| Summary: | This article has two main currents. First, it argues that an affinity or similarity can be identified between the philosophy of Gianni Vattimo (the so-called “Weak Thinking”) and the “Discourse Theory” of Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. The two theorizations are engaged with related problems, but have conceptualized them differently; they share central insights, but understand them with different vocabularies. The article furthermore illuminates as regards what this affinity consists in, and it discusses the differences and similarities between the two theoretical positions. The second current of the article takes the ‘postmodern’ philosophical problems of anti-foundationalism and nihilism as its point of departure. It raises the questions of: 1) how it is possible at the same time to take the critique of universality and objectivity seriously and still believe in the value of ethics and science; and, 2) how we are to understand emancipation if there is no necessary relationship between truth and freedom. The article investigates the status, meaning and interconnection of the categories of truth, knowledge, ethics, politics and emancipation in the light of the absence of metaphysical first principles. The article concludes that: A) faith can constitute a “weak foundation” of knowledge and ethics; and, B) nihilism can be combined with the political and ethical ambitions of universal human emancipation and radical democracy.
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