Towards a Critical Existentialism: Truth, Relevance and Politics

Combines Deleuze’s thought with Marxism, sociology, ethology and existentialism

Offers a critical framework for addressing a number of key concepts that are often deployed within political theory, and focuses in particular on the concepts of freedom, law, and progress

Revitalizes a number of key aspects of existentialism, developing a critical existentialism that will provide helpful tools for analyzing what is at stake in key social and political debates

Provides a novel way to think through the relationship between Marx’s project, especially the implications of primitive accumulation, and Deleuze’s project - the problem of making sense

Jeffrey Bell argues that a motivating problematic for existentialist writers is the attempt to think through the implications of the problematic nature of life.

He applies a Deleuzian theory of problems to an analysis of some key concepts in contemporary social and political theory. Building on the metaphysics of problems set out in his book, An Inquiry into Analytic-Continental Metaphysics, he provides a new way of integrating the concerns of existentialist writers into contemporary political and social debates.