Instituting Thought: Three Paradigms of Political Ontology

by Roberto Esposito, Mark Epstein (Translator)

This new book by the Italian philosopher Roberto Esposito addresses the profound crisis of contemporary politics and examines some of the philosophical approaches that have been used to try to understand and go beyond this crisis.  Two approaches have been particularly influential – one indebted to the thought of Martin Heidegger, the other indebted to Gilles Deleuze.  While opposed in their political thrust and orientation, both approaches remain trapped within the political ontology that has framed our conceptual language for some time. In order to move beyond this political ontology, Esposito turns to a third approach that he characterizes as ‘instituting thought’.  Indebted to the work of the French political philosopher Claude Lefort, this third approach recognizes that the road to reconstructing a productive relation between ontology and politics, one that is both realistic and innovative, lies in instituting praxis.  Building on this insight, Esposito conceptualizes social being as neither univocal nor plurivocal but as cross-cut by the dual semantics of political conflict.  This new book by one of the most original European philosophers writing today will be of great interest to students and scholars in philosophy, social and political theory and the humanities generally.

264 pages, Hardcover

Published September 27, 2021

About the author

Roberto Esposito was born in Naples where he graduated at University of Naples 'Federico II'.
He is Vice Director of the Istituto Italiano di Scienze Umane, is Full Professor of Theoretical Philosophy and the coordinator of the doctoral programme in Philosophy.
For five years he was the only Italian member of the International Council of Scholars of the Collège International de Philosophie in Paris.
He was one of the founders of the European Political Lexicon Research Centre and the International Centre for a European Legal and Political Lexicon, which was established by a consortium made up of the Universities of Bologna, Florence, Padua, Salerno, Naples L'Orientale and Naples S. Orsola Benincasa.
He is co-editor of Filosofia Politica published by il Mulino, the 'Per la Storia della Filosofia Politica' series for publishers Franco Angeli, the series 'Storia e teoria politica' for publishers Bibliopolis and the series 'Comunità e Libertà' for Laterza.
He is editor of the 'Teoria e Oggetti' series published by Liguori and also acts as a philosophy consultant for publishers Einaudi.