Alexis Tsipras & Slavoj Žižek /// The Role of the European Left ||| 15th May 2013

6th Subversive festival
15/05/2013, 21:00h, cinema Europa
Alexis Tsipras & Slavoj Žižek: The Role of the European Left

Moderator: Srećko Horvat

The accession of Croatia to the periphery of the European Union, as the most recent and possibly the last member state, is a good cause to ask ourselves what kind of Europe this is, but also what is the future of Europe and what is the left wing's role in it. After the great success of SYRIZA in Greece, a question arises concerning the relationship between social movements and organized party activity, as well as the burning issue of taking over the power and resisting the dictatorship of Troika. Is it even possible to design and bring into life a realistic utopian power within the existing frame of the financial and political union, one that will make a radical shift from the prevailing "neoliberal consensus"? And if it is, what are the necessary strategies and forms of organization? All these questions will be discussed - just two months before Croatia's accession to the EU and one month before the Altersummit in Athens - by the "most dangerous man in Europe", a name that the leading mainstream media gave to Alexis Tsipras, and "the most dangerous philosopher of the West", as they call Slavoj Žižek, a regular guest of the Subversive Festival.

Alexis Tsipras
Greek left wing politican and a member of the Hellenic parliament, president of the Synaspismom political party since 2008, head of the SYRIZA parliamentary group since 2009 and Leader of Opposition since June 2012. He studied civil engineering at the National Technical University of Athens As a university student he joined the ranks of the renovative left movement and was member of the executive board of the Student's union of the Civil Engineering School of National Technical University of Athens, and also served as student representative at the University Senate. In 2009 Tsipras became a leader of SYRIZA parliamentary group. In the 2012 Greek legislative elections SYRIZA became the second largest party in the Greek parliament and the mainopposition party.

Slavoj Žižek
Slovenian philosopher and cultural critic working in the traditions of Hegelianism, Marxism and Lacanian psychoanalysis. He has made contributions to political theory, film theory and theoretical psychoanalysis. Žižek is a senior researcher at the Institute of Sociology, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia, and a professor at the European Graduate School. He has been a visiting professor at many important universities. He is currently the International Director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities at Birkbeck, University of London and president of the Society for Theoretical Psychoanalysis, Ljubljana. He has been called 'the most dangerous political philosopher in the West'. He is a traditional guest and Parteigenosse at Subversive Festival. He has published over 50 books that have been translated into 20 languages. He writes on many topics including subjectivity, ideology, capitalism, fundamentalism, racism, tolerance, multiculturalism, human rights, ecology, globalization, the Iraq War, revolution, utopianism, totalitarianism, postmodernism, pop culture, opera, cinema, political theology, and religion. Some of his books are The Sublime Object of Ideology (2002.), The Ticklish Subject (2006.), Violence (2008.), The Parallax View (2009.), First As Tragedy, Then As Force (2010).

Srećko Horvat
One of the founders of Subversive Festival and Subversive Forum. Author, publicist and translator. Published seven books in Croatian. His latest publication -- entitled Attention! The Enemy is listening! -- is a collection of interviews with Amos Oz, Francis Fukuyama, Gayatri Spivak, Stéphane Hessel, Zygmunt Bauman and others. He is also editor-in-chief of the critical theory dossier Up & Underground and deputy editor of the journal for cultural and social issues Zarez.

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