Democracy and Defiance

Bryan Nelson is a Liberal Arts & Sciences Professor at Humber College, Toronto, Canada.

• Introduction: The Antinomies of PoliticsTowards Democracy’s Anarchic ConditionDemocracy as CritiquePlato Discovers the Political: Ranciere’s Reading of the Allegory of the ShipPhilosophy’s Sovereignty over Politics: Abensour’s Reading of the Allegory of the CaveThe Polemics of the Polis: The Greek Invention of PoliticsDemocracy’s Anarchic Condition: A New Political OntologyMaking Politics ThinkableDissolution of the Arche In the Name of Democracy: The Kratos of the DemosOn the Universality of the Problem of the ArcheThe Nature of Rule: An Interpretation of Plato’s Laws Commandment and Commencement: The Strange Logic of the Arche PrincipleIn Summary: Archic GovernmentEnter Democracy: What Does It Mean to be against the Arche?Understanding Democracy’s ‘Anarchic Title’Democracy as ‘Political’ or ‘Anarchic’ GovernmentAnarchy: The Infinite OpeningTo Think Democracy Otherwise: Claude Lefort and Savage Democracy On the Status of Political PhilosophyPierre Clastres and the Logic of Being-AgainstThe Essence of Democracy: A Question of InterpretationDemocratic Revolution: Tocqueville and LefortThe ‘Principle of Anarchy’ and the Emancipatory Act of PoliticsPermanent Contestation: Savage Democracy and Human RightsThinking Democracy Savage: A Philosophical ExerciseDemocratisation of the Sensible: Democracy against the Police On the Many Forms of Being-AgainstPolitics and the Police: A Radical DichotomyFoucault, the Police and Governmentality The Government of the Sensible and the Symbolic Constitution of Society: Ranciere’s Concept of the Police‘Logical Revolt’: Towards a Theory of the Political SubjectOn Political NamesThe ‘History’ or ‘Tradition’ of EmancipationThe Politics of Emancipation: Democracy against the State Social Domination and Political Emancipation: An Introduction to Abensour’s General Approach to DemocracyFrom the Frankfurt School to Lefort and Machiavelli: Abensour’s Critical Political PhilosophyUtopia and DemocracyAgainst the State: Clastres contra HobbesMarx’s ‘Machiavellian Moment’: Hegel, Sovereignty and Political Alienation‘True’ Democracy and the Reduction of the StateInsurgent DemocracyIn Summary: Ranciere’s Democracy against the Police and Abensour’s Democracy against the StateConclusion: ‘Hic et nunc’ – the Use of Philosophy and the Critique of the Present Bibliography Index

Nelson’s book is imbued with both a sense of urgency and an almost timeless feeling. It asks us to rethink democracy, because the all-too-established notions that try to tame it fail at grasping its "savage" nature. This task is demanded by our times, but it is also intrinsic to democracy itself.