Date: Wed, 15 May 2002 22:09:51 +1000
From: Hockeys <limhockey-AT-onthenet.com.au>
Subject: Re: BHA: Bhaskar's five new books - publishing details


Hi Mervyn and all

Thanks for this info. I have often wondered to what extent CR is
promoted, accepted or applied in India. Having lived and worked in both
North and South India for nine years between 1978 and 1992, I am really
keen to dialogue with people using CR frameworks in India or Asia
generally. Does anyone know who to contact in that part of the world,
based in either universities, communities or both?

Neil

Mervyn Hartwig wrote:
> 
> Hi all,
> 
> Publishing details and blurbs of Bhaskar's five new books, all being
> published by Sage (New Delhhi/ Thousand Oaks/ London)
> 
> 1. *Reflections on Meta-Reality: Transcendence, Emancipation and
> Everyday Life*  will probably be released in India this month, and
> should be available in the UK very soon and in the USA early next month
> at the latest.
> 
> In a brilliant series of studies, based on talks given in India, Europe
> and America, Roy Bhaskar, the originator of the influential, multi-
> discipliinary and international philosophy of critical realism,
> presents, for the first time in published from, his new philosophy of
> Meta-Reality.
> 
> Though based on critical realism, it goes beyond it by showing how the
> world of duality, alienation and global crisis in which we live depends
> upon and is sustained by a realm of non-duality in which our creativity,
> love and intelligence is spontaneously and unconditionally manifest.
> This realm contains the seeds of a radically different natural and
> social order, of balanced development and a state of affairs in which
> the free development and flourishing of each unique human being is the
> condition, as it is also the consequence, of the free development and
> flourishing of all. In developing this vision, the  philosophy of Meta-
> Reality confirms many aspects of the great philosophical traditions of
> the past, while correcting their one-sideness and transcending their
> dualisms and dichotomies, representing what is valid in them in a
> radically new way, apt for our contemporary times of global crisis.
> 
> Among the topics discussed are CR and the nature of being, modernism and
> post-modernism [the Bhaskarian system is contextualised in relation to
> (its immanent critique of) the philosophical discourse of modernity.-
> MH], the nature of the self, the relationship between social science and
> self-realisation, the ubiquity of transcendental phenomena in everyday
> life and the orientation of enlightenment towards collective human
> emancipation and universal self-realisation.
> 
> 2. *The Philosophy of meta-Reality: Re-enchanting Reality*
> 
> In this new, long awaited book, which may be regarded as the climax of
> all his philosophical work to date, Roy Bhaskar, originator of the
> increasingly influential, inter-disciplinary and international
> philosophy of critical realism, systematically presents and expounds the
> principles of his new philosophy of meta-Reality.
> 
> Building on a radically new analysis of the self, human agency and
> society, Roy Bhaskar shows how the world of alienation and crisis we
> currently inhabit is sustained by the ground-state qualities of
> intelligence, creativity, love, a capacity for right-action and a
> potential for human self-realisation or fulfilment. In parts one and two
> of *The Philosophy of meta-Reality* he shows how transcendence and non-
> duality are necessary and ubiquitous features of all social interaction
> and human agency; and how these and connected features of human being
> and activity sustain the totality of the structures of the world of
> duality and oppression in which we live.  In parts three and four of the
> book he shows how any objective an agent chooses in life will ultimately
> set him or her on a process or dialectic to self-realisation, entailing
> a commitment to universal self-realisation; and how these goals or
> ideals are explicit or implicit in all emancipatory projects, of
> whatever political, social or religious declension. Moreover they all
> imply the same principles of clarity and commitment to social
> transformation (on all the planes of social being), which he articulates
> here. In a very real sense he demonstrates how these principles, for the
> first time clearly elaborated here in *The Philosophy of meta-Reality*,
> are indeed the culmination of all traditions of thought and practice
> oriented to human well-being, emancipation or flourishing.
> 
> 3. *Beyond East and West: Spirituality and Comparative Religion in an
> Age of Global Crisis*
> 
> This is Roy Bhaskar's first systematic study of the philosophy of
> religion, situated in the context of his revindication of spirituality
> developed most fully in the context of the elaboration of his latest
> philosophical position, the philosophy of Meta-Reality.  This book is
> based on the Radhakrishnan lectures on spirituality and comparative
> religion which he gave at the Rabindra Bharati University in Kolkata in
> February and March 2002; and it will surely attract worldwide interest
> and stimulate fresh thinking about old issues in the philosophy of
> religion.
> 
> *Beyond East and West* is a critique of the dualisms and dichotomies
> which characterise contemporary thought, whether secular or religious.
> He shows how these dualisms reflect the alienations, contradictions,
> injustices and imbalances of the world of duality in which we live,
> which is currently hurtling the species and the planet to the precipice
> of a fatal crisis. This can be arrested once we appreciate the non-dual
> basis, sustained by the qualities of human intelligence, creativity,
> love and capacity for right-action, of that world of duality; and how
> transcendence, non-duality and related phenomena are ubiquitous and
> essential features of all human life, including the structures of the
> world of duality which dominate and occlude them. He thus reconnects in
> a contemporary context with themes to be found in religious thought.
> 
> In this book, Roy Bhaskar engages a critical history of the trajectories
> of the great religions of civilisation from their primeval roots - in
> particular with the stream originating from the ancient Vedic tradition,
> which through Buddhism interacted with the traditions of far eastern
> spirituality; and the stream which originated from ancient Egypt,
> including both its Greek and its Judaic, Christian and Islamic wings.
> He then shows how spirituality is implicit in secular emancipatory
> projects, including western liberalism and Marxian socialism.  In a
> major tour de force, he shows how all these traditions imply a unique
> commitment to universal self-realisation; and displays in a lucid way
> how this universal objective can be currently achieved.
> 
> 4. *From Science to Emancipation: Alienation and Enlightenment*
> 
> This unique collection of studies, based for the most part on
> transcripts of talks in India, Europe and America over the last five
> years, covers the period in which Roy Bhaskar was developing out of the
> seeds of the most radical phase of critical realism, his new philosophy
> of meta-Reality.  Because of the spontaneous and informal nature of
> these talks and discussions, this book provides probably the most
> immediately accessible introduction to his thought, both for those new
> to it and those already familiar with it alike.  From Science to
> Emancipation will surely provide, together with its [forthcoming]
> companion volume Fathoming the Depths of Reality: Savita Singh in
> Conversation with Roy Bhaskar, an indispensible resource for all
> students of philosophy and human sciences.
> 
> The first part consists in a systematic account of the development of
> critical realism from its roots as a critique of empiricism in the
> philosophy of science in *A Realist Theory of Science* to its
> articulation of a philosophy of universal self-realisation in *From East
> to West*.  This takes the reader gently through transcendental realism,
> critical naturalism, the theory of explanatory critique, the theory of
> dialectic as elaborated in dialectical critical realism to
> transcendental dialectical critical realism. The second part of the book
> contains discussions of the relationships between critical realism and
> Marxism, discourse theory, (containing a debate with Ernesto Laclau),
> ethnomethodology (containing a debate with Rom Harre), ethics and
> finally, religion.
> 
> The third part of the book describes the route from the most radical
> form of critical realism to Roy Bhaskar's new philosophy of meta-
> Reality, in which critical realism is seen as, in virtue of its
> commitment to non-identity, being at best the best description of the
> relative world of duality.  That world, however, he now maintains, is
> underpinned and constituted by non-duality, which is theorised in his
> new philosophy.  Part three considers some themes on this transition
> route, including the topics of post-modernism, Marxism and the global
> crisis; the relation between the left and the right brain; and an
> illuminating interview on the latest phase of Roy Bhaskar's philosophy.
> The concluding part of this book contains some recent explorations
> within this philosophy of meta-Reality, including talks on
> unconditionality in love, the nature of education and the limits of
> thought.
> 
> 5. *Fathoming the Depths of Reality: Savita Singh in Conversation with
> Roy Bhaskar*
> 
> Savita Singh, poet and philosopher, interviews - in a series of
> stimulating dialogues, sustained over several successive days - Roy
> Bhaskar, originator of the increasingly influential, international and
> multi-disciplinary philosophy of critical realism.
> 
> This book presents the main features of Roy Bhaskar's philosophy in a
> readily comprehensible form, with any difficulty in his formulations
> ironed out in the course of Savita Singh's probing questions. The result
> is probably the simplest and clearest statement of the themes and
> development of his philosophy ever published. It presents them,
> moreover, in a form which brings out, in a quite unique way, the
> specific biographical origins, trajectory and context of their
> development.
> 
> These conversations contain an especially clear articulation of the more
> advanced dialectical features of his thought, in which the reader gets a
> unique insight into the nature and limits of the intellectual and
> communicative process. A special feature of this book is a very concise
> statement of his system of dialectical critical realism. *Fathoming the
> Depths of Reality* also incorporates sustained dialogues on the
> relationship between critical realism and Marxism; on issues of
> modernity and modernisation; on feminism and the nature of domestic
> labour and women's role and oppression in India and throughout the world
> today; and on problems of everyday life including questions of our
> successes and failures, our objectives and dreams, our anxieties and
> frustrations. Finally the book takes us to the boundaries of Roy
> Bhaskar's ever-expanding thought, articulating his very latest ideas.
> 
> Savita Singh teaches political theory at Delhi University and has just
> completed a study on the contemporary discourse of modernity in India.
> She is the author of the widely acclaimed book of Hindi poems Apne Jai
> Sa Jeeven (A Life Like My Own) and she is currently working on a follow-
> up to Fathoming the Depths of Reality with Roy Bhaskar called New Ways
> of Being, New Ways of Seeing.
> 
> Roy Bhaskar has taught philosophy and related subjects in universities
> throughout the world.  He is the author of numerous highly acclaimed
> books, including *A Realist Theory of Science*, *The Possibility of
> Naturalism*, *Scientific Realism and Human Emancipation*, *Dialectic:
> The Pulse of Freedom* and *From East to West*.  He was the founding
> Chair of the Centre for Critical Realism, which now has a sister
> organisation, the International Association of Critical Realism.  He has
> been called the "world's greatest living philosopher"; and is now
> engaged in worldwide work oriented to the project of universal self-
> realisation.
> ************
> 
> Books 2-5 will all be launched in Delhi on July 11th, together with the
> already published *Reflections on Meta-Reality*.  They will then be
> launched in UK/Europe in August, probably in the third or fourth week
> and should definitely all be available at the Bradford conference.
> Finally they will be launched in the USA, on the east and west coasts in
> the first week or ten days of September.
> 
> --
> Mervyn Hartwig
> Editor, Journal of Critical Realism (incorporating 'Alethia')
> 13 Spenser Road
> Herne Hill
> London SE24 ONS
> United Kingdom
> Tel: 020 7 737 2892
> Email: <mh-AT-jaspere.demon.co.uk>
> 
> Subscription forms:
> http://www.criticalrealism.demon.co.uk/iacr/membership.html
> 
> There is another world, but it is in this one.
> Paul Eluard
> 
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