Universality and Identity Politics by Todd McGowan - 9780231197700

Name: Universality and Identity Politics by Todd McGowan - 9780231197700
Brand: Columbia University Press

Columbia University Press

Universality and Identity PoliticsAuthor(s): Todd McGowan\nFormat: Hardback\nPublisher: Columbia University Press, United States\nImprint: Columbia University Press\nISBN-13: 9780231197700, 978-0231197700\nSynopsis\nThe great political ideas and movements of the modern world were founded on a promise of universal emancipation. But in recent decades, much of the Left has grown suspicious of such aspirations. Critics see the invocation of universality as a form of domination or a way of speaking for others, and have come to favor a politics of particularismoften derided as identity politics. Others, both centrists and conservatives, associate universalism with twentieth-century totalitarianism and hold that it is bound to lead to catastrophe.\n\nThis book develops a new conception of universality that helps us rethink political thought and action. Todd McGowan argues that universals such as equality and freedom are not imposed on us. They emerge from our shared experience of their abse.