Radical Philoso~~y_7_ __
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political and economic theory: and we want to
develop awareness of the conditions in which
philosophy is actually produced – which means
bourgeois academic institutions.
(See the article
by Jon Davies on what it means to take a degree,
and also parts of Ranci~re’s wide-ranging
critique of his former teacher Althusser in the
context of May 1968, both printed below) .
These wants are common to people who are subjectively Marxists and to people who are not; and
most (but not all) the work which caters to them
comes under the umbrella of Marxism. Whether
these wants are in fact objectively Marxlst is
another question; and it is one for which the
Radical Philosophy Group does not pretend to
have an agreed answer.
But it is certainly a
question we ought to discuss in coming issues:
so please write.
This magazine has been coming out for about two
years; and its policy is more definite now than
when it began. But there is one issue which
people continually accuse us of evading: is
Radical Philosophy a journal of Marxist theory?
Roughly half the material we have printed
has been Marxist – or rather subjectively Marxist
-i.e. the authors ·have intended it as a contribution to Marxism. On the other hand, the Marxist
articles printed in Radical Philosophy represent
an extremely wide range of opinions; and anyway
Radical Philosophy prints a lot of material which
1s not Marxist.
But this does not mean that the policy of
Radical Philosophy is disunited.
It only means
that the unity of the magazine is not the unity
either of a theoretical position or of a political
programme. The present state of philosophy in the
English speaking world means that i t would be
death for Radical Philosophy to go in for cultivating a mandarin purity of doctrine. The Radical
Philosophy Group is united by the practical aim
of creating conditions where something vigorous
and committed can rise from the arid ashes of
English language philosophy. The object of the
~agazine is to help and encourage various people
who in a variety of ways are trying to make this
happen. We (the production group concerned with
this issue of the magazine) feel ~hat we won’t
further this aim by concentrating on producing
sophisticated and expensive theory (like New Left
Review, Economy and Society, or Theoretical
Practice), or by agreeing on a definite theoretical
destination and printing articles which help mark
out the way (like the Bulletin of the Conference
of Socialist Economists). Our aims are different
– but,not conflicting.
We want to get away from the idea that philosophy is a sort of disembodied thing in itself,
with a history all of its own, recorded in the
orthodox histories of philosophy (or should we
call them mythologies of philosophy?); we want
to encourage links between philosophy and the
study of literature,philosophy and psychoanalysis,
philosophy and history, philosophy and social,
Please send us all sorts of material for future
issues. We would welcome not only main articles,
but also suggestions as to what we might reprint or
translate, and any exciting or scandalous philosophical events. We are hoping to run a series of articles
soon on forgotten or misunderstood philosophical
thinkers, and would welcome suggestions for subjects
or offers to contribute. We are also planning to
concentrate on the philosophy of education in a
future issue: do you have any suggestions, first hand
accounts of being taught the subject, etc?
Do you want to try and find people to discuss
things with? If there is sufficient demand, there
will be a column in future issues to enable you to
do this. Write to Tony Skillen (Keynes College,
University of Kent at Canterbury) .
If you want to review a book, write to Tony
Skillen and he will see if he can get a copy of it
for you.
Deadlines for the next issue of Radical Philosophy
(No.S, Summer 1974) are 1 March for main articles and
22 March for other things. Please send contributions
(typed and in triplicate if possible) to Jonathan
Ree, Middlesex Polytechnic at Hendon, ~he Burroughs,
London NW4 4BT.
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