Margins
Infinitely Demanding book cover
Infinitely Demanding
Ethics of Commitment, Politics of Resistance
2007
First Published
3.73
Average Rating
178
Number of Pages

A new political ethics that confronts the injustices of liberal democracy. Infinitely Demanding is the clearest, boldest and most systematic statement of Simon Critchley's influential views on philosophy, ethics, and politics. Part diagnosis of the times, part theoretical analysis of the impasses and possibilities of ethics and politics, part manifesto, Infinitely Demanding identifies a massive political disappointment at the heart of liberal democracy and argues that what is called for is an ethics of commitment that can inform a radical politics. Exploring the problem of ethics in Kant, Levinas, Badiou, and Lacan that leads to a conception of subjectivity based on the infinite responsibility of an ethical demand, Critchley considers the possibility of political subjectivity and action after Marx and Marxism. Infinitely Demanding culminates in an argument for anarchism as an ethical practice and a remotivating means of political organization.

Avg Rating
3.73
Number of Ratings
280
5 STARS
20%
4 STARS
43%
3 STARS
28%
2 STARS
8%
1 STARS
2%
goodreads

Author

Simon Critchley
Simon Critchley
Author · 25 books
Simon Critchley (born 27 February 1960 in Hertfordshire) is an English philosopher currently teaching at The New School. He works in continental philosophy. Critchley argues that philosophy commences in disappointment, either religious or political. These two axes may be said largely to inform his published work: religious disappointment raises the question of meaning and has to, as he sees it, deal with the problem of nihilism; political disappointment provokes the question of justice and raises the need for a coherent ethics [...]
548 Market St PMB 65688, San Francisco California 94104-5401 USA
© 2025 Paratext Inc. All rights reserved