A Political Life: 1937 - 1985

by Alain Badiou, Robin Mackay (Translator)

In this book, the renowned philosopher and polymath Alain Badiou tells the story of the first five decades of his life, from 1937 to 1985, setting it within the political history of the twentieth century.

Born in Morocco on the eve of catastrophic conflict, Badiou’s childhood and youth were marked by the Second World War and the Algerian War, experiences that would shape his political consciousness.  Badiou honed his political convictions as an activist and organizer among students and workers and in solidarity with the Algerian independence movement, but his life was upended and transformed by May ’68 in ways that were profoundly consequential for his philosophical thought.  By weaving his philosophical ideas into the narrative of his life, we see how the concepts for which Badiou is well-known – such as subject, being, event and truth – operate in the domain of experience and history. 

Written in an engaging and often playful style, this book illuminates both the unique trajectory of a major philosopher and the turbulent history of the twentieth century, showing how the latter shaped the thinking of a man who has come to embody the very idea of political commitment and radical political thought.

304 pages, Hardcover

Published February 10, 2026

About the author

Alain Badiou, Ph.D., born in Rabat, Morocco in 1937, holds the Rene Descartes Chair at the European Graduate School EGS. Alain Badiou was a student at the École Normale Supérieure in the 1950s. He taught at the University of Paris VIII (Vincennes-Saint Denis) from 1969 until 1999, when he returned to ENS as the Chair of the philosophy department. He continues to teach a popular seminar at the Collège International de Philosophie, on topics ranging from the great 'antiphilosophers' (Saint-Paul, Nietzsche, Wittgenstein, Lacan) to the major conceptual innovations of the twentieth century. Much of Badiou's life has been shaped by his dedication to the consequences of the May 1968 revolt in Paris. Long a leading member of Union des jeunesses communistes de France (marxistes-léninistes), he remains with Sylvain Lazarus and Natacha Michel at the center of L'Organisation Politique, a post-party organization concerned with direct popular intervention in a wide range of issues (including immigration, labor, and housing). He is the author of several successful novels and plays as well as more than a dozen philosophical works.

Trained as a mathematician, Alain Badiou is one of the most original French philosophers today. Influenced by Plato, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Jacques Lacan and Gilles Deleuze, he is an outspoken critic of both the analytic as well as the postmodern schools of thoughts. His philosophy seeks to expose and make sense of the potential of radical innovation (revolution, invention, transfiguration) in every situation.