Chantal Mouffe | |
---|---|
Born |
Charleroi, Belgium | 17 June 1943
Awards | Western philosophy |
Era | Contemporary philosophy |
School | Post-Marxism |
Main interests | Political theory |
Notable ideas | Criticism of deliberative democracy |
Chantal Mouffe (French: [muf]; born 17 June 1943) [1] is a Belgian political theorist, formerly teaching at University of Westminster. [2]
She is best known for her and Ernesto Laclaus contribution to the development of the so-called Essex School of discourse analysis. [3] [4] She is a strong critic of deliberative democracy and advocates a conflict-oriented model of radical democracy.
Chantal Mouffe studied at the Universities of Leuven, Paris and Essex and has worked in many universities throughout the world (in Europe, North America and Latin America). She has also held visiting positions at Harvard, Cornell, Princeton and the CNRS (Paris). During 1989–1995, she served as Programme Director at the Collège international de philosophie in Paris. She currently holds a professorship at the Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Westminster in the United Kingdom, where she is a member of the Centre for the Study of Democracy. [2]
She developed a type of post-Marxist political inquiry drawing on Gramsci, post-structuralism and theories of identity, and redefining Leftist politics in terms of radical democracy. [5] With Laclau she co-authored her most frequently cited publication Hegemony and Socialist Strategy, ans she is also the author of influential works on agonistic political theory, including Agonistics: Thinking the World Politically and The Democratic Paradox. Her book For a Left Populism was published in 2018.
A prominent critic of deliberative democracy (especially in its Rawlsian and Habermasian versions), she is also known for her use of the work of Carl Schmitt, mainly his concept of "the political", in proposing a radicalization of modern democracy—what she calls "agonistic pluralism". She has developed an interest in highlighting the radical potential of artistic practices. [6] Mouffe's Agonistics: Thinking the World Politically (2013) has been criticised by Timothy Laurie for its strong focus on State institutions, noting that Mouffe's "professed enthusiasm for (some) non-Western Islamist movements is solely conditional upon their assumption of State instruments". [7]
CIP t.p. (Chantal Mouffe) data sheet (b. 17 June 1943)