The Pervert's Guide to Political Philosophy: Agonism and the Ontology of Power. Issue 4 (2nd October 2022)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Castro-Gomez, Santiago
• Is Part Of: Critical horizons. Volume 23:Issue 4(2022)
• Page Start: 311
• Page End: 329
• Publication Date: 2022-10-02
• Subjects: Žižek -- foucault -- agonism -- transcendental subject -- political thought; Critical theory -- Periodicals; 142.05
• DOI: 10.1080/14409917.2022.2104079
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1440-9917

Abstract

ABSTRACT: This article is a slightly modified version of the first part of Chapter 4 of Revoluciones sin sujeto. Slavoj Žižek's y la crítica del historicismo posmoderno (Madrid: Akal, 2015) translated by Douglas Kristopher Smith and Nicolas Lema Habash. This text seeks to overcome the scission between Slavoy Žižek and Michel Foucault by challenging the notion that Foucault lacks an ontology of power, beyond contingent historical processes. By exposing the underlying Nietzschean relational ontology of struggle—as distinct from a fundamental, positive grounding—in Foucault's work, the piece shows how this aspect has been largely misunderstood—including by Žižek himself. Furthermore, it demonstrates how this agonistic ontology of human experience can serve to shed light on Žižek's notion of the incompleteness of the subject by bringing it into the realm of politics.