Ernesto Laclau

political theorist (1935–2014), Buenos Aires and London

Ernesto Laclau is a political theorist and Professor Emeritus of Government at the University of Essex, Essex, where he was director of the doctoral program in Ideology and Discourse Analysis for many years. Laclau is also Distinguished Professor of Humanities and Rhetorical Studies at Northwestern University, Evanston. Active in the new social movements of the 1960s, he developed, with Chantal Mouffe, a theory of radical democracy in their landmark book Hegemony and Socialist Strategy (1985). Laclau is a member of the editorial boards of the journals Journal of Political Ideologies, Latin American Perspectives, and Philosophy and Social Criticism. His many books include: On Populist Reason (2005); Contingency, Hegemony, Universality (with Judith Butler and Slavoj Žižek) (2000); and Emancipation(s) (1996). Laclau lives and works in Buenos Aires and London. [Last updated 2010]