Abstract

This book is an attempt to reconstruct the philosophical ideas that support Guy Debord's theory of 'spectacle'. By drawing on a wide range of textual evidence from across Debord's oeuvre, and by reading that evidence in the light of the philosophical and theoretical texts that informed his claims, the book develops a holistic interpretation of his work, and frames the latter as being primarily concerned with time, history and historical agency. Through doing so, the book advances an interpretation of Debord's Hegelian Marxism, and contends that the latter can be seen to afford a philosophy of praxis that merits further scholarly attention. The book also offers a detailed critique of Debord's engagements with Marx's mature value theory, and proposes that the conception of historical time that supports Debord's work may in fact be of greater interest than the more overtlly Marxian elements of his thought.