Poses of the World develops a theory of the pluralistic coexistence of politics with aesthetic, scientific, ethical and economic procedures that have sought to influence, dominate or even replace politics.
We are accustomed to saying that everything is political. It is true that politics has throughout history ventured into the domains that used to be non-political, be they art, science or economy. However, rather than being totally dominated by politics, our societies are marked by the coexistence of diverse procedures, whose logics are distinct but nonetheless remain in contact, ranging from frontal conflict to lasting syntheses. This book develops a theory of this pluralistic coexistence. It builds upon the findings of the first two volumes of Void Universalism to outline an account of pluralism that affirms the incommensurable character of the procedures that regulate the manners of our being and acting in the world. Neither reducible to nor insulated from each other, politics, ethics, art, economy, science and numerous other procedures persist in errancy without ever cohering into any overarching unity. The book demonstrates how the abandonment of the aspiration for such coherence opens up new perspectives on the key sociopolitical debates of our time, from the critique of neoliberalism to concerns over cancel culture.
Systematic and accessible, this volume will be of interest to students and scholars of political science, philosophy, sociology, anthropology and cultural studies as well a wider readership beyond academia.
Introduction: On This and That
In Praise of Poseurs
Rethinking Pluralism
Politics and its Others
What is a Procedure?
Pluralism beyond Reductionism and Parallelism
PART 1. MAPPING THE PLURAL: ETHICS, AESTHETICS, GOVERNMENT, THEORY
Chapter 1. Ethics: The Deposition of the Self
In Excess of Every Totality
The Privilege of Asymmetry
The Expelled Other
Chapter 2. Aesthetics: The Composition of Forms
The Idle Work
The Ambivalence of Political Art
Becoming Beautiful
Chapter 3. Government: The Disposition of Things
The Providential Machine
Order and Equivalence
(Dis)Ordering Worlds
Chapter 4. Theory: The Exposition of the World
Capacity for Elaboration
The Paradoxes of Theoretical Politics
Omnipotence and Truth
Politics Revisited
Part II. NAVIGATING THE PLURAL: TEN THEOREMS OF PLURALISM
Chapter 5. Manners of Appearance: Procedures, Worlds and Objects
Procedures and Worlds
Procedures and Objects
A Tentative Typology
Chapter 6. From Plurality to Pluralism: Navigating between the Incommensurable
Beyond Reductionism: Saving Appearances
Beyond Parallelism: Coexistence without Coordination
Errancy: The Irreducibility of the Incommensurable
The Archipelago
Passages: From Domination to Synthesis
Chapter 7. Against the Temptation of Coherence
Integrity and the Limits of Politicization
The Incoherent: On Martin Heidegger and Michael Jackson
Objections: Domination, Revolution, Democracy
Chapter 8. The Shimmer of the World: Pluralism vs. Paradoxico-Criticism
The Many and the Fractured One
Is There a Monoculture?
The Powerless Paradox
Co-Appearance: Be
Beyond Event and Truth
Appendix: Ten Theorems of Pluralism
Bibliography
Index
Biography
Sergei Prozorov is Professor of Political Science at the University of Jyväskylä. He is the author of ten books including Ontology and World Politics: Void Universalism I and Theory of Political Subject: Void Universalism II, both published by Routledge. He has published over 30 articles in major international journals. His research interests include political theory, continental philosophy, biopolitics, democracy and totalitarianism.
