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The Charms of Indeterminateness

Indeterminateness is a concept introduced by political philosopher Chantal Delsol in her trilogy on "late modernity." It delineates the penchant of contemporary humans to defy limitations, avoid long-term commitments, and celebrate variability for its own sake. These traits strongly echo the accounts of democratic character as inherently inconstant found in both Tocqueville and Plato. This essay highlights Delsol's concept against the backdrop of these older accounts. In doing so, it helps us better understand democratic character in its perennial as well as its contemporary tendencies, with particular reference to the phenomenon of relativism, and it provides an entry into Delsol's central theme of late modernity.