Filozofski vestnik | Volume XLIII | Number 2 | 2022 | 7–39 | cc by-nc-nd 4.0 | doi: 10.3986/fv.43.2.01
Peter Klepec*
Caught in the Super-emergency
One of the most general observations about our contemporary age is that we live in a time of transition,1 for which various alternative terms have been proposed – from “interregnum” (Gramsci)2 and “the dialectic of standstill” (Benjamin) to “the great regression”3. There are many interpretations as to when this transition actually began, what it really means, and what it actually involves. There is also an almost universal consensus that this transition is not yet over and that no one knows for sure when it will end4 and where it will take us. Recently, things have become even more complicated as several crises have emerged that overlap and reinforce each other. The problems and contradictions of late capitalism have obviously taken their toll. It began with the climate crisis that was declared many decades ago and that we are all familiar with today, without any appropriate countermeasures having been taken so far. The latter, however, is not the only crisis we have experienced in recent decades. The mere enumeration of the events that have marked the last three decades quickly confronts us with all that we have denied and swept under the rug, but also testifies that great changes are underway. Three decades ago, the Cold War ended with the fall of the Berlin Wall and the subsequent collapse of socialism 1
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This article is a result of the research programme P6-0014 “Conditions and Problems of Contemporary Philosophy” and the research projects N6-0286 “Reality, Illusion, Fiction, Truth: A Preliminary Study” and J6-4623 “Conceptualizing the End: its Temporality, Dialectics, and Affective Dimension”. See Nancy Fraser, The Old Is Dying and the New Cannot Be Born, London and New York, Verso, 2019. See Heinrich Geiselberger (ed.), Die große Regression. Eine internazionale Debatte über die geistige Situation der Zeit, Frankfurt am Main, Suhrkamp, 2017. Or, as Nancy Fraser put it recently: “The duration of this interregnum is anyone’s guess, as is the likelihood of its devolution into full-bore authoritarianism, major war, or catastrophic meltdown – as opposed to ‘mere’ slow unraveling.” (Nancy Fraser, Cannibal Capitalism. How Our System Is Devouring Democracy, Care, and the Planet – and What We Can Do about It, London and New York, Verso, 2022, p. 156.) ZRC SAZU, Institute of Philosophy, Ljubljana, Slovenia | ORCID: 0000-0002-2374-1149 | peter.klepec@zrc-sazu.si
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