This book familiarizes the English-speaking reader with the debate on the originality of Gramsci’s thought and its importance for the development of Marxist theory. The contributors present the principal viewpoints regarding Gramsci’s theoretical contribution to Marxism, focussing in particular on his advances in the study of the superstructures, and discussing his relation to Marx and Lenin and his influence in Eurocommunism. Different interpretations are put forward concerning the elucidation of Gramsci’s key concepts, namely: hegemony, integral state, war of position and (...) passive revolution. (shrink)

Columbia University Press's multivolume _Prison Notebooks_ is the only complete critical edition of Antonio Gramsci's seminal writings in English. Based on the authoritative Italian edition of Gramsci's work, _Quaderni del Carcere_, this comprehensive translation presents the intellectual as he ought to be read and understood, with critical notes that clarify Gramsci's history, culture, and sources; an index of names; and a contextualization of the thinker's ideas against his earlier writings and letters. This set includes notebooks 1 through 8 with all (...) attendant notes and materials and is an indispensible resource for scholars in the humanities and social sciences. (shrink)

In this book she describes the perplexing crises which modern society faces as a result of the loss of meaning of the traditional key words of politics: justice ...

Why do most of us consider ourselves free but also believe there is little we can change in the way the world is run - individually, severally, or even collectively? Why has the growth of individual freedom coincided with the growth of collective impotence? Bauman argues that this condition hangs on the agora - the space where private and public meet to seek the creation of 'public good', a 'just society', or 'shared values'. The problem is that little remains of (...) such old style spaces. We cannot, he argues, overcome our collective impotence without resorting to politics and using the vehicle of political agency. Three orientation points for a reconstruction of politics are suggested: the republican model of the state and of citizenship, basic income as a universal entitlement, and re-enabling the institutions of autonomous society by catching up with the controlling extraterritorial powers in an age of globalization. (shrink)

The ways in which knowledge relates to power have been much discussed in radical education theory. New emphasis on the role of gender and the growing debate about subjectivity have deepened the discussion, while making it more complex. In Getting Smart , Patti Lather makes use of her unique integration of feminism and postmodernism into critical education theory to address some of the most vital questions facing education researchers and teachers.

These remarkable essays include Cornelius Castoriadis's latest contributions to philosophy, political and social theory, classical studies, development theory, cultural criticism, science, and ecology. Examining the "co-birth" in ancient Greece of philosophy and politics, Castoriadis shows how the Greeks' radical questioning of established ideas and institutions gave rise to the "project of autonomy". The "end of philosophy" proclaimed by Postmodernism would mean the end of this project. That end is now hastened by the lethal expansion of technoscience, the waning of political (...) and social conflict, and the resignation of intellectuals who blindly defend Western culture as it is or who merely denounce or "deconstruct" it as it has been. Discussing and criticizing Plato, Aristotle, Leibniz, Kant, Hegel, Weber, Heidegger, and Habermas, the author of The Imaginary Institution of Society and Crossroads in the Labyrinth poses a radical challenge to our inherited philosophy. (shrink)

This book is organized around three themes: mechanisms of domination and control; pedagogies of possibility; and theory as critique. It links education with an analysis of politics and economics, and takes as central the possibilities of schools as places where social critique and the empowerment of students can take place. The authors have considered the possibilities of student resistance and curriculum transformation, and have deepened their critiques to incorporate recent theoretical analyses influenced by feminist critiques, anti-racist approaches, and postmodernist thought. (...) In moving from theoretical analysis to "practical" examples of curriculum transformation and classroom practice, What Schools Can Do provides both a foundation for the analysis of schooling and alternatives for teaching practice. (shrink)