Description
Book SynopsisLooks at qustions, such as: What happens to left and liberal political orientations when faith in progress is broken, when both the sovereign individual and sovereign states seem tenuous, when desire seems as likely to seek punishment as freedom, when all political conviction is revealed as contingent and subjective?
Trade Review"
Politics Out of History speaks in illuminating ways to distinctive features of contemporary experience. Wendy Brown's work commands widespread attention and respect, and there has been considerable interest as to how it would develop after
States of Injury. This book will not disappoint."
—William Connolly, The Johns Hopkins University, author of Why I Am Not a Secularist"Brown shows enormous skill in interpreting difficult texts, sounding them to their depths, and eliciting from them some of their most subtle meanings. Her book is steadily absorbing, and provides a genuine contribution to political theory."
—George Kateb, Princeton UniversityTable of ContentsAcknowledgment ix 1. INTRODUCTION: Politics Out of History 3 2. SYMPTOMS: Moralism as Anti-Politics 18 3. DESIRE: The Desire to Be Punished: Freud's "'A Child Is Being Beaten'" 45 4. POWER: Power without Logic without Marx 62 5. POLITICS: Politics without Banisters: Genealogical Politics in Nietzsche an Foucault 91 6. DEMOCRACY: Democracy against Itself: Nietzsche's Challenge 121 7. FUTURES: Specters an Angels: Benjamin an Derrida 138 Note 175 Index 189
