New Demons : Rethinking Power and Evil Today / Simona Forti.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Forti, Simona, Author.

Contributor:

Hanafi, Zakiya

Series:

Cultural Memory in the Present

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Ethics, Modern--19th century.

Ethics, Modern--20th century.

Good and evil.

Political science--Philosophy.

Power (Philosophy).

Local Subjects:

Ethics, Modern--19th century.

Ethics, Modern--20th century.

Good and evil.

Political science--Philosophy.

Power (Philosophy).

Physical Description:

1 online resource (413 p.)

Place of Publication:

Stanford, CA : Stanford University Press, [2020]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

As long as we care about suffering in the world, says political philosopher Simona Forti, 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, Forti concludes that it is time to leave behind what she calls "the Dostoevsky paradigm": the dualistic vision of an omnipotent monster pitted against absolute, helpless victims. No longer capable of grasping the normalization of evil in today's world—whose structures of power have been transformed—this paradigm has exhausted its explanatory force. In its place, Forti offers 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 she 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, she contends, 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.

Contents:

Front matter

Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

1. The Dostoevsky Paradigm

2. Instincts, Drives, and Their Vicissitudes: Nietzsche and Freud

3. Ontological Evil and the Transcendence of Evil

4. Thanatopolitics and Absolute Victims

5. The Legend of the Grand Inquisitor Reinterpreted from Below

6. A Different Genealogy: The Evil of Docility

7. Strategies of Obedience and the Ethos of Freedom

8. Parrhesia Put to the Test: Practices of Dissidence Between Eastern and Western Europe

9. Poor Devils Who “Worship” Life: Us

Notes

Index of Names

Cultural Memory in the Present

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 23. Jul 2020)

ISBN:

9780804792981

0804792984

OCLC:

1178769946