The life and work of Sigmund Freud continue to fascinate general and professional readers alike. Joel Whitebook here presents the first major biography of Freud since the last century, taking into account recent developments in psychoanalytic theory and practice, gender studies, philosophy, cultural theory, and more. Offering a radically new portrait of the creator of psychoanalysis, this book explores the man in all his complexity alongside an interpretation of his theories that cuts through the stereotypes that surround him. The development (...) of Freud's thinking is addressed not only in the context of his personal life, but also in that of society and culture at large, while the impact of his thinking on subsequent issues of psychoanalysis, philosophy, and social theory is fully examined. Whitebook demonstrates that declarations of Freud's obsolescence are premature, and, with his clear and engaging style, brings this vivid figure to life in compelling and readable fashion. (shrink)

Foucault's rejection of the repressive hypothesis is generally taken as a critique of Freud. Its real target is, however, the left Freudian tradition, which received its paradigmatic articulation in the work of Herbert Marcuse. Marcuse sought to show that the conflict between the repressive demands of civilization and instinctual desires of the individual didn't represent a transhistorical state of affairs, as Freud maintained. He argues, rather, that it represents a particular historical constellation that can be transcended. Foucault purports to reject (...) the entire structure in which the problem arises, that is, the conflict between the demands of civilization and bodily based desire. The thesis of this article is, however, that he doesn't reject the conflict, but simply displaces it. In his scheme, the displaced conflict takes place between the apparatus of sexuality and bodies and pleasures. Furthermore, Foucault maintains that the emancipation of bodies and pleasures from their entrapment in the apparatus of sexuality constitutes the desirable political program. The diagnosis of the situation and the suggested political remedy are, in other words, exactly parallel to Marcuse's. (shrink)

The standard interpretations of Foucault's intellectual biography usually present Sartre as his major adversary. Though it would be difficult to underestimate the importance of Sartre for Foucault's development, this paper argues that Foucault was involved in an even more intense and deeper contest with Freud. Indeed, Freud was Foucault's principal adversary and, throughout his career, Foucault was trying to formulate a counter-project to psychoanalysis. The author attempts to demonstrate this claim by examining Foucault's early psychological writings, Madness and Civilization, his (...) encounter with Kant in The Order of Things and The History of Sexuality. He argues, moreover, that Foucault had articulated a project, namely, 'the dialogue with unreason', which not only could have provided a meeting point for his project and Freud's but can still provide a way of getting beyond the exhausted debate between the advocates of the Enlightenment and the Anti-Enlightenment. Because he could never give up the temptation to valorize transgression, however, Foucault was unable to pursue the dialogue with unreason in a systematic way. Key Words: Foucault • Freud • psychoanalysis • reason. (shrink)

Constellations, Volume 28, Issue 3, Page 306-321, September 2021.

My intention in writing “The Politics of Redemption” (Telos #63) — which was admittedly polemical and therefore somewhat overstated — was in part to stimulate theoretical controversy within me journal. It seemed at the time that Telos was suffering from stagnation camouflaged by animated political debates, and that an open and even heated discussion of basic theoretical issues might prove healthy and productive. I was therefore pleased to see the responses to my article and welcome the opportunity to clarify and (...) elaborate my position. I would now state my diesis in die following way: Modernity is a fundamentally ambivalent — if not antinomic — phenomenon which requires a sufficiently differentiated conceptual scheme to capture die elements of diat ambivalence; contrawise, an insufficiendy differentiated theory cannot do justice to that ambivalence and mutatis mutandis to the social, political and historical situation in which we find ourselves. (shrink)

D'Amico's review of Castoriadis' Crossroads in the Labyrinth (Telos, 60) can be taken as a negative example of one of the book's central theses: namely, that there exists an intimate connection between sublimation and truth. In D'Amico's case, there is little of either. One is struck by the vehemence of the attack and wonders about the source of its unmediated anger. I am usually reluctant to make psychologizing arguments in public controversies. However, in this case, I feel justified in asserting (...) that only extra-theoretical factors can account for the tone and character of the review. Whatever these factors may have been, they apparently prevented the reviewer from taking up the work in a serious fashion, as reflected not only in the failure to grapple with central theoretical issues. (shrink)

Now that the more overtly political controversies of the recent past have subsided in Telos, it is possible to examine the deeper theoretical issues that lie behind them. Despite the importance of the manifest political content of those controversies — and they were indeed important — it is my contention that the fractiousness of the discussion can only be accounted for in terms of the underlying theoretical situation. What was in fact happening with those debates was that the old theoretical- (...) political consensus that had more or less united Telos since its inception had fragmented. There had been a shared sense from the beginning, however illusory it might have been, that the Hegelian Marxist or Western Marxist paradigm provided a common project that could encompass the various tendencies within the journal. (shrink)