Antagonism forever. On conservative left-wing philosophy in Mouffe, Žižek, and Kristeva

Abstract

Chantal Mouffe, Slavoj Žižek, and Julia Kristeva contribute in a problematic manner to the ontologizing of political antagonisms and hence also to the cementing of unfreedom. While showing how contradictions are not possible to be sublated in societal unities, all three of them disregard the effect on the other end of the question: if antagonisms or revolts are found to be permanent, then problems which antagonisms contain, or which revolts address, become permanent as well. In contrast, Theodor W. Adornos’ understanding of societal antagonisms is that while social contradictions point towards the falsity of the whole and therefore must be acknowledged critically, they should not be considered unhistorical and permanent. This article aims at showing how Mouffe, Žižek and Kristeva end up in essentializing antagonisms and offers Adorno’s notion of antagonism as an alternative.