Stuart Elden

Numbers and politics are inter-related at almost every level -- be it the abstract geometry of understandings of territory, the explosion of population statistics and measures of economic standards, the popularity of Utilitarianism, Rawlsian notions of justice, the notion of value, or simply the very idea of political science. Time and space are reduced to co-ordinates, illustrating a very real take on the political: a way of measuring and controlling it. This book engages with the relation between politics and number through a reading, exegesis and critique of the work of Martin Heidegger. The importance of mathematics and the role played by the understandings of calculation is a recurrent concern in his writing and is regularly contrasted with understandings of speech and language. This book provides the most detailed analysis of the relation between language, politics and mathematics in Heidegger's work. It insists that questions of language and calculation in Heidegger are inherently political, and that a far broader range of his work is concerned with politics than is usually admitted. Key Features: *A unique introduction to the political dimension of Heidegger's work, opening it up to a wider audience *Offers an original exploration of the relationship between language, mathematics and politics in Heidegger's thinking *Shows how questions of politics and calculation are inter-related in modern conceptions of the political Books in the series are...Valentine and Arditi Polemicization Shapiro Cinematic Political Thought Chambers Untimely Politics Elden Speaking Against Number Bowman Post-Marxism Versus Cultural Studies Marchart Post-Foundational Political Thought Little Democratic Piety

Henri Lefebvre has been celebrated as one of the most influential social theorists of the twentieth century. Understanding Henri Lefebvre places Lefebvre in his historical and intellectual context and analyzes the extraordinary range of his work, across politics, philosophy, history, literature and culture. Particular emphasis is given to Lefebvre's trilogy of inspirational thinkers-Hegel, Marx and Nietzsche; his links to contemporaries such as Heidegger, Axelos and the Situationalists; and his critiques of existentialism and structuralism. Analysis of his writings on cities are balanced with those on rural communities, the production of space connected to ideas of time and history, and everyday life linked to the festival and cultural revolution. Understanding Henri Lefebvre offers the most wide-ranging and reliable account of this central theorist available.

Henri Lefebvre has been celebrated as one of the most influential social theorists of the Twentieth Century. Understanding Henri Lefebvre: Theory and the Possible places Lefebvre in his historical and intellectual context and analyses the extraordinary range of his work, across politics, philosophy, history, literature and culture. Particular emphasis is given to the three thinkers who most strongly influenced Lefebvre - Hegel, Marx and Nietzsche; his links to contemporaries such as Heidegger, Axelos and the Situationists; and his critiques of existentialism and structuralism. Analysis is not confined to his writings on cities, but also covers those on rural communities, the production of space connected to ideas of time and history, and everyday life linked to the festival and cultural revolution. Understanding Henri Lefebvre: Theory and the Possible offers the most wide-ranging and reliable account of this central theorist.

In a late interview, Foucault, suggested that Heidegger was for him the essential philosopher. Taking this claim seriously, Mapping the Present assesses the relationship between these two thinkers, particularly on the issue of space and history. It suggests that space and history need to be rethought, and combined as a spatial history, rather than as a history of space. In other words, space should become not merely an object of analysis, but a tool of analysis.The first half of the book concentrates on Heidegger: from the early occlusion of space, through the politically charged readings of Nietzsche and Holderlin, to the later work on art, technology and the polis which accord equal status to issues of spatiality. Foucault's work is then rethought in the light of the analysis of Heidegger, and the project of a spatial history established through re-readings of his works on madness and discipline..