Alain
Badiou (1937- ) is a French philosopher who has engaged readers for several decades. Many
say he is one of the most provocative and most important thinkers living today.
Reading Badiou is like opening a window after living years in a small cell. The
fresh air can provoke many to close the window in order to keep everything as
it is. Others may feel the refreshing air he represents as an invitation to
find the door and take a walk. Two of his most famous books are nothing less
than manifestos, and that’s what he has called them. Manifesto for Philosophy
was published in 1992 and the Second Manifesto for Philosophy in 2011. Many
relate the concept of manifesto with the Communist Manifesto, written by Karl
Marx and Friedrich Engel and published in 1848. I also relate manifesto with
Søren Kierkegaards Works of Love, published in 1847. Kierkegaard doesn’t use
the word manifesto, but I have no doubt that Works of Love is just as revolutionary
(if not more) than the Communist Manifesto.
Why does
Badiou call his books manifestos? Because he her is making a statement. He is
reminding us all that life is more than survival, radically more. His first
Manifesto was written in a time when philosophy was of little interest for
individuals and society. Philosophy was considered by many as dead. His Second
Manifesto was written in a completely different atmosphere. Now everything is
philosophy and we find it everywhere. Philosophy sells very good and everyone
can be his or her own philosopher. His first book was written to revitalize
philosophy while is second book was written to take philosophy back again. Philosophy,
says Badiou, has become its own greatest enemy, conservative ethics. He has
written in his Second Manifesto a wounderful book where he demoralizes philosophy
and separates from servile and ubiquitous thinking. He brings back certain
eternal truths in order to cast light on action. Let me give an example:
“When all
this is said and done, this second Manifesto is the result of our confused and
detestable present time forcing us to declare that there are eternal truths in
politics, art, science and love. And that if we understand that to participate,
point by point, in the process of creation of subjectivizable bodies is what
renders life more powerful than survival, we will possess what Rimbaud, at the
end of A Season in Hell, desired above all alse: “Truth, in a soul and a body”.
Then shall we be stronger than Time” (p. 129-130 in the second Manifesto).
Thankyou Alain Badiou!
Kaare T. Pettersen
References:
Badiou,
Alain. 1992. Manifesto for Philosophy. New
York: State University of New York Press
Badiou,
Alain. 2011. Second Manifesto for Philosophy. Cambridge: Polity Press.
