With an apparently contradictory and characteristically makeshift term, Liberal Fascisms, Slavoj iek captures the paradoxical nature of political populism.
To see this phenomenon as purely liberal and dictatorially fascistic is to expose liberalism and fascism as two sides of the same coin. The concept offers a glimpse into the murky landscape of half-lies and double-truths that iek enters in this latest collection of urgent essays.
From the economy and politics to ideology, these short texts work through the different faces of liberal fascisms, structured around a trio of the universal, the particular, and the singular: our global predicament; Europe and the Middle East; Trumps America. Peeling back the inadequate labels we hasten to pin on the phenomena that terrify us like post-truth' to peer at the seeping wounds beneath them, these writings reveal the uneasy mixture of hypocrisy, self-deception and what is real that have always been stacked, matryoshka like, inside of one another.
With no cure in hand, but a refusal to dispense with thought that is muddled and murky, these interventions are both timely and resolute. From the so-called death of truth opens up the possibility for a new authentic truth or for an even bigger lie. And ultimately we must ask what forms of justice are made possible by this disorder?
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The third installment in Slavoj iek's essay series, iek's Essays, exploring the various 'liberal' fascisms which pervade contemporary political and social life.
Introduction: From the Standpoint of Eternity
Part One: The Global Mess We're In
Altona, Los Angeles: From the Nearby to the Neighbour
The Ambivalence of De-Commodification
Decolonization and the Public Use of Reason
Let It Rot...
Re-staging the Event
Part Two: Local Turbulences
Dark Humour in the Reign of Daddy Cool
Next Year in Gaza!
Sumud: Remember This Word
Peace for Our Time
The Story of Three Faces
Part Three: The Black Hole of our World
Let's Pray Trump Survives
Grab 'em by the Pussy
Why Evil Men Need Noble Spirits
Donald Trump as a Gramscian
Mamdani's Wager
Conclusion: Abandon All Hope, You Who Enter Radical Politics
Notes
Index
Slavoj iek is a Hegelian philosopher, a Lacanian psychoanalyst, and a Communist. He is Visiting Professor at the New York University, USA, and Senior Researcher at the Department of Philosophy, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia.