Archive of The Intellectual and His People

The time of emancipation, in Rancière’s imagination, is not a progression towards truth and justice. It is rather, Katharina Clausius argues, a common ground whose gridlines sprout delicate tendrils that extend out, coil around, germinate new shoots that spiral out beyond its boundaries.

Oliver Davis on neoliberalism's appropriation of the Marxist narrative of historical necessity. 

This text, written by Jacques Ranciere more than 20 years ago, seems particularly relevant in the run-up to a presidential election that is already saturated with racist ideas, nonstop polemics and the obsessions of a far right that is guaranteed media coverage whether benevolent or pseudo-indignant.

Complete your Rancière bookshelf with this reading list! 

Our Critical Theory reading for the academic year ahead, featuring McKenzie Wark, Erik Olin Wright, Judith Butler, and more.

In this new edition of a classic, The Intellectual and His People, Jacques Rancière analyzes a question key to struggle: How does the intellectual relate to the masses they theorize about and, ultimately, for?

40% off new Rancière editions, plus our bestselling political theory and philosophy books.

Should we await le Grand Soir – the climactic "great night" of revolution? Or re-organise other common worlds in the here and now, making visible the capacities and intelligence of all those who live in them?