New demons : rethinking power and evil today / Simona Forti ; translated by Zakiya Hanafi.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Forti, Simona, author.

Series:

Cultural memory in the present

Standardized Title:

Nuovi demoni. English

Language:

English

Italian

Subjects (All):

Good and evil.

Power (Philosophy).

Ethics, Modern--19th century.

Ethics, Modern.

Ethics, Modern--20th century.

Political science--Philosophy.

Political science.

Physical Description:

xiv, 388 pages ; 24 cm.

Place of Publication:

Stanford, California : Stanford University Press, [2015]

Language Note:

Translated from the Italian.

Summary:

As long as we care about suffering in the world we are compelled to inquire into the question of evil. But is the concept of "evil" still useful in a postmodern landscape where absolute values have been leveled and relativized by a historicist perspective? Given our current unwillingness to judge others, what signposts remain to guide our ethical behavior? Surveying the nineteenth- and twentieth-century Western philosophical debates on evil, political philosopher Simon Forti concludes that it is time to leave behind "the Dostoevsky paradigm": the dualistic vision of an omnipotent monster pitted against absolute, helpless victims. An inaccurate account of evil in today's world-whose structures of power have been transformed - this paradigm has exhausted its explanatory force. In its place, we get a different genealogy of the relationship between evil and power, one that finally calls into question power's recurrent link to transgression. At the center of contemporary evil Forti posits the passive attitude towards rule-following, the need for normalcy, and the desire for obedience nurtured by our contemporary mass democracies. In our times, evil must be explored in tandem with our stubborn desire to stay alive at all costs as much as with our deep need for recognition: the new modern absolutes. A courageous book, New Demons extends an original, inspiring call to ethical living in a biopolitical age. Book jacket.

Contents:

The Dostoevsky paradigm

Instincts, drives, and their vicissitudes : Nietzsche and Freud

Ontological evil and the transcendence of evil

Interlude : hypermoral biopolitics

Thanatopolitics and absolute victims

The legend of the grand inquisitor reinterpreted from below

A different genealogy : the evil of docility

Strategies of obedience and the ethos of freedom

Parrhesia put to the test : practices of dissidence between eastern and western Europe

Poor devils who "worship" life : us.

Notes:

"First published as I nuovi demoni in March 2012 by Giangiacomo Feltrinelli Editore, Milan, Italy."

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780804786249

0804786240

9780804792950

080479295X

OCLC:

896598071