Politics in a Tragic Key

In memory of Joel Olson (1967–2012) In the quarter-century or so since the obscure disaster of the Soviet bloc’s collapse, two words have been pinned to that of ‘communism’ with liberal abandon: ‘tragedy’ and ‘transition’. Tragedy, to signify the magnitude of suffering, but not the greatness of the enterprise; the depth of the fall, but […]

Citizens’ agora: The new urban question

Comment Citizens’ agora The new urban question Andy merrifield What would Rousseau, who penned his classic Discourse on Inequality in 1755, have made of things today? Had he still been around, had he travelled around the globe a bit, he’d have doubtless despaired of how little ‘civilized’ society had ameliorated the ‘artificial’ inequalities that derive […]

Truth and Relativity: An Exchange: 1. Sean Sayers' Relativism; 2. Once more on Relative Truth: A Reply to Skillen

TRUTH & RELATIVITY: AN EXCHANGE Sean Sayers’ Relativism Tony Skiffen For some years Sean Sayers has been urging, against empiricism and anal ytical philosophy, the virtues of dialecticallogic. Such logic, he believes, is essential to a proper understanding. I take issue with this view at the level of ‘logic and language’. It seems to me […]

38 Reviews

REVIEWS Martin Hollis and Steven Lukes (eds.), Rationality and Relativism, Basil Blackwell, 1982 .Bryan Wilson’s anthology of essays on ‘Rationality’, first published in 1970, has become something of a minor classic in recent analytical philosophy, bringing together the main contributions to a lively and accessible debate, and providing the starting-point for a host of subsequent […]

On Materialism

On Materialism· Wal Suchting TEACHER SI FU TEACHER SI FU TEACHER SI FU Si Fu, name the basic questions of philosophy. Are things external to us, selfsufficient, independent of us, or are things in us, dependent on us, non-existent without us? What opinion is the correct one? There has been no decision about it …. […]

Freedom as the efficacy of knowledge

r..e edom as Ihe Bfficacy of knowledge Andrew Collier In this paper, I am primarily concerned with freedom in the metaphysical sense, not with political freedom. Nevertheless, some of my examples will have political import, and I do believe that there is a relation of theoretical support between the conception of freedom which I am […]

16 Reviews

Reviews Goodbye to all that’ ‘1 Perry Anderson, Considerations on western Marxism, New Left Books, 121pp, £4 Marx in British culture Through the sixties and early seventies English academic’ Marxism lay back with its legs open. We experienced the successive thrills of penetration by the giants of continental European Marxist philosophy. Lukacs, Korsch, Adorno (perhaps […]

On Dialectic

This paper is the first stage of an attempt to answer the question ‘What is dialectic?’ I assume no prior knowledge of the subject and only a minimal prior knowledge of philosophy. I am aware that this task has been attempted many times before. But one of the things which I have found particularly confusing […]

The Marxist Dialectic

as I ~have already said, this seems too banal and obvious. Hopefully not that’ everything is always changing’, since this is false. There is stability within change. We cannot describe change except by talking about ‘things which change’, and to say that a thing is changing is . to imply that within the process of […]

On Materialisms

expected is an analysis of our present situation with s’ome general guidelines for the transition to socialism. Dialectical change provides us with ever new situations which for an understanding demand that a wide range of experience .be drawn upon from within and without the revolutionary core. This in turn requires a respect for the opinions […]

Discussion: Dialectic

Discussion Dialeclics IN SEARCH OF DIALECTIC I am going to make some criticisms of dialectic as it is presented in the two papers in :R adical Philosophy 14. Richard Norman quotes with approval Engels’s criticism that Hegel failed to distinguish between a dialectic of concepts and a dialectic of the real world. He then takes […]

Jospeh Dietzgen

Joseph Dj-elzgeD This article is the first of a series on neglected philosophers. Some subjects will, like Dietzgen, be largely unknown, others simply forgotten by British philosophy departments. Later articles will (we hope) include introductions to Merleau-Ponty, Cassirer, Collingwood and Fouca~lt. Other suggestions would be welcome JOSEPH DIETZGEN is indeed a neglected philosopher. How many […]