Singularité, universalité, généricité et généralité chez Alain Badiou

Abstract

The present paper offers an analysis of two periods in the development of the concept of singularity in Alain Badiou’s philosophy. 1) In Theory of the Subject, published in 1982, he opposes himself to structuralist tendencies in French Marxism by trying to think that which substracts itself from any structure. 2) In Being and Event, in 1988, he tries to make singularity compatible with a general ontology. The article concludes, after examining the coherence of the concept as well as its aptitude to do the work for which it was designed, that it is in the first period that Badiou can serve as a guide towards a theory of the singular, since he presented then some of the concepts necessary to think that which is over and above any structure.

Keywords

• singularity
• Althusser (Louis)
• Badiou (Alain)
• structuralism
• universality