Prof. Dr. Mehmet Ulukütük
Whenever individuals associated with philosophy appear in Turkey’s mainstream media, they tend to claim that the primary obstacle to philosophical thought is the society’s religious beliefs and traditions. They argue that without freeing ourselves from these constraints, “free thinking” is impossible—and therefore, so is doing philosophy. Regardless of the context or starting point of their statements, the conclusion always seems to lead to the same familiar story. Given that the modernization project during Türkiye’s transition from the Ottoman Empire to the Republic was framed largely in opposition to religion and tradition, such criticisms have gained both a familiar and legitimate place in public discourse. Even those who critique religion not with contempt, but on purely “rational” grounds often fail to recognize that they do so within a capitalist world. This is because the capitalist system employs critiques of religion and tradition as a “veil of legitimacy” that reinforces its own hegemony. In this way, actual power relations, economic structures, and modes of cultural production are rendered invisible. In both media and academia, the institutions of capitalist cultural hegemony—media, education, and the arts industries—blunt philosophy’s essential critical capacity. Thus, as long as criticism directed at religion and tradition does not disrupt the functioning of capitalism, it is tolerated—transformed into a harmless form of dissent, like a “well-behaved child” within the system.
To be sure, there are indeed problems within society’s belief systems and traditions, and it is certainly possible—and often necessary—to articulate and critique them. However, to reduce the problem to this alone and overlook the deeper issue is, in my view, a clear sign of complacency and conformism. For targeting belief systems and traditions is relatively easy—what is truly difficult is to confront the capitalist order itself, which has become a hegemonic form of oppression, deeply ingrained in our very existence. This is why many of those presented as philosophers in the media opt for the easier path. Their words may be eloquent, their rhetoric compelling, and they may appear to speak from a thoroughly philosophical ground. Yet the moment they avert their gaze from the fundamental issue, their eloquence collapses into emptiness. Thus, the refusal of these so-called “philosophers” to acknowledge the core problem is not merely a personal choice—it is also the outcome of a discursive filtering mechanism shaped by hegemonic power. Regardless of how impressive their rhetoric, conceptual arsenal, or philosophical references may be, any philosophical critique that fails to touch capitalism runs the risk of becoming, as Adorno warned in his notion of the “culture industry,” nothing more than an ornamental accessory to the system it ought to challenge. These “philosophers” (and you know exactly who they are, just as they themselves do) will only have begun to truly think the moment they confront the capitalist order. Accordingly, the real question becomes: Can philosophy be done in a capitalist world?
This question is not merely an abstract intellectual curiosity for me; it lies at the heart of a professional, social, and personal inquiry. As a philosophy lecturer, I feel compelled to ask it in order to understand the obstacles I often encounter when attempting to communicate philosophical ideas to my students. The tension between philosophy’s slow, deep, and critical nature and the fast-paced, superficial, efficiency-oriented ethos of the capitalist world manifests itself in the background of these classroom communication difficulties. This question also concerns me as a member of the university. The modern university took shape amid the institutional differentiation of the sciences; as the natural and social sciences increasingly specialized in their own domains, philosophy lost its once-central position. Notably, this academic shift coincided historically with the rise of capitalist modernity. From the 19th century onward, relations of production and modes of knowledge generation were restructured to align with the logic of the market. As a result, philosophy became increasingly marginalized—both within the university and the public sphere—because it no longer produced “direct utility.” Moreover, maintaining a philosophical stance in the society I live in carries its own difficulties, especially in an environment where capitalism has deeply entrenched itself. The capitalist ethos functions not merely as an economic order, but as a cultural hegemony that shapes patterns of thought, value systems, and channels of communication. Expressing philosophical intent under such conditions means confronting not only conceptual barriers but also public perception, market-driven language, and a culture obsessed with speed. And not only the society I live in, but the entire world is under the domination of capitalism. Even supposed ideological opposites like the United States and China share a common foundation in their capitalist structures. These challenges demonstrate that the context in which philosophy is practiced directly shapes both how and why philosophy is done. In short: the world in which you philosophize profoundly matters.
The possibility of doing philosophy depends not only on the innate capacity for thought that human reason possesses, but also on the social, cultural, and historical milieu that nourishes and sustains that capacity. The emergence of philosophy in Ancient Greece cannot be explained solely through the individual genius of Socrates, Plato, or Aristotle; rather, it was the political structure of the polis, the concept of citizenship, commercial networks, the institutionalization of leisure (scholé), and a culture of public discourse that collectively made such intellectual activity possible. Every philosopher thinks not only as an individual endowed with reason, but also as a member of a particular society. For this reason, even the most radical criticisms can be seen as responses to the cultural and moral codes embedded in that society. The philosopher, even in dissent, must speak the language of the very values they oppose. Within this framework, the real question becomes: What is the possibility of doing philosophy in a world dominated by today’s globalized and intensified neoliberal capitalist ethos? For capitalism transforms not only economic relations, but also our sense of time, patterns of attention, social values, and even the individual’s very sense of self. Thus, the question may also be reframed: How does the capitalist ethos shape the forms of philosophical thinking and its public resonance? Can philosophy still sustain its emancipatory and critical function under such conditions? In a world where people are simultaneously reduced to objects of consumption and trapped in daily economic struggles, can we genuinely speak of thinking—or of doing philosophy at all? In a world where corporations and conglomerates reign, where the realm of advertising and imagery pervades everything, and where money is the singular measure of worth, can people still meaningfully reflect on ethics, politics, religion, aesthetics, or law?
In the past, religion and tradition were said to impose external restrictions on philosophy—declaring, in effect, “You cannot think here.” The capitalist order, by contrast, does not exclude philosophy so overtly; instead, it absorbs and reshapes it from within, often in ways that are far more insidious. It permits the practice of philosophy, but either domesticates it in accordance with market logic or buries it in the technical disputes of academic philosophy departments. Today, we find philosophy departments in universities across the globe. Thus, the threat is not the banning of philosophy, but rather the proliferation of a pseudo-philosophy—one that mimics the appearance of philosophical inquiry, but has been translated into the language of the market. In the past, theology and tradition were seen as philosophy’s primary adversaries; today, the capitalist order has become the most powerful hegemonic structure confronting it. Within the parameters of this hegemony, “safe” and “harmless” philosophy is permitted. This new adversary does not operate through crude censorship or prohibition; rather, it neutralizes thought through commercialization and instrumentalization. That is precisely what makes it all the more dangerous and insidious.
In his article Philosophy and the Study of Capitalism (2022), Justin Evans observes that while sociologists, economists, anthropologists, and literary critics have produced a vast body of research on capitalism, philosophy has remained strikingly disengaged. Why has capitalism failed to emerge as a central philosophical problem? The mere neglect of this question, by itself, constitutes a philosophical failure—if not a scandal. Philosophy’s inability—or unwillingness—to confront capitalism as a core issue amounts, in truth, to a kind of intellectual suicide.
In his recently published book The Apocalypse of Thought: The Death of Philosophy 1 (İnsan Publishing, 2025), Ali Sait Sadıkoğlu incisively and convincingly argues that capitalism is one of the principal agents responsible for the death of philosophy. According to Sadıkoğlu, the human being has now been reduced to an entity defined solely by ego and body—shaped by economic individualism, impulses, and self-interest. The liberal-capitalist order has transformed the body into a performance apparatus, severed the human being from transcendence, and reduced them to a mere object of instrumental reason—thus stripping philosophy of its very raison d’être. Within this framework, religion has been relegated to the immanent aesthetic realm of private conscience, and faith has become a speculative lifestyle choice. The economy, in turn, redefines belief in terms of performance and productivity, thereby fully instrumentalizing the sacred. In this process, the sacred is reduced to a mere symbol of nostalgia. With the loss of transcendence and the spiritual dimension of religion, the individual becomes a soulless, secular creature, existing solely through the body. Democracy is reduced to an instrument of capital domination, and representative systems have become dysfunctional. All political structures under the liberal system bear totalitarian tendencies. Even communism, Sadıkoğlu argues, has failed to reverse this materialist trajectory. (After all, one form of materialism does not eliminate another; it only reinforces it—this, according to Sadıkoğlu, is precisely what Marx and Marxism have done.) As a result, the entire world—with its nature and humanity—has been thoroughly instrumentalized, and the total logic of capitalism has saturated every dimension of existence. The individual shaped by the logic of capital is no longer a subject capable of bearing universal ethical principles. (pp. 13–20)
Over the past two centuries, studies in the history of philosophy have overwhelmingly eclipsed efforts to produce original philosophical thought. (More than 70% of academic philosophy today is focused on historical studies.) The core reason for this lies in the capitalist academic structure, where safe, canon-conforming, and citation-producing research is incentivized, while bold, radical, and system-building philosophy is institutionally viewed as “reckless,” “dangerous,” or “utopian.” If philosophy is understood not merely as theoretical inquiry but as a way of life—as Pierre Hadot argued in his reading of ancient philosophy—then to do philosophy within a capitalist world becomes, in itself, a countercultural act, even a form of resistance. Philosophy must propose a different vision of life in opposition to capitalism’s dominant values of “efficiency,” “competition,” and “consumption.” Yet within the logic of the system, such efforts are often labeled as “marginal” or “unproductive.” For this reason, doing philosophy in a capitalist world entails not only thinking, but resisting.
Martin Heidegger critiques the technocratic rationality exalted by capitalism through the concept of Gestell (enframing). For Heidegger, modern technology views Being solely as a calculable and utilizable resource. Within this logic of “calculative thinking,” the space for philosophy to pose the fundamental question of Being is increasingly foreclosed. Heidegger’s call for “meditative thinking” (besinnliches Denken) proposes slowing down, waiting, and re-engaging with Being as a response to the hyper-speed of capitalist logic. Jean Baudrillard, in turn, argues that the consumer society creates a regime in which what is consumed is not needs but signs and images. In such a world, philosophy risks being reduced to a “concept store” that serves the production of image, not the pursuit of truth. Byung-Chul Han stresses that neoliberal capitalism, unlike older disciplinary regimes, turns the individual into their own oppressive taskmaster. In the “burnout society,” the self is exhausted by constant pressure to perform. In this context, philosophy becomes not only a critique of systemic structures, but also a practice for reclaiming inner freedom. For Han, to do philosophy in a capitalist world is to cultivate an “aesthetic of negativity” in resistance to the compulsive demand for positivity.
Capitalism effectively banishes philosophy from the organic fabric of everyday life—politics, labor, media—and confines it largely to academic institutions. This is because when philosophy intervenes in a capitalist context, the system begins to stall. The very act of questioning what is taken for granted halts the machine. Hence, universities in capitalist societies increasingly evolve into “centers of credentialed knowledge production.” Philosophy departments are often regarded as “marginal,” “peculiar,” or “obscure” fields—disciplines that generate no direct market value, engage in abstruse technical debates, and are scarcely understood outside their own circles. Consequently, philosophy’s critical potential becomes subordinated to journal metrics, grant applications, measurable outputs, and project-based funding. Rather than confronting the capitalist system head-on, academic philosophy often survives by identifying system malfunctions, proposing repairs, or offering tools for rehabilitation. In law schools, legal philosophy is not pursued as a genuine effort to understand the ontological foundations of justice, but as a burdensome requirement—an exam to be passed and forgotten. In economics departments, when philosophy’s interrogative power is unleashed, the system falters—even the most basic concepts like “desire” and “need” prove difficult to define. (Let İşaya Üşür’s ears burn, as the saying goes.) In the end, philosophy’s public role narrows; philosophers no longer speak in the agora—they now whisper to one another in the secluded hallways of academia.
Contrary to common belief, capitalism does not eradicate philosophy altogether; on the contrary, it assimilates it in a controlled fashion into the logic of the market. Activities such as so-called “philosophical” workshops, mindfulness retreats, and “corporate ethics” seminars often serve not to cultivate critical thinking but to boost individual performance and productivity. In this way, philosophy ceases to be a tool of resistance and becomes a self-polishing service sector within the system itself. Capitalism does not abolish philosophy; it spatially confines it (by incarcerating it within university departments) and functionally neutralizes it (by molding it to fit market rationality). For this reason, doing philosophy today often means breaking out of this “institutional prison” and attempting to reconstruct the public sphere from the ground up.
Paradoxically, capitalism has produced individuals who are structurally selfish, socially fragmented, and politically impotent: selfish in the face of gain and consumption; fragmented and depressed due to the erosion of solidarity; and powerless, reduced to the mere pawns of electoral rituals in the game of democracy. Within such an atmosphere, it becomes nearly impossible to speak of an individual capable of genuine thought. Structural selfishness eliminates humility and the recognition of limits before truth—making it both the gravest danger and the primary source of self-deception. Social atomization renders the individual indifferent to others, thereby obstructing the emergence of the ethical subject. Political impotence robs the individual of the capacity to critique and question prevailing conditions. What remains is a type of pseudo-individual who deceives themselves with philosophical jargon and theoretical posturing. As Byung-Chul Han points out in The Burnout Society, neoliberal capitalism has transformed the subject into a “self-exploiting performance unit.” Such a subject does not cultivate ethical responsibility in relation to others but produces only a competitive solitude. Capitalist loneliness leads not only to depression but also to a profound form of ethical blindness.
To do philosophy in a capitalist world is both arduous and indispensable. It is arduous because the logic of the market stands in stark opposition to the slow, deep, critical, and autonomous nature of thought. And it is indispensable because philosophy is—or at least ought to be—one of the rare domains in which the human being can preserve their intellectual existence in the face of this logic of acceleration and commodification. Failing that, philosophy risks being reduced to solving abstract puzzles, conducting archaeological excavations of past thought, whispering in technical jargon, serving as a garnish to capitalism, functioning as a vent against social tradition and religious belief, or becoming a low-visibility digital pursuit of monetized attention.
