Mechanisms of Alleviation and Realization of Real Change in the World

Abstract

The paper considers the mechanisms of alleviation and the realization of actual change in the world through the lens of Alain Badiou’s philosophy. The paper proceeds in three theoretical steps. First, a distinction is made between Badiou’s ontological and his phenomenological project, on the basis of which it is shown that the theme of true change is present only in the latter. In the second step, the focus is on the difference between the concepts of the forbidden and the impossible. To demonstrate the logic of the impossible, the logical game that Badiou introduces in his early book Peut-on penser la politique? is used. From the standpoint of a given system something counts as the forbidden and something else as the impossible of that system. True change is only that which derives from the logic of the impossible. In the third and final step, we address Badiou’s typology of change, which he introduces in the Logics of the Worlds. We show that change, which happens regularly within a certain world, is established as a reaction to a real change or as its alleviation.