Studiekretsar / Krets 8 2007-2009 Sommarsession: Call For Papers 

Creation, Rationality and Autonomy

Sommarsession: Call For Papers

Inlagd i mars 2007

“What is the social-historical?”

What is the social-historical? For the philosopher Cornelius Castoriadis (1922-1997), neither society nor history can be understood without taking the other into consideration; forming the question of the social-historical.

According to Castoriadis, traditional philosophy is built on inadequate notions that block our understanding – even the ability to pose the question – of the mode of being of the social-historical. These inadequacies are rooted in fundamental presuppositions of the philosophical traditions – such as the notion of universal causality, which Castoriadis rejected as a central part of what he called ‘the myth of being as being-determined’. Accordingly, the notions and ways of thinking that have upheld, and still uphold the Western philosophical tradition have contributed to screen out its own social-historical dimensions. For Castoriadis, this meant a severe reductionism; specifically lethal to the idea of being as creation: creation of meaning, significations and social forms – and creation of new modes of being: ideas that are central in his work.

"Inherited thought has necessarily been led to reduce the social-historical to the types of being that it knew or thought it knew – having constructed them and thus determined them – from somewhere else, making the social-historical a variant, a combination or a synthesis of the corresponding beings: thing, subject, idea or concept. … However, if we decide to consider the social-historical for itself; if we understand that it is to be questioned and reflected upon on the basis of itself alone … then we observe that it shatters our inherited logic and ontology. For we see that it does not fall under any traditional categories – except in a nominal and empty way – but instead it makes us recognize the narrow limit of their validity, permits us to glimpse a new and different logic and, above all, radically to alter the meaning of: being." (Castoriadis 1989:169).

But then there is the other side of the matter: the anthropological dimensions of the social-historical. Patterns of the social-historical must also be thematized as modes of being-in-the world. And that is where the resources of the philosophical tradition come back in, beginning with the phenomenological tradition out of which Castoriadis came. This might imply a critique of Castoriadis’s tendency to a certain over-psychoanalytization of the anthropological dimensions. Possible trails to follow are civilization analyses and culture studies inspired by the thought of Max Weber, e.g. recent works of Johann P. Arnason. Also, a promising rereading of Castoriadis’s psychoanalysis can be found in Marcel Gauchet's work, indicating another way of understanding the link between psychoanalysis and political philosophy.

Furthermore, there is the notion of the human subject, which for Castoriadis is closely connected to the mode of being of the social-historical. What are the philosophical/scientific and political/practical implications of this way of conceptualizing the human subject, e.g. in terms of individuality?

To Castoriadis, Greek antiquity is in several respects a privileged domain of reference. First, it is one of his paradigmatic examples of social-historical creativity. Second, it is the one and only case of an original breakthrough to autonomy, i.e. to a self-reflection of the social-historical. Third, Greek philosophy is both an integral part and the most explicit articulation of this breakthrough; and Castoriadis saw it as a crucial resource to be drawn upon for the thematization of the social-historical. Fourth, Plato's thought is for Castoriadis the paradigmatic reversal/suppression of the original current of reflection – although the verdict is ambivalent.

The ensuing questions and areas for investigation are many, e.g.:

- Castoriadis's interpretation(s) of Greek antiquity and philosophy.
- The status and use of psychoanalysis in political thought.
- Notions of the human subject, and “the self”, in social and political theory.
Hereunder, possibly, Castoriadis’s ambiguous relationship to Hegel.
- The social-historical discussed in different currents of thought (hermeneutics, phenomenology, pragmatism, postmodernism etc.).
- The influence and use of Castoriadis’s concepts, e.g of the social-historical, in current social theory (e.g. Giddens, Bauman, Joas, Wagner).

Contributions are welcomed on these subjects, or any subject matter within Castoriadis-studies as well as studies of thinkers that may elucidate the subject matter from other angles, whether philosophical, sociological, psychoanalytical or otherwise. We invite researchers, students, activists and others with an interest in these and connected problems to participate with papers, preferably in English, alternatively in a Scandinavian language, with summary and presentation in English.

PLEASE SEND AN ABSTRACT OF CA 300 WORDS TO ingerids2<a>yahoo.no BY MAY 1ST


Suggested reading:

On Castoriadis’s conception of the human psyche/subject
Castoriadis, C. (1987), The Imaginary Institution of Society, (chapter 6, ”The Social-Historical Institution: Individuals and Things").
Castoriadis, C. (1984), "Epilegomena to a Theory of the Soul which has been presented as a Science", in Crossroads in the Labyrinth.
Castoriadis, C. (1984), "Psychoanalysis: Project and Elucidation", in: Crossroads in the Labyrinth.
Castoriadis, C. (1997), "From the Monad to Autonomy", in World in Fragments (Stanford University Press, 1997).
Castoriadis, C. (1997), "Psychoanalysis and Politics", in World in Fragments (Stanford University Press, 1997).
Castoriadis, C. (1997), ”The State of the Subject Today", in World in Fragments (Stanford University Press, 1997).
Castoriadis, C. (1997), "Psychoanalysis and Philosophy", in The Castoriadis Reader (Blackwell).

On Castoriadis’s conception of the social-historical
Castoriadis, C. (1987), The Imaginary Institution of Society, (chapters 3, 4, 5 & 7).
Castoriadis, C. (1988) “The First Institution of Society and Second-order Institutions”, Free Associations, 12: 39-51.
Castoriadis, C. (1997) “Radical Imagination and the Social Instituting Imaginary (1994)” in The Castoriadis Reader (Blackwell, pp 319-337).
Castoriadis, C. (1984) “The Imaginary: Creation in the Social-Historical Domain”, in World in Fragments (Stanford University Press, 1997).
Castoriadis, C. (1984), “Value, Equality, Justice, Politics: From Marx to Aristotle and from Aristotle to Ourselves”, in Crossroads in the Labyrinth.

- - -

Alford, C. F. (1991): The Self in Social Theory. A psychoanalytic account of its construction
in Plato, Hobbes, Locke, Rawls and Rousseau. New Haven; Yale University Press
Arnason, Johann P. (1989): The Imaginary Constitution of Modernity. In: Autonomie et
autotransformation de la société. La philosophie militante de Cornelius Castoriadis.
Ed.: Giovanni Busino, Genève Libraire Droz
Arnason, J.P.: Roads Beyond Marx. In press
Arnason, J.P.: Imaginary Significations and Historical Civilizations. In press
Bouchet, D. (2007): The Ambiguity of the Modern Conception of Autonomy and the Paradox
of Culture. In: Thesis Eleven no. 88/2007. London, Sage
Bourdieu, P. (1997): Méditations Pascaliennes, Paris, Seuil
Cassirer, E., 1957, The Philosophy of Symbolic forms, vol. 3, The Phenomenology
of Knowledge, New Haven and London, Yale University Press
Castoriadis, C. (1987): The Imaginary Institution of Society. Cambridge, MIT Press
Castoriadis, C. (1999): On Plato's Statesman. Stanford, Stanford University Press
Castoriadis, C. (2007): Fenêtre sur le Chaos, Paris, Seuil
Castoriadis, C. (2004): Ce qui fait la Grèce. La création humaine II. Paris, Seuil

--- For a complete bibliography of Castoriadis’s work, see www.agorainternational.org

Caumières, Klimis and Van Eynde (eds.) 2006: Imagination et création historique.
Cahiers Castoriadis no 2, Bruxelles, Publications des Facultés universitaires
Saint-Louis
Gauchet, Marcel (2002): Redefining the Unconscious. In: Thesis Eleven no. 71/2002,
pp. 4-23, London, Sage
Klimis, Sophie (2006): Explorer le labyrinthe imaginaire de la création grecque: un projet en
travail. In: L’imagination selon Castoriadis. Thémes et enjeux. Cahiers Castoriadis
no. 1. Bruxelles, Publications des Facultés universitaires Saint-Louis
Pato&#269;ka, Jan (1996 b) Heretical Essays in the Philosophy of History, Translated by Erazim Kohák, Edited by James Dodd, with Paul Ricoeur’s Preface to the French Edition, Chicago: Open Court Press.
Res Publica no. 58, 2003: Castoriadis. Eds. Ingemar Karlsson and Mats Rosengren.
Stockholm, Brutus Östling.
Rorty, R. (1999): Philosophy and Social Hope, London, Penguin
Taylor, Charles (1985) Human Agency and Language. Philosophical papers 1. Cambridge
University Press
Taylor, C. (1985): Philosophy and the human sciences. Philosophical papers 2. Cambridge
University Press


• See also the Association Castoriadis homepage http://www.castoriadis.org

+ blog: http://castoriadis.blogspot.com