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Žižek reverses the traditional view of the [[universal]], a view commonly associ- ated with the [[notion ]] of an empty neutral container that either encompasses or serves as a collection of particulars. For Žižek the universal is not situated to the [[particular ]] as container is to [[content]]. Instead he makes clear that the rela- tionship between [[universality ]] and [[particularity ]] is a [[dynamic ]] one. In the properly [[dialectical ]] [[relationship ]] between the universal and the particular, “the [[difference ]] is not on the side of [[particular content ]] (as the traditional differentia specifica), but on the side of the Universal” (PV: 34). Difference as universal cuts across all particularity. Difference then disrupts any attempt of the universal simply to harbour various particulars within itself, as in the standard charting of genus to [[species]].

The universal is not the encompassing container of the particular content, the peaceful medium-background of the [[conflict ]] of particularities; the universal “as such” is the site of an unbearable [[antagonism]], [[self]]-[[contradiction]], and (the mul- titude of) its particular species are ultimately [[nothing ]] but so many attempts to obfuscate/reconcile/master this antagonism. In [[other ]] [[words]], the universal names the site of a problem-deadlock, of a burning question, and the particulars are the attempted but failed Answers to this Problem. The [[concept ]] of [[state]], for [[instance]], names a certain problem: how to contain the [[class ]] antagonism of a [[society]]? All particular forms of state are so many (failed) attempts to find a solution to this problem (LN: 782; PV: 34–5; MC: 49).

The point we [[need ]] to take away here is that universality is continually at war with itself; it is its own deadlock, and the [[space ]] of emergence of universality is precisely this space wherein different particularities attempt to resolve this deadlock. As a result, the universal can be seen more as a series of particular exceptions. To put this [[another ]] way, each particularity has its own version of universality. The commonly made mistake is, for example, to argue for a universal genus called [[religion ]] with [[Christianity ]] and [[Judaism ]] and [[Islam ]] as its subspecies. This would assume a neutral [[frame ]] within which each of the subspecies resides. But the fact remains that each of these subspecies carries with it its own notion of universality, so that when, say, a [[Christian ]] and Muslim debate, they not only disagree, they disagree on how the disagreement should be posed (CHU: 316).1 Here universality is caught up in its very own [[process ]] of trying to encompass the particular: “Since each particularity involves its own universality, its own notion of the [[Whole ]] and its own part within it, there is no ‘neutral’ universality that would serve as the medium for these particular positions” (ibid.). Universality arises from this [[self-relating ]] negativity of the particular-to-itself, from the way every particular [[identity ]] is [[split ]] from within (LN: 360–63).

In the more traditional, mainstream [[discourse]], the universal is grounded in an exception that Žižek, using Lacan’s [[theory ]] of [[sexuation]], refers to as a “masculine “[[masculine]] logic”. Here the universal rule relies on a constitutive exception that functions: (a) to assert an [[objective ]] point from which to view, delimit and police its borders (this is the so-called “Archimedean point”, as detailed by [[postmodern ]] critics of objectivity); and (b) act as the unspoken [[jouissance ]] or what Žižek [[terms ]] the law’s [[obscene ]] underside.

On the other hand, the Hegelian–Lacanian Hegelian–[[Lacanian]] version of the universal that Žižek promotes is not what enables us to see things from a “neutral” [[position ]] once disengaged from all particulars. On the contrary, for Žižek, universality, like [[truth]], can be accessed only from an engaged [[partial ]] [[subjective ]] position (LN: 285, 812). Here Žižek puts forward a “feminine “[[feminine]] logic”, in which instead of the exception acting [[outside ]] of the rule, the exception is itself the universal rule. In this manner, the universal is rendered [[not-all]].

That universality emerges from a partial [[subjective position ]] and is based on the [[feminine position ]] of not-all is important because it tells us that uni- versality is not a completed field; it is not totalized. [[Concrete ]] universality is “not [[true ]] ''[[concrete universality ]] without including in itself the subjective position of its reader-interpreter as the particular and [[contingent ]] point from which the universality is perceived''” (LN: 359). In addition to including a particular sub- jective viewpoint, every [[totality ]] or universality is composed of its own gaps, fissures and breaks, in other words, its own [[symptoms ]] and deadlocks. The totality as perceived from the standpoint of the [[symptom]], or what Žižek calls, after Jacques Rancière, ''the part of no part'', can then be seen from a vantage point of “truth” (UE: 186). Truth is one-sided; it is seen from the perspective of those who are formally part of the [[system ]] but have no [[place ]] in it. This univer- sality from the perspective of the ''part of no part'' is the concrete universal. Here universality is reflected in the particular that remains outside; it has no place in the system, no [[proper place ]] within the [[social ]] edifice. Not to put too fine a point on it, one should keep in [[mind ]] that the perspective of the whole, the totality from the point of the ''part of no part'' is that of the concrete universal. The subjective position more specifically, however, could be called the “singu- lar universal”: the “Subkulaks” in Stalin’s [[Russia]], the “Untouchables” in India’s caste system and the “Rabble” that [[Hegel ]] noted in his [[work ]] on the state [[speak ]] from the position of the [[singular ]] universal: “the universality grounded in the subjective singularity extracted from all particular properties, a kind of direct short circuit between the singular and the universal, bypassing the particular” (LC: 16–7).

Žižek”s work on [[Todestrieb ]] ([[death]]-[[drive]]) and his [[interpretation ]] of Robespierre and [[Terror ]] all point to his attempt to connect the concrete univer- sal with an emancipatory [[subjectivity]], that is, the singular universal. Here Žižek cites the paradoxical notion that one can participate in the universal dimen- sion, the concrete universal, only when one is “extracted from or even opposed to one’s substantive communal identification”. In other words, one is truly uni- versal “only as radically singular, in the interstices of communal identities” (MC: 295; LC: 16–7). An [[individual ]] attains universality when the flow of particularity “gets stuck” on a singular [[moment]], when they are ready to risk everything for that. Todestrieb is getting stuck onto this particular [[objet ]] a that is associated with a [[Bartleby]]-like [[withdrawal]], a night of the [[world]], negating all [[ontic ]] particu- larities: “Subjects “[[Subjects]] purified of their [[symbolic ]] identities, subjects who meet on the ground of objectivity, as objects” (Rothenberg 2010: 177; LN: 812).2 Thus the definition of singular universality, following aspects of Badiou’s argument: an undead [[insistence ]] on a contingent particularity is what maintains the sub- ject’s fidelity to an [[event]].

Žižek [[notes ]] that the “figure “[[figure]] of the ‘part of no-Part’” confronts us with “the truth of our own position; and the ethico-[[political ]] challenge is to recognize ourselves in this figure”. This underscores the importance of meeting the singular universal on the ground of objectivity. All [[ethical ]] humanisms [[disavow ]] this instance, this moment when the neighbour appears strikingly mad, this [[night of the world]].3 If the concrete universal can be constructed only from a particular position excluded from the social totality, the singular universal relies on a short-circuit that directly embraces the universal above all particularity. It is the relationship between these two types of universality that plays an important [[role ]] in the [[construction ]] of a radical emancipatory [[subject]].