The Czech philosopher Jan Patočka not only witnessed some of the most turbulent politics of twentieth-century Central Europe, but shaped his philosophy in response to that tumult. One of the last ...students of Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger, he inspired Václav Havel and other dissidents who confronted the Communist regime before 1989, as well as being actively involved in authoring and enacting Charter 77.He died in 1977 from medical complications resulting from interrogations of the secret police. iConfronting Totalitarian Minds/i examines his legacy along with several contemporary applications of his ideas about dissidence, solidarity, and the human being’s existential confrontation with unjust politics. Expanding the current possibilities of comparative political theory, the author puts Patočka’s ideas about dissidence, citizen mobilization, and civic responsibility into conversation with notable world historical figures like Mahatma Gandhi, Vaclav Havel, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and other contemporary activists. In adding a fresh voice to contemporary conversations on transcending injustice, iConfronting Totalitarian Minds/i seeks to educate a wider audience about this philosopher’s continued relevance to political dissidents across the world.
In 1977 the sixty-nine-year-old Czech philosopher Jan Patocûka died from a brain hemorrhage following a series of interrogations by the Czechoslovak secret police. A student of Husserl and Heidegger, ...he had been arrested, along with young playwright Václav Havel, for publicly opposing the hypocrisy of the Czechoslovak Communist regime. Patocûka had dedicated himself as a philosopher to laying the groundwork of what he termed a “life in truth.”
This book analyzes Patocûka’s philosophy and political thought and illuminates the synthesis in his work of Socratic philosophy and its injunction to “care for the soul.” In bridging the gap, not only between Husserl and Heidegger, but also between postmodern and ancient philosophy, Patocûka presents a model of democratic politics that is ethical without being metaphysical, and transcendental without being foundational.
The Risk of Freedom presents an in-depth analysis of the philosophy of Jan Patočka, one of the most influential Central European thinkers of the twentieth century, examining both the phenomenological ...and ethical-political aspects of his work. In particular, Francesco Tava takes an original approach to the problem of freedom, which represents a recurring theme in Patočka’s work, both in his early and later writings. Freedom is conceived of as a difficult and dangerous experience. In his deep analysis of this particular problem, Tava identifies the authentic ethical content of Patočka’s work and clarifies its connections with phenomenology, history of philosophy, politics and dissidence. The Risk of Freedom retraces Patočka’s philosophical journey and elucidates its more problematic and less evident traits, such as his original ethical conception, his political ideals and his direct commitment as a dissident.
Jan Patočka, perhaps more so than any other philosopher in the twentieth century, managed to combine intense philosophical insight with a farsighted analysis of the idea and challenges facing Europe ...as a historical, cultural and political signifier. As a political dissident in communist Czechoslovakia he also became a moral and political inspiration to a generation of Czechs, including Václav Havel. He accomplished this in a time of intense political repression when not even the hint of a unified Europe seemed visible by showing in exemplary fashion how concrete thought can be without renouncing in any way its depth. Europe as an idea and a political project is a central issue in contemporary political theory. Patočka’s political thought offers many original insights into questions surrounding the European project. Here, for the first time, a group of leading scholars from different disciplines gathers together to discuss the specific political impact of Patočka’s philosophy and its lasting significance.
In The Crisis of Meaning and the Life-World, Ľubica
Učník examines the existential conflict that formed the focus of
Edmund Husserl's final work, which she argues is very much with us
today: how to ...reconcile scientific rationality with the meaning of
human existence. To investigate this conundrum, she places Husserl
in dialogue with three of his most important successors: Martin
Heidegger, Hannah Arendt, and Jan Patočka.
For Husserl, 1930s Europe was characterized by a growing
irrationalism that threatened to undermine its legacy of rational
inquiry. Technological advancement in the sciences, Husserl argued,
had led science to forget its own foundations in the primary
"life-world": the world of lived experience. Renewing Husserl's
concerns in today's context, Učník first provides an original and
compelling reading of his oeuvre through the lens of the
formalization of the sciences, then traces the unfolding of this
problem through the work of Heidegger, Arendt, and Patočka.
Although many scholars have written on Arendt, none until now
has connected her philosophical thought with that of Czech
phenomenologist Jan Patočka. Učník provides invaluable access to
the work of the latter, who remains understudied in the English
language. She shows that together, these four thinkers offer new
challenges to the way we approach key issues confronting us today,
providing us with ways to reconsider truth, freedom, and human
responsibility in the face of the postmodern critique of
metanarratives and a growing philosophical interest in new forms of
materialism.
