W stronę niepolitycznej emancypacji – pytanie o podmiotowość w warunkach neoliberalnej dominacji
Towards non-political emancipation - The question of subjectivity in conditions of neo-liberal domination

Summary/Abstract: In this paper the author examines some of the theories of subjectivity that are influential in contemporary pedagogy. They are analyzed in connection with theories of emancipation that are grounded in different concepts of subjectivity. In author’s opinion, contemporary pedagogy needs to formulate a theory of emancipation through education that aims to satisfy the need for a just society and equal opportunity. Concept of emancipation prevalent in Polish pedagogy is grounded in the humanistic psychology and, as author argues, is unable to account for the transformative character of the category of emancipation. In consequence it is used in legitimizing social exclusion rather than in promoting inclusion. The concept of subjectivity formulated within the humanistic psychology is not able to assert itself against the dominant economic rationality, within which the rational and self-actualizing subject is conceptualized as “human capital”. The theories of emancipation that originate from this concept can not explain human oppression as an effect of structural determinations, shifting the “guilt” (responsibility for being oppressed) to the individuals themselves. A typical instance of such “privatization of responsibility“ can be seen in the figure of homo sovieticus, which is used to explain social marginalization, common in the transforming economy as an effect of the personal deficiencies of marginalized individuals.

• Details
• Contents