We contribute to the scientific debate by studying the storylines, discourses and related normative judgments in parliamentary motions by private members of the Swedish parliament from the time period 2010–2019. The paper makes use of an ecofeminist theoretical framework to problematize these storylines, discourses and normative judgments. We conclude that the focus in the material is on economic and technical issues, while issues of justice play a marginal role. None of the important dimensions of energy justice are adequately considered (...) and many of the dominant storylines and discourses are based on the implicit assumption that issues of justice are insignificant. (shrink)

_In this article we justify why justice ought to be considered in scenarios of energy transitions, stipulate what dimensions should reasonably be considered, and investigate whether such considerations are taken in Swedish parliamentary debates on energy policies. Through interviews we investigated how Swedish parliamentary politicians think through justice in energy transitions, providing a practical perspective. We conclude that while there is some overlap between minimal conditions for energy justice and the issues brought forward by Swedish politicians, (...) several issues are omitted. Examples include procedural justice and recognizing Sámi interests. On the other hand, principles of energy justice omit economic issues, which are however often brought up by respondents. It can be argued that justice issues, and not only the technical and economic issues that currently dominate the political debate, should be considered in energy transitions. It is therefore unfortunate that questions about justice are not adequately recognized by Swedish members of parliament, as outlined here by interview results. Stronger conclusions would require more empirical work, but the article points out several discrepancies between the topics discussed in the research literature on energy policies, and the topics discussed by elected parliamentarians having a specific focus on energy policies. _ _Keywords_: energy justice; energy transitions; Swedish energy policies; climate justice. (shrink)

Climate change presents a fundamental challenge to the current global energy regime. Under the Framework Convention on Climate Change, the international community is developing the architecture of a policy response. Three serious flaws are examined: (a) the potential sacrifice of small island states, (b) the use of market-based policy measures to commodify the atmospheric commons, and (c) the substitution of carbon sequestration for meaningful reductions in energy use. The authors’ analysis of the politics of climate change, based (...) on these issues, suggests a new understanding of ecology is emerging—what they term postmodern ecology—in which a global environmental crisis is risked to secure the future of the world energy regime. An alternative, based on principles of sustainability and equity, is proposed that would require abandoning the global energy status quo. (shrink)

This article is about the novel role of the Unión de Naciones Suramericanas (South American Nations Union) - UNASUR as a peacekeeper in the SouthAmerican region. It begins with an overview of UNASUR, its history, legal framework, and its mandate related to peacekeeping activities. Then, the efforts for regional integration and peacekeeping are addressed, with an explanation of the different frameworks backing those intents and the new peacemaking body known as UNASUR. Examples of political conflict are outlined, namely those in (...) Bolivia and Venezuela, and the ways in which the novel intervention of UNASUR deescalated the violence. After providing a brief description of South American history, its recent conflicts, and a review of some applicable conflict causation theories, the article concludes with a theoretical explanation of the role of UNASUR and its intervention for building peace in the region. This leads to questions and suggestions about how the work of UNASUR can be protected and enhanced to benefit the creation and maintenance of harmonious relationships within South American states. (shrink)

This volume contributes to advancing an 'ecology of freedom,' which can critique current anthropocentric environmental destruction, as well as focusing on environmental justice and decentralized ecological governance.

This volume collects academic as well as artistic explorations highlighting historical and contemporary approaches to the energetic in its aesthetic and political potential. Energetic processes straddle dance, performance art, and installations. They transform the body, evoke specific states, and push towards intensities. In contemporary dance and performance art, energetic processes are no longer mere conditions of form but appear as distinct aesthetic interventions. The contributions in this volume submit these to thorough investigation, elucidating maneuvers of mobilization, activation, initiation, regulation, navigation, (...) and containment of forces as well as different potentials and associated with the energetic. (shrink)

A close analysis of contemporary and historical extraction of Caspian oil and its transportation, via pipeline and tanker, to central Europe, frames an investigation into interrelationships between the organization and conditioning of European societies and their fuel mobility systems. For the fuel used for contemporary mobility systems relies on the mobility systems of fuel. The article examines the governmental and capital structures that have driven oil consumption growth since the 1870s, enabled the powering of geopolitics and determined the spatiality of (...) carbonized sociotechnical systems. It unpacks the current forces that resist any shift away from this petroculture, any ‘powering down’ of society. (shrink)

The concept of ‘political energy’ is often treated as merely a rhetorical synonym for enthusiasm and active engagement. However, as Bruce Clarke’s Energy Forms argues there is an allegorical traffic of ideas between politics and science that reaches an apotheosis in the early-twentieth century interest in energy. In the field of the ‘energy-humanities’ inaugurated by Clarke, the work of George Sorel remains largely overlooked. Situating itself in this field, my paper investigates the interplay of science (...) and politics in Sorel’s work. I contend that Sorel, influenced by Vico’s ideogeneitic law anticipates Clarke’s allegorical framework. Paralleling Henri Bergson’s attempts to rethink the novelty of life in the post-thermodynamic framework of energy, I argue that models from science (Brownian motion and friction) underlie Sorel’s conceptions of political myth and class antagonism. While these remain inchoate in Sorel’s works, I conclude with the suggestion that these traces are completed in Ernst Jünger’s conception of ‘total mobilization’. (shrink)

Introduction changing climates of colonialism -- Every Navajo has an anthro -- Extractive legacies: histories of Diné power -- The rise of energy activism -- Solar power in Klagetoh -- Sovereignty's interdependencies -- Contesting expertise: Public hearings on Desert Rock -- Artifacts of energy futures -- Off-grid in the Chuskas -- Conversions -- Vitalities.

Scientific and technical information is only part of the calculus of policymaking. How voters view the importance of societal issues with significant science and engineering content will drive how policy-makers weigh scientific and technical information. In many cases, as issues become more embroiled in partisan politics, the use of scientific and technical information declines. The use of science and technical information and its weight in environmental and energy policy has differed because of differences in how voters perceive risk (...) in these issue areas. Recently, the politicization of many issues with significant scientific and technical content has led to the politicization of the discussion of how science is used in policymaking. (shrink)

To a large extent and one that is highly structuring, energy choices that are made in a society are political choices. This article aims at studying how these choices can be redirected by technological developments associated with renewable energy, thus contributing to a redistribution of opportunities and correspondingly to social reorganizations. In order to show that the development of alternative energies not only depends on technological advances but can also, in the process, reveal political potentialities, three steps are (...) proposed. The first step will clarify the theoretical arguments in favor of an approach in terms of “technological potentialism.” Second, we will extend this approach by identifying a set of potentialities linked with renewable energies and the model that could arise from these alternative forms or approaches. Finally, we will examine how these potentialities could find paths to become effective. (shrink)

This paper provides a detailed account of the prehistory of the KEK National Laboratory for High Energy Physics at Tsukuba in Japan. Attempts to establish Japan's first truly national laboratory marked the beginning of ‘big science’ in Japan. An examination of the debate and decision-making processes, which spanned over a decade, provide insight into the political aspects of policy making in the post-war period. History shows that even in Japan, self-interest has taken precedence over group interests in lobbying for (...) research funds for science. (shrink)

Arguing that a crisis is upon us, the Bush Administration has proposed an energy strategy remarkable in its scope and audacity. While much criticism has been directed towards the plan’s ecological impacts, it also guarantees the continuing collapse of communities tha stand in the way of the full realization of the current energy economy. This situation is best understood reference to evolving notions of environmental justice. Unfortunately, the variety of meanings attributable to environmental justice often times come into (...) conflict when applied to specific cases. Until a way is found to reconcile the idea’s many diverse meanings and to prevent one or another to be used in a specific institutional context to the exclusion of all others, environmental justice will, in a perverse way, be turned into yet another means to disregard society’s most vulnerable members. (shrink)

This study examines an important aspect of energy history and policy: the intertwinement of energy technologies with ideals. Ideals play an important role in energy visions and innovation pathways. Aspirations to realize technical, social, and political ideals indicate a long-term commitment in the design of energy systems, distinguishable from commitment to other abstract goals, such as values. This study offers an analytical scheme that could help to conceptualize these differences and their impact on energy policy. (...) In the proposed model, two spheres of interaction are highlighted: a material sphere in which values and technologies co-evolve, and an imaginary sphere in which ideals interact with idealized technologies. Furthermore, the relation between these two spheres can be understood in different ways. This study examines three cases that are illustrative of the different roles of ideals in the development of energy technologies and visions: (1) the evolution of safety in nuclear reactor design; (2) visions of atomic power in France; (3) the political idealization of a tidal power scheme in the Severn Estuary. Finally, the developed model implies more general insights for the development of sociotechnical systems. Amongst others, it shows why certain projects and technologies remain a political, but not a techno–economic option. (shrink)

Throughout the history of mankind, energy security has been always seen as a means of protection from disruptions of essential energy systems. The idea of protection from disorders emerged from the process of securing political and military control over energy resources to set up policies and measures on managing risks that affect all elements of energy systems. The various systems placed in a place to achieve energy security are the driving force towards the energy (...) innovations or emerging trends in the energy sector. Our paper discusses energy security status and innovations in the energy sector in European Union (EU). We analyze the recent up-to-date developments of the energy policy and exploitation of energy sources, as well as scrutinize the channels of energy streaming to the EU countries and the risks associated with this energy import. Moreover, we argue that the shift to the low-carbon production of energy and the massive deployment of renewable energy sources (RES) might become the key issue in ensuring the energy security and independency of the EU from its external energy supplies. Both RES, distributed energy resources (DER) and “green energy” that will be based on the energy efficiency and the shift to the alternative energy supply might change the energy security status quo for the EU. (shrink)

Achieving energy sovereignty is increasingly gaining prominence as a goal in energy politics. The aim of this paper is to provide a conceptual analysis of this principle from an ethics and social justice perspective. We rely on the literature on food sovereignty to identify through a comparative analysis the elements energy sovereignty will most likely demand and thereafter distinguish the unique constituencies of the energy sector. The idea of energy sovereignty embraces a series of (...) values, among which we identified: (i) accessibility, to allow access to everyone, (ii) empowerment and recognition, to develop and sustain capabilities to collaboratively produce solution-oriented energy system knowledge and effectively participate in governance, (iii) stewardship and sustainability, to be able to design and manage decentralised renewable systems in view of protecting the environment, (iv) self-sufficiency, to reduce the negative shocks of exploitative business practises, (v) resilience, to maintain production capacities while withstanding socioeconomic, political, environmental and climatic shocks, (vi) peace, to establish production systems that do not involve hostile relations, (vii) transparency and self-determination, to establish democratic decision-making mechanisms that give a voice to previously underrepresented groups and limit corporate takeover (viii) gender-justice, by acknowledging the contributions of women and eliminate barriers to their empowerment. With a conceptual framework of energy sovereignty, we present a rationale that draws on the key values to be considered when formulating policy solutions for the energy sector. (shrink)

The question of energy is among the most vital for the future of humanity and the flourishing of life on this planet. Yet, only very rarely (if at all) do we ask what energy is, what it means, what ends it serves, and how it is related to actuality, meaning-making, and instrumentality. Energy Dreams interrogates the ontology of energy from the first coinage of the word energeia by Aristotle to the current practice of fracking and the (...) popularity of "energy drinks." Its sustained, multi-disciplinary investigation builds a theoretical infrastructure for an alternative energy paradigm. This study unhinges stubbornly held assumptions about energy, conceived in terms of a resource to be violently extracted from the depths of the earth and from certain living beings (such as plants, converted into biofuels), a thing that, teetering on the verge of depletion, sparks off movement and is incompatible with the inertia of rest. Consulting the insights of philosophers, theologians, psychologists and psychoanalysts, economic and political theorists, and physicists, Michael Marder argues that energy is not only a coveted object of appropriation but also the subject who dreams of amassing it; that it not only resides in the dimension of depth but also circulates on the surface; that it activates rest as much as movement, potentiality as much as actuality; and that it is both the means and the end of our pursuits. Ultimately, Marder shows that, instead of being grounded in utopian naïveté, the dreams of another energy—to be procured without devastating everything in existence—derive from the suppressed concept of energy itself. (shrink)

The convergent development of distributed electricity sources, storage technologies, ‘big data’ devices, and novel ICT infrastructure matching energy supply and demand enables new local and collective forms of energy consumption and production. This socio-technical evolution has been accompanied by the development of citizen energy communities that have been supported by EU energy governance and directives, adopting a political narrative of placing the citizen central in the ongoing energy transition. But to what extent are the ideals (...) that motivate the energy community movement compatible with those of neoliberalism that have guided EU energy policy for the last four decades? Using a framework inspired by Michel Foucault’s idea of governmentality, we analyze the two political forms from three dimensions: ontological, economic and power politics. For the ontological and the economic dimensions, neoliberal governmentality is flexible enough to accommodate the tensions raised by the communitarians. In the dimension of power politics however, the communitarian logic does raise a fundamental challenge to neoliberal governmentality in the sense that it explicitly aims for a redefinition of the ‘common good’ of society’s energy supply based on democratic premises. (shrink)

Energy production and consumption give rise to issues of justice for future humans. By analysing a specific case – Swedish energy politics – this article contributes to the discussion of how consideration for future humans should affect energy policy making. It outlines three different energy scenarios for the period 2035-2065 – the nuclear-renewables, the renewables-low and the renewables-high scenarios – and assesses them from the point of view of justice for future individuals by using the (...) capabilities approach as a normative framework. We cannot make a definitive assessment of the different scenarios due to the great uncertainties involved in determining the impacts on individuals living between 2035 and 2065 and individuals born thereafter, but we still conclude that we have certain reasons to prefer the renewables-low scenario since it avoids certain risks connected with the other scenarios. The economic growth in this scenario is lower than in the others, but we question whether this is a disadvantage from the point of view of the capabilities approach. _Keywords:_ energy scenarios, justice, future generations, capabilities approach. (shrink)

There exist overwhelming – and morally compelling – reasons for shifting to renewable energy (RE), because only that will enable us to timely mitigate dangerous global warming. In addition, several other morally weighty reasons speak in favor of the shift: considerable public health benefits, broader environmental benefits, the potential for sustainable and equitable economic development and equitable energy access, and, finally, long-term energy security. Furthermore, it appears that the transition to RE is economically, technologically, and politically feasible (...) at this point in time. However, there are different possible pathways towards that goal, all of which involve tough choices. Some of these concern different ways of living: Do we have to make a choice between being sustainable and maintaining our current living standard? And if so, how can we balance the value of high living standards against that of a sustainable energy regime? In this chapter, I will not conduct a comprehensive analysis of all available renewable energy technologies, but rather provide a number of examples of tough choices entailed by solar, wind and hydropower. I will also attempt to rebut some of the common misconceptions regarding RE technologies. (shrink)

Energy humanities is a field of scholarship that, like medical humanities and digital humanities before it, overcomes traditional boundaries between the disciplines and between academic and applied research. Like its predecessors, energy humanities highlights the essential contribution that the insights and methods of the human sciences can make to areas of study and analysis once thought best left to the natural sciences. This isn't a case of the humanities simply helping their cross-campus colleagues to learn the mechanics of (...) communication so that they might better articulate their ideas. Rather, these fields of scholarship are ones that demonstrate how the scale and complexity of the issues being explored demand insights and approaches that transcend old school disciplinary boundaries. Energy Humanities : A Reader offers a carefully curated selection of the best and most influential work in energy humanities that has appeared over the past decade. To stay true to the diverse work that makes up this emergent field, selections range from anthropology and geography to philosophy, history, and cultural studies to recent energy-focused interventions in art and literature. The three readers all agree that this is an important, ground-breaking collection of work"--Provided by publisher. (shrink)

Science once had an unshakable faith in its ability to bring the forces of nature—even human nature—under control. In this wide-ranging book Anson Rabinbach examines how developments in physics, biology, medicine, psychology, politics, and art employed the metaphor of the working body as a human motor. From nineteenth-century theories of thermodynamics and political economy to the twentieth-century ideals of Taylorism and Fordism, Rabinbach demonstrates how the utopian obsession with energy and fatigue shaped social thought across the ideological spectrum.

How does one arrive at a life in politics and policy? What happens to one's ideals when confronted with the reality that the only way to get things done in Washington is compromise? Who are the men and women who help shape our national agenda, and what drives their work? Dispatches From the Eastern Front provides fascinating, intensely personal, yet universal answers to these central questions. Recounting four decades inside Washington politics, Gerald Felix Warburg brings remarkable candor to (...) a most unusual memoir. An idealistic California baby boomer transported to the intimidating world of Capitol Hill policymaking at a young age, Warburg finds himself working to reform nuclear energy, strategic arms control, and foreign policy. As his access and power grow, greater challenges loom: how to maintain principles while cutting deals, and how to balance public purpose with private interests. An eclectic career reveals the slow and often painful development of emotional intelligence for work at the highest reaches of the public arena. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: References and Further Reading.

Energy has an ambivalent status in social theory, variously figuring as a driver or an outcome of social and institutional change, or as something that is woven into the fabric of society itself. In this article the authors consider the underlying models on which different approaches depend. One common strategy is to view energy as a resource base, the management and organization of which depends on various intersecting systems: political, economic and technological. This is not the only route (...) to take. The authors develop an alternative approach, viewing energy supply and energy demand as part of the ongoing reproduction of bundles and complexes of social practice. In articulating and comparing these two positions they show how social-theoretical commitments influence the ways in which problems like those of reducing carbon emissions are framed and addressed. Whereas theories of practice highlight basic questions about what energy is for, these issues are routinely and perhaps necessarily obscured by those who see energy as an abstract resource that structures or that is structured by a range of interlocking social systems. (shrink)

Abstract Scientific, technological, ethical, and religious issues confronting the human prospect are emerging as we encounter the inevitable shift from fossil to renewable fuels. In particular, we are entering a period of monumental transition with respect to both the forms and use of energy. As for any technological transition of this magnitude, ultimate success will require good ethics and religion, as well as good science and technology. Economic and political issues associated with energy conservation and renewable energies are (...) arising in the context of climate change, sustainability, and human purpose. Specifically, we must consider (1) ethical and religious perspectives which might guide future energy choices and (2) energy choices which, in turn, might challenge ethical and religious perspectives. In this paper, I set the stage for subsequent articles by introducing thermodynamic and theological considerations relevant to our energy future. Scientific and technological aspects are covered within the context of the first and second laws of thermodynamics. Ethical and religious aspects are covered within the context of basic philosophical and theological motifs within our secular culture. My intention is to provide the necessary background, motivation, and perspectives for a fuller discussion of pertinent issues in the remainder of the conference papers. (shrink)

Abstract As there are food gluttons, so there are energy gluttons. One difference is that energy gluttons are typically oblivious to how much energy they consume and the source of that energy. Their energy gluttony is a side effect of insatiable desire for material goods, which themselves are often associated with social status. Nonetheless, steps taken to deal with energy gluttony parallel those taken with food gluttony. Typically these fall into three categories: educational, political, (...) and technological. I will examine a fourth, however, best characterized as philosophical. I will show how, by following the advice of the ancient Stoics and training ourselves to care less what others think of us, we can help overcome our desire for social status, resulting in a reduction in our desire for material things and a significant reduction in our personal energy bill. The pessimistic conclusion, however, is that most people are probably unwilling to undergo the self-analysis and self-transformation that this philosophical approach requires. (shrink)

It is important for energy enterprises to research on the investment potential of the energy markets in countries along the “Belt and Road,” which can help them optimize the regional investment structure, reduce investment risks, and conform to the development trend of “going global.” Therefore, we construct an investment potential assessment system of 29 indexes including five dimensions: politics, economy, society, energy, and cooperation and assess energy investment potential of 48 sample countries along the “Belt (...) and Road” using principal component analysis to provide reference meanings for energy enterprises. The results show that the assessment results of investment potential are affected by a combination of multiple indexes. In addition, compared with Central Asia and South Asia, which have weak economic foundations and greater political and legal risks, the investment potential of Central and Eastern Europe and some emerging economies in Southeast Asia is higher. (shrink)

As humanity continues to consume planetary resources at an unsustainable rate, we require not only new and renewable forms of energy but also new ways of understanding energy itself. Clayton Crockett offers an innovative philosophy of energy that cuts across a number of leading-edge disciplines. Drawing from contemporary philosophies of New Materialism, non-Western traditions, and the sciences, he develops a comprehensive vision of energy as a material process spanning physics, biology, politics, ecology, and religion. Crockett (...) argues that change is foundational to material reality, which is ceaselessly self-organizing. We can observe energy’s effects in the operations of natural selection as well as those at work in human societies. Matter and energy are not an oppositional binary; rather, they are expressions of how change functions in the universe. Ultimately, Crockett argues, we can conceive of God neither as a deity nor as a being but as the principle of change. Informed by cutting-edge theoretical discourses in thermodynamics, science studies, energy humanities, systems theory, continental philosophy, and radical theology, Energy and Change draws on theorists such as Gilles Deleuze, Catherine Malabou, Slavoj Žižek, Karen Barad, Bruno Latour, and Kojin Karatani as well as ideas about spirituality, society, and nature from Amerindian, Vodou, and Neo-Confucian traditions. A foundational work in New Materialist philosophy of religion, this book offers compelling new insights into the structure of the cosmos and our place in it. (shrink)

Abstract Energy typically is discussed in terms of science, technology, economics, and politics. Little attention has been given to fundamental religious and ethical questions surrounding the upcoming transition to renewable energy. The essays in this thematic section seek to redress that deficiency. This introductory essay raises some key questions and summarizes various presentations on energy and religion, as these were held at the 2010 conference of the Institute on Religion in an Age of Science (IRAS). Some (...) presentations described the energy landscape and provided data and perspectives needed for sound policy. Others raised ethical and religious considerations for energy decisions as the transition from nonrenewable to renewable sources is faced. Some posed the challenges of the energy transition to religion itself. Yet others offered examples of sustainable energy use and/or promising sources for meeting future needs sustainably. At the conclusion of the conference, presenters crafted a common “Statement on Energy and Climate Change” that includes a “Call to Action.” The “Energy Statement” follows as an appendix. (shrink)

In the Renaissance the beauty of a garden was for people a source of energy, it nurtured their inherent love of plant life, enchanted them and gave them a sense of pure aesthetic contentment. This fascination with nature and the values nurtured by the emerging culture of the garden also had broader reasons than just the desire for subjective experience. They can be sought in the belief that the style of an epoch is reflected not only in all the (...) forms of pure art, but also in the sphere of applied art. The aesthetic criteria which determined the early-Renaissance conception of the garden were at least twofold: first, the then-emerging culture of the garden co-formed the identity of the entire era as one of the few enclaves of a rising trend away from the classical tradition. The culture of the garden contested the adulation of the Antique that was common at the time and ruled supremely in art. (shrink)

In this paper the centrality of concepts for intellectual history is stressed. Naturally, this focus on concepts requires an account of what concepts are. More contentiously, an account of how concepts are best approached by intellectual historians also requires taking a stand vis-à-vis some prevailing notions of concepts. In particular, I will direct attention to the weaknesses of the historicist theory of concepts derived from the later Wittgenstein. By contrast, I will put forward an account of conceptual innovation and change (...) in intellectual history based on a notion of concept loosely inspired by Frege. The first three parts of the paper lay out a framework for what I call “analytic contextualism,” which is then briefly illustrated with an example from the history of political thought in the fourth part. I argue that this framework should be attractive to intellectual historians for two reasons: First, Fregean concepts, due to their relative independence from context, explain long-term conceptual stability and change better than competing notions of concepts. Second, a Fregean notion of concept is better suited than its competitors to explain how concepts and conceptual innovation sometimes manage to have causal effect on institutions and social reality. To demonstrate the latter point, it will be shown that my account of concepts is consistent with, and well placed to exploit, recent philosophical advances in social ontology. (shrink)

Political ecology is one of the most vibrant fields of environmental research. This book introduces political ecology to a new generation of students in a daring new way: as an interdisciplinary approach to environmental research but also as a series of lived realities and a praxis for change. The origins of political ecology are often traced through an Anglo-American canon. In Discovering Political Ecology, Gustav Cederlöf and Alex Loftus instead take up the challenge of presenting the key conversations and the (...) diverse traditions that have shaped this field with attention to its extensive international roots. Inspired by voices and research in Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas, the authors address the concerns of those who from different social backgrounds have grown up in a world shaped by climate change and increasing environmental inequalities.Engaging and accessible in style, Discovering Political Ecology introduces a set of key concepts around which conversations in political ecology coalesce. It also shows how these concepts allow you to make sense of some of the most pressing issues of our time-issues around water, energy, agriculture, forestry, climate change and environmental justice. Each chapter includes learning outcomes and suggested further readings, extensive bibliographies and seminar activities to be used by students and educators. At the cutting-edge of the field, the book will be of interest to those in all disciplines brought together in political ecology, including but not limited to anthropology, development studies, ecology, geography, history and political science. (shrink)

Beginning with Jacob Taubes and Günther Anders on eschatology, apocalypse and political theology, including Saint Paul and Frankfurt School critical theory along with bombs and power plants (energy/climate), this essay parallels a re-reading of Tracy B. Strong’s political reading of Nietzsche on Jesus (and love) with Taubes, Anders and Carl Schmitt on politics (and technology). Highlighted throughout is the politically charged (and inherently esoteric) context of Gnosticism for philosophy and theory for Taubes but also for Anders.

In this acclaimed exploration of the search for "authentic" individual identity, Marshall Berman explores the historical experiences and needs out of which this new radicalism arose. Focussing on eighteenth-century Paris, a time and place in which a distinctively modern form of society was just coming into its own, Berman shows how the ideal of authenticity—of a self that could organize the individual's energy and direct it toward his own happiness—articulated eighteenth-century man's deepest responses to this brave new world, and (...) his most ardent hope for a new life in it. Exploring in particular the ideas of Montesquieu and Rousseau, Berman shows how the ideal of authenticity was radically opposed to the bourgeois, capitalistic idea of "self-interest.". (shrink)