Jacques Rancière: aesthetics, time, politics

Abstract

This article explores Jacques Rancière’s critique of political philosophy. I argue that, to understand this critique, it is necessary to explore the aesthetic dimension of philosophers’ politics, pointing out that, at its foundation, lies a certain understanding of time that, paradoxically, negates political practice. To get out of this paradox, I point out that Rancière proposes a politics of writing that allows us to understand political practice from the point of view of a heterochronic and conflictive form of time. This approach, which distances itself from the Western tradition of political thought, allows us to address the concepts of contingency and equality in a radical way.

Keywords

• Aesthetic dimension
• time of progress
• heterochrony
• J. Rancière
• political practice
• political philosophy