Summary Of Living In The End Times By Slavoj Zizek

In his lecture Living in the End Times, Slavoj Zizek analyzes a few of the major issues that our modern-day society faces. He believes in the power of radical solutions. However, beginning with setting aside profoundly political discussions about socioeconomic theories, many of the ideas he provides can be linked to a more fundamental issue: the existence of man and his relationship towards his environment.

From a historical point of view, the ecological crisis affecting our world is now more severe than ever before. There is a growing concern about the increasing dissipation of earthly resources, and about the devastating effects of climate change on our atmosphere. Nevertheless, this concern stems from a twisted notion: the present-day capitalist State might write up policies and treaties which are meant to ensure the salvation of nature as we know it, but still the situation keeps becoming worse. It is as if everybody comprehends, in the back of their minds, that the global capitalist system simply cannot remain at work indefinitely. That if it does, it will lead to the utter downfall of our current society.
The idea stays buried, though — its disturbing echo becomes muffled by the bright lights of popular media and popular politics, which intend to turn us into commodified, inebriated, small, content citizens.

Zizek rightly focuses his attention on the increasing role of humans within nature. He points out the need for humans to take notice of their central role in the destruction of nature, but also of their ability to take a stand. His claim about how “maybe paradoxically we should accept that nature doesn’t exist” is bright, but I only agree with it partly. Yes, we can accept that nature is essentially a chaos in itself. We can accept that there is no true perfect order in nature, but this does not mean that we should disregard our concern for its