Gavin Rae

Tadeusz Kowalik lived through ten decades and three economic and political systems in Poland. He combined his academic study of economic ideas with his socialist ideals of building a fairer and more just society. This book covers the intellectual and political work of Kowalik, within the context of modern Polish history. Kowalik was part of a Polish School of critical left-wing political economists, that included Michal Kalecki and Oskar Lange. Kowalik contributed to the body of work produced by this group, which included his interpretation of their work. Kowalik participated in some of the most momentous events in post-war Polish history, helping to organise a group of intellectuals to advise the shipyard workers at the Gdansk shipyards in 1980. He became a vehement opponent of Poland’s neoliberal form of capitalism and left a body of work that illuminates our understanding of capitalism and socialism today.

Western thinking on sexuality has historically affirmed not only a binary division between two sexes, each of which is defined by unique fixed attributes that delineate its essence, but also a privileging of the masculine over the feminine and heteronormative relations over alternatives. By engaging with psychoanalytic theory, phenomenology, feminist and gender theory, and the new materialisms, Gavin Rae shows how this model came under sustained and heterogeneous attack in the twentieth century. Rather than affirm one of these critical trajectories, Rae rethinks the problematic by turning to Walter Benjamin's notion of concepts as constellations to develop an alternative model called sexuality as constellation.

Gavin Rae offers us a new evaluation of poststructuralist thought. This involves a re-conception of the embodied subject as a continual process within and defined by ever-changing configurations of the social, the symbolic and the psychic.He shows that the question of the subject is central for poststructuralist thinkers, that they are aware of the problematic status of agency that arises from their decentring of the subject and that they offer heterogeneous solutions to resolve it. First, showing how this plays out in the thinking of Deleuze, Derrida and Foucault, Rae subsequently demonstrates that it is with those poststructuralists associated with and influenced by Lacanian psychoanalysis that this issue most clearly comes to the fore. He goes on to reveal that the conceptual schema of Cornelius Castoriadis best explains how the founded subject is capable of agency.

Charting a sweeping history of evil within the Western philosophical tradition, Gavin Rae shows that the problem of evil as a conceptual problem came to the fore with the rise of monotheism. Rae traces the problem of evil from early and Medieval Christian philosophy to modern philosophy, German Idealism, post-structuralism and contemporary analytic philosophy and secularisation.

This book considers the social, economic and political consequences of Poland's transition from socialism to capitalism. The immense changes that have occurred in the country over the past decade and a half are analysed in their historical and geo-political framework. Poland was the first Eastern European country to return to capitalism, with its shock-therapy economic reforms replicated throughout the region. These sought to dismantle the socialist elements of the economy as rapidly as possible and open up the post-socialist countries to the world capitalist market. The former socialist countries were absorbed into the international division of labour and their economies quickly became a part of and dependent upon the global capitalist system. The revolutions of 1989-91 not only transformed Eastern Europe but instigated fundamental changes to the international capitalist system itself. By opening up the ex-socialist economies to international capital a new era of globalisation was opened, as the principles and practices of neo-liberalism gained ascendancy. While a section of society prospered from this opening, other social groups saw their living-standards decline, creating large social inequalities. One consequence of these social divisions has been the destabilising of the newly created democratic political systems. The growth of more authoritarian, conservative political currents in Poland is an example of this. As the largest and most strategically important country in Central-Eastern Europe, Poland has increasingly become a focus of international relations between the major powers. Events in Poland, especially after European expansion, influence relations between the USA, the European Union and Russia. This book therefore looks both at how the absorption of Poland into the international capitalist system has transformed the country and at how this process is contributing to developments globally. It finishes by considering developments since EU Accession and at the expected results of this expansion both within Poland and an enlarged EU.

While Western political theory has traditionally affirmed the importance of pure reason, this has recently come under attack from a variety of directions, including from those who question its universal pretensions, its neglect of the emotions, and its attachment to rationally discerned truth. Gavin Rae accepts aspects of these critiques, but rejects the conclusion that this means that reason should be abandoned politically. Instead, Rae argues that it opens the possibility for a rethinking and recuperation of a reconceived understanding of political reason that emphasises, not individual abstract reflection, but social performativity. Through engagements with analytic epistemology, critical theory, feminism, hegemony theory, poststructuralism, and psychoanalysis, political reason is reconceived as an ongoing collective performative practice that aims at establishing the hegemonic norms that will structure and define collective identity, including its political and epistemic possibilities.

Gavin Rae offers an original approach to sovereign violence by looking at a wide range of thinkers, which he organises into three models. Benjamin, Schmitt, Arendt, Deleuze and Guattari form the radical-juridical perspective; Foucault and Agamben the biopolitical; Derrida the bio-juridical which Rae argues produces the most nuanced account. Rae engages with new translations of 'The Beast and the Sovereign' and 'The Death Penalty' to show that Derrida offers a radical and alternative angle in which violence is placed between law and life, simultaneously creating and regulating each through the other.

Gavin Rae shows that the problematic status of agency caused by the poststructuralist decentring of the subject is a central concern for poststructuralist thinkers. First, Rae shows how this plays out in the thinking of Deleuze, Derrida and Foucault. He then demonstrates that it is with those poststructuralists associated with and influenced by Lacanian psychoanalysis that this issue most clearly comes to the fore. He goes on to reveal that the conceptual schema of Cornelius Castoriadis best explains how the founded subject is capable of agency.

Gavin Rae offers an original approach to sovereign violence by looking at a wide range of thinkers, which he organises into three models. Benjamin, Schmitt, Arendt, Deleuze and Guattari form the radical-juridical perspective; Foucault and Agamben the biopolitical; Derrida the bio-juridical which Rae argues produces the most nuanced account. Rae engages with new translations of 'The Beast and the Sovereign' and 'The Death Penalty' to show that Derrida offers a radical and alternative angle in which violence is placed between law and life, simultaneously creating and regulating each through the other.

Charting a sweeping history of evil within the Western philosophical tradition, Gavin Rae shows that the problem of evil as a conceptual problem came to the fore with the rise of monotheism. Rae traces the problem of evil from early and Medieval Christian philosophy to modern philosophy, German Idealism, post-structuralism and contemporary analytic philosophy and secularisation.

In this book, Gavin Rae analyses the foundations of political life by undertaking a critical comparative analysis of the political theologies of Carl Schmitt and Emmanuel Levinas. In so doing, Rae contributes to key debates in contemporary political philosophy, specifically those relating to the nature of, and the relationship between, the theological, the political, and the ethical, as well as those questioning the existence of ahistoric metaphysical, ontological, and epistemological foundations. While the theological is often associated with belief in a fixed foundation such as God or the truth of a religion, Rae identifies another sense rooted in epistemology. On this understanding, the ontological limitations of human cognition mean that, ultimately, human truth is based in faith and so can never be certain. The argument developed suggests that Levinas’ conception of the political is grounded in theology in the sense of religion, particularly the revelations of Judaism. For this reason, Levinas claims that the political decision is based on how to implement a prior religiously-inspired norm: justice. Schmitt, in contrast, develops a conception of the political rooted in epistemic faith to claim that the political decision is normless. While sympathetic to Schmitt’s conception of theology and its relationship to the political, Rae concludes by arguing that the emphasis Levinas places on responsibility is crucial to understanding the implications of this. The continuing relevance of Schmitt’s and Levinas’ political theologies is that they teach us that, while the political decision is ultimately normless, we bear an infinite responsibility for theconsequences of this normless decision.

In this book, Gavin Rae analyses the foundations of political life by undertaking a critical comparative analysis of the political theologies of Carl Schmitt and Emmanuel Levinas. In so doing, Rae contributes to key debates in contemporary political philosophy, specifically those relating to the nature of, and the relationship between, the theological, the political, and the ethical, as well as those questioning the existence of ahistoric metaphysical, ontological, and epistemological foundations. While the theological is often associated with belief in a fixed foundation such as God or the truth of a religion, Rae identifies another sense rooted in epistemology. On this understanding, the ontological limitations of human cognition mean that, ultimately, human truth is based in faith and so can never be certain. The argument developed suggests that Levinas’ conception of the political is grounded in theology in the sense of religion, particularly the revelations of Judaism. For this reason, Levinas claims that the political decision is based on how to implement a prior religiously-inspired norm: justice. Schmitt, in contrast, develops a conception of the political rooted in epistemic faith to claim that the political decision is normless. While sympathetic to Schmitt’s conception of theology and its relationship to the political, Rae concludes by arguing that the emphasis Levinas places on responsibility is crucial to understanding the implications of this. The continuing relevance of Schmitt’s and Levinas’ political theologies is that they teach us that, while the political decision is ultimately normless, we bear an infinite responsibility for theconsequences of this normless decision.

Privatising Capital examines the historical development of Poland’s public sector and its welfare state. Their infrastructure, services and employees add up to a form of public capital, upon which the vast majority of society is dependent. The book describes the ongoing attempts to financialise and commodify this public capital and examines how this occurs in the areas of health, education and pensions. It also analyses the impact of public capital on the ideas and opinions of the population and how it affects contemporary ideologies and politics in Poland.