Psyche-soma and polis in Castoriadis and beyond: A new conception of an inextricable relation

Abstract The essay1 examines the relationship between ‘psyche-soma’ and ‘polis’ in Castoriadis’ work and shows its irresolvable aporias. These aporias are due less to his shortcomings than to what I call the aporetic unity of psyche-soma. This aporetic unity consists in the fact that the ‘psychic monad’, which tends towards fantasies of omnipotence and hubris, is existentially as well as formally bound to the body, which it simultaneously seeks to split off as its other. This phenomenon also makes the socialization of human individuals an aporetic undertaking. The attempt to link the tension between psyche-soma and political body-imaginary with the tension between autonomy and heteronomy makes it possible to better understand these difficulties and those inherent to the ‘project of autonomy’. The final section of this paper links the reality principle with body consciousness and opens the gaze to the material boundaries of our overheated planet.