•  11
    Political Epistemology without Apologies
    European Journal of Philosophy. forthcoming.
    Political epistemology has become a popular field of research in recent years. It sets itself the ambitious task to intertwine epistemology with social and political theory in order to do justice to the relationships between truth and politics, or reason and power. Yet many contributions either expand arguments and concepts from traditional epistemology to political phenomena or use existing theories and frameworks from social and political theory to address the politics of epistemological quest…Read more
  •  83
    What might a contemporary philosophical practice after and following Foucault look like? After briefly analyzing Foucault’s rather ambiguous stance towards academic philosophy in his posthumously published Le discours philosophique, we argue for continuing his historico-philosophical practice of diagnosing the present. This means taking up his analytic heuristic (with its three dimensions of power, knowledge and subjectivity) rather than his more concrete diagnostic concepts and the specific his…Read more
  •  38
    Currently, the rise of science denialism is met by a new positivism that is equally detrimental for the natural and social sciences and humanities. Both paint an unrealistic picture of science in the singular, based on an idealist epistemology. In stark opposition, the article argues for a materialist epistemology that can support a realistic understanding of scientific practices by taking seriously their plurality, historicity and contextuality.
  •  26
    Michel Foucault’s thoughts on truth have been controversial from the start, and not just for those who routinely charge him with relativism without reading him—once again a prominent exercise in contemporary public and philosophical debates, especially when taking up the diagnosis of a “post-truth era”. While Daniele Lorenzini confronts these “interpretations” several times in his book, he has wisely decided not to let them frame his attempt to clarify Foucault’s actual philosophical conception …Read more
  •  30
    Gegen Responsibilisierung. Über die Herrschaft von Begriffen
    In Catrin Heite, Veronika Magyar-Haas & Clarissa Schär (eds.), Responsibilisierung, Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden. pp. 17-34. 2024.
    Begriffe herrschen, so können wir im Anschluss an Wittgenstein und Nietzsche sagen, wenn sie unsere Denk-, Handlungs-, und Seinsweisen bestimmen und uns zugleich vergessen machen, dass sie Ergebnisse einer langen Geschichte von Konflikten um jene sozialen Praktiken sind, in denen sie gebraucht werden. Denn ihre heutige Bedeutung ergibt sich aus dem Sieg eines bestimmten Gebrauchs – mit jeder unreflektierten Verwendung bekräftigen wir daher unhinterfragt die Sieger der Begriffsgeschichte. Die Res…Read more
  •  25
    Über die Wissenschaften wird derzeit gestritten: über ihre Ergebnisse, ihre Methoden und ihre Praktiken. Das ist ihrer gesellschaftlichen Bedeutung angemessen. Doch so, wie der Streit derzeit geführt wird, zementiert er ein gefährlich verkürztes Verständnis, als gäbe es nur die eine Wissenschaft. Gegen die Leugnung »der Wissenschaft« errichten ihre Verteidigerinnen ihrerseits ein Ideal, das Wissenschaft gegen Kritik immunisiert, ihre Vielfalt verdeckt und Wissenschaftsleugnerinnen in die Hände s…Read more
  •  17
    Der Weisheit Freund und aller Welt Feind?
    Deutsche Zeitschrift für Philosophie 71 (2): 157-177. 2023.
    How is philosophical knowledge related to the world in which it is produced – and how should it be related? In the article, “world” refers to the whole of historically established, politically contested and materially constituted practices. Three ideal-type relationships are distinguished: affirmatively in the world, negatively against the world, and with the world. The article argues for the latter because it combines the two decisive insights of the first two relationships: the insight into ph…Read more
  •  37
    Political epistemology is the name of an ambitious task. In order to aptly conceptualise the internal relationship between truth and knowledge on one side, and politics and society on the other side, political epistemology must reformulate the concepts of epistemology and social and political theory. For the concept of knowledge, this task implies to consider the truth and the force of knowledge equally. Frieder Vogelmann shows in his book the far-reaching consequences of this endeavour: for the…Read more
  •  19
    Demokratie und Wahrheit (edited book)
    with Martin Nonhoff
    Nomos. 2021.
    Contemporary concerns about the increase in untruths in politics have renewed interest in the relationship between truth and politics. Is democracy losing its foundations in a ‘post-truth era’ because it is becoming disconnected from reality? Or are facts, to which a technocratic mindset cannot tolerate alternatives, threatening to suppress political debate? In twelve contributions, political theorists investigate the relationship between truth and politics against the background of the current …Read more
  •  50
    In this article, three theses are proposed. The first is that ›force‹ and ›normativity‹ are not just two fundamental concepts in philosophy today but two paradigms: Each claims to structure how we view the world, to name what is specifically human and to determine the task of philosophy. Their confrontation repeats, according to the second thesis, the dispute between neo-Kantian normativism and life-philosophy in the 19th century, best captured by the concepts of ›life‹ and ›validity.‹ Third, th…Read more
  •  22
    This review of Bernard Harcourt’s "Critique & Praxis" focuses on the book’s two guiding ideas that (a) critical theory has been on an “epistemological detour” which has separated it from critical praxis, and that (b) the lesson critical theory should learn from its “epistemological detour” is a heightened reflexivity in its action imperative, that Harcourt reformulates as “What more am I to do?” The review suggests that this historical account of critical theory is not quite right and that the r…Read more
  •  51
    One step forward, two steps back: Idealism in critical theory
    Constellations 28 (3): 322-336. 2021.
    Although Amy Allen’s critique of contemporary Frankfurt School critical theory has been widely discussed, her concern for an adequate conceptualization of reason’s intertwinement with power has not received the attention it deserves. The article shows that the diagnosis of a too idealistic account of reason forms the backbone of Allen’s charges against Habermas, Honneth and Forst, before it discusses her criteria for an adequate conceptualization of the intertwinement of reason and power. It dem…Read more
  •  24
    Starting with the observation that transparency has become a concept so familiar that one hardly ever stops to consider the presuppositions and consequences of its usage, the chapter analyses transparency demands as a specific way of exercising power. By doing so, the author shows that the intrinsic logic of transparency leads to paradoxical effects. Any attempts to realize complete transparency undermine its own preconditions. As Vogelmann argues, instead of providing more visibility and clarit…Read more
  •  43
    Keep score and punish: Brandom’s concept of responsibility
    Philosophy and Social Criticism 46 (8): 922-941. 2020.
    Although seldom examined and not explained by Robert Brandom himself, the concept of responsibility is as important as the concept of inference for Brandom’s account of discursivity. Whereas ‘inference’ makes explicit the propositional content of concepts as the inferentially structured totality of their relations of material incompatibility, ‘responsibility’ makes explicit the normative force of these relations. ‘Responsibility’ thus becomes the paradigm of understanding normativity’s binding f…Read more
  •  1016
    The Problem of Post-Truth. Rethinking the Relationship between Truth and Politics
    Behemoth. A Journal on Civilisation 2 (11): 18-97. 2018.
    ‘Post-truth’ is a failed concept, both epistemically and politically because its simplification of the relationship between truth and politics cripples our understanding and encourages authoritarianism. This makes the diagnosis of our ‘post-truth era’ as dangerous to democratic politics as relativism with its premature disregard for truth. In order to take the step beyond relativism and ‘post-truth’, we must conceptualise the relationship between truth and politics differently by starting from a…Read more
  •  46
    Biopolitics as a Critical Diagnosis
    In Beverley Best, Werner Bonefeld & Chris O’Kane (eds.), Handbook of Frankfurt School Critical Theory, vol III: Contexts. 2018.
    Foucault’s concept of ‘biopolitics’ has sparked a lively debate within critical theory, although Foucault himself rarely used it after The History of Sexuality, Volume 1. In this chapter I argue that the reasons both for the way ‘biopolitics’ stirred Foucault’s readers and for his subsequent abandonment are to be found in the relation between Foucault’s model of critique and the role ‘biopolitics’ plays in it: it names the counter-truths derived from Foucault’s critical diagnosis of the disposit…Read more
  •  41
    Although the various interpretations of Foucault’s model of critique often seem to differ only in minor details, they seriously diverge by situating critique on different levels of abstraction in Foucault’s work. Mapping interpretations of Foucault’s critique according to this criterion shows that none of them pays full attention to all three of Foucault’s methodological imperatives which he calls nihilism, nominalism and historicism. The article offers such a reading of Foucault’s critique, int…Read more
  •  26
    Foucault lesen
    Springer. 2016.
    "Foucault lesen" [Reading Foucault] proposes a systematic and philosophical readig of Foucaut’s work: Systematically, I emphasize Foucault’s methodological perspective as a nihilistic, nominalistic and historicistic analysis of practices and the realities produced by them. This analysis proceeds along the three axes of knowledge, power and self-relations. I explore the consequences of this interpretation regarding the debates about Foucault’s concept of critique, his attack on the science humain…Read more
  •  36
    This introduction diagnoses two tendencies among Foucaultian scholars with regard to Michel Foucault’s Discipline and Punish: While the book was initially enthusiastically embraced and its central concepts – above all “discipline” and “panopticism” – were used almost too frequently, these very concepts were often thought to be superseded by Foucault’s own development in the governmentality lectures and beyond. The articles in the special issue, however, demonstrate that Discipline and Punish, re…Read more
  •  55
    The Spell of Responsibility: Labor, Criminality, Philosophy
    Rowman & Littlefield International. 2017.
    Most people would agree that we should behave and act in a responsible way. Yet only 200 years ago, ‘responsibility’ was only of marginal importance in discussions of law and legal practice, and it had little ethical significance. What is the significance of the fact that ‘responsibility’ now plays such a central role in, for example, work, the welfare state, or the criminal justice system? What happens when individuals are generally expected to think of themselves as ‘responsible’ agents? And w…Read more
  •  38
    Verantwortung als Subjektivierung. Zur Genealogie einer Selbstverständlichkeit
    In Andreas Gelhard, Thomas Alkemeyer & Norbert Ricken (eds.), Techniken der Subjektivierung, Fink. 2013.
    Die Behauptung, dass Verantwortung eine Subjektform sowie die Technik zu ihrer Herstellung bezeichnet, wird kaum Erstaunen auslösen. Wozu wären all die auf Verantwortung sich stützenden ethisch-moralischen Normen auch gut, wenn sie nicht unsere Subjektivität formen könnten? Dieses Selbstverständnis als verantwortliche Subjekte ist Nietzsches zentralen Angriffspunkt in der zweiten Abhandlung von "Zur Genealogie der Moral". Doch sein Verständnis von Verantwortung als Subjektivierungstechnik und Su…Read more
  •  25
    Die Regierung des Selbst und der anderen. Vorlesung am Collège de France (review)
    Zeitschrift für Philosophische Forschung 64 (2). 2010.
  •  613
    Liberale Subjekte. Eine affirmative Streitschrift
    Mittelweg 36 25 (2): 74-90. 2016.
    n diesem Beitrag zum Scherpunkt "Politische Theorie in der Krise" untersuche ich das von liberalen Theorien produzierte Wissen. Der Beitrag folgt dazu drei Selbstbeschreibungen des politischen Liberalismus, der sich erstens selbst als dominierendes Zentrum der gegenwärtigen Politischen Theorie sieht, der zweitens Anspruch darauf erhebt, mit seinem Wissen die politischen Selbstverständnisse von Bürger_innen anleiten und verändern zu können, und der schließlich drittens seine eigene Wirksamkeit in…Read more
  •  65
    Measuring, Disrupting, Emancipating: Three Pictures of Critique
    Constellations 24 (1): 101-112. 2017.
    All theories of critique rely on a – often implicit – description of the activity that doing critique is supposed to consist in. These “pictures of critique” frame all further distinctions and justifications in the debate about critique and critique’s normativity. After distinguishing three pictures of critique – measuring, disrupting and emancipating critique – I ask whether the theoretical reflection in which a certain conception of critique is elaborated is itself accurately captured by the p…Read more
  •  54
    Review of the following books (in German): Michael Ruoff: Foucault-Lexikon, München 2007. Fink/UTB. Clemens Kammler, Rolf Parr und Ulrich Johannes Schneider (Hrsg.): Foucault-Handbuch. Leben – Werk – Wirkung, Stuttgart 2008. Metzler. Paul Veyne: Foucault. Der Philosoph als Samurai, Stuttgart 2009. Reclam. Thomas Lemke: Gouvernementalität und Biopolitik, Wiesbaden 2007. VS Verlag. Patricia Purtschert, Katrin Meyer und Yves Winter (Hrsg.): Gouvernementalität und Sicherheit. Zeitdiagnostische Be…Read more
  •  1199
    Der kleine Unterschied. Zu den Selbstverhältnissen von Verantwortung und Pflicht
    Zeitschrift für Praktische Philosophie 2 (2): 121-164. 2015.
    Die Debatte um die Differenz von „Verantwortung“ und „Pflicht“ ist kein bloßer Streit um Wörter, geht es doch um Begriffe, für die der Anspruch erhoben wird, sie seien konstitutiv für moralische Normativität oder gar für Normativität per se. Doch welchen Unterschied macht es, die besondere Bindungskraft von Normativität über Verantwortung oder über Pflicht zu explizieren? Die Genealogie der philosophischen Reflexionen auf Verantwortung lokalisiert die Differenz zwischen Pflicht und Verantwortung…Read more
  •  28
    Habermas, die Demokratie, die Ökonomie
    WestEnd. Neue Zeitschrift für Sozialforschung 11 (2): 121-140. 2014.
    Does Habermas have the conceptual resources to not only rationally reconstruct the political shape of the European Union as a supranational democracy with a “shared sovereignty” between European citizens and member states, but to also rationally reconstruct the economic practices and processes? My answer will be in the affirmative, and my argument takes the form of an exemplary sketch how such a reconstruction might look like. It is, however, nothing more than a sketch because both rational reco…Read more
  •  51
    Neosocial market economy
    Foucault Studies 14 115-137. 2012.
    Although the governmentality literature has occasionally acknowledged the importance of the concept of a liberal truth-regime, there has never been a thorough investi-gation of the role it plays in Foucault’s governmentality lectures. Therefore, this paper begins with an examination of the lectures’ “archaeological dimension” that leads to two claims: First, it shows that the crucial conceptual tool in the lectures is the question about the relation to truth that a particular political rationali…Read more
  •  49
    The Circle of Criminal Responsibility. Juridicism in Klaus Günther’s Discourse Theory of Law
    Archiv für Rechts- und Sozialphilosophie 100 (4): 413-428. 2014.
    Klaus Günther’s discourse theory of law links the concept of criminal responsibility with the legitimacy of democratic law. Because attributions of criminal responsibility are always aimed at a person, they contain an implicit conception of the person. In a democracy under the rule of law, Günther argues, this conception of a person must be understood, as a “deliberative person”, a free and autonomous person capable of being both the addressee and the author of legal norms. The “deliberative per…Read more
  •  53
    Review of the following books: Michael Ruoff: Foucault-Lexikon, München 2007. Fink/UTB. Clemens Kammler, Rolf Parr und Ulrich Johannes Schneider (Hrsg.): Foucault-Handbuch. Leben – Werk – Wirkung, Stuttgart 2008. Metzler. Paul Veyne: Foucault. Der Philosoph als Samurai, Stuttgart 2009. Reclam. Thomas Lemke: Gouvernementalität und Biopolitik, Wiesbaden 2007. VS Verlag. Patricia Purtschert, Katrin Meyer und Yves Winter (Hrsg.): Gouvernementalität und Sicherheit. Zeitdiagnostische Beiträge im An…Read more