The Continuing Travails of Trumpification

Save 20% on the paperback edition of The Travails of Trumpification by purchasing it in our online store and using the coupon code BOOKS20 during checkout.

The disagreement about the propriety of the FBI’s search of Donald Trump’s residence reveals a fundamental divide over the proper role of the federal government. On the one hand, the defenders of the search have emphasized the rule of law and the idea that no one should stand above the law. From this perspective, Trump represents a danger to democracy itself, which the federal government is defending. On the other hand, for Trump supporters the search epitomizes the all-encompassing reach of the federal government into people’s daily lives and thus a further example of the erosion of freedom in the United States. The uncomprehending attitude of each side toward the other exemplifies the ways in which “the travails of Trumpification,” as described by Tim Luke, do not represent a passing phenomenon. As three recent reviews of Luke’s book emphasize, Trumpism is a complex phenomenon that is not just about Donald Trump. Populism predates Trump’s rise by more than a century, and the motivating attitudes and ideas will surely continue to shape American politics after he is gone. The focus on Trump the man has led, for both supporters (not least Trump himself) and detractors, to a failure to address the broader currents that he has been able to mobilize.

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New Reviews of Timothy W. Luke’s The Travails of Trumpification

Forthcoming in Educational Philosophy and Theory is a collection of reviews of Timothy W. Luke’s recent book The Travails of Trumpification, published by Telos Press Publishing. Excerpts from the reviews appear below, and the full set of reviews can be read here (subscription required). Save 20% on the paperback edition of The Travails of Trumpification by purchasing it in our online store and using the coupon code BOOKS20 during checkout.

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Timothy W. Luke on the Travails of Trumpification

In his new book, The Travails of Trumpification, a series of critical essays written over the course of Donald J. Trump's presidency, Timothy W. Luke explores how the recent twists and turns in the civic life of the United States have precipitated a dangerous transformation of American political culture. Tim recently talked with Mark S. Weiner about the book and the current precarious state of U.S. politics.

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The Telos Press Podcast: Timothy W. Luke's The Travails of Trumpification

Today’s episode of the Telos Press Podcast features a panel discussion of Timothy W. Luke’s new book, The Travails of Trumpification, published earlier this month by Telos Press. The discussion, in which Tim is joined by David Pan, Fred Siegel, and Mark S. Weiner, covers a range of topics and questions, including the meaning and origins of “Trumpification”; Trump’s contempt for democratic liberal norms; the emergence of a progressive habitus in the early twentieth century; the critique of liberal managerialism; the rhetoric of the “forgotten little guy” (à la Rodney Dangerfield); the purposeful use of ignorance to send up the degreed classes; the extent to which Trump emerged out of “Nixonland”; Trump’s undermining of the claims of scientific truth; the relationship of science to political interest, and how each should inform the other; the populist attack on the New Class; Trump’s elevation of individual winning over larger collective interests and the public good; the weakening of a rationalist epistemology on which democracy depends in favor of an ethos of pure power; how the Afghanistan withdrawal and the coronavirus pandemic exacerbated the public’s disdain for expertise; and how power might be shifted from the administrative state to the local level as a way of integrating all members of the public in political decision-making and thereby revitalizing citizenship. Timothy W. Luke’s The Travails of Trumpification is now available in our online store, where you can save 20% off the list price by using the coupon code BOOKS20.

Listen to the podcast here.

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Now Available: Timothy W. Luke's The Travails of Trumpification

Now available from Telos Press: The Travails of Trumpification, by Timothy W. Luke. Order the paperback edition today in our online store and save 20% by using the coupon code BOOKS20. Also available in Kindle ebook format at Amazon.com.

The Travails of Trumpification

by Timothy W. Luke

Telos Press Publishing is delighted to announce the release of Timothy W. Luke’s new book, The Travails of Trumpification. In this series of critical essays written over the course of Donald J. Trump’s presidency, from its chaotic early days to its calamitous end, Luke explores how the recent twists and turns in the civic life of the United States have precipitated a dangerous transformation of American political culture. Since 2016, Trump’s will to attain, and then retain, his office by whatever means necessary crossed red lines never before violated by any previous presidential administration. Even before his loss in the 2020 election, Trump sought to discredit America’s electoral process by challenging legal voting practices in key swing states on social media, in the courts, through executive agencies, and finally with violent riots, culminating in the disastrous attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. Yet while Trump himself no longer remains president, the “Trumpification” of the American political system persists today, with the majority of Republican politicians as well as Trump’s millions of devoted followers still firmly in the grip of his influence. The goal of the critical probes collected in this volume is to evaluate the “travails,” or excessive tribulation, pain, hardship, anguish, and agony, that his dangerous demagoguery has inflicted—and continues to inflict—on the nation’s democratic institutions and processes.

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New from Telos Press: Timothy W. Luke's The Travails of Trumpification

Now available for pre-order: The Travails of Trumpification, by Timothy W. Luke. Pre-order today in our online store and save 30% off the list price. Release date: December 1, 2021. While supplies last, also save 30% on our other books by Timothy W. Luke, including Screens of Power: Ideology, Domination, and Resistance in Informational Society, Anthropocene Alerts: Critical Theory of the Contemporary as Ecocritique, and A Journal of No Illusions: Telos, Paul Piccone, and the Americanization of Critical Theory. Sale ends November 30, 2021.

The Travails of Trumpification

by Timothy W. Luke
Release date: December 1, 2021

In this series of critical essays written over the course of Donald J. Trump’s presidency, from its chaotic early days to its calamitous end, Timothy W. Luke explores how the recent twists and turns in the civic life of the United States have precipitated a dangerous transformation of American political culture. Since 2016, Trump’s will to attain, and then retain, his office by whatever means necessary crossed red lines never before violated by any previous presidential administration. Even before his loss in the 2020 election, Trump sought to discredit America’s electoral process by challenging legal voting practices in key swing states on social media, in the courts, through executive agencies, and finally with violent riots, culminating in the disastrous attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. Yet while Trump himself no longer remains president, the “Trumpification” of the American political system persists today, with the majority of Republican politicians as well as Trump’s millions of devoted followers still firmly in the grip of his influence. The goal of the critical probes collected in this volume is to evaluate the “travails,” or excessive tribulation, pain, hardship, anguish, and agony, that his dangerous demagoguery has inflicted—and continues to inflict—on the nation’s democratic institutions and processes.

Continue reading →