The second guest in the series “Between Politics and Philosophy” was Professor Andrzej Leder, philosopher of culture, psychotherapist, graduate of the Medical Academy and the University of Warsaw, head of the Cultural Philosophy Unit at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences, author of books: The Transformation of Myths, or Life in the Age of Decline; Unconsciousness as Emptiness; Freud’s Science in the Age of Sein und Zeit; The Premature Revolution. An exercise in historical logic. Professor Leder gave a lecture referring to his latest book, which has been widely read in all intellectual circles in Poland. In this thesis, the author puts forward the thesis that in Poland in the years 1939-1956 a social revolution took place which created conditions for the rise and expansion of the bourgeoisie. This revolution, however, is repressed by the collective consciousness of Poles who stubbornly cling to romantic and landowner myths and stereotypes.
Having presented the main assumptions of his book, Professor Leder encouraged the audience to engage in a discussion, which was perhaps not as stormy as this excellent and controversial book deserves to be, but which touched upon such important issues as the diagnosis of the current state of collective consciousness in Poland, the reasons for the aforementioned denial or the interpretation of Polish history in the post-colonial perspective. There were also questions about the method Andrzej Leder uses in his work. The spirit of Lacanian psychoanalysis, which effectively encourages unexpected revaluations, suspicions and questioning of commonly held truths and opinions, pervaded the entire meeting and discussion.