Philosopher's Zone

Cultural Marxism is many things to many people — at one end of the political spectrum, it's the hidden force behind political correctness, identity politics and 'wokeness', while at the other end it's a shopworn conspiracy theory that explains nothing much at all. So what is Cultural Marxism? Did a group of Marxist intellectuals in the mid-20th century really set out to reshape Western culture? And if they did, how convincingly does their story stack up as a tale of secret plots and calculated ideological subversion?
Guest: Alexander Howard, Senior Lecturer in English and Writing, University of Sydney
Producer: David Rutledge
'Cultural Marxism' is a conspiracy theory for our time - Alexander Howard in The Conversation July 2026
The Cultural Marxism Conspiracy: Why the Right Blames the Frankfurt School for the Decline of the West by A.J.A. Woods (Verso 2026)
Conspiracy theories, anti-Semitism and fun - The Philosopher's Zone, December 2022
*The 2026 Alan Saunders Lecture* - Alexandre Lefebvre on 'The return of the moral state: politics and the good life', Thursday September 24 6.30 pm - register here

The great German philosopher Jürgen Habermas, who died in March, wrote in his later works about what he called Unheimlichkeit — roughly translated as "the unease of the times" — to describe the global retreat of liberal democracy, the fraying of the rules-based international order, and the increasing polarisation and hostility of public discourse. And yet, to the end he defended Enlightenment reason and the utility of rational debate. In a world that seems to be losing its democratic bearings, has Habermas' day passed? Or is the problem more that we haven't read him carefully enough?
Guest: Peter J. Verovšek, Assistant Professor in the History of European Integration, University of Groningen, The Netherlands
Producer: David Rutledge
Did Jürgen Habermas's death also mark the end of his vision of democratic life? - Peter Verovšek for ABC Religion & Ethics

When it comes to the ideal philosophical medium, most of us would identify the written word - or maybe the spoken word, if we're fans of Socratic dialogue - and this is because for centuries, philosophy has been a linguistic practice. But this week we're arguing that visual art can be philosophy, and looking at how visual art can represent concepts in ways that haven't traditionally been recognised by Western epistemic traditions.
Guest: Taylor-Jai McAlister, clinical psychologist and postdoctoral Research Fellow in Philosophy, Macquarie University, Sydney
Producer: David Rutledge
Defining Aboriginality - Taylor-Jai McAlister on The Philosopher's Zone, November 2023

Ever since AI was founded in the 1950s, people have talked and written about 'intelligence' as though we all broadly agree on what that word means. But there's considerable debate on that score, and among the debaters are philosophers - like this week's guest - who question the degree to which machines can be said to be intelligent at all, and think that claims of intelligence can all too easily deflect attention from the real ethical issues around AI.
Guest: Tim Crane, Professor of Philosophy at the Central European University (CEU) in Vienna, Austria
Producer: David Rutledge

GWF Hegel (1770-1831) wanted to construct nothing less than a complete explanation of reality - nature, consciousness, art, history, politics, the lot - based on a single self-explanatory idea. Whether or not he succeeded is an interesting question (spoiler: he didn't), but more interesting is the question of why philosophy has become so much less ambitious since then, and what we can learn from Hegel today.