Zizek argues that the physical violence we see is often generated by the systemic violence that sustains our political and economic systems. With the help of eminent philosophers like Marx, Engel and Lacan, as well as frequent references to popular culture, he examines the real causes of violent outbreaks like those seen in Israel and Palestine and in terrorist acts around the world. Ultimately, he warns, doing nothing is often the most violent course of action we can take.
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Violence: Six sideways reflections (Big Ideas)
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"* 'Since the deaths of Jacques Derrida in 2004 and Jean Baudrillard in 2007... Zizek has quickly cemented his position as the world's prominent philosopher and cultural theorist.' Matthew Taunton, New Statesman * 'A thinker whose views are worth paying attention to.' The New Yorker 'A startling critic of great daring, who doesn't watch his back or observe the pieties as he swerves and swoops through the age of globalised images and fabricated realities.' Times Literary Supplement 'Zizek is... the most formidably brilliant exponent of psychoanalysis, indeed of cultural theory in general, to have emerged in Europe for some decades.' Terry Eagleton, University of Oxford '[Zizek] stares out, dishevelled, from the page and dares the reader to disagree.' The Guardian"
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'The Elvis of cultural theory' confirms his status as the most exciting philosopher in recent history as he explores the nature of violence in typically controversial style.
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In 1922 the Soviet government organised the forced expulsion of leading anti-communist intellectuals, from philosophers and theologians to economists and historians. Read the first page Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
In 1922 the Soviet government organised the forced expulsion of leading anti-communist intellectuals, from philosophers and theologians to economists and historians. Read the first page Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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24 of 24 people found the following review helpful
By .
Format:Paperback
This book is coherent and lucid. It focusses on the conventionally, comprehensibly political. There is a sustained line of argument which is refreshing given the often scattered, repetitive nature of some of Zizek's recent stuff. His thesis is relatively simple: that while the media waxes hysterical about sporadic and incomprehensible outbursts of graphic violence, whose very immediacy and excessiveness short-circuit sustained rational analysis, there is a constitutive and structural violence - principally economic - that sustains the operation of the developed world, and is simply more important. The introduction, in which he sets out his stall, is outstanding. There is a helpful epilogue which summarises the book as a whole and its argument, which is nice. Zizek clarifies his position more often than usual too, and this added sense of nuance and position considerably enriches the usual mixture of brilliant provocation and irony. There is relatively little jargon in it (relatively) and it is pleasingly concrete too, for those among us who like concrete. One comes away from Violence with a clear sense of what Zizek thinks about the way things are, as opposed to a panoply of dazzling apercus and a hodgepodge of abstruse theoretical speculation. Recommended, especially as a way in to Zizek, with a greater than usual emphasis on the political. What a pity he made a tit of himself on Newsnight.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
By Douglas
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
This is a fascinating and hugely thought-provoking book by the ever stimulating Slovenian writer. His premise is that violence sustains what we perceive today as the "normal", peaceful state of things. It's refreshing to read Marxist-based thinking and analysis helping to explain so much.
16 of 20 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
There is a lot of recycled material in this book and a lot that is off the point altogether. So a typical Zizek book. The one idea I found interesting is his explanation of street protests that turn violent, as well as the kind of thing that went on in Paris in 2005, as 'phatic' violence. That is to say, it serves the sole purpose of saying 'I'm here' and 'we're talking'. But Zizek doesn't take it far enough because in fact the phatic requires two interlocutors and its purpose is to keep open the lines of communication. So the obvious point he missed is that the police response is also phatic. By brutalising the protestors, they too are saying 'I'm here' and 'we're talking'. Moreover, if this in fact the case, then this type of protest action will not bring change because it is a routine exchange.
7 of 11 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
We regularily express our concerns on the preponderance of violence in the world, while (sub)consciously we filter out the essence of this violence, as we go on to live our own. western, protected, lives. For that reason, violence may be used as objects of ideological manipulation. A fundamental trait in today's liberal/democrat society is the condemnation of violence, while only occasionally, if ever, we see violence as a dyad: 'subjective' and 'objective' violence. I hence think that Berthold Brecht put this dyad into perspective in saying: "what is the more violent act; robbing a bank compared to founding one?" In "Violence", Slavoj Zizek points out 'objective' violence as an important substrate, or indirectly causative element, of 'subjective' violence. For this reason alone, this book is strongly recommended.
18 of 28 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I have never felt that Zizek is a particularly good writer, as good writers go: he doesn't have Lacan's gymnastics, Derrida's self-reflexive argument-as-content wizardry, Foucault's strategic reemployment of established words, and so on, and yet neither does his prose flow with the clear coherency and well rounded arguments of other marxist writers, like Jameson or Eagleton. And certainly this book does not break him out of that status.
That having been said, a number of his 'look at things from a different direction' insights are genuinely interesting, and one thing you can always, ALWAYS count on Zizek for is this: he has balls. Though his argument to get to the point is highly warbling and not particularly neat or convincing, when he states that emancipatory violence exists within the realm of love, you have to imagine Che Guevara smiling a bit in revolutionary heaven (it's not as well furnished as normal heaven, but there's more camaraderie). He will run, hell, he will CHARGE at your preconceptions, and he will show no quarter.
I would recommend reading this as part of a range of works on the subject of global violence and terrorism. It is too messy and rambling to give any coherent picture by itself, but together with his other work 'Welcome to the Desert of the Real', and such works as 'Philosophy in a Time of Terror' with Habermas and Derrida, 'Ground Zero' and 'Desert Screen' by Virilio, and such Baudrillard essays as 'The Violence of the Global' and 'The Spirit of Terrorism', it can give a good, interesting, and even (!) semi-coherent view of the world's more virulent mechanics.
That having been said, a number of his 'look at things from a different direction' insights are genuinely interesting, and one thing you can always, ALWAYS count on Zizek for is this: he has balls. Though his argument to get to the point is highly warbling and not particularly neat or convincing, when he states that emancipatory violence exists within the realm of love, you have to imagine Che Guevara smiling a bit in revolutionary heaven (it's not as well furnished as normal heaven, but there's more camaraderie). He will run, hell, he will CHARGE at your preconceptions, and he will show no quarter.
I would recommend reading this as part of a range of works on the subject of global violence and terrorism. It is too messy and rambling to give any coherent picture by itself, but together with his other work 'Welcome to the Desert of the Real', and such works as 'Philosophy in a Time of Terror' with Habermas and Derrida, 'Ground Zero' and 'Desert Screen' by Virilio, and such Baudrillard essays as 'The Violence of the Global' and 'The Spirit of Terrorism', it can give a good, interesting, and even (!) semi-coherent view of the world's more virulent mechanics.
9 of 15 people found the following review helpful
By 666
Format:Paperback
Yes, it is flawed; yes, it is full of arguments that he has used at length elsewhere - but few can write prose that is as stimulating to read. Agree or not, Zizek has something to say - and you'll be glad you read it...
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Meticulous and appropriate!
Some there are that opine that Slavoj Zizek is a twister. Others sincerely hold that he is in fact a typewriter. Read more
Published on 14 May 2009 by Professor Bjorn Hagforth
3.0 out of 5 stars
polemic, insightful but without the foundation
as ever Zizek twists and manipulates everything in his grasps....provactive, challenging and purposely against our common (mis)conceptions. Read more
Published on 10 Feb 2008 by Mr. R. Crich
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