A collection of highly readable essays in which Badiou discusses some of the key events and shifts in the recent years including 9/11, the Iraq wars, NATO intervention in Kosovo, the French government’s ban on headscarves, and how propaganda has become a dominant force in our media-saturated society. See in particular ‘On September 11 2001: Philosophy and the ‘War against Terrorism’,’ ‘The Law on the Islamic Headscarf,’ and ‘Third Sketch of a Manifesto of Affirmationist Art.’