Towards an Improper Politics

Argues that democratic politics is improper, in enacting equality against property and propriety This book systematically introduces the idea of an improper politics. It contributes a conceptual vocabulary that engages with the politics of the proper, propriety and property from a post-foundational perspective. The author argues that this triad is central to understanding the maintenance of global inequality, both economic and political. The book characterises democratic politics as improper, challenging the proper bounds of reason, accepted behaviours, and the policing of proper order. The conceptualisation of democracy as an improper practice of equality accords a dignity to forms of politics often deemed marginal. - Characterises democratic politics as improper against the dominant view of democracy as a regime; - Shows that questions of property, inequality and impropriety are central to post-Marxist thought and politics; - Frames conceptual arguments within specific examples of political interventions from around the globe, including the politics of a brick and of occupations; - Rethinks hegemony in terms of proprietary order thus rethinking the links between culture, economy and polity. Mark Devenney is Principal Lecturer in the School of Humanities and Co-Director of the Centre for Applied Philosophy, Politics and Ethics at the University of Brighton.