In this posthumous collection of writings, Cornelius Castoriadis (1922-1997) pursues his incisive analysis of modern society, the philosophical basis of our ability to change it, and the points of intersection between his many approaches to this theme. His main philosophical postulate, that the human subject and society are not predetermined, asserts the primacy of creation and the possibility of creative, autonomous activity in every domain. This argument is combined with penetrating political and social criticism, opening numerous avenues of critical thought and action.
The book's wide-ranging topics include the core worldview of ancient Athens, where the idea of self-creation and self-limitation made democracy possible; the wealth of poetic resources; a deconstruction of the so-called rationality of capitalism and of the current conception of democracy, along with a discussion of what a radical, revolutionary project means today; the role of what he calls the radical imagination in the creation of both societal institutions and history; the roots of hate; a psychoanalytic view of human development torn between heteronomy and autonomy; the role of education in forming autonomous individuals; and notions of chaos, space, and number.

In this vibrant debate with intellectuals influenced by Marcel Mauss, including Alain Caille and Chantal Mouffe, the incisive Greek-French activist and philosopher Cornelius Castoriadis addresses the challenge of critical thinking in an international context. The first half explores the tradition of radical self-critique and the prospect of affirming its value in a non-ethnocentric way. While defending ancient Greek contributions to the Western tradition of radical self-critique - including the practice of "relativizing" one's own culture, of engaging in philosophical interrogation, and of establishing democratic institutions - Castoriadis is challenged to explore the trans-contextual features of any self-critical, or "autonomous," social institution. In the second half Castoriadis offers a penetrating critique of representative democracy, and the discussion makes important strides toward a new conception of direct democracy, of political education, and of the institutional prerequisites for the continuation of radical self-critique in politics and philosophy.

In this vibrant debate with intellectuals influenced by Marcel Mauss, including Alain Caille and Chantal Mouffe, the incisive Greek-French activist and philosopher Cornelius Castoriadis addresses the challenge of critical thinking in an international context. The first half explores the tradition of radical self-critique and the prospect of affirming its value in a non-ethnocentric way. While defending ancient Greek contributions to the Western tradition of radical self-critique - including the practice of "relativizing" one's own culture, of engaging in philosophical interrogation, and of establishing democratic institutions - Castoriadis is challenged to explore the trans-contextual features of any self-critical, or "autonomous," social institution. In the second half Castoriadis offers a penetrating critique of representative democracy, and the discussion makes important strides toward a new conception of direct democracy, of political education, and of the institutional prerequisites for the continuation of radical self-critique in politics and philosophy.

This is a collection of interviews in which Cornelius Castoriadis discusses his key works and ideas. Cornelius Castoriadis (1922-1997) was a philosopher, social critic, political activist, practicisn psychoanalyst and professional economist. His work is widely recognized as one of the most singular and important contributions to twentieth-century thought. In this collection of interviews, Castoriadis discusses some of his most important ideas with leading figures in the disciplines that play such a crucial part in his philosophical work: poetry, psychoanalysis, biology and mathematics. Available in English for the first time, these interviews provide a concise and accessible introduction to his work as a whole, allowing him to draw on the astounding breadth of his knowledge (ranging from philosophy and mathematics to political theory and psychoanalysis). They also render Castoriadis' cutting, polemical and entertaining style while displaying the originality and clarity of his primary concepts. Intellectually provoking, this timely collection shows how Castoriadis' polemics are sharp and riveting, his conceptual manoeuvres rigorous and original, and his passion inspiring. This is an excellent introduction to one of Europe's most important intellectuals.

The privileged link of psychoanalysis to spoken language does not necessarily facilitate communication among analysts and psychotherapists of different mother tongues. The Journal of European Psychoanalysis published since 1995 has long sought to overcome these linguistic barriers. Traditionally, it has introduced English readers to important European authors, as well as to authors of Latin American countries whose paradigms are close to European "styles." Freed of the editorial and political constraints that often govern the official organs of schools and institutions, the Journal of European Psychoanalysis has, for many years, regularly featured conversations with some of the most prominent and brilliant figures in contemporary psychoanalysis: highlighting debates and trends within psychoanalysis and related fields while remaining ever-sensitive to the practical, ethical, and theoretical implications of clinical practice. In Freud's Tracks collects some of the most engaging and provocative of these conversations, thus tracing a recent history of psychoanalysis in Europe while also evidencing the discipline's vital and vibrant connections with the fields of politics and social policy, science and philosophy, cultural studies and the social sciences."

This posthumous collection of interviews and occasional papers given by Castoriadis between 1974 and 1997 is a lively, direct introduction to the thinking of a writer who never abandoned his radically critical stance. It provides a clear, handy resume of his political ideas, in advance of their times and profoundly relevant to today's world. For this political thinker and longtime militant (co-founder with Claude Lefort of the revolutionary group "Socialisme ou Barbarie"), economist, psychoanalyst, and philosopher, two endless interrogations-how to understand the world and life in society-were intertwined with his own life and combats. An important chapter discusses the history of "Socialisme ou Barbarie" (1949-1967); in it, Castoriadis presents the views he defended, in that group, on a number of subjects: a critique of Marxism and of the Soviet Union, the bureaucratization of society and of the workers' movement, and the primacy of individual and collective autonomy. Another chapter presents the concept, central to his thinking, of "imaginary significations" as what make a society "cohere." Castoriadis constantly returns to the question of democracy as the never-finished, deliberate creation by the people of societal institutions, analyzing its past and its future in the Western world. He scathingly criticizes "representative" democracy and develops a conception of direct democracy extending to all spheres of social life. He wonders about the chances of achieving freedom and autonomy-those requisites of true democracy-in a world of endless, meaningless accumulation of material goods, where the mechanisms for governing society have disintegrated, the relationship with nature is reduced to one of destructive domination, and, above all, the population has withdrawn from the public sphere: a world dominated by hobbies and lobbies-"a society adrift."

In this posthumous collection of writings, Cornelius Castoriadis (1922-1997) pursues his incisive analysis of modern society, the philosophical basis of our ability to change it, and the points of intersection between his many approaches to this theme. His main philosophical postulate, that the human subject and society are not predetermined, asserts the primacy of creation and the possibility of creative, autonomous activity in every domain. This argument is combined with penetrating political and social criticism, opening numerous avenues of critical thought and action.
The book's wide-ranging topics include the core worldview of ancient Athens, where the idea of self-creation and self-limitation made democracy possible; the wealth of poetic resources; a deconstruction of the so-called rationality of capitalism and of the current conception of democracy, along with a discussion of what a radical, revolutionary project means today; the role of what he calls the radical imagination in the creation of both societal institutions and history; the roots of hate; a psychoanalytic view of human development torn between heteronomy and autonomy; the role of education in forming autonomous individuals; and notions of chaos, space, and number.

This posthumous book represents the first publication of one of the seminars of Cornelius Castoriadis, a renowned and influential figure in twentieth-century thought. A close reading of Plato's "Statesman," it is an exemplary instance of Castoriadis's pragmatic, pertinent, and discriminating approach to thinking and reading a great work: "I mean really reading it, by respecting it without respecting it, by going into the recesses and details without having decided in advance that everything it contains is coherent, homogeneous, makes sense, and is true."
Castoriadis brings out what he calls "The Statesman"'s "quirky structure," with its three digressions, its eight incidental points, and its two definitions, neither of which is deemed good. He does not hesitate to differ with the text, to show that what is, in appearance, secondary is really essential, and that the denunciation of the Sophists accommodates itself quite well to the use of sophistical procedures. Castoriadis shows how "The Statesman" takes us into the heart of what is distinctive in the late Plato: blending, acceptance of the mixed, of the intermediate.
These transcriptions of Cornelius's afford the reader an opportunity to discover his trenchant, convincing, energetic, provocative, and often droll voice. Here is a hitherto unknown Castoriadis, who reflects as he speaks, collects himself, corrects himself, and doesn't hesitate to revisit key points. In short, this is Castoriadis's thinking in action.

This book collects 12 previously untranslated lectures by Castoriadis from 1982 to 1983. Castoriadis focuses on the interconnection between philosophy and democracy and the way both emerge within a self-critical imaginary already in development in the work of early Greek poets and Presocratic philosophers. Displaying both mastery of the relevant scholarship and original interpretation, he reveals the birth of a society that would place its highest value in calling itself and its institutions into question. He argues that this spirit would develop directly into the twin signatures of the Greek world, namely radical philosophy, on the one hand, and radical democratic practices, on the other. Like no previous interpreter, Castoriadis allows us to feel the existential need, already present in the earliest Greek thinkers, to question the significance of human existence and to share in shaping its meaning. The Greeks not only did this, he argues, they also began the equally important work of establishing the institutions to support such a project.

This posthumous collection of interviews and occasional papers given by Castoriadis between 1974 and 1997 is a lively, direct introduction to the thinking of a writer who never abandoned his radically critical stance. It provides a clear, handy résumé of his political ideas, in advance of their times and profoundly relevant to today’s world. For this political thinker and longtime militant (co-founder with Claude Lefort of the revolutionary group “Socialisme ou Barbarie”), economist, psychoanalyst, and philosopher, two endless interrogations—how to understand the world and life in society—were intertwined with his own life and combats. An important chapter discusses the history of “Socialisme ou Barbarie” (1949—1967); in it, Castoriadis presents the views he defended, in that group, on a number of subjects: a critique of Marxism and of the Soviet Union, the bureaucratization of society and of the workers’ movement, and the primacy of individual and collective autonomy. Another chapter presents the concept, central to his thinking, of “imaginary significations” as what make a society “cohere.” Castoriadis constantly returns to the question of democracy as the never-finished, deliberate creation by the people of societal institutions, analyzing its past and its future in the Western world. He scathingly criticizes “representative” democracy and develops a conception of direct democracy extending to all spheres of social life. He wonders about the chances of achieving freedom and autonomy—those requisites of true democracy—in a world of endless, meaningless accumulation of material goods, where the mechanisms for governing society have disintegrated, the relationship with nature is reduced to one of destructive domination, and, above all, the population has withdrawn from the public sphere: a world dominated by hobbies and lobbies—”a society adrift.”

This collection presents a broad and compelling overview of the most recent work by a world-renowned figure in contemporary thought. Starting from an inquiry that grows out of the specific context of a society that is experiencing uncertainty as to its ways of living and being, its goals, its values, and its knowledge, one that has been incapable, so far, of adequately understanding the crisis it is undergoing, Castoriadis sets as his task the elucidation of this crisis and its conditions.
The book is in four parts: Koinonia, Polis, Psyche, Logos. The opening section begins with a general introduction to the author's views on being, time, creation, and the imaginary institution of society and continues with reflections on the role of the individual psyche in racist thinking and acting and on the retreat from autonomy to generalized conformity in postmodernism. The second part is a critique of those who now belittle and distort the meaning of May '68 and other movements of the sixties as well as the French Revolution. The fate of the "project of autonomy" is considered here in the light of the Greek and the modern "political imaginary," the "pulverization of Marxism-Leninism," and a recent alleged "return of ethics" (Habermas, Rawls, McIntyre, Solzhenitsyn, Havel).
In part three, Castoriadis shows how psychoanalysis, like politics, can contribute to the project of individual and collective autonomy and challenges Lacan, Foucault, Derrida, and others in his report on "The State of the Subject Today." This section also presents his most current lines of psychoanalytic research and thought on the "human nonconscious" in the body and on the problem of the psychoanalysis of psychotic subjects, where an alternative coherence on the level of meaning offers a constant challenge to the task of psychoanalytic interpretation.
Castoriadis's highly original investigations of the unruly place of the imagination in Western philosophy round out the book. He examines how Aristotle's original aporetic discovery and cover-up of the imagination were repeated by Kant, Freud, Heidegger, and Merleau-Ponty.

"Political and Social Writings: Volume 3, 1961-1979" was first published in 1992. Minnesota Archive Editions uses digital technology to make long-unavailable books once again accessible, and are published unaltered from the original University of Minnesota Press editions.

This work offers an extraordinary wealth and variety of writings from the crucial years that followed the publication of Castoriadis's landmark text, "Modern Capitalism and Revolution." The "new orientation" he proposed for the Socialisme ou Barbarie group centered on the emerging roles of women, youth, and minorities in the growing challenge to established society in the early sixties. Resistance within the group to this new orientation led Castoriadis to criticize the "neopaleo- Marxism" of Jean-Francois Lyotard and others who ultimately left Socialisme ou Barbarie. A heightened concern for ethnological issues culminated in what might be called, to the embarrassment of today's "poststructuralists," Castoriadis's "premature antistructuralism."

Additional texts examine the dissolution of the group itself and analyze the May 1968 rebellion of workers and students - who, according to their own testimony, were inspired by ideas developed in the group's journal. Also included were many of Castoriadis's still-relevant political writings from the seventies, which were developed in tandem with the more explicitly philosophical work now found in "The Imaginary Institution of Society and Crossroads in the Labyrinth." "Political and Social Writings: Volume 3" provides key elements for a radical renewal of emancipatory thought and action while offering an irreplaceable and hitherto missing perspective on postwar French thought.

"Political and Social Writings: Volume 1, 1946-1955" was first published in 1988. Minnesota Archive Editions uses digital technology to make long-unavailable books once again accessible, and are published unaltered from the original University of Minnesota Press editions.

A series of writings by the man who inspired the students of the Workers' Rebellion in May of 1968.

"Given the rapid pace of change in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, and the radical nature of these transformations, the work of Cornelius Castoriadis, a consistent and radical critic of Soviet Marxism, gains renewed significance. . . . these volumes are instructive because they enable us to trace his rigorous engagement with the project of socialist construction from his break with Trotskyism to his final breach with Marxism . . . and would be read with profit by all those seeking to comprehend the historical originality of events in the USSR and Eastern Europe." -Contemporary Sociology"

"Political and Social Writings: Volume 2, 1955-1960 " was first published in 1988. Minnesota Archive Editions uses digital technology to make long-unavailable books once again accessible, and are published unaltered from the original University of Minnesota Press editions.

A series of writings by the man who inspired the students of the Workers' Rebellion in May of 1968.

"Given the rapid pace of change in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, and the radical nature of these transformations, the work of Cornelius Castoriadis, a consistent and radical critic of Soviet Marxism, gains renewed significance....these volumes are instructive because they enable us to trace his rigorous engagement with the project of socialist construction from his break with Trotskyism to his final breach with Marxism. . . and would be read with profit by all those seeking to comprehend the historical originality of events in the USSR and Eastern Europe." -"Contemporary Sociology"

This title is a collection of interviews in which Cornelius Castoriadis discusses his key works and ideas. Cornelius Castoriadis (1922-1997) was a philosopher, social critic, political activist, practicing psychoanalyst and professional economist. His work is widely recognized as one of the most singular and important contributions to twentieth-century thought. In this collection of interviews, Castoriadis discusses some of his most important ideas with leading figures in the disciplines that play such a crucial part in his philosophical work: poetry, psychoanalysis, biology and mathematics. Available in English for the first time, these interviews provide a concise and accessible introduction to his work as a whole, allowing him to draw on the astounding breadth of his knowledge (ranging from philosophy and mathematics to political theory and psychoanalysis). They also render Castoriadis' cutting, polemical and entertaining style while displaying the originality and clarity of his primary concepts. Intellectually provoking, this timely collection shows how Castoriadis' polemics are sharp and riveting, his conceptual manoeuvres rigorous and original, and his passion inspiring. This is an excellent introduction to one of Europe's most important intellectuals.