Spirit of Resistence. Brief notes for an intellectual biography of Karel Kosik

e-mail: michael.lowy@orange.fr

Karel Kosik was not only one of the most important philosophers of the second half of the 20th century, but one of those that better embodied the spirit of resistance of critical thought. He is also one of the few that fought, in their succession, the three great forces of oppression of modern history: Fascism, during the 1940’s, Stalinism, after 1956, and the dictatorship of the Market, after 1989. At a time when so many thinkers gave up their autonomy, Kosik stands up, refuses to surrender, and doesn’t hesitate to think against the current.

Beyond the changes that correspond to historical transformations and to the internal evolution of Kosík’s ideas, one can perceive certain deep lines of continuity that runs through his whole oeuvre, giving it a profound coherence, and a singular, even unique position in the intellectual landscape of the second half of the 20th Century.