This editorial was first
published in Thesis Eleven
Journal, April 2021, #163

Into its 40th year, Thesis Eleven is in transition, as ever.

Its founding, and dominant generation has moved on. Our teachers, the towering generation of Castoriadis, Bauman, Feher and Heller and the Markuses, have passed on, as have many other figures who inspired us across the years. Peter Murphy and David Roberts have retired from the journal. Their imprints remain, forever. Trevor Hogan shifts into the Editorial Advisory Board, along with Eduardo de la Fuente and Simon Marginson. Peter Beilharz remains an absent presence, as Founding Editor.

Thesis Eleven is now firmly in the hands of its rising and middle generation, Tim Andrews, Rachel Busbridge, Alonso Casanueva Baptista, James Dorahy, Andrew Gilbert, Julian Potter, Howard Prosser, Ira Raja, Raul Sanchez-Urribarri, Sian Supski, with Tin Luong and Jacqueline Tolentino as editorial interns. The energies and enthusiasms generated here are already apparent in work such as the online COVID-19 Project, Thinking and Living Crisis, steered by Tim Andrews, and in powerful issues of the journal taking on pressing global themes such as populism.

We have been in discussion on matters of this transition for some years already now. What to maintain, what to change, what to seek anew? How to register the best of the traditions which the journal has built upon; what to move on from, how to innovate and keep up the sense of the cutting edge?

Ten years ago the journal shifted to six issues a year: continuous production, in effect. This strategy enabled us not only to track our own winds of change and tradition, but also to share the platform of the journal with others, often in the form of special guest issues. This has given us a significant sense of room to move, to be open to the views and initiatives of others.

In all this, the most overwhelming patterns of change and unpredictability have been external. Brave New Worlds continue to surprise and to test us, globally and locally. The relatively benign culture of universities that we emerged into 40 years ago has gone. We chose well when we chose independence, all those years ago. This, and the friendship and trust of our collective, has generated a culture of confidence in our capacity to continue to build and further to innovate into this future.

Into this, our 40th year, we will continue to seek making further sense of these challenges and achievements. As in 1980, all those years ago, we welcome new beginnings, and new possibilities in the unknown that lies before us. Welcome to the next 40 years, and thanks for helping make all this possible as readers, writers, reviewers, friends, critics and supporters, near and afar, tomorrow and today.

Sian Supski and Peter Beilharz