Exploring the Relationship Between Post-Modernism and the Political

Abstract

Postmodernism, as the current which has emerged out of developments in the modern world, and by enjoying the critical discourse of modernity, has created many effects on various spheres, including in the political arena. In this research, by raising this question that, what is the relation between post-modernism and politics, this hypothesis is formulated that, postmodernism, when implemented in politics, under the influence of relativistic attitudes in the ontological, epistemological and ethical spheres, offers a cynical and skeptical approach to power and rule, which leads to suspension the possibility of any political judgment or political action. In order to test this hypothesis, and by taking advantage of a coherent conceptual framework, first, the genealogy of this current, based on modernity’s process of change and evolution, is investigated and then, by analyzing different aspects of postmodern though in the realm of ontological, epistemological, ethics and politics, the consequences of this approach, on the political and related areas of power and politics, are analyzed.

Keywords

• modernity
• postmodernism
• ontology
• epistemology
• the political