Instituent Power
Merleau-Ponty, Lefort, and Post-foundational Politics
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4437216 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Emmanuel Alloa (0000-0003-1919-5074) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Volume | 124 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 521-539 |
| Publication date | 2025-07-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | South Atlantic Quarterly (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0038-2876 • E-ISSN: 1527-8026 |
| Publisher | Duke University Press (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1215/00382876-11850229 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 9 |
Some central debates in current political theory have been dominated by the opposition of approaches insisting on either "constituent power" or "destituent power." Recently, some suggested an alternative to this opposition: the role of "instituent powers." Yet this notion is nothing new and in fact harks back to Maurice Merleau-Ponty's theory of institution. The article will explore what this theory might offer for reconceptualizing politics today. By focusing on the lecture titled "Institution and Passivity" from 1954-55, as well as on Merleau-Ponty's reading of Machiavelli, the author indicates how a theory able to hold together both ends of the chain - the instituted order and the instituent, inaugural event establishing it in the first place - locates Merleau-Ponty's political philosophy in a tradition set up by Claude Lefort, that of "post-foundational" political theory
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |