On the latest episode of the Outsider Theory podcast, host Geoff Shullenberger talks with Jacob Siegel, senior writer at Tablet and co-host of Manifesto! A Podcast, about the rightward trajectory of certain insights of Frankfurt School–derived critical theory, especially in light of the history of the Telos and its founder and editor, Paul Piccone. The discussion also turns to Piccone’s friend Paul Gottfried, the continued relevance of Herbert Marcuse’s “Repressive Tolerance,” the Thiel-affiliated New Right’s cultivation of a counter-elite, the recent Vanity Fair profile of the Thielverse, and more. Listen to the podcast here. For a limited time, save 20% on individual subscriptions to Telos and on Telos Press books by using the coupon code OUTSIDER20 in our online store.
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Writing at the National Interest, Alex Hu reports on the recent 2022 Telos Conference, entitled “Civilizational States and Liberal Empire—Bound to Collide?” An excerpt from the article:
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. The Telos Student Seminars provide a forum for students around the world to engage with critical theory by discussing a common set of paired texts from Telos—one current essay and one pertinent essay from our archives. In our second cycle of seminars, we are discussing Huimin Jin’s “Cultural Self-Confidence and Constellated Community: An Extended Discussion of Some Speeches by Xi Jinping” (Telos 195, Summer 2021) and an excerpt from Cornelius Castoriadis’s “The Crisis of Western Societies” (Telos 53, Fall 1982). The following reports are from the Telos Student Seminars groups in Budapest, Hungary, and Nanjing, China. For more details about the Telos Student Seminars, including summaries of the two essays under discussion, click here. One of the surprising aspects of the Ukraine War is that it came as a surprise. After the devastation that Russia wreaked in Chechnya, after the invasion of Georgia, after the occupation of Crimea—and the list goes on: after Russia’s complicity in the destruction of Aleppo and the violence of the Wagner Group deployments especially in Africa, and, most obviously, after Putin’s explicit declaration of his intent, the West could nevertheless watch Russia prepare for the invasion and still believe that it would not happen. Before the invasion would have been the time to arm Ukraine. Instead the West succumbed to a Chamberlain-like logic of self-delusion: if we do nothing, the aggressor will dissipate. The wishful thinking of liberalism is a scourge. It remains to be seen whether the brutality of Russian violence will change that mindset in the foreign policy elite. Optimism is not warranted. The Telos Student Seminars provide a forum for students around the world to engage with critical theory by discussing a common set of paired texts from Telos—one current essay and one pertinent essay from our archives. In our second cycle of seminars, we are discussing Huimin Jin’s “Cultural Self-Confidence and Constellated Community: An Extended Discussion of Some Speeches by Xi Jinping” (Telos 195, Summer 2021) and an excerpt from Cornelius Castoriadis’s “The Crisis of Western Societies” (Telos 53, Fall 1982). The following report is from the Telos Student Seminars group in Haifa, Israel. For more details about the Telos Student Seminars, including summaries of the two essays under discussion, click here. |
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