ABSTRACT
In the modern world - that is, since the eighteenth century - the discourse of politics is founded upon one problematic relation: the relation between the Subject of consciousness and its Object. From this relation all else follows, for what is at stake in it is the variety of ways in which humanity engages its environment. A conservative politics is one in which some Subjects arrogate to themselves the right to regard not only an inanimate environment as an Object over which they may hold sway, but also other human beings as legitimate Objects over whom they hold power. Such power consolidates the Identity of the dominant Subject in this state of affairs. An emancipatory politics is one in which this situation is addressed by an overt attention to alterity as such. In a radical politics, the Subject realises her or his identity through two different means: first, she or he acknowledges that identity is predicated upon the Other, i.e. upon other Subjects of consciousness; secondly, she or he questions the relation of dominance between consciousness and the inhuman environment. The name for the first of these radical positions is Marxism; that of the second, post-Marxism or postmodern Marxism.
