Full Description
This book offers an interpretation of the French Revolution and modern democracy, arguing that the revolution gave rise to a democratic power that is liminal by nature, and therefore unlimited, unaccountable on principle, and the basis for a state religion of continuous transformation. It demonstrates these claims by focusing on the universally adulated but little understood sacred motto 'liberté, egalité, fraternité', and on the sacrifice and role of Louis XVI in the revolution. Analysing the revolutionary process by which representative democratic government took the shape of political metamorphosis, the book shows that modern democracy does not represent the people but refers to the representation of representation and the existential condition of permanent displacement. The present study will appeal to scholars from across the social, political and human sciences with an interest in the French Revolution, modern democracy, political modernity, contemporary politics and the history of art.
Contents
Prologue
Preface
Introduction: framing the French revolution as fundamental problem of the contemporary
Chapter 1: In and out of the methodological cave: the French revolution as liminal event and predicament of the sacred
Chapter 2: The French revolution and the constitution of metamorphic power (I): from the liminal void to liberté - egalité - fraternité
Chapter 3: The French revolution and the constitution of metamorphic power (II): Jacques Louis David's Tennis Court Oath and the vision of modern democracy as political metamorphosis
Chapter 4: Liminality and the disincorporation of royal power: the revolutionary events as symbolic-existential breaks with the past
Chapter 5: The execution of Louis XVI and the rise of terror and civil war
Chapter 6: Louis XVI between angelization and the sacrifice of love: the philosophical anthropology of the Christian prince
Conclusion
Epilogue
Bibliography
Name Index
Subject Index
