Table Of ContentCynical Suspicions and Platonist Pretentions
Social and Critical Theory
A Critical Horizons Book Series
Editorial Board
John Rundell (University of Melbourne)
Danielle Petherbridge (University College Dublin)
Jeremy Smith (Federation University)
Jean-Philippe Deranty (Macquarie University)
Robert Sinnerbrink (Macquarie University)
International Advisory Board
William Connolly (Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore)
Manfred Frank (Universität Tübingen)
Leela Gandhi (La Trobe University, Melbourne)
Agnes Heller (Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest)
Dick Howard (suny at Stony Brook)
Martin Jay (University of California, Berkeley)
Richard Kearney (Boston College)
Paul Patton (University of New South Wales, Sydney)
Michel Wieviorka (L’École des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, Paris)
VOLUME 22
The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/sct
Cynical Suspicions
and Platonist Pretentions
A Critique of Contemporary Political Theory
By
John McGuire
LEIDEN | BOSTON
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For Mary Margaret
∵
In his Sale of Diogenes, Menippus says that, when taken prisoner and put
up to be sold, and asked what he could do, Diogenes answered, “Govern
men.” And so he bade the crier “give notice that if anyone wants to pur-
chase a master, there is one here for him.”
Lives and Opinions of the Eminent Philosophers [6.29]
∵
Contents
Introduction: Causarum Cognitio 1
1 Naked in the Marketplace 13
2 The Courage and Scourge of Truth 42
Excursus: Sloterdijk on a motorbike! (or, Zen and the Art of
Neo-Kynicism) 56
3 The Resistible Rise of Rawlsian Reasonableness 70
4 Thomas Pogge: Ethics and the Ire of the Beholden 103
5 Nancy Fraser’s Subaltern Weltbürger Blues 130
Excursus: The Poverty of Agonism 154
6 Jürgen Habermas’ Postmetaphysical Paralysis? 165
7 Defacing the Political Currency: Cynicism as a Normative Perspective
for Critical Theory 203
Bibliography 227
Index 236
Introduction: Causarum Cognitio
We notice him almost immediately; the languid, incongruous figure sprawled
along the bottom steps. Although the very architecture of The School of Athens
radiates around the arrival of Plato and Aristotle, the true point of dramatic
tension occurs centre-right, where we see two men hurrying to intercede: one
apparently trying to prevent the approaching metaphysicians from stumbling
over the idler in their path; the other, petitioning his colleague, perhaps pro-
posing they drag him out of the way. After all, who invited Diogenes the Cynic
to their gathering anyway?
Few would credit Raphael with having any appreciable insight into
ancient philosophy. His painting evinces a decidedly middlebrow celebra-
tion of Great Minds, sprinkled about with vague iconography: a globe, a
stylus, some decorative armature, and, of course, Plato’s upturned finger
counterpoised against Aristotle’s down-spread palm—the great metaphysi-
cal debate epigrammatically reduced to “knowledge of causes comes from
up there” versus “No, it comes from down here.” Or something along those
lines. That Plato clutches his Timaeus while Aristotle brandishes his Ethics
suggests their conversation to be very confused indeed. As for the rest, the
identity of many attendees can only be guessed at. Is it Heraclitus who
‘weeps’ and Democritus who ‘laughs’? Is that supposed to be Alexander or
Alcibiades in uniform? Do we presume Averroes features here in his mous-
tachioed, Orientalist finest? Only the figures of Socrates and Diogenes
of Sinope are recognisable from classical representations—but whereas
Socrates discretely conducts his elenchus off to one side, Diogenes insists
on making a nuisance of himself.
It seems remarkable that a philosopher, whom many still consider unwor-
thy of the title, would enjoy such prominence in a painting commissioned
nearly two thousand years after he died. It is no less remarkable that the
cynical disaffection Diogenes represents is considered as much a threat to
democratic life today as it did to our Periclean predecessors. To cite two re-
cent examples, amidst the deluge of critical diagnoses following the United
Kingdom’s referendum on Brexit, the charge of ‘cynicism’ (particularly against
Leave campaigners) was a regular motif. In the view of some commentators,
the referendum was a malignant outgrowth of a struggle over the Tory leader-
ship, with the least scrupulous of the contenders channeling xenophobic re-
sentment and populist hostility against Europe to advance their own political
© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2018 | doi 10.1163/9789004364929_002
2 Introduction: Causarum Cognitio
careers.1 Others laid the blame for the shock result on the cynicism of the elec-
torate, whose jaded impotence was said to have fuelled an ill-informed protest
vote.2 A similarly bifurcated analysis has been applied to the unprecedented
squalor of the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Although both Democratic and
Republican national campaigns struggled to compensate for the unpopularity
of their party nominees, it was unquestionably the Republican voters’ nomina-
tion of a reality television ‘celebrity’ that brought about the more acute sense
of crisis. Once again, ‘cynicism’ was used to describe the barely concealed
mendacity of the candidate himself,3 as well as the motivations of his sup-
porters, who now stand accused of sowing geopolitical chaos for the sake of
venting their rage against a ‘rigged system’.4 Here, it is interesting to note that
cynicism—which operates by exposing impure or duplicitous motives—is it-
self blamed for contributing to the behaviours it targets. It is also worth not-
ing how cynicism denotes both manipulative intrigue by influential ‘insiders’
and the fatalistic abandonment of the political system by powerless ‘outsiders.’
Long considered anathema to the intellectual inheritances of Enlightenment,
1 Stewart Lee, “The EU debate is a cynical battle of big beasts, not beliefs,” The Guardian
(01.05.2016): https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/may/01/eu-debate-cynical
-battle-big-beasts-referendum-boris-johnson [last accessed: 24/07/2017].
Marco Giannangeli, “Former minister blasts Cameron for ‘Cynical pro-EU camp aign,’ ”
Daily Express (21.05.16): http://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/672594/Brexit-EU
-referendum-Leave-Remain-David-Cameron-campaign-Lord-Owen-vote [last accessed:
24/07/2017].
2 Jim Pickard, “Obama tells young British adults to reject isolationism and cynicism,” Financial
Times (23.04.2016): http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/4161d44a-093e-11e6-9456-444ab5211a2f.html#
slide0.
Una Mullally, “Gullibility at its most ferocious when cynicism at its highest,” Irish
Times (04.06.2016): http://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/una-mullally-gullibility-at-its-most
-ferocious-when-cynicism-at-its-highest-1.2709002 [last accessed: 24/07/2017].
3 Eric Levitz, “Joe Biden Asks Nation to Quietly Contemplate Donald Trump’s Cynicism,”
New York Magazine (27.07.2016): http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/07/biden-asks
-nation-to-contemplate-president-trump.html [last accessed: 24/07/2017].
Gaby Hinsliff, “Trash talk: how Twitter is shaping the new politics,” The
Observer (31.07.2016): https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/jul/31/trash- talk- how
- twitter- is-shaping-the-new-politics.
4 Michael Gerson, “The true danger to democracy is cynicism, not anger,” The Washington
Post (07.07.2016): https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-triumph-of-cynicism/
2016/07/07/232b5028-446c-11e6-8856-f26de2537a9d_story.html; [last accessed: 24.07.2017].
Ross Douthat, “Trump and the Madness of Crowds,” The New York Times (28.04.2016):
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/28/opinion/campaign-stops/trumpand-the-madness-of
-crowds.html [last accessed: 24/07/2017].
