No complex and structured singularity has the preconditions associated with it, is not gestated in its past, and does not preexist as an abstract possibility. No structured entity comes into the world through a continuous genealogy or origin, with either the appropriate elements or the abstract structure in which they will ultimately be interconnected. On the other hand, the "start from zero" does not mean creation ex nihilo, nor does "always-already" imply the pre-authorization of existence or substance at the beginning of time, but in one sense, the exact opposite of both. [...] Of course, elements existed before, but neither the elements of this thing that would bear its mark and predefine it existed, nor the structure that would determine them. The always-already of absolute commencement always constitutes a cut with the past, and the thing that begins is essentially unpredictable, radically new, singular, and innovative.
This book gathers some of the most important texts from the research work of Giorgos Fourtounis, spanning nearly three decades. The author, critically studying major contributions from thinkers such as Louis Althusser, Jacques Derrida, Gilles Deleuze, Jacques Lacan, Michel Foucault, Judith Butler, Étienne Balibar, identifies critical theoretical questions in the treatment of concepts that formed their shared theoretical concern: concepts of structure and subject, and consequently persistence, structural causality, the indeterminate, the whole, ideology, as well as cut and science. He dares thus to confront questions that seem to remain unanswered since the 1960s, setting up with each of his texts a research workshop producing new approaches, reflections, and proposals, and reactivating one of the most critical pursuits of radical theory.
