CFP: Lisbon Praxis Summer School 2025: Global Critical Theory

LPSS 2025: Global Critical Theory

Marx defined critical philosophy as the “self-clarification of the struggles and wishes of the age” (in the famous ‘Letter to Arnold Ruge’ from 1843). The problems and the struggles of the current age are global: capitalism, climate change, inequality, migration, the proliferation of surveillance technology, AI and the ‘end of work,’ authoritarianisms and populisms, and many others. Thus, the possibility of an adequate and timely Critical Theory depends upon its global reframing. But does current Critical Theory have the methods and concepts that allow it to tackle such problems in their global dimensions?

The tradition of Critical Theory associated with the Frankfurt School of Social Research is a major component of contemporary thought, widely taught in the humanities and social sciences. But what exactly are the dimensions of the ‘social’ and society researched: a local community, the nation-state, the whole world? When the contours and dimensions of this society have been examined, it was often identified with the European/Western societies, and Critical Theory itself became suspect of Eurocentrism. As Edward Said famously wrote, “Frankfurt School Critical Theory, despite its seminal insights into the relationships between domination, modern society, and the opportunities for redemption through art as critique, is stunningly silent on racist theory, anti-imperialist resistance, and oppositional practice in the empire” (Edward Said, Culture and Imperialism (Chatto & Windus, 1993, p. 278). Authors from the post-colonial and decolonial studies argued further that Critical Theory fails to recognize the world-historical processes of dispossession, appropriation, and enslavement as central to the emergence and development of Western modernity. And, as Amy Allen observes, “Twenty plus years after Said made this charge, not enough has changed; contemporary Frankfurt School critical theory, for the most part, remains all too silent on the problem of imperialism” (Amy Allen, The End of Progress: Decolonizing the Normative Foundations of Critical Theory. Durham: Duke University Press, 2016, p.2) Thus, the calls to decolonize and globalize Critical Theory are ongoing with renewed urgency.

But what exactly is the global when we speak of globalizing Critical Theory? The Summer School will envisage a two-fold approach to this global dimension: (i) a Critical Theory practiced at different points in the world, beyond the confines of the European tradition and framework, and (ii) examination of the methods and concepts adequate for a Global Critical Theory targeting problems across geographical and political borders.  Under these auspices, the Lisbon Praxis Summer School 2025 will address and examine a cluster of questions:

[1] How is Critical Theory received, transformed, contested, adapted, and put into dialogue with various cultures of critique   situated in the non-Western contexts? What are the methodological transformations of Critical Theory in the Global South?

[2] Is there a core of Critical Theory that can be globalized, and if so, is the very gesture of globalizing it free from a new colonizing intent? Can Critical Theory of the Frankfurt School be contested without using the very instruments and methods provided by this approach? What are the prospects of a Global Critical Theory that will not be a ‘grand narrative’ of critique, prone to criticism of imperialism and colonialism? Should Global Critical Theory be conceived as a ‘sum’ of different critical stances all over the world, or does it have to envisage a world society?

[3] Does the fact of being within a ‘form of life’ endow someone with a critical position, or is critical engagement acquired by reclaiming the tradition of critical thinking? How can critique and Critical Theory stop at the margins of a ‘form of life’ without questioning how this ‘form of life’ has emerged? Can critique stop at the geographical, cultural, and political borders without questioning the very formation of these boundaries? If the aim of Critical Theory is emancipation – “human emancipation from slavery” (Horkheimer) – can emancipation be local?

These and other questions emerging from the current practices of critique and actualization of Critical Theory will be addressed during the inaugural Summer School.

To apply for participation, graduate students and early career scholars are invited to submit a 1- 2 pages research statement reflecting their research interests, in connection to the questions above and/or the following themes:

• Critical Theory of the Frankfurt School and its postcolonial and decolonial criticism
• Critical Theory from the Global South
• Non-European traditions and practices of critique
• Critical Theory of world society
• Methods of a Global Critical Theory
• Immanent critique in the global context
• Other related topics

The 1-2 pages research statement and a short bio, in one pdf document, has to be sent to [email protected] by April 11th, 2025. The decisions will be communicated within two weeks.

Registration Fees (covering lunches and coffee breaks):

Funded scholars from the Global North: 150 €

Funded scholars from the Global South: 100 €

Non-funded scholars: 50€