on the Left today, held on November 6, 2007, at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Audio Recording Your browser does not support the audio element Transcripted in Platypus Review #4 Panelists Michael Albert (Z Magazine, author of Parecon: Life After Capitalism) Chris Cutrone (Platypus) Stephen Duncombe (Gallatin School of New York University, editor of Cultural Resistance Reader) [Read More]
3rs  Anti-capitalism  Reform  Resistance  Revolution 

The Left is dead! Long live the Left!

Vicissitudes of historical consciousness and possibilities for emancipatory social politics today

 November 1, 2007  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society  • Other languages: Ελληνικά

The tradition of all dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brains of the living. —Karl Marx, The 18th Brumaire of Louis Napoleon (1852) The theorist who intervenes in practical controversies nowadays discovers on a regular basis and to his shame that whatever ideas he might contribute were expressed long ago – and usually better the first time around. —Theodor W. Adorno, “Sexual Taboos and the Law Today” (1963) [Read More]
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