States of injury : power and freedom in late modernity / Wendy Brown.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Brown, Wendy, 1955- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Political science--Philosophy.

Political science.

Power (Social sciences).

Culture.

Feminist theory.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (220 pages) : illustrations

Manufacture:

Baltimore, Md. : Project MUSE, 2021

Place of Publication:

Princeton, New Jersey : Princeton University Press, 1995.

Summary:

Whether in characterizing Catharine MacKinnon's theory of gender as itself pornographic or in identifying liberalism as unable to make good on its promises, Wendy Brown pursues a central question: how does a sense of woundedness become the basis for a sense of identity? Brown argues that efforts to outlaw hate speech and pornography powerfully legitimize the state: such apparently well-intentioned attempts harm victims further by portraying them as so helpless as to be in continuing need of governmental protection. "Whether one is dealing with the state, the Mafia, parents, pimps, police, or husbands," writes Brown, "the heavy price of institutionalized protection is always a measure of dependence and agreement to abide by the protector's rules." True democracy, she insists, requires sharing power, not regulation by it; freedom, not protection. Refusing any facile identification with one political position or another, Brown applies her argument to a panoply of topics, from the basis of litigiousness in political life to the appearance on the academic Left of themes of revenge and a thwarted will to power. These and other provocations in contemporary political thought and political life provide an occasion for rethinking the value of several of the last two centuries' most compelling theoretical critiques of modern political life, including the positions of Nietzsche, Marx, Weber, and Foucault.

Contents:

Front matter

Contents

Preface

Acknowledgments

CHAPTER ONE. Introduction: Freedom and the Plastic Cage

CHAPTER TWO. Postmodern Exposures, Feminist Hesitations

CHAPTER THREE. Wounded Attachments

CHAPTER FOUR. The Mirror of Pornography

CHAPTER FIVE. Rights and Losses

CHAPTER SIX. Liberalism's Family Values

CHAPTER SEVEN. Finding the Man in the State

Index

Notes:

Published by Princeton University Press.

This book has been composed in Bembo.

Princeton University Press books are printed on acid-free paper and meet the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on: online resource; title from pdf title page (ACLS Humanities, viewed January 12, 2021).

ISBN:

9780691029900

0691029903

9780691201399

0691201390

OCLC:

1145417514