Deleuze, desire, and the psychology of capitalism.

The French philosopher Gilles Deleuze (1925–1995) was one of the 20th century’s most influential philosophers. His philosophy can be described as a nonjudgmental, affirmative approach that aims to become worthy of what happens.

In Difference and Repetition, Deleuze sees the task of philosophy as “a liberation of thought from those images which imprison it.” 

One thing that can imprison and control thought and life is capitalism.

Together with the psychiatrist Félix Guattari, Deleuze published Anti-Oedipus (2000) and A Thousand Plateaus (1987)—both books share the same subtitle: Capitalism and Schizophrenia. In this sense, the title already points toward the problem and the solution: How do social and economic systems organize our desires, and how might desire escape those forms of organization?

Read the rest in Psychology Today.