This masterly study has a grand sweep. It ranges over centuries, with a long look backward over several millennia. Yet the history it unfolds is primarily the story of individuals: thinkers and dreamers who envisaged an ideal social order and described it persuasively, leaving a mark on their own and later times. The roster of utopians includes men of all stripes in different countries and eras--figures as disparate as More and Fourier, the Marquis de Sade and Edward Bellamy, Rousseau and (...) Marx. Fascinating character studies of the major figures are among the delights of the book. Utopian writings run the gamut from fictional narratives to theoretical treatises, from political manifestos to constitutions for a new society. The Manuels have structured five centuries of utopian invention by identifying successive constellations, groups of thinkers joined by common social and moral concerns. Within this framework they analyze individual writings, in the context of the author's life and of the socio-economic, religious, and political exigencies of his time. Concentrating on innovative works, they highlight disjunctures as well as continuities in utopian thought from the Renaissance through the twentieth century. Witty and erudite, challenging in its interpretations and provocative in the questions it poses, the Manuels' anatomy of utopia is an adventure in ideas. (shrink)

UTOPIAN THOUGHT BETWEEN WORDS AND ACTION:Seminar with Raymond GeussInstitute for Philosophy and Social Theory, Belgrade, February, 2016.

"The choice we have is not between reasonable proposals and an unreasonable utopianism. Utopian thinking does not undermine or discount real reforms. Indeed, it is almost the opposite: practical reforms depend on utopian dreaming."--Russell Jacoby, _Picture Imperfect_ Utopianism suffers from an image problem: A recent exhibition on utopias in Paris and New York included photographs of Hitler's _Mein Kampf_ and a Nazi concentration camp. Many observers judge utopians and their sympathizers as foolhardy dreamers at best and murderous totalitarians (...) at worst. However, as noted social critic and historian Russell Jacoby argues in this salient, polemical, and innovative work, not only has utopianism been unfairly characterized, a return to an iconoclastic utopian spirit is vital for today's society. Shaped by the works of Theodor Adorno, Walter Benjamin, Ernst Bloch, Gustav Landauer, and other predominantly Jewish thinkers, iconoclastic utopianism revives society's dormant political imagination and offers hope for a better future. Writing against the grain of history, Jacoby reexamines the anti-utopian mindset and identifies how utopian thought came to be regarded with such suspicion. He challenges standard readings of such anti-utopian classics as _1984_ and _Brave New World_ and offers stinging critiques of the influential liberal and anti-utopian theorists Hannah Arendt, Isaiah Berlin, and Karl Popper. He argues that these thinkers mistakenly equate utopianism with totalitarianism. The reputation of utopian thought has also suffered from the failures of, what Jacoby terms, the blueprint utopian tradition and its oppressive emphasis on detailing all aspects of society and providing fantastic images of the future. In contrast, the iconoclastic utopians, like those who follow God's prohibition against graven images, resist both the blueprinters' obsession with detail and the modern seduction of images. Jacoby suggests that by learning from the hopeful spirit of iconoclastic utopians and their willingness to accept new possibilities for society, we open ourselves to new and more imaginative ideas of the future. (shrink)

The significance of utopian thought for education can be made evident through reconceptualizing utopia and approaching it alongside the notion of dystopia. Awareness of dystopian elements of reality radicalizes the kind of critique that assists utopian thought and makes engagement with it more pressing. Awareness of the lurking danger of future dystopia goes hand in hand with a utopia that is cautious and vigilant of its own possible turn into catastrophe. If education is not just an (...) institution of the unreflective socialization and social integration of the young immersed in technicist and prudentialist goals, if it is about futurity and vision of a better world, it has to rely on, and renegotiate, utopian thought. Yet, all this presupposes a new descriptive account of the self and the world that breaks with the kind of anthropology and ethics that generated a particular conception of utopia as impossible and purely oneiric. (shrink)

1492. The American continent was drawing Europeans on. Some saw in it the chance of a utopia, others saw it as utopia already coming about, in its natural state. All at once two processes of domination were triggered: one supported by the force of arms, and the other by the power of ideas and beliefs. If the defenders of utopian thinking were able to create a lasting achievement, it is because they managed to make their ideas fit with the (...) principles governing the social life of the indigenous peoples: thus a substantial part of what remains from the period of Don Vasco de Quiroga had preceded it. Cultures will not be able to transcend nationalisms and rise to the level of concerns shared by the whole of humanity until they can stand up for their own particular character against ‘globalizing’ trends. (shrink)

Jason Lagapa’s Negative Theology and Utopian Thought in Contemporary American Poetry tackles a question that has been a difficult one to address for critics attempting to discuss contemporary experimental poetry in the line of “ Language writing.” This is a tradition that claims to be politically engaged but which nevertheless does not tend explicitly to exhort its readers to take concrete political actions. How can we thus judge this poetry’s political efficacy when there are no clear or obvious (...) political actions associated with it? Lagapa’s recourse to negative theology and utopian thought tells us that we should pay close attention to matters... (shrink)

Radical political thought of the 20th century was dominated by utopia, but the failure of communism in Eastern Europe and its disavowal in China has brought on the need for a new model of utopian thought. This book thus seeks to redefine the concept of utopia and bring it to bear on today's politics. The original essays, contributed by key thinkers such as Gianni Vattimo and Jean-Luc Nancy, highlight the connection between utopian theory and practice. The (...) book reassesses the legacy of utopia and conceptualizes alternatives to the neo-liberal, technocratic regimes prevalent in today's world. It argues that only utopia in its existential sense, grounded in the lived time and space of politics, can distance itself from mainstream ideology and not be at the service of technocratic regimes, while paying attention to the material conditions of human life. Existential Utopia offers a new and exciting interpretation of utopia in contemporary culture and a much-needed intervention into the philosophical and political discussion of utopian thinking that is both accessible to students and comprehensive. (shrink)

A series of essays by an international and trans-disciplinary group of contributors which explores the nature and extent of the utopian impulse. Working across a range of historical periods and cultures, the book investigates key aspects of utopian theory, texts, and socio-political practices.

This book examines the utopian dimension of contemporary social and political thought. Arguing for a utopian optic for the human sciences, el-Ojeili claims that major transformations of the utopian constellation have occurred since the end of the twentieth century. Following a survey of major utopian shifts in the modern period, el-Ojeili focuses on three spaces within today’s utopian constellation. At the liberal centre, we see a splintering effect, particularly after the global financial crisis of (...) 2008: a contingent neo-liberalism, a neo-Keynesian turn, and a liberalism of fear. At the far-Right margin, we see the consolidation of post-fascism, a combination of “the future in the past”, elements of the post-modern present, and appeals to a novel future. Finally, at the far-Left, a new communism has emerged, with novel positions on resistance, maps of power, and a contemporary variant of the Left’s artistic critique. The Utopian Constellation will be of interest to scholars and students across the human sciences with an interest in utopian studies, ideological and discourse analysis, the sociology of knowledge, and the study of political culture. (shrink)

Examines the life and thought of the spiritual writer who fought in the Spanish Civil War, journeyed to Germany during the ascent of the Nazis, and worked to establish an immediate link between Christian and Greek thought.

My objective in this paper is to write a pharmacology of the university by thinking about its relationship to systemic stupidity, intelligence, and the possibility of becoming. Starting with an exploration of the contemporary dystopia of drive-based stupidity imagined by the French philosopher Bernard Stiegler, which I seek to capture through the idea of the humiliation of thought, I look to deepen his response to this situation by suggesting a return to the work of two of his key sources, (...) Martin Heidegger and Gilles Deleuze. My objective here is to use their work in relation to Stiegler’s in order to suggest a utopia of educational becoming. Following my exploration of Stiegler’s dystopia, in the second part of the article I read Heidegger’s philosophy in order to formulate a utopian theory of education becoming, which is sensitive to the possibility of authoritarianism contained in his catastrophic decision to become a member of the Nazi party. Against the dystopic humiliation of thought Heidegg... (shrink)

Apocalypse, it seems, is everywhere. Preachers with vast followings proclaim the world's end and apocalyptic fears grip even the non-religious amid climate change, pandemics, and threats of nuclear war. But as these ideas pervade popular discourse, grasping their logic remains elusive. Ben Jones argues that we can gain insight into apocalyptic thought through secular thinkers. He starts with a puzzle: Why would secular thinkers draw on Christian apocalyptic beliefs--often dismissed as bizarre--to interpret politics? The apocalyptic tradition proves appealing in (...) part because it theorizes a special relation between crisis and utopia. Apocalyptic thought points to crisis as the vehicle to bring the previously impossible within reach, thus offering apparent resources for navigating challenges in ideal theory, which tries to imagine the best and most just society. By examining apocalyptic thought's appeal and risks, this study arrives at new insights on the limits of ideal theory and utopian hope. (shrink)

This article studies the response of the US disability community to the prevalent assumption that disabled people do not have a future, in the form of the disability rights movement. It provides an exploratory discussion of the key role played by utopianism in the response. In doing so, the article adds to critical theorizing on the importance of utopia to the oppression of non-dominant groups and to transcending that oppression. I use utopian studies scholarship to interpret the activities leading (...) up to the passing of the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990 as a minor utopia, characterized by an ambiguous, grounded, and provisional effort to imagine alternative ways of being. I articulate the central role played by a positive vision of disability and disabled people for this inversion of the historically negative relationship between utopia and disability. The article turns to disability activists to show that the movement countered exclusionary utopian approaches by acting as if it had a right to envision and enact a different, better future for all from the perspective of disability and disabled people. (shrink)

(2000). The treatment of the ‘woman question’ in radical utopian political thought. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy: Vol. 3, The Philosophy of Utopia, pp. 116-139.

This article assesses the exploration of the utopian paradigm within the context of technological advancement and its implications for human labor. It engages in this reflection, beginning with John Danaher’s reading of utopian perspectives related to the evolution of the labor domain, and then focusing on the significance of the social element and its dynamics in redefining labor and productive structures. It focuses on utopia as a regulatory ideal, valuing the conjectural contributions from theories throughout the history of (...) utopian thought. The analysis aims to understand how utopian theories arise in contexts of social dissatisfaction, prompting internal reflection on the structure. The article is organized into three sections: the first introduces the concept of utopia, tracing its historical and philosophical roots, with a focus on influential figures such as Henri de Saint-Simon and Charles Fourier. Through the study of nineteenth-century social theories, the article explores their radical proposals for societal restructuring in response to the socio-economic upheavals of their time. The second section examines utopia as a form of social critique, emphasizing its critical function in assessing and guiding societal development, by engaging with Norbert Elias’s definitions of utopia. The third section evaluates the relevance of utopia in contemporary discourse on social change, emphasizing the critical examination of utopian visions in relation to the concept of the end of work and aiming to articulate clear parameters defining a utopian model as a social regulatory ideal. (shrink)

The utopian imagination is ambivalent in that it both escapes from, while also critically engaging with contemporary societies and forms of living. This paper calls to mind the dignity of utopian longing as well as common objections against political interpretations of utopia. Philosophical utopias, it is argued, make deliberative use of the imagination by sharpening a sense of possibility and providing reasons for (or against) utopian thought-images. On this account, utopias draw on irony and satire as (...) constructive modes of imagining unrealized potentials and exposing what falls short of these potentials. Thus conceived, the utopian imagination is not the enemy, but an essential aid of practical reason. (shrink)

Mark Doyle's Utopian and Dystopian Themes in Tolkien's Legendarium reads Tolkien's work through the history of utopian and dystopian thought. The aim of this new study is not to prove that Tolkien set out to write dystopian fiction or create a blueprint for a utopian society, but that utopian and dystopian societies and settings crucially inform his legendarium. By placing his study outside of its usual fantasy context, Doyle gives us a valuable societally focused and (...) historicized contribution to both Tolkien and utopian studies respectively, yet one occasionally marred by the author's own unexamined value judgments.The book examines several aspects of Tolkien's legendarium, from its utopian and dystopian literary... (shrink)

This article examines the concept of the “education of desire,” which undergirds literary utopian studies’ response to postmodernism’s challenge to the modern utopian impulse. The analysis returns to two classic utopian texts—the work of Miguel Abensour, who coined the term “education of desire,” and Ursula K. Le Guin’s novel about ecological sustainability, “The Dispossessed”—to argue that the education of desire involves a more intimate relationship between desire and domination than literary utopian studies has allowed. This article (...) not only transforms our understanding of a mainstay of utopian studies; it relates this discussion to utopian strains in environmental thought, tracing the tension between the desire for ecological sustainability and the social, political, and economic prescriptions this would entail. (shrink)

Utopian thought feeds on a speculative magnitude that has attracted sustained critiques and generated radical revisions. In the contemporary age, the advocates of utopia have been prompted to corroborate the effective agency of a predominantly abstract frame of mind. A response, which also serves as a rebuttal, entails illuminating how utopian projects have intervened in history and shaped societies by probing the most unyielding, unchangeable features of humankind. Understanding how utopias unfold proposals for the present involves recognizing (...) that utopian writers share a penchant for extrapolation: While perusing the present, they anticipate the future; in focusing their investigation on very specific historical... (shrink)

The city has featured as a central image in utopian thought. In planning the foundation of the new and ideal city there is a close interconnection between ideas about urban form and the vision of the moral good. The spatial structure of the ideal city in these visions is a framing device that embodies and articulates not only political philosophy but is itself an articulation of moral and cosmological systems. This paper analyses three different utopian moments in (...) three different historical epochs – Tommaso Campanella’s City of the Sun (1602), the Choson dynasty foundation of the city of Seoul (1395) and the modernist utopian urbanism of the controversial Le Corbusier (1887–1965). In this analysis attention is drawn to the cosmological and moral visions articulated in these three ‘images of the city’ (Lynch). The opposition between rationalistic/mechanistic and religious/traditional urban design can prove to be an oversimplification that obscures the complex interrelations between the moral geometry and the natural alignments of the ideal urban form. (shrink)

My article analyses the political power of the utopian imaginary through the concepts of actuality, potentiality and possibility. Tracing the tensions of a critical model of utopia as both a form of thought and a form of the sensible, it links Louis Marin's concept of the utopic imaginary as a common sensorium that is reconfigured through the play of a mobile figure with Jacques Rancière's formulation of the partition of the sensible. Studying the critical reception of Melville's Bartleby (...) in Deleuze, Rancière and Agamben, it proposes that the space of literary potentiality, where the past could not have been or retains its possibility to be otherwise, where the actual can not be and the potential and the possible have a right to be and exist, forms the spatio-temporal configuration of the utopian imaginary of literature. Potentiality offers a key to understanding the politics of the ontology constructed by aesthetics. (shrink)

Most scholars study postrevolutionary Mexico as a period in which cultural production significantly shaped national identity through murals, novels, essays, and other artifacts that registered the changing political and social realities in the wake of the Revolution. In Biocosmism, Jorge Quintana Navarrete shifts the focus to examine how a group of scientists, artists, and philosophers conceived the manifold relations of the human species with cosmological forces and nonhuman entities (animals, plants, inorganic matter, and celestial bodies, among others). Drawing from recent (...) theoretical trends in new materialisms, biopolitics, and posthumanism, this book traces for the first time the intellectual constellation of biocosmism or biocosmic thought: the study of universal life understood as the vital vibrancy that animates everything in the cosmos from inorganic matter to living organisms to outer space. It combines both analysis of unexplored areas--such as Alfonso L. Herrera's plasmogeny--and innovative readings of canonical texts like Vasconcelos's La raza cósmica to examine how biocosmism produced a wide array of utopian projects and theorizations that continue to challenge anthropocentric, biopolitical frameworks.--Back cover. (shrink)

Unfinished at the time of Kolnai's death, The Utopian Mind should be widely welcomed by students of moral and political philosophy. It provides a powerful critique of the Utopian mode of valuation. Kolnai locates utopian thinking in totalitarian systems of the Right and Left and as an unspoken background to much liberal thought and to many of the best known theories of moral philosophy.

In these skeptical and disillusioned times, there are still groups of people scattered throughout the world who are trying to live out utopian dreams. These communities challenge the inevitability and morality of dominant political and economic models. By putting utopian religious ethics into practice, they attest to the real possibility of social alternatives. In Seeds of the Kingdom, Anna L. Peterson reflects on the experiences of two very different communities, one inhabited by impoverished former refugees in the mountains (...) of El Salvador and the other by Amish farmers in the Midwestern U.S. What makes these groups stand out among advocates of environmental protection, political justice, and sustainable development is their religious orientation. They aim, without apology, to embody the reign of God on earth. The Salvadoran community is grounded in Roman Catholic social thought, while the Amish adhere to Anabaptist tradition. Peterson offers a detailed portrait of these communities' history, social organization, religious life, environmental values, and agricultural practices. She discovers both practical and ideological commonalities in these two comparatively successful and sustainable communities, including a strong collective identity, deep attachment to local landscapes, a desire to preserve non-human as well as human lives, and, perhaps unexpectedly, a utopian horizon that provides both goals and the hope of reaching them. By examining the process by which people struggle to live according to a transcendent value system, she sheds light on both the actual and the potential place of religion in public life. Peterson argues that the Amish and Salvadoran communities, geographically and culturally removed from the industrialized West, have relevance for the political and environmental problems of the developed world. These communities have succeeded in the face of significant internal and external challenges, offering important practical and theoretical lessons on how to achieve ecological sustainability and social justice in the wider world. (shrink)

Arturo Roig inscribe el ejercicio del filosofar en la geografía de su función crítica. Crítica que es comprendida como una forma de pensamiento que se cuestiona a sí mismo y que considera no sólo los límites y posibilidades de la razón, sino también la realidad humana e histórica de un sujeto que se constituye en un "nosotros". La filosofía, así entendida, es un saber de vida. La función utópica se presenta como tarea para este saber de conjetura y para una (...) filosofía que sirve a la vida. Roig devuelve con ello el valor epistémico que tiene el plus lo axiológico, no verificable como hipótesis científica. Arturo Roig inscribes the exercise of philosophizing in the geography of its critical function. Critique that is understood as a form of thought that questions itself and considers not only the limits and possibilities of reason, but also the human and historical reality of a subject that becomes a "we". Philosophy, thus understood, is a knowledge of life. The utopian function arises as a task for this knowledge of conjecture that serves to life. Thus Roig gives back an axiological dimension as epistemic value to this knowledge. (shrink)

These essays in aesthetics by the philosopher Ernst Bloch belong to the tradition of cultural criticism represented by Georg Lukács, Theodor Adorno, and Walter Benjamin. Bloch's fascination with art as a reflection of both social realities and human dreams is evident in them. Whether he is discussing architecture or detective novels, the theme that drives the work is always the same - the striving for "something better," for a "homeland" that is more socially aware, more humane, more just.The book opens (...) with an illuminating discussion between Bloch and Adorno on the meaning of utopia; then follow 12 essays written between 1930 and 1973, on topics as diverse as aesthetic theory, genres such as music, painting, theater, film, opera, poetry, and the novel, and perhaps most important, popular culture in the form of fairy tales, detective stories, and dime novels.Ernst Bloch was a profoundly original and unorthodox philosopher, social theorist, and cultural critic. The MIT Press has previously published his Natural Law and Human Dignity and his magnum opus, The Principle of Hope. The Utopian Function of Art and Literature is included in the series Studies in Contemporary German Social Thought, edited by Thomas McCarthy. (shrink)

In response to the grim realities of the present world Jewish thought has not tended to retreat into eschatological fantasy, but rather to project utopian visions precisely on to the present moment, envisioning redemptions that are concrete, immanent, and necessarily political in nature. In difficult times and through shifting historical contexts, the messianic hope in the Jewish tradition has functioned as a political vision: the dream of a peaceful kingdom, of a country to return to, or of a (...) leader who will administer justice among the nations. Against this background, it is unsurprising that Jewish messianism in modern times has been transposed, and lives on in secular political movements and ideologies. The purpose of this book is to contribute to the deeper understanding of the relationship between Jewish thought, utopia, and revolution, by taking a fresh look at its historical and religious roots. We approach the issue from several perspectives, with differences of opinion presented both in regard to what Jewish tradition is, and how to regard utopia and revolution. These notions are multifaceted, comprising aspects such as political messianism, religious renewal, Zionism, and different forms of Marxist and Anarchistic movements. (shrink)

abstract The paper considers what (if anything) can justify that a utopian community or a micro‐society makes an exception to the general rules of society for itself. The discussion evolves around the Danish case of Christiania. Three moral theories, to wit Kantian constructivism, rule‐consequentialism and act‐consequentialism, are applied to the case at hand. The aim is to test whether the exceptions in question are unjust or in other ways morally problematic. The two former theories appear to deny the justice (...) of Christiania. The relevant exceptions are unacceptable according to those two moral perspectives. Act‐consequentialism, however, seems to endorse the case of Christiania, including the exceptions pertaining to it. While the latter theory is often thought to conflict with widely shared reflective moral convictions, in this case it might square with at least an important pragmatic layer of Danish public culture. (shrink)

The role of the ‘ideal’ in political philosophy is currently much discussed. These debates cast useful light on Mill's self-designation as ‘under the general designation of Socialist’. Considering Mill's assessment of potential property-relations on the grounds of their desirability, feasibility and ‘accessibility’ (disambiguated as ‘immediate-availability’, ‘eventual-availability’ and ‘conceivable-availability’) shows us not only how desirable and feasible he thought ‘utopian’ socialist schemes were, but which options we should implement. This, coupled with Mill's belief that a socialist ideal should guide (...) social reforms (as the North Star guides mariners), reveals much more clearly the extent of his socialist commitments (even if he thought political economists would be concerned with forms of individual property for some time to come). Moreover, this framework for assessments of ‘ideal’ institutions makes a useful contribution to an ongoing contemporary debate. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Blind Spots and Avenues for Transformation within the Utopian Canon: Toward A Terrestrial EcotopianismHeather Alberro (bio)Limitations and Exclusions of the (Western) Utopian CanonUtopianism in all of its manifestations often powerfully (re)surfaces during times of significant socio-ecological upheaval as a response to oppressive and exploitative realities. As such it is a fervent refusal against a given status quo and its purported inevitability. Utopianism and hope are rendered possible (...) by, and draw their transformative potential from, the boundless terrain of potentiality surrounding any given reality.1 Indeed, without such conditions of radical uncertainty, hope and utopianism would not be possible. Often and understandably, the seminal works of Plato, Thomas More, William Morris, H. G. Wells and others come to mind when we think of utopian studies. Hence Kumar’s parochial observation that there is no discernible utopian tradition beyond the West because other cultures lack the foundational myth of the Golden Age—that is, the Garden of Eden, Atlantis, and Arcadia—that has been so formative to the development of utopia in the West.2 These traditional or “transcendental” utopian modalities often feature a dichotomous opposition to their present reality, depicting time and historical movement [End Page 528] as linear successions of stages proceeding from an archaic past and toward a future wherein the utopian ideal is seen as occupying a “fixed space outside time and history.”3 Such temporally “transcendent” utopias marked the dawn of the modern phase of utopian thought, originating in the seventeenth century alongside new theories of social evolution that coalesced into modern Enlightenment notions of linear historical progress.4Prioritizing Pluralism: Critical Heterotopias of the “Here and Now”What kind of life? We are still confronted with the demand to state the “concrete alternative.” The demand is meaningless if it asks for a blueprint of the specific institutions and relationships which would be those of the new society: they cannot be determined a priori; they will develop, in trial and error, as the new society develops.5Tom Moylan’s notion of “critical utopianism,” which emerged during the “historic block” of political opposition of the 1960s and 1970s, marks one important step within the utopian canon toward praxis and the essential “Nowness” of critique and imaginative projection.6 This “critical” strand of utopianism is fueled by a fervent opposition to the exploitation and domination of people and the natural world that is increasingly characteristic of Western-capitalist societies.7 This opposition is coupled with a utopian desire for mutual aid, ecological resilience, liberation, and peaceful living—in effect, a longing for community.8 The “critical” in Moylan’s formulation has a bivalency: first, in the sense of critique through the debunking and deconstruction of the utopian genre itself, which was “colonized” by capitalism toward the 1970s and infused with technocratic dreams of material abundance through boundless economic expansion; and second, in the sense of the critical mass required to effect fundamental societal transformations.9 If the better is the enemy of the good, then perfection serves as “a stick with which to beat the possible.”10 Utopias do not offer rigid blueprints of a fixed or perfect ideal world but rather head toward “the ideal” by offering “a rich blending of creative fantasy, critical thinking, and oppositional activism” predicated on a demand for radically new relations between social and natural systems.11 Ever critically self-reflective, critical utopias continually remind us of the limitations of the utopian impulse, particularly the dangers of pursuing rigid and transcendental visions of “the better.” Nevertheless, these are desperate times that demand some orientation toward a better; utopianism’s [End Page 529] denunciative function is not enough. Thus, in his impassioned recent work Becoming Utopian, Moylan denotes the need for an intersectional, democratically unified leadership structure that can help sustain a political movement for counteracting the “global/neoliberal superpower order while reaching for a utopian horizon.”12 With a focus more on process than a fixed ideal, the critical utopia explores and articulates vibrant post-capitalist futures that are simultaneously open-ended, and far more socio-ecologically resilient than the “now” of late capitalism.Akin in function and style to critical utopias are the grounded and transgressive... (shrink)