Research Catalog

Title

Refugees, terror and other troubles with the neighbors : against the double blackmail / Slavoj Žižek.

Author

Žižek, Slavoj

Publication

Brooklyn, NY : Melville House, 2016.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Holdings

Details

Description

127 pages; 22 cm

Summary

"Called "the Elvis of cultural theory" by The New York Times, popular philosopher and leftist rabble-rouser Slavoj Zizek, looks at one of the most desperate situations of our time: the current refugee crisis overwhelming Europe. In this short yet stirring book, Zizek argues that accepting all comers or blocking all entry are both untenable solutions... but there is a third option. Today, hundreds of thousands of people, desperate to escape war, violence and poverty, are crossing the Mediterranean to seek refuge in Europe. Our response, from our protected Western European standpoint, argues Slavoj Zizek, offers two versions of ideological blackmail: either we open our doors as widely as possible; or we try to pull up the drawbridge. Both solutions are bad, states Zizek. They merely prolong the problem, rather than tackling it. The refugee crisis also presents an opportunity, a unique chance for Europe to redefine itself: but, if we are to do so, we have to start raising unpleasant and difficult questions. We must also acknowledge that large migrations are our future: only then can we commit to a carefully prepared process of change, one founded not on a community that see the excluded as a threat, but one that takes as its basis the shared substance of our social being. The only way, in other words, to get to the heart of one of the greatest issues confronting Europe today is to insist on the global solidarity of the exploited and oppressed. Maybe such solidarity is a utopia. But, warns Zizek, if we don't engage in it, then we are really lost. And we will deserve to be lost"--

Subject

• Refugees > Europe
• Refugees > Government policy > Europe
• Social change > Europe
• POLITICAL SCIENCE / Political Freedom & Security / Terrorism
• POLITICAL SCIENCE / Political Freedom & Security / Human Rights
• PHILOSOPHY / General
• Emigration and immigration > Government policy
• Emigration and immigration > Social aspects
• Refugees
• Refugees > Government policy
• Social change
• Europe > Social aspects
• Europe > Government policy
• Europe

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (pages 119-127).

Processing Action (note)

• committed to retain

Contents

The double blackmail -- A descent into the maelstrom -- Breaking the taboos of the left -- The obscene underside of religions -- Divine violence -- The political economy of refugees -- From the culture wars to class struggle ... and back -- Where does the threat come from? -- The limits of neighbourhood -- Hateful thousands in Cologne -- What is to be done?

ISBN

• 9781612196244 (paperback)
• 1612196241 (paperback)
• 9781612196251 (ebook) (canceled/invalid)

LCCN

^^2016026459

OCLC

• 951753802
• SCSB-11134800

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library