Politics and contingency :|Louis Althusser

Abstract

This dissertation undertakes a close reading of Louis Althusser’s early and mature works as a problematization of a particular way of thinking that, with inspiration from Althusser, I have called “the logic of genesis.” Logic of genesis corresponds to a teleological thinking with reference to a model of generation. As in the case of the development of a seed into a plant, this model treats every succession as a continuous process, which one can trace back to its initial, embryonic form. Althusser finds this way of idealist thinking to be dominant not only in idealisms, but also in materialisms, Marxism included. The reconceptualization of Althusser’s work from this perspective, which puts him in a broader context than that of structuralism or post-Marxism, allows for a new axis to reevaluate his relationship with Hegel and Marx and his specific type of materialism. I begin my inquiry with Althusser’s early writings, which are positioned in post-war return to Hegel in France, in a battlefield, which is defined by two fronts: the philosophies of the concept and the philosophies of intuition. Then, I proceed with Althusser’s mature works, which I read as a critique of a conceptual society that logic of genesis operates in and as attempts to develop an alternative conceptual society through his well-known concepts such as overdetermination, structure in dominance or invisible time. This context is a preparation for a discussion of why Althusser thinks there cannot be a Hegelian politics and the importance of contingency for conceiving political practice.