It is often said that thinking begins with problems, or that problems are the motor of thought and practice. If this is true, how exactly should this notion of problems be understood? What must a problem be in order to play this inaugurating role? Does the word “problem” have a univocal sense? What is at stake – theoretically, ethically, politically, institutionally – when philosophers use the word? This special issue is devoted to making historical and philosophical sense of the various uses and conceptualizations of notions of problems, problematics and problematizations in twentieth-century French thought. In the process, it augments our understanding of the philosophical programs of a number of recent French thinkers, reconfigures our perception of the history and wider stakes of twentieth-century French philosophy, and reveals the ongoing theoretical richness and critical potential of the notion of the problem and its cognates.
The contributors to this issue are Amy Allen, Giuseppe Bianco, Sean Bowden, Pierre Cassou-Noguès, Simon B. Duffy, Jill Hernandez, Mark G.E. Kelly, Colin Koopman, Craig Lundy, Alison Ross, Matthew Sharpe and Daniela Voss. Their contributions treat thinkers as diverse as Bergson, Cavaillès, Lautman, Bachelard, Canguilhem, Althusser, Simondon, Marcel, Hadot, Foucault and Deleuze.
Issue image: Effigy – Black Beach, 2017, by Jade Suine. Reproduced by kind permission.