Digitalia
Advanced Search
Twenty Theses on Politics

Twenty Theses on Politics

  • Author: Dussel, Enrique; Maher, Geo; Mendieta, Eduardo
  • Publisher: Duke University Press
  • Serie: Latin America in Translation
  • ISBN: 9780822343455
  • eISBN Pdf: 9780822389446
  • Place of publication:  Durham , United States
  • Year of digital publication: 2008
  • Month: December
  • Pages: 184
  • DDC: 320
  • Language: English
First published in Spanish in 2006, Twenty Theses on Politics is a major statement on political philosophy from Enrique Dussel, one of Latin America’s—and the world’s—most important philosophers, and a founder of the philosophy of liberation. Synthesizing a half-century of his pioneering work in moral and political philosophy, Dussel presents a succinct rationale for the development of political alternatives to the exclusionary, exploitative institutions of neoliberal globalization. In twenty short, provocative theses he lays out the foundational elements for a politics of just and sustainable coexistence. Dussel first constructs a theory of political power and its institutionalization, taking on topics such as the purpose of politics and the fetishization of power. He insists that political projects must criticize or reject as unsustainable all political systems, actions, and institutions whose negative effects are suffered by oppressed or excluded victims. Turning to the deconstruction or transformation of political power, he explains the political principles of liberation and addresses matters such as reform and revolution.

Twenty Theses on Politics is inspired by recent political transformations in Latin America. As Dussel writes in Thesis 15, regarding the liberation praxis of social and political movements, “The winds that arrive from the South—from Nestor Kirchner, Tabaré Vásquez, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Evo Morales, Hugo Chávez, Fidel Castro, and so many others—show us that things can be changed. The people must reclaim sovereignty!” Throughout the twenty theses Dussel engages with Latin American thinkers and activists and with radical political projects such as the World Social Forum. He is also in dialogue with the ideas of Marx, Hegel, Habermas, Rawls, and Negri, offering insights into the applications and limits of their thinking in light of recent Latin American political thought and practice.

  • Contents
  • Foreword: The Liberation of Politics: Alterity, Solidarity, Liberation
  • Preliminary Words
  • Introduction
  • Thesis 1. Corruption and the Political Field: The Public and the Private
  • Part One: THE PREVAILING POLITICAL ORDER
    • Thesis 2. The Political Power of the Community as Potentia
    • Thesis 3. Institutional Power as Potestas
    • Thesis 4. Obediential Power
    • Thesis 5. The Fetishization of Power: Power as Domination
    • Thesis 6. Strategic Political Action
    • Thesis 7. The Need for Political Institutions: The Material Sphere (Ecological, Economic, Cultural): Fraternity
    • Thesis 8. Institutions in the Spheres of Democratic Legitimacy and Feasibility: Equality and Liberty: Governability
    • Thesis 9. Ethics and the Implicit Normative Principles of Politics: The Material Principle
    • Thesis 10. The Formal-Democratic and Feasibility Principles of Politics
  • Part Two: THE CRITICAL TRANSFORMATION OF THE POLITICAL: TOWARD THE NEW POLITICAL ORDER
    • Thesis 11. The People: The Popular Sector and ‘‘Populism’’
    • Thesis 12. Liberatory Power as Hyperpotentia and the ‘‘State of Rebellion’’
    • Thesis 13. The Political Principles of Liberation: The Critical Material Principle
    • Thesis 14. The Critical-Democratic and Strategic Transformation Principles
    • Thesis 15. Liberation Praxis of Social and Political Movements
    • Thesis 16. Anti-Hegemonic Praxis and the Construction of a New Hegemony
    • Thesis 17. Transformation of Political Institutions: Reform, Transformation, Revolution: Political Postulates
    • Thesis 18. Transformation of Institutions in the Material Sphere: ‘‘Perpetual Life’’ and Solidarity
    • Thesis 19. Transformation of Institutions in the Sphere of Democratic Legitimacy: Irruption of New Rights: ‘‘Perpetual Peace’’ and Alterity
    • Thesis 20. Transformation of Institutions in the Sphere of Feasibility: The ‘‘Dissolution of the State’’? Liberation
  • Notes
  • Bibliography
  • Index

Subjects

Back
Login to your account

Viewers online

  • Text
  • ReadSpeaker Audio

Download options

  • Adobe DRM Adobe DRM
  • Loan duration: 21 days
  • Format: PDF

SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER

By subscribing, you accept our Privacy Policy

©2021 - 2024 Digitalia - All rights reserved