Anti-Badiou: The Introduction of Maoism Into Philosophy

In a new paperback edition, this compelling and highly original book represents a confrontation between two of the most radical thinkers at work in France today: Alain Badiou and the author, François Laruelle.

At face value, the two have much in common: both espouse a position of absolute immanence; both argue that philosophy is conditioned by science; and both command a pluralism of thought. Anti-Badiou relates the parallel stories of Badiou’s Maoist ’ontology of the void’ and Laruelle’s own performative practice of ’non-philosophy’ and explains why the two are in fact radically different. Badiou’s entire project aims to re-educate philosophy through one science: mathematics. Laruelle carefully examines Badiou’s Being and Event and shows how Badiou has created a new aristocracy that crowns his own philosophy as the master of an entire theoretical universe. In turn, Laruelle explains the contrast with his own non-philosophy as a true democracy of thought that breaks philosophy’s continual enthrall with mathematics and instead opens up a myriad of ’non-standard’ places where thinking can be found and practised.

François Laruelle is Emeritus Professor at the University of Paris Ouest, Nanterre La Défense (Paris X) and lectures at the Collège International de Philosophie. He is the creator of the concept of ’non-philosophy’, author of over twenty books, and director of L’Organisation Non-Philosophique Internationale. Robin Mackay is a philosopher and director of the UK arts organisation Urbanomic. He is an Honorary Research Fellow in Fine Art at the University of Kent, UK.