Description
This course will introduce Bruno Latour’s important ecological theory, with special focus on his most recent works. While he has long been a leading researcher in anthropology, sociology, and science studies, he has increasingly become an ecological thinker at the forefront of the climate debate. The semester will begin with some background readings. The early Latour launched his ator-network-theory with a “might makes right” conception of politics, with little room for moralism. This began to shift with his 1991 classic We Have Never Been Modern, where Latour announced that if we plan to deconstruct the scientific conception of truth, then the same must be done for political power as well. His first concrete steps in this direction came with the 1999 Politics of Nature, where climate politics became his central topic while redirecting his theory of truth as an openness to what lies outside the current polis: whether it be new scientific entities such as global warming or previously op