Badiou is at his strongest in pointing to the inconsistencies of a facile multiculturalism, the pluralism of the food court and the shopping mall, which wilts in the face of any genuine expression of cultural hostility to liberal values.

Alain Badiou teaches philosophy at the E?cole normale superieure and the College international de philosophie in Paris. In addition to several novels, plays and political essays, he has published a number of major philosophical works, including "Theory of the Subject," "Being and Event," "Manifesto for Philosophy," and "Gilles Deleuze." His recent books include "The Meaning of Sarkozy," "Ethics," "Metapolitics," "Polemics, ""The Communist Hypothesis," "Five Lessons on Wagner," and "Wittgenstein's Anti-Philosophy." Peter Hallward teaches at the Centre for Research in Modern European Philosophy at Kingston University, London. He is the author of several books including "Absolutely Postcolonial," "Badiou: A Subject to Truth, ""Out of This World: Deleuze and the Philosophy of Creation," and "Damming the Flood."