Austin Hayden Smidt – författare

Does Jean-Paul Sartre's political theory have anything to offer to us today? Are Sartre's ways of reflecting on ethics, praxis, society and political philosophy in terms of hope for a better world, a better future, of interest today? This edited volume brings together Sartre scholars to address the later Sartre’s relevance for political theory and philosophy, with a focus on the contemporary world. Using Critique of Dialectical Reason and Sartre’s later engagements with politics, morality, colonialism, integral humanity and reflections on Marxism as starting points, the book is divided into two sections. The first part develops and expands on the core Sartrean themes of the later Sartre relevant for political thinkers. It deals among other things with the tensions between freedom and compulsion in social human action, with the intelligibility of human action in relation to historical circumstances and with how to understand material conditions and social institutions in congruence with the political world of action. The second part of the book directly poses issues concerning how a Sartrean approach may be developed to fit the contemporary world in order to tackle currently relevant topics such as democracy, populism, colonialism, disability justice and the climate crises.

There are perpetual debates about the extent of freedom in politics. Are we free to choose? Are we overdetermined by our material conditions? Some hybrid between the two? What is more, how are we to comprehend ourselves as creators of history if freedom itself is a problematic concept? And what would it mean if self-comprehension were foreclosed by this problematic? In this text, Austin Hayden Smidt analyzes an oft-overlooked text by Jean-Paul Sartre in order to ground a logical framework for exploring this paradox. In Critique of Dialectical Reason, Sartre sought to develop an historical and structural heuristic; one that would enable future theorists and activists alike to assess the pressing problems facing the various milieux of capitalist life. Through this heuristic, his intent was to develop an orientation enabling humans to transform their world in their perpetual creation of themselves (and vice versa). However, the stylistic difficulties of the text, as well as a general agreement among previous interpreters, has prevented the richness of the investigation from taking root. This book sets a new course, and invites further collaboration as – together – we create society as a work of art.