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| Discipline | Politics,philosophy,critical theory,culture |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Edited by | David Pan |
| Publication details | |
| History | 1968–present |
| Publisher | Telos Press Publishing (U.S.) |
| Frequency | Quarterly |
| 0.1 (2023) | |
| Standard abbreviations ISO 4 (alt) · Bluebook (alt) NLM (alt) · MathSciNet (alt  ) | |
| ISO 4 | Telos |
| Indexing CODEN (alt · alt2) · JSTOR (alt) · LCCN (alt) MIAR · NLM (alt) · Scopus · W&L | |
| ISSN | 0090-6514 |
| LCCN | 73641746 |
| OCLC no. | 1785433 |
| Links | |
Telos is a quarterlypeer-reviewedacademic journal that publishes articles on politics, philosophy, andcritical theory, with a particular focus on contemporary political, social, and cultural issues.[1][2][3][4]
Established in May 1968 byPaul Piccone and fellow students atSUNY-Buffalo with the intention of providing theNew Left with a coherent theoretical perspective, the journal, which has long considered itselfheterodox, has been described as turning to theright politically beginning in the 1980s.[2][5][6][7]
The journal's masthead lists its editor asDavid Tse-Chien Pan and its editor emeritus asRussell A. Berman.[8] Piccone died of cancer in 2004 at age 64.[9]
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The journal was established byPaul Piccone and fellow working-class philosophy students in May 1968 at SUNY-Buffalo, though it was never formally associated with SUNY or any other university.[1][2][10] Elisabeth K. Chaves writes that "this non-institutionalization, in academia or elsewhere, helped keep the journal distinct from other positions within the [intellectual] field, and it reveals a kinship to artists within the field of cultural production that choose to practice 'art for art's sake,' disdaining the economic and political power found at the dominant pole."[10]
According to Chaves, the journal specifically saw its objective as "vindicat[ing] the ineradicability of subjectivity, the teleology of the Western project, and the possibility of regrounding such a project by means of a phenomenological and dialectical reconstitution of Marxism in conjunction with the New Left."[10][undue weight? –discuss] In this light, the journal sought to expand theHusserlian diagnosis of "the crisis of European sciences" to prefigure a particular program of social reconstruction relevant for the United States. In order to avoid the high level of abstraction typical of Husserlianphenomenology, however, the journal began introducing the ideas ofWestern Marxism and of thecritical theory of theFrankfurt School to a North American audience.[11][12][13] In a 1971 pamphlet, in reference to its heterodoxy, members of theChicago Surrealist Group saidTelos conference organizers were "capable only of promoting the peaceful coexistence of various modes of confusion".[14][independent source needed]
Over time,Telos became increasingly critical of the Left in general, with a reevaluation of 20th centuryintellectual history, including focuses onCarl Schmitt,[15][2] federalism, and Americanpopulism through the work ofChristopher Lasch.[citation needed] Eventually the journal rejected the traditional divisions betweenLeft and Right as a legitimating mechanism fornew class domination and an occlusion of new,post-Fordist political conflicts—part of its critique of theNew Class orprofessional-managerial class.[16] This led to a reevaluation of the primacy of culture and to efforts to understand the dynamics of cultural disintegration and reintegration as a precondition for the constitution of thatautonomous individuality critical theory had always identified as thetelos of Western civilization.[17][18][19]
During the journal's "conservative turn" in the 1980s, manyeditorial board members, includingJürgen Habermas, leftTelos.[2][6] The academic Joan Braune writes that one cause for the resignations was Piccone's support of the United States intervention inNicaragua.[15][undue weight? –discuss] According to Chaves, the journal's split with Habermas was due significantly to the second generation of Critical Theory's embrace of thelinguistic turn.[10][undue weight? –discuss] ThepaleoconservativePaul Gottfried, a former student ofHerbert Marcuse, former Republican Party activist, and critic ofneoconservatism, joinedTelos in the 1980s and 1990s.[6] In January 2025, he was not listed on the journal's masthead.[20]
European New Right figures such asAlain de Benoist were key contributors toTelos in the 1990s.[21][22] Piccone asserted that theFrench New Right had incorporated "95 percent of standard New Left ideas".[21] Joseph Lowndes describesTelos as "the major translator" to English of de Benoist and other New Right figures.[7][23] Theirethnonationalist ideas later influenced thealt-right.[10][23][21]
In 1994, the paleoconservativeSam Francis was a panelist at aTelos conference in New York about populism.[7][24][25] The audience "shifted uncomfortably in their seats and chuckled in embarrassment" when Francis said the 1947 anti-austerity riots targeting Jews in England were an authentic form of populism to embrace, as recalled by Lowndes.[7][24]Telos had ties with figures of the paleoconservativeChronicles magazine, and was sympathetic to theLega Nord in Italy, thoughTelos' support for NATO military intervention against Serbia in 1999 to preventethnic cleansing was a tension with paleoconservatives.[5][7]
Noting various criticisms,Timothy Luke, aTelos editor, described the journal in a 2005 remembrance of Piccone as "out beyond the margins of the established academy ... featuring the voices of alternative networks recruited from the contrary currents of many different intellectual traditions".[26][27] According to Chaves, the journal "always maintained a critical distance from any party or political movement."[10][undue weight? –discuss]Telos author John K. Bingley wrote in 2023 that "the clash of divergent opinions" is "at the core of [the journal's] identity."[28]
The journal is published by Telos Press Publishing and theeditor-in-chief is David Pan.[29] It is affiliated with theTelos Institute, which hosts annual conferences, select papers from which are published inTelos.
The journal is abstracted and indexed in theSocial Sciences Citation Index,Arts & Humanities Citation Index,Current Contents/Social & Behavioral Sciences, and Current Contents/Arts & Humanities.[30] According to theJournal Citation Reports, the journal has a 2023impact factor of 0.1.[31]
Telos Press Publishing was founded by Paul Piccone, the first editor-in-chief ofTelos, and is the publisher of both the journalTelos as well as a separate book line. It is based inCandor, New York.
The Telos group formed in 1968 as a New Left publication and group, only to turn toward conservatism by the 1980s and 1990s.