Political Spirituality Research Articles

Review: Political Spirituality in an Age of Eco-Apocalypse: Communication and Struggle Across Species, Cultures, and Religions by James Perkinson

Review: Political Spirituality in an Age of Eco-Apocalypse: Communication and Struggle Across Species, Cultures, and Religions by James Perkinson

Praemeditatio malorum: the disquieting spiritual politics of Pope Francis’ encyclical on climate change – or – how (not) to read Laudato Si

Praemeditatio malorum: the disquieting spiritual politics of Pope Francis’ encyclical on climate change – or – how (not) to read Laudato Si

Book Review: The Political Spirituality of Cesar Chavez: Crossing Religious Borders

Book Review: The Political Spirituality of Cesar Chavez: Crossing Religious Borders

The political spirituality of Cesar Chavez: crossing religious borders

The political spirituality of Cesar Chavez: crossing religious borders

Death, Slavery, and Spiritual Justice on the Colombian Black Pacific (1837)

Quibdo, the frontier, majority-black capital of Choco on the Pacific Coast of New Granada (present-day Colombia), was declared to be in a state of “general alarm” when a free black woman launched a street protest after her enslaved grandson, Justo, was murdered by his Italian master in August 1836. This article explores the contending spiritual politics that emerged in the wake of Justo’s death, and how his death became a point of political confluence between the province’s black underclass and a local elite opposition.

Political Spirituality

The article thematizes the difference between superstition and faith through an allegorical double reading of social theory and Ken Russell’s film The Devils. It discusses the political implications of this difference, contrasting the function of “love of God” in mysticism and in the governmental economy of the church. Crucially, love is originally a universal, immanent impulse, which is captured by religion. But if religion is an apparatus of capture, then the profanation of this universal core is possible. Religion cannot fully appropriate or exhaust the virtual potentiality of faith. By the same token, it becomes possible to distinguish religion and faith. Not all faith is religion and not all religion is faithful. The article draws on Foucault, discussing the possibility of a “political spirituality” outside the religious domain, as a profane, modern political gesture that cannot be reduced to theological notions. Finally, it turns to the relationship between political spirituality and political strategy.

A Russian Version of Christian Realism: Spiritual Wisdom and Politics in the Thought of S. L. Frank (1877–1950)

Christian realism is a concept normally associated with the US theologian and ethicist Reinhold Niebuhr. However, Niebuhr was not alone in warning Christians of the dangers of utopianism and trying to promote a religiously inspired political realism; thinkers from a number of countries had similar aspirations. In this context, the Russian philosopher Semyon Liudvigovich Frank (1877–1950) deserves particular attention. A Marxist in his youth, Frank became disillusioned with revolutionary ideas before and after the 1905 revolution, and was drawn away from politics to philosophy. However, he remained interested in political questions, both while he was in Russia and after he was forced into exile in 1922. This found expression in the 1940s in a form of Christian realism. Frank rejected the doctrine ‘the end justifies the means.’ But he was a gradualist in his approach to social change, believing that politicians needed to have a pragmatic attitude of mind. A distinctive feature of Frank's approach was the connection he made between spiritual inwardness on the one hand and effective decision-making on the other, although he also saw spirituality as arising in a social context. Ultimately, there was a mystical dimension to Frank's Christian realism that was absent in Niebuhr's doctrine.

Response to Andrew Mitchell “The Politics of Spirit and the Self-Destruction of the State to Come: Heidegger’s Rectorate in the Black Notebooks"

Response to Andrew Mitchell “The Politics of Spirit and the Self-Destruction of the State to Come: Heidegger’s Rectorate in the Black Notebooks"

The Politics of Spirit and the Self-Destruction of the State to Come

Among the Black Notebooks, the one entitled Considerations and Hints III, gives us Heidegger’s thoughts from his time as the rector of Freiburg University, April 21, 1933–April 28, 1934. In it we find Heidegger proposing and defending his own peculiar conception of a “spiritual National Socialism [geistige Nationalsozialismus]” (GA 94: 135). Insofar as “National Socialism” is a political determination and “spirit” an ontological one, Überlegungen III presents us with Heidegger’s “political ontology,” what I will term a thinking of “mediation,” properly understood. Delving into this ontology shows that mediation, the condition of being “in the middle,” of being “between,” is no stable state at all, but one prone to collapse and cancellation. This paper explores three factors in the Notebook that are antagonistic to mediation, and thus to spiritual National Socialism. Two of them Heidegger himself identifies—mediocrity and forgery—the third he does not: enmity. Spiritual National Socialism is doomed to failure, but not for the reasons Heidegger decries. It fails due to the antagonism that necessitates an enemy as Heidegger construes it. Among the Black Notebooks, the one entitled Considerations and Hints III, gives us Heidegger’s thoughts from his time as the rector of Freiburg University, April 21, 1933–April 28, 1934.159 The bulk of the notebook consists in the central section “From the Time of the Rectorate,” which includes entries dated from the very last day of the rectorate, attempts at the wording of a farewell speech, mottos, titled assessments, and retrospective glances over the year just past. In it we find Heidegger proposing and defending his own peculiar conception of a “spiritual National Socialism [geistige Nationalsozialismus]” (GA 94: 135). Insofar as “National Socialism” is a political determination and “spirit” an ontological one, Überlegungen III presents us with Heidegger’s “political ontology,” what I will term a thinking of “mediation,” properly understood. Delving into this ontology shows that mediation, the condition of being “in the middle,” of being “between,” is no stable state at all, but one prone to collapse and cancellation. Today I wish to explore three factors that are antagonistic to mediation, and thus to spiritual National Socialism. Two of them Heidegger himself identifies—mediocrity and forgery—the third he does not: enmity. Spiritual National Socialism is doomed to failure, but not for the reasons Heidegger decries. It fails due to the antagonism that necessitates an enemy as Heidegger construes it.

Foucault: Pensar mirando hacia Irán. Los “Reportajes de ideas” filosóficamente considerados

Attending the “non” orientalist attitude of Foucault, this paper proposes to pose a philosophical consideration of the Foucault’s texts on Iran. At first, it will take the problem of “philosophical journalism” –as Foucault named this expression of the problematization of the present–. Secondly, it addresses the foucauldean notion of “contra-conduct” that he was working in parallel in his course of this year (1978) and the political practices that he seemed to be watching that are could be associated with the notion. Last, it will be addressed the problem of political spirituality, as that which Foucault was looking with fascination as a mobilizing force for the politicization of the structures and the place of action in history.

The Politics of Spirit in Stiegler’s Techno-Pharmacology

This article begins by examining the concept of the pharmakon that is developed in Derrida’s essay ‘Plato’s Pharmacy’, as it is here that the idea of a medium that is simultaneously poisonous and therapeutic is developed in relation to the discursive effects of writing. The author then goes on to look at Stiegler’s attempt to reconfigure the ‘orthographic economy’ of deconstruction, particularly his account of how the ‘tertiary supports’ of virtual and information technologies have transformed the experience of the real in the regime of global capitalisation. Finally, he argues that the appearance of the pharmakon as a matrix idea in his work, sharpens his account of the aporia of technological society: for the impossibility of human culture being reduced to either the disorientated life industrial populism, or to idealist notions of reflexivity, is what, for Stiegler, offers the chance of a new politics of spirit.

Contemporary functions of ilobolo (bridewealth) in urban South African Zulu society

The functions and meanings of bridewealth in African societies have been analysed extensively in anthropological and historical studies. Although bridewealth remains widely practised in Southern Africa, few studies have examined the custom in a contemporary context. This paper addresses the paucity of research by focusing on South African Zulu society where, among all cultural traditions, the payment of bridewealth (ilobolo) continues to be one of the most salient. On the basis of recent qualitative research data collected in the province of KwaZulu-Natal, we argue that ilobolo practices among urban Zulu people are multifaceted and its contemporary functions debated and contested. However, there is also broad consensus about the obligation to uphold the custom based on a complex web of cultural and spiritual motives, socio-economic considerations and collectivist identity politics.

A Brutal Unity: The Spiritual Politics of the Christian Church by EphraimRadner (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2012), v + 482 pp.

A Brutal Unity: The Spiritual Politics of the Christian Church by EphraimRadner (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2012), v + 482 pp.

Identity Politics, Class Politics, Spiritual Politics: The Need for a More Universalist Vision

Identity Politics, Class Politics, Spiritual Politics: The Need for a More Universalist Vision

How Do We Build World-Transforming Coalitions?

Research Article| November 01 2013 How Do We Build World-Transforming Coalitions? Tikkun (2013) 28 (4): 19. https://doi.org/10.1215/08879982-2013-4007 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Twitter Permissions Search Site Citation How Do We Build World-Transforming Coalitions?. Tikkun 1 November 2013; 28 (4): 19. doi: https://doi.org/10.1215/08879982-2013-4007 Download citation file: Zotero Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search Books & JournalsAll JournalsTikkun Search Advanced Search Freedom Quilt Mural by David Fichter.Economic exploitation, racism, sexism, ableism, ageism, homo phobia, transphobia, xenophobia, egoism, spiritual deadness, and the transactional quality of social relations under capitalism — there is so much the Left is struggling to overcome. Contributors to this special section debate the tensions and over laps between identity politics, class politics, and spiritual politics. Don’t miss the lively web-only articles on this topic: visit tikkun.org/fall2013. You do not currently have access to this content.

Afterlife: Living Death to Political Spirituality

This article provides a prolegomena to a discussion of what Michel Foucault meant by ‘political spirituality’ and ‘the courage of truth ( parrhesia)’, terms which preoccupied his last lectures at the Collège de France and through which he continued to pursue his lifelong concern with the politics of truth and the history of the present. The article approaches these issues through the fate of the three strategic figures - God, Man and Life - that have traditionally problematised western rules of truth and truths of rule. It then proceeds to explore the living death, or afterlife, of Man and Life, which calls for a new courage of truth, and to which ‘political spirituality’ has been one response.

A brutal unity: the spiritual politics of the Christian church

A brutal unity: the spiritual politics of the Christian church

What are white progressive masculinities? Counternarratives and contradictions of committed white male teachers in inner-city schools

This life history reflection aims to constitute, generate, and proliferate complex progressive masculinities for male teachers and advance notions of progressive masculinities writ large in education and elsewhere. This reflection, working with life story interviews of white male teachers in US inner-city schools, positions this research within the researcher's life history. Informed by existing literatures on male teachers emphasising crisis-shortage and gender workplace issues, this reflection expands these literatures by developing life narrative concepts that replace static masculinities with narrativised identifications, lived counternarratives, and contradictory progressive masculinities. Key to respondents' progressive masculinities, this life history reflection provides four lived counternarratives including respondents' illegal drug use, process spirituality, alternative media, and critical politics. Through these counternarratives, respondents' contradictory progressive masculinities emerge as bifurcated phenomena that reify privileges yet drive respondents, precariously situated between nihilistic impotency and political potential, towards passively conjugated alliances with subaltern others.

Rolland, Gandhi and Madeleine Slade: spiritual politics, France and the wider world

Rolland, Gandhi and Madeleine Slade: spiritual politics, France and the wider world

Religion in the Web of Immanence: Foucault and Thinking Otherwise after the Death of God

This article rethinks Michel Foucault’s relation to religion by situating his engagement with the ‘death of God’ in relation to his ongoing efforts to frame critical discourse in consistently immanent terms. It argues that a certain, indirect ‘theological’ horizon is the paradoxical and problematic limit, for Foucault, of the possibility of a thoroughgoing immanent discourse in his earlier work, due to the paradoxes of the death of long-duration of God (and ‘man’). The relation of his work to religion thus emerges less as a productive question, for Foucault, than as a problem to be resolved if his critical project is to be viable. The article argues that his later work is informed by a significant re-framing of his relation to religion, signalled in comments he makes at the end of his 1978 lecture, “What is Critique?” and performed in his engagements with Christian mysticism, the ‘political spirituality’ of the Iranian revolution and early Christian practices of the self. Foucault is shown to perform a complex openness to religion as ‘other,’ which negotiates the ‘religious problem’ haunting his early work, even as it must repeatedly risk undermining his project. It is concluded that the relation to religion in Foucault’s work, less reflects resonance with aspects of a religious worldview, than it stages and clarifies the challenge of thinking otherwise immanently after the death of God.