History of England, (ca. 1900) Alain Badiou is a French philosopher, formerly chair of philosophy at the École normale supérieure and founder of the faculty of philosophy of the Université de Paris VIII. He is the author of numerous books and essays. This essay is adapted and updated from Polemics, translated by Steve Corcoran (London: Verso, 2006). The new sections have been translated by James Membrez. In 1871, Karl Marx proposed an account of the Paris Commune that is wholly inscribed in the question of the state. For him, it comprises the first historical case in which the proletariat assumes its transitory function of the direction, or administration, of the entire society. From the Commune’s initiatives and impasses, he is led to the conclusion that the state machine must not be “taken” or “occupied,” but broken.