ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to develop a justification for a notion of fulfilment being inserted into the current proliferation of writings that have recently been carried out in anticipation studies around questions concerning ontological reasons for anticipation’s existence. The chapter does this by considering the utopian ontology of the German Marxist philosopher Ernst Bloch, which he termed an ontology of not-yet being. By putting Bloch’s processual and radically open ontology into conversation with Roberto Poli, a prominent figure in contemporary anticipation studies, the chapter calls for a more serious engagement with the notion of fulfilment by those researchers who are currently working in this interdisciplinary field. The chapter posits that while Poli has undoubtedly considerably enriched our conceptual work in the area of anticipation studies, it is nevertheless the case that up to now this same work falls short of truly living up to the ontological openness that Poli’s writings profess the very existence of anticipation announces. This chapter shows how, within the purview of Bloch’s ontology, this dimension of Poli’s work, which closes off fulfilment from view, can be brought to the fore. In the process an exigence emerges which demands any attempt to understand the essence of anticipation consider the concept of fulfilment. According to the categories of Bloch’s ontology of not-yet being we must envisage the possibility of anticipation’s fulfilment in order to fully grasp the real ontological import of anticipation’s existence. Anticipation only becomes visible, as it were, in the light of a possible arrival. For Bloch, this possibility can be intuited.
