Y’know what word is even worse [than problematic]? Inherently. And you my good sir are inherently problematic. — twertles67¹

In recent years we have witnessed the growing popularity of the adjective “problematic,” which has spilled over from academia—particularly its anglophone precincts—into the incessant flow of everyday conversation and ordinary gossip. We have thus taken to brandishing this rather bland label like a talisman against whatever strikes us as ethically, politically, or morally complex, or, more directly, against those who provoke in us embarrassment, disgust, or abhorrence. In this sense—indeed, in both senses—Louis Althusser, the uxoricidal Marxist, can be considered “a problematic author.”

On Reddit, a user voices confusion at what they see as a rhetorical dodge:

I feel like it’s a word that has only come into use in the past decade or so and I’ve always cringed when I hear it used. When I hear someone call a person’s behavior “problematic,” it feels passive aggressive and vague. It’s like something a risk-averse middle manager in a giant corporation would say.²

And yet the epithet has its uses, in that it allows one to highlight nuances beyond good and bad. In this sense, it can help sketch a judgment that is not trenchant and definitive about cultural products and their creators. Rather than saying “this old cartoon is racist”—a statement often received as shutting off further conversation—asserting that “this cartoon is problematic” invites dialogue and the construction of a critique, one in which anyone can articulate the problems they perceive, or deny their presence.

The adjective, however, is not politically neutral. The Reddit conversation identifies the term’s political connotation: “‘Problematic’ has its roots in social criticism, a project that enjoys popularity on the academic left.” Yet it has acquired a condescending, as well as an exculpatory, connotation: “like saying, it’s ‘wrong, but you probably can't understand why.’”³

Teresa M. Bejan, professor of political theory at the University of Oxford, would seem to agree, turning the question on its head: “Like any casual Twitter user, academics use ‘problematic’ as an innuendo, or better yet, an ‘insinuendo.’” And she confesses: “Academics like me love to describe things as ‘problematic.’ But what do we mean? We’re not saying that the thing in question is unsolvable or even difficult. We’re saying—or implying—that it is objectionable in some way, that it rests uneasily with our prior moral or political commitments.”⁴

Bejan traces the origin of the contagion to the moment American academia began adopting French structuralism, in particular authors such as Foucault, who focused on the process by which settled certainties are converted into questions to be dissected. Foucault spoke, in this regard, of “problematization.”⁵

But, in an irony typical of the culture industry, Bejan traces the expression back to Althusser himself, who had theorised la problématique, and she concludes with a polemical thrust:

The fact that many who embrace his terminology today would now reflexively describe Althusser himself as “problematic”—instead of “misogynistic” or “violent”—illustrates how successfully the word has slipped the bonds of social theory to become an all-purpose term not of art but of opprobrium.⁶

Bejan then introduces the concept of a “community of judgment,” arguing that wielding “problematic” ends up being a way of ostracising not only the object of discussion but also the interlocutor who disagrees, for as long as they refuse to change their mind—because if they hold onto the mistaken view, it can only be because they fail to grasp the error.

The adjective “problematic” can thus be conceived as an embarrassed evasion of the political problem of engaging a rhetorical opponent on agonistic terms, and hence of the risk of being defeated on that terrain. A way of sidestepping the obstacle, in other words. Certainly, there are boundaries beyond which one ought not venture, and it is therefore right that “one does not debate with fascists”—but in that case, things must be called by their names, and so fascist rather than vaguely problematic. Within that boundary, we bear the burden of explanation. This is what Bejan argues, reminding us too that academics—students especially—are human beings, often afflicted by impostor syndrome, and thus more concerned with appearing virtuous than with toiling to construct veridic statements.

In principle, every usage of the term problematic should be followed by an explanation. Is the situation or person in question unjust, immoral, or unfair? Racist, sexist, or otherwise bigoted? Wrongheaded, perhaps, or just plain wrong? All too often, the explanation never comes.⁷

Bejan does not forget that explanation carries a cost in time and energy—a cost typically paid disproportionately by marginalised individuals, forced to justify their minority viewpoint in painstaking detail, defending it against the settled certainties of the majority. Here lies the chief merit of problematisation. The risk, however, is that of determining allies and adversaries in advance, effectively negating the space of the political and thus surrendering to a certain fatalism.

If the problematic points to such fatalism, and therefore to an inescapable condition, it is perhaps the opposite of the problem, which can be confronted and potentially resolved. In this sense, the problematic belongs to the realm of the unresolved, since it treats things and people as problems to be solved while simultaneously foreclosing their solution. Thus, a notion purportedly meant to clarify things ends up muddling them instead. The problematic points more toward the opacity of complexity and the expert codes needed to decipher it than toward the rationalist tradition from which it seems to draw its legitimacy.

Footnotes

1. “Why is the word ‘problematic’ so commonly used by those on the political left?,” r/SeriousConversation, Reddit, October 2, 2022, https://www.reddit.com/. ↑

2. Ibid. ↑

3. Ibid. ↑

4. Teresa M. Bejan, “The Problem with Problematic,” The Atlantic, October 2021, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/10/problem-with-word-problematic/620289/. ↑

5. This is a distinction later taken up by another French philosopher, Bruno Latour, who distinguishes between matters of fact and matters of concern. Bruno Latour, “Why Has Critique Run out of Steam? From Matters of Fact to Matters of Concern,” Critical Inquiry, vol. 30, no. 2 (Winter 2004): pp. 225–48. ↑

6. Bejan, “The Problem with Problematic.” ↑

7. Ibid. ↑