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AUTHORITARIANISM AND ITS ALTERNATIVES: VISIONS AND PRACTICES FOR A POST-AUTHORITARIAN WORLD
A Conference-Symposium at Simon Fraser University, Vancouver, Canada
October 21–24, 2027
Sponsored by J. S. Woodsworth Chair in the Humanities and SFU Institute for the Humanities
Our world today aches for concerted global action: on climate change and its unequal impacts, on the powerful computation technologies seemingly unleashed on an unprepared public, and on the wars and conflicts that continue to mark the international order.
Yet instead of moving toward collective resolve, we see the resurgence of authoritarian and identitarian nationalisms, neo-imperialisms, and a reckless scramble for new resource frontiers and military-technological dominance. How is it that the latter have garnered so much support, while a vision of a convivial global future remains elusive?
In a world that feels unstable, ungrounded, even feverishly disjointed, authoritarianism’s appeal may seem natural. With political and economic certainties gone and intractable challenges all around, old certainties—of nation, ethnicity, religion, patriarchy, and history—promise the return to a lost stability and security. Meanwhile, alternatives to authoritarianism have failed to persuade. Utopias of the left are marred by the broken promises and draconian overreach of Stalinism, Maoism, and their local variants. Liberalism appears to lack imagination, compromised by its inability to spread the wealth its economy encourages. The countercultural visions of the Sixties have declined into consumerism, the hedonistic individualism of neoliberalism, and the conspiratorialism of “MAHA” and its kin. Even environmentalism, with its promise of a new relationship with nature, has come to represent fear and restraint, not joy and abundance. Technological utopias have transformed into authoritarian dystopias dreamed up by billionaire techno-oligarchs in pursuit of millenarian abstractions, from the post-apocalyptic colonization of Mars to a post-human “singularity.”
This conference will shed light on the psycho-social desires that undergird the turn to authoritarianism in its diverse forms. And it will explore the ways in which these desires might be redirected toward a movement that offers a clear alternative: a post-authoritarianism that is forward-looking, not regressive; that takes from the best of human potentials, not the worst; and that reflects an expansive sense of social solidarity within an animate and more-than-human world. It will address questions like these:
How do we spread the desire and motivation for a more capacious vision of what is possible? How do we align the promise of freedom with the virtues of a more just and sustainable world?
What can previous experiences of authoritarianism and its aftermath—in Latin America, Iberia and the eastern Mediterranean, East Asia, the post-Soviet world, and elsewhere—teach us about the process of reviving the democratic and egalitarian impulses that enable a more just society to emerge?
Have attacks by the political Right stalled the post-Sixties “long march through institutions,” with its left-libertarian impulses, or do elements of the latter remain viable and attractive to the broader public? What is at the root of today’s populisms, as, for instance, in the seduction of young men by the misogynistic and homo- and transphobic “manosphere,” and how can these currents best be countered?
What are the promises of recent trends such as the growing opposition to data centers and the tech oligarchs they are taken to represent, the renewal of interest in “democratic socialism” in the US and Canada, or recent years’ “Gen Z” uprisings in countries of the Global South? And how can movements toward regenerative agriculture, “degrowth,” and personal and environmental health be steered in democratic and progressive directions rather than into convergence with exclusionary populisms?
Keynote speakers, tentatively confirmed, include Wendy Brown, Marci Shore, Kostis Kornetis, Svitlana Matviyenko and Lisa Parks.
We invite proposals for panels and presentations that would contend with the psychosocial, historical, philosophical, aesthetic, and media-communicational dimensions of the challenge of building a post-, non-, or anti-authoritarian world. We envision three main thematic areas:
Psyche: from the “authoritarian personality,” with its fascist and populist expressions, to its anti-authoritarian alternatives;
Techne: from the techno-authoritarianism embedded in today’s digital media landscape and the race for AI dominance, to liberatory, forensic, and democratizing forms of technology;
Oikos: from climate chaos, the borderized nation-state, and the neo-imperial world disorder, with its “sacrifice zones” and “states of exception,” to land rights, regenerative social ecologies, ecosovereignty, and global democratic and decolonial solidarities.
Panel proposals focused on one of these topics or their connections, or on specific regions of the world, are especially welcome. Proposals should include a title, an abstract of 250 to 400 words with key references, and a biographical statement. Participants will be expected to share a 2500–4000 word concept paper one month ahead of the conference, for dissemination among participants, so that the majority of conference time can be spent on discussion and debate.
Art proposals are also welcome, to be displayed in conjunction with the conference. Artistic proposals may include some documentation of the proposed work, and should include specifications regarding space, technical or performance requirements, etc. (The conference is not able to support transport of art materials to the conference site.)
Proposals should be sent by November 15, 2026, to aivakhiv@sfu.ca, specifying “Authoritarianism & Its Alternatives” in the Subject line. Accepted proposals will be announced by December 15, 2026. Small travel bursaries up to $500 Canadian may be available to graduate students and non-salaried applicants. Please specify requests with your proposals.
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The Institute for the Humanities respectfully acknowledges the traditional, unceded and continually occupied territories of the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish), səl̓ilw̓ ətaʔɬ (Tsleil-Waututh), kʷikʷəƛ ̓ əm (Kwikwetlem) and xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) peoples.