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Canadian Political Science Association2024 Annual Conference Programme
Approaches, Knowledges, and Methods
for the World of Tomorrow
Hosted at McGill University
June 12 to June 14, 20242024 Annual Conference Programme
Approaches, Knowledges, and Methods
for the World of Tomorrow
Hosted at McGill University
June 12 to June 14, 2024
Political Theory
H05(d) - Roundtable: The Return of Political Things Today: On the Legacy of Miguel Abensour
Date: Jun 12 | Time: 03:30pm to 05:00pm | Location: C-4145, Pavillon Lionel-Groulx (3150 Jean Brillant St), Université de Montréal
Chair/Président/Présidente : Paul Mazzocchi (York University)
Paul Mazzocchi (York University)Martin Breaugh (York University )
James Ingram (McMaster University)
Olivier Ruchet (Paris-Panthéon-Assas University (Paris II))
Sophie Marcotte-Chénard (Carleton University)
Christopher Holman (Nanyang Technological University)
Devin Zane Shaw (Douglas College)
Abstract: In charting a subversive pathway for the discipline, Miguel Abensour distinguished two types of “return” within political philosophy: on the one hand, the return of a neglected academic discipline, intent on re-philosophizing or legitimizing “normal” politics within a liberal institutional framework; on the other, the return of “political things” that emerge from events that irrupt in the here and now, namely emancipatory social movements challenging gods and masters. Demanding attention to the latter, Abensour challenged us to write “about politics from the side of the dominated” who construct emancipatory visions in the face of polymorphic forms of domination. In the context of the upcoming publication of A Politics of Emancipation: The Miguel Abensour Reader (SUNY, 2024), this roundtable opens discussions about emancipation, domination, and the return of political things in our contemporary moment. The years following the 2008 financial crisis saw the rise of diverse movements for emancipation, including Occupy Wall Street, the Arab and Maple Springs, Indigenous resurgence, Black Lives Matter, Nuit Debout, anti-pipeline protests in North America, and anti-austerity movements throughout the world. Such movements have raised the spectre of emancipation. But the concurrent rise of the alt-right and authoritarian movements and governments globally has seen a counter-tendency inaugurating new forms of domination. Convened by the editors of The Abensour Reader, the roundtable will address the current return of “political things” and examine the potentials and prospects for further emancipatory irruptions, particularly in the face of new forms of domination.