postmodernism art 1

7/29/2019 Postmodernism Art 1

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/postmodernism-art-1 1/20

1

1

Abstract

Postmodernism has become an intellectual pariah, with unsubstantiated claims of

theoretical hegemony. At stake is the position of postmodernism as a form of social

explanation. It is useful as a means to enhance the options open to the researcher,

yet can never be credible as the only radical alternative to scientific, objective

research. As a method it draws much criticism in this paper, and is believed to have

invalidated itself as an adequate answer to social explanations in contemporary

politics. It is the dark refuge of the frightened child, rather than the means to shine

light on the politics of today



2

2

POSTMODERNISM AND THE DECONSTRUCTION OF SOCIAL

EXPLANATION: THE FRIGHTENED CRIES OF A CHILD

Postmodernism is a theory of discontinuity that rejects the Enlightenment notions of

truth and progress. Its benefits as a form of social explanation are entwined in a

normative arena of self-investigation that rests on superficiality and despair. As a

means of understanding it proffers a subjective approach to the study of the present.

What follows is a critique on the value of postmodernism as a theory and method,

or more precisely, its disavowal of theory and method. The evidence of the

uniqueness and diversity of postmodernism will be followed by an alternative and

ultimately oppositional perception.

Postmodernism rests on an ontology of difference that celebrates individuality

within a discourse of fragmentation, uniqueness and specificity. N.J.Rengger

(1992, 561-570) has divided postmodernists into the sceptical and affirmative

camps. Foucault, Lyotard, Baudrillard and William Connolly are thus opposed by

Rorty and Rosenau. Baudrillard sees postmodernism as, ‘the world of the hyperreal

as the new fact of the social world ’ and Connolly as a means to ‘play the fool to the

academic priest’ ( Ibid., 564). In contrast, Rorty derides the sceptical postmodernists

as, ‘the School of Resentment’ ( Ibid., 563). Yet such derision of ‘comrades’ in

theory is acceptable, if not edifying, for postmodernist tenets require a constant

stream of ambiguity and paradox. For many it has become associated with a crisis of



3

3

belief and authority. Hannah Arendt, Leo Strauss, Eric Voegelin and Heidegger are

claimed to add an aura of philosophical legitimacy to the credentials of

postmodernism. Richard Rorty identifies postmodernism as a reply to modernity. In

postmodernism the ‘ocular’ knowledge divides the subject from object, a

separation of the subjective and experience from the objective. Heidegger went

further than intellectual contemplation and initially welcomed postmodernism’s

practical manifestation with the rise of Hitler’s National Socialist Revolution. For

Heidegger, here was the development of the individual. The growth of a ‘German

existence’ that promised a future where ‘Doctrines’ and ‘ideas’ shall no longer be

the rule of your Being. The Fuhrer, he and he alone, is the present and future

German reality and its law’ (Gunnell, 1983, 300). One is reminded of Father

Paneloux in Albert Camus’s, ‘The Plague’, ‘No earthly power, nay, not even - mark

me well - the vaunted might of human science can avail you to avert that hand once

it is stretched towards you’ (Camus, 1972). A warning that The Plague (fascism) is

the nemesis of the Enlightenment, from such is nurtured the foundling

Postmodernism and a deeper nihilistic foundation in the works of Friedrich

Nietzsche. Rather than claiming to be a means of social explanation,

postmodernism attacks modernity and derides its role as a progression of human

society. For postmodernists like Bauman, its (modernity’s) overall value is crippled

by the intent to serve an order of nation-state glorification. Universality forms part

of a tyrannical plot (whether intentional or not) to confine and regulate society,

where the emphasis is on an order exemplified by a Hegelians worship of state

legitimacy. Nevertheless, this adds to the confusion found within postmodernism, as



4

4

early Heideggerian notions of resistance to order might best be viewed as an

illustration of the dissonance of postmodernism. Many postmodernists signify a

reality beyond modernity, a reality confused by the actual existence of diversity. A

world of parallel orders, punctuated by a lack of a final goal, in which the world of

science, learning and knowledge is merely a ‘Waiting for Godot’ (Taylor-Gooby,

1994, 385-404).

If, at this point the reader wonders just when sense and sensibility will intrude upon

this explanation of postmodernism, then they are reminded that the fragmentary

nature of the theoretical construct is permeated by an intense promotion of the

unexplainable. S. Gablik described it as a theory where, ‘In the multidimensional

and slippery space of Postmodernism anything goes with anything, like a game

without rules’ (Callinicos, 1989, 12). Alex Callinicos expands and notes that it is

the ‘art of the surface, the depthless, even the immediate,’ a celebration of

disintegration of the subject (Callinicos, 1989, 21). Lassman (1989) views it as a

reorganisation of knowledge, non-totalising, desiring complexity, paradox and

contradictions. ‘Accepting disorder, discrepancies, discontinuities and gaps’

(Lassman, 1989, 144). Waldenfel attempts to explain the relationship of the theory

of postmodernism with the purpose of understanding that ‘man is no longer... the

carrier of meaning, and order is no longer a meaning obeying subjective intentions.’

The belief in a plural concern with the theme of diversity is applauded where. ‘What

is needed here is a preservation of differences, a tolerance for ambiguities, and at

the same time a resistance to forced unity’ (Dallmayr, 1989, 107). Waldenfel’s

dialogue blends communication with conflict. The dubious nature of understanding



5

5

(according to postmodernism) is re-enforced by Fred Dallmayr’s identification of

postmodernism as a radical alternative to modernity. A discourse that claims ‘We

must distinguish between the ‘disordered’ or disorderly in the sense of a rule

violation governed by the binary matrix of an order, and in rule-less or unruled

dimension on the other side of order which we may call the unordered’ (Dallmayr,

1989, 104).

It is here that we can see a form in postmodernism that belies its generally anti-

universalist theme:- There is an increasing tendency towards an identity built around

a meta-narrative. A quest by postmodernists to gain intellectual legitimacy, that in

itself is a denial of postmodernism’s place as break from the ontology of singular

identity. Attempts are made to show clear water between the legitimacy of

postmodernism and its ‘mistaken’ precursor, modernity and the Enlightenment.

Often entwined with post-structuralism, post-Fordism, and the end of the

Enlightenment in its historical sense, postmodernism attempts to develop a singular

character. It is interesting to question how a singular character can be specified

without regard to the modernist ontology of identity, unity, connectedness and

generality. J. Larrain has drawn on the works of Lyotard, Baudrillard and Foucault.

Postmodernism is seen as a ‘complex cultural phenomenon which is characterised

among other things by its distrust of totalising discourses of reason and of universal

truth’ (Larrain, 1994, 289). Postmodernism is here conceptualised as indeterminacy,

primacy of difference and a incommensurability between discourses. Classical

postmodernists define reality as unfathomable and ideology as a means to deceive

and conceal the ‘real truth’ from the inquirer. The existence of fundamental social



6

6

relations with contradictions, doubts and concept of an order negated by a reality

that exists purely within the discourse of its subjects. Lyotard requests that Marx be

considered as a text of ‘madness not as theory’ ( Ibid., 297). Lyotard sees truth as

‘the weapon of paranoia and power...the return of terror. Let us thus struggle against

the white terror of truth’ ( Ibid ., 299). Baudrillard sees that ‘determination is dead,

indeterminism reigns,’ and ‘everything becomes undeniable’ ( Ibid ., 302-305)

Foucault’s criticisms of power are subsumed under his own endorsements ‘of the

importance of the ideological role of the juridical concept of power’ ( Ibid ., 305)

Lyotard destroys his own arguments by developing a critical concept of ideology

that ends in a totality of criticism. The plurality of arguments converge to leave the

primary criticism of ideology as a totalised meta-narrative. Baudrillard is seen as a

denouncer of ideology who justifies that very criticism on the basis of a Marxist

type ideology of appearance and reality.

Postmodernism as such has been aligned with a nihilism: a despair and mistrust of

the promised utopia of progress. Whether borne from the destruction and suffering

of two world wars and utilisation of science as a weapon of ever increasing

domination, or as the reflection of the tortured mind of the modern individual,

postmodernism craves respect as the manifestation of failed enlightenment. Yet, it

also ventures a role as ‘the multi-dimensional pleasure dome of post-modern

society’ (Clegg, 1994, 111). Here it signifies a commodification of theory, a reality

of the marketplace. The status of knowledge is attacked by postmodernism in a

post-industrial age. Knowledge loses its intrinsic value and becomes a means

merely to advance the performance of techniques and technologies of the present.



7

7

Capitalism is enthused with new vigour as the free market celebration finds an

ontology that compliments its essence of selfish progression and pastiche of Kitsch

and profit. The superficiality of capitalism is celebrated by the magnetism of despair

found in postmodernism’s propagation of the ‘value’ of nihilism and simulacra. The

profitability of a product surpassing its utility value, and only advancing on merits

steeped in the mathematics of ‘good’ finance. Human conduct becomes defined in

the realms of efficiency, performance and saleability, rather than as a path towards

universal truth and order. The reality moves towards ‘the perception that the politics

of the nation-state (or even the para-nation) was increasingly subject to economic

forces over which it had little control’ (Davies, 1995, 150). An anti-historical,

globalisation perspective embedded in the ‘Disneyfication’ of cultures in a ‘world

of unthinking marketization’ ( Ibid ., 154). In this ‘New World’ the boundaries are no

longer defined and the blurring is aggravated by the appearance of new analytical

spaces and territories. It is not solely a break with the order of modernity, it is as a

consequence. As Colin Hay notes ‘if “enlightenment” is mythic fear turned radical,

then postmodernism is fear of enlightenment turned reactionary’ (Hay, 1994-95)

Richard Bernstein has identified postmodernism as ‘a mood’ (Rengger, 1992, 562),

Baudrillard describes it as the ‘world of the hyperreal’ ( Ibid ., 564), while Habermas

has it as ‘the synonym for irrationality and nihilism’ (Dallymar, 1989, 107). The

epistemology of postmodernism proposes no privileged standpoint, no position

outside of the world, rejects empiricism and metanarratives, denies the privileged

position of the Marxist, feminists, enlightenment, science, religion or truth.

Postmodernism is a break with the past, an existence in the present and the denial of



8

8

a concern with the future. In the process postmodernism becomes a meta-narrative,

creating a theory of social explanation that challenges modernity and yet, mirrors

the method of that very same modernity. Yet, the reality is that postmodernism is a

child’s refusal to accept the responsibilities of learning. It celebrates the iniquities of

educational laziness and glorifies the despair of (necessary) ignorance. The natural

progression following on from the pursuit of understanding is renounced, for a

market-led carnival of denial and banality that observes only the surface and settles

for a depthlessness. The postmodernist challenges the authority of an epistemology

that aggregates the works of time, stretching from the present back to Marx, Hegel,

Wittgenstein, Aristotle and Plato.

Postmodernists have much to learn and J.S.Nelson promotes Goethe’s Mephisto as

an apt starting point,

My Friend, I shall be pedagogic,

and say you ought to start with logic.

For this your mind is trained and braced,

In Spanish boots it will be laced.

That on the road of thought maybe

It henceforth creep more thoughtfully,

and does not crisscross here and there,

Will-o-wisping through the air. (Nelson, 1983, 130)



9

9

The postmodernist starts and ends with the position that subjects are not the

‘producers of discourse but rather “positions” in discourse’ (Larrain, 1994, 296),

where “positions” are filled by any individual. The concept of order in a subject is

negated. Traditionally, one would start with a conceptualisation leading to

generalisations that help formulate a theory that would help explanation and be open

to testing. The postmodernist lives within the concept of discontinuity and disorder.

The reasoning given is that the frame of discourse can only be understood with the

appreciation of the immediate experience. The deconstruction of social explanation

is limited to the immediate. By contextual disfigurement, intellectual credence is

achieved in postmodernism. Ludwig Wittgenstein is painted as a postmodernist

precursor as he expounds that ‘everything that we say has to be related in the last

analysis, even if by detours, to immediate experience, if it has meaning’ (Brand,

1979, 87). A view that also could be claimed as a tenet of positivism and thus, the

postmodernist might also find value in noting that Wittgenstein felt that ‘without

distinctions there is nothing,’ and that ‘accordingly, the most important thing we are

striving after is clarity, order and perspicuity, for they are clearly missing’ ( Ibid.,

91).

In spite of Wittgenstein’s call for clarity and order, many postmodernists persist in

an avocation of an anti-historical perspective. An existence without past, for we as

individuals cannot know the past within which we did not live. A conclusion made

even more confusing, as the postmodernist claims the same for our lack of

knowledge of the present that we live in. Yet, Larry Spence notes how ‘all wisdom

begins with what we have inherited from the past’ (Spence, 1978, vi). Their



10

10

conceptualisations are still framed, supposedly, without previous form and thus

denied the profit of generalisation by an inadequacy of satisfaction with the

legitimacy of previous knowledge. Therefore, we are left with a premise for a theory

that relies for its existence purely within the actual. We must ask how this can

sensibly occur. N.R.Hanson claims ‘physical theories provide patterns within which

data appear intelligible,’ while ‘the form of theory is a set of concepts related by a

consistent body of rules’ (Spence, 1978, 91). For concepts, patterns and rules we

need some form of relational material. By denying us the food of previous thought

and experience, postmodernists produce a theory crippled by a pre-formed nihilism.

The problems of historical dimensions to explanation are negated by a total absence

of concern for anything outside of the self. The postmodernist disregards Popper’s

claim that we need to look for answers to our problems, and that the ‘self-

individual’ cannot have sense if the ‘social whole’ is not based upon the concepts

and generalisations that ground theories.

What then can we offer as an alternative to the despair of the postmodernist.

Admittedly the meandering of human thought may appear to converge on a position

of confusion and uncertainty. The mind may find pleasure of the moment in the

juxtaposition between the depthlessness of contrasting images and honour the

pastiche of the immediate. Nevertheless, these abstract thoughts are not intended to

mirror the superficiality of a modern technological age. The postmodernist

surrenders him/herself from the intensity of learning and contemplation, refusing to

take thought to the level of logic as Hegel shows,



11

11

‘If thought at first is abstract and concerns itself merely with the

principle regarded as content, but in the progress of its evolution

is forced to regard also the other side, the behaviour of

cognition, then subjective activity is perceived as an essential

moment of objective truth, and the need arises of uniting method

with content and form with principle’ (Hegel, 1961, 95).

This sensibility is induced from an order of need. Leslie Lipson observes that

‘understanding is the beginning of freedom’ (Lipson, 1976, 1). We have often seen

here how, for the postmodernist, contradictions, diversity and fragmentation are a

state of being that has no need for interpretation beyond the parody and irony of the

veneer. The contradictions are accepted and yet Popper would point out to the

postmodernist that ‘contradictions are not to be accepted as normal, natural or

(historically) inevitable but criticised and overcome’ (Nelson, 1983, 139). This view

is mirrored by Terence Ball when he notes that, ‘only by first exposing

contradictions, by bringing their existence and import to a level of conscious

awareness, can they be rationally resolved or overcome. The only sense in which

contradictions “develop” is through being exposed as contradictions’ ( Ibid., 135).

The postmodernists would have difficulty with Terence Ball, for his basis for theory

is totally contradictory to their views of connectedness. For Ball ‘a theory in my

sense, is a more or less systemically interrelated set of beliefs about men (sic) and

society’ ( Ibid ., 128).



12

12

A major drawback for postmodernists is the fear of investigation, for in that

exercise, the contradictions and anomalies are soon plain to see. In “Understanding

Peasant China”, Daniel Little goes from the self-interested rationality or shared

communal values that contest within the moral economy debate, and ventures into

the economic analysis of macro-regions and studies the strategy of rational choice

explanation. Assumptions are made about the nature of human beings, the role of

society and its institutions. Comparisons are made, identities made explicit and

systems given functional roles. Data is correlated and quantitative causal analysis

and proposals for a logic of measurement given. Norms and values are proffered

and social patterns are arranged. ‘Two central aims of research in social science are

to arrive at true factual beliefs about social and historical phenomena and to arrive

at sound explanations of these phenomena’ (Little, 1989, 198). For the

postmodernist, the explanations are flawed and in the process the legitimacy of

social explanation outside that of individual experience, albeit an experience

swamped in confusion, is negated. Many of Little’s arguments and observations

may be impaired by a lack of distinction, for instance, as between theory and

generalisation, yet the attempt is to find form and order, leading to understanding

and “freedom”. Little traces the methodological pattern towards explanation and

the testing of that explanation, and describes approaches that ultimately lead to the

progression of modernity and the Enlightenment. Habermas warns us not to throw

away either modernity or post-modernism for ‘I think that instead of giving up

modernity and its project as a lost cause, we should learn from the mistakes of those

extravagant programmes which have tried to negate modernity’ (Waugh, 1991).



13

13

Yet, postmodernity risks its own nemesis with the alignment to a fascination with

its original pessimism. A despair with the failure of the previous, with the suffering

of total war, the wretched loss of faith borne from genocide and the growing

disillusionment carried in the wake of an ever impersonal, value crunching, modern

age. Instead of seeking answers beneath the clouds of nihilism, in a forlornness

probably no less than any other age involving the paradox of destructive war and

progress, the postmodernist attacks the very core of explanation. They experience

everything and know nothing. For the postmodernist to progress he must note that,

‘to learn our place in time, to learn to live inside a situation requires us at once to

draw the line(s), to acknowledge the need to live within our limits and yet, at the

same time, to attend to what is gathering ‘ beyond the boundaries’, to respond as

best we can to what is gathering, to yearn responsibly across it towards the other

side’ (Hebdige, 1988, 288).

Despite the obvious impairments of postmodernist thought, the attraction of its

contemporary approach still draws the admiration of many social inquirers. John

Gray identifies a view of postmodernism that has a, ‘reformation of the Romantic

critique of the Enlightenment- but virtually an immanent one, in that it endorses the

emancipatory thrust of the Enlightenment, in which history and locality are

constraints on human freedom, while claiming to attack its universalism’ (Gray,

1995, 17). Thus he highlights the basic contradiction found in postmodernism by

many of its critics. Contradictions discovered in the quest to attain legitimacy by

finding a niche within Adorno and Horkheimer’s, ‘dialectic of enlightenment’.

Even if the postmodernist is not aware of the ramifications of a rational and



14

14

objective foundational inquiry on the behalf of postmodernism, it is soon clear that,

‘Postmodernism thus inherits from the Enlightenment the need for an objective or

rational foundation for critical theory, while denying that such a basis exists’ (Hay,

1994-95, 129). As the contradictions of postmodernism grow ever more apparent,

its foundational disabilities are compounded, ‘by various repudiations: the

postmodernist proclamation of the end of meta-narratives; its disavowal of the

hopes of enlightenment, progress, and emancipation; and its rejection of totalizing

social theories’ ( Ibid ., 129). John Gray has a reply in that he repudiates the search

for legitimacy in the dialectic of enlightenment and presents a need where,

‘We will do better if rather than trying vainly to piece together the fragments that

compose our world, and thereby merely trailing in the Enlightenment’s wake, we

turn to a newer way of thinking, and try to contrive practices and institutions in

which we can live peacefully with diversity’ (Gray, 1995, 17) .

In the rejection of postmodernism I turn to Hegel’s, Science of Logic (1961).

Postmodernism identifies an ability to exist within an arena of experience that

contains an essence of the nihilistic, and an acceptance of the banality of a life

without the order of an acceptable level of meaning. The immediate reigns supreme

and contends that the pursuit of meaning is the core of the despair of

postmodernism. Yet, if nothing has meaning then postmodernism misconstrues the

dialectic of nothing and being. It is through the connectedness and coherence of

developing a unity between being and nothing that the ontology of modern totally

displaces postmodernism. Hegel, by drawing a distinction between Being and

Nothingness, shows that Nothing can be determined. It is not only determined, it



15

15

exists in a relationship with Being. Postmodernism cannot maintain its credibility if

its singularity of nothing loses its sanctified position within the tenets of

postmodernism. Hegel provides the final curtain fall for postmodernism when the

ontology of totality in modernism is rubber-stamped by the becoming of the unity of

Being and Nothing. Once Nothing is assigned substance it becomes the nemesis of

postmodernism.

‘Pure Being and pure Nothing are, then, the same; the truth is, not either

Being or Nothing, but that Being not passes, but has passed over into

Nothing, and Nothing into Being. But equally the truth is not their

lack of distinction, but that they are not the same, that they are

absolutely distinct, and inseparable, each disappearing immediately

in its opposite’ (Hegel, 1961, 95).

Thus, the separateness of postmodernism from the Enlightenment and from the

pursuit of rational social meaning can be dispelled as illusionary. Its confusion and

discontinuity is self-induced. Its own proposal for a celebration of despair and

nihilism lies within a whole that contains hope and expectancy. One cannot have

pure superficiality, it must reach deeper into either nothing or being and in doing so

form part of a science of logic, giving meaning and identity to the previously

confusing and dissonant. Postmodernism is merely a part of the whole, a fragment

of understanding that falters beneath the holism of Enlightenment. For

Postmodernists to venture that they can exist in isolation to a hierarchy of

knowledge is to display the arrogance that offends many inquirers.



16

16

I have presented some of the perceived advantages of a postmodernist line of

thought. The ensuing contradictions and anomalies are then presented and replaced

by the logic and sense of Hegel, Ball and Little. For a fair analysis, we must

consider one of the central tenets of postmodernism, the fascination with the instant,

the point in time of existence that seems to suffice in the acceptance of a

meaningless fascination with the present. The ‘Question of the moment,’ is a central

theme of Regis Debray’s “Prison Writings” (1975, 88). As Debray notes, the

‘Question of the moment’ relates to ‘what is going on, what we see now, what

surrounds us, enters into us, absorbs us’ ( Ibid ., 88) and thus we might accept the

postmodernist exclusion of a past or future. Nevertheless, Debray is aware of the

logical universality of seeing time as a relationship between past, present and future.

Debray, in attacking the refusal of new Marxist scientism to accept and enter into

the concept of the present situation, helps us to clearly identify the failings of

postmodernism. Just as Marxist scientism ignores the present and isolates the past,

so postmodernism excludes the past and isolates the present. Both are symptomatic

of the refusal to face the unity of time in its entirety, or in its unfolding. Debray

reminds us that, ‘in the long term, we and everything we do will be things of the

past’ ( Ibid ., 88). The same can be said of the future, for the present is the path to

the future and, ‘What is not yet is held in being by what is already’ ( Ibid ., 96). In

his analysis of crisis, Debray, by illustrating the interrelationship of opposites, gives

us further cause for a sceptical view of postmodernism. Crisis, forming the juncture

between the unity of a past epoch of contraries and a replaced realm of new unity

(whether before, after or in crisis), contains a disunity of imbalance, instability and



17

17

fragmentation. The qualitative notion of the ‘moment’ contains the opposites of

balance, stability and cohesion. Just, as with Hegel’s, Being and Nothing, Debray

accepts postmodernists nihilism only in the context of its opposite. Postmodernism

can thus be explained only as an unfinished symphony, an image. Achieving

meaning with the acceptance of its reflection, a positive to balance the negativity.

Conclusion

For postmodernism, the order of modernity is a falsehood. An exercise in delusion

borne from a need to find an idealistic reasoning to the purpose of existence.

Modernity, constantly striving to explain and regulate chaos. In contrast to

modernity, postmodernism accepts, possibly even welcomes, the disorder and

paranoia of confused meanings, legitimising all in the name of subjectivity.

Benefiting from the deserved credence given to linguistic theories, postmodernism

delves into the intellectual ‘moment’ of discourse and finds a labyrinth of cerebral

bedlam. The ‘reality’ existing only in the discourse and denying the ‘truth-telling’

objectivity of modernity. In final analysis of postmodernism, one is inclined to

deride it, accuse it of madness or ignore it all together. Yet, this disavowal of

postmodernism as a theory or method, this condemnation, allows postmodernist to

celebrate the success of its schizophrenic essence, for the negativity mirrors its most

extreme advocates. Postmodernism has a modern utility. It provides the

deconstructed, linguistic framework upon which reason and rationality can discern a

form of meaning to the present and recent past. It, postmodernism, is but part of

modernism’s development, and when viewed in isolation from the whole, appears



18

18

nihilistic and confusing. Once framed within the search for enlightenment,

postmodernism is correctly labelled as the frightened cries of the child who sees

only the dark isolation of his own discourse, and is eventually salved, only by the

light of knowledge. Postmodernists, are here clearly seen as a varied collection of

basically misguided proponents of despair, while they would contend that they

reflect the hyper-consumerism and post-Enlightenment of the moment. One may

finally offer them the ‘watchword of enlightenment’, with, ‘Sapere aude! Have the

courage to use one’s own reason!’ (Honderich, 1995, 236)

Bibliography

Brand , G. (1979) The Central Texts of Ludwig Wittgenstein (U.K: Basil Blackwell)



19

19

Callinicos, A. (1989) Against Postmodernism. A Marxist Critique (G.B: Polity Press)

Camus, A. (1972) The Plague (London: Penguin)

Clegg, S R. (1994) Frameworks of Power (G.B: Sage Publications)

Dallmayr, F. (1989) Margins of Political Discourse (U.S: New York Press)

Davies, I. (1995) Cultural Studies and Beyond. Fragments of Empire (London: Routledge)

Debray, R. (1972) The Plague (London: Penguin)

Gray, J. (1995) “Vive la difference”, Times Higher Educational Supplement, Oct 13.

Gunnell, J. F. (1983)“In Search of the Political Object”, in John S Nelson ed., What Should

Political Theory Be Now? (U.S: University of New York Press)

Hay, C (1994-95) “Postmodern Tension”, Arena Journal, No.4

Hebdige, D (1988) Hiding in the Light (London: Commedia)

Hegel, G.W.F. (1961) Science of Logic (London: Allen and Unwin)

Honderich, T. (1995) The Oxford Companion to Philosophy (U.K: Oxford University Press)

Larrain, J. (1994) “The Postmodern Critique of Ideology”, Sociology Review Vol.42 no.2.

Lipson, L (1976) The Great Issues of Politics (U.S: Prentice-Hall Inc.

Little, D (1989) Understanding Peasant China (London: Yale University Press)

Lassman, P. (1989) Politics and Social Theory (London: Routledge)

Nelson, J.S. (1983) What Should Political Theory Be Now (U.S: University of New York Press)

Rennger, N.J. (1992) “No Time Like The Present? Postmodernism and Political Theory”, Political

Studies XL

Spence, L.D. (1978) The Politics of Social Science (Pennsylvannia: University Press)

Taylor-Gooby, P. (1994) “Postmodernism and Social Policy. A Great Leap Backwards”, Journal

of Social Policy Vol.23, no.3

Waugh, P. (1991) Postmodernism-A Reader (London: Edward Arnold)

Bibliographic note



20

I am a teacher and PhD student at the University of Birmingham, England. I teach

political science and European politics. My research is a ESRC funded examination

of ‘British Government Policy in Northern Ireland’. I have given a number of

conference presentations, the last being a paper on globalisation at an international

forum in Nankai University, China and one on the development of the European

Union, at Beijing University, China (both in Oct,1999). My main theoretical interest

is in critical realism and historical institutionalism.

postmodernism art 1

Documents