Equality and Freedom in Rancire and Foucault

(Hardback)

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Responding to the increasing need for new and peaceful forms of emancipation, Stuart Blaney offers a unique solution in the synergy between two pioneering strands of continental philosophy: Michael Foucaults ideas on freedom and Jacques Rancieres ideas on equality. Building a dialogue between these two thinkers, Blaney presents new perspectives on their work and a clear picture that emancipation comes from everyday practices rather than any particular movement or revolution. In exploring these combined views of equality and freedom, Blaney draws on some of the central facets of both concepts, including revolution, disagreement, care for the self, free speech and stoicism. To put these ideas into a practical framework of real, lived experience, we are introduced to the figure of Louis-Gabrielle Gauny the nineteenth century worker-poet and self confessed plebeian philosopher. Gauny is a nexus for Rancieres and Foucaults ideas; his life exemplifying a dual mode of existence in-between conformity and political revolution. This lived philosophy of equality and freedom shows the strong synergy between the two concepts, with one reinforcing the other and strengthening their efficacy as forms of emancipatory practice.

Author Bio

Stuart Blaney is an independent scholar specialising in Jacques Ranciere, political philosophy and aesthetics.