DISSENSUS)))

Also

available

Being and

Thought,

Logicsof

Worlds,

Badiou

Alain

Event,

Conditions, Alain
Infinite

Continuum:)

from

Badiou
Alain

Badiou

Alain

Badiou

Theoretical Writings, Alain Badiou

of the Subject, Alain Badiou
the Invisible,
Michel Henry
Seeing
Meillassoux
Finitude,
Quentin
After
Theory

Timefor

Revolution,

Antonio

Negri

Politics of Aesthetics,
Ranciere
Jacques
The Five Senses, Michel Serres

Art and Fear, Paul

Virilio

Negative Horizon, Paul

Virilio)

Forthcoming:

Althusser's

Lesson, Jacques Ranciere

Times, Jacques

Chronicles

of Consensual

Mallarme,

Jacques

Ranciere)))

Ranciere

DISSENSUS

On

Politics

and

Aesthetics)

Jacques Ranciere)

Edited

.\
continuum)))

and

Translated

by Steven

Corcoran)

International

Continuum

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Ranciere and Steven Corcoran, 20I 0)

@ Jacques

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or any information storage or retrieval
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British

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Data
Cataloguing-in-Publication
this book is available from the British

A catalogue record for

ISBN:

978-1-8470-6445-5)

Library of
Ranciere,

Data
Congress Cataloging-in-Publication

Jacques

on politics

Dissensus
by

Library.)

and

aesthetics

/ Jacques Ranciere

, edited

and translated

Corcoran

Steven

p cm

Includes index
ISBN-13:

978-1-84706-445-5

ISBN -10

1-84706-445-0

science--

Political

I. Corcoran,
JA7I

Steve

Philosophy
II

2. Aesthetics--

Political

aspects

Title)

R36 2010

2009023696)

320.01--dc22)

Typeset

by Newgen

Printed and bound

King's Lynn)))

Imaging Systems Pvt Ltd, Chennai, India

Great Britain by the MPG Books Group,

in

Bodmin

and

Contents)

vii)

Acknowledgements)
Introduction)

Editor's

Part

I
Ten

1)

of Politics

The Aesthetics
Theses

27

on Politics

Does DemocracyMean Something?

Who Is the Subject of the Rights
to
Communism: From Actuality
The People or the Multitudes?

Biopolitics

2
3

Of

War

Plutocratic

Part
9

II

as the

76
84

Inactuality

91)

A Rupture

Afterwards:

97)

105)

Consensus)

The Politicsof

The Aesthetic

The Politics of

in the

Supreme Form of Advanced

Aesthetics)

Revolution

10 The Paradoxesof
11

62

or Politics?

7 September11and
Symbolic Order?

45
of Man?

Political

Literature)

and

Art

Its Outcomes

115

134
152)

y)))

CONTENTS)

12

The Monument and Its

of 'Resistance'
Capacity

13 The Ethical

Part III
14

vi)))

Response

Turn

Confidences;

of Aesthetics

or Deleuze

and

Art's

169
and Politics

184)

to Critics

The Use of Distinctions)

205)

Notes

219

Index)

227)

Acknowledgements)

of the articles includedin this collection have already appeared

I consulted
the translation
on Politics' by
of 'Ten Theses
in the online
Davide
and Rachel Bowlby,
first appeared
which
Panagia
indebted
to their work;
journal Theory and Event 5: 3 (2001) and remain
in the collection
first appeared
'Does DemocracyMean
Something?'
Adieu
Derrida
Costas
London:
Macmillan,
Douzinas,
2007)
(ed.
Palgrave
and has been extensively reworked here, as has the essay
'Who is the
Subject of the Rights of Man?', first published in South Atlantic Quarterly
103 (2004), pp. 297-310.Thanks
are also due to Kheya
Bag for permission to reprint
a slightly
modified version of 'The Aesthetic Revolution
and its Outcomes:
and Heteronomy',
initially
Emplotments of Autonomy
published in New Left Review (vol. 14, 2002). 'The Politics of Literature'
I consulted
was first published
in SubStance (2004), pp. 10-24. Lastly,
Jean - Philippe Deranty's translation
of 'The
Ethical Turn in Aesthetics
and Politics', published in Critical
Horizons 7 (2006), pp. 1-20. However,
the
of
version
of it that appears here is taken
from
my translation
Ranciere's Aesthetics
and Its Discontents (London: Polity,
2009)
pp. 109-32,
reprinted with the kind permission of Sarah Dodgsonat Polity Press and
Joanna Delorme at Galilee.
I would like to thank all those who helped with this project: Aurelie
Maurin
Gene Ray
for her vivid discussions of French linguistic
subtleties;
and Elad Lapidot for their helpful
on the English
translation
comments
and incisive theoretical remarks; and Sarah Campbell
and
Tom Crick at
who
immense
and
and
showed
lastly
my
encouragement;
Polity,
patience
thanks go to Jacques Rancierefor his graciousness
and support throughout
every
stage of the process.)))
A number
in

English.

Editor's

What

is

Introduction)

What
politics?
and attested

is art? And
interrelation?

how

are

we to

There are

conceive of

their

of
domains
approaching these questions.First, art and politics, qua singular
of human
can be taken as two
realities,
separate
thought and activity,
each with its own principle of realization. Politics is so construed,
for
it is defined as a specific
form of the exercise of
whenever
example,
power and its mode of legitimation; so, too, is art, when defined, in
modernist or postmodernist terms, on the basis of the ways in which
won
from the
aesthetic specificity has been gradually
by a liberation
I
of
mimetic
From
this
the
question then
imperatives
logic.
perspective,
in relation
arisesas to whether
these two separate realities can be placed
to one another and, if so, under what conditions it ought
to happen.
Conversely, however, art and politics can be understood, such that their
of the rules
is seen to reside in their contingent
specificity
suspension
is in no
normal
On this view, their
experience.
emergence
governing
a
of
a
that
is
inherent
to the
outcome
way
necessary
supposedly
property
on an innovative leap from
life of individuals
or communities. It depends
the
situations.
In characterizing
logic that ordinarily governs human
of dissensus,
Ranciere seeks to defend a
politics and aesthetics as forms
His most general thesis is that
what
version of this latter alternative.
own way, is to effect a redistribution
of
these activities do, each in their
in which
human communities are 'sponthe sensible, that is of the ways
their
as wholes divisible into
constitutive
counted
parts and
taneously'
intimate

at

least

two

ways

activities
For
functions.
Ranciere,
always
genuine political or artistic
that
tear bodies from their
involve forms of innovation
assigned
places
all reduction
and free speech and expressionfrom
to functionality. They)
1)))

DISSENSUS)

to the spatio-temporal horizons

of creation that are irreducible
the disruption that they
factual community. In other
words,
a reordering
effect is not simply
of the relations of power betweenexistIt is an activity
is not an institutional
dissensus
overturning.
ing
groups;
and
that
cuts across forms of cultural
identity
belonging and hierarchies
and
to introduce new subjectsand
between discourses
genres,
working
into
the
field
of
heterogeneous
objects
perception. And as both activities,
do
with
to
have
to
Ranciere,
according
reorienting
general perceptual
is not a quesforms of belonging, their interrelation
spaceand disrupting
has an inherently
tion that needs asking. It can be shown that politics
are forms

of

a given

aesthetic dimension and aestheticsan

Ranciere, of course, is not the first to
activities

lies

radical

their

in

inherently

challenge

argue

political

that the

to the normal

one.

singularity

of these

socialdistribution.

of
What
is unique about his theorization, however, is how he conceives
as a process of equality
and consequently
also the
this logic of disruption
of these two forms
he is able to analyze the complicated intertwinings
way
of
of exceptionality. If forms of dissensus are irreducible to the objectivity
of
forms
the situation,
it is by virtue
of what Ranciere refers to as their

egalitarian suspension of the

the nodal point around which

'norrral' count of the socialorder.As

both

activities

revolve,

and

which

stated,
ensures

of 'dissensus'. First, then, it pays

every dissensus works to disrupt.
as Ranciere understands it, is defined
Consensus,
by 'the idea of the
of places of the proper and improper it
proper' and the distribution
This logic is, in his view, the spontaneous logic underlying
every
implies.
the proper
and
'it is the very idea of the differencebetween
hierarchy:
their

interrelation,

to examine the

the improper
from

culture,

is that

logicof

that

serves

culture

both

consensus

are forms
that

to separate out the political from the social, art

from commerce' and that
defines
hierarchical

in terms
of their
where everyone's speech is determined
distributions
without
in terms of its proper
function,
proper place and their activity
with
in the matching of a poeisis or way
of doing,
remainder. It consists
is the
an aisthesis,
of affects. The essence of consensus,then,
or horizon
sense and sense, between a fact and
between
supposition of an identity
between
a factual
its interpretation,
between speech and its account,
status and an assignation of rights,
etc.
of
in the demonstration
the logic of dissensusconsists
By contrast,
which
the identity and reveals the gap
a certain impropriety
disrupts
these
is a
between poeisis and aisthesis The logic underlying
practices
materialist and anti-essentialist one. Politics
is a process, claims Ranciere,)
2)))

EDITOR'S

that
form

simultaneously
the

essays

positivity

in this

denies every foundation

or a purity.

of a sphere

book, the basiclogic

of this

on
As we

INTRODUCTION)

which
it might
shall see throughout

form of

innovation

come to

against

the

the

of domains is a paradoxicalone,
in blurring the boundarconsists
of consisting in an activity
iesbetween
instead
the
whose
social, is an activity
separates its domain out from
principle
what
in
the
boundaries
between
is considered
that
consists
only
blurring
domain
of
what
to
the
socialor
and
is
considered
private
political
proper
life. (As we shall see, the samelogic
is used to make sense of the singularity of art.) But we are a far cry here from the motto accordingto which
is political, including
aesthetic
Precisely, if
self-fashioning.
everything
is. Similarly
the concept of 'the
is political, then nothing
everything
art any more
of art' is not another version of 'engaged'or 'critical'
politics
art
never tires of reiterating,
than it is of 'art for art's sake'. As Ranciere
in
and politics only ever consistin the effects of equality that they
stage,
entail.
And
the
the plots which
these
of
unique
blurring
specific practices
cause and
nature
of these
effects, which are irreducibleto the normal
and
effect relations that govern
ordinary
experience, means that politics
art cannot harbour within
them
the integrally realizable principle of new
socialorder (by the same token, however, nor do they exist totally apart
as he points out, always
from it in their own resplendent brilliance, which,
that
amounts
to basing these activities on the very distinctions
they effecThere is thus a fine line between Ranciere's
call into
tively
question).
of
identification
conceptionof art and politics and any straightforward
is
ideas of 'art becoming life' or 'everything
this practice of blurring
with
art
and
to
want
to
make
disto
reduce
them
Since
thus,
politics
political'.
effects that they bring
the singular
appear as singular processes, is to miss
about and to return
them
to the logic of consensus. Art can never become
of those who want
to
the
instrument
life
by being turned into
except
will always
mould a new social ethos; and implementing
'emancipation'
overturn into a form of societal management by 'enlightened'
experts.
that
The ground can then only ever be ripe for forms of disappointment
root
of
as
the
cause
the
the
dream
of
injustices
emancipation
interpret
perpetrated by those same experts. Ranciere's work has, I believe, enabled
to the estabus to see more dearly than ever that nothing is more favourable
lished powers than the 'loss' of the thought and practice of emancipation.
is the
What
is further
unique about Ranciere's philosophicalenterprise
to introduce
the egalitarian effects of political and)
way that he attempts
dictates

which

of

can

hierarchy

and

the

policing

be simply stated as: A always

A and non-A. Politics, then,

3)))

DISSENSUS)

artistic

action into the core of theory

be construed
as a

similarly

might

itself.

Indeed,
and

contingent

for Ranciere
creative practice

philosophy
no less

at a higher level of condensation, to levelout discursive

hierof the prevailing categories
by effecting an egalitarian
disruption
and action. As a result,
for all his insistence on
governing
perception
Ranciere's
own practice of theorizing
to be
boundaries,
blurring
ought
and theoretical
devaludistinguished from the sorts of interdisciplinarity
ation of universality
often
with so-called postmodern theory.
associated
The singular
instances
of equality in politics and art provide
Ranciere
with normative points
from
which
to critique present-day understandof politics
and art. As the present
collection reflects, Ranciere's
ings
theoreticalapparatus
itself
is nothing if not geared
to intervening in the
Written between 1996 and 2004, the texts included
present.
comprise
some of his most stimulating
and provocative essays, touching
on diverse
of our times - from
the status
political, aesthetic and philosophical
questions
of theory and questions of progressand modernity
to the demise of egalitarian
and the shrinking political
from the overturning of
politics
space,
the emancipatory promiseof aesthetic
into artistic practices of
experience
the social bond and testifying
to an immemorial
alienation, not
restoring
to mention the consensuson the necessity of the world capitalist
econIn so doing, he engages with
a diverse
0my and the state focus on security.
from
Hannah
Arendt to Giorgio
array of thinkers
Agamben,
including
that

works,

archies

Jean-Francois
Derrida, Antonio
Badiou,
Lyotard and Alain
Negri,
These essays contain ideas and concepts
that have often
2
already been treated in detail in book -length works. At the same time,
as Ranciere's
however, they reveal new aspects of these ideasand concepts,
takes his fight to different fronts or movesto new landscapes
that throw
new
of the plots that he
paths or obstacles, and oblige a reframing
up
proposesfor mapping our political and artistic present.)

Jacques
among

others.

THE AESTHETICS

The present-daycircumscription
of
where permeated and suffocated by
ing

the

radical

Ranciere's concept of the

4)))

political
activity, we know,
the notion
of consensus.

of political appearing and

dimension

contemporaryantidotes

OF POLITICS)

to

aestheticsof
this

politics

its

By restorof equality,

one of the best

ideological notions.)

provides

most fashionable of

effects

is every-

EDITOR'S

In this vein, then, I'll say a few introductory

words
about
ception of politics and his critique of the 'police'notion

INTRODUCTION)

Ranciere's

con-

of consensus.

Let us begin with

the expression'
consensus democracy'. It is a notion,
as Ranciere implacably
that means far more than
the advodemonstrates,
cacy of discussion and preferencefor social and political peace to which
one seeks to reduce it. What
of
it essentially states is that
the experience
the social order is a common and non-litigious
A consensual vision of
one.
an attempt to define the preconditionsthat deterinvolves
politics
always
univocal.
mine political choice as objectiveand
Such an experience can
take many forms: it can be 'grounded' in the ancient order of the divisions
action
of society, or it can take on its current
shape as the idea that political
is circumscribed by a series of flows of wealth,
and
populations,
opinions
geo-strategic forces. Needlessto say, the logic of consensus is a major feature
of the contemporary
managerial state. In its current form, the consensual vision of politics involves two basic operations:a first operation that
is to a socioreduces the people as political
to the population, that
subject
into
its
constituent
logical category decomposable
empirical categories;
and second, the transformation
of politics
into the affair
of professional
in government
is to
whose arrogated function
politicians and their experts
arbitrate the residual and marginal
that the objectivity of the
possibilities
situation
subject
strugpermits.
Today's worker, precisely, is not a political
insofar as these
he/she
is a worker who has rights
only
gling for equality;
with the factual status of the function
accord
performed,
rights
rights
that
which must be continually
eaten
away at to 'ensure' job protection,
fall
of the situation permits it - those who then
is, so long as the objectivity
immioutside of the preserve of worker identity
(the unemployed,
'illegal'
are simply
etc.) are no longer excluded; they
grants,
drop outs.
to the normal socialdistribution,
Construed as an equalitarian
challenge
that
is precisely an activity
overturns
however,
politics
every such
reduction of the people to the population and of politics to an affair of
rests
While, as stated, every hierarchicalorder ultimately
government.
on a logic of the 'proper' that
works
to separate out different
domains,
and to allocate different
to groups based on the supposedproprishares
of their
of
and
function
their
ety
activity, dissensus is based on
place
a logicof equality
for
that reveals the arbitrariness of that
distribution
political participation and artistic
practice.
the invention
of
of politics in Ranciere's sense stretch from
Examples
'We are the)
the demos in Ancient
Greece to the East German crowdscrying
5)))

DISSENSUS)

people'

against

their

statist

The

incorporation.

diverse historical instancesof

is that it

politics,

feature that binds all the

concerns a particular
kind

often short-lived moment

when
order or included in it in a
subordinate way, stand up and speak for themselves. This speechsituation
is always a litigious
one insofar
as it is maintained that,
to
contrary
the justifications for maintaining
hierarchical
order, no reasons exist that
can justify
excluding anyone from the order of speech.It is litigious insofar as it disputes
as baseless the extension of the predicatesthat
defines
the politicity of some and relegatesothers
to the obscurity
of the merely
and
given. It is litigious insofar as it refutes the forms of identification
that work to maintain
the status
a violently
belonging
quo and, through
relations
of speech, introduces a
poetic displacement of the prevailing
that is irreducible to the constraints of social place.
supplementary
speech
This
is precisely
what nineteenth-century workers and women did through
a process of extra-institutional
that
litigation.
They enacted the rights
were
the
constitution
but
were
denied
the
conguaranteed by
they
by
straints of the order. As Ranciere
puts it, through the fact of their speech
showed
that they had the rights
that
they
they had not, and did not have
the rights that they had. Though such claims will not always be seen or
it does manage to bring
whenever
about
is effective
heard, politics
a global change in the perception
of social space through
this
play of
is this basic sense. If
aesthetic
litigation. Politics for Ranciere is always
he insists
on the aesthetic dimension of politics, then, this insistence
is
to be rigorously
from
notions
the
of
distinguished
involving
application
criteria of beauty to forms of authoritarian
that Walter Benjamin
power
of speech
those who

situation. It consists
are excluded from

aimed at under the conceptof

The logic that this politics of

callogicof
of the

the

political

aestheticization
of politics.
egalitarian litigation entails is a paradoxiuniversal'. Against the particular
power-interests

'singular

ruling elite and

in the

the

the

of privatization
of speech, political speech,
a local instancethat acts as a stand-in for the
in a conflict between the structured
universal: it consists
social
body
where each part has its place and the \"part with no part\" which unsettles
- the principled
this
order
on account of the empty principle
of universality
of
all
On
this
basis
Ranciere
is also able to
qua speaking beings'.
equality
show that the specific kind of conflict entailed in political
dissensus
has
nothing to do with the forms of struggle associated with the supposed
divide between friend
and
Rancierian political dissensus is not a)
enemy.

as Zizek

6)))

puts

forms

it, 'involves

EDITOR'S

of the

revival

dubious Schmittian notion that

on the enemy. Politics, for

a decision

making

politics

INTRODUCTION)

has

to do

Ranciere,effects

with

a break

sensory selfevidenceof

the 'natural'
order that destines specific
to rule, to public or private
life, and that delineates between friend
and
enemy,
by pinning bodies down to a certain
time
and space, that is by pinning
to specific bodies. It invents
individuals

with the

ways

individuals

and

groups

of being,

seeing and

saying,

engenders

new

subjects,

new forms of

collectiveenunciation.
And
as the principle of this
innovative
break is
the paradoxical presuppositionof equality,
it is simultaneously an activin which
all can partake, irrespectiveof the characteristics
ity
defining
one's being
Against

the

in

the

situation

consensual

in question.
positing of a common

and

non-litigious

experi-

demonstrates,
supplement of politics
precisely, that the sodal, in this
into the socialorderthat severs the
a supplement
sense, is not. It introduces
from
its account, that forces the withdrawal
objectivity of the situation
of every idea that those who rule
have
a disposition or title
to do so. In
other words, the egalitarian
effects
of politics, showing that the uncounted
also partake of political
rebounds
on the order of earnedtitles and
speech,
the
supposed
dispositions that aim at stitching
up social space. It shows that
fact of ruling is not underpinned
the
underpins
by an order of reasons. What
rule of some is only that fact that they rule, beneath
which there is nothing
but the title of the equality
of speech - and thus
of the capacity for politics
which is in itself belongs to all and no one in particular. The dissensusby
which
the invisible equality subtending social distinction
is made
visible,
and the inaudible
those
into
the
of
obscure
speech
rejected
night of silence
enacts a different sharing
of the sensible.
audible,
thereby
also always
Further, as Ranciereseesit, the political staging of equality
severs the fact of the social order from
the theoretical
accounts given of
that
order.
In showing that there is no order of reasons
the
underpinning
social order of domination,
it disrupts
the gesture of complicity between
and
the oligarchic social order - the elitist
theory
gesture
whereby the
of
is reserved
to the few and the vast majority
are
thought
privilege
to shadowy silence or inchoate
noise.
This rupture is one whose
banished
Ranciere
strived to incorporate into theoretical
has always
consequences
will
come
to
this
(we
practice
point again below). As such, his practice of
him against two mains fronts: the first, of which the
has pitted
thinking
famous Marxist theorist Louis Althusser
is a prime example, sets it against
3 In Althusserian)
all scientific attempts to know the truth
of the masses.

ence, the

7)))

DISSENSUS)

well-known
distinction between scienmystification. In contrast to the language
of the masses, ideologically
of their (inferior) place in
mystified
by virtue
the social order, the science of the intellectual is that
which
enables
him/
her to discern the true condition of the masses.This frame of analysis,
forged by one of Marxism's most radical theoreticians,was itself to be
overturned in the unprecedented
union of intellectual contestation and
worker'sstruggles
that
demands
comprised
May 1968. The shop- floor
for workers'
forms for reprecontrol, for example, escapedthe existing
were
towards negotiation at the top, between
sentation, which
geared
and
union
Not only
were
such
claims structurally
structures.
party
excluded from existing structures
of 'communication',
but they showed
to the Althusserian
scientific
the masses do not
that, contrary
Marxist,
- there are no
need to be told about the reasons for their domination
reasonsapart from domination,
and what is rather at stake is the belief
in being
able to change that
order.
For many of those who, like Ranciere,
were active in May 1968, what
with striking clarity is that
appeared
reason
is
not
that
occurs
behind
the backs of the
political
something
of politics need to be conceivedon the
masses; instead,the movements
basis
of the effects of their
own
and actions. Political thought
is
words
not that which is performed in transcendent
fashion
by the intellectual
who reads culture for its signs of truth, but as that which
is produced
action.
immanently by the collective of those engaged in political
If May
1968 disrupted the rigid
stratification
of the order of speech and
to
theoretical
then
this
is
it showed that
because
the
elitism,
paid
put
this
had
class
which
for
and
the
subitself,
working
theory
appropriated
task, was more about shoring
sequent elaboration of its theoretical
up a
place for theory itself.
terms,

tific

this was articulated

and

endeavour

The secondmajor
matic,

liberal

for politics.

front

attempts

of Ranciere's strategy concerns the

to delineate the performative
speech

The Habermasian schema,for

exist a priori

pragmatic

argumentative

engagein

the

in

ideological

It

of mutual

supposes

that determine that

that interlocutors
supposes

constraints

exchange.

example,

the

more pragconditions

that there

logic of
are obliged to
very

which
they enter
comprehension, failing
and lose their self-coherence. Now
this
that
the
of
the
is
existence
interlocutors
logic presupposes
precisely
Ranciere emphasizes the
Habermas,
however,
pre-established. Against
fact
that
a dispute over the very)
genuine
political speech above all entails
a relation

into a performative

8)))

contradiction

EDITOR'S

INTRODUCTION)

of those who speak. Ranciere'sargument

in fact undermines
all
quality
attempts to deduce a form of political rationality from a supposed essence
of language
or activity of communication. Political struggle
is
proper
therefore not a matter
of rational
debate between multiple interests; it is
above all, a struggle to have one's voice
heard
and oneself recognized
as a legitimate
in debate. Conversely, the most elementarygespartner
ture
of depoliticization
is always to disqualify
the political
quality of the
of
those
who
demonstrate
their
speech
argue
equality.
Ranciere's unique style of political critique is based in what he see as
the fundamental
oscillation
between
the privatization of speech in structures of power and its dis-incorporation
the activities of political
through
this oscillation,
in Ranciere's view, is the fundasubjects. Underpinning
mental presuppositionof the equality of intelligences. Equality here is
not an essence,a value, or a goal. It is a presupposition of theory and
of its own.
practice,but it has no inherent content, nor specificgrammar
of
insofar
it
is
as
the
disavowed
Indeed, it supports
practices
equality only
of power
itself. It is the latent
presupposition for the proper functioning
in taking the effects of this presupposition
involved
as far as
potential
forms
the condition
of possibility
of politics.
In other
possible which
words, if it is possible for a political supplement to emergethat disrupts
the social order based on nothing
but the presupposition
of equality,
this
is because the inegalitarian
order
itself always already presupposes the
4
of individuals
as speaking beings in its functioning.
The political
equality
re-enactment
of equality
can
of
because
the
inevitable
only emerge
contradictions of a socialorder which
but
simultapresupposes
equality
disavows
it.
neously
The presupposition
of equality,
then, is an empty presuppositionor
void
in the sense that, while in every
order only some are counted as
the othbeing
equals
among
equals, and as capableof social distinction,
ers from whom they are supposedly distinct,
are always
already included
in
that
trait
ever
equality,
precisely because no social or biological
excludes them from enacting it. Moreover, if Ranciere
continually
all the attempts
to
emphasizes the chance-like nature of politics against
events
to
it
is
because
causes,
explain political
by
referring
underlying
decide
to rise up and demonstrate
their
nothing explains why
people
equality with those who rule. Equality, that is, is only ever the preserve
of those who decide to include themselves out. Which is to say that every
moment involves the incalculable leap of those
who decide to)
political
9)))

DISSENSUS)

their equality and organize

the status quo.)

demonstrate

tices that

their

refusal

against

the injus-

promote

of this collection, 'Ten theses on Politics',

simultaneously
Ranciere's most succincttext on this logic of politics and the
doxa
aesthetics it implies and a pointed intervention into present-day
about the nature of politics. His strident
formulations
him
distinguish
both from 'liberal' claims, made after the demise of the Soviet Union,
about
the 'return of politics', as well
as from melancholic
claims of the
'end of politics'qua emancipatory
that
in
both
is,
cases, from
project
claims that ultimately
work to make a radical distinction
between
the
social and politics, which,
in the state, ultimately
localized
gets reduced
to the struggle
for and maintaining
of power.
with
The remaining
of this section, starting
his eulogy to Jacques
essays
Mean
illustrate variou5. aspects
Derrida, 'Does Democracy
Something?',
of the 'TenTheses'.Like Ranciere,
Derrida
set forth an alternate idea of
- to the hegemonic
his
much-discussed
democracy
democracy-to-come
of
the
new
1990s
world
order
to
institutionalize
it or usurp
its
attempts
name.
Where Ranciere does so by emphasizing
subjectivation,
political
however, Derrida tries to open up this gap through the category of the
Other. He thus ends up tying emancipation not to the activity of a subject
trait here and now, i.e. to political
but to an
activity,
enacting the egalitarian
this
ethical attitude
of infinite
that
respect for otherness. Ranciereargues
the emphasis
shifts
substantialization of the other, which
exemplary
- which inscribes a
demonstration
of
multiplicity
decisively from political
forms of otherness
in supplement to the body of the community - to a
transcendental
horizon that never arrives,
is a hallmark
of the contempoethical
trend. What is more, caught
in the necessity of having
thus
to
rary
avoid all pre-emptive
identifications
of a particular
event or other with
the
Other
as such, Derrida ultimately
dismisses
political
speech and its
verification
of cases of universality,
it for the benefit of a theory
diverting
that
must continuously
deconstruct the occurrence of any actual other.
The next essay, 'Who
is the
of Man?'
looks
Subject of the Rights
more closely at the operativecategories
of political
in
the
subjectivation
modern age of human
The
of
man
or
the
is
who,
citizen,
question
rights.
the subject of human rights,
the
was
revived
after
the
of
again
collapse
SovietUnion in the 1990s. Against the background of the triumphalism
of liberal
the exception to the consensusappeared in the
democracy,
form of xenophobic
and nationalist
movements,
since, notwithstanding)

The first

comprises

10)))

essay

EDITOR'S

INTRODUCTION)

and acts they sanction, they

alone
repulsive ideas they
espouse
to insist on the need for collectiveaction
on major
national and
- this is their
international
issues
of strength.
point
Despite its apparent
to the system of consensus,however,
this appearance
is in
heterogeneity
fact part and parcel of it, a phenomenon
that the system denouncesbut
is simultaneously
complicit in producing.
Ranciere locatesthis development
against the background of the demise
- or leftist forms of
- that has
of political
dissensus
consciousness
political
the

seemed

taken place overthe last thirty years. While the

has always taken place in the interval
partaking
the demise
of the selfevidence of political
litigation
the

interval

of the

political subject to

- citizens who

turn

into

paradoxical relationship

of

between man and citizen,

has made it possible for
an interval between two

of belonging to a
by virtue
and the masses of rightless
'men'
who simply fall
state, on the one hand,
outside
of the happy circleof state and right,
on the other.
It is similarly
this background
that it pays to locate Agamben's
against
thesis according to which
the camp
is the nomos of modernity
in which
the exception tends to become the rule. What
to
take into
fails
Agamben
account
is the rarity of political
the way in which it appears
subjectivation,
and vanishes.
This doing, he tends to analyse the conjunction,
in the
liberal
and the rise of xenophobicand
discourse
1990s, of strengthening
racist
as the historical
result
of an underlying ontological
phenomena
process,rather as having been facilitated by a weakening of politics proper.
And
that he does so in taking
Arendt's
depoliticising archipolitical distinction
between
and
the
social
as a starting point is significant.
politics
Ranciere shows that the effort is doomed from the outset, that it is not
between
the political and the social
possible to escape the rigid distinction
the two sides of the binary to reveal their
(Arendt)
merely
by articulating
zone
of indiscernability
can itself only be depo(Agamben). The upshot
on Agamben's
view the 'rightless' of the Nazi camps
and of the
liticizing:
deportation zones of our liberal democraciesalike, to mention only those,
are simply
unfortunates
poor
caught in a state of exception 'beyond
in terms of democracy or
which
is
to
oppression',
say beyond any account
or
are
of an undifferanti-democracy,
justice
injustice. They
simply
part
from
a
which
God
could save
entiated, global ontological situation
only
us.Against Agamben,
and therefore
Ranciere
insists on the possibility
the
in such terms.
necessity of accounting for these situations
with
Along
Agamben's
ontologizing of the exception, another key operator of what Ranciere callsthe ethical turn
of politics
is the radicalization)
distinct

groups

possess rights

11)))

DISSENSUS)

of emancipation
is plainer
wrong, whose effecton the narrative
stated in the language of George Bush
or the philosophical
the overall
result in the same: the multiplicity
of
enterprise of a Lyotard,
the
litigious
arguments that aim to overcomeinjustice
by demonstrating
to appear as
starts
part of those with no part is swept aside; and injustice
an absolute and irremediable evil against which the politician will undertake a mission of 'infinite
and the philosopher exhort us to the
justice'
infinite
of
the
which
is nothing other than
the
inhuman,
duty
resisting
of
to
our
witness
interminably
prescribed duty
dependence on
bearing
the Other. The narrative
far from the end of Grand
of the philosopher,
in a new form of narrative
consists
that
the philosoNarratives,
permits
pher to account ad infinitum for the essential reason for every historical
the
of ways that political
wrong. It aims to dispense with
multiplicity
of the visible and the sayable in favour
of
subjects
open gaps in the fabric
an overarching ethical discourse that denounces
every attempt at emanciin advance.
An affirmative exception to this triumphant
chorus
pation
of liberal democracy and sombre accountsour of destiny
are the attempts
to rethink
the
of communism
for the present conjuncture.
actuality
Ranciere
out the revivals the Marxian conception of
However,
singles
in the work of Michael Hardt
and
Antonio
communism,
notably
Negri,
with their influential
of the multitudes and phenomenological
concept
In 'Communism:
movements.
From
description of the antiglobalization
to Inactuality',
Ranciere questions the validity
of the presupposiActuality
tion on which
the
traditional
idea of communism's actuality
is based.
His claim is that it involves a form of the ontologization
of equality
from
which viewpoint
short
of
the
full
of
the
collecanything
implementation
tive intelligence is ultimately
as mere appearance. This idea of
dismissed
the actuality
of communism
and political subjectivity
wants
to open up
room for a new political
but does so only
a new form
voices,
by proffering
of consensus - the coming
of the true community. In short,
the striking
which
orthodox
novelty of Ranciere's position on communism,
many
Marxists will no doubt find unacceptable, is that to think the manifestation
of political
equality there is no need to ontologizeit as a supposed
collective power of production
that
is always already at work in the forms
of capitalist domination and apt to explode them. His arresting
reversal
that
such manifestations
of equality
states, quite to the contrary,
always
occur afterwards, as attempts to expand the domain
of universality,
to
to do so, he)
reconfigure its objects and re-populate its subjects. Failing

of political

still.

12)))

Whether

INTRODUCTION)

EDITOR'S

risks confusing the veritable forms of political

the capitalist forms that they interrupt.
conducted
The next two
are interviews
chapters

argues

emancipation

the

by

with
Deleuzian

Multitudes. Both touch on rival attempts

to conceive the basic
world
order. The first deals
tendenciesand lines of flight of the current
with
the above-mentioned
attempt by Hardt and Negri to conceptuagain
and bears
alize the world order and the anti-globalization
movements,
the
notion
of
on
the
differences
between
Ranciere's
people and
specifically
the concept of the multitudes
as ways of dealing with these phenomena.
Theseconddealswith current uses of the notion of biopolitics as a way of
and its implications for
radical political and artistic
theorizing
practices
subjectivity. Ranciere shows that the ontological
conceptualizing
political
of biopolitics and the multitudes,
distinctions claimed by the concepts
end up dismissing
insofar
as they comprise ideas of political
subjectivation,
its multiple instances in the law of a global situadissensus by dissolving
tion.
This occurs either in metapolitical fashion
scenes, that is
by switching
to
back
the unique
the
of
dissensus
by referring
multiple stagings
political
in archi-political fashion,
scene
of Empire vs the multitudes,
or, again,
by
and bare life.
it in the relation
between
sovereignty
dissolving
The last essaysof this section turn towards specific occurrencesof geo11 and Afterwards: A Rupture
political
significance. The first, 'September
consensual
reacin the Symbolic Order?', examinesthe overwhelmingly
on the Twin Towers. After
the
tion to the September 11 terrorist
attacks
uttered:
from nai've arguments about
attacks all kinds of stupidities
were
and the desire for world hegemony,
the destruction of symbols
of power
the
of anon -symbolizable real in
effraction
to proclamationsabout
to notions that the representaof
American
symbolizations
togetherness,
tives of the other world, that of traditional
symbolic order, had returned
with
us of the price to pay for our westcrn
violent
force as if to remind
that traditional relationships can be simply
overwhich
follies,
imagine
there was no
turned
at will. Ranciere's analysis here is right
on target:
no dissensus.
Indeed, not only did the US government have the
rupture,
words on hand to capture the events, but they did so in perfect identity
with the principle of their
that of the everlasting fight
attackers:
against
If
11
us something about the world
and
evil.
did
tell
good
September
of the relations between the
we live in, it was not due to any alteration
journal

symbolic

and

such events

the

real

- categorieswhose pertinence

Ranciere puts

into

question.

Instead,

for

the

understanding
to which)

rupture

13)))

DISSENSUS)

testifies had already taken

place with the shift from demoethical turn of politics. In other words,
11 is that it revealed the utter weakness
what
on September
happened
of the left, which completely
missed a chance to formulate
a political
alternative to the ethical discourseof the war on terror.
this

event

cratic dissensusto

the

consensual,

In the next essay on 'War as the Supreme Form of Advanced Plutolinks

cratic Consensus',
Ranciere
the neo-liberal promotion of
together
the freedomof the commodity
to a shift in the form of state consensus
arbitration to one that focuses
on pracincreasingly
is he links shifts
in the economy
to shifts in forms
of governance.
But what
are
we to make of this
interrelation?
Usual
- as the
of this interrelation
descriptions
global government of capital,
mass
or soft totalitarianism
democracy
triumphant
posit that contemare attributable
to changes in the global
porary modes of governance
of the other.
economy. The modernity of one prescribesthe modernity
an
of
the
with
mixture
of sophistiits
However, analysis
Iraq war,
strange
and
and
the old,
cated technologicalweaponry
of
the
new
religiosity,
from

one

involving

tices of security,

that

such descriptions.
What lies 'behind' the recourse
countermands
'archaic' forms of propagandaused to justify the Iraq war is a form
of consensus
that eschews traditional
state
functions
of the re-distribution
of forms of socialsolidarity
in favour
of a
of wealth
and the construction
symbolization of the collective as a people united by common values and
under attack from 'inexplicable'
evil. To denounce this as mere ideology
working to cover over the stain of economic interests is to miss a crucial
No doubt the manipulation
of the frightened
collective of 'citizens'
point.
huddled around the consensualwarrior
state
always been the best form
of collective
for a state based essentially on promoting
the unbridled
reign
of the commodity. But the particularity
of this example of the military
of 'liberal democracy' resides, precisely,
in the autonomy
of its prinexport
ciple with respect to all explanations in terms of economics or technology.
This
Ranciere
of insecurity.
The most advanced
principle,
argues, is that
form
of the contemporary
consensual state is that which requires the generation of new situations
to enforce its governance.)
of insecurity
quickly

to the

THE POLmCS

OF AESTHETICS)

In the faceof such oligarchicdomination,

creative action will also surely be key to
14)))

art's
altering

power
the

of trans
realm

formative and
possible.)

of the

EDITOR'S

At a first
and

level,

politics

then,

we

as forms of

INTRODUCTION)

can see that Ranciere's conceptualization of art

aims
to capture the
dissensual activity
precisely

of dominacommon nature
of their innovative
forms
potential to disrupt
tion. Indeed, sinceits emergence
as a domain of singular
around
experience
from the strictures of tradition
the time of the French Revolution,
separate
and the unimpeded
dictates of oligarchy,
art has always been connected to
the promise of new world of art and a new life for individuals and the comin fact shows is that the freedom of the aesthetic What
Ranciere
munity.
of
the same
as separate
experience or appearance - is basedupon
sphere
in
is key to
that
is
enacted
demonstration.
This
of
principle
political
equality
his concept of the politics
But what does it mean to talk about
of aesthetics.
vis-a.-vis
artistic practice and aesthetic experience?
equality
To understand
Ranciere
between
this, it pays to recall that
distinguishes
three regimes of art - only the third of which is, properly speaking, to be
with
to above. In the
associated
the kind of innovation
referred
activity
of
art
have
no
the
ethical
works
first,
autonomy. They are viewed
regime,
as images
to be questioned for their truth and for their effect on the ethos
for this
of individuals
reference
and the community. Ranciere'sstandard
In the second, the representative regime, works
regime is Plato's Republic.
and so are no longer subjectto the
of art belong to the sphere of imitation,
laws of truth or the common rules of utility.
are not so much copies
They
As such, they are subject
of reality
on matter.
as ways of imposing a form
a hierarchy
to a set of intrinsic
norms:
of genres, adequationbetween
etc.
and subject matter, correspondences between the
arts,
expression
The third, the aesthetic regime, overthrows this normativity
and the
and
matter
on which it is based. Here art
relationship between form
in its singularity,
as such,
as belonging
to a specific
comes to be defined
sensorium that forms an exception to the normal regime of the sensible.
of action
In
the representative
regime, Ranciere argues, the centrality
while the parallel between
justified the primacy of speech over the image,
socialand aesthetic oligarchy was rendered in a series of rigid separations
between art forms. Despite these strict, hierarchical separations, art forms
were commensurable
insofar as they all depicted actions: knowing whether
of
a given form of virtuosity
was an art could be answeredby the question
a
had to have a narrative
with
whether it 'told a story'. Every
artwork
It
on
a
of
relied
moral, social and political
meaning,
significance.
system
wherein meaning was a relation from
centred on the primary
of action,
the law of mimesis
one will to another. 'The fine arts were sonamed
because
- a
a way of doing
defined
between
them as a regulated relation
poiesis -)
15)))

DISSENSUS)
The
a way of being which
is affected
pleasure
by it - an aisthesis'.
in the artwork was the guarancontain
afforded by this threefold relation
But this nature
was always
tee off 'human
nature'.
split, since the repreof
was also one in which
the fine arts distinguished
sentative
system
people
the
of the masses. With
refined sensibility as opposedto the coarseness
between
aesthetic
poiesis and aisthesis is undone, and
regime this knot
But
it a promise of a new form of
is
the
loss
with
lost.
humanity
brings
and community
art now addresses itself,
individual
life At the same time,
at least in principle,
to the gaze of anyone at all, can be used by anyone to
situation.
Art in the aesthetic regime finds its only
intervene in whatever
content precisely in this process of undoing, in opening up a gap between
a way of doing
and a horizon of affect.
between
poeisisand aisthesis,
is
While this is a feature common to both art and politics, the rupture
is in no way an ontodifferently in each case. The difference
performed
to
resides
in the different
according
logical one, but instead
principles

and

While politics involvesthe open-endedset

between
the
any and every
by
assumption of equality
practices
- that is, the
and
concern
to
test
the
this
equality
staging
by
speakingbeing
itself - aesthetic productions
of a 'we' that separates the community
from
the
tend to define a field of subjective anonymity as a result of introducing
themselves.
egalitarian axiom into the modes of representation
The significanceof the aesthetic
regime and the politics it implies
clearly in contrast to the strictures of the representative regime.
emerges
The
with
one another.
Each
sets of principles contrast directly
of their
new
in
is
the
of
action
the
representative
regime
opposed by
primacy
in the aesthetic.
This expressiveness means that
primacy of expressiveness
or images of the world are now usedas poeticpowersand ends
language
in themselves,
function.
The hierarchy of genres is
beyond any mimetic
which

of

this

is operated.

severing

driven

of all subjects
regime asserts the equality
fact that ordinary
things, let alone the lowly people,
can comprise the main subjectsof a book. This, in turn, implies a third
the equality of subjects, is the principle
beyond
of indifference.
principle:
The imperative of propriety,
of representing
specific subjects in the
fashion, is undone by the aesthetic
regime's insistence on
appropriate
the indifferenceof style in relation to represented subject.Paradigmatic
of style
for Ranciere
here is Flaubert, who achieved an absolutization
all things with
the same
relative to the subject, or rather,
by presenting
care, made style into the only true subject of literature.)

deposedinsofar
the once scandalous

16)))

as the

aesthetic

EDITOR'S

INTRODUCTION)

the uniqueness of Ranciere's conceptualization of art's specificity,

in the aesthetic regime, is that it finds its generative dynamic
in the
constitutive
and irresolvable contradictions
these principles.
between
The first such contradiction
is that between total expressiveness
and the
the
first establishes
a substantial link
principle of indifference. While
between
the immanent
and the artistic work - the
poeticity of the world
the
is
at
a
of
of the meaning
concentration,
poem
expression,
higher
power
that
is already
that of the world
itself - the second rejects the substantial
link and denies that expression should be privileged
in any kind of neces(social or aesthetic) for any given
sary
way
topic. The second emerges as
an attempt
to deal with this first contradiction.
Trying to produce an idenbetween
the radical subjective freedom of the artist
and the objective
tity
in the work, Romanticism fails to close
necessity of the world
expressed
the gap and is compelled to testify
to the irreducible
gap between the
sensibleand the intelligible, between things and words. The deeperconis that between the principle of expressiveness ('everytradiction,
then,
and
the 'principle of literariness'. This latter
is the
thing
speaks')
principle
Now,

as it

emerges

ultimate consequence of the demiseof the representative

regime, which
on language
and image use through
the rules of mimesis
placed constraints
and tied the propriety
of representation
to the norms attached to social
of literariness refers to the freeing
of language
and
and anyone is now entitled
such that that everyone
to
intervene
in any form of discourse, use or be addressedby any language
and be the subject of representation. It refers
to the availability
of the
in
a
letter
of
unlimited
With
the
anonymous
regime
representability.
destruction
are the social
of the logic of the representative regime, not only
disorder also
undermined,
separations between individuals
ontological
ensues: all constraints
are removed
concerning the very choice of objects.
Ultimately, the idea of silent
speech
goes further, then: it points,
beyond
the expressiveness of the silent
to the very impossibility of tying
thing,
as such to fixed ontological distinctions
the ideal and the
between
speech
and the social, art and non -art, words and things.
real, the political
In the new regime, the field
of experience,
severed from its traditional
references
is
new
therefore
for
points,
open
restructurings
through
the 'free play' of aestheticization.Sinceno pre-ordered,
strucpre-given
tures are available anymore that would
define what can be said,in what
which
and to whom, art in the
form, in which language, using
images,
'aesthetic regime' consists of always
limited
or propositions for)
attempts
hierarchy.

The

principle

representation,

17)))

DISSENSUS)

of the field of experience. Aestheticized art thus

is only 'ever the set of relationsthat
are traced
here and now through
and precarious
acts'.
singular
In the
first essay 01 this section,
'The Aesthetic Revolution and Its OutRanciere explores the various plots that have framed the attempts
comes',
at restructuring
individual
and collective life in the modern era. Ranciere's
him both
description of what he calls the aesthetic revolution
separates
from endeavours to give an account of artistic purity that would
sever
it
from all compromise
with politics or commodity aestheticization, as well
as from those that would
like to see the political
of the aesthetic
promises
fulfilled.
His position
eschews the basis either for the pure autonomy or
the sheer heteronomy of art with respect to politics or life. Ranciere's
all the sociologicalattempts
aesthetic
undermines
to refer the indiftheory
ference of aesthetic judgement
to the realities of class struggle,
as it
just
to all the modernist and postmodernist theories
presents an alternative
that
define
the different art forms in terms
of their self-liberation from the
of
mimetic
Whether
one
considers Flaubert's posture of
imperatives
logic.
art
for art's sake, Mallarme's concern with
the essential language
finding
of poetry,
of the self-containedness of the artwork,
Adorno's
insistence
or
Lyotard's
assigning the avant-garde the task of isolating art from cultural
in the experience of the sublime, all simultaneously
demand
link their
of heteronomy.
respective notions of autonomy with a conception
The paradoxical basisfor all these positions is given in Ranciere's
original reading of Schiller's famous
claim
that the aesthetic 'will
bear
the
edifice of the art of the beautiful and of the art of living'. As Ranciere puts
it 'The entire question of the \"politics
of aesthetics\"
turns on this short
The
aesthetic
is
effective
inasmuch
as it is the
conjunction.
experience
experience of that and It grounds the autonomy or art to the extent that
it connects
it to the hope of \"changing
life\"'. The productively
ambiguous
formula of this politics is: 'art is an autonomous form of life' . In this essay,
the reader will admire the deft footwork with which Ranciere is able to
the twists and turns this
formula
takes in multiple artistic
navigate
projects
and aesthetic theories, from Flaubert through
the Soviet
Constructivists
and today's relational art, from Schiller through Adorno and Lyotard.
Each of these positions
articulates
a specific solution to the relation
between autonomy
and heteronomy,
and each solution
in turn generates
its own entropy,
in turn, gives rise to new strategies for reframing
which,
the divisions
of the forms of our experience. Each reading of this paradox
of art in the aesthetic regime - that
art is art to the extent that
it is not)
a local
does

18)))

restructuring

not always

exist, but

EDITOR'S

art -

has

rangements
ing

its

own

'metapolitics',

of its

space, of

as true

itself

its own

politics'. Key to

way

art

reconfiguring
this

essay

INTRODUCTION)

of 'proposing
to politics rearas a political issue, or of assertis the way that Ranciere goes

current trend: instead of arguing

for a 'radical' aesthetics of
the sublime over and against
an 'ideological'
aesthetics of the beautiful,
he
itself actually
overturns
seems to prethings: the aestheticsof the sublime
aesthetic
it is an inverted form.
supposethe Schillerian
promise, of which
If art
in attempts to disturb
the
between art and
consists
boundary
against

the

trend

of Political
non-art, the next essay, 'The Paradoxes
Art', deals precisely
artistic attempts to disturb
this boundary.
diverse
The air is
current,
thick
with
claims that, after a time spent in the postmodern
today
Ranciere
the
wilderness, art has 'returned to politics'.
inquires into what
statement
about art's return
to politics
give us to understand about how
art
is conceived,
the
its efficacy, and our hopes and judgementsregarding
We know that art in the aesthetic
political
import of artistic
practice.
regime involves a form of aesthetic experience that suspends the sort of
in the ethical and representative regimes.
hierarchicalrelations
implied
It forgoes
a
ethical immediacy
and representational mediation, inducing
cut between the intention
of the artist and the outcome on the spectator's
between
cause
and effect. Art,
cannot
know or
behaviour,
precisely,
the effect that its strategies of subversion mayor may
not have
anticipate
on the forms of political subjectivation. Art may create a new scenery of
of the intelligible,
the visible and a new dramaturgy
but these innovations
work
to reframe the world of common experienceas the world
of
a shared impersonal experience. And
in this way it helps to create the
fabric
of a common
new modes of constructing
experience in which
and
common
new
of
may
object
possibilities
subjectiveenunciation
be developed
that are characteristicof the 'aesthetics
of politics'. This
the conditions
politics of aesthetics, however,operatesunder
prescribed
It produces effects, but it does so on the basis
by an original
disjunction.
of an original
that implies the suspension of any
effect
direct
cause effect relationship.5 However, the various practicesthat can be subsumed
under the statement of art's return
to politics
eschew precisely that.
- which include projects
the grain'
These
artistic attempts to 'go against
as diverse as relational art's attempt to restore the socialbond in the face
of the atomizing effects of capital and emphasizethe sense
of taking part
in a common
world, to those that seek to provide a refuge for political
dissensus as a way of counteracting
the shrinking
of political
space share two things: first, a certain consensual notion of rea lit y, or of the)
with

19)))

DISSENSUS)

and second an idea of the efficacy of art itself, of its power

for political causes,
effects 'outside' itself (mobilize
people
create a sense of our being together etc.). In other words, this 'return to
that had been torn
practice
politics' is a far cry from the type of artistic
from
the hinges of its specific
and specialized realm to keep apace with
of events in May 1968. The 'return
to politics'
the speed
does not aim to
achieve contemporaneousness
with
the present,
to exhort people to
and to work through
its effects,
to uphold that untimely
continue
present
but instead to set up a placefor art as such. The question is thereforenot,
or not return to politics, but
as Ranciere
to
notes, whether art should
the shift in artistic
in line with
the shift from dissensus
analyse
practice
to consensus. What
does
this latter shift mean for artistic
today?
practice
it
What does aestheticized art do in times of consensus? The struggle,
of the politics of aesthetics, attestablein
turns out, is between two forms
the artwork an enigmatic
one which
ascribes
current
artistic production:
and
another
outside
that
a
that
radical
effects
has
itself,
power, presence
induces an aesthetic cut to set up a disconnection between the production
the
and social destination, between sensoryforms,
of artistic
savoir-faire
that can be read on them and their possible effects.
signification
A similar
structures
'The Politics of Literature'. This syntagm,
point
but
Ranciere
does not refer to the politics held by its author,
maintains,
does politics as literature. This politics is
instead to the way that literature
a conflict
within
a specific system of the efficacy of words, between two
of
of the \"mute letter\"': that
ways of using words or 'two politics
opposed
of
the
of the democratic
on the one hand,
letter,
literariness,
chattering
the letter without
master to guide it, that speaks too much and to anyone
at all; and, on the other, that of the symptomatic reading, the attempt to
which
does
written
on the body of things
decipher the mute meaning
disorder.
Ranciere's reading of these
away with the evil of this democratic
all those
malaise
two
of literature
reveals the profound
affecting
politics
about literature, since it reduces
scientific attempts to tell the 'truth'
the disvalue
of the supposed distinction
between
to zero the analytical
of the
and literature
itself. A rigorous
course on literature
understanding
notion
of literature
conflict between the two politics
first,
any
dispels,
it shows that the literary
of a truth underlying literature;
and,
second,
of possibility for the
the
conditions
'politics of the mute letter' provide
itself - f<.ulturkritik, to take one example,
scientific discourse on literature
is ultimately
indiscernible from the objects of its own analysis.)
'outside'

of art,

to produce

20)))

EDITOR'S

Now, if there is one thing

or 'sociological'interpreter
an epistemology
of
contradiction

of

art

of

it

is a

'critical',

'political'

He does not develop

others does he argue
that
the
the old illusion
of mistaking
the

like

nor

many
to
its transformation.

art,

boils

literature

down

in Qu' est-ce
Deleuze's effort
to try to close the gap between art
and
Instead of a disjunction
there
is an identity.
politics
altogether.
Deleuze's thesisis that art is politics - it is a thesis that Ranciere's more
democratic
and
less aristocratic
stance on aesthetics and artists
must
refute if it is to stand. Deleuzianswill no doubt protest against the charges
of transcendencewhich
Ranciere
but it will
pins to his aesthetic theory,
be harder for them
a curious thing,
to overcome
the fact that
namely,
is
to Deleuze's in its conclusions,
Lyotard's view of art, while opposed
- from the same
drawn - perhaps more logically
premises.
The
final
that
essay in this section thematizes a point
peppers
many of
the previous essays,namely
Ranciere's
thesis that art and politics today
are affected
The prevailing
discourse on ethics is genby an ethical turn.
a
to
the
and
seen
as
corrective
excesses
of
the artistic
absolute
erally
disasters of visions of political utopia - a set of norms that submit politics
and art to the validity of their principles and the consequencesof
their
are
The familiar list of categories under which
these
practices.
radical otherness,
terror,
consensus, the
supposedly carried out: trauma,
un representable,
mark
the
the sublime actually
humanitarian,
quite a
contrary tendency: namely, a collapseof the very categories by which
normative judgementsand the analysis of consequences is carried out.
This
one of the most trenchant analysesof the series of
essay
provides
and
over
the
last thirty
more years, has affected artistic
that,
changes
and political practice, not to mention theoretical analysis.
production
Ranciere
a series of plays, films, art exhibitions,
discusses
statepolitical
ments and theoretical positionsthat attest to a gap between two eras.
His diagnosis is unequivocal: the postmoderncarnival
was basically
only
ever a smokescreen hiding
the transformation
into ethics and the pure

interpretation
que la philosophie

of

was not,
or literature.

Deleuze

that

INTRODUCTION)

life

for

is, argues

Ranciere,

and simple inversion of the promiseof

choly, however, Ranciere also takes
religiosity

event.

of yesterday's

Against

modernist

every idea of the

internal necessity,

he asserts the

Devoid

emancipation.
equal

from

distance

concept of the

future

'event' coupled with

radical

contingency,

of melan-

the

latent

revolutionary

idea of an
in politics and
the

aesthetics, of dissensus.)
21)))

DISSENSUS)

THE AESTHETICS

OF WRITING)

remarks about Ranciere's own practiceof philosoLa Lefon d'Althusser, Ranciere has set out to
work,
a
that
ends
of
avoids radical talk which
practice
writing
simply
develop
the
of
the
order
after
restoration
Academic
(notably
May
up providing
1968) with even more sharper theoretical
weapons.
Taking cognizance
Ranciere
has
of this failure of theory, particularly noticeable in Althusser,
that carries the logic of disstrived to develop a style of philosophizing
sensusthat had been so vibrant in the 60s and 70s over into critique. In
from
so doing, he distanceshimself
two other prevalent modes of crito discern
tique. First, from a hermeneutics of suspicion which attempts
a mark
a 'secret' hidden beneath discourse- usually
of domination;
and
of
from
from
the
deconstructive
model
second,
interminably
digging
the strata of metaphorical meaning. Insteadof the various forms
through
and the figures of
of denunciation normally associated with
critique,
as much
the formal game of conceptual distinction
mastery that underlie
a way of philosophising
as its deconstruction, Rancierestrives
to develop
that
itself be characterized as a dissensualactivity.
might
as much as politics or art, also
For Ranciere
this entails that philosophy,
that
into
its operations,
the paradoxical principle of equality
incorporate
of equality
it uphold
these instances of discourse and carry their
effects
But this immediately involves
or non-mastery overinto conceptualization.
with
to
site of
that
is
any
pre-established
displaced
regard
philosophy
all
establish
a
What
aims
to
Ranciere
at,
attempts
against
philosophy.
method
form of rationality
that
by virtue of its superior
gives us accessto
I will

the

with

finish

a few

Ever since his

phy.

thing

itself,

the interval
history

first

is an

egalitarian levelling

between discourses(that

or literature...),

it is to undo

discourses to a commonlanguage.

out

all

If the

of discourses.

the

of
such

masses

If

and

he

occupies

philosophy,

and reduce all

discourse is wanting,

pretensions

master's

as those
it is because it relies
on exactly the same poeticoperations
discourses it rejects or pretendsto subsume.
to both the aesthetics of politics and the politics of
Corresponding
aesthetics, then, is what Ranciere calls a 'poetics of knowledge': an
that shows all discourses to be specifiable,
not
by forms of selfoperation
then

of their
object, but by
legitimation based on the supposed specificity
the visibility of objects and
with which they
establish
operations
The poetics of knowledgeinvolves)
make them
available
to thought.

poetic

22)))

EDITOR'S

setting

all discourses

itself
allows

the

within

losophy, qua poeticsof

y,

is thus

without any pre-established site, creates

for a re-description of a common world

lenge to apparent disciplinary

it

common language. Phian inventive activity

which,

of this

horizon

knowledge,

it enables

separating out those that

a house
for it, and those
theoretical

stifle
that

a commonlanguage
01 experience,

and

in chal-

by this principle of equaltendencies

of the times,
in
even
the
dissensus,
guise of providing
of
new
scenes
and
suggest
political, artistic
divides.

a re-description

INTRODUCTION)

that

Guided

maps

the

innovation.

is not that of an autonomous

So, Ranciere's conceptionof philosophy
realm
of systems
that evolve in time; instead philosophy is an intervention
In this sense, his work
into
is similar to that
of Althusser
theory.
insofar as both understand
as a practice that is polemical and
philosophy
The
of both authors always
texts
address
a historical
situation-specific.
and political
context
stakes they set out to clarify.
to
whose
Contrary
strived
to reveal any given conceptual
Althusser, however, who always
debateas a struggle between idealist tendencies and Marxian
materialism,
Ranciere
is always and everywhere out to exposethe figures
of mastery
Marxian
materialism
itself is
underlying conceptual debate, of which
the common poetic operation
merely a sophisticatedvariant,
by exposing
on
which
is thoroughly
they rest. That his writing
permeated by a trenchant irony is a reflection of this radical
stance; everywhere
polemical
he correctsour supposed
in
certainties
and vaguer notions, unremitting
his efforts to identify
and differentiate
the crucial nuances. The upshot
is
that every idea in these
as
the
idea
as
the
someone,
pages appears only
of
ideological projection of that idea into theory itself from an identifiable
or artistic operation.
political
We might say that philosophy, for Ranciere, is a sort of unity-of-theoryThis is to say that
it works
with concepts, but that those
and-practice.
of practice.
Two major ways
of using
concepts are also forms
concepts
themselves:
there are those philosophers who seek
appear to distinguish
to impose
as we
rigid ontological
separations onto the world - which,
have seen, is for Ranciere ultimately
with
the
complicit
repressive social
order- and there are philosophers who adhere to the presupposition01
the
of intelligences.
What Ranciere shows,again reminiscent
of
equality
Althusser, is that both usages of concepts are unable to be debated in a
disinterested
way without the uncomfortable imposition
philosophical
of practical
himself)
Here, however, Rancieredistinguishes
implications.
23)))

DISSENSUS)

from Althusser,
for whom such implications
with a integrated set of prescribable
practical

the gap betweenthe

is irreducible.In this

yielded

knowledge

were

always

identifiable

for Ranciere,
by thought and political stances
commitments;

to Foucault (or, indeed,more

Foucaulhe renounces
all transitivity between
theory and politics or art, that is to say all assertions that aim to control
the effects of his knowledge.This has practical effects in itself, insofar as
false appearances and claiming to be leading
instead of shooting
down
the
more
he,
good
practice,
modestly, and perhaps more
effectively,
us
to
the
points
independent, demonstrative power of the multiplicity of
and artistic innovation.
local and precarious instancesof political
The final essay, 'The Use of Distinction', deals with the ontological
as opposed
to other recent
structure underlying his practice of writing
radicaltheories
of the political
and the aesthetic. The discussionhere
on the status of the concept of dissensus
itself.
The question
turns
ultimately
of how to understand
the emergence
of events that are heterogeneousto
the
order is a preoccupationthat Randere
shares with such
established
thinkers
and
Zizek.His
as
Badiou,
extremely
Agamben, Negri
contemporary
the alternative in stark terms: terms: either
instructive
discussion
presents
with
dissensus can be thought,
the above-mentioned
thinkers, as emergor
due to the power of an ontological (or non-ontological)
difference,
ing
and experience induced
of action
can be based upon paradoxicalforms
Either dissensus is configured in a way
presupposition.
by the
egalitarian
as master discourse,
that works to shore up a specific
place for philosophy
or it does so in a way that eschews all notion of philosophy's place,situintervals
between
discourses,
it, in egalitarian fashion, in the
ating
is that real
the
lesson
between philosophy and non-philosophy.Again
are only ever created by relating
a world in which it
effectsof dissensus
in a distinct
is supposed
that the power of the heterogeneousis grounded
ontological difference with a world in which heterogeneity is castas the
of space
and time according to the
apres coup, of partitions
reworking,
dian

than Foucault

presuppositionof

the

he

is closer

himself was6 ):

equality

of intelligences.

to stimulate
debate.
Ranciere's work on politics and aestheticscontinues
It offers us some of the most productive solutions to questionsof political
and aesthetic experience, as well as insightful
analyses of
subjectivation
his concepts are not merely prethe conjuncture. Ultimately,
however,
sentedas fodder for academic debate; the challenge that they throw out
is one of their
usefulness.)
to us, and the test of their pertinence,

24)))

PART

The

Aesthetics

of

Politics)))

1.

Thesis
terms

as a

CHAPTER

ONE

Ten Theses

on Politics!)

Politics is not the

\037xerdse

spedfic mode of action

its own

proper

conceive

of the

Politics,

when

rationality.

It is

subject ofpolitics,
identified

its possession,
is
as a theory - or

Politics ought to

is enacted

by

a spedfic

the political relationship

not the other way
round.)
the

with

dispensed

of power.
that

with

exercise
from

the

that

be defined in its own

subject and that has
makes it possible to

of power and the struggle

for
outset. More, when conceived

of legitimacy - of power, its

investigation into grounds
of
is
with.
If
has a specificity that
also
type
thinking
dispensed
politics
makes
it other than a more capacious
mode
of grouping
or a form of
it is that it concerns a
characterized
power
by its mode of legitimation,
it concerns
this subject in the form of
distinctive
kind
of subject, and that
a mode of relation that
is proper
to it. This is exactly what
Aristotle
says
in Book I of the Politics,
when
he distinguishes
political rule (as the ruling
of equals)
from all other kinds of rule; and again in Book III, when he
in the fact of ruling
and
the fact
defines the citizen as 'he who partakes
of being ruled'. Everything
in
about
is
contained
this
specific
politics
this 'partaking' (avoir-part)2
that
needs to be interrogated as
relationship,
to its meaning
and conditions of possibility.
An interrogation
into what is 'proper' to politics must
be distinguished
the
carefully from the current and widespread propositionsregarding
return
of the political. The contextof state consensus
that has developed
sincethe 1990s has brought with it a profusion
of affirmations
proclaiming
the end of the illusion
of the social and a return
to a 'pure'
form of)

27)))

DISSENSUS)

politics. These affirmations generally also draw on the above-mentioned

the
of Leo Strauss
Aristotelian
texts, read through
interpretations

and
order
is
Hannah Arendt. In these interpretations the 'proper' political
generally identified with that of the eu zen (living with a view to a good),
in
of basic life). As a result,
contrast
to the zen (conceived as an order
the boundary between the political and the domestic becomesthe
the political and the social; and the ideal of a citybetween
boundary
of
to the sad reality
state defined by its common
good is set in contrast
and
a modern
cast
as
the
rule
of
the
masses
democracy
necessity.
In practice, this celebration
of pure politics relinquishes the virtue
with the political good, handing
it over to governmental
oliassociated
the
experts. This is to say that
supposed
by their
garchiesenlightened
and social necessity, is
of the political, freed from domestic
purification
to the state
tantamount
to the pure and simple reductionof the political

(l'eta

tiq ue ) .

the buffoonery of today's proclaimed'returns'of the political

there
lies a fundamental vicious circlethat
and of political philosophy,
itself.
This vicious circleconsistsin the
characterizes
political
philosophy
particular
way in which the relation between the political relationship
that
and the political subjectgets interpreted;
is, in the assumption that
is a way of life that
is 'specific'
to political existence, enabling us to
there
Behind

of
from the properties of a specific
order
infer
the political
relationship
a
being and to construe it in terms of the existence of a figure
possessing
with the private or domestic
specific good or universality,
by contrast
to be seen as
of needs
and interests. Politics, in a nutshell,
comes
world
the accomplishmentof the way of life proper to those who are destined
comes
in fact forms the object of politics thus
to it. The very partition that
to be posited as its foundation.
of life, the specificity of politics is disSo, conceived as a specificway
on the basis of any
pensedwith from the start. politics cannot be defined
makes
subject. The' difference' specificto politics, that which
pre-existing
in the form of its relation.
must be sought
it possible to think
its subject,
In the above-mentioned
definition
of the citizen, the subject
Aristotelian
a
is
a
name
defined
(metexis) both in a form of
by
partaking
(polites)
given
to this action
action (arkhein) and in the passibility
corresponding
(arkhesthai).

in this

28)))

If

relationship,

there

is something
which
is not

'proper' to politics, it
a relationship
between

consists

entirely
but)

subjects,

TEN THESES ON POLITICS)

that
define
a subject. Politics disappears
a subject and a relationis undone, which
what occurs in all the speculative and empiricist fictions that
of its
origin of the political relationship in the properties

two

between

is exactly
seek

the

terms

contradictory

the moment

between

knot

this

subjects and the conditions of their coming together. The traditional

into political com'For what reason do human
question
beings
gather
a response,
munities?'is always
resulting in the disappearance
already
- that is, the
of the object it professes
to be explaining or founding
in the play
of elements
form of political partaking
that
then vanishes
or atoms of sociability.)
Thesis

2. What

participation

in

is

specific

contraries.

Formulations that
and the citizen

to politics

Politics is

define

as

the

is the existence of a subject

a paradoxical
form of action.)

as the ruling
(commandment)
politics
who
partakes in ruling and

one

defined

by its

of equals,

being ruled,

If we
demands a rigorousconceptualization.
of the Aristotelian
are to understand the originality
formulation, banal
the
systems that invoke
representationsof the doxa of parliamentary
forand
duties
must be set aside. The Aristotelian
reciprocity of rights
mulation speaks to us of a being that is at once the agent of an action
It contradicts the
and
the
matter
action
is exercised.
upon which that
conventionallogic of action according to which there exists an agent
an effect upon an object,
endowed
with a specific capacityto produce
in
its
for receiving that and
its
is
characterized
which,
turn,
aptitude
by
is
no
means
resolved
that
effect.
This
by
through the
problem
only
between
two modes of action,
classical opposition that distinguishes
a poiesis governed
to
by the model of fabrication which gives form
from this relation the 'inter-being'
and a praxis
that
subtracts
matter,
that
to political action. We know
of people
committed
(l'inter-etre)3
this opposition, relaying
that
of zen and eu zen, underpins a specific
of political purity. In Hannah Arendt's work, for instance,
conception
are in possession
of the
the
order
of praxis is an order of equals who
'To
of
the
that
is
the
to
anew
arkhein,
power
(commencer):
power
begin
in The Human
Condition,
act, in its most general sense',she explains
\"to
'means to take an initiative,
to begin (as the Greek word arkhein,
she concludes)
\"to lead,\" and eventually \"to rule\" indicates)';
begin,\"
articulate

a paradox

which

29)))

DISSENSUS)

this

by going

thought

on to

Thus, oncea soleproper

arkhein

link

mode

and

principle of freedom'.4
action is defined,a vertigi-

to 'the

world of

short-cut
enables one to posit a seriesof equations
between
'commencement',
'ruling', 'being free' and living in a polis (as Arendt
of
it 'to be free and to live in a polis is the same thing'). This
series
puts
in the movement that
finds its equivalent
civic
equations
engenders
are in their
they
equality in the community of Homericheroes;equals
in
the
of
arkhe.
power
participation
The first to bear witness against this Homeric
idyllic is Homer himself.
nous

Against

Thersites

but has

no

the Greek

that

the

the one who is an

'garrulous',

able public

speaker

to speak, Ulysses reminds us of the fact

one chief: Agamemnon. He thereby
only

entitlement

particular

army has one and

to walk at the head. And

arkhein:
if there
is
one who walks at the head, then the othersmust necessarily
walk behind.
The line between the power of arkhein
(Le. the power to rule), freedom
and
the polis, is not straight
but broken.
As confirmation of the point,
we
the
in
which
Aristotle
the
three
need
look
at
characterizes
only
way
possibleclassesof rule within a polis, each of which possesses a particular
'wealth'
for the oligoi and 'freedom' for the
title: 'virtue' for the aristoi,
In this division,
demos.
the 'freedom' of the demos comes to appear as
a paradoxicalpart, one that, as the Homeric hero tells us, and in no
has only one thing
to do: stay silent and submit.
uncertain
terms,
In short, the oppositionbetweenpraxis and poiesis by no means enables
us to resolve the paradoxical definition of the polites. As far as the arkhe is
conventional
concerned,
else, the exislogic posits, as with everything
to
that
is
tence of a particular
act
exercised
disposition
upon a particular
The
of
to
'be
acted
arkhe
thus
upon'.
disposition
logic
presupposes that a
determinate
determinate
superiority is exercisedoveran equally
inferiority.
For a political subject- and therefore
for politics - to come to pass, it is
necessary to break with this logic.)
reminds

us of

Thesis 3.

Politics

presuppose

the meaning of

is a specific

a break

exercisespower and
there exist dispositions
In

30)))

break

the

with

'normal'

who is subject to it
'specific'

the logic of the arkhe. It does not simply

distribution of positions
that defines who
It also requires a break
with the idea that

to these positions.)

ill of the Laws (690e), Platoundertakesa systematic

and
qualifications (axiomata) required for governing

Book

of the

with

inventory

the correlative)

TEN THESES ON POLITICS)

for

qualifications
traditional

being

qualifications

seven that

ruled. Of the
for positions

of

authority

he

four are
based on a
to
qualified

retains,
are

and

that is, the difference of birth.

Those
difference,
rule are those 'bornbefore'or 'bornotherwise'.This is what grounds
the power of parents over children,
the old over the young,
masters
over slaves and nobles over serfs.The
fifth
is introduced
qualification
difas the principleof principles,
the one that informs all other natural
a superior
it is the power of those with
ferences:
nature, of the strong
over the weak - a power that has the unfortunate quality, discussed at
In Plato's eyes, the
indeterminate.
in the Gorgias, of being strictly
length
is the sixth
one:
the power of those who
qualification
only
worthy
know
those
four
over
who do not. There are thus
pairs of traditional
to two theoretical pairs:
are in turn subordinated
qualifications, which
natural
rule of science. The list ought
to stop there.
and:the
superiority
for determining
However, Plato lists a seventh
possible
qualification
who is able to exercise the arkhe. He calls it 'the choice of God' or,
otherwise
said, the 'drawing of lots'. Plato doesnot
expand
upon this,
but clearly this choice
of regime, ironically said to be 'of God',also
refers
a god could save: democracy.So,democto the regime that
only
of lots, or the complete absenceof
by the drawing
racy is characterized
entitlement
to govern. It is the state of exception in which no
any
for the dividing
can function,
in which there is no principle
oppositions
in ruling
and in being ruled' is something rather
up of roles. 'Topartake
to reciprocity.
the exceptional
essence of this
different
On the contrary,
an
absence
of
a
nd
constituted
is
by
relationship
reciprocity; this absence
that is an absence
of reciprocity
rests on the paradox of a qualification
in
it is
of qualification. Democracy
is the
situation
which
specific
the absence of entitlement that entitles
one to exercise the arkhe.
It is the
a form of rule (commandement)
commencement without
commencement,
that
does
not command.
In this logic the specificity of the arkhe - its
it always
that is, the fact that
precedes itself in the circle of
redoubling,
its own disposition and exercise- is destroyed.
But this situation of
exception is identical with the very condition that more generally
makespolitics
in its specificity
possible.)
natural

Thesis

4. Democracy

arkhe, that is,

of politics itself

is not

political

regime.

As a

rupture

in

the

in its disposition, it is the

of the antidpation of ruling
that defines a spedfic subject.)
as a form of relationship

logic of the
very

regime

31)))

DISSENSUS)

What
the

possible the metexis

proper
that
allocate parts accordingto
logics
makes

'liberty' of the people, which

as its

real

content

a break

between a

of correlation

ruled. The citizen

who

the

constitutes
the

with

axiom

capacityfor
part 'in

takes

to politics
the exercise

break with

of the

all

arkhe. The

of democracy, has
that is, any sort
and a capacity for being
and
in being ruled' is only
that
breaks with all forms
axiom

of domination,
ruling

ruling

on the basis of the demosas figure

of correspondence betweena seriesof correlated
So, democracy is not a political regimein the
conceivable

is a

capacities.
sense that

it forms one
which
define
the ways in which
of the possibleconstitutions
people
is the very institution
assemble under a commonauthority.
Democracy
and of the form of its relationship.
of politics
itself - of its subject
invented
we know, was a term
Democracy,
by its opponents, by all
those
who had an 'entitlement' to govern - seniority,
birth,
wealth,
as a term of
the
word
virtue or knowledge. In using
democracy

derision, these opponents

order

of things:

who rule are

to

entitlement

demos

is the

marked

an

reversal

unprecedented

the 'power of the demos'referred to

the

fact that

in

the

those

is that they have no

commonality
the
being the name of a community,
the poor. But the 'poor',
the community:

those whose only

govern.

Before

name of a part

of

of
part
precisely, does not designate an economicallydisadvantaged
have
no
the people who do not count, who
the population, but simply
to exercise the power of the arkhe, none for which
entitlement
they
might be counted.
Homer
This is exactly what
says in the above-mentioned episode of
strike
If they insist on speaking out, Ulysseswill
anyone
of the 'unacundifferentiated
collection
to
the
demos
to
the
belonging
- in the back with
This is not a
his sceptre.
counted for' (anarithmoi)
To be of the demos is to be outside of the
deductionbut a definition.
in a
This point is illustrated
to have no speech to be heard.
count,
remarkable
Polydamas
passage of Book XII of the Iliad. In this passage,
With you, he
his opinion.
complains to Hector for having
disregarded
has
no
to
to
the
demos
one
'if
one
right
speak'.
Only
says,
belongs
like Thersites;
he is Hector's brother.The term
Polydamas is not a villain
The one who
inferior
'demos'
does not designate a socially
category.
is
not
to
is the one
who
when
he
the
to
demos,
speak,
speaks
belongs
in.)
in what he has no part
who
partakes
Thersites.

32)))

TEN THESES ON POLITICS)

and thus the atomic

people that comprises the subject of democracy,
is neither the collection of members of the community,
nor the
It is the supplementary part
in relation
to
labouring classesof the population.
count of the parts of the population,
'the count
every
making it possible to identify
with the whole of the community.)
of the uncounted'
Thesis

subject

5. The

of politics,

as a rupture
with the logic of arkhe,
a
people (demos) exists only
with
the
of
I
t
commencement/commandment.
can
be
rupture
logic
identified neither with
the
race of those who recognize each other
as
the same beginning
or birth,
nor with a part or sum of the parts,
having
of the population. The peopleis the supplement
that disjoins the popu-

The

This
domination.
by suspending all logics of legitimate
is well-illustrated in the crucial reform that gave rise to
Athenian
of
democracy,
na..nely that effected by Cleisthenes'
redrawing
the territorial distribution
of the city's demes.5 By constituting
the tribes
on the basis of three distinct
of regional
distribution - a city
types
- Cleisthenes
a
coastal
one
and
an
inland
one
broke with
constituency,
the ancient
that
to
tribes
the
rule
of
local
aristocratic
subjected
principle
the real content of whose power, legitimated
chieftainships,
through
In sum, the
birth, was the economic power of landowners.
legendary
people as such consistsin an artifice that cuts through the logic that
runs
from the principle of birth
to the principle
of wealth. It is an
abstract supplement in relation
to any actual (ac)count of the parts of
the population, of their qualifications
for partaking in the community
and of the common sharesthat they are due by virtue of these qualifications.
The people is a supplementary existence that
the
inscribes
count of the uncounted, or part
of those
who have no part - that
is,
in the last instance, the equality
of speaking
beings without which
itself is inconceivable. These expressionsare to be understood
inequality
in a structural
not in a populist but
sense. It is not the labouring
and suffering
that emerges on the terrain of political action and
populace
that
identifies
its name with that
of the community.
The 'all' of the
named
is
an
community
by democracy
empty, supplementary part that
the
from
sum
out
the
of the parts of the social
separates
community
This
initial
founds
as
the action of supplemenbody.
separation
politics
as a surplus in relation
inscribed
to every count of the
tary
subjects,
parts of society.)
1ation

from

itself,

disjunction

33)))

DISSENSUS)

of the question of politics, then, residesin the interpretation

void and surplus. Critiques hoping
to
discredit
democracy
of the political people to
persistently reduce the constitutive
'nothing'
the surfeit
of the greedy masses and the ignorant
(trop-plein)
populace.
An interpretation
of democracy by Claude
Lefort
confers a structural
sense
on the democratic void.6 But this theory of the void can be interin two ways. According to the first,
the
void is an -archy, the
preted
absence of any legitimacy
of power and itself constitutive
of the very
nature of political space. According
to the second, the void emergedvia
the
of the king's two bodies, human
and
divine.
'dis-incorporation'
Democracy, according to this latter view, begins with the king's murder,
when the symbolic collapsesto produce
a disembodied
social presence.
This originary
link
is said to involve an original
to create an
temptation
re-construction
of a glorious body of the people, itself heir to
imaginary
the immortal
body of the king and the basis of all forms of totalitarianism.
to this interpretation,
it can be argued that
the people's
Contrary
two bodies are not a modern
the
of
the
act
of
consequence
sacrificing
but
instead
a
constitutive
of
itself.
It
is
sovereign
body,
given
politics
the
and
not
the
that
has
a
double
And
this
people,
initially
king,
body.
is nothing but the supplement
exists
as a
duality
by which politics, itself,
and
in exception
to every logicof
supplement to every social(ac)count
The core

of

this

domination.

The seventh
that

the

qualification is 'god's part', says

'belongs to god', that is,

that

part

who have no

qualification,

focus on the

Present-day

into

It is my contention
of those
qualification

Plato.

the

contains
all that is theological in politics.
theme of the 'theologico-political'
dissolves
the

and of the originary

situation
that
the liberal fiction
of the contract
with a
of the arkhe
representationof an originary sacrifice. But the dividing
that founds politics, and thus democracy,
is not a founding
It is
sacrifice.
the neutralization
of every sacrificial body. The fable form
of this neutralization can be read at the end of Oedipus at Colon us: it is at the price of the
disappearanceof the sacrificial body, of not going to seek Oedipus' corpse,
that
Athenian
receives the beneficial effectsof its burial. To
democracy
want to disinter the body is not only to associate the democratic form
with
a scenario
of sin or of original
malediction.
More radically, it involves
scene of
reducing the logic of politics to the question of an originary
the)
power, that is to say reducing politics to the state. By interpreting
question

founds

34)))

of politics

it.

It

serves

that

of power

to re-double

TEN THESES ON POLITICS)

of original
empty
part in terms of psychosis, the dramaturgy
symbolic
catastrophe transforms the political exception into a sacrificial symptom
of democracy: it subsumes
the litigiousness
proper to politics under any
sin or murder.)
number
of versions of man's originary

with respect to the disThesis 6. If politics is the tracing of a vanishing

difference
and
it
that
its
existence
is by no means
social
shares,
parts
of
follows
accident
within
the history
but
that
it
occurs
as
an
necessary,
provisional
always
the
domination.
It
also
that
essential
object
of political dispute
offorms of
follows
is the very existence of politics itself.)
tribution

no means a reality
that
might be deduced from the necessito gather in communities.
Politics is an exception in
this
relation
to the principles according to which
occurs. The
gathering
'normal' order of things is for human communities to gather under the
are evirule of those who are qualified to rule and whose qualifications
dent by dint of their very rule. The various
qualifications
governmental
are ultimately reducible to two major titles. The first returns
society
to the order of filiation,
human
and divine. This is the power of birth.
of its activities. This is
The
second
returns society to the vital principle
of society, then, presents
the power of wealth. The 'normal'
evolution
of birth to a
itself
in the
form of a progressionfrom
a government
from
this normal
of wealth.
Politics exists as a deviation
government
is expressed
in the nature of
order of things.
It is this anomaly that
forms
of
are
not social groups but
rather
political subjects, which
the
that
for
unaccounted.
inscription
(ac)count
as the people is not identified with
a race or a
Politics
insofar
exists
Politics
ties

is by

leading

people

with a particular disadvantaged sector, nor

poor
a group of industrial
etc., but insofar as
workers,
in the form of a
these latter are identified with subjects that inscribe,
supplementto every count of the parts of society, a specific figure of the
count of the uncounted or of the part of those without part. That this
does not
Political
conflict
exists is the very stake of politicsitself.
part
It forms
interests.
involve an oppositionbetween groupswith different

population, nor
the

the

with

proletariat

an opposition

between logicsthat

count

the

parties

and parts of the

between the 'rich' and the

community
ways.
is one over the very possibility
of splitting these words into two,
'poor'
of the)
of instituting
them
as categories
that inscribe another (ac)count
in

different

The combat

35)))

DISSENSUS)

Two ways of counting the parts of the community

real parts only - actual groups defined by differences

community.
The

first

birth, and
the social

by

the

different

functions,

places and interests

body to the exclusionof every supplement.

counts
a part of those without
this,
part.
the second politics.)

addition' to
police and
Thesis
bution
void

exist.

counts

7. Politics

stands

in

distinct

of the sensible (partage

and of supplement.)

opposition

that

make

The second,
I call

the

first

in
up

'in
the

to the police. The police is a distriis the absence of

principle

du sensible)whose

The police is not a social

of the
function
but a symbolic constitution
in repression
social. The essence of the police lies neither
nor even in
over the living. Its essence lies in a certain
control
way of dividing
up
the sensible. I call 'distribution of the sensible' a generally
law that
implicit
defines the forms of partaking
by first defining the modes of perceptionin
which
are
The
of
inscribed.
of the sensible is the dividing-up
partition
they
the nemei\"n upon which
the world (de monde) and of people (du monde),
the nomoi
of the
are founded. This partition
should
be
community
in the double sense of the word: on the one hand, as that
understood
and excludes; on the other, as that
which
allows
which
separates
A partition
of the sensible refers to the manner in which
participation.
commun
a relation
between a shared common
(un
partage) and the
This
distribution
of exclusive
experience.
parts is determined in sensory
its
anticilatter form of distribution,
which,
by
sensory self-evidence,
a
of part and shares (parties),
itself
presupposes
pates the distribution
distribution of what
and what not, of what
can be heard and
is visible
what

cannot.

The essence

of the police lies in

a partition

of the

sensible

that

is char-

here
is
of void and of supplement: society
of doing, to places in which
modes
specific
these occupations
are exercised, and to modes of being corresponding
to these occupations and these places.In this matching
of functions,
of
there
is
no
for
void.
It
is this excluand
places
place any
ways
being,
at the core of
sion of what 'is not' that
constitutes
the police-principle
of politics consists in disturbing
this
statist
The essence
practices.
a part of those without
part,
arrangement
by supplementing it with
with the whole of the community.
Political
is that)
identified
dispute

acterized by the absence

made up of groups tied to

36)))

TEN THESES ON POLITICS)

it from the police, which

politics into being by separating
either by purely
and simply denying
continually
it or by claiming
political logic as its own. Politics, before all else, is an
intervention in the visible and the sayable.)
which

brings

causesit

to

disappear

essential work ofpolitics

is the configuration of its own space. It is to
and
its
its
is the
of subjects
operations seen.Theessence
of politics
dissensus
the
as
two
worlds
in
one.)
manifestation of
presence of
Thesis

make

8. The

the world

us start with an empirical given: policeinterventions

in public
spaces
consist primarily
not in interpellating
demonstrators, but in breaking up
demonstrations. The policeis not the law which interpellates individuals
not unless it is confused
(as in Louis Althusser:s 'Hey, you
there!'),
7
with
It consists,
before all else, in recalling
the
religious
subjection.
obviousness
of what
there
there
is not, and its
is, or rather of what
is: 'Move along! There's nothing
to see here!'
The police is
slogan
that
which
that
on
this
there's
here,
street,
nothing to see and so
says
to
do
but
It
move
asserts
that
the
nothing
along.
space for circulating
is nothing
but
the space of circulation. Politics,by contrast,
consists
in
of circulation, into a space
transforming this space of 'moving-along',
for
the
of a subject: the people, the workers, the
citizens.
appearance
It consists in re-figuring space, that
is in what is to be done, to be seen
and to be named in it. It is the instituting
of a dispute
over the distribution
of the sensible,
over that nemern that founds every nomos of the
Let

community.
This partition
of politics is never given
constitutive
in the form of fate,
of a kind of property
that destines or compelsone to engage
in politics.
These properties, in their understanding
as much as in their extension,
are
litigious. Exemplary in this regard are those properties that, for Aristotle,
define the capacity for politics or the destiny
of a life lived according to
the good.Nothing
could
be clearer, so it would
seem, than the deduction

madeby

in Book I of the Politics:

the sign of the political nature
is constituted by their possession
of the logos, which
is alone
able to demonstrate a community
in the aisthesis of the just
and the unjust,
in contrast to the phone,
appropriate
only for expressing feelings of
is in the presence of an animal that
pleasure and displeasure.Whoever
the ability to articulate
and its power of demonstration,
possesses
language
- and therefore political- animal.)
knows
that
he is dealing with
a human
Aristotle

of humans

37)))

DISSENSUS)

this sign can be

animal mouthing
of you is actually
a discourse,
rather than
articulating
a state of being? If there is someone you do not wish
expressing
merely
to recognize
as a political being, you begin by not seeing him as the bearer

The only

practical

recognized;that
a noise in front

of
what

signs

lies

difficulty

is, how

you can

of politicity, by not
from his mouth

issues

invoked oppositionbetween,

in knowing

be surethat

understanding

as discourse.And

in which
the

what
the

sign

human

he says, by not hearing

same goes for the easily

on the one hand, the obscurity

of domestic
of
the public
other, the radiant
luminosity
in order to deny the political quality
life
of equals.
of a
Traditionally,
category - workers, women and so on - all that was required was to
assert that they belonged to a 'domestic' spacethat was separated from
which
public life, one from
only groans or cries expressingsuffering,
not
actual
or anger could emerge, but
speech demonstrating a
hunger
sharedaisthesis. And the political aspect of these categoriesalways consists
in re-qualifying
these spaces, in getting them to be seen as the places of
a community; it involves
these
categories making themselves seen or
as speaking
heard
subjects (if only in the form of litigation) - in short, as
It consists
was unseen
in making what
participants in a common aisthesis.
was audible
as mere noise heardas speechand in
visible; in making what
that what appeared as a mere expressionof pleasure
and
demonstrating
of a good or an evil.
pain is a sharedfeeling
The essenceof politics is dissensus. Dissensus is not a confrontation
or opinions. It is the demonstration
between
interests
(manifestation) of a
in
the
makes
visible
that
which
sensible
itself.
Political
demonstration
gap
had no reason to be seen;it places
one world in another - for instance,
is a public space in that where
it is considered
the world where the factory
the community,
the world where workers speak, and speakabQut
private,
in that where their
voices
are mere cries expressing pain. This is the reason why politics cannot be identified with the model of communicative
that
action. This model presupposespartners
are already pre-constituted
the constraint
as such and discursive
forms
that entail a speech community,
dissensus
is
of which is always
Now, the specificity of political
explicable.
of
constituted
than is the object or stage
that its partners are no more
itself. Those who make visible
the fact that they belong to a
discussion
sharedworld that others do not see - or cannot take advantage of - is the
who
of any pragmatics of communication. The worker
logic
implicit
puts forward an argument about the public nature of a 'domestic'wage)

and private

38)))

life

and,

on the

TEN THESES ON POLITICS)

demonstrate
the world in which his argument counts as an
must demonstrate
it as such for those who do not have the
frame of reference enabling
them
to see it as one. Political argumentation
is at one and the same time
the
demonstration
of a possible world in
which
the argument
could count as an argument,
one that is addressed by
a subject
to an addressee who
qualified to argue, over an identified
object,
is required to see the objectand to hear the argument that he 'normally'
has no reason eitherto see or to hear. It is the construction of a paradoxical
dispute

must

and

argument

together two separate worlds.

has no proper place nor any natural
A demonsubjects.
stration
in a particular place and bears
is political
not because it occurs
a particular
upon
object but rather because its form is that of a clash
between two partitions
of the sensible. A political
is not a group
subject
world

Politics,

that

puts

then,

of interestsor of

I:\"

...

the operator of a particular

of subjecdispositif
tivation and litigation
which
existence.
through
politics comes into
A political demonstration
is therefore always
of the moment
and its
are
A
difference
is
subjects
political
always precarious.
always on the
shore of its own disappearance: the people are always
to sinking
close
into the sea of the population or of the race; the proletariat is always
on the verge of being confusedwith
workers
their interests;
defending
the space of a people'spublic
is always prone to being
demonstration
confused with the merchant's
agora and so on.
The
notion
that politics can be deducedfrom
a specific world of equals or
free
as opposed to a world
of lived necessity, takes as its ground
people,
It thus necessarily confronts
the blindness
precisely the object of its litigation.
of those who 'do not see' that which has no placeto be seen. Exemplary,
in this regard, is a passagefrom Arendt's
On Revolution, in which she coma text by John Adams, who identifies
ments
of the
the unhappiness
upon
8
poor with the fact of 'not being seen'. Such an identification, she remarks,
coulditself only issue from a man that belonged to a privileged community
of equals. Conversely,this is something
that those comprising the categories in question
could
seem
'hardly understand'. This assertion might
deafness
to the multiplicity
of discourses
surprising
given its extraordinary
and demonstrations made by the 'poor' concerning precisely their mode of
has nothing accidental about it. If forms
a circle
visibility. But this deafness
with the act of qualifying
as an original partition founding
what is
politics
in fact the permanent objectof litigation
that constitutes
politics. It forms
a circle with the defining
of homo laborans within a division
of 'ways of life' .)
ide as, but

39)))

DISSENSUS)

is not specificto such-or-sucha theoretician;

of 'politicalphilosophy' itself.)

This circle

9. Inasmuch

Thesis

as

the

province

of political

it is

the very

philosophy lies

in

circle

grounding

essentially to efface the

constitutive
effects this effacement in its very
of politics. Philosophy
litigiousness
the effectiveness of this effacement
Moreover,
description
of the world of politics.
or anti-philosophical
is also perpetuated in non-philosophical
descriptions of

political

the

action

in

a specific

mode of

being,

it works

world.)

the distinguishing feature of politics is the existence of a subject

no qualifications
to rule; that the
by the very fact of having
of
is irremediably divided as a result
of commencement/ruling
principle
this and that the political
is essentially a litigious
community
community
If
we
can
such is the secret of politicsfirst encountered
by philosophy.
as having
a privilege over the 'Moderns',it resides
speak of the' Ancients'
in their having been the first
to perceive
this secret and not in their
first
the
been
the
to
contrast
community of the 'good' with
having
that
of the 'useful'. Concealed under the anodyne expression
'political
and
the
is the violent encounter between philosophy
philosophy'
That
who

'rules'

to politics, not to mention philosopolitics under the auspicesof this law. The
and the Laws - all these texts testify to
the Statesman
Gorgias, the Republic,
from
one and the same effort to efface the paradox or scandalarising
an effort to turn democracy into
a
that 'seventh qualification' - namely,
of
the
of
the
indeterminable
of
'the
case
government
simple
principle
it with the governbut to contrast
strongest', leaving no other solution
to
ment
of experts
to one and the same effort
(des savants). They testify
and to expulse the
law of partition
place the community under a unique
of the demos from the body of the community.
part
empty
of an opposiThis expulsion,
however, does not simply take the form
and
of a community
that is both united
tion between a good regime
a
to
of
and
bad
of
divihierarchized
its
according
principle
regime
unity,
a
sion and disorder. It takes the form of a presuppositionthat identifies
is
with
a
of
life.
And
this
form
already
political
way
presupposition
for describing 'bad' regimes,and democracy
operative in the procedures
in particular.
is played
out in the)
All of politics, as mentioned above,

exception

phy's own

40)))

to the law of
effort

arkh\342\202\254
proper

to resituate

TEN THESES ON POLITICS)

of democratic
it with
the
'anarchy'. In identifying
Plato
the form
transforms
dispersion of the desires of democraticman,
of politics into a mode of existence, and the void into a surfeit. Before
Plato
is the founder
being the theorist of the 'ideal' or 'closed'city-state,
of the anthropological conceptionof the political, the conception that
identifies
with the deployment of the properties of a type of
politics
man or a mode of life. This kind of 'man', this 'way of being', this form
of the city-state:it is here, before any discourse about the laws or
the educationalmethods
of the ideal state, before even the
of
partition
into classes, that the partition
of the sensible cancels out
community
interpretation

political singularity.
of 'political philosophy' thus
has
a twofold
gesture
On the one hand,
Plato
founds
with it the community as
a principle of unity,
an undivided
accomplishes
principle - a
defined
as
a
common
with
its
strictly
body,
places and
and
forms of internalizing
the common. He founds
an archi-

initial

The

consequence.
which

that

community
functions,

politics

law that
of inhabiting

as a

understood

(i.e. its way

'ethos'

its

specific'tone' according

also as the

the 'occupations'

unifies
an
to

abode)
which

of the city-state,

and its nomos

(as law but
this ethos reveals itself).

community once again renders indistinguishable

politics and police. And political
philosophy,
by its
desire to give to the community
a single
is fated to have to
foundation,
re-identify politics and police,to cancel out politics through the gesture

This

the

of the

etho-Iogy

gap

between

of founding

it.

But Plato

of political forms. In
against

the

a 'concrete'mode
a word, he invented

also invented
'ideal

on the one hand,

city-state',

the regulated

for

describing

the very
forms

the production

forms of contestation

of opposition

between,

the conof forms of politics as

an
of ways of life. This secondlegacy
is more
expression
profound and
has been longer
than
the first. Political philosophy's second
lasting
resource- its deuteron plous - is a sociologyof the political, through which
it accomplishes
(if necessary in the guise of being 'against' it) its fundamental project: to found
the community
on the basis of a univocal
partition of the sensible. Notable here is Alexis
de Tocqueville's
analysis of
variants
and ersatz versions feed current
democracy, whoseinnumerable
discourseson modern
the age of the masses, the individual)
democracy,

crete sociological

philosophical'apriorism'and,

or

political-scientific

on

the

other,

analyses

41)))

DISSENSUS)

masses and so on. This analysis

is one with the theoretical act that
out the structural singularity
of 'the qualification
without qualification,
and the 'part of those without
part',
by re-describing
democracy
as a social phenomenon
or as the collectiveeffectuation of the properties
of the
cancels

a type

of

of man.

Conversely, assertions of the

of

constitution

the

community

purity

of

bios politicos,

in contrast

to the

of the republican
or

individual

the

and the
mass, and the opposition between the political
social, contribute to the efficacy of that same knot between the a-priorism
of the
'republican'
re-founding and the sociological description
of
The opposition
between the political and the social,
democracy.
of
the frame
regardlessof where one begins, is defined entirely within
political philosophy; that is to say, it lies at the heart of the philosophical
repressionof politics. The current proclamations of a 'return to politics'
and
to 'political
of
philosophy'
merely imitate the originary
gesture
'political philosophy' but without
actually
grasping the principles or
issuesat stake in it. In this sense, they mark a radical forgetting
of
and
of
the
tense
between
and
politics
relationship
politics
philosophy.
Both the sociological theme of the 'end of politics' in postmodern
of the 'return
of politics' originate in
society and the 'political'theme
initial twofold act and combineto bring about the
political
philosophy's
same forgetting
of politics.)

democratic

Thesis 10. The 'end ofpolitics'

and the 'return of politics'
out politics in the simple relationship
ways
of cancelling
social and a state of the state apparatus. 'Consensus'is the
this

are

two complementary
state
of the

between a
common

name given

to

cancellation.)

of politics resides in the modes of dissensual subjectivation

in its difference to itself. The essenceof consensus,
discussion
and reasonable agreeby contrast, does not consist in peaceful
as opposed
to conflict or violence.Its essencelies in the annulment,
ment of dissensus as separation
of the
in the
sensible from itself,
nullification
of surplus
in
the
reduction
of
the
subjects,
people to the
sum
of the parts of the social body and of the political community
to
the relations
between the interests and aspirations of these different
Consensus
of politics to the police.
consists, then, in the reduction
parts.
Consensusis the' end of politics': in other words, not the accomplishment)
42)))

The

essence

that

reveal

a society

TEN THESES ON POLITICS)

of the ends of politics

the non-existence of

but

simply

a return

to the normal

politics. The 'end of

state of

things

is the

ever-present
shore of politics (le bord de la politique), itself an activity
that
is always of
the moment and provisional.The expressions
'return
of politics' and 'end
of politics' encapsulate
two
that both
symmetrical
interpretations
produce the same effect: an effacing of the concept of politics itself and
the precariousness that is one of its essential elements. The so-called
return
of the political, in proclaiming a return
to pure
politics and thus
an end to the usurpations
of the social, simply occludes the fact that
the social is by no means a particular
of existence but instead a
sphere
of politics. Consequently, the end of the social that
it
disputed
object
is simply no more than
the end of political litigation over the
proclaims
of worlds.
The 'r\037turn of politics' thus boils down to the assertion
partition
that
there
is a specific- place for politics.Isolated in this manner,
this
but the place of the state. So, the
theorists
specific place can be nothing
of the 'return of politics' in fact announce
its extinction. They identify
it
with the practices of state, the very
in
of
which
consists
the
principle
suppression

politics'

of politics.

the 'end of politics'

Symmetrically, the sociologicalthesis announcing
posits the existence of a state of the social in which politics no longerhas
reason
for being; whether this is because
it has accomany
necessary
plishedits ends by bringing this state into being (the exoteric American
Hegelian-Fukayama-ist version) or becauseits forms are no longer
and
of present-day
economic and
adapted to the fluidity
artificiality

social relations (the

version). The thesis thus
capitalism

esoteric
amounts

entails the extinction of

European
Heideggerian-Situationist
to asserting
that the logical telos

of

either

by

politics.

It

concludes,

then,

mourning the loss of politics in the face of a triumphant, and now immaor by its transformation
into
terial,
Leviathan,
broken-up,
segmented,
that
match
those of the social pertaincybernetic, ludic and other forms
to the highest
ing
stage of capitalism. It thus fails to recognize that, in
actual fact, politics has no reason for being
in any state of the social and
that
the
contradiction
between these two
is an invariant given
logics
the
and
defining
contingency
precariousness specificto politics.This is to
via
a
Marxist
this thesis validates in its own way two
detour,
that,
say
in
further
theses:
that of political philosophy which
politics
grounds
a particular
mode
of life and the consensual thesis that
identifies
the
the
social body, and thereby also political)
political community with
43)))

DISSENSUS)

The
with state activity.
debate
between
those philosophers
who profess
who proclaim the 'return of politics'and the sociologists
a simple
'end'
is therefore
debate over the
its
scarcely more than
to read the presuppositions of political
appropriate order in which

practice

philosophy,

of

44)))

annihilating

for

the
politics.)

purpose

of

interpreting

the

consensualist

practice

CHAPTER

Does

I ought
this

TWO

Democracy

Mean Something?)

with a p,reliminary
statement
about my intervention in
dedicated to Jacques Derrida.1 I have never been a discipleof
nor a specialist of his thought.
I had him as a teacher,
Since
very

to begin

series

Derrida,

to discuss
philosophical
years ago, there has beenno opportunity
questions with him. The tribute that I can pay him, then, cannot take the
form of a commentary
I will simply present
on his work. To honour him
one
that also edged
my way of dealing with a concept or problem,
into
the forefront of his thinking
the nineties, that is
increasingly
during
what
is meant
by the name of democracy?
de l' amine in a passage
This
is raised by Derrida in Polinques
question
on
a
well-known
statement
that
is
attributed
to Pericles and
bearing
is a
paraphrasedin Plato's Menexenus: 'the government of the Athenians
a government
of
democracy by the name, but it is actually an aristocracy,
the best with
the
of the many'. 2 Derrida
to the oddity
approval
points
of the statement. 3 The very rhetoric of 'democratic' government
that
states
this type of governance can be given
two
names. 'Democratic
opposite
government' may be called democracy but it is in actual fact an aristocracy.
Theproblem,
is how to conceive of this 'but'
that inserts a disjuncthen,
tion
between
the name and the thing?
We can interpret
of
it as a matter
lies and rhetorical posture. However,this difference
between
governmental
name and 'thing'
also be seen to point
to something
more radical, an
may
internal
difference
that constitutes
other
than a
democracy as something
kind of government. This question definesthe common
between
ground
Derrida's inquiry
into
the aporetic structure of democracy and my own
into what I prefer to call the democratic paradox.)

many

45)))

DISSENSUS)

To explain

to two

ring

what I mean

'democratic

by

contemporary debatesthat

I shall

paradox',
address

democracy

begin

by

refer-

both in name

The first concerned a major disagreementover

the American
campaign to spread democracyto the Middle East. Following
in Lebanon,
the elections in Iraq and the anti-Syrian
an issue
protests
of The Economist ran with the headline: Democracy
Stirs in the Middle East.
The expressionof this self-proclaimed
satisfaction with having
stirred
a
involved
structure
about
this
democracy
two-pronged argumentative
difference between name and fact: democracy
stirs even though . . .;

and

in

fact.

military

or democracy

stirs

but.

The first argument was as follows:

'democracy
claim
that
it is a form of self-government
that

stirs even
cannot

though' idealists
by force

be brought

people.In other words, democracy can be seen to stir but only

views of it as the 'power of the people' are dismissedand it is
looked at pragmatically. The secondargument
was that 'democracy
stirs
bur
not
means
the rule of law, free
democracy
bringing
simply bringing
elections and so on. Above
all, it means introducing the mess, the chaos
of democratic
life. As Donald Rumsfeld put it in relation to the looting
that
followed
Saddam
Hussein's
the
deposition: we brought
Iraqis
freedom and that,
other things, is what
freedom
gives people the
among
to another

if utopian

to

opportunity

do.

The even though and but arguments

combine
to form a consistentlogical
structure.
because democracy is not the idyll of self-government,
Indeed,
because it is also messy, democracycan, and perhaps
must, be brought
the outside by the weapons of a superpower.A 'superpower'
from
is not
a
that
absolute
It
is a
country
simply
possesses
military superiority.
that
has
the
to
master
the
democratic
mess.
country
power

These arguments
of

us

remind

for

older

endorsing

arguments

spreading democracy.In fact,

presented

arguments
why

there

was

The argument

at the

a 'crisis' of

military campaigns to spread democracy

that
were
not so 'enthusiastic about

they
very precisely repeat the two main
Trilateral Commission4 in order to explain

democracy.

at the Trilateral
Commission
also claimed
that democracy was stirring,
even
democratic
dreamers
though
equated
it with
of the people by the people. In this instance, the
the government
dreamerswere those 'value-oriented
intellectuals'
by 'policycharged
oriented intellectuals',and their pragmatism,
for nurturing an 'adversary)

46)))

put

forward

DOES

culture'

and for

DEMOCRACY

promoting democraticactivity

SOMETHING?)

MEAN

to the

excessively

point of

and

authority.
Democracy stirs, but the mess stirs alongside it. Donald Rumsfeld's
about
the looting in Baghdad
is but a bald repetition of the argujoke
ment made by Samuel
30 years previously: namely
that
Huntington
leads to an increase in demands,
and this puts pressure on
democracy
undermines
and renders individuals
and groups
governments,
authority
to
the
necessities
of
and
sacrifice
associated
with
unresponsive
discipline
in
the
name
of
common
interests.
ruling
The campaign to spread democracy
to new
territories
happens to
challenging

leadership

foreground perfectly the paradox of

Democracyhere
of

designates

'democratic

what

currently

government',

by its

goes

that

name.

good form

the excess threatening

in
good
policy
is also given the name of democracy.
As stated
in The Crisis of Democracy,
democratic
is threatened
government
other
than
This
democratic
life.
itself in the
threat
by
nothing
presents
form of a perfect
double
bind.
On the one hand, democraticlife calls
to implement
the idealistic view of government
for the
by the people
that
encroaches
on the
people. It entails an excess of political activity
principles and proceduresof good policy, authority, scientific expertise
and pragmatic
In this instance, good democracyseemsto
experience.
a reduction
of this political
excess.
Yet a reduction of political
require
actionleads to the empowerment
of 'private life' or 'pursuit
of happiand demands
ness', which, in turn, leads to an increase in the aspirations
that
work
to undermine
and
civic behaviour.
As a
political authority
refers
to
a
form
of
able
to
tame
the
result,
democracy'
'good
government
doubleexcessof political commitment
and egotistical behaviour inherent
to the essence of democratic life. The
contemporary
way of stating the
'democratic paradox' is thus: democracy
as a form of government is
threatenedby democracy
as a form of social and political life and so the
former must repressthe latter.
In order to understand this paradox,
it may prove helpful
to examine
the second debate mentionedearlier.
The disagreement
involved in this
second debateis the more minor of the two, but it might just enable us to
grasp the stakes of the first and thus the core of the democratic paradox.
As
set their sights
American
soldiers
on democracy
in Iraq, a small
book
came out in France that
the problem of 'democracy in)
presented
able

government

general. But

this

to

threate)1ing

master

excess

47)))

DISSENSUS)

the Middle East' in

between 'good' and
criminels

de l'Europe

very

light and

different

'bad' democracy.The
5

democratique.

Its

book

author,

undid

the

was entitled

Jean-Claude

homonymy

Les Penchants
Milner, is a

things, as the most influential

thinker
of so-called republican theory,
for which
citizenship is grounded
of the law and education exclusivelyin
exclusively in the universality
of
the
of knowledge.
Republican theory opposes all forms
authority
and affirmative action, let alone any encroachments
multi-culturalism
difference
on this authority and this universality.
by social or cultural
is
to
is
the 'crime' that democratic
Milner,
What,
Europe
according
it consists in pushing for peace in the
committing? In the first instance,
Middle
to the Israeli-Palestinian
East, that is, for a peacefulresolution
conflict. Milner argues that the peace proposal set forth by Europe can
imply one and only one thing: the destruction of Israel. Europeandemochas proposed its own version of peace to solve the
so he argues,
racy,
came about only by
Palestinian
but democratic
problem,
peace in Europe
means
of the Holocaust. Democraticand peacefulEurope,
putting
paid to
as
this
was
after
1945
because
of
wars,
only
year
past European
possible
was allegedly freed by the Nazi genocide of the people that stood
Europe
- the Jews. 'Democratic
in the way of its dream
Europe',Milner argues,
in fact implies the dissolution
whose principle is rule over a
of politics,

theorist

regarded,

widely

among

other

a society whose principle is limitlessness.Modern

accomplishment of this law of limitlessness, which is
and which today has culmiemblematized and realizedby technology
and
natedin the project to rid ourselves of the very laws of sexual division
an
filiation.
As such, modern European democracy,
appropriate
using
was compelled
to annihilate the very people that
technological invention,
as its principle.
has the laws of filiation
and transmission
The argument
seem paranoid,
but it is perfectly consistent with a
may
democwhole trend of thought which, for the last 20 years,has equated
This
so-called
racy with the reign of narcissistic 'mass individualism'.
demands and emphasis on
its ever-increasing
mass individualism, with
is
the
and
communitarianism,
regarded as undermining
particularism
forms of political agency and sense of community.
Milner,
by arguing
and
demands
which stem
that the limitlessness of needs, aspirations
from sociallife work to undermine
good policy, is, in a sense, making the
of his argument, however, consistsin the way
same point. The novelty
it as a logical one. The)
that he radicalizes the oppositionand presents
limited

democracy

48)))

totality,

into

is the

DOES

DEMOCRACY

MEAN

SOMETHING?)

and mathematics of democracy, he says, is contrary

to all forms of
good government. His appealin Penchants criminels, then, is no longerto
a good government
able to master the democraticexcessof 'democracy',
but instead, strikingly if discreetly,
to pastoral government. This expression,
as Milner uses it, is a reference both to Moses and to another influential
book
former leftist intellectuals, LeMeurtre
du Pasteur6 by former
among
Maoist leader Benny
a biblical
Levy.
Levy's book presents us with
figure
of the pastor that has apparently
been repressed by the tradition
of
Western philosophy and politics. More importantly,
this term
however,
of 'pastoral government' is a throwback
to Plato.
Levy, in fact, accuses
Plato of having
his own conception of the shepherd as put
betrayed
in the Statesman. In reality,
forward
the situation
is more
however,
Plato actually locates the place of pastoral
ambiguous. First, because
in a mythical
our world was guided
government
past, a time when
because the pastoral
Second,
by the hand of a divine
shepherd.
directly
logic

paradigm

is indeed

still at work

in

Plato's

conception

of government

by

guardians as elaboratedin the Republic.

In my view, the reference to pastoralgovernment
discloses
the theoretical kernel containedin the arguments
about democracy that emerged
and the French
during the American campaign to spreadit triumphantly
indictment of

crimes.
discourse on the twofold
excess
Contemporary
as the utopia of people's self-governmentby contrast
turmoil
of individual
desires in
policy, or as the anarchic
the original setting
contrast
to the discipline of common law,
restages
of democracy in Plato: on the one hand, democracy for Plato is the stubborn regimeof the unalterable,
written law - it is like a prescription that
a physician
has laid down once and for all, irrespectiveof the disease to
be treated; on the other, the rigidity of the letter is an expression of the
peoplein its sheer arbitrariness, of the unrestricted 'freedom' of individuals to behave
as they please without
regard to common discipline.The
is not a principleof
that
Platonic
amounts to saying
argument
democracy
but a way of life, and one that actually resists good policy. Democpolicy,
to chaos: not only
of life in which everybody
leads
does it imply a way
racy
doesjust as he pleases;more radically, it is a way of life in which everyall natural relations are
is turned
on its head, the state in which
thing
overturned.In Book VIII of the Republic, Plato describes the state of
the democraticcity as a state in which, instead of ruling,
rulers
have to
the younger,)
obey, in which fathers obey their sons, and the elderimitate
its

of democracy,
to pragmatic

49)))

DISSENSUS)

women and slaves are as 'free' as men and masters, and in

the asses in the streets 'hold on their way with the utmost
freedom and dignity,
into everyone
who meets them
and
do
bumping
not step aside'.7
All the post- Tocquevillian talk
as a social way of life
about
democracy
and the associated dangersof democratic
individualism
is obviously only
a rehashing
of the old Platonic joke about
the proud
ass. Nevertheless,
the persistent successof the joke has something intriguing
about
it. We
are told day in day out that we live in the twentieth
that
our
century,
world is one of large nations-states,
the
and
global-market
powerful
cities
technologies, one that is entirely different to those little Ancient
was based on the exclusion of women,
comprised of men whosefreedom
slaves
and metics.
Our 'democracies', the conclusion goes,have
nothing
in common
with the government of the Ancient
If
democratic
village.
we admit this to be true, then how are we to explain
the fact that a
in which

which

even

polemicaldescription

of

the

democratic

village

by

an

anti-democrat

as the veritable portrait

of the
presented
being
in
our
world
of stock exchanges, supermarkets
and onlineeconomies?The paradox
that this conceptualization
suggests
of democracyis sustained
by a ruse in the description of democratic
life.
It suggests
that the turmoil
caused
democratic
by the unflinchingly
from antiquity is still
democratic
individual

ass involves

more
profound
problems. In other words,the standard
of stating the democratic paradox, according
to which
democracy
form
of life that democratic government has to repress,
a
suggests

way

is a
more

radical paradox.This paradox,

I submit, is that
of politics
itself.
The core of the problem,as I seeit, is that democracy is neither a form
of government
nor a form of sociallife. Democracy
is the institution of
as a paradox. Why
a paradox?
Because the
politics as such, of politics
of politics
seems to provide an answer to the key question as
institution
to what it is that grounds the power of rule in a community.
And democthat
the
racy provides an answer,but it is an astonishing one: namely,
is that there is no ground
at all.
very ground for the power of ruling
This is what
Plato
allows us to perceive, in a very quick flash, at the
of Book ill of the Laws. As far as I am aware this
never
passage
into Derrida's discussionsof democracy,
but I think it aptly
renders
the core of the democratic 'aporia'or 'paradox'.In this passage
for ruling.
He begins
Plato make a list of all the necessary qualifications
with
the six that are predicated on a natural
difference
between
the one)
beginning

entered

50)))

DOES

DEMOCRACY

MEAN

SOMETHING?)

rules and the one who is ruled: the power

of parents over their
of masters over slaves, of nobles
children, of the elder over the younger,
All
the ignorant.
over
the strong over the weak, the learnedover
villains,
a clear distribution of positions. You may, as
these qualifications
involve
Plato did, question what
being
'stronger'
really means, but it is undeniwhether seniority
able that weak is the opposite of strong. It is debatable
that
it is a
is a sufficient
for the exercise of power, but
qualification
All
to
differences
is
not.
these
relate
objective
qualification
qualifications
in society and can all be put
and forms of power already
operative
An arkhe is two things:
it is a theoretical
as an arkhe for ruling.
forward
a clear distribution of positions and capacities,groundprinciple
entailing
of power between rulers and ruled; and it is a temporal
the distribution
ing
is anticipated
in the disposition
that
the fact of ruling
beginning entailing
of this disposition is given by
to rule and, conversely: that the evidence
the fact of its empirical operation.
of its arkhe, namely an
Government seemingly requires an account
accountof the reasons why some take the positionof the rulers and the
others that of the people over whom they rule. The first six principles for
but
there is a seventh,
meet
the two requirements of the arkhe,
ruling
that
does not meet
which
Plato
calls the 'drawing of lots',8 or democracy,
of
distribution
a pre-determined
either of them. Democracyis neither
for
of the exercise of power to a disposition
roles nor an attribution
of a 'qualification
The 'drawing of lots' presents the paradox
ruling.
But you
of one that spells the absenceof arkhe.
without
qualification',
this
from
can draw two different
consequences
'qualification without
that
it is not an arkhe
and
You
can
take
of
the
fact
note
qualification'.
If
of
Plato
chose
it
from
the
list
of
scratch
principles
government.
simply
on his part. He retainedit not
not to, it was not because of any leniency
the
only because democracy in his time existed and because its 'subject',
but because of something
existence,
people, attested to its specific
that
lack of arkhe rebounds on the 'good'
the democratic
else, namely
of an
that are supposed to demonstratethe effectiveness
qualifications
are they
arkhe. Good qualifications
exactly
they
may well be, but what
to infer
from
the seniority of the senior it is possible
good for? Doubtless
a form of government;
its precise name would be gerontocracy.
Similarly,
of the learned or expert a form of government
can serve
the knowledge
or technocracy;
and so on and
to ground
that we might call an epistemocracy
is the)
so forth. Missing from this list of forms of government,
however,
who

51)))

DISSENSUS)

it must
government means anything,
the
to
superadded
something
governments of
fatherhood,
is, to the forms that
science,
seniority,
strength, etc., that
exist in families, tribes, schools and workshops,and that provide
already
of human
An
communities.
patterns for wider and more complexforms
extra something
must
it, from 'heaven'.
come, must arrive, as Plato puts
But there are only two forms of government that descend from heaven.
The first is pastoral government,
that
is the government of mythic
times,
when
ruled
the human
flock. The other is
the divine shepherd directly
the
of chance, or drawing
of lots, namely democracy.
government
In other words, there
are many
of
patterns of government by means
which men are ruled. The most common
are based on birth,
wealth,
force and science. Politics, however, implies that
extra - a
something
common
to both the rulers and the ruled.
supplementary qualification
But
if the divine
then
shepherd no longer rules the world,
only one
exist.
is
of those
additional
can
And
this
the
qualification
qualification
no more qualified for ruling
than
are
for
that
are
they
being ruled.
means
that
of
the
demos'
i
s
the
the
Democracy
'power
power of
precisely
that no arkhe entitles them to exercise.Democracy
is not a definite
those
It is a suppleset of institutions,
nor
is it the power of a specific
group.
or grounding,
and de-legitimizes
mentary,
power that at once legitimizes
or the power of anyone set of people.
every set of institutions
This is the reason that
the proud
ass causes such discomfort.For what
of good
policy is not the excess of demands springing
gets in the way
own
from
mass-individualism but democracy's
so-called
democratic
of
the
The
rests
on
the
supplementary
'power
people',
ground.
political
In my view,
which
at once
founds it and withdraws
its foundations.
which he develDerrida's notion of the 'auto-immunity'
of democracy,
of this identity
of
ops in two key ways, does not touch on the radicality
and
the negating
the grounding
powers. According to Derrida, autounlimited
means,
first, that democracy has an inherently
immunity
can also empower
anti-democratic profor self-criticism, which
capacity
paganda.Second,it implies the possibility that democratic governments
can act to revoke democratic rights in order to protect democracy against
to fight against it.
its enemies,
those who use the freedomof democracy
Derrida arguesthat in both cases democracy still holds fast to the same
unexaminedpower of the autos or self. In a word, democracylacks its
set out)
can only come to it from the outside. Derrida thus
which
Other,

political

form.

If

imply an extra

52)))

the

idea

something,

of political

DOES

MEAN

SOMETHING?)

the circleof the selfby weaving

to break
of the

DEMOCRACY

khora to the

horizon of a 'democracy

the

or

other,

to

a thread
from the pure receptivity
newcomer, whose inclusion defines

the

come'.

My objection to this is very simple: otherness

the outside, for the precise reason that

from

does not cometo

it

already

politics

has its own

own
its
of heterogeneity.
Indeed, democracy is this
principle
of self, democracy
is the
a power
of otherness.
Rather than
a power and of the circularity
of the arkhe. It is an
of such

otherness,
principle
disruption

for politics to exist at all

be presupposed
it precludes the self-grounding of politics,
I have tentatively
as the seat of a division.
concepthe disjunctive relation between three
through

anarchic principle that must

and insofar as it is anarchic
it instead

establishing

tualized

that

division

terms:police,politics

an\037

the

political.

- or, more
are
who Tule other men because they
the
of
the
one
who
is
elder, wiser,
part
they
play
that
richer
there
are patterns
and procedures of ruling
and so on. And
are predicated
on a given
distribution
of qualifications,
places and
if
the
of
I
this
of
the
call
the
However,
police.
power
competencies.
logic
have to
of a gerontocracy; if the learned
elders is to be more than
that
rule not only over the ignorant but also over the rich and the poor; if the
the
learned
command
them to do;
must 'understand' what
ignorant
their
for their
if soldiers
are to obey their rulers instead of using
weapons
own gain, then the power of the rulers has to rely on a supplementary
become
common
both to rulers and to the ruled. Power must
quality
There

are

men

accurately, because

political.
by the
happen the logicof the police has to be thwarted
of
all
Politics
the
of
means
logic
supplementation
qualifications
politics.
on which rulers
by the power of the unqualified. The ultimate
ground
govern is that there is no good reason as to why some men should
absence
of ruling rests on its own
rule others. Ultimately
the
practice
and
of reason. The 'power of the people' simultaneously
legitimizes
it.
de-legitimizes
mean. The demos is not the populaThis is what
demos and democracy
the lower classes.
It is the surplus
the
or
the
tion,
political body
majority,
have
to rule, which
made
of
who
no
those
up
qualification
community
of the people'
means
at once everybody and anyone at all. The
'power
or
with
the power of a particular
therefore cannot be equated
group
On the one)
institution
and it exists only in the form of a disjunction.

For that to

53)))

DISSENSUS)

state institutions
and
difference, one that
those

difference that

it is the inner

hand,

the power of the

subjects that
structure

anything

people must

re-stage

this

that is

own principle.

implies a practice
practice of ruling
can be

be

is not

aporetic

the attempt to

it is

aporetic,

However,becausethe

one that

of dissensus,

democracy

implementedin
'common' in which they

is continually

thwarted,

ceaselessly

by political

but

dissensual.

ground

the

on its

re-opening

and that the

foundation
it

keeps

If

there

is

political
is riven, democracy

plugs.

relentlessly

that

since it

re-enacted

police distribution of parts, places or compethe anarchic foundation

of the political.
The

disjunction

Earlier I claimed that

reason
for this is

The

the

challenge
that

of

is continually

On the other hand,

institutions.

tences, and

and de-legitimizes
legitimizes
This implies that it is a vanishing
thwarted by the oligarchic running
of
both

of ruling.

practices

one
opposite

and

cannot
consist in a
the same constitution
ways

depending

set of institutions.
and

set of laws

on the sense of the

are framed. They can circumscribethe sphere

and
restrict
political
political agency to an activity
performed
by
definite agents endowed with the appropriate
or they can
qualifications;
and
that are democratic,
give way to forms of interpretation
practice
which
invent
new political places, issues and agentsfrom
the very same
texts. This difference doesnot arise from a set of institutions
but consists
in another distribution
of the sensible,
another setting
of the stage, in
relations
between
that
words, the kinds of thing
producing different
they
I also claimed that
designate and the kinds of practices they
empower.
the
the sphere of the political.
logic of police consists in delimiting
effects a shrinking of the political stage that
is
However,this delimitation
in
a
in
biased
the
name
of
the
of
the
practised,
usually
way,
purity
of the law or the distinctioJ?
between
political, the universality
political
and social particularity.
The result
of such a 'purification' of
universality
its eviction.
Democratic logic, on the contrary,
consists
politics is actually
in blurring and displacing the borders of the political.This is what politics
means: displacing the limits of the political by re-enacting the equality
of
each and all qua vanishing
condition
of the political.
Needlessto say, those who want the government of citiesand states to
be grounded in one simple and unequivocal principle of community find
this practice
This is the reason for the relentlessseriesof
unacceptable.
denunciations
have
aimed
to
that, from Plato to Samuel Huntington,
or lie of democracy,
for)
expose the double bind, contradiction, duplicity
of the

54)))

DOES

DEMOCRACY

MEAN

SOMETHING?)

contradicts its name. This

terms of the opposition between
real
and formal
democracy so strongly
emphasized
by the Marxist tradition. However, the oppositionitself stretches
as far back as the Platonic
distinction
between
as the power of the written
law
and
democracy
of individual
and social life. Peoplewill remark
that
democracy as a form
In the Platonic
these distinctions operate in very
different
contexts.
the
individualistic
life
of
the
democrats
is
as
plot,
posited the real content
of the fake commitment to the rigour
of the law; while in the
Marxist
formal
tradition, real democracy is pitted against
democracy,
bourgeois
which works as a cover
to conceal
its contrary, that is, the 'real life' of
the differing conclusions,
However,
exploitation and inequality.
despite
is the same. In both, democracy is considthe argumentative
structure
...
ered formal and is contrasted with the reality of inequality. This 'reality'
can take on different
It may be, as it is in Plato's work, the sheer
guises.
individual
of
the
democratic
pleasure
governed by a calculus of pleasure
of private
and pain. It may also be, as it is in Marx's work, the reality
as
and
interests.
Or
it
can
be
turned
down,
upside
property
particular
we see in Arendt,
by extolling the brightness of the political sphere of
appearanceagainst the 'dark background of mere givenness'.In each case,
the opposition
is approached through
between appearance and
democracy
evicted.
of which it is described, disguisedand ultimately
reality,
by means
The most telling example of this equivalence
between
seemingly opposite
can be found in the critique of the revolutionary
'Rights
interpretations
of Man and of the Citizen'. Today,
these revolutionary rights
we know,
of 'Human
have
ceded their place to a generalregime
Rights'. This shift
can in part be attributed
to the fact that for two
centuries
authors
as difhave
shown
that these rights
had
ferent as Burke, Marx and Arendt
The basic argument
their
duplicity.
something
wrong with them, namely
of all these authors, which
has reprised in his Homo
Giorgio
Agamben
and
so some fallacy
Sacer, is that two subjects are simply one too many,
must
have crept in. 1o Marx
the matter by saying that the rights of
argued
the citizen are in fact the rights of a 'man' who is actually a proprietor.
For Burke and Arendt,
these
rights present themselves in the form of a
dilemma. It can be said that the rights of the citizen are the rights of man,
but if this is so, then the rights
are the rights
of the apolitical
of man
individual and, as this individual
has no rights on his own, these rights
turn
amounts
to)
out to be the rights
of those
who have no rights,
which
the continual

attempts to prove that

denunciation was most

famously

its

reality

cast in

55)))

DISSENSUS)

be saidthat
these latter possess

are the rights

of citizens,
of their belonging to an existing
state. If this is the case, then they
constitutional
are the rights of those
who have rights, which amounts to a tautology.
- if there are two subjects, one of them must
this argument
Underlying
be a fake, that the 'true' subjectmust
one or the other, man or
be either
- is a
citizen
states
that the political subject must
presupposition which
be one and the same, a claim
that
is either mere appearance
politics
in constitutional
or else its subject is identical to that defined
texts.
that
there is never merely one subject,since
Democracy,however,entails
different
exist in the interval
between
identities, between
political
subjects
Man and citizen. Far from being the embodiment of the power of Man or
consists
in the
that of the citizen, a political process of subjectivation
construction of a form of connection
and disconnection between Man
and citizen.In this process,
Man and citizen are used as political
names
itself
the
of
a
whose
is
political
product
process.
They
legal inscription
in the sense that
and compreare also conflictual
names
their
extension
OJ
which
hension is a litigious
matter,
opens a space for their testing
citizen
and Man altematf
verification.
Within these forms of verification,
between the role of the inclusive against the exclusive principle, of tht
have
been anc
universal
against the particular. Such is how these names
can be used in democratic
Citizenship means, on the one hand
struggle.
as men
the rule of equality
or superior
among people who are inferior
that
is as private
individuals subordinate to the power of ownershi)
and social domination. On the other, by contrast
to all the restrictions 0
from
of
whose
citizenship
scope many categories
people are excluded
reach
and
which
limits citizens by placing certain problems out of their
'man'
entails an affirmation
of the
equal capacity of everyone an
cannot
be reduced
to the universal power of th
anyone. Democracy
law
the particularity of interests, becauseit is the very logic {
against
of the universal. As
the police to carry out a continuous
privatization
the universal must be put into play continuously
and, f{
consequence,
that
to happen, it must be divided anew.
I made this point by commenting on the forms of feminist prote
11
during the French Revolution. In this time, women were denied tt
whi(
of citizens on account of the so-calledrepublican
principle
rights
while
women's
activ
states that citizenship is the sphere of universality,
life. Women were deemed)
ties belong to the particularity
of domestic
nothing.

the rights

56)))

Or it can

the rights
on account

of man

DOES

DEMOCRACY

MEAN

SOMETHING?)

the sphere of the particular

as a result, could not be included
and,
of the universal. Lacking a will of their own, they could not be
this self-evident statement, Olympede Gouges
subjects.
Against
that since women were qualified
to mount
the scaffold,
argued

occupy
that

in

political
famously

to mount the platform of the Assembly. Her

boundaries
separating these two realms by
a
entailed
in
the
so-called
of bare life.
setting
universality
up
particularity
Sincewomen
were
sentenced
to death as enemies of the Revolution,
their bare life itself was political. On the scaffold everyone was equal:
women
were
'as men'. The universality
of the death
sentence undermined
the
'self-evident'
distinction between political life and domestic
life. Women could thereforeaffirm
their
rights 'as citizens'. The affirmation amounts
to demonstrating that,
and Arendt, women did
pace Burke
not have the rights that they had and had the rights that they did not
have. On the one hand, women were deprived of the rights guaranteed
that belonged
those
to all 'free and equal'
by the Declaration of Rights,
men
and
demanded
to have these rights
denied
to them. On the other,
their
through
very protest, these women demonstrated a political
capacity.
that since they
enact
could
those rights, they
They showed
actually
they

also

were

possessed

qualified

the

blurred

argumentation

them.

This is what
in the interval

process entails: creating

identities;
creating

a democratic

two

between

on the

double relation betweenthe

forms

of subjectivation

cases of

universality

the particular. Democracy cannot be predicated

on the universality of
exclusively
the law, since that universality
is privatized ceaselessly by the logic
of governmental
action. The universal
has to be supplemented
by forms
of subjectivation
and cases of verification
that
the relentless
stymie
by playing

privatization

That

of public
privatization

universal

and

life.

takes

two

forms: an explicit

form that

denies

political

or ethnic
rights to certain parts of the population on sexual, social
the sphere of citizenship to a
grounds; and an implicit form that restricts
definite
set of institutions,
the
problems, agents and procedures.While
former appears outdated in the West, the second is a contemporaryissue
of major
Over the last 30 years,both
the soft name of modimportance.
ernization
and
the candid name of neo-conservative revolution
have
been used to effect a reversal
of the democratic
process that had broadened the public sphere by turning
matters
of 'private life' - suchas work,
health
and pensions
into
concerns
related to equal citizenship.)
public

57)))

DISSENSUS)

stakes behind the reform of the 'social'or the 'welfare'

state are
much greater than the balance between the public and private provision
of servicesand utilities. The stake that liesbehind the way in which work
and health are regulated is the particular
understanding
given to the
'common' of the community.
a line between a political sphereof
Tracing
and a social sphere ruled by private
also means
citizenship
arrangements
deciding who is able and who unable to address public affairs.
In the winter
of 1995 in France there wasa long
workpublic
transport
and Straussian arguments sought
ers' strike. An outpouring
of Arendtian
to portray
out to protect their own private
these workers as individuals
and immediate intereststo the detriment
of the political search for the
common good and the political ability to act in the interest of future
generations. However, in the course of the strike, it became
increasingly
clear that its main object was to decide whether a specific
of men
group
of
and institutions
had the exclusive
privilege of determining the future
The canonical distinction
the political and the
the community.
between
social is in fact a distinction between those who are regarded
as capable
the
and those who
of taking care of common problems and
future,
are regarded as being
unable
to think beyond private and immediate
concerns.The whole democratic
process is about the displacement of
The

that

boundary.

was:
to my starting point. The question
in opposition
the paradox that sets democracy
to itself? How are we to move from oft-repeated
statements about the
of
its
name
and
the
contradiction
of
its
to a more
uncertainty
actuality,
In Spectres
de Marx,
of democratic
self-difference?
radical interpretation
the historical
Derrida comments on Francis Fukuyama's
thesis
about
to re-open
the gap underneath
achievement of liberal democracy,aiming
the latter's self-satisfiedtriumphalism:
'It must
be' cried out, at a time
in the name of the ideal
when
some have the audacity
to neo-evangelize
of a liberal
realized
itself as the ideal of human
democracy that has finally
never
have violence, inequality,
famine
and thus
exclusion,
history:
economic oppressionaffected
as many
human beings in the history of
.12 To re-open
the world and of humanity'
the gap, Derrida contrastsa
to
come
to
a
which
has
reached
itself or reached its
democracy
democracy
will
A
to
is
a
that
as
Derrida
sees
not
come,
it,
democracy
democracy
self.
a different
but a democracy
come in the future,
time, a
emploted within
is the time of)
different
temporal
plot. The time of a 'democracyto come'

I shall

how

58)))

conclude

by

returning

are we to understand

DOES

a promise
can never
up

with

comes -

DEMOCRACY

MEAN

SOMETHING?)

- and
that has to be kept even though
precisely because - it
be fulfilled. It is a democracythat can never 'reach itself', catch
to that which
itself, because it involves an infinite
openness
which
also
an infinite openness to the Other or the
means,

newcomer.

Derrida contrasts another

placing two temporalities in
the same
time and two spaces in the same space. However, the precise
lies in the way in which the two democracies
nature
of the problem
of
are set in opposition.
Derrida
places liberal democracy as a form
to the newcomer
on one side, and the infinite
openness
government,
and wait for the event that evades all expectation,on the other. In my
and
a
view something gets lost in this opposition
between an institution
What
transcendental horizon. What disappears is democracyas a practice.
that
is
of the Other or the heteron;
is the political invention
disappears
creates
which
the political process of subjectivation,
continually
'newcomers', new subjectsthat enact the equal power of anyone and
words about community in the given
new
everyone and construct
of heterology is to trap
common world. To ignore the political
power
in a simple opposition, with
'liberal
on the one
oneself
democracy'
side- which actually means oligarchy, embodying the law of the self as the time and
and
a 'democracy
to come' on the other - conceived
space of an unconditional opennessto the event and to otherness. In my
this amounts
to dismissing politics and to a form of substantializaview,
the
substantialization
of the self
tion of otherness. Dismissing
alleged
form
of substanthat
in democracy,
occurs
then, leads to a symmetrical
of what can be called the
tialization of the Other - the very hallmark
ethical trend. References to the event and to the 'infinite
contemporary
are commonfor otherness',
contrasted to democratic autonomy,
respect
these
references
places of the current ethical trend. Notwithstanding,
can be interpreted differently
and lead to very dissimilar conclusions.
of
Let
us consider,
for instance, Jean -Fran\037ois
interpretation
Lyotard's
an
Internahe presented
the Rights of the Other, which
during
Amnesty
13 For
for othon human rights.
tionallecture
respect
Lyotard, the 'infinite
erness, means obedienceto the power of the Other - be it the Freudian
the human being is a hostageor slave.
Thing or the Judaic Law - of which
and of emancipation
turn out
On his reading, the dream of Enlightenment
will to deny the law of heteronomy,)
to be underpinnedby a pernicious
I cannot

but agree

democracyto

so-called

with

liberal

this

principle.

democracy,

59)))

DISSENSUS)

totalitarianism
and the Nazi
he alleges, lies at the root of modern
is
that
the
of
the
The
Other
upshot
ultimately
provide
Rights
genocide.
for the military
the axis of Evil. Ethics,
a justification
campaigns
against
and the infinite
Otherness
respect for Otherness thereby become a
of
sort
of 'new
Gospel', working to legitimate the practiceand ideology
'liberal democracy'.
Such an interpretation
of the Levinassian
concept of the Other and
to Derrida's
of the ethical trend
is, to be sure, very different
way of
ethical
In
stark
contrast
to
Derrida
ties
injunction to a
thinking.
Lyotard,
which,

horizon of emancipation,clearly

ence to

Law.

the

messianic

opposing

But in order to

avoid

of the event, the other or the

infinite,
supplementive processof deconstruction,
of otherness,
as
The ethicaloverstatement
vacillation between those two interpretations:

radicallaw

of heteronomy

the soldiers of

of the

identifications

In the end,
much

God- or an

- which

ultimately

infinite

task

to obedi-

identification

has perform an endless

and apophansis.
leads to a
I see it, necessarily
an assertion of a
either
he

crossing-out

supports

of crossing

the campaigns of
out all pre-emptive

Other.

Derrida'sconceptualization

to democracy.

promise

pre-emptive

any

Too little,

gives

both

too little and

because democracyis more

than

the

too
state

it is less than
the
because
practice of 'liberal democracy'.Too much,
to the Other. There is not one infinite openness to
infinite
openness
the part of the other. In
otherness, but instead many ways of inscribing
as the
practice
my own work, I have tried to conceptualizedemocratic
- which does not mean
who
have
no
of
the
of
those
part
part
inscription
is made
the 'excluded' but anybody
whoever.
Such an inscription
by
who
allow
new
to
who
are
'newcomers',
objects
appear as
subjects
and new voices to appear and to be heard. In that
common
concerns,
otherness.
is one among various ways of dealing with
sense,
democracy
a specific
time - the
Its own inventions of subjects and objectscreate
broken time and intermittent
legacy of emancipation. In my view,
a
of invoking
and
instead
we ought to think
act in this broken time

messianism.
We

should

not ignore the reverse side of my position.

for a time when the very nature of the

Derrida

spoke at

'break' becamean
and the following question emerged:can the figure of the demos, as
issue
it has
been played out, in its various guises, on the stage of the
hitherto
nation-state,meet the demands of a time when politics must be thought)
a moment

60)))

and

DOES

in cosmopolitan
terms? While the
states is debatable, we cannot deny
terms

with

a cosmopolitan
order.
But
the forms
that

International'.
take on are not

DEMOCRACY

SOMETHING?)

MEAN

issue of the 'disappearance'of

that

democracy

today must

Derrida's answeris to
this new International

call

nation-

come to

for a

'new

and

must

can

The main issue, in my view, is whether it will be

clear.
in political or 'ethical'terms.If we conceptualize
it politithen
the 'infinite respect for the other' cannot take
the form of an
cally,
infinite wait for the Event or the Messiah,but instead
the democratic

conceptualized

shape of an otherness that has a multiplicity

of alteration or dissensus.)

of forms of inscription

and

of forms

61)))

CHAPTER

Who Is

THREE

the Subject of the

Rights

of

Man?)

raised by my title took on a new cogency

the last
during
decade of the twentieth
The dissident movements in the Soviet
century.
Union and Eastern Europe had just rejuvenatedthe Rights
of Man, or
Human Rights,
not
long before, in the seventies and eighties.As the
'formalism'
of those rights had been one of the first targets of the young
the rejuvenation
took on an added significance.
As the Soviet
Marx,
it
seemed
Empire collapsed,
they had come to take their revenge, and
movement leading
they
began to appear as the charterof an irrepressible
towards a peaceful post-historical
in which global democracy
world
moveshand-in-hand
with
the global market of the liberal economy.
We
know
that things did not exactly turn
out that way. In subsequent
years, the new landscape of humanity, freed from utopian totalitarianturned
into an arena filled
with
new outbreaks
of ethnic conflict
ism,
and slaughter,
of religious
fundamentalisms
and of racial and xenophoThe territory
bic movements.
of 'post-historical'
and peaceful humanity
to
new
be
that
of
of
the
Inhuman.
And the Rights
of Man
proved
figures
turned out to be the rights
of the rightless,
of the populations hunted
out of their homes, chased from their land and threatened with ethnic
These so-called Rights
themselves
as
slaughter.
presented
increasingly
the rights
of victims,
the rights of those unable to exercise
their rights or
even to claim any in their own name, so that eventually
their rights had
to be upheld by others.
The cost of doing so was the
of the
shattering
edifice of International Rights,
carried
out in the name of a new right
to
- itself ultimately
'humanitarian
no more
interference'
than the right
The question

to

62)))

invasion.)

WHO

A new

Man

IS THE SUBJECT OFTHE

thus arose: what

and from Humanity
Rights of Man had turned

suspicion
to Humanity

subjectof

the

the claims being

made in

lies

RIGHTS

OF

MAN?)

this strange shift from

Humanitarian?
The real
that of Human Rights. But

behind
to

the

into

of such

rights appeared distinctly

The Marxist form of critique could not be revived,
was resuscitated in its place:
obviously; instead another form of suspicion
of Man was a mere abstraction and
namely, that the 'man' of the Rights
that
the
attached
to a
only real rights belonged to 'citizens',the rights
biased

or distorted.

national

community

This same

name

the

as such.

by Edmund Burke
most significantly,
by
2
Arendt
in her book titled
The Origins of Totalitarianism. In the chapter
devoted to 'Perplexities of the Rights
of Man',
she equates the 'abstractedness' of 'Men's Right\037( with the concrete situation
of the
refugee
populations fleeing all over Europeafter the First World War. These popshe argues,
were deprived of rights
because
ulations,
they were made up
of
without
'men'
national
to
ensure
Arendt
them.
only
any
community
found
in these 'men' the 'body' to match
the very abstract nature of
human rights.
She expresses
the paradox as follows:the Rights
of Man
are the rights of those who are only human
beings, whose only remaining
is that of being human as such. In other
words,
property
they are the
of those
who have no rights,
the mere
rights
mockery of all right.
The very possibility of this
resides in Arendt's identification
of
equation
the political sphere as a specific
realm
from that of necessity.
separated
Within
this framework,
abstract life can mean 'deprived life', a 'private
life' trapped in its 'idiocy', as opposed to the life of public action, speech
and appearance. In actual fact, this critique of 'abstract' rights is a critique
of democracy.
It rests on the assumption
that
modern
democracy was
from
the beginning
for the
because of the pity of revolutionaries
spoilt
between
two types of
poor; in other words, because of their confusion
freedom: political freedom,opposedto domination,
and social freedom,
opposed to necessity.In her view, the Rights of Man were not, as Burke
had claimed,
the idealist fantasy
of revolutionary
dreamers; they were the
of
the
paradoxicalrights
private, poor, de-politicized individual.
This analysis,
articulated over 50 yearsago, seems tailor-made,
50 years
of the Rights
of Man
on the
later, to deal with the new 'perplexities'
'humanitarian' stage. However,
it is important
to pay close attention
to what
allows it to 'deal with'
these
perplexities,
namely Arendt's)
against

the

polemical statement

French

Revolution

was

and

later

first

made

revived,

63)))

DISSENSUS)

of a certain state of exception.In a striking

passage
on the perplexitiesof the Rights of Man, she writes the
is not that they are not equal
about
the rightless: 'Their plight
following
the
not that they are
before
law, but that no law exists for them;
oppressed,but that nobody wants to oppress them'.3
conThe
statement
that 'nobody wants to oppress them', its plainly
is
temptuous tone,
quite extraordinary. It is as if these people were guilty
of oppression.
of not even being able to be oppressed,
not
even
worthy
The contention that there exists a situation and a status
oppres'beyond
of conflict and repression, or law
and
sion', beyond account in terms
has a stake that we need to be aware of. For the fact is that
violence,
there were peoplewho wanted to oppress these refugee populationsand
to do so. The notion of a 'state beyond
relates
less to
laws
oppression'
conceptualization
from the chapter

the realm of the

and
between
more to Arendt's rigid
opposition
reality
life - what in the same chaptershecalls
political and the realm of private
this notion
'the
dark background
of mere givenness'.4In other
words,
accords perfectly with her archi-politics.
Later, however, this position,
and line of argument
of description
paradoxically
enough, offered a frame
and represwould
that
prove useful for de-politicizing issues of power
of exceptionality
that
a way of placing them in a sphere
sion. It enabled

was no longer
beyond political

anthropological sacredness situated

inversion from archi-politics
to have
to a stance
of de-politicization
is a key feature of the thinking
the
on the Rights
of Man,
reflections
emerged from contemporary
The
is
most
Inhuman and crimes against
inversion
humanity.
clearly
in Homo
of biopolitics, notably
theorization
illustrated
by Agamben's
Sacer. Agamben transforms Arendt's equation - or paradox
by means
with
Foucault's
of a series of substitutions
that equate it, first,
theory
Carl
Schmitt's
of biopower and, second, with
theory of the state of

exception

political

dissensus.

but

of an

This

theoretical

(Ausnahmezustand).

between
of two
contrast
step, his argument relies on Arendt's
kinds of lives, itself basedupon the distinction
between two Greek words,
'form of life', or
life' , and bios, meaning
'bare physiological
zoe,
meaning
'the
life
of
and
noble
words'. In her
bios
that
actions
is,
politicos,
great
of
Man
modern
rest
on
a confusion
the
and
view,
democracy
Rights
in
results
the
reduction
those two kinds of life, which
between
ultimately
with Foucault's
of bios to bare zoe. Agamben connects Arendt's
critique
Il faut defendre)
. In La volonte de savoir
and
polemics on 'sexual liberation'
In

64)))

a first

WHO

IS THE SUBJECT OFTHE

OF

RIGHTS

MAN?)

that the desire for sexual liberation

and
to
argues
speak out about sex are in fact effects of a power machine that actually
are effects of a new form of power,
urges people to speak about sex.They
no longer
the
old form of sovereignty that
a power of Life and
holds
Death over its subjects,
but a positive power of control over
biological
life. According to Foucault, even ethnic cleansingand the Holocaust
are
more than they are revivals
of
part of a 'positive'biopolitical
programme
la societe, 5 Foucault

6
right to kill.
this conceptualization of biopolitics to turn
democracy as it is defined by Arendt into the positivity

the sovereign
Agamben

uses

the

law

of

form
of power. Biopolitics
becomesdemocracy's
that is, part of the
accomplice,
mass individualistic
concern
with individual
and
life
of the technologies
of power that hold sway over biological life as such. From there, Agamben
further.
Foucault contrasts modern biopowerwith
pushes things
W\037ere
old sovereign
power, Agamben has them
converge
by equating Foucault's
of
'control
over
life'
with
Carl
notion of the state of
Schmitt's
concept
7
For
its
in the state
finds
Schmitt,
exception.
political authority
principle
of exception, meaning
that
is
the
to
decideon
the
power
power
sovereign
state in which normal legality
is suspended.
This boils down to saying
that
the law hinges on a power of decision
that is outside of law. Agamben, for
his
identifies
the state of exception with the power of decision over
part,
life. Then he correlates
the
of sovereign
exceptionality
power with the
of life, that is with
that
bare or naked life which,
to
exception
according
between
zoe
him, is captured in a zone of indiscernibility or of indistinction,
and bios, between natural
and human
life.
and
are
turned
from an opposition
Sovereign power
biopower thereby
into
an identity.
The opposition between absolute state
and the
power
The Rights
of Man made it seem
that natuRights of Man also vanishes.
rallife was the sourceand bearer of rights, and birth was the principle of
it is alleged, was protected for a long
time
sovereignty. This identity,
by
- or
- with
the identification of birth
of the
nativity
nationality or figure
citizen. But the vast flood of refugeeswhich
in the twentieth
emerged
shattered
the identity and, stripped of nationality's
century
apparently
the nakedness of bare life as the secret of the Rights
revealed
of
veil,
Man. Similarly, the programmes of ethnic cleansingand
extermination
revealed
themselves
to be the radical attempt
to draw
the full conseof this splitting. Democracy's secret - the
secret
of modern
quences
power - can then emerge into full view. State power, now, is concretely)
modern

of a

65)))

DISSENSUS)

with bare life, itself no longer the life of the subject that this
wants to repress, nor the life of the enemy that it has to kill, but,
- a life taken within
a state of exception,
a
Agamben
says, a 'sacred' life
8
life 'beyond oppression'. Bare life is a life between life and death, identifiable with the life of the condemned man
or that of someone
in a coma.
concerned

power

In his

Holocaust, Agamben emphasizes the continuity

scientific experimentation on life 'unworthy
of
lived'
that
on
or
condemned
is,
abnormal, mentally handicapped
being
- and the
of the Jews, posited as a popupersons
planned extermination
lation
reduced
to
the
of bare life.9 The Nazi
condition
experimentally
laws which suspended the constitutional
articles
that guaranteed
freedom
of association and expressionare thus able to be conceived as the blatant
manifestation
of the state of exception and as modern
hidden
power's
secret. In the same stroke,the Holocaust
begins to appear as the hidden
truth
of the Rights of Man, that
is, of the state of bare, undifferentiated
is
which
the
correlate
of
life,
biopower.The 'nomos' of modernity can
then be figured
as the camp, subsuming, under one and the samenotion,
the refugee
are parked by national
camp, the zones where illegal
migrants
authorities
and the Nazi death camps.
Political conflict, properly speaking, thus comes to be replaced by a
correlation
between sovereign power and bare life. The camp becomes a
of deciding between fact and law, rule
space of the' absolute
impossibility
10
and application,
the
exception and rule'. It becomes a space in which
executioner
and the victim, and the German body and the Jewishbody,
as two parts of the same 'biopolitical'body.Any
kind
of claim to
appear
or
is
thus
from
the
any struggle enacting rights
rights
very outset
trapped
in the
mere polarity of bare life and the state of exception,a polarity
that
as a sort of ontological destiny: we are all, every single one of us,
appears
in
the
same situation
as the refugee in a camp. Differences between
totalitarianism
and democracy
out
grow faint and political practice turns
in the biopolitical
to be always already caught
trap.
Agamben's view of the camp as the 'nomos of modernity' may seem
remote from Arendt's
view
of political
action. My suggestion here,
is
that
the
radical
of
of bare
however,
politics in the exception
suspension
life
is actually
the ultimate consequence of Arendt's
archi-political
posicontamination
tion, that is, of the attempt to preserve the political from
life. This attempt
by the private, the social or a-political
de-populates the
aside its always ambiguous actors, and
thus)
political stage by sweeping
between

66)))

analysis

two

of the

things:

IS THE SUBJECT OFTHE

WHO

by

the
incorporating
stands
face to

which
into

has

and

politics

individual

itself gets increasingly

destiny

face with
The

a complementarity.

ultimately

power

political exception

from

which

be

to

will

into

life. This
preserve

OF

MAN?)

power,
posited as that
opposition is then turned
the realm of pure politics

state

vanish in the pure relationship between state

life. So politics gets equated with power
and power
construed
as an overwhelming historico-ontological

only a

God can save

To escape this ontological trap,

the question
of their
precisely,

politics, has to

bare

RIGHTS

the
subject

us.

of the Rights of Man question

- and therefore of the

and politics placed on an entirely

let us look again at Arendt's
mind,

re-worked

footing. Bearing this in

which Agamben basically

endorses - concerning
of Man and of the Citizen.Arendt
sees these
as follows:
quandary, which can be \037pressed

more

subject of
different

argument

the themes
of the Rights
in a
latter as being caught
of the citizen
first, the rights
of man
of the nonare the rights
of man,
but the rights
are the rights
- which
or
of
who
no
the
those
have
politicized person,
rights
rights
means they amount
of man are the rights
to nothing; second, the rights
of the citizen, the rights
attached
to the fact of being a citizen of suchor
such
a constitutional
means
that they are the rights
of those
state - which
II
who have rights
and we end up in a tautology.
the Rights of
So, either
Man are the rights of those who have no rights or they are the rights
of those
who have rights.
a void or a tautology,
in either case,
Either
and,
a deceptivetrick, such is the lock that Arendt builds. This lock is solid,

third
if we pay the price of sweepingasidethe
assumption
This assumption
the
that escapes the quandary.
can be stated as follows:
of
Man
are
the
of
who
have
not
the
that
those
Rights
rights
rights
they
have and have the rights
that
they have not. Let us to try to make sense
of this sentence.
It is clear that
the
it expresses cannot be
equation
of a single x. The Rights of Man are not the
resolved
by the identification
of a single subject that
would
at once be the source and the bearer
rights
of the
this
use the rights actually possessed. Were
rights and would only
the case, then it would
be easy to prove, as Arendt
that no such
does,
between
the subject and rights,
however,
subject exists.The relationship
is not so easily dispensedwith.
is that the relationship between the subject and rights
is
The
reason
enacted through a doublenegation.
The subject
of rights is the subject the interval
or more accurately
the process of subjectivation - that bridges
between the two forms of existenceof those rights. In the first place,)

however,only

67)))

DISSENSUS)

rights are inscriptions, a writing

as such
are not merely the
situations

of rightlessness

abstract ideal, situated

are part the

of the

may
far

configuration

community

predicatesof
them,

gainsay

as free and

equal,and

a non

-existing being. Actual

but they are not merely

an

the givens of the situation.

Instead
they
of the given, which does not only
consist
in a
also contains an inscription
that
gives equality

from

situation of inequality,
but
a form of visibility.
In the second place, the Rights
of Man
are the rights
of those
who
make something of that inscription,
not
to
'use'
their
only
rights
deciding
of the inscription. At issue
but also to build cases to verify
the power
is
not simply to check whether rights
are confirmed
or denied by reality,
but to bring to light
what
their confirmation
or denial mean. Man and
citizen
do not designate collectionsof individuals.
Man and citizen are
political subjectsand as such as are not definite collectivities,but surplus
that set out a questionor a dispute
names
about who is included
(litige)
in their
count.
freedom
and
are not predicates
Correspondingly,
equality
to
are
definite
Political
predicates open predicates:
belonging
subjects.
entail, whom they concern and
up a dispute about what
open
they
they
in

which

cases.

The Declaration of Rights

and thus raises a question

about

predicates.
Answering,

Arendt,

like

states

all men are born free and equal,

sphere of implementation of these
that this sphere is that of citizenship,

that
the

political life separated from that of private life, resolves the problem
in
advance.
For the issue is to know precisely where to draw
the line
an
life
the
that
one
from
other.
Politics
concerns
border,
separating
activity
which continually
it in question. During
the French
a
Revolution,
places
de
made
this
woman,
revolutionary
Olympe
Gouges,
point
very clearly,
that
if women were entitled to go to the scaffold,then
famously stating
were also entitled to go to the assembly.
they
Her point was that women, who were apparently
born
equal, were in
fact not equal as citizens.
could neither vote nor stand for election.
They
The
as usual, was justified
on the grounds
that women did
proscription,
to private,
not fit the purity of political life, because they belonged
of
had
to
be
domestic life. The common
the
good
community
kept apart
life.
de
from
the
activities,
feelings and interests of private
Olympe
draw
the
showed
that
it
was
not
to
border
possible
Gouge's argument
separating bare life and political life so clearly. At least one point existed
where 'bare life' proved to be 'political': when women weresentencedto)
of a

68)))

WHO

IS THE SUBJECT OF THE RIGHTS OF MAN?)

of the revolution. If they could lose their 'bare life'

motivated public judgment, this meant
that even
their bare
life
from
the standpoint
of its being able to be put to
death - was political. If they were as equal 'as men' under
the guillotine,
then they had the right
to the whole of equality,
including
equal particilife.
pation in political
The deduction would not be endorsed by lawmakers,
indeed
they
could not even hear it. But it could be enacted in the process of a wrong,
in the
construction
of a dissensus. A dissensus
is not a conflict of interit is a division inserted in 'common
a
sense':
ests, opinions or values;
is given
and about the frame within
which
we see
dispute over what
as political
something as given. Women,
subjects, set out to make a twofold statement.
They demonstrated that they were deprived of the rights
that
and that through
their
they had thanks to the Declaration of Rights
public action that they had the rights denied to them by the constitution,
that they could enact those rights. They acted as subjectsof the Rights of
Man in the precise sense that I have mentioned.
They acted as subjects
that
did not have the rights
that
had
and
that
had
the rights that
they
had not. This is what
I call a dissensus: the putting
of two worlds in
they
one and the same world. The question
of the political subject is not
the void term of Man and the plenitude of the citizen
between
caught
with
its actual
for staging
scenes
rights. A political subject is a capacity
of dissensus.
If there
is a positive content to this term,
it consists in the rejection of
that
difference
between
every
people who 'live' in different
distinguishes
of
the
dismissal
of
existence,
spheres
categoriesof those who are or are
not qualified
for political
life. The very difference between man
and
citizen is not a sign
of disjunction,
are either
void or
proving that rights
for political
tautological. It is the opening of an interval
subjectivation.
Political names are litigious
whose extension
and comprehension
names,
are uncertain,
and
which
for that reason open up the space of a test or
verification.
Political
subjects build such casesof verification.
They
put the
- that is, their
of
names
extension
and
power
political
comprehension
to the test. Not only do they bring the inscription
of rights
to bear
situations
in which those rights
are denied
but they construct the
against
world in which those rights are valid, together with the world in which
are
not. They construct a relation of inclusion and a relation
of
they
death

as enemies

thanks

to

a politically
- their
life

exclusion.)

69)))

DISSENSUS)

name for all the subjects that stage such cases of verification
demos, or the people. At the end of Homo Sacer, Agamben emphasizes
what
he calls the 'constant ambiguity'
of the concept
of the people, at
once the name of the political body and the name of the lower classes.
bare life and
He
sees in this ambiguity the mark of a correlation
between
sovereignty.12 But the demos - or the people - does not mean the lower
classes,nor bare life. Democracy is not the power of the poor, but the
for exercising
power of those who have no qualification
power. In Book ill
of the Laws, Plato lists all the qualifications
that
are, or make claimsto be,
Such are the powers of masters over
sourcesof legitimate
authority.13
and so
of the old over the young,
of the learned over the ignorant
slaves,
on. At the end of the list, however,
there is an anomaly, a 'qualification'
for
that he calls ironically
God's
choice, meaning pure chance: the
power
The generic

is the

the casting of lots, whose name is democracy.

for
power of those who have no specific
qualification
I
the
the
fact
of
no
As
ruling, except
having
qualification.
interpret it,
demos - the political subject assuch - has to be identified with the totality
I call it the count of the
made
by those who have no 'qualification'.
uncounted - or the part of those who have no part. It does not mean
the population of the poor; it refers to a supplementary part, an empty
from
the count of the parts of
part that separates the political community
the population.
is of a piece with
the classical
opposition between
Agamben's
argument
the illusion
of sovereignty
and its real content.This is why he completely
misses the logicof political
Political subjects are surplus
subjectivation.
of
the
that
inscribe
the
count
uncounted
as a supplement.
subjects
is not a specific sphere of political
from other
Politics
life, separate
from
itself
spheres,sinceit acts to separate the whole of the community
The community can be counted
in two opposed ways. There is the police
it as the sum of its parts (that is, of its groups
and of the
of counting
way
qualifications that each of them bear); and there is the political way of
it as the supplement
added
to the sum (as the part of those who
counting
have
no part, and that
acts
to separate the community from
its parts,
is
on the
functions
and
The
count
made
qualifications).
police
places,
is
a
basis of distinct
but
a
not
spheres,
process,
sphere.
politics
of the demos, which
is the generic
The Rights of Man are the rights
name of political subjects, that is, subjects that, in specific scenes of
of this supplement.
When)
dissensus,enact the paradoxical
qualification

power gained

Democracy

70)))

through

is the

WHO

ISTHE SUBJECT OFTHE

RIGHTS

OF

MAN?)

those rights to one and the samesubject,

this process
disappears
is there no man of the Rights
of Man,
there is no need
only
for
one.
The strength of those rights
lies in the back-and-forth movement
between the initial inscription of the right and the dissensual stage on
which
it is put to the test. This
is why the subjects of the Soviet constitution
were
able to make reference to the Rights
of Man
in opposition to the
laws that denied their effectiveness. This is also why they can be invoked
the citizens
of states ruled by religious
law or governmental fiat, the
by
in
clandestine
held
transit
zones
in wealthy countries or
immigrants
you

assign

entirely.

Not

in refugee
camps.
always individuals among them
to construct
a dissensus against
really have these rights.
populations

You
in

fact

are
those

When such groups can - and there are

that
do - make something of these rights
the

denial

only compelled to claim, as Arendt

that are given to the citizens of

belonging to it
that
presuppose

and
rights

guaranteed
belong

to

by the
definite

of rights
did,

a nation

they

that
by

suffer,

they

real rights are

virtue
of their

if you
protection of a state,
or permanent subjects.This

of all struggles outside

you to deny the reality
of the frame of the national
constitutional
state and to claim that
national
revealed
in the situation
of
rights are merely' abstract', an abstractedness
the 'merely' human
of them. The conclusion, however,
person
deprived
is a vicious circle, since it merely re-asserts what was presupposed
at the
that
there is a division between those who
are and those
outset, namely
who are not worthy
in politics.
of engaging
But the act of identifying
the
of the Rights of Man with
the
subject
of
is
not
the
vicious
of
a
circle
it
is
subject
deprived
rights
theory;
only
the result of an effective re-configuration of the political
also, and always,
this process
field, of an actual process of de-politicization.
goes by
Today,
the name of consensus,whose meaning
far exceeds
the simple attempt
to settle political conflicts reasonablyand practically
forms of
through
is ideally
allotted its
negotiation and agreement whereby each party
maximum possibleshare taking into account the interests of the other
parties.Consensusconsistsin the attempt to dismiss politics by expelling
with
real partners,
social and idensurplus
subjects and replacing them
and
so
on.
The
result
is
that
conflicts
are
turned
into problems
tity
groups
to be resolved
learned
and
the
of
by
expertise
negotiated adjustment
interests.
Consensus means closing spacesof dissensus
by plugging intervals and patching
up any possible gaps between appearanceand
reality,)
presupposition

also obliges

71)))

DISSENSUS)

fact. In this way, the 'abstract' and litigious

of Man and of
Rights
the citizen are provisionally
turned
into real rights - those of real groups
with a solid identity
and a recognized
place in the society.
In this way,
over partaking in the common
dissensus
of the
political
in which each part of the social
community gets reducedto a distribution
the share to which
it is entitled.
obtains
body
supposedly
According to
this
laws and rights
are increasingly
positive
logic,
finely moulded to fit
the diversity
of social groups and to match the speedof changes
of social
life
and
individual
of
The
aim
of
consensual
ways
being.
practice is to
an
between
law
and
such
that
the
former
becomes
fact,
produce identity
identical with the natural life of society.In other words, consensusconsists
in the reduction
of democracy to the way of life or ethos of a society- the
and lifestyle of a specificgroup.
dwelling
Consensusis the process underlying
today's continual shrinkage of
ever emerges in the very gap between
the
political space. The latter
only
abstract
literalness of the rights
and
the polemic over their verification.
This shrinkage
has
occurred
these
now
to such an extent that
rights
of
us.
And
no
use
to
when
actually appear empty,
longer
any
rights are
of no use, then just like charitable persons do with their old clothing,
they are given to the poor. Appearing useless, these rights are sent abroad
and clothes to people deprivedof medicine,
clothes
along with medicine
and rights. As a result of this process, the Rights
of Man
become the
of those
who have no rights,
of bare human beings
the
rights
rights
and conditions of existence. TheRights
of
exposedto inhuman
repression
Man become humanitarian rights,
that
the
of
those
who
cannot
is,
rights
enact
of victims whose rights
are totally
denied. Nevertheless these
them,
not
are
names
and
political placesnever become
rights
empty; political
void. The void is always
filled
merely
by somebody or something else;by
the rights of those who cannot enact
them
the Rights of Man
becoming
do not become null and void. If these rights are not 'truly' those of the
victims, they can become the rights of others.
Under the auspicesof the Oxford Lectures on the Rights of Man, organized by Amnesty
International
in 1993, Lyotard
a paper called 'The
gave
14 The theme of the
of
the
of
the
Other'.
other has to be
Rights
rights
understoodas an answer to the question, 'What do Human
mean
Rights
in the context of the humanitarian
situation?'
Lyotard's
attempt was
to re- think
by re- thinking the question of wrong. For after the
rights
outcomes
of what)
collapseof the Soviet Empire and the disappointing
law and

72)))

WHO

was

supposed

issue of

to be the

re- thinking

final

'wrong'

step

IS THE SUBJECT OFTHE

on the way

became

RIGHTS

OF

MAN?)

to universal democracy, the

increasingly

insistent.

Renewed

of racial and religious hatred and violence- of new crimes

could
not be assigned to a specificideology,
against humanity - which
meant
that the crimes of defunct totalitarian
needed
to be
regimes
A new claim emerged that
were not so much the specific
rethought.
they
effects
of perverse
as the manifestations
regimes'
ideologies and' outlaw
of an infinite
that
one
could
not
be
accounted
for
in terms
of
wrong,
the opposition between democracyand
of
anti-democracy,
legitimate
state or lawless state,
but
which
as an absolute evil - an
appeared
unthinkable
and irredeemable
evil.
is one of the most signifiLyotard's conceptualization of the Inhuman
in fact did was split
cant
of that absolutization. What Lyotard
examples
the idea of the inhuman:into
that
two. He argued
the forms of repression
and cruelty,
of distress, that might
or situations
be called
are
'inhuman',
the
of
a
of
another
this
time
a
Inhuman,
consequences
betrayal
actually
one.
The
I
nhuman
is
Otherness
as
in
that
the
us
such,
'good'
part
'good'
we cannot master, which
the Unconscious,
may be called birth or infancy,
the Law or God. The Inhuman
is irreducible
otherness, the part of the
a hostage or
Untamable to which
the human
being is, as Lyotard
says,
slave. Absolute
evil begins
with the attempt to tame the Untamable,
with
the attempt to deny this hostage
and to dismissour dependency
situation,
on the power of the Inhuman in order to build a world that we might
master completely. IS
Total mastery,
he argued, was the effective dreamof the Enlightenment
and revolutionary emancipation, and is alive and well in contemporary
dreams
of perfect communication and transparency. The full revelation
and realization
of the dream, however, only came about in the Nazi
that is, in the extermination of the peoplewhosevery
mission
Holocaust;
it is to bear witness to the situation
of hostage,
to obey the law of Otherness, the law of an invisible and unnameable God. It seems to follow,
are in fact crimes that result from
then, that 'crimes
humanity'
against
assertionsof human freedom which deny the fundamental dependency
on the Untamable.
On Lyotard's view, then, our response to the 'humanitarian' situation
of denied
of the
rights ought to be to uphold the rights
of the Inhuman.
He contends, for example,that the right
Other, the rights
to speak ought
with the duty
of 'announcing
to be identified
something
new'.16 But the 'new' to be announced
is nothing
but the immemorial)
outbreaks

73)))

DISSENSUS)

to fulfil the duty of announcing

Other and our own incapacity
to the rights
of the Other sweeps aside the heterogeneity of
political dissensusin the name of a more radical heterogeneity.
Just
as we saw with Agamben, this
means
wrong and
infinitizing
that
with a sort of ontological destiny
processing
replacing its political
is no manifestation
of
permits
only of 'resistance'. Such resistance
faithfulness
to the law of
here
means
freedom, however. Resistance
out
Otherness, thereby ruling
any dreams of 'human emancipation'.
This
of the Other. But they
is the philosophical
understanding the rights
as
and more trivial
sense
can also be understood in a less sophisticated
suffer inhuman repression cannot exercisethe
who
follows: if those
last recourse,
then it is up to others to inherit
Human
Rights that are their
name
for this is the
these
rights and exercise them in their place. The
- a right that some nations have
interference'
to humanitarian
'right
arrogated becausethey claim, very often against the views of humanitarian organizations
themselves, that it will help the victimized populations.
of the
The 'right to humanitarian
interference',
then, is like the return
disused rights sent to the rightless
back
to their senders. This movement
In being returned, the' disused'rights
a
is not a null transaction.
acquire
achieves
new use, one which
effects
on the world stage what
consensus
on national stages: an erasureof the boundary
between law and fact, law
of
that are 'returned' are the rights
and lawlessness. The human
rights
of an absolute evil.
the absolute victim, so-called becausehe is the victim
The rights that are returned to the sender - and avenger - are akin to a
power of infinite justice against the Axis of Evil.
was dismissed by the U.S. government
The expression 'infinite
justice'
term only a few days after it was put forward, but to
as an inappropriate
a type of justice
me it seemed
rather
fitting. Infinite justice is not only
that dismisses principlesof International
Law, which themselves prohibit
interference
in the' domestic affairs' of another state. It is a justice that
which
defined the field of justice
erases all the distinctions
formerly
in
and
that is, those between law and fact, legal punishment
general,
to a
and
all
of
which
are
reduced
retaliation, justice/policing
war,
private
stark
ethical
conflict between
Good and Evil.
The questionof ethics is on our agenda more than ever. This phenomof the community
enon is seen by some as a return to the founding
spirit
laws and political agency. I take quite a different
that
sustains
positive
of it. To me, the new reign
of ethics
is about the dissolution of all)
view

power

of the

it. Obedience

74)))

WHO

ISTHE SUBJECT OFTHE

RIGHTS

OF

MAN?)

in the infinite
conflict
and political intervals
of dissensus
versus Evil. The 'ethical' trend
is in fact a 'state of exception',
to its status in Agamben's
work, is not the realization of
which,
contrary
of the political. Instead, it is the outcome of an erasure
a putative
essence
of the political in the couple of consensual policy and humanitarian
The theory of the state of exceptionand the theory
of the 'rights
police.
this
result
into an anthropological or ontological
of the other' turn
and trace it back to the inescapable pre-maturation of the human
destiny
I submit, however, that
the
animal.
destiny of the human
ontological
animal is a story that only works to shroud the real task before us: that of
who
the Rights of Man is and of rethinking
politics
today,
understanding
were it out of its very lack.)
legal

distinctions

of Good

75)))

FOUR

CHAPTER

Communism:

From Actuality

to Inactuality)

it
does
the ambiguity of our conference topic: what
the actuality of communism?! 'Actuality'
can mean
is actual
it can mean
First,
'topicality', so that something
is - as problem or
if the
we happen to be confronted with
situation
it can mean 'reality', so that
somesolution - on our agenda.
Second,
it is 'on the agenda', and thereby possible
because
thing is actual not only
it already has a reality,
an effectivity,
here and
or potential,
but because
shall

start

mean to talk
two things.

with

about

now. The syntagm

nism

is not

irrationality

Communism's
The

question

of the

'actuality
- as a

of communism'

means that

commu-

or
response to the violence,injustice
only
in a certain sense, it already
exists.
of capitalism - but that,
actuality is not only a task; it is also a process.
forms
of actuality
is thus as follows: how can these two
desirable

the answer to this

is
be made to converge?In fact, however,
question
itself. Our interrogations
already presupposed in our idea of communism
first is that commuinto
its actuality rest on two Marxian axioms.The
nism is not an ideal, but that it is an actual form of lif\037. For, in contrast to
in the separate
represents freedom and equality
democracy, which
merely
turns
them
into a sensory reality,
form of law and state, communism
common
world. The second
them in the forms of an existing
embedding
of well-minded
individuals
is that this form of life is not the gathering
life as a response to selfishness
attempting to experiment with collective
of a form of universality
it is the full implementation
or injustice.
Instead,
It is the fulfilment
of a collective ratiothat
is already at work in society.
- in the
- albeit in the form of its
nal power alreadyin existence
contrary
of)
the
collective
forces
interest.
As
Marx
of
it,
private
put
particularity

76)))

COMMUNISM:

already exist in
production. The

humanity

capitalist

their
only

FROM

in the unilateral
is to find

objectification
requirement,

INACTUALITV)

ACTUALITVTO

then,

form

of

a form

for

their collective and subjectivere-appropriation.

is the only itself. Two further
is a problem, of course, and that
There
have been used to skirt
this
axioms
The first posits the exisdifficulty.
to the realization
of those collective
tence of a dynamism that is intrinsic
is
to blow apart the form of capitalist privateness.This
forces,
tending
of this
the power of the 'inseparate'. The secondsays that the realization
all the other
dissolves
is in any case inevitable, as its dynamism
power
embodied
all the 'separate' forms
of communities
forms
of community,
With these two axioms
in the state, religion and traditional
social
bonds.
the problem of the only is overturned: the collective reappropriation
turns out to be the only form of community
by communism
implied
after
all the others have collapsed.
possible, the one that -remains
has been predicatedon the impossibility
The
of communism
necessity
of politics.
of communism
However, this way of approaching the actuality
merely
to
inherent
our idea of it. Thereby
the
dialecticof
repeats
actuality
already
it was in 1847 or in
is communism
neither
more nor less actual than
1917.
there
is a contemporary specificity to
But if we want to claim that
the effects
of capitalism
this
then we cannot simply argue that
actuality,
are more unbearableor nonsensical
than
ever before. Instead, it has to
communism
is more actual, more effective
be demonstrated that today
it is
insideof capitalism
than ever before. It has to be demonstrated that
world
and
as
the
of a common
actual both as the materiality
sensory
- as the
of
form
o
f
an
immaterial
of
rationality
accomplishment
unity
that materiality
and that immateriality.
the problem soon finds a tailor-made
solution: it can
Thus expressed,
exists within, and thanks
be claimedthat communism
to, new
already
The argument
can be paraphrased as
forms of capitalist
production.
follows:

material

today,

goods,

because

capitalist

and more and

tion; and because its

shake loose its status

production produces

more services

or

means

fewer and

fewer

of communica-

less material, it tends to

commodity and deceptive fetish.
the
of the global network,
production
production
Capitalist
of immaterial
collective intelligence.
construed as the sensorymateriality
than
What
contemporary
goods
capitalism
essentially produces - rather
is the network
for private appropriation
of human communication, in)
production

is increasingly

as appropriated
tends to become

77)))

DISSENSUS)

which

consumption

production,

but join

together

in

the

of capitalist
production
a content which
turns

and exchange

are no longer

separate

collective process. Consequently, the content

starts to emerge through
form itself,
the capitalist
out to be the same as the communist
of
power

same

immaterial labour.
This makes it possible to dovetail two statements from the Communist
are their own grave-diggers in
Manifesto and claim that the bourgeoisie
is solid melts into air'. The postmodern
the
same sense that 'all that
immaterial
of everything
sets the framework for the actuality
becoming
cooperative

from the manifestation of

of capithe more soas the actuality
all the other forms of community
talist production increasingly
renders
than
ever before insoCommunism
is held to be more 'actual'
impossible.
far as the power of the capitalist
renders
the power of our nation
network
and the power of political action surrounding
them,
states,
increasingly
at an idea of the actuality
of
ineffective.
Ultimately, then, we arrive
The
communism
whose form is the in-separate life of the multitudes.
of the
start to appear as the supreme manifestation
multitudes,
then,
History of Being. Sowe are told, communism
today has to be ontological.
it true, it would at least need to
This
does
not seem so to me, but were
It would need to break with a way
break
with a certain kind
of ontology.
which
consists in two
of thinking
that I call the onto-technological
trick,
the complex set
essential operations. The first involves
identifying
of
and contradictions
that frame our historical world with
processes
with the
the fulfilment
of an ontological determination; in order
words,
- or a threat
in
of a promise
the
of
fulfilment
History
Being
implicit
the medium
of that fulfilment
itself. The second involves
identifying
with the operation of some form
of technology,
so that the immateriality
of the process of Being can be equated
with
a material process of production.For more than a century, electricity, radiography,
broadcasting,
and mobile phones have all taken turns at being
television,
computers
in our solid and prosaic
the representativesof immaterial
Intelligence
of

a sensory

world

that

is indistinguishable

collective intelligence.And

this

is all

world.
But

ableto

there
fuse

immaterial intelligence, no law of

the separate forms of implementation
together
is no

intellectual power.

The global

network

the

History of Being
of a collective

of computerized

intelligence is

one thing, the global intelligence of capitalism another and the socialization of someone's intellectual capacityanother
still. So long as we do not)
78)))

FROM

COMMUNISM:

actually
buy

turn into

clothes

and

immaterial beings,we will

use computers,

collective intelligenceof capitalism

immaterial communication - and
factory

work,

underpaid

work

that

is,

much
implement

continue

objects

INACTUALITV)

ACTUALITVTO

which

to consume

food,
implement the
do the form of

more than they

it in the form

at home,

of underpaid

clandestine workshops of

and so on. Not only is immaterial

'illegal'
immigrants
production not
the whole of capitalist production,but there is nothing clear-cut about
the argument that equates
with de-commodification.
dematerialization
Let's take an examplefrom the field of artistic practice and intellectual
artists claimed to have broken
property. Thirty
years
ago, conceptual
with
the
forms of commodified
art by no longer creating solid objects
available for private
but instead specific forms for the presenownership,
tation
or spatialization
of ideas: a hole in a wall, a crack running
through
a building,
a line in the. desert, etc. And yet intellectual and artistic
did not disappear; it simply
underwent
a displacement. Artists
property
- as owners and sellers of
to
be
viewed
and
increasingly
began
paid
ideasas such.This meant that intelligence itself came to take the place
of its products,
implying a radicalization in the idea of private property.
The immateriality
of concepts
and images, instead of doing away
with
turned out to be its best refuge, the place where its
private
appropriation,
is tantamount
to its self-legitimation.
reality
This shows us that
the
various
forms of manifestation of collective
of intelligence,
intelligencedo not dovetail. If there is a communist
power
it is not cyberspace, but instead
the capacity possessed by those
who
make the computer parts and piece them
to be able to have
together
their
all the issues of collective
about
say, not only about computers, but
life.This power is the collective embodiment of the capacityof anybody,
the power of those who have no 'entitlement'
to exert
power by the
- whether birth, wealth, science or other.
privilege of possessinga quality
It is the specific and paradoxical power of the 'unqualified'
people.
this power
under the name of democracy.
Long ago, Plato stigmatized
I endeavoured
in La Mesentente to give that
'lack
of qualification'
a positive
the supposed 'flaw' peculiar to democmeaning. This I did by identifying
with
the principle
of politics itself. For politics means something
racy
other
than the institutions of state or the struggle
for power. Politics is
the configuration
of a specific 'totality' that
as a supplement to
emerges
does
every collectivebody:that is, the totality of the uncounted, which
not mean the 'excluded' but simply
at all.)
anybody
79)))

DISSENSUS)

of intelsense, politics is a specificform of the implementation

is a collective
form of implementation of an intelligence
defined
as that of anyone
at all - of implementation
of the equality of
is realized in different
intelligence.This meansthat 'collective
intelligence'
forms and that there existsno essenceof the common
that could be
life or an inseparate community.
Political
implemented in an inseparate
of equal intelligence always
come
after the implemenimplementations
tations
of other
forms of the 'collectivization' of intelligence,such as
is
commandment,
trade, etc. The upshot
military
priesthood,
monarchy,
that this political implementation appearsin the form of a dissensus.
Dissensus does not refer to a conflict of interests, opinionsor values,
but to the juxtaposition
of two forms of the sensoryimplementation
of
collective
of its own, a world
intelligence. Politics frames a sensoryworld
in
which
a generic intelligence is implemented. Politics emerges as a
to the sensory
worlds framed by state, military, economic,
supplement
and
are
all privatized powers
religious
scholarly powers. These latter
of collective intelligence,that is, exclusive
forms for appropriating
its
resources.
that
is its own.
Politics, however, frames a sensory world
And
it does so both from within
these
forms and against
them.
private
It frames a network of discourses and practices by actualizing
the
'communism
of intelligence' via the construction
of a dissensus, but
within
a world structured
forms
of privatized
collective
always
by
in the form of a supplement
intelligence. Politics as suchis accomplished
and is always
at risk of being swallowed up by one of those private forms,
and most commonly
of state power and the struggle
for it.
by those
Political dissensus sets stages for implementing
a collective
power of
are
but
these
not
the
foundations
a
solid
of
world of
intelligence,
stages
institutionalized
Politics will always fail to deliver
on promises
equality.
to implement freedomand equality
integrally.
It was as a response
to this
'failure'
of politics that our idea of communism
was
born.
Communism
has been conceivedas the search
for the
in the form of a sensorycommunity
of
promise of freedom and equality
common
that would supersede the boundaries separating
intelligence
the various
worlds of common experience.As we know, it was born in
the interval
between two political revolutions: the French Revolution
of
1789 and the European revolutions
of 1848. The Communist Manifesto
was
But the theoretical
published
just one year beforethe 1848 revolutions.
framework
for
the idea of communism that
it advances
dates back)
In that

ligence.

80)))

It

COMMUNISM:

FROM

INACTUALITV)

ACTUALITVTO

a few German poets and philosophersset

the task of providing
to the faila response
that the French
ure of the French Revolution. Thesethinkers
assumed
to shape a new world
of
revolutionaries had failed in their endeavour
and equality because they
had
searched
for them where they
freedom
- that is, in the 'dead forms' of laws and state instiwere
not to be found
tutions.
had
failed
because they did not trace the problem back
They
to
its roots
and place questions of freedom and equality
on their real
of
The
the
the
lived
world.
for such a
ground,
way
namely
configuration
radicalization seemed to have beenpaved
by the discovery of a new form
of freedom
and equality. This was the form of freedomand equality
to
be found in the aesthetic
of
sphere. Kantian 'free-play', or 'equality'
and sensibility, implied an overturning
of the hierarchy
of
intelligence
form over matter
and
a new kind
of. activity over passivity,
suggesting
of equality
of the
that
could be brought to bear against
reversals
simple
forms of state power.
This 'aesthetic freedom'
can
be given two opposite interpretations.
One
casts the aesthetic sphere as a radically
separate
sphere of experience
that has to be kept separate. The other contrasts
that freedom to the
it into
forms of separate implementation
of the
common
and turns
the principle of a new revolution
to be realized in the materiality
of the
lived world; in other
it contrasts the supplementary and dissenwords,
sual
to the true community.
political
community
A true community
is a consensual community,
not one in which everyin
is
'in
is
but
one
in
which
sense
body
agreement,
agreement'with sense.
is
in
the spiritual senseof
The consensual
a
which
community
community
50 years

earlier to a time

themselves

and

their

when

nation

being-in-commonis embeddedin
experience.

It

is the

no boundariessevering

community
politics

the

material

sensorium

of an inseparate life
from economics, art,

in
religion

of everyday

which

there are

or everyday

life. According to the schema of the aesthetic revolution,

root of
the
of freedom
domination is separation. As a result, the full implementation
and equality
entails
the various forms of collective
re-unifying
intelligence
into
one and the same form
of sensory
experience. This means that the
of the material world
collective
intelligence has to re-configure the totality
in order
to turn it into the product of its own immaterial
power.
in the Schillerian programme for the
This schema first appeared
of man'.
A few years later it would
become
Das iilteste
'aestheticeducation
vision it was that
des deutschen Idealismus, 2 whose
the living)
Systemprogramm
81)))

DISSENSUS)

of a

body

people could be re-animated,

the state, but

by

the

embodiment

not

by the

of philosophy

in

dead mechanism of
a new

mythology

new fabric of common life. Fifty years after, Marx turned

it into
the programme
for a 'human revolution', the revolution
of the
the lie of formal democracy. Now,
two centuries
producers overthrowing
communism
of the multitudes, carried
later, it has become the living
along by the irresistible expansion of the global network.
Sothe actuality of communism today is still tied to the actuality of that
- to the everlasting actuality
of the paradigm
of the
originary
setting
'aesthetic' revolution. Unfortunately,
the programme
to implehowever,
ment
collective
world
for it
intelligence
by striving to frame a specific
has never resultedin a free and equal society. It has resulted in one of
two things:
the
domination
of the collective intelligence
planetary
of capitalism
or the absolute power of a state
to
hierarchy
purporting
incarnate the collective intelligenceof cooperative
labour.
The actuality
of communism is still marked
aesthetic
by the paradigm of this
the
endeavour
to
the
members
revolution,
by
piece together
splintered
of human experience. It is still marked by the infinite
of its
actuality
is the actuality
of capitalist
domination
and that of the
actuality, which
failure
of the Soviet Revolution.
For this reason,
it pays to turn
the
around and to start
out
problem
from the inactuality
of communism.
we
begin
My suggestion is that
from the everlasting intempestivity
of the process
of implementing the
of collective intelligence with
to every' objective'
egalitarian
power
respect
of collectivized
process, every processof the unequal implementation
that

is,

in a

intelligence.
To

be

time,

just

means
intempestive
as to be a-topian

do and do not belong to a

you do and do not belong to
means
a-topiancommunists
being think-

at once
means

that

you

that

Being intempestive or
ers and actors of the unconditional
of anybody and everybody,
equality
but
this can only happen in a world
in which communism has no actualcommunistic
ity bar the network framed by our
thoughts and actions
themselves.There is no such thing as an 'objective'communism
already
at work in the forms of capitalist
or able to be anticipated in
production
the
and
more
Capitalism may well produce more
logic of capitalism.
but
this
will
never
amount
to
immateriality,
immateriality
anything
the immateriality of capitalism itself. Capitalism
more
than
ever
only
is to mean anything,
it must
be)
produces capitalism. So, if communism
a place.

82)))

FROM

COMMUNISM:

heterogeneous

radically

the

world.

capitalist

network

Yet,

in a

framed

and
to the logic of capitalism
communism's
heterogeneity

place other than

in

that

INACTUALITV)

ACTUALITVTO

capitalist

the

materiality

of

cannot have

its

world;

no

it

has

place outside it.

To be intempestive

means occupying a site that

- with our thoughts,
acts
world
of material and immaterial communism.
and struggles - a certain
Howseem
This type of 'separate'
communism might
overly restrictive.
on the development of
communism
ever, instead of forever predicating
of communism
on that of capiof basing
the eternal actuality
capitalism,
of communism
as a power of
to reassert the radicality
we ought
talism,
to me crucial
or not it is overly restrictive, it seems
Whether
separation.
as power
that
we experiment
with its powers. In any case, communism
that exists. The global economy
of separation is the only\037' communism
doesnot produce a single scrap of it.
of its critique.
It
in fact, is the actuality
The 'actuality' of communism,
insofar
as
is the actuality
of the critique
of the very notion of actuality
contains
an inherent communist
the latter presumes that
capitalism
and
has
not escapedthe quanThe
cannot
idea
of
communism
power.
can be a process or
dary that Marx wanted to sweep aside:communism
it involves
a programme
but
not both. If it is a process,then
framing
a sensory world of communist
such a world, however, can
intelligence;
and
than
the network framed by our affirmations
be nothing
more
If it is a programme, then it
demonstrations of the capacity of anybody.
forms of
involves
by the different
trying to fuse the various worlds built
collective intelligenceinto one and the same community. Were such a
be speculations
on what it might
to exist, there would
yield.
programme
of totalitarianism.
Some will predict
that it would lead to a new form
I take the view, however, that
if it existed,
and if it was a good one,
capitalists would buy it and exploit it as they saw fit.)
is both

inside

or

a-topian

and outside.

It

communists

means

framing

83)))

CHAPTER

FIVE

The People

or the Multitudes?)

Responding

conceptof the

question from Eric Alliez

and what interest there

to a

people

to which he puts the

substituting it with that
is constitutive of
people

about

the use

might

be in

that the concept of the

of the multitude, Ranciere submits
the political,
name for the set ofprocesses
of subjectivainsofar as it is the generic
in dispute. Politics
involves
tion that place representations
of equality
always
The concept of the multitude,
however, rejects the
opposing one people to another.
negative, owing to the phobia that it manifests with respect to any negatively
that of the people insofar
as it emphasizes that
defined
politics. It is distinct
from
the
is
but
that
which
not
a
instead
existence,
expresses
separate sphere of
politics
the
in
is
as
the
Law
The
multitudes,
concept
fact, part of
multiple
of being.
of
forces. All the same, it cannot
long effort to enlarge the concept of the productive
avoid the alternatives that
questions
of
confronts when dealing with
thought
1)

political subjects.

an analysis of the conflict

Mesentente, you present
in terms
of the
the
hand,
community, constru\037d
in
with
which
and
roles
accordance
as
that
determines
places
police
on the other, the process of political subjectivation,
identities,
and,
construed
as that which opens 'singular worlds of communities',producesnew fields of experience involving 'floating
who disorder
subjects
every representation of placesand of roles', disrupts 'the homogeneity of
the sensible',etc.Far from expressing this conflict in the terms of plural
multitudes against
a united
people (Le. popular sovereignty reduced to its
call the 'egalitarian
you
representation),
you relate the people to what
trait'
constitutive
of political action, itself conceived as a 'local and)
Multitudes:

between, on the

84)))

In La
one

THE PEOPLE

of cases of universality'.
Beyond questions of
reflections are you inspiredby current
to tie in
attempts
with:
notion of the multitudes
(a) a 'phenomenological'

construction

singular

to what

writing,
the

biopolitical

description of the anti-globalization movements;and

determination of contemporary processesof rupture
world order?)

JR:

ORTHE MULTITUDES?)

(b)

an 'ontological'

with

the capitalist

or the multitudes? Before knowing

which
word
or
people
is
we
must
know
of
what
it
is
the
The
concept
preferable,
concept.
people,for me, is the name of a political subject,that is to say a supplein relation
ment
to all logics of counting
the population,
its parts and its
whole.
It implies a gap with
to every idea of the people as the
respect
in movement,
of parts of a population, a collective
an
body
gathering
...
ideal body incarnatedin -sovereignty,
it in the sense of
etc. I understand
the expression'weare the people'
used by the demonstrators in Leipzig
in October 1989, who were manifestly
not the people, but who enacted
its enunciation
and disrupted
its statist
embodiment.
The people in this
sense is a generic name
for the set of processes of subjectivation
that,
the egalitarian trait, dispute
the forms of visibility
of the common
enacting
and the identities, forms of belonging, partitions,
defined
etc.,
by these
forms. Such processes
have
been
names,
staged by all sorts of singular
consistent
and inconsistent, 'serious' and paradoxicalones.Furthermore,
of subjectivation
which
processes
stage politics as an artifice of equality,
is itself not a 'real' foundation,
since
it exists only as the enacted condition
of these dispositift of dispute. The interest
of the name 'the people',
asI seeit, lies in staging its ambiguity.
in this sense, is the enacted
Politics,
discrimination
of that
the
which, in the last instance, is placed under
name
of the people: either the operation of differentiation
which
institutes political collectives by enacting
or the
egalitarian
inconsistency
reduces
which
operation of identity
politics to the properties of the social
or the
Politics
body
fantasy of the glorious body of the community.
involves one people superaddedto another,
one people against
always
The

another.
This is perhapsthe point that the conception of the multitudes
rejects.
Access to this issue is no doubt
blocked
and
by the molar/molecular
paranoiac/schizophrenic oppositions.For the problem is not that the
of the One. The problemis
people is too molar, too ensnaredin fantasies
the people
that
of cases of division,)
only ever consists in the singularity
85)))

DISSENSUS)

that

is, that politics is

actionsand

utterances.

of the negative, of any

politics that is nothing
than

the

inconsistency

particular

sphere,

The concept of the

that defines
politics

an

organization

multitudes

manifests

itself 'against',

is founded
but political, that
of the egalitarian trait

and

but

of specific
a phobia
of any

also

on nothing other
the
hazardous

construction of its cases of effectivity. Before refusing

the
paranoid
of dualistic
the stance of the multitudes
is a stance
opposition,
unmarked
for a subjectof political
action
by separation, a 'communist'
in
the
that
it
sense
denies
the
or
subject
specificity of particular
dispositift
of
It
is
in
the
also
communist
sense
that
what
acts
spheres
subjectivation.
in it is the power of what
The concept of
brings
beings to be in common.
the multitudes
to that of the people the communist
opposes
injunction:
does not consist in a separate
is
politics
sphere, because everything
which is to say, in fact, that politics expresses the nature of
political,
the nature
of the inseparate; in other
for the concept
words,
everything,
of the multitudes
the community
has to be groundedin the very nature
in general in
of being in common,
in the power which
places
beings
structure

community.
is distinct
from that of the people, it
concept of the multitudes
to an ontological claim that
substantializes
the egalitarian
reactive
presupposition: in order not to constitute itself in oppositional,
from
and telosof politics has to be drawn
terms, it holds that the principle
the mulother than itself. Political subjects ought
to express
something
is the very law of being. In this
the
sense,
tiple insofar as the multiple
of
multitudes
is
of
the
tradition
of
the
concept
part
political philosophy,
since
it resides in an attempt to reduce political exceptionalityto the
More
it is
of that which places beingsin community.
principle
precisely,
to political
part of the metapolitical tradition
proper
philosophy's
of metapolitics
lies in the fact that it summodern age. The specificity
of the political scene before the truth
of the
mons the precariousartifices
immanent power which
places
beings in community; in its identification
the sensory
of the true community with
and situated effectivity
of that
truth. The metapolitical paradox residesin its identifying
the common
power with the truth of the unwilled truth of the community, with the
of Being. According to modern metapolitics,to desire
involuntary
being
with
the 'unwilled' insofar as it
is
do
so in conformity
community
the question
is to
the very ground of Being. For me, however,
comprises
know whether that which 'grounds'
politics is, in fact, not also the thing)

If the

is

86)))

owing

THE PEOPLE OR THE MULTITUDES?)

that

it impossible. Ontology, by contrast,

is ethics: to will
the
of the Nietzschean
and

renders

whose real name

proclamation par excellence
of action
eternal
what

return,
has

been,

a proclamation which,
by affirming
insists on an ethics of becomingin

of multiple assemblages is

contrastedagainst

the

a modality
This is the

requires
unwilled.

Deleuzian ethicsof the

chance and choosing
which

either..

.and...

the and..

.or... of

active

goals in opposition to other goals.

But
for multiple
be comings to be substantialized
as multitudes,
somein
elseis
cannot
consist
affirmation
affirmation;
thing
required.Being
only
must
be identified as the immanent content of all negation.
The deployment of unwilled
must not be left to chance
connections
and their
Being
counter-effectuations; it must be inhabited by an immanent teleology.
'Multitudes'
is the name for this
of superabundant
power
being identified
with
the essence of the 'community, one which,
of its superby virtue
wills

their

pursuing

abundance, is endowedwith the burden of blowing apart all barriers and

of accomplishing itself in the form of a perceptiblecommunity.
Dismissing
the negativity
of political subjects means that the power of affirmation
must become a power of disruption
or, in other words, the ultimate
content
with overcomlodged inside every state of domination
charged
the content of which
must
become
ing all separation. The 'multitudes'
is the container.
the Empire
In Marxist
the name for this
of disruptive
affirmation,
theory
power
for the

affirmative

and

productive forces. The

'productive'

final
name

and 'production'

power
has

of

that

a bad

which

is 'without

reputation. The

are regardedas suspiciousinsofar

will', is the
notions

of

as they

evoke the

allegedly bygoneage of the factory and the party, as well as an

that
misses
the collective power of
overly restrictive ethics of work
and life aimed at by the term
'multitudes'.
This difficulty
can be
thought
seen in many of the debates within
Multitudes.
the particular
However,
content ascribedto the concept of production matters little. The term is
indeed so broad that the domain
of the productive forces can have
at all to imported into
it, even laziness and refusal of work. The
anything
fundamental
issue
here is the determination of the power of being
in
common as production, in other words, the idea of production as a force
inhabited
essence.
The authors
by a teleology immanent to its affirmative
of Empire 2 appeal
to the 'plural multitude
of productive
and creative
to the
subjectivities of globalization', to their 'perpetual movement',
'constellations
of singularities' that they constitute,
to their 'processes of)
87)))

DISSENSUS)

and hybridization'

mixture

to any simple logic of

the a-systemic. But the space

reduction

resist

that

correspondencebetween the
accorded to the notion of

and

systemic

multiple
hybridizations counts less than
these
by the concept itself: that
productive
of the Empire, that the combats of the
assemblages constitute the reality
multitudes
are what
of its
'produce the Empire itself as the inversion
own image',3 in the way in which, once again, Feuerbachian man
constitutes
his god and then reclaims its attributes
in order to live a life
the

assurance

brought

that

is fully

human. The

according to which

the

system

The manifest

effectivity.

ideal' attests

essentialthing

affirmation
metapolitical
a truth
that has its own
to the notion of 'productive

is the

is endowed

with

reticence with regard

gap between the ontologicalconcept

to the

simply

of pro-

duction and its empirical

avatars.
This gap, through
the
consideration
of its aporia, is also that
which
the 'productivist'
In this
affirmation.
opens up a space for reformulating
the concept of 'multitudes' belongsto the great work that stamped
sense,
Marxist
movements
and theory
throughout the second half of the
twentieth
the
of the notion of 'productive force'.
century
broadening
Classical
Marxism
had a tendency to conceive of the productive forcesas
the
of the true able to dissipatethe shadows
of politics. Leninism
power
is the admission that such a view of things
it is the declared and
fails;
of executing
an archi-political act to push through
practisednecessity
the
work that was supposed to be performed
forces
by the productive

themselves. Thefailure
age
truth

to political

fatalism,

but

of procedures
and technical

at

integrating

that,

and

order.

type of
no

that

in

activity,

various

forms

ways,
of

intellectual
flight

the

at

contrasting

decision

third

economic

to

economic

concept of productive forcesthe set

create the common: from
scientific
from,

The revisionist theory of

the cultural revolution,

aimed

revolutionary

into the

or creative

archi-politics engenderedthe

longer

appearance, or

practices and all the

world

of this

the age

of Marxism,

student

activity

to political

in general,

or resistance to, the

'science = directproductive
revolution

and

existing

force'

operaism

all

count as diverseforms of this project, which the concept of the multitudes

is an attempt
to radicalize insofar as it assigns
a 'productive
force' to
form
that
acts
to
transform
a
of
state
of
that is,
affairs,
every
activity
inscribes the logic of the content that cannot
but cause the container to
blow apart. In this way, the metapolitical statement according to which
is political' is exactly identicalto the statement'
'everything
everything is)
88)))

THE PEOPLE OR THE MULTITUDES?)

and

economic',

also to the archi-political statement 'all

throw
is a
dice
throw', itself renderable as 'every

ultimately
a dice

emits

thought

productive force'.

So,with

multitudes, the role left for chance counts

with necessity, its anti-productivism
less than
- that is, at the
an inner opposition between Empire
into
end of the day, Capital - and the forces that it 'unleashes'.
The essential
- resides in
of
as
well
as
the
essential
of
strength
point
poin\037
fragility
less than
its integration

the

its

notion

of the

identification

scene. The theory

'imperial' scene as the unique
to measure up to an effectively globalized world in which the people is still clinging
to the nation-state. This
ambition is right so long as it does not forget that today - globalization
or otherwise - there
as many nation-states,
twice as many
ar\037 twice
there
were 50 years ago. It is right
military,
police, etc., apparatuses, than
so long as it does not subsume the phenomenon of massivepopulation
that result from the repressive power of those
nationdisplacements
states under the title of 'nomadism'.
nomadic
movements
that,
Exulting
of
'overflow
and
break
the
limits
measure'
and
create
'new
allegedly,
spaces',spacesdescribed
'by inhabitual
topologies, by rhizomes that are
in an enthusiastic
and impossible to contain', 4 enacts,
subterranean
was performed
in a compassionate mode
that
mode, the same operation
exhibited under the title of Exiles, which placed
by a style of photography,
in the city alongside inhabitants
Brazilian peasants looking for work
of
The nomadic movements
camps fleeing the genocide in Rwanda.
refugee
invoked as evidence
are
in
of the explosive
power of the multitudes
essence the movements of populationsthat have been forced to flee the
violence of nation -states and the dire misery
into
which
these failed
states had dragged them.
The
is just as
of the 'multitudes'
concept
identifications
as is that of the 'people'. This is
susceptibleto problematic
in times when
after
thrived
11, the questions which
September
why,
people liked to insist that 'the people', or 'the masses', had desired
the Twin Towers
were revived: did the Arab
crowds
fascism,
applauding
carnagein the name of Allah constitute an example of the 'multitudes'?
Are
all multitudes
The empirical
multitudes
'good' or 'true' multitudes?
once again seemed to emerge as the exact opposite of the 'affirmative'
essence of the multitude.
because
the occurrence of mass
Indeed,
between
continents
and the phenomenon of individuals
displacements
are not sufficient)
at the speed of the information
roaming
superhighway
the

affirmation

of the

multitudes

of this
is an

endeavour

89)))

DISSENSUS)

there is always
a point
at which affirmativeness is the
a
who come together to organize a demonstration,
refusal. This may be the symbolic
of demonstrators
that take a
gesture
stand
of the world's masters, gathering
because
against
meetings
together
face to the multiple different
forms
they feel the need to give a common
of refusal of this
control.
Or it may be the Parisian church in which
demonstrators
them to
go on hunger-strike to demandpapersto enable
work and have an identity
in France.
The authors of Empire
are the first
of unheard-of
to affirm
it: immediately
topogfollowing their exultation
a
'How
is
it
the
that
actions
of the multitude
arises;
raphies,
question
become
the
multitude
becomes political
political?'
By responding that
of Empire
'when it starts to confront the central, repressiveoperations
the authors respond in the
consciousness',
directly and with an adequate
first give as
most traditional
they
way. Furthermore, the slogan that
of 'global citizenship' is a claim lifted
testimony to that consciousness
in
from the sans-papiers movement (workers without
straight
papers)
France: papers for all.5 What better way is there to expressthat first and
foremost at stake in politics
are the lines of division defining
inclusions
Howand exclusions,
are operations that displace
forms of belonging.
in what follows: the authors of
resides
ever, the ambiguity
entirely
6
state
that demands for global citizenship are not unrealistic, since
Empire
the same legal and economic claims demanded by capitalist
are
they
be
internationalization
itself. This discordant accord, however,
can
understood
in two ways: first,
as the
political exhibition of the gap
between the 'internationalism' of production,as it is required by capitalist profit-making,
ensures
and the 'nationalism' of the state of law, which
the conditions of exploitation - that is, as the contradiction manifest in
of a unithe demands
of the world order; and, second,as the affirmation
is immanent
that
to the deployment of the Empire
'containing'
versality
The multitudes
the multitudes.
can be conceived
either as processesof
political
subjectivation,
giving rise to the problem of the sites and forms
of these processes; or, in meta political
fashion, as the very name for the
that
the
whole, whereupon there is a price to pay for
power
invigorates
will
of Being
that wills nothing.
it
with
some
unconscious
identifying
that every
of the multitudes does not escapethe alternatives
The concept
confronts.)
of
theory
political subjectivity
necessarily
in themselves:
affair

90)))

of

people

SIX

CHAPTER

Biopolitics

M: In

your

book

or Politics?!)

Mesen ten te,

L4 ...-

you

challenge

traditional

political

the false oppositionon which

are based
they
in Aristotle's Politics:
the
dualism
of voice (phone), as expressionof the
- a binary
and speech (logos),as expression
of the
useful,
just
according
to which animality
is divided from the outset. Beyond this opposition,
the veritable
site of the political as what
call dispute
you
identify
you
here
consists
(litige), or wrong. Wrong
precisely in the act of dismissing
the majority
of speaking beings into the vocal noise that is but the expression of pleasure and suffering.
If we have sought you in order
to think how the category of biopolitics
to
be put to use, it is because
the gesture you accomplish
seems
may
us to constitute a singular
to return politics to the life of subjects
attempt
and to take its concept
to this level of radicality.
Even
so, it is as if this
is straightaway held in check:
happens as though
gesture
everything
takes place in its entirety
in the gap that opens up between two
politics
forms
of life and in the dispute
produced by this same gap. So,placing
in your perspective, could it not be said that biopolitics continues
oneself
to be the
constitutive
'unthought' of politics itself?And to what extent
can this 'unthought'
be implemented
as such?)
problematics

JR:

by exposing

I did not 'return politicsto

I am
life of subjects' in the sense that
is not the
power of life. For me, politics
that stands in opposition
to
expression of an originary
living
subjectivity
- nor to
of derived, or
kind
another, originary mode of subjectivity
any
to the)
hijacked mode, as in the theories of alienation. In returning

to have shown

its

rootedness

the

in a

91)))

DISSENSUS)

definition
of the political animal, my obj ective was to
of politics:
that is, to question
question the anthropologicalfoundation
the attempt
to found
politics on the essence of a mode of life, on the
off again
via
idea of a bios politicos, an attempt that has recently taken
Leo Strauss
and Hannah Arendt). I
more modem references(essentially
contained a vicious circle:the 'test
wanted to show that this foundation
or the power of community
of beings
endowed with the
of humanity',
Aristotelian

from

far

logos,

founding

politicity, is

dispute separating politics

does not
police

do not

ble, to

two

fact

in

police.

stake of the
the permanent
However, this dispute itself

between

opposition

refer to such, but

ways

the

and
two modes of life. Politics
distributions of the sensior not seeing comof framing a sensory space,of seeing
or not hearing in it subjects
that designate
it, of hearing
an

involve

from

mon objectsin
them or reasonin

their

to two

instead

relation.

of the sensible in which

the effectuation
The police is that distribution
the effectuation
of
of the common of the community is identified with
- that characterize bodies
the properties - resemblancesand differences
and their modes of aggregation. It structures perceptual spacein terms
of places,
functions, aptitudes, etc., to
As far as politics is concerned, it consists
of acts that effectuate a supplementary

biologically and

beings. This

structurations

contrasting
bios (from
tion

flows);

world'.
different

Such

exists

in addition

of the common

any

supplement.

consists alone -

'property',

a property

in

the

set

that is

the equality of speaking

to every bios. There are two

world:one that

knows

only

of

regulation of populathrough
of equality,
that is, forms
and one that empowers artifices
the
common
of a 'given
which
political
subjects
re-figure
another
type of life but configure a
subjects do not affirm

transmission

enacted by

- and

unlocatable,

anthropologically

property

the exclusionof

bloodlines

to the

world-in-common.

event, the idea of the political subject,or of politics as a mode of

its characteristically
natural
life in which a singular living species unfolds
to what
Foucault examines: that
is,
disposition, cannot be assimilated
The Aristotelian
bodies
and populations as objects of power.
political
as a
animal is an animal
endowed
with politicity, one capable of acting
a
in
in
who
Aristotelian
terms,
action,
or,
partakes political
being
subject
in the power of the arkhe
as both
that
subject and object.
partakes
In Foucault's 'biopolitics',the body in question is the body as object
of)
it is localized in the police distribution
of
therefore,
and,
power
In any

92)))

OR POLITICS?)

BIOPOLITICS

bodies and their

difference

meansby

in

which

bodies and the

same as that
the

of

aggregations. Foucault presentsbiopolitics

of power and their effects, that

practices

effects

produces

power

the

through

socialization of populations.Now,

this

as

a specific

as a

to say
individualization
is,

of

is not the

question

The question of politics begins when the status

with
the community
able and ready to concern itself

of politics.

subject

becomes an issue.

was never interested

in this question,
not at
with
In La
was
concerned
any
power.
of 'biopower'
is introduced as a way of conconcept
ceptualizing power and its hold over life. It pays to recall that he presents
it in the context of a critique
of the thematics
of sexual repressionand
liberation.
Foucault's
aim was to counter a Freudo-Marxist
of
type
idea
of 'the politics of life' rests on
discourse, to show how:a certain
the
life and its
misrecognizing
way in which power is exercisedover
'liberation'.

It

is a

dispositifin

the

case. He

in

thing to

paradoxical

the

to assert

order

while

to me,

it seems

Foucault,

a theoretical level
volonte de savoir the

concept

fused. Indeed Foucault

used

polemical
Furthermore,
is conbiopolitics

of politics.

seems sound, that of

term biopolitics to designate things
call the police. It does not help to say

of biopower
uses
the

in the space that I

the terms biopolitics and

are situated
he

Foucault's

to invert

want

rootedness

vitalist

biopowerinterchangeably,

the

that
that

point

is

of
that his conception of politics is constructed around
the
question
drawn
to the question of political
power, that he was never
theoretically

subjectivation.
the

Today,

directions.
of thinking,

is a type of thinking
of sovereignty,

of these

identification

Both these
and are in

any

that

tying the

biopower onto an

two terms

directions,I believe,

are

proceedsin
foreign

to mine. On the one

out biopower as a mode of

case foreign
singles

question of politicsto

that

two

opposite

to Foucault's

of power

hand,
the

way

there

exercise

by dragging

terrain:
this happens in the
for example, when he explains
to us that the exterto life
mination
of Europe's
Jews was a consequenceof the relation
in
is
the
of
The
effect
to
take
Foucault
closer
implicit
concept
sovereignty.
via
of
and
to a Heideggerian
a
the
sacred
position
mediating image
is
la
That
had
a
for
such
notions
a
Bataille.
Foucault
taste
sovereignty
obvious, but he never directly identified the concept of sovereignty with
that
of the power over life, nor did he conceive
of modern
racism in
terms of the relation between sovereignty and bare life, but instead)
work

onto-theologico-political

of Agamben,

93)))

DISSENSUS)

terms

in

of a

power that

by an

Heideggerian- problematic

Arendtian

of modes

to enhancing life. Agamben's

- or in the last instance

of living,

which seems to

me to

be

to Foucault's.
there is a way

different

very

itself

applies

is underpinned

theorization

On the other,
of thinking
that endeavours to endow the
notion of 'biopolitics'with positive
At a first level, the will has
content.
arisen to definethe modes of care and the subjective relation to the body,
health and sickness,in opposition
to the state management of the body
and health; this, notably,
can be seen in the struggles
over
of
questions
and
AIDS.
At
a
the
second
there
is
to
an
idea
level,
drugs
attempt
ground
of biopolitics in an ontology of life, itself
identified
with a certain radicalof self-affirmation.
This radicality of self-affirmation stems from
the
ity
Marxism

with the Grundrisse,

and then rejuvenated thein Deleuzian
vitalism. In my view, it amounts
to an attempt to
oretically
the
of
with
that
of the forms of
identify
question
political subjectivation
and
collective
For
I
individuation.
do
not
believethat
personal
my part,
an ontology
of individuation
is of any use for the theorization of political
subjects.)
tradition

of anthropological

before being saucedup

M: In LaMesentente,
from

you

via a

politics

that

began

in operaism

politically

present

your definition of the

reference to the genealogyof

the

police as distinct

police

outlined

by

Foucault in Omnes et Singulatim, where it is defined as that which

applies
to all that concerns man
and his happiness.
But what do you make of the
fact that, in Foucault's
eyes, the police constitutes only a single aspect of
the form of power that is exercised
over the life of populations and
individuals?)

in

in my reference to Foucault
seems to have been an ambiguity
in which I define the policeas a form
of the distribution

There

JR:

La Mesentente,

characterizedby the imaginary

of places,
adequation
ways of being, by the absence of void and of supplement.
of the police, elaborated in the context
of a polemic over

of the sensible
functions
This

and
definition

the question of

in the 1980s, is entirely

of
independent
of the question of biopolitics.In presenting
it,
it both from the usual associations of the police
and from the Foucauldian problematicof
apparatus

'identity'

Foucault's
elaboration
I took care to distinguish

94)))

with

a repressive

the

disciplinarization

of bodies

- of 'surveillancesociety'.In this

precise)

OR POLITICS?)

BIOPOLITICS

context,

I thought

it

to recall

useful

that,

in

Foucault's

work,

too, the

far broader
than that implied by notions
question of the policeis actually
of the repressive apparatus or the disciplinarization
of bodies.
This same word 'police' clearlyrefers
to two very different theoretical
edifices.In Omnes et Singulatim, Foucault conceives of the police as an
institutional

bodies;
but

apparatus

while,

that participates

for me, the

a distribution

define strategiesand

of the

in

policedesignates
sensible

techniques

within

over

power's

control

not

an institution

which

it becomes

life

and

of power
possible to

of power.)

In Foucault's rendering of biopoliticsin the La volonte de savoir as a

a 'power over
of sover\037ign power, as the transition
from
death'
to a 'power as the administration
of life', the emergence
life
and
of the socialas the new' space of the political plays a major role. The
of the welfare state, more recently
named
Foucauldian
interpretations
Etienne
Balibar
and
Robert
the
national-social
state, have
Castel)
by
(by
honed in on exactly this point. For you, too, the social is the fundamental theme
of a transformation. What you refer to as 'police
incorporation'
is precisely
the effectuation of the political subject as a social
Is it
body.
possible, according to you, to short-circuitthat incorporation
by restoron the social? Is it possible
to bring a political
ing another viewpoint
of reduction?
viewpoint to bear on the social that escapes this kind
its Foucauldian
And - albeit at the priceof inverting
usage - is the name
a suitable one for designating
that
intention?)
biopolitics
M:

transformation

In Foucault's work,
the social is the object of a concern
of
(souci)
this
transformed
the
classical
f
orm
of
concern
of
Foucault
(fear
power.
the working/dangerous masses)into another:
the positive investment by
in the administration of life and the production of optimal
forms
power
This preoccupation can no doubt
be inscribed
in a
of individuation.
theorization of the social State. But the state does not constitute the
or a
of power
object of my study. For me, the social is not a concern
and
between
production of power. It is the stake of a division
politics
a
of
It
is
not
a
univocal
field
relations
of
police.
producthereby
object
tion or of power - that could be circumscribed.
The word 'social' can
mean
at least three things. First,
it can mean 'society', that
is, the set of
that the police logic identifies with
the
groups, places and functions
are implicated
whole
of the community. Insofar as they
in the notion of)
JR:

95)))

DISSENSUS)

of life, of populations
the preoccupations of the administration
this
and of productions of forms of individuation
are inserted in precisely
of the social as polemical dispositi{
There is also a notion
framework.
of subjectivation,
constructed
by subjects who rise up to contest the
counted what I call
'naturalness'
of these places and functions
by having
of
the part of those without
part.
Lastly, there is the social qua invention
or
less
hidden
modern metapolitics: that
the
social
as
the
more
is,
is conceived
in the manner of Marx
whether this truth
truth
of politics,
or of :Emile Durkheim, of de Tocqueville or of PierreBourdieu.
of these
three
interests
me is the opposition and intertwining
What
it seems
to me, is not obliged to pass via a
figures. This intertwining,
of life and the question of its modes
of regulation.
To say it
theory
of
I do not believe that
is it possible to extract from
the
notion
again,
that
a form of preoccupation and mode of
biopower - a term
designates
as a specific mode of political
of biopolitics
exercise
of power - a notion

biopower,

subjectivation.)

96)))

CHAPTER

SEVEN

September

11 and

Symbolic

Afterwards:

Rupture

in the

Order?!)

DoesSeptember11mark

a symbolic
rupture in our history? The answer
clearly depends on two prior, interconnected
questions.
are we to understand by 'symbolic
And second, by
First, what
rupture'?
what
essential
feature are we to characterizethe events
of September
II?
The first question
can be formulated from two different
viewpoints.
to the first, we might call 'symbolic event' that which
befalls a
According
to

this

question

symbol. The questionof the symbolic, then, is raised from the viewpoint
ideal spectator of human
affairs
and can be stated as follows:
what
were towers such as these symbols
of? And what lesson does the collapse
of this
from this angle does not
symbolic
object afford us? Taking
things
the name of
get us far. That four-hundred-metre-hightowers
sporting
the world's financial
centre
in general
were a symbol of human hubris
and of one nation's desirefor world
domination
in particular, and that
their
of that
destruction
greed and the
aptly allegorizes the vanity
- this is clearly not a major discovery.
of that hegemony
fragility
Sothe question of the symbolic event must be approached from another
a symbolic
event is the name for any event that strikes
angle. Accordingly,
a blow to the existing
of relations between the symbolic and the
regime
real.It is an event that the existing
modes
of symbolization
are incapable
of apprehending,and which therefore reveals a fissure in the relation of
the real to the symbolic. This may be the event of an unsymbolizable real
or, conversely, that of the return of the foreclosed symbolic. From this
11' is more than a designation
for the successof a terangle, 'September
rorist
act and the collapse of the towers.The decisive
point for identifying)
of an

97)))

DISSENSUS)

of a rupture
becomes
one of the event's reception, that
is,
and of those charged with
its
uttering
ability of those it affected
and
media
to
(the American government
significance
conglomerates)
ensure its symbolic
A symbolic rupture
can thus be said to have
capture.
taken placeon the day in question if this capacity for symbolization was
the occurrence

the

deficient.
I could not

The

attack

to be

did,

never been

sure,

of factors

a combination

involve

seen previously,

its

including:

high -level of

destruction; and the exemplarity of its

of material

power

place on September11.

anything of the sort took

see that

that had
its

visibility;

But

target.

for

collapse of the towersand the gruesome deaths of thousands

the effraction of anon -symbolizable
real.
of innocents does not indicate
If anything
was thrown
into question by the success of the terrorist
attacks, it was perhaps the capabilities of the American secret services
more profoundly, the clear-sightedness of long-standing
somewhat
and,
'realist'policiesthat furnish Islamist movements in the Middle East with
all that the

and

support

was the

ability

But

weapons.
to

register

American togethernessand
everything
transpired
bolic reaction to the

foresee and prevent

itself

this

by no

was

what

the event

as

if

of the
the

through

state of the

its

On

realization.

spectre

had

contained

proportional

in

question

of

symbolization

world. On the

of vivacity

power

into

thrown

a certain

event was inversely

inconceivable

means

in

to the

contrary,
this

sym-

capacity to

the morning of September 11

been exorcized. Way
already

fact

even possible to count the numbers of dead and survivors,

terwas
known for sure and repeatedpractically
everywhere:
thing
rorists had tried to undermine America's foundations,
but their
attempt
was doomed to failure
because
the towers were the mere figuration
of
the American people.
that 'United We Stand' attitude
that
characterizes
In Union
was
made to represent the
a drawing on the ground
Square,
before

it was

one

'true' and indestructible towers, consisting

of

hundreds

of American

another to replace the glass and steel

seen as immediately identical to
towers
and those who perished in them,
exultations of collective being-together.On the evening of the same day,
had
the
president
already had the words on hand to capture what
of
evil
had
forces
of
forces
attacked
the
good.
happened:
of the real find
deficient.
the symbolic
So, by no stretch did any grain
in the real - that
But neither did the symbolic return
is, take its revenge
- as some had claimed.
that
the West was)
on Western
realism
Fancying
bodies

98)))

standing

on

top

of one

SEPTEMBER

11 AND

AFTERWARDS)

for neglecting the exigencies of the symbolic order,some

symbolic had returned in the real. Allegedly, the West
argued
men
out
for having entertained the crazy idea that
had been caught
of human
existence as they
could alter the foundational
relationships
the difference
and
the symbolic order of birth
death;
pleased:
namely,
and the relationship of man
between the sexes, kinship
and
alliance;
from the other world,
to some foundational
Representatives
alterity.
punished

being

that

of

that
of

that

the

symbolic

tradition,

paid us a

visit,

as

it were,

to recall the

cost

folly.

This argument,

September 11 attacks
attackers were hardly

The target of the

levels.
And the
the West but American
power.
voice of a repressed unconscious. They were

however, collapsesdistinct
was
the

not

networks linked to U.S.-alliednations

which
had been busy instrumentalizwas found
wanting on September 11
ing them
only shortly before. What
alliance.
It was the
of
and
was
not
the Western
(dis)order
kinship
that
the
of
in
order
constitutive
symbolic
general
defining
humanity
this
It
the
of
of
a
national
was
community.
ability
being-together
its traditional
to utilize
symbolical points of reference, to
community
its
framework
in which it represents
the
integrate the event within
and to the Other. On this point,
no rupture
to others
relation to itself,
of a gap between the real of American
occurred; there wasno revelation
exists
life and the symbolic of the American people. Sucha gap
only for
those who pretend that the United States is no more than the country of
in fact,
materialistic objectivity, of fast food and the dollar. But what
this,
bearsa
even
subdivision
of
the
dollar
double
is
that
the
smallest
forgets
of the multiple and
one written in Latin about the constitution
inscription:
another in English about divine election. No symbolic rupture
occurred;
on the contrary, what
revealed
itself in large letters were the prevailing
of the togetherness
and tendencially
hegemonic modes of symbolization
them.
of our communities and the conflicts facing
as
From the beginning, the American government
accepted,
positing
of its attackers. It accepted
to characterits own axiom, the very principle
and ethnic terms as a combat
between
ize the conflict in religious
good
is as everlasting
as the opposition
and evil, and therefore as one that
between them. Europe's
great minds might ascribe this characterization
of events to the irrepressible naivety
of the American
people. However,
the supposednaivety
of official
American discourse conveys the present)
executors

that

had

working

turned

for paramilitary

against the

nation

99)))

DISSENSUS)

state
level
replaced

has come to replace it. At

of politics perfectly, or rather of what
of symbolizing our political being-together, politics proper has
by

Censensus is not simply an

name of the national interest. It implies

consensus.

the

been

agreement between

an immepositing
constitution of the community and
of a population.
Consensus describes
the physical and moral constitution
as an entity that is naturally
unified
the community
by ethical values.
means 'dwelling' and 'way of being' beforeit refers to a
we know,
Ethos,
between
a way of being, a sysdomain of moral values.This agreement
values and a political co-belonging,is a common
tem
of shared
interpreconstitution.
The
tation - albeit not an exclusive one - of the American
show of support for GeorgeBush'spolicies
university
by 60 American
clear: more than a juridico-political
professors made this abundantly
united
the United
States is an ethical community
community,
by common religious and moral values. The Good founding
this community
resides preciselyin the agreement
between its moral principle and its
In official
it was precisely this
concrete
mode
of existence.
discourse,
that
was
identified
as
the
of
the
terrorists'
attack: they
target
agreement
leads
them to prohibit
hate
us, it is claimed, for the same reasons that
and love death. They hate freedom
so
freedom of thought,
veil women
is, they hate us because freedomis our
way of life,
very
they hate us, that
of our community.
the living breath
for the declaration
Yet,
'they hate us becausewe have the freedom of
opinion that we so please'to have any plausibility, at least some memfrom risof Congress would have had, on September21,to refrain
bers
a
in
unison.
Freedom
is
virtue
so
and
political
long as
ing up
applauding
a way of living, so long as it is a polemical
it is something other than
is animated
stake. It is only a virtue when a community
by the very conin their
it means, and when several freedoms clash
flict
over
what
and of assowhen freedom of thought
attempt to embody it, for instance
The question of the symbolic
freedom.
ciation clash with entrepreneurial
There
are two major ways of
in that very affair.
is played out entirely
it
sum of its parts, the
one
as
the
the
represents
symbolizing
community:
One conceives
other defines it as the division of its whole.
it as the
a
the
other
as
a
over
of
common
of
accomplishment
way
being,
polemic
I call the first police,
the second politics. Consensus is the
the common.
In this form
which
the
form
police.
by
politics is transformed into
the community
can be symbolized
exclusively as the compositionof the)
parties

diate

100)))

in the

identity

between

the

political

11 AND

SEPTEMBER

AFTERWARDS)

that
make
it up. Such is the
- at the limit of de symbolization - that
fun at
tends
to prevail in western Europe. Its advocateswillingly
poke
somehow
fancies
that God and the Good
American 'naivety', which
are involved
in the affair,
and
that identifies its own actions with
their
interests

mysterious
scepticism

groups and

of the

individuals

of symbolization

mode

minimal

But
workings.
that mocks it.

this

'naivety'

Because

what

advanced

is more
stands

in

the

than

opposition

to the

community of political division

interests.

Instead,

shared ethos, the

and the universality
of infinite

that

of
is not, of course, the sole community
it is the latter identified with
the
of
a
community
between
the
of
a
mode
of
being
identity
particularity
of the Good, between the principle of security and

justice.

This symbolization of.the

taneouslya symbolization
Bush defined this relation

community's

mode

relation to that
as 'infinite
precisely

of its

of togetherness
attacks
which

is simulit: George

justice'. This definition

- expression of a
art
of
nuance.
Nor
did
this
same
president inexperienced
president proclaim Bin Laden 'wanteddeador alive'
he had watched
because
In actual fact, what
too many westerns.
often
occurs in westerns is that
from the
the
sheriff
puts his body on the line to wrench the assassin
lynching mob and deliverhim to the justice system. By contrast to the
of justice
of westerns,
however, infinite justice implies a type
morality
all the categories which
without limits, one that disregards
traditionally
define its exercise: legal punishment
as opposed
to individual vengeance;
the juridical and the political by contrast
to the ethical and the religious;
are police
criminal proceedings,which
from
forms, as distinct
military
forms of conflict between armies.The expunging
of the forms of interof a
national
law
and the identification of war prisoners as members
criminal association have today thrown
all these
distinctions into question. The principle
of terrorist action is clearly containedin the very act
of expunging
insofar
as politics and law thereby become indistinitself,
'Infinite
however, is not merely a responseto a
guishable.
justice',
one necessitated by the nature
of that adversary.
terrorist
adversary,
of the
it
the
status
that
Instead, bespeaks
strange
today's
expunging
the
confers
on
laws
of
nations
and
that
between
them.
political
There is indeed a singular
here. Both the collapse of the Soviet
paradox
and the weakening
of socialmovements
in major Western countries
empire
were broadly seen and applauded
as a liquidation of the utopias of real)
was

not

the unfortunate
still

and

fortunately

corrected

in the

101)))

DISSENSUS)

in favour of the rules of the State of Right.

This simple
democracy
was
belied by outbreaks of ethnic
immediately
philosophy of history
in the domestic
situaconflict and religious fundamentalism. Further,
tions of Western powers and their modes of foreign intervention, the
in line with a tendency
relationship between law and fact have evolved
In France
in
which
the boundaries
of law are increasingly
expunged.
have
become
on the
itself, specific phenomena
prominent:
increasingly
of rights
has by virtue of
as that which
one
one hand, an interpretation
aim
on the other, legislative practices that
belonging to a specificgroup;
at matching
the letter of the law with each of the new modes of life and social relationwith
the new forms of work, technologies, the family
is constituted
in the
ships. As a result, the space of politics - which
over its interpretaabstract literariness of the law and through
polemics
came to
tions - has shrunken
So, the law that
accordingly.
increasingly
a particular
out to be about registering
be celebrated turned
community's
of the law's power, limits
and
A political
symbolization
way of living.
in terms of ethics: a
a symbolization
was replaced with
ambivalences
of
of consensual
between the factual
status
expression
relationship
society and the norm of the law.
the rest of the world
This operationobviously
a remainder:
produces
of individuals
and peoples that fall outside of this happy
or the multitude
of the boundaries
between fact and
circle of fact and law. The blurring
and inverse to
law here also takes on another
complementary
figure,
humanitarian
and of
the figure
of the
that
of consensual
harmony:
interference'
The 'right of humanitarian
'humanitarian
interference'.
of ex-Yugoslavia
may have enabled the protection of some populations
But
the
cost
of this act was a
from an undertaking
of ethnic
liquidation.
of symbolic
boundaries
and those betweenstates.
simultaneous blurring
of interenshrine the collapse of a structuring
It did not merely
principle
a principle of undeniably
national law - that of non-interference,
equivin a principle of limitlessness that
ocal values - above all, it ushered
the very idea of law.
destroys
- more or
At the
time of the Vietnam war there existedan opposition
- between
less explicit or latent
the lofty principles
by
promulgated
them to
Western powers and the practicesby which they subordinated
vital interests. Throughout the 1960s and 70s, anti-imperialist
their
own
the discrepancy between founding
mobilized
to denounce
forces
and actual practice. But today the polemic bearing on the)
principles
102)))

11 AND

SEPTEMBER

AFTERWARDS)

between
and actual practice seems to have
principles
The principle of this vanishing
is the representation
of the
the victim
absolute victim,
of infinite evil which
infinite
retribuobliges
tion. Forged in the setting of 'humanitarian'
war, the notion of the
'absolute' right of the victim was then seconded by the broad intellectual
contradiction

vanished.

movement

the notion of

to examine

We need

calledthe
resolve of

more thoroughly

and

entrenched

forged in

ot:

are-tracing

through

took on a

the Jews,

in their

facts

and

struggle

against

balance sheet of communism,

the processes involved in
different

totally

Nazi

the

genocide.

a still

and

These

meaning.

could be
the

strengthen

second

The

totalitarianism.

as a

of what

specificity

crimes and the

aimed to establishthe

threatening

1970s

the

the

of Soviet

democracies

Western

a century,

crime.

infinite

denunciation

'second'

first denunciation

The

itself, over the last quarter of

committed

has

which

to theorizing

firmly

denunciation,
in the 1980s

extermination

of

crimes were

no

monstrous effectsof regimes to combat, but

crime,
manifesting
unthinkably and irredeemably - infinite
as the work of a power of Evil exceeding
all juridical and political measure. Ethics became a way to conceive the unthinkably
and irredeemably
viewed

longer

as the

merely

an -

as forms

evil that cuts history

irremediably
The upshot has been the constitution
for
the victim of infinite
Evil.
right
infinite

absolute right

thereby

The unlimited

nature of the

two.

into
of an
Whoever

absolute, extra-juridical
inherits
the victim's

of

the defender

becomes

wrong

absolute

that

right.

by a victim justifies the

This process was brought
to
for the absolute
crime com-

suffered

right of its defender.

the
American
retribution
completion
by
mitted
American
lives.
The obligation of providing assistance
against
to the victims
of absolute
Evil thereby came to be identified
with
the deployment
of an unbounded military
as a
power,
functioning
is to establish
order wherever Evil might
police force whosemission
of the

unlimitedness

seek

shelter.

Infinite

right,

we

is identical
the circle of 'infinite

know,

fall within

prits

alike

total

juridical

indetermination

qualification

of the

the

discourse

interference
in
the latter,

sanctify

practice,

the

rule

in the

international

of right/law,

indistinctness

Victims

non-right.

justice',

impacting the
facts brought against

and the

of consensus

with

status

expressed
of war
If both

them.
discourse

it is

only

of ethics,

and cul-

today by the
prisoners and

the

national

of humanitarian

in order
to shroud
whose ultimate mode)

103)))

DISSENSUS)

of manifestation,

speaking, is

literally

of

that

an

unbounded

military

superpower.

September 11 did not mark any rupture in the symbolic order. It

to light the new dominant
form
of symbolizing
the Same and
the Other that has been imposed under the conditions of the new world

brought

(dis)order.

The most

of politics;

it

is the

distinctive feature of that

eclipse of an

is the

symbolization

that

identity

is inclusive

of

eclipse

alterity,

an

While reliidentity
through polemicizing over the common.
and
a
ethnic
this
to
radical
gious
powers subject
identity
negation, consensual states hollow it out from the inside. This symbolization
also
entails
a growing indetermination of the juridical, whereby facts
are
identified
either via the direct route of consensus
or via the indirect one

constituted

of

and

consensus

humanitarian

political symbolization is

the war

A juridico-

terrorism.

against

replaced

being

slowly

by an

ethico-police sym-

bolization of the life of so-called democratic communities and their

relations with a separate world identified as the exclusivereign of ethnic
and fundamentalist powers. On the one hand, the world of Good: that of
the consensus that eliminates political dispute by the happy harmonizing
of right and fact, of ways of being and values. On the other, the world of
Evil

in

through

is
by contrast, wrong
a war to the death. If a symbolic

which,

been accomplished.To
way

of eliminating

states and of
terrorism,

104)))

reinforcing

of Good

all political
the

only

occurred,

on September

reflection on

scenario
Evil.)

and can

rupture

to date it

want

against

infinitized

the

of civilization's

be

it had

enacted

already

11 is ultimately

practices

infinite

of Western

war

against

EIGHT

CHAPTER

as the Supreme Formof Advanced

Of War

Consensus)

Plutocratic

war testifies to a
the Anglo-American
of our advanced societies.It is more difficult,
this
the reason for which
is simple.
however, to identify
novelty,
of historical
Our idea of the new, forged by the progressist
conception
movement, asserts not only that the new is new but that all novelties
walk hand-in-hand with one another. The claim is thus made that more
modern forms of the exerciseof power are emerging in line with technoand the global reach of Capital:these forms
are
logical advancements
and imperceptible;
are mobile and invisible
more are increasingly diluted
and
like
the flows of communication; are brokered like commodities
is general
their painless effects via a mode of life to which
there
exercise
call this the invisible
consent. People, dependingon their
bent,
global
of capital, triumphant mass democracyor soft totalitarianism.
government
All these names purport
is far
to point
to a form of government
that
for right and civilization,
to
removed from military
hymns
campaigns
are
we
to
God and the flag or the lies of state propaganda.How,
then,
There is

general agreement that

in the

novelty

government

conceive of this
we

sophisticationand
Let's begin

concoctedto
simply

between

this

coarse
the

with

fabricate

mass destruction

was not

so strangely resembles the old? How

are
of
weaponry
great technological
gap
forms of opinion manipulation?
blatant
most
fact: the enormity of the lies
which

novelty,

to conceive of

the

able to
enormous.

simply incredulous.

So,in

image

of an Iraq

Western

strike

To anyone with
to enforce it,

order

endowed with

weapons

of

an hour. The lie

sense, it was
slightest

within

nations
the

recourse was had

to an old)

105)))

DISSENSUS)

of propaganda.

principle

pushedbeyond

To enforce the
'the bigger

all probability:

the lie, it had to be

more it'll be believed'.
by belief. The very thing
of totalitarian
regimes, today
of

reality
it

is, the

This is perfectly suited to a regime

underpinned
that
was claimed to be the defining
feature
of a democracy
appears perfectly well suited to the government
inspired
the
Christian
by
religion. The question remains as to why this government had need of it, as to why it was necessary to imposethe improbable
to create
consent in order to
reality of this lie. The reasonwas apparently
war.
But
start
a
war
if
the
was
known
not to be real?
wage
why
danger
Out
of anticipation?
Due to possibly exaggerated feelings of insecurity? It
to invert the terms of the problem.Imagined
seems
of
necessary
feelings
insecurity did not necessitate the war; instead the war was necessary to
The management
of insecurity
is the most
impose feelings of insecurity.
of our consensual states/societies.
appropriatemode of functioning

Despitepronouncements
totalitarianism,

by

the irresistible

overflowing

firmly

in

the

heart

is to say the

thinkers

by
theoreticians
of

of the

of generalized
the multitudes,

of our extreme

modernity.

end of history,
those
of soft
simulacra and those of
the 'archaic' is lodged
Automatic

consensus,

harmonizing
daily negotiation of pleasures
with
the collective
is not the
brokerage of power and its re-distributions,
norm of the advanced capitalist
state.
This state does not indicate a
in matters of conflict, nor a divestment
level- headedness
of
greater
It does not self-destruct into the limitless
values.
freedom of informational
communication
or the 'polymerization'
of forms of individuality
that
corrode
the social bond. In those placeswhere commodities
reign
untrammelled,
namely
post-Reagan America and post-Thatcherite
the
form of consensus is one cemented
the
England,
optimal
through
fear of a societygroupedaround
the warrior
state.
The United
States'
conflict with' old Europe', then, is perhapsa conflict
between
two states of consensual government. In the placeswhere the
of social solidarity and protection are not
eroded,
systems
completely
in the national redistribution
and where governments still intervene
of
It
consensus is geared to its traditional
functions
of arbitration.
wealth,
a
mode
for
an
overall
between
conflictdesignates
representing
solidarity
interests.
This solidarity is said to operate against
the background
of the
ing
iron-clad
law
of
to
abandon
economic
us
necessity,
supposedly
compelling
the 'archaisms' of the social,progressively
and concertedly.
In the places
where this step has been taken, where the 'modest' state has rid itself of)

which

106)))

of

the

WAR AS

SUPREME FORM

OF PLUTOCRATIC CONSENSUS)

functions
of social intervention and gives free reign
to the sole law of
capital, consensus assumesits bald face. In its final form, the consensual
state is not a state of management, but a state reduced to the purity
of its
essence - the policestate. The community
of feeling that underpins this
and which the latter uses to good effect,
is the community
of fear.
state,
If some
of sovereignty,
great thinkers have made fear into the foundation
this is because it is the feeling that maximizes not only the identification
between individual and collective interestsbut which
also accomplishes
an identification
between
interests
and values. This identification
between
the notion of the community weldedtogether
to its
by threats
values
security and that of the community united by the fundamental
blessed
as we know,
was,
pertaining to a human
gathering
by divinity
in question.
The United
States
pushed to extremes on the occasion
threatened
federation
of white, black
by Iraqi weapons: that incredible
and Indian
some centuries ago, got together and
who,
populations
decided
to build a great community founded on the
mutual
respect
between races, religions and classes.
So, there are two types of consensual state and it may well be that,
to notions propagated by right-thinking
the most
contrary
progressivism,
advanced state is not that of the state arbitrating
to create
a balance
between social interests,
but
that
of the state managing insecurity.
the game that our governments play with the theme of insecurity
Besides,
and
the parties that they
should
to us.
be enough of a warning
exploit,
The new force of extremeright-wing
in Europe cannot be forever
parties
ascribedto the distressed reaction of classes in constant
slow down and
individuals.
The
twists
and
turns
of
the
2002 French
dis-empowered
at
least
us
in
election
assisted
the
central role
presidential
discerning
played by the theme of insecurity, as well as the allegedlymarginal
that exploit it, in the overall logic of consensus. 1 On the one hand,
parties
these partiesfoment
of insecurity, which the state then turns
to
feelings
its own advantage. On the other, the consensual state
these
paints
form of insecurity.
Consemarginal parties themselves as an additional
these
themselves,
marginal
parties end up working
quently,
against
of consensual
helping to promote today's sacred 'democratic' unions
who
are
thus
handed
the
means
to
their
government,
push through
of social consensus - that
of the forms
is, of the soft liquidation
policies
- which tomorrow will hand
of protection and socialsolidarity
them the
means to manage the consensusof fear.)
its

107)))

DISSENSUS)

a simple questionof fantasy,

the
down.
And
the
forms
of
smashing
rackets
and the other things
that
foment
our
violence,the extortion
do exist. Be that
as it may, the American
feelings of insecurity
really
in showing
that the prevention of real dangers
examplewas superlative
and
and the prevention of imaginary
are two very
violence,
insecurity,
it shows that the advanced
different
state is infinitely
Moreover,
things.
more
to tackling the latter than
the
former.
Once again, it is
adjusted
better
the
return
of archaisms
observed in
to discard the notion that
advanced
nations
and societies in recent
times are defensive reactions,
due to the dangers that they face in the form of the reactive attitudes
of
Not even
the more or less dis-empoweredpopulations
of the planet.
the number of sociologists and political
by
exponentially
increasing
scientiststhat use it to earn their crust can the theme of the desperation
of the backward and humiliated left behind
forever be
by modernity
to indicate
that the boundusedto mask the reality. First, there is nothing
the gap
less global development
of plutocratic
government will reduce
between the rich and the poor, the very thing said to pose a permanent
threat
to advanced
countries. Second, the preparations for September11
in
that
tie
show
international
capital and modern technology can
and destructive fanaticism. Third,
archaism'
perfectly well with religious'
and
the
media management of all kinds of dangers, risks
everyday
- not to mention the intel- from Islamism to heat waves
catastrophes
lectual tsunami
of discourses
about catastrophe and the ethics of the
unlimited
lesser evil, suffice to show that the topic of insecurity
has
resources. Insecurity is not a set of facts. It is a mode of management of
collectivelife; and one that is likely to persist even if our polities and
mode of life-in-common.
institutions end up agreeingon an acceptable
Were Iran to be invaded after Iraq, there would still be something like 60
nations.
Further'rogue states'left to threaten the security of plutocratic
that
threaten
our
are not the only things
more, weapons, as we know,
to imagine police-military operations,
security. It is not far-fetched
by enlightened
opinion, being launchedto topple
strenuously
supported
deemed
to
of setting off a climatic,
heedless
be
at risk
government
any
is
o
r
health
There
every chance that the famous
ecological
catastrophe.
used to justify the
the
advanced
and
the
between
backward,
gap
all the risks facing it, will
interventions
of the security police against
be indefinitely
re-opened by this same police.)
People will say: surely this fear
Twin Towers really were brought

108)))

is not

WAR AS

It would

forms of
mances

no doubt
managing

of this

self-regulating

SUPREME FORM

be hazardousto
Our

insecurity.

new utopia,

that

is, of

OF PLUTOCRATIC CONSENSUS)

the

prognosticate

planetary

capital. This is obviously

only

potential

future

mere dawn of perfor-

time is the

governance
a

manner

by

means

of

of speaking.

Indeed, no historical necessityobligesus to usher in its apotheosis. It is

all the more urgent
of the
therefore
for us to leave behind the falsefacts
and
to recognize the link
between
the
progressist conception of history
of plutocratic governand
the advances
'archaic' element of insecurity
of
ment. It is also crucial to identify
the
features of this mode
singular
A
in
the
few
indicators
can
be
found
above-mentioned
governance.
some
claim were exemplary of 'totalitarian'
episode of state lies, which
will continue
to exclaim that nothing
principles of propaganda.Others
in common exists between the United
States
of George
whatsoever
Bush and the Germany of Goebbels:opponents of the war freely
in
voiced
their
demonstrations
expressed their opinions and openly
is
But
such
indicates
the
which
correct.
public,
perfectly
precisely
singuin question with
of the situation
to the received opposirespect
larity
tions betweentotalitarianism
In actual fact, the situation
and democracy.
that
confronted
us was completely new; it was one in which the forms of
free expressionof modern
states were juxtaposed with
constitutional
totalitarian
states. Over
forms
of propaganda
associated with supposedly
the course of many
the dominant
television stations in the
months,
United
States pounded away,
and night, reiterating the verities of
day
official
discourse,
by a
telling us that the American nation was targeted
horrible threat in the form of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.They
this through
the mouth
of the president and
pounded
away, reiterating
his secretaries of state, through
those
of the majority representatives
and the 'opposition',and those of journalists and experts in all things.
did it 'freely',
these
since, as we know,
They pounded away and they
also
television
stations are independent of government, but actually
milieus
to which the governheavily dependent on the same financial
ment
is indentured.
It became abundantly
that for a television
clear
broadcasterto submit to the service of propagating states, it need not be
state-owned.
As
never
it became clear that the conflict between the parties
before,
that
the
of insecurity
and
state
lies is merely
management
govern
apparent and has an underlying substantial reality - their solidarity (the
and timid
at the Republican)
solitary
critiques directed by the Democrats
109)))

DISSENSUS)

against

the latter's lack of material

demonstrated its

concerned

administration
fight

Capital

insecurity).

for the
to be
ability

provision
perfect

able to assemble information

machines
to safeguarding the
geared
that
is
propaganda of state lies.This gave us a taste of the form of liberty
to be expected from
an information
system that is both protected from
the

constraints

the conjunction
Iraq, the United

of

serving

of state

the public and

power and

the

power

entirely

to

homogeneous

of wealth.

In

its

war

on

States's
forms
of state, its military
and its
apparatus
the high degree of integration
economic and media power all attained
that
direct
signals the plutocratic system's perfectionment.Giving
power
to the owners of media empires, something
with
experimented
being
in Italy, can be classifiedas one of the pioneering
forms of this very

same

system.

of
The originality
of the present
situation consists in the coexistence
a democratic
this capitalist apparatus of state propaganda and
public
Spain and Blair's England
gigantic
opinion. In Berlusconi's Italy, Aznar's
mass demonstrations
the
war. Even in the United States,
erupted against
of consensus
and the alignment of the so-called
despite the pressures
to the war were able to expressthemselves
liberal press,opponents
freely
in the streets. Even the most enraged presenter of Fox News had to
concede that the first amendment of the Federal Constitution
disbarred
of having
one from sacking the professor at ColombiaUniversity
guilty
said that all serious opponents
to the war should hope for an Iraqi
in his face would suffice, he concluded.The
official
victory.
Spitting
of information/opinion
can tolerate, alongsideit, a realm of free
system
this is so
expression regarded as completely
contemptible.
Apparently
of
even when at stake is not simply the personal and debatableopinion
nations were
an individual
but a mass movement.
Allied
European
from
the straight
thanked
by President Bush for not straying
strenuously
and narrow in the face of their publics' expressions of opposition.
it is no doubt
a moment on the co-existence
worth
reflecting
By contrast,
it pessimistically
as a
of these
of opinion.
Some will interpret
systems
that
democratic
the occasion
opinion is worthless. On the contrary,
sign
that the duality
to recall
presents itself as a chance
by no means of
but
the
of
of
public opinion, is what
governmental
parties
systems
of government
democratic
from
the
normal
forms
politics
by
separates
wealth. The normal tendencyof these oligarchic governments,
to which,)

110)))

WAR AS

by

way

of a

confusion between the

politics, one gives

communication
state,

military

SUPREME FORM

the

name'

forms

democracies',

and mass consumption.It

and media powers. A serious

pace the progressistfaith

OF PLUTOCRATIC CONSENSUS)

of

state

is not the

and the
egalitarian

forms of
reign

of

of capitalist,
integration
democratic
movement
must,

is the

in the homogeneity
of its
full cognizance of what
its forms from the
separates
form
of liberty from the freedom of commodities.)

developments,

take

forms of state and its

111)))

PART

The

II

Politics

of Aesthetics)))

CHAPTER NINE

TheAesthetic

Revolution

and

Its

Outcomes)

At the end of the fifteenth

of his ()ber die asthetische
des Menschen 1
Erziehung
He
Schiller
states a paradox and makes a promise.
declares
that 'Man is
human
when he plays', and assuresus that this paradox
only
completely
is capable 'of bearing the whole edifice
of the art of the beautiful
and
of the still more difficult
art of living'. We could reformulate this
thought
as follows: there exists a specific
that holds the
experience
sensory
of
for individuals
both
a
new
world
of
Art
and
a
new
life
promise
and the community,
the
There
are
different
aesthetic.
namely
ways of comwith
to
terms
this
statement
and
this
It
ing
promise.
might be said that
as
a
define'
aesthetic
illusion'
device
serving
they
virtually
merely to mask
the reality
that
aesthetic
is structured
judgement
by class domination.
This is not the most productive approach,in my view. Conversely, it might
and the promise were only too true, that we
be said that the statement
have experiencedthe reality of that 'art of living'
and
of that 'play' as
in totalitarian
much
attempts at making the community into a work of art
as in the everyday aestheticized life of a liberal society and its commercial
is the
entertainment.
Caricatural as it may appear, I believe this attitude
the statement
more pertinent. Neither
nor the promise were ineffectual.
We are dealing not with
the 'influence'
of a thinker, but with the efficacy
of a plot, one that reframes
the division of the forms of our experience.)
OF

EMPLOTMENTS

This

in

plot

modes

has taken

AUTONOMY

AND HETERONOMY)

discourses
shape in theoretical
perception and in social

of individual

and in practical attitudes,

- museums,)
institutions
115)))

DISSENSUS)

inventions
as well.
programmes; and in commercial
the principle of its efficacy,
and of its
mutations.
How can the notion of 'aesthetics' as
a specific experience
lead at once to the idea of a pure world
of art and
of the self-suppression of art in life, to the tradition
of avant-garde
In a sense,
radicalism and to the aestheticization of commonexistence?
the
whole
lies in a very small proposition.Schiller
that
problem
says
aesthetic experience will bear the edifice of the art of the beautiful and of
the art of living. The entire question of the 'politics of aesthetics'- in other
The
of the aesthetic regime of art - turns on this short conjunction.
words,
as it is the experience of that
aesthetic experience is effectiveinasmuch
It grounds the autonomy of art, to the extent that it connects
it to
and.
the hope of 'changing life'. Matters
would
be easy if we could merely
- that the beauties of art must be subtracted from
say - naively
any
politi- that the
or
of art disguises its
cization,
knowingly
alleged autonomy
this is not the case: Schiller
dependence upon domination. Unfortunately
- will reconstruct both the edifice of
that
the
drive'
Spieltrieb
says
'play
art
and the edifice of life.
Militant
workers
of the 1840s broke out of the circleof domination
by
- not
but
popular and militant
reading and writing
'high' literature.
The bourgeoiscritics of the 1860s denounced Flaubert's posture of 'art
wanted
to
for art's sake' as the embodiment of democracy.Mallarme
from common
speech, yet
separate the 'essential language' of poetry
claimed that poetry gives the community the 'seal' it lacks. Rodchenko
from an overhead
took photographs of Soviet workers and gymnasts
in
to construct
the
their
bodies
and
movements
order
angle, squashing
of
art
and
life.
Adorno
said
that
art
surface of an egalitarian
equivalence
must be entirely
the better to make the stain
of the
self-contained,
art. Lyotard
unconscious
appear and denounce the lie of autonomized
task was to isolate art from cultural
contended that the avant-garde's
to the heteronomy
of
demand so that it can testify all the more starkly
All of these positions
The
list can be extended ad infinitum.
thought.
reveal the same basic emplotment
of an and, the same knot
binding
and
heteronomy.
together
autonomy
To understand
the
proper to the aesthetic regimeof art is to
'politics'
in
the
that
and heteronomy are originally
linked
way
grasp
autonomy
Schiller's formula. 2 This may be summed up in three
First, the
points.
autonomy stagedby the aesthetic regime of art is not that of the work of)
libraries,

educational

My aim is to try to
various and antithetical

116)))

understand

THE AESTHETIC REVOLUTION

AND ITS OUTCOMES)

is one
but of a mode of experience. Second,the 'aesthetic
experience'
it is also
of heterogeneity, such that, for the subject of that experience,
the dismissal of a certain
Third, the object of that
experience
autonomy.
is 'aesthetic',
insofar as it is not, or at least not only, art. Such is the
threefold relation that Schiller sets up in what can be called the' original
scene' of aesthetics.)
art

SENSORIUMOFTHE

GODDESS)

he places himself and his readers in

end of the fifteenth
letter,
known
as the
specimen of 'free appearance',a Greek statue
The statue
is 'self-contained', and 'dwells in itself', as befits
Juno Ludovisi.
the traits of the divinity: her 'idleness', her distance
from
any care or duty,
wears
no
from
she
any purpose or volition. The goddessis such because
of the goddess are those of
trace of will or aim. Obviously, the qualities
the statue as well. The statue thus comes paradoxically to figure what
was never
an object of will. In other words: it
has not been made, what
embodies the qualities of what is not a work of art. (We should note in
of art, 'this
that formulas of the type 'this is' or 'thisisnot' a work
passing
is' or 'this is not a pipe',have to be traced back to this originary
scene, if
more
than hackneyed
we want to make of them
jokes.)
the free play of the
Correspondingly, the spectatorwho experiences
of a very
aesthetic in front of the 'free appearance' enjoysan autonomy
the
of
kind.
It
is
the
free
not
Reason,subduing
autonomy
anarchy
special
It is an
of sensation.
It is the suspension of that kind of autonomy.
of
The
'free
related
to
a
withdrawal
power.
appearautonomy strictly
in front of us, unapproachable, unavailable to our knowlance'
stands
edge, our aims and desires. The subject is promised the possessionof a
he cannot possess in any way. The goddess
new world by this figure
that
and the spectator, the free play and the free appearance, are caught
up together in a specific sensorium, cancelling the oppositions of activand the
will and resistance. The 'autonomy
of art'
and
ity
passivity,
autonnot
The
is
the
of
are
counterposed.
'promise politics'
autonomy
work
of
art.
In
other
the
of
the
not
of
the
words,
experience,
omy
as
it
is
in
the
sensorium
of
inasmuch
artwork
participates
autonomy
not a work of art.)
At the
front

of a

117)))

DISSENSUS)

of art'
takes on a new
immediately
of
the
statue
is
the
meaning.
appearance of what
has not been aimed at as art. This means that
it is the appearance of a
form
of life in which art is not art. The 'self-containment' of the Greek
statue
turns
out to be the 'self-sufficiency' of a collective
life that does
not rend itself into separate spheres of activities, of a community
where
art and life, art and politics,
life and politics are not severedone from
another.
The Greek people are supposedto have
lived such a life, the
of
which
in
is
the
self-containment
of the statue.
expressed
autonomy
The
or
otherwise
of
that
vision
of
ancient
Greece
not at issue
is
accuracy
here. At stake is the shift in the idea of autonomy insofar as it is linked
to that of heteronomy. At first autonomy
was tied to the 'unavailability'
of the
it turned
out to be the
object of aesthetic experience. Then
of a life in which art
no separate
has
existence - in which
autonomy
its productions
are in fact self-expressions
of life. 'Free appearance', as
the
encounter
of a heterogeneity, is no more. It ceases
to be a suspension
of the oppositionsof form and matter, of activity
and
and
passivity,
becomes the product of a human
mind
which
seeks to transform the
surface of sensoryappearances
into
a new sensorium that
is the mirror
of its own activity. This is the plot that unfolds
in Schiller's last letters,
where primitive
man
learns to cast an aesthetic gaze
on his
gradually
of appearance
from
arms, tools and/or body, to separate the pleasure
the functionality
of objects.
Aesthetic play thus becomes a work
of
aestheticization.
The plot of a 'free play', suspending
the power
of active
form over passive matter
and
a still unheard-of state of
promising
in
becomes
another
which
form
and
equality,
plot,
subjugates matter,
the self-education
of mankind is its emancipation
from materiality,
as it
transforms
the world into its own sensorium.
of aesthetics reveals a contradiction that
So the original
scene
is not the
or art
opposition of art versus politics, high art versus popular culture
versus the aestheticization of life.All these oppositions
are particular features and interpretations
of a more basic contradiction. In the aesthetic
of art, art is art to the extent that it is something
else than art. It is
regime
that
it
is
as
a 'form of life' .
meaning
always 'aestheticized',
always posited
The key formula of the aesthetic regime of art is that art is an autonomous
form
of life. This formula, however, can be read
in two different
ways:
autonomy can valorized over life, or life over autonomy - and these lines
of interpretation
can be opposed,or they can intersect.)

Now,

this

The

118)))

'not being a
free

work

appearance

THE AESTHETIC REVOLUTION

AND ITS OUTCOMES)

to the
Such
and intersections can be traced
oppositions
interplay
between three major scenarios.Art can become life. Life can become art.
scenarios
art and life can exchange their properties.These
three
And
of the aesthetic,
yield three configurations
emplotted in three versions of
of the
temporality. According to the logic of the and, each is also a variant
we should
rather call its 'metapolitics'
politics of aesthetics, or what
of producing
that is, its way
its own politics, proposing to politics
issue
or
re-arrangementsof its space, re-configuring art as a political
as
itself
true
politics.)
asserting

THE NEW

CONSTITUTING

The first scenario

to be not only an

is that

of 'art

expression

COLLECTIVEWORLD)

becominglife'.In this

of life

but a form

of its

schema

art is

self-education.

taken
What

this
means
is that, beyond its destruction
of the representational regime,
the aesthetic regime
of art comes to terms with
the
ethical
regime of
its
of times
in
a
It
rejects
partitioning
two-pronged
relationship.
images
But it ratifies its basic principle:
matters
and spaces, sites and functions.
of art are matters of education. As self-education art is the formation of
- one which
in actuality,
a new sensorium
a new ethos. Taken
signifies,
to an extreme,this means that the 'aesthetic self-education of humanity'
will frame
a new collective ethos. The politics
of aesthetics proves to be
the right way to achieve what was pursued in vain by the aesthetics of
politics, with its polemical configuration of the common world. Aesthetics

world.
consensual framing
of the common
turns
out
to
be
to
aestheticization,
politics
Ultimately
scenario
was
viewed as the constitution
of a new collective ethos. This
first set out in the little draft associated with Hegel, Holderlin and Schelling,
known as Das iilteste Systemprogramm
des deutschen Idealismus. 3 The scenario makes politics vanish in the sheer opposition between the dead
promises

a non-polemical,
the
alternative

mechanism of the State and

the living power of the community, framed

thought. Poetry's vocation- the task of 'aesthetic
ideas perceptible
education' - is to render
by turning them into living
an
ancient
as the fabric of a
of
creating
images,
equivalent
mythology,
the
the
common
common experienceshared
elite
and
by
people.
by
to make common)
In their words: 'mythology
must
become
philosophy
by

the

power

of living

119)))

DISSENSUS)

to make
and philosophy must become mythology
sensible'.
This draft would be more than just a forgotten
dream
of the 1790s. It
came
to lay the basis for a new idea of revolution.
Even though Marx
never read the draft, we can discern the same plot in his texts of the
will
1840s. The coming Revolution
be at once the consummation and
'formal'
and 'political', it will
abolition of philosophy; no longer
merely
revolution
is an offspring of the
be a 'human' revolution. The human
aesthetic paradigm. This is the reason that the Marxist vanguard and
in the 1920s, since each side was
the artistic
avant-garde
converged
of life
to the same programme: the construction of new forms
attached
of
in which the self-suppression of politics matchedthe self-suppression
the originary logic of the 'aesthetic state' is
art. Pushed to this extreme,
that did not refer to any
was
an appearance
reversed.Free appearance
'truth'
it becomes the expression of
lying behind or beneath it. But when
to which
it bears witness. In the
a certain
life, it refers again to a truth
next step,this embodied
truth is opposed to the lie of appearances.When
assumes the shape of a 'human' revolution
the
aesthetic
revolution
has been overturned. The
the 'formal' one, the originary
logic
cancelling
its unavailability,
had once promised a
of the idle divinity,
autonomy
new age of equality. Now the fulfilment of that promise is identified with
who
does away with all such appearances,which
the act of a subject
now
were
as reality.
possess
only the dream of something he must
But we should not for all that simply equate the scenarioof art becoming
life with the disasters of the 'aestheticabsolute',embodiedin the totaliof art. The same scenario can be
tarian figure of the collectivity as work
in more sober attempts to make art the form of life. We may think,
traced
and
Crafts
for instance,
of the way the theory and practice of the Arts
dream
of
and a medi\037val
movement
tied a sense of eternal
beauty,
and artisan
handicrafts
to concern with the exploitation of the
guilds,
class and the tenor of everyday life, and to issuesof functionality.
working
William Morris was among the first to claim that an armchair is beautiful
than satisfying the pictorial fantasies of
a restful
rather
if it provides
seat,
viewed
as the incarnaits
owner.
Or let us take Mallarme, a poet often
'this
mad
of
Those
who
cherish
his
tion
of artistic
phrase
purism.
gesture
the
the
text
often
as
a
formula
for
the
of
'intransitivity'
forget
writing'
end of his sentence,which
the poet the task of 'recreating everyassigns
to show that we actually are at the place we)
out of reminiscences,
thing,

people

reasonable

philosophers

120)))

THE AESTHETIC REVOLUTION

AND ITS OUTCOMES)

have
to be'. The allegedly 'pure' practice
of writing
is linked to the need
in a general re-framing
of the human
to create forms that participate
of the poet are, in the same breath, comabode, so that the productions
life, like the fireworks of Bastille
pared both to ceremoniesof collective
and to private ornaments of the household.
Day,
It

is

no

coincidence

that

Kant's

in

Kritik

der Urteilskraft4 significant

were
taken from painted decors that
examples of aestheticapprehension
were
'free beauty'
insofar as they represented
no subject, but simply
We know how far
contributed to the enjoyment of a placeof sociability.
of art and its visibility
the transformations
were linked to controversies
Polemical
to reduce all ornamentation
over the ornament.
programmes
in the style of Adolf Loos, or to extol its autonomous
to function,
signifyof Alols Riegl or Wilhelm
Worringer,
appealed
ing power, in the manner
to the same basic principle
first and foremost, art is a matter of
that,
in a

dwelling

common

world. That is why

ornament couldsupport
design.

The notion

projects

of

'new

of 'art

ideas

both

becominglife'

life'. It also

which can be encapsulated

art. 'Pure' art and 'committed'

the

of abstract
does

weaves a

about the
and
industrial
of
painting
not simply foster demiurgic
same

common

formula: a

discussions

temporality

new life

of art,

a new
art, 'fine' art and 'applied'
art, all equally
it in
Of course, they understand and fulfil
partake of this temporality.
Mallarme
wrote his Un coup de des,s
very different ways. In 1897,when
he wanted
the arrangement
of lines and size of characterson the page to
Peter
match the form of his idea - the fall of the dice. Some years later
the
and
and
trademark
of
the
Behrens
kettles, catalogues
lamps
designed
German General Electricity
What
do
in
have
cotnmon?
they
Company.
The answer, I believe, is a certainconception
of design.
The poet wants
to replace
the representational subject-matter of poetry with
the design
of a general form, to make the poem likea choreography
or the unfolding of a fan. He calls these general forms 'types'. The engineer-designer
wants
to create
use and advertisements
objects whose form fits their
which
exact information
about them, free of commercial
embelprovide
lishment. These forms he also calls 'types'.
The poet thinks of himself as
of everyday
an
inasmuch
as he attempts to create a culture
life that
artist,
is in keeping
with the progress of industrial
and
artistic
production
design,
rather than
with
the routines
of commerce and petty-bourgeoisconso are Mallarme's.
His types are symbols of common life.But
sumption.
above the level of the monetary)
They are part of the projectof building,
in

a simple

needs

121)))

DISSENSUS)

economy,

a symbolic

economy that

a celebration

'magnificence',

of the

would

display

a collective

human abode,

'justice' or

replacingthe

forlorn

and religion. As far removed

from each other as
the
poet and the functionalist
symbolist
engineer
may seem, they both
share the idea that forms of art should be modesof collective
education.
Both industrial production and artistic
to doing
creation
are committed
a
not only objects but
something on top of what they do - to creating
a new partition
of the perceptible.)
sensorium,
ceremonies

of throne

FRAMING

THE

LIFE

OF ART)

is the schema of 'lifebecoming

art'
be given
the title of a book by the
6
French
des Formes:
the life of art as the
a
in
of
series
forms
which
life
art. This is in fact
of
becomes
development
the plot of the museum, conceivednot as a building and an institution
but
as a mode of rendering visible and intelligible
the
'life of art'. We
know that when
such museums
were born around 1800, it unleashed
bitter disputes. Their opponents argued that
the artworks
should not be
torn from their settings, the physical and spiritual
soil on which
they
and
were born. Every now and then this polemic is reprisedtoday,
the
museum is denounced as a mausoleum
dedicated
to the contemplation
from
of dead icons, separated
the life of art. Others hold that,
on the
museums
have
to
be
blank
surfaces
so
that
contrary,
spectators can be
confronted
with
the artwork itself, undistracted by the ongoing
culturalof art.
ization and historicization
In my view, both positions are misguided.There
is no opposition
between life and mausoleum,
blank surface and historicized artefact.
From
the beginning
the scenario of the art museum
has been that of an
aesthetic condition in which the Juno Ludovisi is not so much the work
of a master sculptor as a 'living
both of the indepenform',
expressive
dence of 'free appearance'
and of the vital
of
a community. Our
spirit
fine arts museums exhibit
not pure specimens
of fine art but historicized
art: works by Fra Angelico
an
between Giotto and Masaccio that frame
idea of Florentine princely splendour and religious
others by
fervour;
Rembrandt between Hals and Vermeer that feature
Dutch domestic and)
Such is the

or the

122)))

first

scenario.

The second

'life of art'. This scenariomay

art historian Elie Faure, L'Esprit

THE AESTHETIC REVOLUTION

AND ITS OUTCOMES)

a
rise of the bourgeoisie and so on. Our museums
exhibit
art
as so many moments of the incarnation of thought.
To frame
this plot was the first task of the discourse named' aesthetics',
we know
of
and
how Hegel, after Schelling, completedit. The principle
the framing is clear: the propertiesof the aesthetic
experience are transferredto the work of art itself, cancelling their projectioninto a new life
and invalidating
the aesthetic
revolution.
The 'spirit of forms' becomes
the
of
revolution.
This re-working involves
inverted
the
aesthetic
image
and
two
main moves. First, the equivalence of activity
form
passivity,
and matter, that characterized
the 'aesthetic experience', turns
out to be
of consciousness
the status of the artwork itself, now posited as an identity
and unconsciousness, will and un-will. Second, this identity
of contraries
by the same token lendsworksof art their historicity. The 'political' charand encapsulated in
acter
of aesthetic
reversed
experience is, as it were,
But the meaning
the historicity
of the statue. The statue is a living
form.
of the link between
art and life has shifted.
The statue, in Hegel's
view, is
art not so much
it is the expression of a collective
but
because
freedom,
life and the
instead because it figures
the distance between that
collective
it can express itself. The Greekstatue,
to him, is the work
according
way
of an artist expressing
an idea of which
he is aware and unaware at the
in a figure of stone. But
same time. Hewants to embody the idea of divinity
what
he can express is only the idea of the divinity
that he can feel and that
the stone can express. The autonomous form
of the statue embodies divinof it - that is, deprived of interiority.
ity as the Greeks could at bestconceive
It matters
to this judgement.
What
little whether or not we subscribe
matters is that, in this scenario, the limit of the artist, of his idea and of
his
is also the condition
for the success of the work of art. Art lives
people,
in a matter that resists it.
so long as it expresses
a thought unclear to itself
It lives
inasmuch
as it is something else than art, namely a belief and a way
civic

life, the

time-space of

of life.
of art.
This plot of the spirit of forms results in an ambiguous historicity
On the one hand,
it creates
an autonomous life of art as an expression of
daims for a
to new kinds of development. When
open
history,
Kandinsky
an
which
revives
the
new abstract
inner
impulses and
expression
necessity,
and opposes its
forms of primitive
of forms
art, he holds fast to the spirit
to academicism.
On the other hand,
the plot of the life of art entails
legacy
a verdict of death. The statue
is autonomous
insofar as the will that
it is heteronomous. When
art is no more than
art, it vanishes.)
produces

123)))

DISSENSUS)

is transparent
to itself and when no matter
thought
success means the end of art. When the artist does what he
a trademark
to paper or
Hegel states, he merely revertsto affixing

When

the content of

resists

it, this

wants,

a canvas.
'end of art' is not simply Hegel's own idiosyncratic
of forms'.
to the plot of the life of art as 'the spirit
That spirit is the 'heterogeneous sensible',the identity
of art and non -art.
to this plot, when art ceases
to be non -art, it is no longer art
According
The

plot

of the

theorization.It

clings

either. Poetry is
poetry.

sensible.The

poetry,

prose is

When

says

Hegel,

only

prose,

so long as prose is confused

with
there
is no more heterogeneous

of collective life are only the

furnishings
of collective life. So the formula
of art
a new life does not need a new art. On the
becoming life is invalidated:
the new life is specific in that it does not need art. The whole
contrary,
of art forms and of the politics of aesthetics in the aesthetic
regime
history
of art could be staged as the clash of these two formul\037: a new life needs
a new art; the new life does not need art.)
statements

statements

and

and

furnishings

METAMORPHOSES

OF THE

CURIOSITY SHOP)

problem becomes how to reassessthe 'heteroThis concerns not only artists, but the very idea of a
new life. The whole affair of the 'fetishism of the commodity' must, I
of view: Marx needs to provethat
think, be re-considered from this point
has a secret, that it ciphers a point of heterogeneity in the
the commodity
of everyday life. Revolution is possible
commerce
1?ecausethe commodthat
has a double nature: it is a work of art
ity, like the Juno Ludovisi,
when we try to seize hold of it. The reasonis that the plot of the
escapes
as a new partition
of modernity
'end of art' determines a configuration
ratiowith no point of heterogeneity.In this partition,
of the perceptible,
of activity becomes a responseboth
nalization of the different
spheres
The whole
revolution'.
to the old hierarchical orders and to the' aesthetic
can be spelt out as
motto of the politics of the aesthetic regime, then,
follows:let us save the 'heterogeneous sensible'.
a specific politics, with its
Thereare two ways of saving it, each involving
link between autonomy and heteronomy. Thefirst is the scenario of)
own

In that

geneous

124)))

perspective

sensible'.

the key

THE AESTHETIC REVOLUTION

AND ITS OUTCOMES)

life exchanging their properties', proper to what can be called, in

sense, Romantic poetics. It is often thought that Romantic poetics
involved
a sacralization
of art and of the artist,
this is a one-sided
but
view. The principle
in a multipliof 'Romanticism'
is rather to be found
cation of the temporalities of art that renders its boundaries permeable.
'art

and

a broad

of temporality
means complicating and ultimately
scenarios of art becoming
life or life
straightforward
of
the
'end'
of
and
them
with
scenarios
of
art;
becoming art,
replacing
is
and
reactualization.
This
the
of
idea
of
burden
latency
Schlegel's
universal
It does not mean any
'progressive
poetry'.
straightforward
march of progress. On the contrary,
the works of the past
'romanticizing'
its

Multiplying

means

lines

the

dismissing

elements, sleeping and awakening,

reactualizations, according to new linesof tempoas forms for new contents
rality. The works of the past can be considered
or raw materials
for new formations. They can be re-viewed,
re-framed,
re-made. In this way museums
exorcized the rigid plot of the
re-read,
'spirit of forms' leading to the 'end of arts' and helped to frame new
visibilities
of art, which
led to new practices.Artistic
became
ruptures
a multiplication
of the tempooffered
possible, too, because the museum
ralities of art, allowing,
for instance,
of
Manet to become a painter
life by re-painting Velasquez and Titian.
modern
this multi-temporality
Now
also means a permeability
of the boundarof art turns out to be a kind
ies of art. Being a matter
of metamorphic
status. The works of the past may
fall asleep
and cease to be artworks,
in various
be
awakened
and
on
a
new
take
life
they
may
ways. They
make thereby for a continuum
of metamorphic
forms. According to the
same logic,common
of
objects
may cross the border and enter the realm
artistic combination. They can do soall the more easily in that the artistic
the historic are now linked together, such that
and
each
object can be
withdrawn
its condition
of common use and viewed
from
as a poetic
In this way, the 'end of art' argubody wearing the traces of its history.
ment
can be overturned. In the year of Hegel'sdeath,
Balzac
published
La Peau de chagrin.' At the beginning
of the novel, the hero Raphael
enters the showrooms
of a large curiosity
where
old statues and
shop
with
old-fashioned
furniture,
paintings
mingle
gadgets and household
goods.'This ocean of furnishings, inventions, works of art and relics',
Balzac writes, 'made for him an endless poem'. The paraphernalia of the
of objects
and ages, of artworks and accessories.)
shop is also a medley
susceptible

taking

them

as metamorphic

to different

125)))

DISSENSUS)

of an
on its body the history
objects is like a fossil, wearing
A little further on, Balzacremarks that
the great poet
a civilization.
of the new age is not a poet as we understand the term: it is not Byron
who
could reconstitute
forests out of petrified
but Cuvier, the naturalist
traces and racesof giants out of scattered bones.
In the showrooms of Romanticism,
the power
of the Juno Ludovisi is
transferred to any article of ordinary life which can become a poetic

Each

of these

era or

object, a

of

fabric

shop makes the

hieroglyphs,

museum

of

fine

The
old curiosity
ciphering a history.
arts and the ethnographic museum

the argument of prosaic use or commodification.

is
a commodity, the end of a commodity
for everyday conunavailable
to become art. By becoming
obsolete,
or familiar article becomes available for art, as
sumption,
any commodity
a body ciphering a history
and
an object of 'disinterested pleasure'. It is
in a new way.
The
sensible' is everyre-aestheticized
'heterogeneous
a huge, fantastic poem. Any
where. The prose of everyday life becomes
realm
of aesthetic
can cross the border and re-populate the
object
experience.
We know what came out of this shop. Forty years later, the power of
the Juno Ludovisi
would
be transferred
to the vegetables, the sausages
and
of Les HaIles by Zola and Claude Lantier, the Impresthe merchants
8
in Le Ventre de Paris. Then
there will be, among
sionist painter he invents,
Art and current
the collages of Dada or Surrealism,
others,
Pop
many
of re-cycled
commodities or video clips.The most outstanding
exhibitions
of the
of Balzac's repositoryis, of course,
the window
metamorphosis
old-fashioned umbrella-shopin the Passage de l'Opera, in which Aragon
of Le Paysan de
The mermaid
recognizes a dream of Germanmermaids.
Paris 9 is the Juno Ludovisi as well, the 'unavailable'goddess
promising,
will
her unavailability,
a new sensoryworld. Benjamin
recogthrough
the
nize her in his own way: the arcade of outdated commodities
holds
He will only add that,
for the promise
to be kept,
promise of the future.
the arcademust be closed down, made unavailable.
of
Thereis thus a dialectic within Romantic poetics of the permeability
available
to play the part of
art and life. This poetics makes everything
sensible.
the heterogeneous, unavailable
By making what is ordinary
is
too. From this
it
makes
what
extraordinary
ordinary,
extraordinary,
- of its own.
a kind of politics - or meta politics
contradiction, it makes
of signs. 'Prosaic' objects become signs)
That meta politics is a hermeneutic
equivalent.

If the

126)))

It dismisses

end of

art

is to

become

THE AESTHETIC REVOLUTION

AND ITS OUTCOMES)

have to be deciphered.Sothe poet becomes not only a

their
excavating the fossilsand unpacking
of symptomatologist,
potential, he also becomesa kind
poetic
delving
into the dark underside or the unconscious
of a society to decipher the
in the very flesh of ordinary
The new poetics
messagesengraved
things.
frames a new hermeneutics,
upon itself the task of making society
taking
consciousof its own secrets, by leaving the noisy stage of political claims
and doctrines and delving
to the depths of the social, to disclosethe
and
in the
fantasies
hidden
intimate
realities of everyday life.
enigmas
It is in the wake of such a poeticsthat
the commodity
could be featured
as a phantasmagoria:
a thing
that looks trivial
at first sight, but on a
closerlook is revealed
as a tissue of hieroglyphs
and
a puzzle full
of
of history,

which

or an

naturalist

theological

archaeologist,

quibbles.)

INFINITE REDUPLICATION?)
of the commodity is part of the Romantic plot which
of art' as the homogenizationof the sensible world. We
could say that the Marxian commodity steps out of the Balzacian shop.
That
is how
fetishism allowed Benjamin to account for the
commodity
of Baudelaire's
structure
of the Parisian
imagery by the topography
arcades and the figure of the flaneur. For Baudelaire loiterednot so much
in the arcades themselvesas in the plot of the shop as new sensorium,
as
a place of exchange between every
life
and
the
realm
of
art.
The
day
and
the explicandum are part of the same poeticalplot,
which
is
explicans
the case
why they fit so well, maybe even too well.Suchis more
widely
for the discourse of Kulturkritik
in its various figures - a discoursewhich
to speak the truth
about
of aesthetics
art, about the illusions
purports
the dependency
and their social underpinnings,
about
of art upon common culture and commodification. But the very procedures
through
which
to disclose what
art
and aesthetics
it tries
truly are were first
framed
on the aesthetic stage. They are figures
of the same poem. The
of
culture
can
be
seen
as
the
face of Romantic
critique
epistemological
of its way of exchanging the signs of art and
poetics,the rationalization
to cast on the productions of Romantic
the signs of life. Kulturkritik
wants
the gaze of dis-enchanted reason. But that disenchantment
itself)
poetics
Marx's
denies

analysis
the 'end

127)))

DISSENSUS)

the Romantic re-enchantmentthat has widened ad infinitum

the
of art as the field of disused objects encrypting
a culture,
the realm of fantasies to be decipheredand
too,
extending to infinity,
the procedures
of that decryption.
formatting
So Romantic
poetics resists the entropy of the 'end of art' and its
'de-aestheticization'. But its own procedures
of re-aestheticization
are
kind of entropy. They are jeopardizedby their
threatened by another
own success. The danger in this case is not that
becomes
everything
It
is
that
becomes
artistic
that
the
of
prosaic.
everything
process
of
the
border
reaches
a
where
the
border
exchange,
point
crossing
becomes completely blurred, where nothing,
however
prosaic,
escapes
the domain of art. This is what happens
when
art exhibitions present us
with
mere
of objects of consumption and commercial
re-duplications
them
as such, on the assumption that
these
artefacts
videos,
labelling
offer a radical critique of commodification by the very fact that they are
the exact re-duplication
of commodities. This indiscernibility
turns
of the critical discourse, doomed either to
out to be the indiscernibility
in the labelling or to denounce it ad infinitum,
participate
asserting that
the sensorium of art and the sensorium of everyday life are nothing more
than the eternal reproductionof the 'spectacle'
in which domination is
both mirrored and denied.This denunciation,
in turn, soon becomes part
of the game.An interesting
case of this double discourse couldbeseenin
an exhibition,
first presented in the United States as Let'sEntertain,
then
in France as Au-dela
du spectacle. 10 The Parisian
exhibition played on three
levels:first, the Pop anti-high-culture
provocation; second, Guy Debord's
of
entertainment
as
of alienated
spectacle, meaning the triumph
critique
of 'entertainment'
with the Debordian concept
life; third, the identification
of
free
as the antidote to 'appearance'. The encounter
between
'play'
a
between
play and free appearance was reducedto a confrontation
billiard
a bar-football
table and a merry-go-round,and the neotable,
dassical busts of Jeff Koonsand his wife.)
is part of
sensorium

ENTROPIES

Such

outcomes

de-aestheticization
128)))

prompt

of

art

OF THE AVANT-GARDE)

the second response to

alternative way of

- the

the

of the
the power)

dilemma

reasserting

THE AESTHETIC REVOLUTION

AND ITS OUTCOMES)

sensible'. This is the exact oppositeof the first. It

of art lies in the romantic blurring
of its
of art from the forms of
borders. It argues the need for a separation
for art's
aestheticizationof common
life. The claim may be made
purely
own sake, but it may also be made for the sake of art's emancipatory
is the same: the sensoria are to be
power. In both cases, the basic claim
far prior to the existence of
The first manifesto against
kitsch,
separated.
in Flaubert's
the word, can be found
Madame Bovary. The entire plot of
and
his
the novel is, in fact, one of differentiation
between the artist
character, whose chief crimeis to wish to bring art into her life. She who
of life, deserves
her life, who makes art a matter
wants
to aestheticize
the
death - literarily
The cruelty of the novelist will become
speaking.
the
lays the same charge against
rigour of the philosopher when Adorno
of Madame
Stravinsky, the musician who thinks
equivalent
\037ovary
and mixes classical
kind
of
or
is available
that
any
harmony
disharmony
for the
and
chords and modern
dissonances,
primitive rhythms,
jazz
is an extraordinary
of his bourgeois audience.There
excitement
pathos
11
in
der neuen Musik
where
the
tone
of the passage in the Philosophie
salon music are
Adorno
states that some chords of nineteenth-century
he adds, 'everything be trickery'. If those
no longer audible,
unless,
the political promise of
chords
are still available, can still be heard,
is lost.
the aestheticsceneis proved a lie and the path to emancipation
Whether the quest is for art alone or for emancipation through
art, the
stage is the same. On this stage, art must tear itself away from the terriwhich
of aestheticized
life and draw a new borderline,
cannot
be
tory
crossed. This is a position that we cannot simply ascribe to the avanton art's autonomy.
For, in fact, this autonomy proves to
gardeinsistence
has to
If Madame Bovary has to die, Flaubert
be a double
heteronomy.
of literature
akin
to the
the sensorium
disappear. First, he has to make
of
that
do not feel: pebbles, shellsor grains
sensorium of those things
from
that of his
dust. To do this, he has to make his prose indistinguishable
of
the autonomy
life. In the same way
characters, the prose of everyday
is
a
as
double
heteronomy:
conceptualizedby Adorno,
Schonberg's music,
in order
the capitalist
division
of labour and the adornments
to denounce
division
of labour yet further,
to be
of commodification,
it has to take that
than
the products of capitalist
mass
still more technical, more 'inhuman'
in turn, makes the stain
of what has been
But this inhumanity,
production.
repressed appear and disrupt the work's perfect technical arrangement.)
of the

'heterogeneous

maintains

that

the

dead -end

129)))

DISSENSUS)

of the avant-garde artwork

becomes
the tension between
between
the bonds that tie Ulysses to his mast and
the song of the sirens against which he stopshis ears.
We
can also give to these two positionsthe
of a pair of Greek
names
and Dionysus. Their opposition is not simply
a construct
divinities,
Apollo
of the philosophy of the young
It is the dialectic of the 'spirit
Nietzsche.
of forms' in general.
The aesthetic
identification of consciousness and
and
can
be interpreted in two ways. Either
unconsciousness,logos
pathos,
the spirit of forms is the logos that weaves its way through its own opacity
and the resistance of the materials, in order to become the smile of the
statue or the light of the canvas - this is the Apollonian plot. Or it is identified with a pathos
that
the forms of doxa,
and
makes
art the
disrupts
of a power that is chaos, radicalalterity;
art inscribes
on the
inscription
surface of the work the immanence
of pathos in the logos, of the unthink- this is the
able in thought
Dionysian plot. Both are plots of heteronomy.
Even the perfection of the Greekstatue
in Hegel's
Asthetik 12is the form of
an inadequacy.The same holds all the more for Schonberg'sperfect
conIn order that
struction.
art
faithful
to
the
'avant-garde'
promise of
stay
the aesthetic scene it has to stress more and more the power of heterthat underpins its autonomy.)
onomy
The 'autonomy'
two

heteronomies,

DEFEAT

This

inner

necessity

OF THE IMAGINATION?)

leads to another

task of autonomous avant-garde

art

kind

akin

of entropy,

to that of

which

makes the

giving

witness

to

This entropy is perfectly exemplified by Lyotard's

'aesthetics
of the sublime'. At first sight this is a radicalization of the
a reversal
dialecticof avant-garde
art that twists into
of its logic. The
avant-gardemust draw the dividing-line that separates art from comthe link of art to the 'heterogeneous
inscribe
modity culture indefinitely,
sensible' interminably.
to invalidate indefinitely
But it must do so in order
the 'trickery' of the aestheticpromise
to
denounce
both the promises
itself,
of revolutionary
and
the
of
avant-gardism
entropy
commodity aestheticization.
The avant-garde
is endowed with the paradoxical
duty of bearing
witness to an immemorial dependencyof human
that makes
thought
of emancipation
a deception.)
any
promise
sheer

130)))

heteronomy.

THE AESTHETIC REVOLUTION

This

takes the shape of a

a re- framing of the

demonstration

Kritik der

of

Urteilskraft,

radical

AND ITS OUTCOMES)

re-reading

of Kant's

aesthetic sensorium,which

stands
as an implicit refutation
of Schiller's
of countervision, a kind
art is deduced by Lyotard
originary scene. The whole 'duty' of modern
from the Kantian analysis of the sublime as a radical
of
experience

of imagination is defeated
up a gap between the
sensibleand the supersensible.
In Lyotard's analysis, this defines
the
of
modern
art
as
the
of
the
manifestation
space
unrepresentable, of
the 'loss of a steady relation between the sensible and the intelligible'.
This
assertion
is paradoxical:
first, because the sublime in Kant's account
does not define the spaceof art, but marks the transition
from
aesthetic
to ethical experience; and second,because
the
of disharmony
experience
between Reason and Im\037gination
tends
the discovery of a higher
towards
- the
to the supersensible
harmony
subject's self-perception as belonging
world of Reason and Freedom.
wants
to oppose the Kantian
Lyotard
gap of the sublime to Hegelian
of the
aestheticization,but in so doing he has to borrow Hegel'sconcept
sublime qua impossibility
of any adequation
between thought
and
its
sensible presentation. He has to borrow
from the plot of the 'spirit of
forms' the principleof a counter-construction
of the originary scene, to
allow for a counter-reading
of the plot of the 'life of forms'. Of course,
this confusion
is not a casual misreading.
It is a way of blocking the
from aesthetics to politics, of imposing at the same crosspath
originary
a one-way
road
detour leading from aesthetics to ethics.In this fashion
the opposition
of the aesthetic regime of art to the representational
to the sheer opposition of the art of the unrepreregime can be ascribed
sentable to the art of representation. 'Modern' artworks
then
have to
become ethical witnesses to the unrepresentable.
Strictly speaking,
however, it is in the representational regime that you can find unrepresentable subject matters,
those
for which form and matter
meaning
cannot
be fitted together in any
way. The 'loss of a steady relation'
the sensible and the intelligible
between
is not the loss of the power of
the
but
of
its
forms.
There
is nothing that
is
multiplication
relating,
in
the
aesthetic
of
art.
'unrepresentable'
regime
Much has been written
to the effect that the Holocaust is unrepresentthat
it permits of witnessing
but not of art. The claim, however,is
able,
refuted
of Primo)
by the work of the witnesses. The paratactic
writing
disagreement,

by

the

in

experience

which

the

of an

synthetic

infinite,

power

which

sets

131)))

DISSENSUS)
as the sheer mode
Robert Antelme, for example,has beentaken
of Nazi de-humanization.
of testimony befitting
the experience
But this
and sensaparatactic
style, made of a concatenationof little perceptions
revolution
of the
tions, was one of the major features of the literary
The
short notations
at the beginning
of Antelme's
nineteenth century.
book L'Espece humaine,13
the latrines and setting
the scene
of
describing
the camp at Buchenwald, follow the same pattern
as the description
of

Levi or

film
has
Emma Bovary's farmyard.
Claude
Lanzmann's
Shoah
Similarly,
as bearing witness to the unrepresentable.But what Lanzmann
to the representational plot of the US television series
counterposes

been seen
The

is another

Holocaust

re-constructing

inquiry

cinematographic
an

enigmatic

of a present
plot - the narrative
or an erased past, which
can
be
in Citizen Kane. The 'unrepresent-

Orson Welles'sRosebud
it
does
not fit the experience of artistic
able' argument
Instead,
practice.
or unavailable,
fulfils
a desire for there to be something
unrepresentable,
of the ethical
so that the practice of art can be enlistedin the necessity
an
form
still
be
inverted
detour. The ethics of the unrepresentable
might
of the aesthetic promise.
of these entropic scenarios of the politics of aestheticsmay
sketch
My
that
is quite pessimistic. That is not
seem
to be proposing a view of things
and
its
about art's destiny
at all my purpose. A certain
melancholy
political commitments is expressed in many ways today, especially in my
with
declarations
about the end of art,
France. The air is thick
country,
the end of the image, the reign of communications and advertisements,
of art after Auschwitz,
for the lost paradise of
the
nostalgia
impossibility
traced back to

incarnatepresence,indictment
tarianism
choir.

current
mischievous

of aesthetic

utopias

for

spawning

totali-

My purpose is not to join this mourning

from
this
I think
that we can distanceourselves
understand
that the 'end of art' is not 'modernity's'
but the reverse side of the life of art. To the extent

or commodification.

On the

contrary,

mood

if

we

destiny

it sets that life

the aesthetic
formula ties art to non -art from the start,
points: art becoming mere life or art becoming
up between two vanishing
mere art. I said above that
to the extreme', each of these
'pushed
scenariosentails its own entropy, its own end of art. But the life of art in
between
these
the aesthetic regimeof art consists precisely of a shuttling
a heteronomy
and a heteronomy
scenarios, playing an autonomy against
an
against
autonomy,
playing one linkage between art and non-art
against another such linkage.)
that

132)))

THE AESTHETIC REVOLUTION

Each

of these

scenarios involves a certain

hierarchical divisions
rium; or art replacing

of

the

politics

meta

and
perceptible
as a configuration

AND ITS OUTCOMES)

art refuting the

sensothe sensible world; or
in its
art becoming,

politics:

framing

of

a common

of social hermeneutics;or even

of the promise
of emancipation. Each of
very isolation, the guardian
these
that there is a
positions
may be held and has beenheld.This means
certainundecidability
in the 'politics of aesthetics'. Thereis a metapolitics
of aesthetics
which frames the possibilities of art. Aesthetic art promises
a political accomplishment
that
it cannot
satisfy, and thrives on that
That is why those who want
to isolate
it from politics are
ambiguity.
somewhatbesidethe point. It is also why those who want it to fulfil its
political
promise are condemned to a certain
melancholy.)
art

becoming

a kind

133)))

CHAPTER

TEN

of Political Art)

The Paradoxes

turn of the

increasingly frequent talk

Numerous exhibitions and conferences have been put on that re-assert art's capacity
to resist
forms of
At the same time, this
economic, political and ideologicaldomination.
new
faith in the political capacity of art has taken on many forms, which
are very often divergent, if not conflicting.
Some artists make big statues
out of media and advertising
icons
to make us conscious of the power
have
over our perception. Others silently
invisible
monuments
they
bury
dedicated to last century's crimes.Still others endeavour
to show us the
biases containedin mainstream
of subaltern
identities,
representations
or to sharpen our perception
of images using photographs about characters whose identity
is fleeting
and enigmatic. Some artists,
false
using
and politicians to make them
identities, crash the meetings of big bosses
look
others design banners and masks for street demonstrations
foolish;
the powers that be. Someusethe space
of the museum to demagainst
onstrate the functioning
of new ecological machines, others layout small
stones
or erect signs in disempowered
with the aim of re-creating
suburbs
the
environment
and engendering
new social relations.One artist pays
workers to dig their own graves in order to point
to the violence
migrant
of exploitation, while another plays the role of supermarket
assistant
as
a way of mending
the social bond.
their
these strategies and practices all predifferences,
Notwithstanding
supposea specific notion of art's efficacy. Art is presumed to be effective
because
it displays the marks of domination,
or parodies
politically
mainstream
or
even
i
t
the
because
leaves
for it and)
reserved
icons,
spaces
Since

the

of art's

134)))

having

'returned

century,

there

to politics'.

has been

THE PARADOXES

OF POLITICAL

ART)

- or so-called a social practice. Despitea century

of critique
to be still firmly
mimetic tradition, it appears
entrenched,
in forms of supposed political
and artistic subversion.
including
Underlying
these forms is the assumption that art compels us to revolt when it shows
us revolting things, that
it mobilizes
when it itself is taken outsideof the
or museum and that
it incites
us to oppose the system
of
workshop
domination
in that system. This
by denouncing its own participation
becomes

at the

directed

assumption implies a

effect,intention

and

form

specific

of relationship

between cause and

consequence.

politics of art

suffers
from a strange schizophrenia. In the
never tire of repeatingthat art practices have
to be re-situatedinterminably,
in ever new contexts. Adamantly
placed
that
our context is one of late capitalism,
or economic
proclaiming
or computer communication and the digital
camera,
globalization
they
the politics
of art. In the second place,
say we must completelyre-think
these same artists and critics are still very attached to paradigms for
the
of art that were debunked at least
two
understanding
efficacy
centuries
before these technologicalinventions
For
this
appeared.
a maximum
reason, it pays to invert the usual perspective and, taking
of distance
from our present, discussthe following
which
questions:
models of the efficacy of art govern our strategies, hopes and judgements
the political
And to which age do
practice?
regarding
import of artistic

In fact, the

first

artists

place,

and critics

thesemodelsbelong?
To

do

so, I shall

and more
paradigm

ception of

take a leap backin

precisely

was

thrown

the

efficacy

to

time

time

when

into question
of art within

from
this

to eighteenth-century

the hegemony of the

Europe,
mimetic

opposed
angles. The conis
well
illustrated by
paradigm
two

In classicaltimes it was supposed that the theatre, or

to view the
spectators
magnifying glass, inviting
and vices of their fellow men and women in the form
behaviour, virtues
of a fiction. It was considered,
for example, that Moliere's
Tartuffe taught
Mahomet
and Lessing's
spectators to recognize hypocrites,and Voltaire's
Nathan
der Weise to struggle for tolerance against
and so on.
fanaticism,
Current ways of thinking
and
are
far
from
removed
feeling
apparently
this edifying vision of art's vocation,and yet they are still thoroughly
bound to the causallogic underpinning
it. This logic posits that
what
the
viewer sees - on a stage
no less than in a photographic exhibition
or an
- is a set of signs formed according to an artist's intention.)
installation
the

stage,

classical

theatre.

functioned

as a

135)))

DISSENSUS)

By recognizing

these signs the spectator is

supposedlyinduced

into

specific reading of the world around us, leading, in turn, to the feeling of
a certain proximity
and ultimately to the spectator's interor distance,
into the situation
staged by the author. We may no longerbelieve
vening
that
virtues and vices on stage can improve
human behaviour,
exhibiting
but
we continue
to act as if reproducing
a commercial
idol in resin will
the
and as if a series of photoengender resistance against
'spectacle',
the colonized will work
to
represent
graphs about the way colonizers
undermine
the fallacies of mainstream
identities.
Let
of
representations
us call this the pedagogical model of the efficacy of art.
The pertinenceof this model was thrown into question
as early as the
1760s. In his Lettre a M. D'Alembert sur les spectacles,1 Rousseau
argues
relation
from the perforagainst the presumption of a direct
running
mance of bodies on stage to its effects on the minds of spectators and its
for their behaviour outside the theatre. DoesMoliere's
consequences
us to value Alceste'ssincerity
the hypocrisy
above
Misanthrope
encourage
of the socialites that surround
him? Does it lead us to privilege their
sense of social life over his intolerance? The question
is undecidable.
Moreover,
very

essence

how can the

is defined by

feelings and

thoughts

on

theatre itself
what

human

expose

do

hypocrites

bodies that

they

hypocrites,
namely,

do not

given that
showing

signs

its

of

have? Transposing
ask the following:

we might
to a contemporary situation,
we make of a photographicexhibition
of
victims
depicting
as a form of rebellion against
the perpetrators?
genocide? Does it count
Does it amount to anything
an inconsequential sympathy
more
than
the victims? Ought it generate
towards
anger towards the photographer
this

scenario

should

what

turns
the victims'
pain into an aesthetic matter? Or elseto indignaas
against those who view them
only in their identity
degradingly
victims?
The list can be extended.The element
that is left over once
all these reactions
is the supposed 'beauty' or 'power'of
are subtracted
the photograph
itself. The logic of mimesis consistsin conferring
on the

who
tion

artwork the power of the

behaviourof
It is
that

not the value of the

stake here, but the

is at

effectsthat

it

is supposed

messageconveyed

by the mimetic
dispositif
The
not
dispositifitself.
efficacy of art resides
of behaviour
that it provides, but first

in the model (or counter-model)

and foremost in partitions of

space and time

in
ways of being together or separate,
being
136)))

to elicit on the

spectators.

that
it produces
to define
front or in the middle of,)

THE PARADOXES

inside or

being
The

problem

outside, etc. Therein

with

representation,

lies

the point

for him, is not

OF POLITICAL

ART)

of Rousseau's polemic.
that
it is evil as such,

that
it entails a separation between doing
and
Rousseau
seeing.
with the collective body of a city that
sought to contrast this separation
enacts its own unity
through
hymns and dances, such as in the celebration
of the Greek City Festival.
This defines the second great paradigm
of the
contrasts
one idea of mimesis with another,
an ethics
efficacy of art, which
of representation and an archi-ethicalparadigm.
because
Archi-ethical,
the stake here is not to improve
behaviour
but
representation,
through
to have all living bodies directly embody the sense of the common.This
points right to the core of the questionof political
paradigm
efficacy, but
it does so by jettisoning
both art and politics in the same stroke, fusing
them together by framing
the community
as artwork. It is a paradigm
that stretches at least as..far back as Plato, but that came to be espoused
in a modern
into its truth: the
guise as anti-representation, as art turned
- a model that
of
the
fabric
of
life
common
is still with
framing
sensory
us. Although
we
no longer share early twentieth-century
dreams
of
collective rhythmics or of Futurist
and
Constructivist
of
the
symphonies
new mechanicalworld,
we continue
to believe that art has to leave the
in order to be effectivein 'real
art
world
life': we continue to try to
overturn
the logic of the theatre by making
the spectator active, by turninto
a place of political activism or by sending
ing the art exhibition
artists into the streets of derelictsuburbs
to invent
new modes of social
relations.It thus appears that, from the outset, the idea of critical art
itself is caught
two types of pedagogy: one that
between
could
be called
and
another
that
we
refer
to
as ethical
mediation,
representational
might
but

immediacy.

Ethical immediacy was not

the only concept

used to challenge repreend of the eighteenth century.
So also was
its contrary,
aesthetic
which does not consist in the ecstatic
distance,
of the beautiful
and
work mischievously to concontemplation
thereby
cealthe social underpinnings
of art and dispense with
concrete
action in
the' outside' world.Instead,
it was first used to refer to the suspensionof
a determinable
in
relation between the artist's intention,
a performance
some place reserved for art, and the spectator's gaze and state of the
This is, after all, what
means:
community.
separation. When
'critique'
Rousseau wrote his Lettre sur les spectacles, this separation was emblematized
statue, that)
by the apparently innocuous descriptionof an ancient
sentational

mediation

at the

137)))

DISSENSUS)

Joachim Winckelmann of the

by Johann

break

his description

by

inaugurated

lay

of

Torso

Belvedere.
The
of the statue as

the

its account

in

to
which, in representational logic, makesit possible
expressions and anticipate the effectsof their viewing. The
to express
statue has no mouth
it to deliver messages, no face
enabling
emotions, no limbs to command or carry out action. Even so, Wmckelmann
consideredit to be a statue of Hercules no less,the hero of the Twelve
Labours. But for him it is the statue of an idle Hercules,sitting among the
Gods at the end of his labours.At its core, what this description expresses

deprivedof

all that

define bodily

is an

of opposites:

identity

in it activity

and

passivity

together,

merge

whose sole expressionlies in the muscles of

the torso that ripple with the same indifference as ocean waves.
This
to propose
mutilated
statue of an idle hero, unable
anything to imitate,
and
so
the epitome of Greek beauty,
was, accordingto Winckelmann,
an equivalence

forming

also of

Greek

His

liberty.

description

sums

efficacy
predicated on the
suchas an enigmatic
and
movement
expression

of art. No longer

this

efficacy

the

is, on
or

subtraction

withdrawal.

contrary,

based

This very

on

up

thus

the

paradoxical

feature to
power
image an indifference and radical
addition

same paradox is

of a

of the

conceptualized

aesthetic 'free play' and 'free appearance', phenomena that he regarded as having been epitomizednot in a headless
statue but in a torso-less head - that of the Juno Ludovisi. This head, he
absence
of
is characterized
thought,
by a radical indifference,a radical
Schiller

by

in terms of

care, will or designs.

I call the aesthetic regimeof
This paradox defines a configuration
that
itself stands in contrast
to both the regime of representational
art, which
mediation
and
that
of ethical immediacy. 'Aesthetic' designates the
of every determinate relation correlating the production of
suspension
art
and a specific social function.
The statue
of which Wmckelmann
forms
no
an element
in a religious or civic ritual;
and Schiller speakisno longer
does it stand to depict belief, refer
to a social distinction, imply
longer
or collective
moral
or the mobilization of individual
improvement,
bodies. No specific audienceis addressed
instead
the
statue
dwells
it,
by
and indeterminate
museum spectators who look at it
beforeanonymous
as they
can a Florentine painting
of the Virgin Mary, a little
Spanish
a
still-life
fish or
Dutch
or
a French
peasant marriage
depicting
beggar,
fruit.

a
138)))

form

In the
of

museum,
framing

of building, but
which is not merely a specific
type
all these)
space and a mode of visibility,

of common

THE PARADOXES

OF POLITICAL

ART)

are disconnected from a specific

are offered
destination,
representations
to the same 'indifferent' gaze.This is the reason that the museum today
can accommodate
not only all kinds of prosaic objects,but
also forms
of
information
and debate on public
issues
that challenge mainstream forms

of information

and

This means that

one that
efficacy,

of

artistic

savoir-faire

aesthetic

relates to a
and

that can

significations

call it the
such, but

discussion.
the

rupture

arranges a
between

disconnection

social destination,

be read on them

and

paradoxicalform
the

between sensoryforms,
their

of

production
the

possible effects. Let us

which is not a designation of conflict as

conflict
between
sense and sense.
Dissensus is a conflict
between
a sensory presentation
and a way of
sense of it, or between
several sensory regimes and/or 'bodies'.
making
This
is the way in which- dissensus can be said
to reside
at the heart of
the latter itself consists in an activity
that redraws
politics, since at bottom
the frame within
which
common
are
determined.
Politics
breaks
objects
with
the
self-evidence
of
the
'natural'
order
that
destines
sensory
individuals
and groups to occupypositions
of rule or of being
specific
them
to private or public lives, pinning
them
down to
ruled, assigning
a certain time and space, to specific 'bodies', that is to specific ways of
a distribution
of the
being, seeing and saying. This 'natural' logic,
invisible and visible, of speech and noise, pins bodies to 'their' places
- this is the
and
the private and the public to distinct
allocates
'parts'
order of the police.Politics
can therefore
be defined by way of contrast
as the activity
that
breaks
with the order of the police by inventing
new subjects.
Politics invents new forms
of collective
it
enunciation;
re-frames the given by inventing
new ways of making sense of the
new configurations between the visible and the invisible,
and
sensible,
between
the audible and the inaudible, new distributions
of space
and
time - in short, new bodily capacities. As Plato tells us - a contrario
in the domestic
politics begins when those who weredestinedto remain
and invisible territory
of work
and reproduction, and prevented from
'have
not' in order
else', take the time that
doing
'anything
they
to affirm
that
to
a
common
world.
It
when
they belong
begins
they
make the invisible visible, and make what
was
deemed
to be the mere
noise of suffering bodies heard as a discourseconcerning
the 'common'
of the community. Politics createsa new form,
as it were, of dissensual
'commonsense'

efficacy

is a

of dissensus,

specific type

thereof, a

.)

139)))

DISSENSUS)

connectionbetween art

and
it should be cast
politics,
the very kernel of the aestheticregime:artworks
can
effects of dissensus preciselybecausethey
neither
produce
give
lessons nor have any destination.
The statue of Hercules may
have
been
mutilated for entirely
extraneous
reasons.
Yet, it came to embody the
ruination
of the former distribution of the sensible, in which
bodies were
to match
their function and destination.
geared sensorially and mentally
the marble
With
of the mutilated statue we thus
shift
to the reality of a
dissociation'in the flesh': on the one hand, the work carried out by
on the other, the activity
of a gaze. Writing for a revolutionary
arms;
a nineteenth
newspaper,
-century floor layer described this shift in a
fictional diary of his brother:)

exists a

If there
terms

in

of dissensus,

Believing himself at

room,solong

as he

opens out onto

he stops his arms

to enjoyit better

home, he loves

has not yet

finished

a gardenor commands
and

than

.)

glides

to

ponder
laying

a view

in imagination

the possessors of the

the arrangement
the floor.

If

the

of a

window

of a picturesque horizon,
toward the spacious view
neighbouring

residences.

that the aesthetic rupture

works
to qualify a body
neither to its task nor to its determination.
the fleeting
arms
the body
introduces
gaze from the labouring
Divorcing
of the sensible, overturning
of a worker into a new configuration
the
between
what
a
'can'
do
and
what
it
cannot.
'proper'
relationship
body
It is no coincidencethat
this
apparently
a-political
description was
published in a workers' newspaper during the 1848 French Revolution:
the possibility
of a 'worker voice' emerged through
the dis-qualification
of
a certain reality
of the worker body. It emerged
are-distribution
through
in the whole set of relationships
between
capacities and incapacities,
the ethos of a social body.
defining
in a position to addressthe paradox
that resides at the
We
are now
heart of the relationship between art and politics. Art and politics each
definea form of dissensus, a dissensual re-configuration of the common
experienceof the sensible. If there is such thing as an 'aesthetics of
it lies in a re-configuration of the distribution
of the common
politics',
through political processes of subjectivation. Correspondingly, if there is
a politics of aesthetics, it lies in the practices and modes of visibility
of art
that re-configure the fabric of sensory experience.However,
no direct)
This

passage

whose

140)))

dwelling

shows
is

geared

THE PARADOXES

OF POLITICAL

ART)

is determinable between the intention

realized
a capacity for political subjectivation. What
of
by the name of the 'politics of art' involves the intertwining
goes
several
there
exists a politics of aesthetics that
logics. In the first place,
and
artistic intentions
and strategies: the theatre, the museum
predates
In other words,
in and of themselves.
the book are 'aesthetic' realities
of space and time,
of the visible and the
are specific
distributions
they
of
that
create
forms
invisible,
'commonsense', regardlessof the
spedfic
such-and-such
an
artist
intends
to convey and or cause
specific message
he or she wants to serve. This is not a simple matter
of an 'institution',
of space and the weaving of fabrics
but of the framework of distributions
of perception. Within
artists are those whose
framework,
any
given
to which
aim to change the frames, speedsand
scales
according
strategies
element
we perceivethe visible, \037nd combine
it with a specific invisible
are
intended
to make the
and a specific meaning. Such strategies
or to question the self-evidence of the visible; to rupture
invisible
visible
relations
to invent
between
given
things and meanings and, inversely,
novel relationships between things
and
that
were
meanings
previously
in my view,
unrelated. This might be called the labour of fiction,
which,
is a word that we need to re-conceive. 'Fiction', as re-framed
by the
of an
aesthetic regime of art, means
far more than the constructing
than
its Aristotelian sense as
world, and even far more
imaginary
the imaginary
of actions'.
It is not a term that designates
'arrangement
the re-framing
of the 'real', or the
as opposed to the real; it involves
of a dissensus. Fiction is a way
of changing
existing modes of
framing
and
forms
of
of
scales
enunciation;
frames,
sensory presentations
varying
and rhythms; and of building
new
between
relationships
reality and
cause-effect

in an

art

relationship

appearance, the
This

and

performance

and

individual

frames

intertwining

new

collective.

fabric of common

experience,a new

It creates
new connections between those modes,
of the given and new plots of temporality.
perception
of
Similar
a change in the distribution
to political action, it effectuates
the sensible. The difference might
that
the
be said to lie in the fact
of the sensible carriedout by politics is an effect of forms
re-configuration

sceneryof the
new modesof
new forms of

of

subjectivation.

visible

and a

the

a new

individuality

In

other

dramaturgy

of the

intelligible.

and

words,

such re-configurations

by collectives of enunciation and demonstration

of politics' consists above all in the framing
'aesthetics

about

are

brought

(manifestation).

of a

we, a

The
subject)

141)))

DISSENSUS)

that disrupts
whose emergenceis the element
an element that I call the part of those
the wretched, but the anonymous.
The 'politics

demonstration

a collective

the

of

distribution

who have no part

of aesthetics', as

social
- not

parts,

for
new forms of individuality
new
and
it, frames
It does not give a collectivevoice
to the anonymous.
Instead,
it re-frames
the world of common experienceas the world
of a shared
impersonal experience.In this way, it aids to help create the fabric of a
common experience in which
new
modes of constructing
common
and
new
of
enunciation
be
objects
possibilities subjective
may
developed

haecceities.

that are

characteristicof

'aesthetics

the

aesthetics, however,operatesunder
inal

It produces

disjunction.

original

that

effect

implies

the

politics'. This politics of

prescribed by an origdoes so on the basis of an

of

conditions

effects, but it
the suspension of

any

cause-effect

direct

relationship.

This tension
paradigm

of

was long

separationand

the

concealed

art', which

'critical

pedagogical

ethical immediacy. Critical art

in

by the pseudo self-evidence of the

fact
conflates
the logic of aesthetic

logics of representational mediation and

is an art that aims to produce a new

to its
world, and therefore to create a commitment
This schema, very simple in appearance, is actually
the
of three processes: first,
of a sensory form of
the production
conjunction
of an awareness of the reason for
'strangeness';second,the development
that
and third, a mobilization of individuals
as a result of that
strangeness
When Brecht portrays Nazi
leaders
awareness.
as cauliflower
sellers and
the
business in classical
presented their discussionsabout
vegetable
situations
and heterogeneous
verse, the ensuing clashof heterogeneous
is
intended
to
about
an
awareness
both
of the trade relabring
languages
tions
hidden
behind
and of the forms of
hymns to the race and the nation,
economicaland political
domination
that are hidden behind the dignity
of
2
a monochrome
high art. When Godard, placing it against
background,
event
whose
attendees suddenly begin repeating
depicts a high-society
advertisements
for a new car and new chic underwear,
the
resultant
break in the sound and image continuum
is intended
to reveal the forms
of self-alienationand of estranged social relationships that are produced
3
Martha
RosIer juxtaposes photoby the language of commodities. When
in
for petty-bourgeois
of
the
war
Vietnam
with
advertisements
graphs
of

perception

the

transformation.

furniture

and

is intended to
142)))

household

reveal the

goods
realities

- the epitomeof
of imperialist

American

war

that

happiness
underneath)

lie

- it

THE PARADOXES

standardized

images

commodity
world'.4 But

lies

that

the

of

apparently

a contradiction.

presents

lize bodies

through

individual

underneath

the

happiness,

to produce
of a
presentation
It

aims

the

that

strangeness,

same

aesthetic

which

is tantamount

empire of the
of the 'free

distantiation

actually

the

representation,

reasons

underlying

to suppressing it. In

process, it endeavours to produce

of sensory
clash of heterogeneous forms

correction of the behaviour through

defence

in

ART)

a sensory clashand to mobistrangeness, of an encounter

it aims to produce an effectof

betweenheterogeneouselements.That is,
in order to engender an awarenessof
strangeness
of

the

and

the wars waged

clear-cut
logic of

OF POLITICAL

fusion

one and

between

presentation
between

the

and the
aesthetic

The
dispositif of the critical work is
separation and ethical continuity.
not annulled by this contradiction,
since it can contribute to changing
of the sensible and the thinkable. The effect
the
thereby
cartography
transmission
between artistic
is not a kind of calculable
shock,
produced
intellectual
awareness and political mobilization. Thereisno reasonwhy
forms of the
the production
of a shock produced by two heterogeneous
to yield an understanding
of the state of the world, and
sensible ought
the latter ought to produce a decisionto change
none why understanding
from the viewing of a spectacleto an underit. There is no straight
path
intellectual
awareness
standing of the state of the world, and none from
one
to political action. Instead, this kind of shift implies a move from
and incapacities, forms of
capacities
given world to another in which
are differently
defined. What comes to passis
toleranceand intolerance,
a processof dissociation:
a rupture in the relationship between senseand
is
what is seen and what
is thought,
and between what
between
sense,
in
is
the
felt.
What
comes
to
a
and
what
is
pass rupture
specific
thought
configuration that allows us to stay in 'our' assigned places in a given
can happen anywhere and at any
state of things.
These
sorts of ruptures
but they can never be calculated.
time,
its real forms of
This gap, which separates the aims of critical art from
so long as there exist patterns of intelligibility
effectiveness, can remain
the artistic
and forms of mobilization
procedures
strong enough to sustain
in
are
sustain
them.
Critical
to
art, whose purported
that,
turn,
supposed
is in actual
task is to produce forms of political awareness and mobilization,
of a dissensual world. The question
fact always buoyed by the self-evidence
thus
arises is: 'what happens to critical art in the context of consenthat
far more
than simply a new way of governing)
sus?, Consensusmeans

143)))

DISSENSUS)

in order to avoid conflicts, appealsto expertise,

arbitration
and the
agreement of the respectiveparts of a population. Instead, consensus is
an agreementbetweensenseand sense, in other words between a mode
and a regime of meaning. Consensus,as a mode
of sensory
presentation
interof government,
says: it is perfectly fine for people to have different
to
ests, values and aspirations, nevertheless there is one unique
reality
is experienceable
as a
which everything must be related, a reality
that
The context
sensedatum and which has only one possiblesignification.
that is invoked to enforcethe ideas and practices pertaining to 'consensus'
'economic
is, as we know,
globalization'.
Precisely for the reason that it
and irrefutable,
itself as a global developmentthat is clear-cut
presents
it - good or bad!
about
regardless of one's opinions
This
critical
starts to spin around itself. We are not dealing
dispositifthen
from
to a 'post-modernist'paradigm.
here with the shift
a 'modernist'
of mood,
but by no
Post-modernism
might
designate a certain kind
means doesit refer to a specific kind of artistic paradigm. In fact, over the
have
last 30 years, the procedures
and rhetoric of the 'critical' dispositif
its
art
to
assert
not
much
continues
indeed,
only
barely changed. Today,
to denounce the reign of the commodity, its iconic
will, but also its ability
the
ideals and putrid excrement. Callsfor the need to struggle against
to
continue
society of the spectacle, to develop practicesof detournement,
come from all quarters. And they do so by invoking the same standard
parodies of promotional films;
repertoire of denunciatory
techniques:
in
stars
modelled
disco sounds; advertising icons or media
re-processed
monturned
into
wax figures;
animals
polymorphous perverts;
Disney
of 'vernacular'
tages
photographs depicting standardized petty-bourgeois
overloaded
supermarket
living-rooms,
trolleys, standardized entertainof
of consumerist civilization;
installations
ment
and the excrement
huge
the bowels of the social machine as it
pipes and machines that
depict
and turns it into shit. These sorts of rhetorical
swallows
everything
in a good many galleries and museums professingto
dispositifstill
prevail
the power of the commodity, the reign of the spectacleor
be revealing
of power. But since it is very difficult to find
the
anybody
pornography
of such things, the mechanism ends up spinning
who is actually ignorant
of its effect. In the
around
itself and playing on the very
undecidability
as crifeeds
off the very equivalence between parody
end, the dispositif
tique and the parody of critique.It feeds off the undecidability between
these two effects. This undecidability in turn tends to boil down to the)
that,

144)))

THE PARADOXES

simple parodic mise-en-sceneof its own

become
increasingly clear that this

has

of the

commodity

magic; unfortunately,
mode of manifestation

ART)

however,
is also that

it

itself.

The critical dispositi[

has
consensus that has brought
is made

OF POLITICAL

a transformation in the
undergone
with
it two kinds of response. First,

context
the

of

claim

more modest, that, instead

of professing to
contradictions of our world, it ought help to
threatened
restore the basic socialfunctions
by the reign of the market,
on
the
of
cast an attentive
the
common world and the
objects
gaze
and
the sense of taking
memory of our common history,
part
emphasize
in a common world. Second,it seems
that the shrinking of political space
a substitutive
It is increasingly
has conferred
value on artistic
practice.
the case that art is starting to appear as a spaceof refuge for dissensual
practice, a place of refuge where the relations between sense and sense
continue
to be questioned and re-worked.This fact has given a renewed
to
the idea that art's vocationis actually
to step outside itself, to
impetus
in
an
intervention
the
'real'
world.
These
two
trends,
accomplish
opposed
movement, a shuttling-back-andthen, result in a form of schizophrenic
art and social
forth
between
the museum
and its 'outside',
between
must

art

that

be able to

practice.
In a first

become

the hidden

reveal

takes place,as strategies

of critical
clash are
archive and documentation, processes
seekingto give us a new perception of the traces of our history and the
this
shift from 'critical art' to
signs of our community. Let us illustrate
in
art'
with
an
a
work
of
the 1970s, Chris Burden
'testimony
example:
replaced

made a sort
dedicated

then,

step,

by

those

of

a shift

of testimony,

counter-monument

to all the anonymous

called
Vietnamese

The Other
victims

Vietnam

of the

Monument,

American war.

The monument

the
includes
Burden
copper plaques on which
engraved
names of other anonyms,
that
is Vietnamese
names picked randomly
from
a phone directory. By contrast, in 2002
Christian
Boltanski also
presented us with a work that deals with the subject of anonymity and
called
Les abonnes du telephone.s The installadirectories, an installation
from around the world
tion
consists
of two shelves filled
with
directories
visitors
can sit down and
between which
two
tables are placed so that
consult their chosen directory.The point of this work is no longerto give
it
names
to those left unnamed
by the invaders. Nor is the anonymity
refers to emplotted in any kind of controversy. Here, the anonymous, as
himself
Boltanki's)
Boltanski
says, simply become 'specimens of humanity'.
145)))

DISSENSUS)

were presented
specimens
the new century
commemorate

Paris

in

which

as

of a

part

large exhibition

for example,

included,

to

a work

by

Peter Feldmann of 100 photographsof individuals

aged from 1 to
a huge installation
called
by Peter Fischli and David Weiss
Monde visible (1987-2000) consisting of hundreds of slides that
looked
identical
to the photographs taken by tourists
of famous
sites from
is a favourite
around the world. It also included
an installation that
of many museums today,
a big mosaic by Chinese
artist Bai
namely
Yiluo called The People. Made of 1600 ID photos stitched together, the
the anonymous
multitude
and
their
installation
represents
living
Hans

100 years,and

families

uniting

as the anticipated

people in

in the
artist's words, to point to 'the delicate
is presented,
and communities'. The work
then,
of what
it evokes. Art is supposed
to 'unite'

an attempt,

environments,
threads

a way

reality

that is

comparable with

Yiluo
together, a method that
in
a
studio.
The
employee
photo

first

the

of stitching

practice

while

developed

tends

photograph

photos
as

working

simultaneously

an

to

The
makes present what
it is about.
become a sculpture
that
already
in
acts
of
curatorial
rhetoric
thus
today,
concept metaphor, omnipresent
asa conceptualization
of this new conjunction between representational
distance

and

ethical

immediacy,

work's representationof

of

this

its signification

between

identity

anticipated

and the

embodied reality

the

of that

signification.

There is a

doubleplay

which we

see even more

come the

separation

here
vividly

between

between

the work and

of art that
the museum and its
in forms

socialactivism;

its

supposed

claim
outside,

effect

to have overor between

no longer to
real
or
instead
but
produce duplicates
objects,
images
messages,
new forms of social relationships and
actions, or objects, that engender
the
of relation and infiltration
environments. The two concepts
epitomize
to transform the hackneyed
trend. These concepts representtwo attempts
to demonstrate
the power of the market
or the media into
critiques
seeking
a form of direct social action. In one respect,at issue is to restore a certain
senseof community
to counter the bond-dissolving effectsof consumerism. Such is, for example, the premise of relational
art: the desire to
in museums and galleries, as well
as
create new forms of relationship
to produce
in order to bring
modifications in the urban environment
it is perceived.
In this vein, we might recall a
about
a change in the way
recent attempt
to identify
the production of artistic
artefacts
and the)
artistic performance and
of

146)))

such

art purports

THEPARADOXES

OF POLITICAL ART)

forms of social relationships - namely

Orta's
Lucy
objects'. Created as part of a collective dwelling project,
these objectscan be used both as a 'home' and as a form of collective link
that
work to forge 'lasting connections between groups
and individuals'.
This kind of 'social architecture'seemsto constitute
the third stage in a
evolution in art. First, there was the time of the Werkbund and
particular
the Bauhaus, when artists
became
and designers with the aim
engineers
of re-framing
the environment of everyday life. Then
came
the time of
Wodiczko
his
'critical engineers',when,
for example,
invented
Krysztof
the
homeless vehicle
or his alien staff as dialectical tools to question
Orta's
duplicity of public space. With
together of 'tent-clothes',
sewing
horizon
starts to disappear and is replacedby a
however,this polemical
of the artist as creatorof new community
bonds. This shift is
conception
illustrated
biennale
by a work presented at the Sao Paulo
by
clearly
Cuban artist Rene Fernandez.Fernandez,
a grant he received from
using
an artist foundation,
conducted a survey
in the poor suburbs of Havana,
after
it
was
to
in that
situation
of misery
intervene
resolving,
completed
fellow
artists.
The
a
old
woman's
house
with
some
poor
by restoring
work
consisted
of a screen made of gauze on which
was
the
printed
at the 'real' screen, a video-tapeshowing
image of the old couplelooking
us the artists working as masons,plumbers
and painters.
This demonstration
with current notions of art as a means of restoring
accords
perfectly
it took place in one of the last 'communist'
the social bond. But because
that
countries,it was worked into a sort of parody of the great ambition
artists
in
the
time
of
Malevitch:
to
the
of
inspired
production
replace
to
with
frame
new
forms
of
life.
paintings
attempts
of critical
There have also been attempts
to go beyond
the limits
of the
demonstration,
by using it as a strategy to subvert the functioning
this
is epitomized by
market, the media and so on.In France,
strategy
of artist Matthieu Laurette. Laurettedecided
he would take the
the work
back' made by food
promises of 'satisfaction guaranteedor your
money
He went
on a campaign, systematically
companies at facevalue.
buying
those products
so that he could express his 'dissatisfaction', seek reimbursement
and use the allure of television to promote his subversion.
The
result of this process was presented at the 'Space
of contemporary
Art' in Paris, where spectators were treated to an installation
consisting
of three elements: a wax sculpture by the artist of himself pushing an
a wall
of TV monitors showing
him)
overflowing supermarket trolley;
manifestation

of new

'transformable

147)))

DISSENSUS)

on

his strategy

explaining

reporting
is to

newspapers

mentator put it,

principle of surplus
seems to me that

photographs

huge

of

international

endeavour. Laurette'sclaim,
as
have discovered a strategy
to overturn

value
the

and

TV

on his

comboth the
show. But it
one

the principle of the TV game

of this 'overturning'
of both

and

obviousness

and media would

not
be so apparent were it
his actions
by the process of monumentalizing

not

market

anticipated

already

and him as icon - had

a single TV set and standard-size
photographs of newspaper
of
his
the
not have
clippings
'bargaining'
'overturning'
strategies,
might
been so 'self-evident'.
the
The
of
effect
is
reality
actually
already
anticipated
in the process of monumentalizing
art
his acts and him as icon.In 'activist'
a clear trend
has emerged
that plays on the reality
of occupying
nowadays
an exhibition space as a way of proving the real effectsof subverting
the
social order. The trend
a form of hyper-commitment to 'reality'
manifests
that
short-circuits
on the powers of artistic
reflection
practices
by relying
there

been

on the combined

effects of

action in

world'

exceed
it may
more

the

'real

consensus
well be that
art

by

fills rooms

the

self-evidence

and rhetorical

of exhibitions

presence,
attempts

to

presence and meaning. But

the very law of consensus itself. The
it with

supplementing

oversaturation

of sculptural

demonstration.Art

is

with

monumentalized

reproductions

the
culture,
objects and icons of everyday life and commodity
in a form of
more it goes into the streets and professes to be engaging
social intervention,
and
the more anticipates and mimics its own effect.
Art thus risks becoming a parody
of its alleged efficacy.
It thus
that
art
does
becomecritical or political by 'moving
not
appears
or
from
and intervening in the 'real
itself',
itself',
beyond
'departing
world'. There is no 'real world' that
as the outside of art.
functions
of folds in the sensory fabric
of the common,
Instead, there is a multiplicity
folds in which outside and inside take on a multiplicity
of shifting
forms,
in which the topography
of what
is 'in' and what
is 'out'
are continually
criss-crossedand displacedby the aesthetics of politics and the politics of
aesthetics. Thereis no 'real world'.Instead,
are definite configurathere
tions of what is given as our real, as the object of our perceptions and the
field of our interventions. The real always is a matter of construction, a
matter
of 'fiction',
in the sense that
I tried
What
to define it above.
the mainstream fiction
of the police order is that
it passes
characterizes
itself off as the real, that it feigns to draw a clear-cutline between
what
belongs to the self-evidence of the real and what belongs to the field of)
of the

148)))

THE PARADOXES

OF POLITICAL

ART)

opinions and utopias. Consensusmeans

representations,
is
fictions
the
precisely
sensory given as univocal. Politicaland artistic
'real'
and multiplying
it in a
introduce
dissensus by hollowing out that
polemical way. The practice of fiction undoes, and then re-articulates,
connectionsbetween signsand images, images and times, and signs and
a given
It is a
a given
sense of reality,
'commonsense'.
spaces, framing
appearances,

that

practicethat invents
can be saidand what

new

trajectories

can be

between

what

can

be seen,

what

done.

that shakes up the

of places
and compedistribution
its own
to
blur
the
borders
thereby
defining
art's borders, just as doing politics
activity. Doing art means
displacing
the
of what is acknowledged as the political.
means displacing
borders
art's borders does not mean leaving
that is making the
art,
Displacing
to reality.
Practices
of art do not
(or 'representation')
leap from 'fiction'
of awareness
or rebellious impulses for politics.Nor do
provide forms
of collective
political
they take leave of themselves to become forms
action. They contribute to the constitution
of a form of commonsense
that
to a new landscapeof the visible, the sayable and
is 'polemical',
It

is a

practice

tences, and

which

works

the doable.
to constituting a new idea of what'
critical'
They may thus contribute
art could mean today. For critical art is not so much a type of art that
as it is an art
reveals
the forms and contradictions of domination
and
that
its own limits
that refuses to anticipate its
powers,
questions
own
effects. This is why
one of the most interesting
contribuperhaps
tions to the framing
of a new landscape of the sensible has beenmade
by
- that refuse the
forms of art that accept their
insufficiency
sculpturethe world of
performancemodel - or by artistic practices that infiltrate
market and socialrelations
and then remain content to be mere images
on
to
screens and monitors. They use those fragile
surfaces
cibachrome,
it is that is given to see to us and an
compose a proposition on what
of
into
the power of representation. Unsurprisingly,
many
of space,
territories, borders,
propositions focuson matters
wastelands and other transient
matters
that are crucial to today's
places,
three
issuesof power and community. Let me mention,
others,
among
interrogation

those artistic

in this respect.
works that seem to me particularly significant
The first is a film by Chantal Akerman, De l'autre cote, 6 which deals with
the fence along the US-Mexico
border.The film is not about 'immigration'
or border-crossing,
but
about
the fence itself,
both
as a material object)

149)))

DISSENSUS)

focus on the
as an object of discourse.While
so many
film-makers
drama involved
in crossing
out the contradictions
the border and point
that exist betweenthe realities
of the US economy and the injustices and
Akerman plays on the elements of their
prejudicesof US nationalism,
she has the camera move
the fence,
dissociation.
Sometimes
along
especially under night
lighting.
making us feel its inhuman
strangeness,
The rest of the time, however, she usesit to present
either the hopes,
and fears on
on the Mexican side, or the concerns
and failures
attempts
the American side. The film's political impact consists precisely in the
issueinto an aesthetic matter,
way it turns an economic and geopolitical
two sides, and a
the way in which it produces a confrontation
between
and

seriesof

conflicting

narratives

Similar to Akerman's

way

around

of dealing

the raw
with the

materiality

of the

fence.

border are photographer

of Israeli blockadeson Palestinian

to photograph the big Wall itself, Ristelhueber
a bird's-eye
took shots of little blockades
on minor country roads from
of
the
little rocks
from
a
view
from
which
and
hence
point
perspective,
The
here
is
to
effect a
into
the
attempt
landscape.
nearly disappear
- affect of
but hackneyed
from the - more spectacular
displacement
simple
to the (less spectacular) affect of curiosity.
indignation
The second,
a work called 'Giveme the Colours'
(2003) by video-artist
Anri
on art's 'political' power. His
uses video as a means to reflect
Sala,
a project, initiated by the mayor of Tirana and
video-installation
presents
reminiscent of the Schillerian projectof the' aesthetic education of Man',
of his town
in which
the mayor decided to have all the house facades
in
in
new
of aesthetic
to
a
sense
colours
order
re-painted
bright
engender
in such a
work
citizens.
Sala's
camera
movements
its
community
among
the discourse of the 'political
a confrontation
between
as to produce
way
street
and
the run-down character of the muddy
artist'
and
both
as well as the abstractness
seemingly blithe circulation of its inhabitants,
of the patchesof colours on the walls lining it. The point, it seems, is to
art in order to question a prevalent
use the means specific
to 'distant'
to fuse art
In
it
seems
to be a direct attempt
of
art.
other
words,
politics
and life into a single process.
No Quarto da Yanda
is a film
called
The third
work
by Portuguese
film-maker
Pedro Costa.' The film is about the life of a group of young
reside
or small business,
who, caught between a life of drugs
underdogs
While)
in a poor
suburb of Lisbon that is slowly being raised by bulldozers.
Sophie

roads.

150)))

Ristelhueber's

Instead

representations

of choosing

THE PARADOXES

so-called

artists

'relational'

monuments

fancy

and

social relationships

in

paradoxical look at

the

situation

of misery:

busy

poor

suburbs,

possibilities

from the

with

themselves

unexpected

creating

inventing
to

situations

Pedro Costa's
available to art and

strangely

coloured

OF POLITICAL

effort

ART)

real and

new
engender
is to take a

life in

architecture

a particular
resulting

from the demolition itself to the efforts

of inhabitants,
amidst the effects
of drugs and despair, to recover a voiceand a capacity to tell their own
stories. Here, too, the 'politics' of art paradoxically consists in setting
aside all economic and sodal 'explanations'of the existence
and destruction
of the shanty town to identify
a more specifically political element: the
confrontation
between
the power and the impotence of a body,
between
a life and its possibilities.
This way of addressing the 'truly
political',
does not manage to sidestepthe incalculable
tension
between
however,
aesthetic
indifference.
It cannot sidestep the
an9
political dissensuality
fact that a film remains a film and a spectator remains a spectator.Film,
the frame of our
video
and installation
art
rework
art, photography
and
our
affects.
As
the
of
such,
dynamism
open
perceptions
they
may
but
cannot avoid
up new passages for political subjectivation,
they
the aesthetic cut that
from intentions and
separates
consequences
prevents their from being any direct passage to an 'other side' of words
and

images.)

151)))

I will

CHAPTER

ELEVEN

The Politics

of literature)

- and first of all what

it does
title
means
is not the politics
of its writers. It does not
deal with their personal commitment to the socialand political issuesand
of their times. Nor does it deal with the modes of representation
struggles
and
the social struggles in their
of political
events
or the social structure
The syntagma 'politics of literature' means that literature
'does'
books.
- that there is a
link
as
literature
between
as a
politics
specific
politics
definite
of
as
a
definite
of
and
literature
practice
way
doing
writing.
sense of this statement,
I will first briefly
out the idea of
To make
spell
Politics
is commonly viewed as the practice
of
politics this involves.
and the enactpower or the embodiment of collectivewills and interests
ment of collectiveideas.Now, such enactments
or embodiments imply
that
account
as subjects sharing in a common
world,
you are taken into
start

by explaining

not mean. Thepolitics

what my

of literature

noise,
making statements and not simply
discussing
things located in a
world and not in your own fantasy. What really deserves the
common
name of politics is the cluster of perceptions and practicesthat shape this
common world. Politics is first of all a way of framing,
among
sensory
of the sensible, of the
It is a partition
data, a specificsphereof experience.
visible and the sayable, which
allows
(or does not allow) some specific
data
to appear; which allows or doesnot allow
some specific subjects to
designate them and speak about them. It is a specific intertwining of
of being,
ways
ways of doing and ways of speaking.
The politics
thus means that
is
of literature
literature
as literature
involved in this partition of the visible and the sayable, in this intertwinthat
frames a polemical common world.)
ing of being, doing and saying

152)))

THE POLITICS

OF LITERATURE)

is meant
point is: what
by 'literature as literature'? Surprisor
the
social
commentators
of literature
have
political
ingly,
own historicity. We know,
to literature's
that
however,
paid attention
under the notion of 'literature' is not old.
classifying the art of writing
it back to approximately the beginning
We
can trace
of the nineteenth
from this.
century. But critics have not often deducedany consequence

the

Now

few

among

literature
Some of them have tried desperatelyto connect
(taken as the
name
of the art of writing
in general)
with politics conceived
as a historical
set of forces, events and issues. Othershave
tried
to give a
the
of
literature.
this
was
done
content
to
notion
specific
Unfortunately
on a very weak basis,by referring
literature's
modernity to the search for
an intransitive
On this basis, the connection was initially
language.
flawed.
Either there was no way
of binding
together literary intransitivity
and political
to political
commitaction, with 'art for art's sake'opposed
ment, or one had to assume a quite obscure relationship betweenliterary
of as the materialistic primacy
of the signifier)
(conceived
intransitivity
of revolutionary
and the materialistic rationality
politics.
Sartre proposed a kind of gentleman's
agreement,
by opposing the
of
of
to
the
Poets, he
poetry
prose
writing.
intransitivity
transitivity
to the political
assumed,usedwords as things, and had no commitment
use of communicative speech.Prosewriters,
used words as
by contrast,

a -historical

toolsof
ing
After

of a

and

communication

common world.

having

attributed

states of language,

But

were automatically committed to the framthe

distinction
proved to be inconsistent.

the opposition

to the very

Sartre had to explainwhy

prose

distinction

writers

of

two

like Flaubert
And
he had to

used words in the same 'intransitive' way as did poets.

pursue endlessly the reason for this, both in the sad realities of class
in the 1850s and in the neurosis
of the young Gustave Flaubert.
struggle
In other words,he had to pursue outside of literature
a political
commitment of literature, which
he had first purported to ground
on its own
In fact, the
linguistic specificity. It is not a casual or a personal failure.
a specific state or use of language
has no
identification of literature
with
real linguistic
and it cannot ground
of literature
relevance,
any specificity
or its political
involvement.
Moreover, it proves very ambiguous in its
and
we
to deal with this ambiguity
if we want
have
use,
practical
in understanding
as a new system
of the
to move forward
literature
of
art of writing,
as well
as its relationship to the political partition
the

sensible.)
153)))

DISSENSUS)

I would

highlight

samenovelist,

this

two political readings of the

by comparing
the embodiment of 'art for art's sake' and the

point

to be

taken

autonomy of literature. I have just referred to

Flaubert.

Prom his

aristocraticassault
He

used

of

against

transparency

prose's

As Sartre put
and breaks its

point

it,

Sartre's

the

of words to create

a new form

surrounds
the object, seizesit,
into
stone
and petrifies the
changes

'Flaubert

back,

of

analysis

Flaubert was the champion of

democratic
nature of prose language.

view,

an

of opacity.

immobilizes

it

objectas well'.

as the contribution
of bourgeois
writpetrification
dass. Flaubert, Mallarme and their colleagues
to challenge
the bourgeois way of thinking,
and they dreamt
purported
in a world of pure words, conceived
of as a
of a new aristocracy,
living
But their private paradise
secret garden of preciousstones and flowers.
was nothing
but the celestial projection of the essence of private
ownerfrom
those who
ship. In order to shape it, they had to tear words away
as tools of social debate and struggle.
could have used them
the
So the literary
of words and objects went along with
petrification
of
anti-democratic
But
the
'petrification of
bourgeois
strategy.
argument
Sartre

explained

ers to the

strategy

this

of their

the language' had a long history.

had been
made by contempoLong before Sartre, the same argument
of Flaubert.
commentators
prose a
rary
They pointed out in Flaubert's
fascination for detail and an indifference towards the human
meaning
of actions and characters that
led him to give the same importanceto
material
and to human beings. Barbey d'Aurevilly
summed
up
things
that Flaubert was carrying
his sentences
their criticism by saying
just as
All of them
a worker carries
his stones
before him in a wheelbarrow.
was
the
of
human
action
and human
that
his
prose
petrification
agreed
that this
later,
language.And all of them, like Sartre a century
thought
was not a mere literary
that it carried a deep political
device,
petrification
Now
the point is that
the
critics
nineteenth-century
significance.
of
For them, petrification was the symptom
understood this differently.
Flaubert's disregard for any difference
between
democracy.
high and low
between
foreground and background,
subject matters, for any hierarchy
and ultimately
between
men and things, was the hallmark of democracy.
had
no political
commitment. He despised equally
Indeed, Flaubert
democrats
and conservatives,
and assumed that the writer should be
But even that attitude
of
to prove
unwilling
anything on any matter.
'non-commitment'
was for those commentatorsthe mark of democracy.)
154)))

THE POLITICS

What

to be democrat,
not the equal ability
anti-democrat
Flaubert
democracy and anti-democracy? Whatever
form of
about the common people and the republican

is democracy,
to both

or indifferent
might

OF LITERATURE)

think

if

government, his prose was

There would be little point
for a revolutionary
argument

closerlook at

the

embodiment

in proving
argument.

of democracy.

that Sartre mistook

a reactionary
It is more relevant to have

the 'indifference' of a way of writing and

the opposite statements it allows
for. It appears that
three
are
things
bound together: a way of writing without 'meaning' anything,
a way of
as a symptom
that has to be interpreted
and
two
reading this writing
opposite ways of making this political
reading.
I would like to show that this very link between a way of writing,
a
can lead us to the core of
way of reading and two ways of interpreting
the question.The 'indifference'
of writing, the practice of symptomatic
and the political ambiguity
of that
reading
reading are woven in the
same fabric. And this
fabric
be
as such: literature
literature
conmight
in general nor as a specific
of
ceived neither as the art of writing
state
the language, but as a historical mode of visibility
of writing,
a specific
link
a system of meaning of words and
a system
of visibility
between
of things.
of visibility involves a specificsystem
of
This
mode
of the efficiency
as
dismisses
another
of 'literature'
words, which
system. The contrasting
as the modern
such, literature
regime of the art of writing, to the old
world of representationand belles lettres is not the opposition between
two
states
of the language. Nor is it an opposition between the servitude
It is the opposiof mimesis and the autonomy of self-referential writing.
of two ways of linking
and
of
the relation
tion
action,
meaning
framing
between the sayable and the visible, of enabling words with the power of
framing a common world.It is an opposition between two ways of doing
things

with

This is

what

the

link

between

words.
was

ons of the old literary

involved

in the criticism

made by

the

French

champi-

all the
but against
against Flaubert,
new writers: they had lost the sense of human action and human
meanthat they had lost the sense of a certain
kind
of
ing. For us, this means
'action' and of a certain way of understanding
the link between action
and
What was that sense? In order to understand
it, we have to
meaning.
remember the old Aristotelian
that sustained the edificeof repprinciple
resentation.
Aristotle
assumed, is not a specificuse of language.)
Poetry,
regime,

not only

155)))

DISSENSUS)

Poetry
this

is fiction.

poetic

And

imitation of acting

is an

fiction

also was

principle

opposing the causalrationality

men.

We know

that

a political principle.It set forth a hierarchy

of actions
to the empiricism of life as it

unfolds.
is more 'philosophical'
than
because
said,
Poetry, Aristotle
history,
in a whole, while
builds causal plots binding
events
together
tells the events, as they
evolve.
The privilege of action over
history
only
life
noble
to the extent
from
base
that it
distinguished
poetry
history,
those
who
act
from
those
who
do
who
but
'live',
distinguished
nothing
are enclosedin the sphere of reproductive and meaningless life. As a
fiction was divided into
different
of imitations.
consequence,
genres
There were high genres,
devoted
to the imitation
of noble
actions and
to common
characters, and low genresdevoted
people and base subject
The
matters.
of genres also submitted style
to a principle
of
hierarchy
hierarchical convenience:kings had to act and speak as kings do, and
common people as commonpeopledo.The convention
was not simply
an academic constraint. Therewas a homology
the rationality
between
of poetic fiction
and
the intelligibility
of human actions, conceived
of
as an adequation between ways of being, ways of doing and ways of

poetry

speaking.
From
that point
of view we
defenders
of the belles lettres
the dismissal of any
principle

subject matters,
a subject
there
Flaubert:
and

of

any

can figure

of hierarchy

principle

matter. The
are no high

of appropriateness

new principle
or

the
at first sight, what
upset
of the new writers. It was
among the characters and

out,

works

the

in

low

subject

was

stated

matters.

between a

in all its
Further,

crudity

there

style

by

is no

subject matter at all, because style is an absolute way of seeing things.

absolutization
of style may have been identified
afterwards
with an
time, it could only be
a-political or aristocraticposition.But in Flaubert's
as a radical egalitarian
the whole system
interpreted
principle,
upsetting
It turned
of representation,the old regime of the art of writing.
upside
down a certain normality,
as an adequation between ways of being,
put
The new principle broke that
ways of doing and ways of speaking.
of style went along with the
The'
aristocratic'
absolutization
adequation.
'democratic' principle of indifference.It went along with the reversal of
the old hierarchy
between
noble action and base life.
that
we could easily construct a politics
of literature,
On
ground
the egalitarian
of indifference
to the hierarchical)
contrasting
principle
This

156)))

THE POLITICS

OF LITERATURE)

of literature'
could square with
de
old regime. Sucha 'politics
idea
conceived
the'
of
conditions'.
of
as
equality
Tocqueville's
democracy,
But we cannot end matters
that
is more than a social
easily. Democracy
state. It is a specificpartition
of the sensible, a specific regimeof speaking
between
manners of
whose
effect is to upset any steady
relationship
speaking, manners of doing and manners of being.It is in this sense that
literature
its 'democracy' to the representational hierarchy.
opposed
he made
When
accounted
for the power of Corneille'stragedies,
Voltaire
a significant argument. Hesaidthat his tragedies
were performed in front
and generals. He
of an audience made of orators,magistrates,
preachers
meant an audiencemade of people for whom speaking was the same as
of his own time wasno
acting. Unfortunately, he assumed,the audience
It was only
of those specialists of the acting
word.
composed
longer
That
ladies'.
made, he said,of 'a num\037er of young gentlemen and young
of
meant anybody, nobody, no addressee.The representational
regime
was
on
a
definite
idea
of
the
was
based
speech-act. Writing
writing
And speaking was viewed as the act of the orator who is
speaking.
there was no popular
(even
though
persuading the popular assembly
souls
or the
was
viewed
as
the
act
of
the
I
t
preacher
uplifting
assembly).
his troops.
The representational power of doing art
general haranguing
with
the
of a social hierarchy based
words
was bound up with
power
on the capacity of addressing appropriate kinds of speech-actsto appropriate kinds of audiences.
the audience stigaddressed
Flaubert and his peers, on the contrary,
of young
and young gentlemen.
matized by Voltaire:
a number
ladies
is anybody
Literature is this new regime of writing in which the writer
is why its sentences are 'mute
and the reader anybody.
This
pebbles'.
They are mute in the sense that they had been uttered long ago by Plato
of the orphan
letter to the living
when
he contrasted the wandering
planted
logos,
by a master as a seedin the soul of a disciple, where it
that went its way,
could
grow and live. The 'mute letter' was the letter
without
a father to guide it. It was the letter that spoke to anybody,
to whom it had to speak, and to whom it had not. The
without
knowing
too much and endowed anyone
'mute' letter was a letter
that
spoke
I proat all with
the power of speaking. In my book Les noms de l'histoire,l
t
o
of
the
so-called
to
the
name
of
'literariness'
this
posed
availability
give
one
'mute letter' that determines
a partition of the perceptible in which
can no longer contrast those who speak and those who only make noise,)
law

of the

157)))

DISSENSUS)

those

who act and

those who

only

live.

Such

was the

democratic revolu-

of
aristocracy
reactionary critics. The Flaubertian
tied to the democracy of the mute letter, meaning
the
style was originally
letter that anybody can retrieveand use in his or her way.
Literature
discovers
at its core this link with the democratic disorder of
is the art of writing
that
addresses
literariness.Literature
specifically
not read.
This paradoxical relationship is the subject
those who should
matter
of many
works. I will take as a telling case
nineteenth-century
a fable of
Balzac'snovel Le cure de village, 2 which is, strictly
speaking,
The novel
recounts the disaster causedby one
democracy as literariness.
who should never have
single event: the reading of a bookby somebody
read one.It is the story of a young girl, Veronique, the daughter of an
town
of
ironmonger. She lives in the lower end of the small provincial
One
Limoges, in an atmosphere of labour, religion and chastity.
day, as
with
her parents,
she sees on display
in a bookVeronique is strolling
seller's shop a bookadorned
with
a nice engraving. It is Paul et Vir9inie,
a
She buys the book and readsit.
novel famed for its childlike
innocence.
and
And
goes wrong: the pure and chastebookin the hands
everything
mind of the pure and chaste girl becomes
the most dangerous poison.
From
that
carried
Balzac
away,
day on, Veronique enters a new life,
She dreams of meetwrites, by 'the cult of the Ideal, that fatal religion'.
and chaste love. Disaster
her Paul and living with him a life of pure
ing
a
ensues.Veronique,
becomes
a loveless marriage with
rich, enters
of the town. As a wealthy
banker
patron, she meets an honest,noble and
worker. They fall in love. He becomes crazy about their
pious
young
he robs and kills
an old
love
her,
and, in order to flee with
desperate
man. He is arrested, sentencedto death
and dies without denouncing
tion

pinpointed

by the

Veronique.
of the 'dead letter' becomes a power
Thus the democraticavailability
of death.
This evil must be redeemed. So in the last part of the book,
now
a rich widow, retires to a small
and tries to gain
village
Veronique,
her salvation,
But the means of her salvaparson.
guided by the country
tion
her soul with pious
are very
strange. The parson does not uplift
discourseand the Holy Scriptures. The reason for this is clear: the evil
of a book in the life of
that
caused
the whole disaster was the intrusion
who should never have entered the world
of writing. The evil
someone
made by the 'mute letters' cannot be redeemedby any word, not even
in another
kind of)
the
Word of God. Redemption must be written
by
158)))

THE POLITICS

writing,
Veronique

how to

OF LITERATURE)

in the flesh of real things.

So the parson does not make
but a contractor, a businesswoman.He teaches her
her fortune and increase the prosperity of the village
by

engraved

a nun,
make

the forest's waters in sluices

and irrigation
trenches. Thus
barren lands become rich meadows
prized cattle. And just
nourishing
before
written
on the land.
dying, Veronique can show her repentance
She says, 'I have engraved
my repentance
upon this land in indelible
characters, as an everlasting record.It is written everywhere in the fields
from
their courses
(. . .) in the mountains' streamsturned
grown
green
into the plain, once wild and barren, now fertile and productive'.
This makes for a consistent
conclusion. The cause of the evil was the
of the perceptible grounded on democratic
The
very
partition
literarity.
of the evil is another partition
of the perceptible:
no more
redemption
the old hierarchy
of ranks,
no more the old privilege of the acting
word,
uttered
but the new power of a
by the master, the priest, or the general,
written
in the very fabric of 'real things'. That
can heal
which
meaning
the evil done by the democratic
'mute' letter is another kind
of mute
collecting

a writing
on the body of things
and
withdrawn
from
engraved
the attempts of the greedy sonsor daughters
of plebeians.
The 'mute
pebbles' thus take on another meaning. The collapseof the representational paradigm means not only the collapse of a hierarchical system of
of meaning.
The rules
address;it means the collapse of a whole regime
and hierarchies of representation hung
a definite link between
onto
and
If poetry
was identified
with fiction
and
fiction
with
saying
doing.
the imitation
of acting
was
it
because
the
men,
highest accomplishment
of human
action was supposed to be the action made
itself.
by speaking
It is that power
of the acting word that
the popular
orators of the Revolution
had torn away from the hierarchical order of rhetorical
culture
and
appropriated for unexpected aims. But that idea of the speech-act itself
relied on a definite
idea of what meaning means: meaning
was a relation
of address from one will to another. The hub of the system was the idea
of speaking as using words to produce appropriate aims: specificmoves
in the souls and motions of bodies.
The
new
of literature
dismissed that
connection
between
regime
and
The
no
could
use
words
to
moralize
meaning
parson
longer
willing.
to the plebeian's daughter. Nor could
the reactionary
critics use them
to
moralize
to the writer
Flaubert
and teach him which
matters
and
subject
characters he should choose.But the plebeian's daughter, the worker-poets)
writing:

159)))

DISSENSUS)

the militant

workers were equally

to the consequences of
subjected
1790s
their
had appropriated
fathers
regime meaning.
for themselvesthe words and sentences of Ancient
rhetoric.
But the age
of rhetoric was over. Meaning
was no more a relationship betweenone
will
and
another.
It turned out to be a relationship
between
signs and
other signs.
Suchwas the reverse side of the democracy of literature. The mute
offered
letters
to the greediness of plebeian children
were
taken
away
kind of muteness.
from them by another
The reactionary critics themselves
discovered
this double bind of literary
muteness.
This is the reason
did not teach Flaubert what
he should
have done. They explained
they
to their readers that Flaubert
could not have done otherwise,because
he was a writer of 'democratic times'. They did not behave as defenders
of rules
or teachers of good taste. They
behaved
as interpreters
of
symptoms. In so doing, they endorsed the idea that the books they were
for the sin of muteness 'spoke' in another
faulting
way, that they spoke
out of their very muteness.
The 'muteness'
is another
of literature
way
of speaking, another link between
and
words.
Flaubert's
or Hugo's
things
sentenceswere made of 'mute pebbles'. Now, in the age of archaeology,
which was also the time of GermanRomanpaleontologyand philology,
knew that pebbles, too, spokein their own way. They
ticism,
everybody
had no voice.But they wore on their very bodies the testimony
of their
own history. And
that
was much more faithful
than
any
testimony
discourse. It was the unfalsified
truth
of things, opposed to the lies
and chatter of orators.Suchwas the language
of literature,
its system of
was
no
a
between
one
will
and
longer
relationship
meaning. Meaning
another.
It turned out to be a relationship
and
other
between
signs
signs.
Thewords of literature
had to display and decipher the signs and sympin a 'mute writing' on the body of things
toms written
and in the fabric
of language.
From
that
took
on another
point of view, the muteness of literature
a different 'politics'. This new idea
involved
meaning, and that meaning
of mute
had been pioneered by Vico, when he set out to upset
writing
the foundations
of Aristotelian
poetics by disclosing the character of the
'true Homer'.The 'true Homer' was not a poet in the representational
and
sense, meaning an inventor of fictions,
characters,
metaphors
were
no fictions to him, for he lived in a
rhythms. His so-called fictions
time when history and fiction
were
His characters, the valiant)
mingled.
and

the new

160)))

of

In the

THE POLITICS

OF LITERATURE)

wise Nestor, were not charactersas we have them, but

abstractions, because the men of his time had neither the
sense of individuality,
nor
the capacity for abstraction. His metaphors
bore witness
to an age where thought
and image,
ideas and things
could
and
metres
reflected a time when
not be separated. Even his rhythms
In short, Homeric poetry,
were
interchangeable.
speaking and singing
the essenceof poetry, was a language of childhood. It was, Vico said,
of the muteness
similar to the language of dumb persons.Another
idea
was
linked
to this new regime of meaning
that bound
of literature
Achilles

or the

personified

together muteness and significance,poeticality

involved another idea of politics,
contrasting

the letter to

its

democratic

This might
account
sense, replaced the

and

historicity.

the historicity

And it

enclosed in

availability.

for the way

old b\037lles

in its new
the very name of literature,
It is usually said to have occurred

lettres.

de Stael's book,De

la litterature,
published in
this
point.
turning point has two
features.
it
does
not
out
in the practice
First,
point
novelty
striking
any
of writing.
of writing.
What
was changed was the visibility
Germaine de
Stael saidthat she would not change anything
in the rules of belles lettres.
was to highlight
the
between
Her
sole concern
relationship
types of
societiesand types of literature.But this little addition was enough to set
And that new system
a new system of visibility
of writing.
up
appeared
de Stael wrote at the
as a response to a definite political issue. Madame
and she was the champion of a third
end of the French Revolution,
way,
both
to
and
to counter-revolution. She wanted
to
revolution
opposed
of
and
that
the
ideas
uttered
the
philosoprove
progress perfectibility,
by
had not caused the revolutionary
bloodshed
phers of the Enlightenment,
around

1800,

and

Germaine

1800, is often taken

as a turning

But

as charged. They had not, becausethe 'ideas'

stated by the
act as wills. Further,
were the expression of movethey
will.
ments in society and civilization that do not depend on anybody's
ideas and wills as it did by
Literature
did not act so much
by expressing
literature
displaying the character of a time or a society. In this context,
and another
appeared at the same time as a new regime of writing,
way
is not imposing
of relating
to politics,
resting on this principle:
writing
of the orator, the priest or the general.
one will on another, in the fashion
It is
It is displaying
and deciphering the symptoms of a state
of things.
as the geologist does, into
the
delving
revealing the signs of history,
- the)
seams
and strata under the stage of the orators and politicians
and

writers

terror,

did

not

161)))

DISSENSUS)

seams
litterature,

and strata that

Jules Michelet

Revolution. He
of

Republican

underlie

was

undoubtedly

'literary

times'.

When he

vals in the

small villages, he enthusiastically

written

local

by

through

the

related the
referred

revolutionary

to the

festi-

testimonies

orators.

But he did not

their

Forty years after De la

of the French
history
great Republican. But he was a

its foundation.

would set out to write

quote those writings.

speeches:

what was speaking

conveyed
soil at harvest time, or the mud
street. In the times of literature,
city's
of political
orator. This is not a matter
He

the voice of the

and the clamour of the industrial

mute
things speak better than
any
itself. The Republican
It is a politics carried by literature
engagement.
it into play, the reactionary novelist does so as well.
This
historian
puts
new regime and new 'politics'of literature
is at the core of the so-called
realistic
novel.
Its principle
was not reproducing facts as they are, as
the so-called world of prosaic activities
critics claimed. It was displaying
as a huge Poem - a huge
fabric
of signs and traces, of obscuresignsthat
and
had
to be displayed, unfolded and deciphered. The best example
of
in
La
Peau
de
At
the
this
can
found
Balzac's
be
commentary
chagrin.
enters
the showrooms
of an
beginning of the novel, the hero, Raphael,
Balzac
there,
writes, 'this ocean of furnishings,
antique shop. And
works of art and relics made up for him an endless
inventions,
fashions,
poem'. The shop was indeed a mixture of worlds and ages: the soldier's
and
the priest's ciborium; the Moor's yatogan
tobacco-pouch
alongside
the gold slipper of the seraglio; stuffed
boas
at stained-glass
grinned
of Madame
Du Barry seemed to contemplatean
windows; a portrait
Indian
a pneumatic machine was poking
out
the eye of the
chibbouk;
and
so
on.
The
mixture
of
the
made all
emperor Augustus
shop
curiosity
it made
each object a poeticelement,
objects and images equal. Further,
a sensitive
form that is a fabric of signs as well. All these objects wore a
on their body. They were woven of signs
an era
that summarized
history
a huge
and a form of civilization.
And their random gathering
made
of new stories,
poem, each verse of which carried the infinite virtuality
unfolding those signs in new contexts. It was the encyclopedia of all the
times and all the worlds, the compostin which the fossils of them were
blendedtogether.
Further
on in the same book, Balzac
contrasts
Byron,
the poet who has expressedwith words
some aspects of spiritual
turmoil,
- Cuvier, the naturalist,
a poet of a new kind
to the true poet of the time,
out of some teeth,)
who
has done 'true poetry': he has re-built
cities
162)))

THE POLITICS

out of

forests

re-populated

of giants in a mammoth's
same way. He displays the

tion. He
of ordinary

unfolds

the

some petrified tracesand

foot. The

so-called

fossilsand

poeticality,

the

realist

hieroglyphs

historicity

OF LITERATURE)
races

re-discovered

novelist

of history
written

acts in the
and civiliza-

on

the

body

old representational regime,the frame of intelof human

actions was patterned on the model
of the causal
ligibility
of voluntary
actions, linked together and aimed at definite
rationality
ends. Now, when meaning becomesa 'mute' relation
of signs to signs,
human actions are no longer
as
successful
or unsuccessful
intelligible
of aims by willing characters. And
the characters
are no longer
pursuits
their ends. They are intelligible
the clothes
through
intelligible
through
they wear, the stonesof their houses or the wallpaper of their rooms.
This
results
in a very interesting
between
science
literature,
linkage
and politics.Literature
.does
a kind of side-politics or meta-politics.
The
of that 'politics' is to leave the commonstage
of the conflict of
principle
wills
in order
to investigate in the underground
of society and read the
of
It
takes
social
situations
and
characters
symptoms
history.
away from
their everyday, earthbound reality
and
what
displays
they truly are, a
fabric of poetic signs, which
are
historical
phantasmagoric
symptoms
as well. For their nature as poeticsigns is the same as their nature as
things.

In the

historical results and political symptoms.

This
of literature
'politics'
who
emerges as the dismissal of the politics of orators and militants,
conceive of politics as a struggle
of wills and interests.
We are moving
towards
a first answer to our question regarding
the
of
literature
'as
literature'.
Literature
as
such
a
twofold
politics
displays
manner
of re-configuring
politics, a twofold
sensory data. On the one
of the 'mute' letter
hand, it displays the power of literariness,the power
that
not only the hierarchies of the representationalsystem
but
upsets
also any principle of adequation between a way
of being
and a way of
On the other hand, it sets in motion another politics of the
speaking.
mute letter: the side-politics
or metapolitics
that substitutes
the
deciwritten
on the body of things
for the
phering of the mute meaning
democratic chattering of the letter.
The duplicity
of the
'mute letter' has two
The first
consequences.
the
so-called
or
'scientific'
of
consequence regards
'political'
explanation
literature. Sartre's flawed
about
is
a
Flaubert
not
argument
personal
and

casual

critical

mistake.

discourse

More deeply, it bears witness to the strange

about literature. For at least 150years,
daring

status

of

critics)

163)))

DISSENSUS)

have
its

purported

unconscious

how its

to disclose the political import

to make it confess
discourse,

to spell out

of literature,

what

it was

hiding

and

ciphered the
laws of the socialstructure,
the structure
of the literary field. But all those attempts
to tell the truth about literature
in the Marxian
or Freudian key or in the Benjaminian
or Bourdieusian
that
we have already encountered. The patkey, raise the sameproblem
terns
of their critical explanation of 'what literature
relied on the
says'
same system of meaning
that
the
of
literature
itself.
practice
underpinned
Not surprisingly, they very often came upon the sameproblem
as Sartre.
In the same way, they endorsed
as new critical
on literature
the
insights
reveal

fictions

or

of writing unwittingly
patterns
the market
of symbolic goods and

'social' and 'political'interpretations

of nineteenth-century

Further, the patterns they had

the patterns framed by literature

as phantasmagorias

Benjamin explainedthe

to reveal the

truth

on

conservatives.
literature
are

Explaining close- to-hand realities

to the hidden truth
of a society, this
the invention
of literature
itself.
Telling
in
the
underground, spelling out
travelling
- that also was a plot
underneath
lying
itself.

witness

bearing

was
pattern of intelligibility
the truth on the surfaceby
the unconscious social text
invented
itself.
by literature

process

to use

of Baudelaire's
imagery
and the topographical figures

structure

of commodification

through

of

the

passages
of a defi-

and loitering. But the explanation makes senseon the ground

- the model of deciphering
model
of intelligibility
the unconscious
framed
nineteenth
re-elaborated by
literature,
hieroglyph,
-century
by
Proust
and borrowed
from him by Benjamin.
refers to the
Benjamin
Marxist analysis of the commodity as a fetish.
But
the Balzacian paranite

digm of the shop as a poem had to

the commodity as a phantasmagoria,
but actually proves to be a
glance

theologicalquibbles.Marx's

exist

first, to allow for the analysis of

that seems obvious at first
of hieroglyphs
and a puzzle of
stems from the Balzadan shop.

a thing
fabric

commodity

can account for Baudelaire'spoetry,

since
takes place not so much
in the passages
of the
Parisian boulevards as it does in the same Balzacian shop or workshop.
The
that underpins the practices of historical or
symptomatic
reading
was
first of all a poeticalrevolution.
And
these
sociological
interpretation
sciences had to borrow from
'naIve'
literature
the patterns for highlightand telling
the truth
about its illusions. Now,
the second
ing its naivete
concerns literature
itself.
The politics of literature
turns
out)
consequence
And

the

Baudelaire's

164)))

analysis

of fetishism

loitering

THE POLITICS

to

conflict of

be the

ariness and
still

is a

to be

the

two

politics

of the

OF LITERATURE)

'mute letter': the politics of liter-

of symptomatic
reading. Balzac's Curede village
The evil done by democratic
literariness
has
point.

politics

good case in

redeemedby

of a writing engraved in the very flesh of

solution is a dead-endfor literature
itself. Were
it taken at face value, it would
mean that the writer
must
stop writing,
must keep silent and cedethe place to the engineers, who know the right
to bind men together, the right
to write without words in the
way
way
flesh of things. This was not simply
a fictional
invention. It was the core
of the utopia spelledout in the 1830s, a few years beforeBalzac wrote his
no more words,
novel, by the Saint-Simonian engineersand 'priests':
no more paper or literature.
What
is needed to bind
is
people
together
railways and canals.
Balzacdid not stop writing, of course. But he spent five years completit and re-arranged
the order of the chaptersin
ing the book. He re-wrote
order
to have the hermeneutic plot match
the
narrative
plot. But he
failed to solvethe contradiction.
That contradiction
did not oppose the
realisticwriter to the Christian moralist. It was the self-contradictionof
the politics
of literature.
The novelist writes for people who should
not
read novels. The remedy to the evil that he evokes is another kind
of
But that other kind
of writing,
writing.
pushed to the extreme, means
the
of literature.
a contradicThe politics of literature
carries
suppression
tion that can be solved only by self-suppression.
This contradiction
is at
in the case of the apolitical writer
as well as in the writer
who
wants
play
to convey a political messageand heal social problems.
When Flaubert wrote Madame
he was unwilling to denounce
Bovary,
He
moral
or
social
trouble.
wanted
to 'do' literature. But doing
any
only
literature
meant
the old differences between low and high suberasing
ject matters; it meant
dismissing
any kind of specific language.The aim
of the writer was to make art invisible.
The mistake of Emma Bovary,
by
was her will to make art visible, to put art in her life - ornaments
contrast,
in her house, a piano
in her parlour
and poetry in her destiny. Flaubert
would distinguish
his art from that of his character by putting
art only in
his book, and making
it invisible.
In order to trace the border-linesepahis art from that of his character, his prose had
to go overboard
on
rating
the muteness of commonlife. That new kind of mute writing
would
no
longer be the silent language engraved in the flesh of material things. It
fit the radical muteness of things,
will
would
have neither
which
nor)
things.

But

this

the

power

fictional

165)))

DISSENSUS)

meaning.
general.

It would express, in
The prose of the artist

everyday life insofar as it

was

its

magnificence,
distinguished

still muter,

the nonsense of life

from the prose

itself

still more

in

of
deprived of 'poetry'.

kind of self-suppresThat
other
kind of mute writing results in another
et Pecuchet, the two clerks fail in all
sion. In Flaubert's last novel, Bouvard
to the principles written
their endeavours to manage their life according
in their books of medicine, agronomy,
archaeology,
geology,
philosophy,
pedagogy, etc. In the end they decide to go back to their old job of copying.
Instead of trying
to apply
the words of the books in real life, they will
of literariness
and
only
copy them. This is good medicinefor the disease
But this good medicineis the self-suppression
of
its
disorder.
political
has nothing
to copy the
literature. The novelist himself
more to do than
are supposed to copy. In the endhe has to undo
books that his characters
the boundary
his plot and blur
separating the prose of 'art for art's sake'
for art's sake' wants
to
from the prose of the commonplace.When
'art
undo its link to the prose of democracy,it has to undo itself. Once more,
and
conservative
it is not a matter of personal failure. Balzac'sChristian
commitment
comes up against the same contradictionas Flaubert's
The same goes for the revolutionary
to create, out of
nihilism.
attempts
a language
that would make life
the hermeneutic power of literature,
clearerto itself, and change the self-interpretation of life into a new kind
and a new collective
in the framing of a new world
of poem, taking
part

called
life.In the times of the Parisian revolutionary
Rimbaud
Commune,
as he described it, no longer give its rhythm
for a new poetry
that
would,
He called for poems filled with
to action,
but run before it, in advance.
for a language open to the five senses, a lannumbers
and harmony,
- smells, sounds
everything
guage of the soul for the soul, containing
and colours. This idea of a 'poetry of the future' was in line with the
as the music of a collective
Romantic idea of ancientGreekpoetry
body.
And
it might
sound strange that such an idea of poetry came to the fore
in the
times of free verse and prose poetry, when poetry was becoming
and metre,
and more and more a matter
less and less a matter of rhythm
of image.
But this inconsistency is consistentwith the politics of literature
chorus.
that put the Balzacian
shop in the place of the tragic
According
the rhythm
of the future had to be invented out
to the logic of literature,
of the commoditiesand fossils of the curiosity shop. The Rimbaldian
antique
shop was the poor man's shop.It was the shop of those scraps
that

166)))

Rimbaud

lists

at the

beginning

of

his

'Alchimie du verbe':

stupid)

THE POLITICS

popular

paintings,

engravings,

little

erotic books,

OF LITERATURE)

door panels, silly

. .

refrains.

to connect two ideas of poetry:

as rhythm of
poetry
as archaeology of the mute signs sleeping on the
But there was no path from
the
shop of the
body of ordinary
things.
mute signs and the poeticality of outmoded refrains to the poetry of
and the hymn
the future
of the collective body.
Literature had become a powerful
machine
of self-interpretation
and
wanted

Rimbaud

a living

body

and poetry

self-poeticization of life, converting

of

history

and

any

sign of history

scrap of everyday
a poetical element.
new body that would

any
into

life

into

a sign

This politics of
give voice to

of a
power of common poetry and historicity
written
But this power of the mute
on any door panel or any silly refrain.
letter
could not result in 'bringing
back'
this living body. The 'living
body'
In the
the collective hymn
had
to remain the utopia of writing.
voicing
and the Soviet Revolution, the Rimbaudian
times of futurist
poetry
to the idea of a new life where
art and life
would
be
attuned
project
would
those
it
would
back to
be more or less identical.After
come
days,
the
of the curiosity shop, the poetry of the outmoded
Parisian
poetry
in his Paysan de Paris. Benjamin in turn
passages celebrated by Aragon
would
from the
try to rewrite the poem, to have the Messiah
emerge
commodities.
But the poem of the
kingdom of the Death of outmoded
future
the same contradiction as the novel of bourgeois
experienced
of the people experienced the same contradictionas
life, and the hymn
of pure literature. The life of literature
the
work
is the life of this contradiction. The 'critical','political'
or 'sociological'
of literature
interpreters
who
feel challenged
that
the
of
contradiction
by my analysis might
reply
the interpretation
literature
back to the old illusion
of mistaking
goes
of life for its transformation.
has been an attempt
the opposition in
to question
My presentation
the idea that so-called interboth
ways. First, I have tried to substantiate
of
to the extent
that they are re-configurations
pretations are political
the visibility
of a common
world. Second, I would suggest that the discourse contrasting interpretive change and 'real' change
is itself part of
The
the same hermeneuticplot as the interpretation
that it challenges.
new regime of meaning underpinning
both
literature
and social science
has made the very sentence contrasting 'changing the world' and 'interthe world'
into an enigma. The investigation
of this 'politics of)
preting
literature
this

enhanced

re-appropriation

the

dream

of the

167)))

DISSENSUS)

literature'

that is

understand
dimension

this

much more that

ambiguity

and

a matter

some of

its

of writers
consequences.

may help us to
The

political

of literature
has
been
social
usually explained through
science
and political interpretation. By turning
matters
upside-down,
I have been unwilling
to account
for politics and social sciencesthrough
the
mere
transformations
of poetical categories.My wish has been
simply to propose a closerlook at their intertwinings.)

168)))

CHAPTER

TWELVE

The Monument
and

Art's

Capacity

and Its Confidences; or Deleuze

of tResistance')

a virtue
of resistance.
In the world of opinion, this
unproblematic. This world readily accepts that art
resists in diverse ways, which
all converge
in a unique power. In one
of the work resists the wearing effectof time;
in
aspect,the consistency
it resists the determination of the concept.
another, the act that produced
Whatever
resists
both time and the concept is also presumed capable,
as a matter
of course, of resisting
of power. The cliche of the free
forms
and
rebellious
artist lends itself well to illustrating
the logic of the doxa.
the
fortunes
the
in two
of
word
'resistance'
inhere
properAccordingly,
ties. First, in its reserves of homonymy,
which makes it possible
to create
an analogy between the passiveresistance
of the stone and the active
oppositionof men; and second, in the positive connotationsthat the
word has retained by contrast
to so many others that
have
fallen into
disuse or become suspect; community,
revolt,
revolution,
proletariat,
is it seen as such a good thing
classes, emancipation, etc. No longer
to want
to change the world and make it more just. But this is exactly
the point,
since
the lexical homonymy of the word 'resistance' is also
ambivalent
on the practical
level: to resist is to adopt the posture
of
someone who stands opposed to the order of things,
but simultaneously
avoids the risk involved with
to overturn
that order. And we
trying
the heroic
'resistance'
know, in this day and age, that
posture of staging
the torrent of advertising,
and democratic
communicational,
against
rhetoric goes hand-in-handwith a willing deference to established forms
of domination
and exploitation.)
Art

is readily

assertion

ascribed

is deemed

169)))

DISSENSUS)

If we dismiss these false self-evidences

possible to establish links between

of

the

is it nevertheless

opinion,

idea of an

activity,

or

domain,

called 'art', and that

of a specific virtue of resistance? What
could
be
several
made of the homonymy of the word 'resistance',which
contains
ideas in a single word? In fact, there are two seemingly
contradictory
senses in which art is said to resist: first, it resists as a thing
that
persists
in its being; and, second, as peoplewho refuse to remain in their situation.
Under
what conditions
is an equivalence betweenthese two, seemingly
of
senses
'resistance'
conceivable?How can the resistance
contradictory
of that which persists in itself simultaneously be a power of that which
leaves itself, of that which
intervenes
to change the very same order that
defines
its 'consistency'?
And whomever has read Nietzsche
cannot
but
hear another question behind the question
'how can we conceive this?',
a need to think
of art
we conceive it?' Why
is there
'why ought
namely:
at once as a power of autonomy,
of self-maintaining,
and as a power of
and of self-transformation?
departure
I would like to examinethis problematic
knot on the basis of a passage
la philosophie?
borrowed
from
Gilles Deleuze. In the chapter of Qu'est-ce
que
devoted to art we read this:)

The
order

writer

twists

language,

to wrest the

the sensation from

people. . . . This is,

makes

percept from
opinion

precisely,

it vibrate,

perceptions,

- in

view, one

the task of all

embraces and rends it

the

hopes, of
art

in

affect from affections,

and,

the

from

still-missing

colours

and

extract new harmonies, new

sounds, both music and painting
similarly
and
new
or
melodic
plastic
landscapes,
rhythmic characters that raise
them
into
the
earth's
and
the
up
song
cry of men and women: that
and sonorous
bloc. A
which
constitutes
tone, health, becoming, a visual
monument is not the commemoration, or the celebration,
of something
that has happened; instead
it confides
the
to the ear of the future
renewed
sensations
persistent
embodying an event: the constantly
their conof men and women, their
re-created
protestations,
suffering
Will this all be in vain because
resumed
suffering is
stantly
struggle.
eternal and revolutions
do not survive their victory? But the successof
embraces
a revolution
resides
only in itself, precisely in the vibrations,
of its making
and openings it gives to men and women at the moment
in itself a monument in the constant
and that composes
process of
like
which
each
new
traveller
addsa
stone.1)
those
tumuli
to
becoming,
170)))

THE MONUMENT AND ITS CONFIDENCES)

is no mention of the word resistance in this passage.

But it does
strive hard to resolve the problemthat this word harbours: how to transIn the
form
the analogy
between forms of 'resistance' into a dynamic?
first
the text presents us with
an analogy
between two processes:
place,
before
people suffer, protest, fight and embrace for an instant,
solitary
the artist twists and embraces language, or tears
suffering re-asserts itself;
or musical percepts from sonorous and
in
plastic
optical
perceptions,
order to raise them
to the cries of peoples. This presents an
analogy
between
a rift to overcome.
the two processes, but there
is seemingly
The artist works 'in view of' an end that this work cannot achieveby
itself:
he or she works 'in view of' a 'still-missing'
But, in the
people.
second place, this work itself is presented as a bridging
of the gap that
embrace
from the revolutionary embrace. Vibraseparates the artistic
in the
tions
and embraces
assume a consistent figure
solidity of the
monument. And the solidity of the monument is simultaneously a
the monument
'confides to
language, the movement of a transmission:
the ear of the future'
that
the
sensations
persistent
embody suffering
and
These sensations are transformed
into
vibrations
and the
struggle.
contribute their stone to the monumentwhich
embrace,
revolutionary
There

in-becoming.
A

monument

which

speaks to the

future

and

a future

that has

ears -

is really
a little too much for ears so accustomed
to hearing
that the
rejection of metaphor is the alpha and omega of Deleuzian thought.
to all appearances metaphor reigns in this passage
and it does so in
Well,
its full function:
here metaphor is not a simple
ornament
of language,
- a passage or a transport.
but instead - as its etymology
In
indicates
order to go from the vibration
extracted
the
artist
to
the
revolutionary
by
it is necessary to have a monument
that
makes
a language
vibration,
addressed to the future
This passage itself must
from
blocks of vibrations.
condense
the
several
passages, several conceptual leaps: to effectuate
that

leap from the

it has
artistic
of men,
torsion
of sensations
to the struggle
to ensure an equivalencebetween the dynamic
of the vibration and
the static of the monument. It is necessary
of the
that, in the immobility
But
this
the vibration
to
to
another.
monument,
another, speaks
appeals
is
of
of
the
itself
twofold:
it
is
the
transmission
the
or
effort,
speech
humanresists
'resistance', of people, and it is the transmission of what
the forces harnessed on it and
ity, the transmission of the forcesof chaos,
a resistant form; the)
re-captured
incessantly
by it. Chaos has to become
171)))

DISSENSUS)

form

the

must again

Through

become a resistant

and

revolution

the

play

chaos.

The monument

must become

again become a monument.

of metaphor, the gap between the present
of the people turns out to be a constitutive
'in view of' a people. This people is part
of

the

revolution

of the

work and the future

link.
The
artwork is not only
the very
condition of art's 'resistance',that is to say the union
of contraries
which
defines it at once as an embrace of fighters
set in a monument
and as a
monument
in a process of becoming and struggle. The resistance
of the
work is not art's way of rescuing politics; it is not art's way of imitating
or
it
is
their
Art
is
anticipating politics
properly
speaking
identity.
politics.
Such is the fundamental thesis that Deleuze
puts forward in this passage.
For this to be the case, however, there must be an identity between two
the human
languages of the monument:
language of those monuments
about
Schiller said that they have the ability
which
to transmit
to people
of the future
the
intact
of long-vanished free cities;
and
grandeur
the inhuman
language of romantic stoneswhose silent speech belies the
of men.
chattering and agitation
If art is to be art,
it must be politics; if it is to be politics, the monument
must
twice-over:
as a resume of human
and as a resume of
effort
speak
the power of the inhuman separating the human from itself. I would like
to examine this argument's
conditions
of possibility. Such an investigation
seems
to me to involve two things:
on the one hand, I would like to
show that Deleuze's
thesis is not the singular
invention
of one, or two,
form of a more original
the particular
knot
between
authors, but instead
an idea of art, an idea of the sensible and an idea of the human
future;
on the other hand, I would like to analyse the
particular
place that it
occupies in the field of tensions definedby this original knot.
The work and the sensible element torn
from
the sensible,
in the
in-form form of the vibration and the embrace; the instantaneousnessof
the
or of the embrace as the persistent
vibration
monument
of art; as
as they appear in his text, such equivalencesare
not Deleuze's
singular
own invention. They were already long
established.
this
Moreover,
provenance itself is split into two. There is the most immediate filiation:
the vibration
and the embrace come directly
from
the pages that Proust
and
devotes to the music of Vinteuil,
the theme of the sensible cleaved
from
the
forms the core thesis of Temps retrouve. But this
sensible
Proustian thesis and descriptionare themselves
possible
only on the basis
of a much
more
form of visibility
and
of aesthetic)
general
intelligibility
172)))

THE MONUMENT AND ITS CONFIDENCES)

a form

experience,

that

defines

regime of the

entire

an

identification

of art.

The idea of
sensible

element,

a sensibleelement
torn
from
is a specificcharacteristicof

modern regimeof
of art'.
of

art,

What in fact

sensory

I have

which

characterizes this

experience,

the sensible, of
the

dissensual

proposed to call the 'aestheticregime

is the idea of a specificform
regime

disconnected from the normal

us of the work that

experience. When Deleuzespeaksto

from perception and the affect from
particular way, the original
encapsulated
by the Kantian

implied by the

thinking

affection,

he

forms

of sensory

tears

the percept

is expressing,

in

his

of aesthetic

discourse, that is,

that
of the beautiful: aesthetic
analytic
experience is of a sensory weave (un sensible) that is itself doubly
to the law of understanddisconnected. It is disconnected with respect
and
which
sensory perception to its own categories,
subordinates..
ing,
to the law of desire, which
our affections
also with respect
subordinates
to the search for a good.The form apprehended
by aesthetic judgement
is neither that of an object of knowledge nor that of an object of desire.
as the
nor... that defines the experience of the beautiful
It is this neither...
resists both
The beautiful is that which
experience of a kind of resistance.
conceptual determination and the lure of consumablegoods.
or resistance
This
is the initial formula of aesthetic dissensus
which, in
Kant's time, separatedout the aesthetic regime of art from its representative regime. This dissensuscame about because the classical regime, the
representativeregime of art, was governed precisely by the concordance
of sensory
between
a form of intellectual determination and a form
as
In
art
defined
the
work
of
one
was
form, as
respect,
appropriation.
as
matter.
In
the
rules
of
that
its
law
on
which
art,
another,
imposes
to form, were deemed to corredefined by the subjugation
of matter
was taken
experienced
spond to the laws of sensory nature. The pleasure
was
of the adequation
of the rule. Aristotelian
mimesis
as a verification
- a
nature
poiesis- and a
exactly that: an agreement betweena productive
The guarantee
of this three-way agreement
nature - an aisthesis.
receptive
own

was called

nature.

human

or 'dissensus',

'Resistance',

break with

formula

this

three-way

whose first

agreement,

formula

is given

and therefore

by Kant, is

a break with

that

henceforth
experience was what
lay between a nature
which
is also to say between two natures or two humanand a humanity,
then
be to know how to determine this)
ities. The whole problem will

nature.

Aesthetic

173)))

DISSENSUS)

relation
humanity?

without
This

relation
is the

in

the

name

precise problemthat

of which
runs

nature and which

all Deleuze's

through

texts on art: from

one humanity
to another, the path can only be forged
But before coming to this point, we must examine one
of the aesthetic
or two other consequences
of the dissensus constitutive
is
is simply put: if the beautiful
regime of art. The first consequence
concept-less, and if all art is the implementation of ideas that transform
a matter,
it follows that
the
beautiful
and art stand in a disjunctive
relation to one another.The ends that art sets itself stand in contradiction
end that characterizes the experience of the
to the finality
without
Kant
this
beautiful.
To cross the gulf, a specificpower is required. For
not one who is observant of the rules of
of the genius,
power is that
but nature itself in its productive
nature,
power. But the genius must,
for this, share in the unconscious of nature. The genius
cannot
know the
law under which
he
or she operates. If the aesthetic experience of
is to be identical to the experienceof art, then art must be
the beautiful
of a thought
marked by a double difference: it must be the manifestation
that is unaware of itself in a sensible element that is torn from the ordinary
conditions
of sensory experience.
its clearest experience in Hegelian
No doubt this disjunction
received
is
The anti-Hegelian phobia characterizingDeleuze's
aesthetics.
thought
well known.
However, in their own way, the Deleuzian concepts of
and line of flight
are heir to the great Hegelian
vibration,
composition
art. Hegel is the one
of symbolic
art, classical art and romantic
ternary
under the aesthetic
who fixed the paradoxicalformula
of the artwork
is
difference
of
art:
the
work
the
material
of
inscription
thought's
regime
to itself. This begins with the sublime vibration of thought
vainly
seeking
with the classic
its sojourn in the stones of the pyramid; it continues
that only manages
to accomplish itself at
embrace of matter
by a thought
- indeed, it is because
Greek religion is
the price of its own weakness

by inhumanity.

that
of
devoid of interiority
it can ideally be expressedin the perfection
of the Gothic spire striving
the statue of God; finally,
it is the line of flight
the
end where,
heaven and thereby announcing
for an inaccessible
to be a site
art
will
have
ceased
reached
its
home,
thought having
finally
of thought.
To say that art resists thus means that it is a perpetual game
of hide-and-seekbetween the power of sensible manifestation of works
this game of hide-and-seek
and their power of signification.
Now,
and
art has a paradoxical consequence:art is art, that)
between thought

174)))

THE MONUMENT AND ITS CONFIDENCES)

is, it
make

resists in its nature

art, insofar as it

In Hegel's work,
Greek statue is art

'other

this
for

tor: the

representation

and

fetes.

its

as art, insofar as it is not the product of

other than art.

a will

to

is something

is called the

thing'

us inasmuch

as

it

was

spirit

something
the decor

of the Gods of the city,

work, it is called 'medicine';

In Deleuze's

the
of a people:
else for its sculpof its institutions
Deleuze cites, in

a phrase from LeClezio:'one day, we will perhaps come to

relation,
know that it was not art, but merely
medicine'.
These two formulas are not opposed
in their principle: the Greek statue
is the health of a people,and Deleuzian
medicine
is, like Nietzsche's, that
of a civilization.
The difference is that the representative
of the health of
the Greek people is called
while the Deleuzian doctor assumes
Apollo,
this

of
of Dionysus.
two
Apollo and Dionysus are not simply
personae. If ljietzsche was able to use their bipolarity to theorize tragedy,
it is because
this bipolarity
structured
the aesthetic
already
and
of
art.
It
marks
the
double
in
which
the
between
art
way
gap
regime
itself is expressed, the tension of thought
and
the unthought
which
of thought
defines it. Apollo
emblematizes
the moment when the union
and the unthought
become
fixed in a harmonious figure. This is the
of a humanity
in which culture is not distinguished
from
nature,
figure
of a people whose godsare not separate
from the life of the city. Dionysus
is the figure of the dark background which
resists
of the suffering
thought,
of primary
with the cleavage of culture. Art's 'resistance'
nature
grappling
is in fact the tension of contraries,the
interminable
tension
between
an
the
of
annulled
and
between
dissensus,
Apollo
Dionysus:
happy
figure
dissimulated in the anthropomorphic
god made
figure of the beautiful
of stone and re-opened dissensus,exacerbated
fury or comby Dionysiac
will to nothingness or Bartleby'snothingness
of will,
plaint: in Achab's
these two witnesses of primary
of 'inhuman'
nature.
nature,
This is the point at which
ties in with the theme
artistic'
dissensuality'
of the peopleto come. To understand this knot, we must return to that
which
of agreement
founds the modern aesthetic regime of art: the rupture
between the rules of art and the laws of sensibility
which
distinguished
the classical representative order.In this order,
active form was imposed
on passive matter via the rules of art. And the pleasure experienced was
the rule of artistic
to the
taken as verification
that
poiesis
corresponded
It was taken as verification, by those
senses
laws of sensibility.
whose
could be taken as veridical
men of taste, men of a refined)
witnesses:
the

figure

Nietzsche's

175)))

DISSENSUS)

as distinct

nature
the

ment of form

'has

different

common

hierarchy:

That is to
the

say,

command-

a distinction
between coarse sensible
and
sensible nature: 'The man of taste', said Voltaire,
sense
of tact to that
of the
different
ears, a different

eyes,

man.'

experiencesuspends

twofold

that

revokes

of form

commandment

the

hierarchy. Aesthetic
over matter, of active

passive
sensibility. Aesthetic 'dissensuality', then, is
of
the
old human 'nature'. It is also a revocation
splitting
over

understanding
simply

twofold

over matter,

The aesthetic revolution

not

nature.

uncultured

an

involved a

a refined

and

nature

from those of
order

representative

the

of the type of 'humanity'

structured
that it implied: a humanity
by the
distinction between the men of coarsesensesand those of refined senses,
the men of active intelligenceand those of passive sensibility. We find
der Urteilskraft,
this
in paragraph 60 of the Kritik
encapsulated
already
as the mediator
of a new sentiment
which identifies aesthetic universality
that exceeds
of humanity,
as the principle of a form
of 'communication'
of the cultivated classes and the
the opposition between the refinement
classes.
Behind
Deleuze's 'monument
simple nature of the uncultured
music of that
which
to the future', we have to hear the primary
speaks
the
Kantian 'communication'. Furthermore,
we
to recall that
ought
the French
Revolution.
One
Kritik der Urteilskraft is contemporary with
In his
drew
all the consequences of that
author
contemporaneousness.
des Menschen, Schiller isolates the political
Uber die iisthetische
Erziehung
of aesthetic
'resistance'
or 'dissensus'. Aesthetic free play
signification
and
of the opposition between form
involves
the abolition
matter,
is also the abolition between a full
This
between activity and passivity.
and
the universality
and a sub-humanity. Aesthetic free play
humanity
and
a new
kind of liberty
of equality,
of the judgement of taste define
had tried to
different from those that the revolutionary
government
impose under the form of the law: a kind of liberty and equality that
is that of an
Aesthetic
was
no longer abstract but
sensible.
experience
the hierarchies
are abolished that
sensorium in which
unprecedented
structured
sensory
experience. This is why it bears within it the promise
of a 'newart of living' of individuals and the community, the promise of

a new humanity.
So,

that

the

it is

community,

176)))

resistance

of

better suited
united

art

a specific

defined

than

no longer

politics
by

the

proper
abstract

'politics' whose claim it was

to promote a new human
forms of the law but by the)

THE MONUMENT AND ITS CONFIDENCES)

bonds

of lived

peopleto

come

experience.
whose

It

liberty

thereby

and

bears
equality

within
are

it the

effective

promise of a
and lived and

not simply represented. But this promise is marked by the paradox

of
a people in two contradictory ways: it
'artistic' resistance. Art promises
does
so insofar as it is art and insofar as it is not art.
In one respect,art promises
which
constitutes
it,
by virtue of the resistance
to
its
distance
with
owing
regard to the other forms of sensibleexperience.
In the fifteenth letter of Ober die iiesthetische
des Menschen, right
Erzeihung
after having
assured
us that aesthetic free play
is founding
of a new art
in front of a Greekstatue
of living,
Schiller puts us in imagination
known
as the Juno Ludovisi.
he says, is closed in on herself, idle,
The
Goddess,
free of all concern and of all end. She neither
commands
nor resists
the
Goddess'
'absence
of resistance'
anything. We understand that
defines the resistance
of the statue, its exteriority
with respect to the
normal forms of sensory experience. Because she does not want anything, because she is exteriorto the world of thought and the will which
because she is, in a nutshell,
the statue can said
commands,
'inhuman',
to be free and to pre-figure a humanity
that
is similarly delivered from
oppressivewill. Because she is silent, because she doesnot speak to us
and is not interested in our humanity,
the statue can 'confideto the ears
The paradox
of the future' the promise of a new humanity.
of resistance
in all its purity.
without resistance is thus manifest
The resistance
of the
does
not resist, calls forth
a
artwork, representing the goddess who
to come. But it calls this people forth to the very extent that it
people
The statue's
from all human will.
persists in its distance, in its remoteness
resistance promises a future
to people
cease
who, like her, cease resisting,
to translate their suffering
and their complaints
into struggle.
However, Schiller,in an immediate reversal of perspective, alsopresents
the
in an inverse form: art bears
a promise to the very extent
paradox
that
it is the result of something which
was not art for those who made
it. What makes the resistant liberty of the stone statue is that is the
- or in Deleuzian terms, of a certain
health.
expression of a certainliberty
The statue's self-sufficient liberty
is that of the people who is expressed
in it. Now,
a 'free' people, in this view of things, is a peoplethat does not
art as a separate
who has not lived in a time when
experience
reality,
collective experience is separatedinto distinct
forms called art, politics or
religion.What the statue promises, then, is a future in which, once again,
the forms of art will no longer be distinguished
from
the forms of politics,)
177)))

DISSENSUS)

nor from the forms of common experienceand

belief.
Art's 'resistance'
it own abolition, the abolition of
as it promises
promises a peopleinsofar
or inhumanity.
its distance
Art thus takes on as its goal its own suppresof its form into the forms of a common
sion, the transformation
sensory
world. From the time of the French Revolution
to the time of the Soviet
the
aesthetic
revolution
Revolution,
signified this self - realization and
this
of
art
in
the
of a new life in which art,
construction
self-suppression
or
culture
would
dissolve
one and the same form
into
politics, economy
of collective

We know

life.

a form of self-suppressionin the

in a way that was totally
different
to how it had been conceived.In the
first
place, it was swallowed up
a Soviet
in making
artists into the
by
regime that was interested solely
constructors of life forms and that only wanted artists who illustrated its
own way of constructing
the new life. In the second,the project
of an
art that shapes
the forms of daily
life was accomplished
ironically in
aestheticization
and the daily life of capitalism. This twofold
commodity
of
and
the project of making
art life gave rise, by
comic,
destiny,
tragic
of
the
form
of
to
other
aesthetic
the
reaction,
way
great
metapolitics:
idea of an art that accompanies
the resistance of the dominated and
and
an equality to come to the very
extent
that it
promisesa liberty
affirms its absolute
with the
resistance
to engaging in any compromise
tasks of political militantism
or of the aestheticization
of forms of daily
life. This is summed up by Adorno's
'art's social function
is
expression:
not to have one'. On this view,
art does not resist purely by ensuring
its
distance. It resists but its closure
itself shows itself to be untenable,
becauseit occupies the site of an impassable contradiction.For Adorno,
the solitude of art does not cease to present the contradiction between
its
and the reality
of the division
autonomous
of labour,
appearance
symbolized by the famous episode from the Odyssey in which, tied to his
is separated
from the work of the sailors, their
mast, Ulysses'mastery
ears covered,
and
the song of the sirens. To denounce the
capitalist
division
of labour and the commodity embellishment more effectively,
music
must be even more mechanical,
even
more
Schonberg's
'inhuman'
than the Fordist assembly line. But its inhumanity
in its turn
makes
the stain of the repressed appear, the
of
capitalist
separation
labour and enjoyment. It is by endlessly re-enacting the inhumanity
of the human
and the humanity
of the inhuman
that the resistance of)
construction

178)))

that

of the

art

did

undergo

community,

but

THE MONUMENT AND ITS CONFIDENCES)

the work
it

pays

upholds the aesthetic promiseof

so is to defer it indefinitely,

for doing

a reconciled

to refuse

life. But the price

all reconciliation as

a simulacrum.
of art' thus appears as a double-edged
To
paradox.
the promise of a new people,it must either suppress itself, or
the coming
defer indefinitely
of this people. The dynamic
of art for the
The

'resistance

maintain

last two centuries is

by this tension
the
and
indefinite
deferpoles
self-suppression
ral of the people that
it calls forth. This paradox of the politics of art refers
in the aesthetic regime of art, in
back to the very paradox of its definition
which the 'things' called art are no longer defined, as before,by the rules
of a practice. They are defined
belonging to a specificsensory
by their
that
of a sensible weave subtracted from
the ordinary
forms
experience,
in the forms of experience
of sensory experience.'But this difference
in the very nature of its products.
The aesthetic
cannot
be a difference
the products of art visible
sensorium that renders
as the products of art
does
not thereby endow them with
or sensory, quality
that
any material,
it is
to
Art's
difference
exists
insofar
as
them.
belongs
specifically
only
constructed
case by case, step by step, in the singular strategies of artists.
The artist must, intentionally,
make a work capable of emancipating
The
itself
as power of the impersonal and of the inhuman.
artist has
to do so at the risk that at any stage this impersonality
might become
with prose or the cliches of the world, from
confused with another,
which
no real barrier separates it. Aesthetic differenceisalsoengendered
under
the form of an as if. The book,
as if it
says Proust, must be written
The work is the extended
is made of the very language
of sensation.
difference which makes it into both the
metaphor of the inconsistent
present of art and the future of a people.
It is precisely
this melancholic destiny
of art and its politics that
Deleuze
In the first place,
Deleuze
endeavoured
to force the dilemma
rejected.
which
encloses
art between the self-suppression of resistanceand the
He
of a resistance that
defers
the people to come indefinitely.
maintaining
strived to make the vibration
of a la [a musical note A], or the embrace of
And he strived
two
forms, comprise the resistance of a monument.
plastic
a
to have the monument
to
the
to
have
note
of Berg, the
future,
speak
of
of
a
Bacon
or
the
told by a
canvass
boxing ring
story
metamorphosis
Kafka novel producenot simply the promise of a peoplebut its reality, a
of the political dilemma of)
new way of 'peopling'
the earth. This forcing

between the

two

perhaps the

dynamic

generated

of art's

179)))

DISSENSUS)

another forcing,
this time in the very definition
of
of art. For Deleuze,art cannot
be confined to the regime of
the 'as if' and metaphor: its sensory status must aver a difference in the real
itself. The inhuman
that
it from itself must really be inhuman.
separates
From this point of view, there is nothing
more
than his
significant
relation with Proust.
From Proust, Deleuze borrows the vibration
and
the embrace which attest to the confrontation
between
two orders, that
of the sensible organizedby the understanding,
and that of the sensible
in its truth.
But in Proust's work, this difference
is, in the last instance,
the work of metaphor.
It is the intended metaphor of the writer which
attests to the involuntary
of the truth, that
is which
irruption
gives it its
for his part,
refuses
to accept that, in the last
Deleuze,
literary
reality.
it to be a real
of its truth. He wants
instance, metaphor can be the truth
must
not a metaphor but a metamormetamorphosis:literature
produce
must be as different
as that which
phosis. The sensible that it produces
our
as
the
in
cockroach
Samsa's
organizes
daily
experience
Gregoire
room is from the good son and honest
Samsa.
The
employee
Gregoire
Schumanian melody must be identified with the song of the earth. Achab
must
be the witness of 'primary nature' and Bartleby
must
be a Christ,
the mediator between two radically
orders. For this, the artist
separate
himself must have passed over
to 'the
other side', must have lived
that
is too strong,
an experience
unbreathable,
through
something
of primary
of the inhuman nature from which
with
he returns
nature,
'reddened eyes', an experiencethat leaves its marks in his flesh. Only
then is it possible to go beyond the Kantian
as if, the Proustian
metaphor
or the Adornian
contradiction.
But it remains to be seen what
the price
to pay is for that excess.
The price to pay is literally
the
reintroduction
of a kind of transcendence in the thought
of immanence.
These reddened eyes, this
relation
with
too strong,
something
reminds us in effect of another philosophical
unbreatheable,
something
experience of an encounterbetween two orders. They remind us of the
Kantian
of the experience of the sublime that
confronts
the
dramaturgy
sensible order with the suprasensible.
For Deleuze, the power (puissance)
of artistic
dissensus cannot be expressedin the simple gap between poiesis
and aisthesis.
It must be the power communicated
excessive
power
by the
of an aisthesis,
which
is to say, in essence,
the power of an ontological
differencebetween two orders of reality. The artist is one who finds him
or herself exposedto the excess of the power of the pure sensible,of)
aesthetics

the

180)))

process

presupposes

THE MONUMENT AND ITS CONFIDENCES)

And the work that tears the percept from perception is

to this excess of power.To conceptualize
things
in this way involves
from the Kantian
of the sublime,
reprising
theory
the idea of a confrontation
between
two orders. The difference is that,
with
the imagination's encounter with
an
excessive
Kant,
sensory
experience induces the mind to become cognizant of the superior power
of
reason
and its suprasensible vocation. With
the
Deleuze,
however,
element
encounteredin
the
of
the
sublime
is
suprasensible
experience
not the intelligible;
it is the pure sensible, the inhuman
of
life.
power
into
a form of transcendence. Moreover,
Immanence must be turned
with
the experience
of the sublime inducedus to leave the domain
Kant,
of art and the aesthetic. It signalled the passage from the aesthetic to the
moral sphere.With Deleuze,
this difference between aesthetic
however,
and moral
the very practice of
autonomy
autonomy is re-invested within
art
and
the aesthetic
of the experiexperience. Art is the transcription
ence of the suprasensible
the
of
manifestation
a
transcendence
sensible,
of Life,
is the Deleuzian name for Being.
which
It is the transcription
of
an experience
of the heteronomy of Life with respect
to the human.
To what extent, then, can this heteronomous power of Life become the
in struggle? To put this question,
collective
it seems to
power of a human
me useful to compare Deleuze's formulation with that of a philosopher
contemporary to him who drew diametrically opposite consequences
from
the same premises,
in fact, turned
Jean-Fran\037ois
Lyotard,
Lyotard.
the Kantian
sublime into the principle of modern art. Modern art in its
of the sublime
disaccord between
entirety is, for him, is the inscription
the mind and a sensible power in excess, a power that throws
the mind
into confusion. And again,
calls
this
of
the
power
Lyotard
suprasensible
sensiblethat of the Inhuman. He proceeds, therefore,similarly
to Deleuze,
Like Deleuze, he transformed a gap
by inverting the Kantian
analysis.
between
two spheres into an experience of the sensible'stranscendence
with
to itself. And like Deleuze
he turned the experience of this
respect
into the very principle of artistic
transcendence
But in so doing
practice.
he drew an entirely
conclusion.
Deleuze and Guattari
wrote
opposite
to
contrast
this
excess
of
of
the
with
the
Kafka
power
sensory exception
of
the
father
and
and
the
to
the
establish
law,
paranoiac,
Oedipal reign
of a fraternal
drew
the inverse conclusion.
principle
community. Lyotard
For him the shock of the suprasensible sensibleis not the de-territorializing
force
that makes the monument a call to the fraternal
embrace of the)
inhuman

nature.

the effectof

an

exposure

181)))

DISSENSUS)

It is the

future.

its

primary

Other

thus

and

force that

takes

the name

name of the Law. Art

mind from itself,

that
testifies
to
in the power of the Other. This
of the Freudian
it takes the
before
Thing
a testimony to this immemorial
becomes

separates

irremediable
thus

the

alienation

Spirit as regardsthe Other. Fraternal

utopia becomes
a mere avatar
in the times
of the dream of emancipation that
was born
of the Enlightenment,
the
dream
of a mind that
is master
of itself and
its
free
of
the
of
the
For
Other.
this
dream
of a
world,
power
Lyotard
that
is
master
of
itself
is
not
it
is
criminal.
The
naive,
humanity
only
accomplishmentof this dream, he claims, results in the Nazi genocide.
He turns
the
extermination
of Europe's Jews into
the
of
extermination
the very people who stand to testify
to the dependence
of the mind with
to the law of the Other. Art's
resistance
thus consists in its providrespect
a twofold
of the impassable
alienation of the
ing
testimony: a testimony
human and one of the catastrophethat arises from misrecognizing that
alienation. The consequences
that
draws from his re-interpretation
Lyotard
of the sublime
are
thus
to those of the Deleuzian
gap
entirely
opposite
to
come.
are
less
that
people
They
assuredly
appealing.I fear, however,
instituted at the heart of
they are more logical,that the transcendence
Immanence, in fact, signifies the submission of art to a law of heteronwhich
undermines
of
every form of transmission of the vibration
omy
to the vibrations
colour and of the embrace of forms
and to the embraces
dependence

of a fraternal

of the

humanity.

perhaps necessary to choose.In the first place, the sensible difference

which institutes art can be taken
as a difference
without ontological
a
difference
each
time
in
work
remade
the
of
consistency,
singular
In
to
a
artistic
this
case,
impersonalization
specific
particular
procedure.
of the inhuman remains the work
of
then, the artistic
appropriation
And it is precisely as a form
of precariousness
that this act
metaphor.
of appropriation becomeslinked
to the precarious
and ever-threatened
work
of political
invention
as it strives to separate its subjects and its
scenes
from the normality of social groups and their conflicts of interest.
In the second place, poetic difference can be transformed
into
an ontodifference.
But
this
realization
to
amounts
the
logical
specificities
tying
of political or artistic
invention
to one and the same suprasensiblesensible
The political becoming of art, then,
becomes
the ethical
experience.
in the name of their union,
confusion in which,
art and politics both
vanish. And what logically arises from this confusion
is not a humanity)
It is

182)))

THE MONUMENT AND ITS CONFIDENCES)

rendered
fraternal
It is a
through the experience of the Inhuman.
of any kind of fraternal
dream.
humanity referred to the vanity
The theme
of the 'resistance' of art is therefore
but an
anything
of language
from which one could free oneself
by relegating
ambiguity
art's consistency and political protest each to their own side. It actually
and paradoxical
link between an idea of art and
designates the intimate
an idea of politics. Art has lived for two centuries from
the very tension
which
it
is
at
once
itself
and
and
which
it promises a
itself,
by
by
beyond
future
destined
to remain unaccomplished. The problemis therefore
not
to set each back in its own place, but to maintain the very tension by
which
a politics of art and a poetics of politics tend towards each other,
but
cannot
meet up without suppressing themselves.To maintain
this
confusion
which tends to be
tension, today, means opposingthe ethical
imposedin the name of resistance, under the name of resistance.The
to
movement
from the monument to the embrace and from
the embrace
the monument can only ever be accomplished at the price of cancelling
out
this
tension.
To prevent the resistance of art from fading into its
it
must
be upheld as the unresolved tension
between
two
contrary,

resistances.

2)

183)))

In

order

CHAPTER

THIRTEEN

The Ethical

Turn of Aesthetics and

to understand

exactly

what

is at

stake in the

Politics)

ethical turn

that

is

we must precisely define what

is
impacting aesthetics and politics today,
is no doubt a fashionable word. But
it
meant by the word 'ethics'. Ethics
is often taken for a simple, more euphonious
of the old word
translation
one to
'morals'. It is viewed as a general instanceof normativity
enabling
and discourses operative in distinct
of practices
spheres
judge the validity
of judgement
and action. Understoodin this way, the ethical turn would
mean
that today there is an increasingtendency
to submit
politics and
art

moral

to

about the

judgements

consequences of their

practices.

Not

validity

a few

of

their

people

principles
loudly

rejoice

and the
about

to ethical
such a return
values.
I do not believe that there is much cause for rejoicing, becauseI do not
The reign of ethics is not
that this is actually
what
is happening.
believe
the reign of moral judgementsover the operations
of art or of political
it signifies the constitution
action. On the contrary,
of an indistinct
sphere

dispractices
only is the specificity of political and artistic
the very core of 'old morality':
which
formed
what is and what
to
the distinction
between fact and law, between
ought
into
fact: in other words,
be. Ethics amounts to the dissolution of norm
of all forms of discourse and practicebeneath
the same
the subsumption
or morality, the word
indistinct point of view. Beforesignifying
a norm
in

which

not

solved, but

ethos

signifies

lifestyle,
thinking

way of

184)))

so alsois that

two

things:

the way of being, or

and
both the dwelling
is the kind of
this dwelling. Ethics,
then,
is established between an environment,
a
is)
of action.
The contemporary ethical turn

to
corresponds
in which
an identity
that

being and a principle

THE ETHICAL TURN

OF AESTHETICS AND POLITICS)

the
of these two phenomena. On the one hand,
conjunction
specific
the instance of judgement, which
evaluates
and decides, finds itself
humbled by the compelling power of the law. On the other, the radicality
of this law, which leaves no alternative,
to the simple constraint
equates
of things.
of an order
The
indistinction
between fact and
growing
law gives way to an unprecedented
evil, justice
dramaturgy of infinite
and reparation.
Two films depicting the avatars of justice in a local community, both
released in 2002, can help us to understand this paradox.
The first is
Lars
film
von
Trier.
The
tells
us
of
the
the
Grace,
Dogville
by
story
foreigner
in order
to be accepted by the citizens of this small town,
who,
places
herself in their service, submitting
at first to exploitation, followed
herself
when
she tries to escape them. This
persecution
by
story
transposes
Brecht's Die heilige Johafly!a
der Schlachthofer, a play
in which
Saint Joan is
to instil Christian morality
in the capitalist
portrayed as one who wanted
l
the
is
a
But
the
illustration
of
transposition
jungle.
good
gap between
the two eras. The setting
of the Brechtian
fable was such that all notions
were divided in two. It turned out that Christian
was ineffective
morality
in
the
fight against the violence of the economicorder. It had thus to
be transformed into a militant
the
morality that took as its criterion
necessities of the struggle
The rights of the oppressed
against
oppression.
were thus held up against the right that was party to oppression and
defended by strike-busting
The opposition between two
policemen.
that between
also
two sorts of morals
types of violencewas therefore

and of rights.
morality and right has a name. It is called
as
is
often said, the oppositeof morals.
It is its
politics.
Brecht
wrote his play about Saint Joan as a fable
about
dividing.
politics
to demonstrate the impossibility
of mediating
between these two sorts of
rights and these two types of violence.The evil that Grace encounters in
Grace no longer
Dogville,
by contrast, refers to no other cause but itself.
This

of violence,

dividing

is not,

Politics

represents the goodsoul mystified

Sheis merely

the

the community,

stranger,
which

by her ignorance
the 'excluded' who wants
her to subjugation
brings

of the causes of evil.

to be admitted
into

before expellingher.

and disillusionment does not stem from any system

of domination
that might
be understood
and abolished. It is based upon
a form of evil that is the cause and effect of its own reproduction.
This is)
This

tale

of suffering

185)))

DISSENSUS)

against that community can be its radical

out by a Lord and Father who is none other than
the king of thugs. The Brechtian lessonwas:'Only
violence
helps where
violence reigns.' The transformed
formula
to our consensual
appropriate
and humanitarian
times
is: 'Only evil repays evil.' Letus translate
it into
the language of George W. Bush:
infinite
suitable
justice is the only
for the fight against
the axis of evil.
justice
The expression
'infinite
raised the hackles of many people and
justice'
it was
deemed
it
to
have
withdrawn
from circulation.
preferable
promptly
It was
said to have been badly
chosen.
But perhaps the choice was only
In all likelihood, it is for this same reason that the morality
too fitting.
portrayed in Dogville caused such a scandal.The jury at the Cannes Film
Festival reproachedit for its lack of humanism, a lack that doubtless
resides in the idea that where
there is injustice, justice can be enforced.
A humanist
that
elimifiction, in this sense, would have to be a fiction
nates such justice by effacing
the very opposition between the just and
the unjust.
was made by the second film, Clint
this proposal
Exactly
why

the only

annihilation,

fitting

retribution

carried

River in which Jimmy commits a crime:the

summary
he thinks
former mate Dave,whom
guilty of murdering
his daughter;
this has gone unpunished
and remains the sharedsecretof
the guilty party and his accomplice, the policemanSean.Why?
Because
the guilt that Jimmy and Sean share exceedsanything
that
could be
judged in a court of law. For it was they who, when they were children,
were responsible for dragging
Dave
off along on their reckless street
is
Dave
was hauled
I
t
because
of
them
that
games.
away
by men posing
as police,lockedup and raped. Dave's trauma then made him a problem
for
adult whose aberrant behaviour singled him out as the ideal culprit
the young girl's murder.
is a transposition
of a theatrical and political fable.Mystic River
Dogville
is a transformation of a cinematographic
and
moral
fable, the scenario of
had been
which
depicted notably in films by Alfred Hitchcock and Fritz
that of the falsely accused.2 In this scenario, truth is put to work
Lang:
of courtrooms
and public opinion, and always
against the fallible
justice
ends
sometimes
the
of confronting
another
form
at
cost
up winning out,
has
been
of fate. But today, evil, with its innocent and guilty
parties,
turned into the trauma
which knows of neither innocencenor guilt,
which
lies in a zone of indistinction
between
guilt and innocence,
traumatic)
between psychicdisturbance
and sodal
unrest. It is within
such

Eastwood's Mystic
execution

186)))

of his

THE ETHICAL TURN

OF AESTHETICS AND POLITICS)

the
victim
of a trauma
Jimmy kills Dave, who is himself
a rape whose perpetrators were probably
also victims
of
some other trauma. However,not only is a scenario of disturbance and
violence

that

resulting

from

the sickness itself has changed

its
in stark contrast to
stands
the one that Hitchcock
and Lang drew on in the 1940s, in which reactia
or the
buried
childhood
memory worked to save the violent
vating
sick. 3 Childhood
has become the trauma of being born,
the
trauma
misfortune
that
human
for
an
animal
befalls
every
simple
being
being
born too early. This misfortune, from which nobody can escape,dismisses
the very notion that
could be dealt with
injustice
by enforcing
But it does eliminate
punishment.
justice. It does not do away with
It reduces punishment
the justice of punishment.
to the imperatives
of protecting the social body, not without the usual few blunders.
then
as the necessary
Infinite
takes on its 'humanist'
shape
justice
violencerequired
to exorcise
trauma in order to maintain the order of

sickness used to

the

replace

The new

meaning.

one

of justice;

psychoanalytical

fiction

community.

nature
at denouncing the simplistic
of the psychoturn
films. These scenarios,however,
out to have adapted their
structure
and tonality rather faithfully
to the
lessons of learned psychoanalysis.From
and Hitchcock's
depicLang's
tions of successful cures to Clint Eastwood's
of the buried
presentation
it is easy to recognize the shift
from
the
secret and irreconcilabletrauma,
division of knowledge
intrigue of Oedipal knowledgeto the irreducible
and law symbolized by another
great literary figure, namely the tragic
heroine
Under
amounted
to a forgotten
Oedipus' sign, trauma
Antigone.
When
event
that could be cured when the trauma
was
reactivated.
a new form
theorization,
Antigone comes to replaceOedipusin Lacanian
of secretis established,
one
that is irreducible to any
salvational
knowlnor
end to the trauma encapsulated in
edge. There is neither beginning
in which
The tragedy bespeaks the discontent of a civilization
Antigone.
the laws of social order are undermined
support
by the very things that
them: the powers of filiation,
earth
and night.
of human
Antigone, said Lacan,is not the heroine
rights created by
modern
democratic
she
is
the
the
witness
of the
terrorist,
Instead,
piety.
secret terror that underlies
the social order. Terror is preciselythe name
that trauma takes in political
matters
and is one of the catchwordsof our
time. The word unquestionably
a reality of crime and horror)
designates
Many

analytical

people

jump

scenarios

in Hollywood

187)))

DISSENSUS)

that nobody can afford

to ignore.
But it is also a term
that
throws
things
into a state of indistinction.
Terror
in New
not
the
attacks
designates
only
York on 11 September 2001or in Madrid
on 11 March 2004, but also the
strategy in which these attacks are inscribed.Little by little, however, the
word 'terror' has also come to designate
not only the shock these events
caused
in people's minds, but
the fear that similar events might
also
acts
of inconceivable
recur,
violence, and
possibly
leading to further
the situation
characterized
the
by
management of such fears by state
To talk of a war against
terror
is to connect the form of
apparatuses.
these attacks to the intimate angst that can inhabit each one of us in the
same chain. War against
terror
and infinite justice then fall into a state
of indistinction,
occasioned
attacks
by a preventative
justice which
that is sure, or at least likely, to trigger terror, anything
that
anything
the social bond holding
threatens
the
community
together. The logic
of this form of justice is to stop only once the terror itself has stopped,but
this
is a terror which
never stops for beings who must
by definition
endure
the trauma of birth.
At the same time, therefore, this
is a kind of
- it is
which
other
for
no
kind
of
a
serve
as
norm
justice
justice might
a kind of justice that
itself
the
above
rule
of
law.
places
Grace's misfortunes
and
Dave's
execution nicely illustrate
this
transformation of the interpretative schemes of our experiencewhich
I call
the ethical turn.
The essential
feature of this process
is certainly not the
return
virtuous
to the norms of morality. It is, on the contrary, the
that
the very word 'morals' used to imply.
suppression of the division
Morality
implied the separation of law and fact. By the same token it
also implied the division
of different
forms of morality
and
of rights, the
division between ways of opposing right
to fact. The suppression
of
this
division
has been given a privileged name: it is called consensus.
Consensus is also a catchword
of our time. However, there is a tendency
to minimize
its meaning. Some reduceit to a global agreement between
and
government
opposition
parties over key national interests. Others
see it, more broadly, as a new style
of government
that gives priority
to discussion
and negotiation in conflict
Yet consensus means
resolution.
much more than
that:
it defines a mode of
understood,
properly
structuration
of
the
that
evacuates
the political
symbolic
community
is in effect a
core constituting
dissensus. A political
it, namely
community
that
is structurally
interest
divided, not between divergent
community
and opinions, but divided
in relation to itself. A political
groups
'people')
188)))

THE ETHICAL TURN

supplementary

as the

thing

sum of

a population.It

is always
a form of
to any counting of the population
and
its parts. And this
form
of symbolization
a litigious
is always
one. The classical form
of political
conflict opposes several 'peoples' in
one:
the people inscribed in the existing
forms of the law and the constithe people
embodied in the State; the one ignored
tution;
by this law or
whose right the State does not recognize and the one that makes its
claims in the name of another right
that
is yet to be inscribedin facts.
Consensus
is the reduction of these various
into a single people
'peoples'
identicalwith the count of a population and its parts, of the interests of
is never

the same

OF AESTHETICS AND POLITICS)

in

symbolization

relation

a global community
and its parts.
Insofar as it strives to reduce the people to the population,
consensus
in
fact strives to reduce right
to fact. It incessantly works to fill in all these
intervals between right \037nd fact through which the right and the people
are divided. The political
thus tends to be transformed
into
community
an ethical community, into
a community
that gathers together a single
in which everyone is supposed to be counted. Only
this
procepeople
dure of counting
comes
that
remainder
it
that
up against
problematic
terms 'the excluded'. However, it is crucial to note that
this term itself is
In the
not univocal. The excludedcan mean two very different things.
an actor who
actor,
political community, the excluded is a conflictual
includes himself
as a supplementary
a right not
political subject, carrying
an injustice
in the existing
of right.
state
yet recognized or witnessing
But in the ethical community, this supplement is no longer
to
supposed
since
is
included.
As
a
there
is
no
status
for
the
arise,
result,
everyone
of the community.
excluded in the structuration
On the one hand, the

excludedis merely

the one who accidentally falls

outside
the great equalthe sick, the retarded or the forsaken
to whom the community
must
a hand in order to re-establish the 'socialbond'. On the
extend
the one who is separated
other, the excluded becomes the radicalother,
from
the community
for the mere fact of being alien to it, of not sharing
that
the community
in
the identity
binds each to all, and of threatening
ity

of all-

each of us.

like the

The de-politicized

small

society

fosters social
rejection

To this
international

services

of the
new

national
then, is set up just
community,
in Dogville - through
the
that at once
duplicity
in the community
and involves the absolute

other.

figure
landscape,

of the

national community there correspondsa new

ethics establishes its reign first in the)

in which

189)))

DISSENSUS)

humanitarian and then in that of infinite justice against

the
a similar process of increasing
accomplishes this through
indistinction
between
fact and right. On national
this process
stages,
between
signifies the disappearance of the intervals
right and fact in
which
and political subjects were constituted.
dissensus
On the international stage, this process
translates
into the disappearance of right
its most visible expressions being targeted assassination
and
the
itself,
to
intervene.
But
this
occurred
of
a
detour,
right
disappearance
by way
- the absolute
the constitution
of a right above all other rights
involving
of the victim. The constitution
of this right itself rather significantly
right
involves
the meta-juridical foundation,
or - as it were - the
overturning
of right, namely human rights.
Since
the late twentieth century,
right
human
victim to
rights have undergone a strange transformation.
Long
the Marxist suspicion of 'formal' rights,
in the
were rejuvenated
they
1980s by the dissident movements of Eastern Europe. At the onset of
the 1990s, the Soviet system collapsedand this appeared
to pave the
in
for
a
world
as
the
which
these
ostensible
basis
for new
way
rights,
national
could also serve as a basisfor a new international
consensuses,
order. The explosionof new ethnic conflicts and wars of religion of
course immediately
belied
this optimistic vision. Human rights,
having
been the weapon of dissidents who used them
to contrast
one people
with
the
that their governments professedto incarnate,
then
people
became the rights
of the victimized
populations of new ethnic wars,
individuals
driven
from
their destroyed homes, raped women
and
massacred
men. These rights
thus
became
specific to people who were
unable
to exercise
them. As a result, the following
alternative
arose:
either these human rights
no longer
amount to anything
or else they
are the absolute rights
of those
without rights, in other
words,
rights
all
formal,
demanding an equally . absolute response, one beyond
juridical norms.
The absolute
of those without rights
can of course be exercised
right
as humanitarian
by another
only
party. This transfer was at first known
war against the
right/interference. Then, however, the humanitarian
of
human
became
an
infinite
oppressor
rights
justice to be wielded
the
invisible
and
terrorized
those
against
omnipresent enemy that
defenders of the absolute right
of victims
on their own territory.
That
absolute
the direct
demand to protect
right then became identified with
the security of a factual
This enabled humanitarian
war to)
community.
form

axis

190)))

of the

of evil. It

THE ETHICAL TURN

into an

turned

be

instead

a mechanism

trauma

elevated

endless war on terror: a

of

to the

infinite

status

protection,
of a

civilizational

OF AESTHETICS AND POLITICS)

war

is not a war
of dealing with
phenomenon.
that

a way

but

in the classical framework of the discussion

the
This distinction collapses into
same state of
or cause
and effect. What
indistinction
as that
between fact and right,
a lesser evil, the simple
is opposed to the evil of terror is, then,
either
for salvation
to emerge out of
conservationof what is, or the waiting

We are no longer,

on

means

and

then,

ends.

the very radicalization of catastrophe.

This reversalin political

lodged themselvesat the

has taken two major

forms
core of philosophical thinking:

thinking
very

of the Other, serving to provide

rights of peace-keeping forces;and
on the other, that of an affirmation
of a state of exception which
renders
some
kind
politics and rights inoperative, but leaves
open the hope that
of messianic
salvation will arise from out of the depths of despair.The
in his essay 'The Other's
first
was well captured by Lyotard
position
in
to a question
Published
this
was
1993,
preparedin response
Rights'.4
in the
raised by Amnesty
International:
what happens to human rights
of humanitarian
intervention?
defined the 'other's
context
Lyotard
in a way that is revealing of the meaning of ethicsand
the ethical
rights'
as
turn. As he put it, human
of the human
rights cannot be the rights
of the bare human being. Thecore of his argument
is
human, the rights
the successive critiques of Burke, Marx and Arendt.
not new. It fuelled
has
no rights, since
all argued that the bare, apolitical human
They
in
than a mere 'human'.
order
to have rights one needs to be 'other'
name for this 'other than
human'.
'Citizen'is the historical
Historically,
the binary of the human and the citizen has informed
two
first,
things:
are always
the critique of the duplicitousness of these rights,
which
elsewhere than in their place; and second, the political action that sets
forms of dissensus in the gap between the human and
up different
the citizen.
this 'other
But
in these
times of consensus and humanitarian
action,
than human' undergoesa radical
mutation.
No longer does the citizen
but
instead
the inhuman as that
which
complement the human,
of
the
human
from
itself.
The
human
declared
separates
inhumanity
of misrecogthe consequences
rights violations are, for Lyotard,
actually
we might say, a 'positive'
inhuman.
Here the)
another
'inhuman',
nizing

hand,

that

a philosophical

of an

affirmation

justification

of the

that have
the one

on

rights

for the

191)))

DISSENSUS)

is the part of ourselves over which

we have no control, a part
be childhood
several
figures and several names. It may
of obedience
to
dependency, the law of the unconscious or the relation
an absolute Other. The 'inhuman'
is that radical dependency of the
human
be mastered.
The
on something
cannot
absolutely other which
of the other', then, is the right
to bear witness to our subjection to
'right
the law of the Other.The will to master the 'unmasterable' is, according
to Lyotard,
where
the violation of this right begins. That will is purportharboured
thinkers
and is manifest in the
edly
by
Enlightenment
That will is what the Nazi genocide is supposedto have
Revolution.
'inhuman'

takes

that

is to
accomplished
by exterminating the very people whose vocation
bear witness to the necessary dependencyon the law of the Other. And
will is purportedly also at work
in soft forms in societies of
that
today

generalizedconsumption
are two
a reversal of the
So, there

and
features

flow

accomplished- progress,
turned

appears

the everyday

time:

the time

emancipation

turned

or the

the catastrophe behind us.But

towards

the very forms of that

then,

of

transparency.
that characterize

as the

catastrophe.

the ethical turn.

Other
it is

existence of our democraticand

- is replacedby
of European

be

that

Jews,

characteristic

situation,
liberal

first is

end to

also a levelling out of

The extermination

explicit form of a global

The

an

towards

lives.

This is

of
what

in saying that the camp is the nomos

of modernity,
its rule, a rule that itself is identical with radical exception.
is certainly different
from
that of Lyotard.
perspective
Agamben's
does
establish
of
the
On
the contrary,
not
Other.
right
Agamben
any
he denounces
the generalization of the state of exceptionand appeals
to
a sense of messianic waiting
for salvation
to emerge from the depths
I call the 'ethiof catastrophe.
His analysis, however, sums up well what
is a state that
the difference
cal turn'. The state of exception
erases
even
that between the
between henchmen and victims,
including
life of our
extreme crimesof the Nazi State and the ordinary
everyday
than
democracies. More horrific
even the gas chamber, the true horror
of the
the hours
when nothing
camps, writes Agamben, occurred during
was happening and the SS and the Jews of the Sonderkommando played
football together.5 And every time we turn on our television sets to watch
formulates

Agamben

it is

its

place

and

a football
match
this game is replayed. All differences
in the law of a global situation.
As a result, this situation
as the accomplishment of an ontologicaldestiny
192)))

disappear
to appear
the)
evacuates

simply
comes
that

THE ETHICAL TURN

OF AESTHETICS AND POLITICS)

of political dissensus and the hope of future

bar the
salvation,
advent of an improbable ontologicalrevolution.
This
of differences
in politics and right
to disappear
in the
tendency
indistinctness of ethics is also defining
of a certain present of the arts and
of aesthetic reflection. Similar
to the way in which the combination
of consensus and infinite
blots out politics, arts and aesthetic
justice
reflectiontend to re-distribute
themselves between a vision
of art whose
is
to
to
attend
the
social
bond
and
another
of
art
as
that
which
purpose
bears
witness
to
catastrophe.
interminably
The creative
with which art intended to bear witness
arrangements
to the contradiction
of a world marked by oppression
some
decades
For instance,
let us
hence, today point to a common ethical
belonging.
compare two works produced30 years apart that exploit the same idea.
the
Chris Burden
1970s, before the end of the Vietnam
War,
During
created a work entitled the Other Memorial,
dedicated
to the dead on the
other
with
neither
name
side, to the thousands of Vietnamese victims
nor monument. On the bronze plates of his monument, Burden inscribed
names
of other
Vietnamese-sounding
anonymous people randomly
from the phonebook to give names to these
copied
anonymous
people.
In 2002, Christian
Boltanski
the installation Les abonnes
du
presented
of two large sets of shelves
telephone. As mentioned above, it consisted
from around the world and two long tables at
containing
phonebooks
which
visitors
could sit down to consult them at their leisure. Today's
installation
is still based on the same formal
idea
as yesterday's
countermonument. It is still about anonymity, but it has a completely different
mode
of material realization and political meaning. Instead of erecting
one monument
to counter another, we are presentedwith a space that
counts as a mimesis
of common
space. And whereas yesterday'saim was
to give names and lives back to those
who had been
simultaneously
deprived of them by State power, today's anonymous massesare simply,
as the artist says, 'specimens of humanity',
those
with whom we are
bound together
in a large community.
Boltanski's installation,
was a good way
of encapsulating
the
therefore,
an
of
exhibition
that
aimed
to
an
be
for
a
of
spirit
encyclopaedia
century
common
a
in
that
stands
contrast
to
uniting
history
memory
landscape
the divisiveness of yesterday's installations. Like so many
contemporary
Boltanski made use of a procedure that,
three
decades
installations,
art: the systematic introduction)
earlier, had been the provinceof critical
possibility

193)))

DISSENSUS)

objects and images of the world into the temple of art. But the
Earlier,
meaning of this mixing together has changed radically.
producing
aim to underline
an encounter between heterogeneouselements
would
the contradictions of a world
and to question
stamped
by exploitation
art's place and institutions
within
that world of conflict. Today, it is
that this same gathering
is the positive
proclaimed
operation of an art
for the functions of archiving
and
witness to a
responsible
bearing
is
of
an
to art that is
commonworld. This gathering,
attitude
then,
part
to a
the
of
consensus:
restore
lost
stamped by
categories
meaning
common world or repair the cracks in the social bond. This aim may be
of relational
art, for example,
directly expressed, as in the programme
aim
is to create community situations
whose essential
that
foster the
in the
of social bond. It is even more evident
development of new forms
have changed in meaning,
way that exactly the same artistic
procedures
even when used by the same individual artists - as in Jean-Luc
Godard's
use of collage, a technique
that
elements
combining
heterogeneous
film
a
In
the
his
career
as
director.
1960s,
appears repeatedlythroughout
that
however, he did this in the form of a clash of contraries,
notably
and the world of the commodity:
between the world of 'high
culture'
Fritz
account
of a filming of The Odyssey and the brutal cynicism of
Lang's
its producer
in Le Mepris; Elie Faure's History
of Art and the advertisement
for Scandalecorsetsin Pierrot le fou; the petty calculations of the prostitute
and the tears of Dreyer's Joan ofArc in Vivre sa vie. In his films of the
Nana
remained
faithful
to collage as a principle
for
1980s, Godardapparently
But
of the collagechanges:
elements.
the
form
linking
heterogeneous
And
what that fusion
what
was once a clash of images becomesa fusion.
of images simultaneously
attests
to is the reality
of an autonomous
world
of images and its community-building
From Passion to Eloge de
power.
90 neufzero to his Histoire(s)
du Cinema,
or from Allemagne
annee
l'amour,
the unforeseeable encounter of cinematicshotswith the paintings
of the
imaginary museum, of the imagesof death camps and literary texts taken
their
come to constitute one and the same
explicit
against
meaning,
of images,
devoted to a single task: to give humanity
back a
kingdom
in
the
world'.6
'place
artistic
So, on the one hand, there are polemical
dispositijS that tend
the
towards a function
of social
mediation,
testimonies, or
becoming
in a non-descript community
of participation
construed
as the
symbols,
world.
restoration of the social bond or the common
On the other hand,)
of the

194)))

THE ETHICAL TURN

however,
it gets

violence tends to take

polemical

yesterday's

radicalized

as a

OF AESTHETICS AND POLITICS)

the

to

testimony

unrepresentable,

on a new figure;
to endless evil

and catastrophe.
The

which

unrepresentable,

between

right

that terror

is the

reflection, is also a

in aesthetic

and

fact,

does on the

occupying
political

category

central categoryof
that

produces

the ethical
turn
an indistinction

the same place in aesthetic

reflection
The idea of the unrepresentable

plane.

fact conflates
two distinct notions: impossibility
and
To
interdiction.
declare that a given subject is unrepresentable by artistic means is in fact
to say several things
at once.
It can mean that the specific means of art,
or of such-and-such
an art, are not adequate to represent a particular
This is the sense in which
Burke once declared that
subject's
singularity.
Milton's
of Lucifer in Paradise Lost was unrepresentable
in
description
painting. The reason was that its sublime aspect depended upon the
of words that do not really let us see what
duplicitous
play
they
pretend
to show us. However,when
the
of the words is
pictorial
equivalent
exposedto sight, as in paintings of the Temptation
of Saint Anthony by
artists ranging
from
a picturesque
Bosch to Dali, it becomes
or grotesque
the same argument: Lessing argues
presents
figure. Lessing'sLaokoon
that
the suffering
of Virgil's Laocoon in the Aeniad is unrepresentable
in
its visual realism divests art of its ideality insofar as
because
sculpture,
it divests
the character
of his dignity.
Extreme
suffering
belonged to a
that
the art of the visible.
was, in principle, excluded from
reality
Clearly this is not what was meant by the attacks, instigated in the
name of the unrepresentable,on the American
television
series Holocaust
which
caused
much
(1978),
by presenting the genocide
controversy
the
stories
of
two
The
families.
through
problemwas not said to be that
the sight of a 'shower room' caused laughter,
but that it was impossible
to make a film about the extermination of the Jews by presenting
fictional
bodies imitating the henchmen and the victims
of the camps. This declaration
of impossibility
in fact conceals a prohibition.
The
prohibition,
a proscription
that bears on the event
however, also conflates two things:
and
a proscription
that bears on art. On the one hand, it is claimed that
the
nature
of the actions and sufferings
in the extermination
camps
forbids
there
it
for
of
aesthetic
being any depiction
pleasure. On the other
calls for a
hand, it is said that this unprecedented event of extermination
new art, an art of the unrepresentable. The task of this art then becomes
associated with the idea of an anti-representative demand that becomes)
in

195)))

DISSENSUS)

norm
Malevich's
the

the

death

of modern art as such.

Black Square, the first
of pictorial
figuration,
in 1985, which
handles

completed
of extermination.

s A
of

straight line is thus drawn

dates from 1915,

which

to Claude Lanzmann's film

the theme of the unrepresentability

from
signing

Shoah,

It must, however, be askedin what

sense this film
to an art
belongs
of the unrepresentable. Like any other film, it depicts characters and
situations. And like so many others, it immediately
sets us in a poetic
in
this
a
case
river
fields
on which a
landscape,
meandering through
boat is rocking
to the rhythm
of a nostalgicsong.The director
himself
introduces this pastoral episodewith a provocative
statement, announcthe fictional
nature of the film: 'This story
in our time on the
starts
ing
banks of the river Ner in Poland.' So the alleged unrepresentability
of extermination
does not mean that fiction
cannot
be used to confront
its
atrocious
from
the argument
reality. This is very different
presented
in Lessing's
between
Laokoon, which instead was groundedin the distance
real presentation and artistic
the
it
is
On
because
representation.
contrary,
is
and
that
fictional
everything
representable,
reprenothing
separates
sentation from the presentationof reality, that the problem of presenting
the genocidearises.This problem
is not to know whether or not one can
or must represent, but to know what one wants
to represent
and what
mode of representationis appropriate
to this end. Now, for Lanzmann,
the essentialfeature
of the genocide
resides in the gap between the perfectrationality
of its organization
and the inadequacy of any explanatory
reason
for that programming. The genocideis perfectly
in its
rational
its own traces. But this ratioexecution, and even planned to eradicate
itself does not depend on any
sufficient
rational
link between
nality
cause and effect.What
makes
fictionalized
accounts of the Holocaust
Such
inadequate, then, is this gap between two types of rationality.
fictions
show us the transformation of ordinary
into monsters,
persons
and of respected citizensinto human
rubbish.
It thereby obeys a classical
to which
enter
characters
into conflict
representative
logic according
with
one another
on account of their personalities, the aims they pursue,
and the ways in which
with the
they are transformed in accordance
situation. Well, such logicis condemned
to miss both the singularity
of
this rationality
and the singularity
of its absence
of reason. By contrast,
there is another type of fiction
that
to be perfectly appropriate
proves
for the 'story' that Lanzmann
wants to tell, that
is, fictional
inquiry, the)
196)))

THE ETHICAL TURN

OF AESTHETICS AND POLITICS)

Kane
of which is Citizen
this form of narration
revolves
(1941):
an unfathomable event or character
and
to grasp its
attempts
but at the risk of encountering only
the emptiness
of the cause or
secret,
meaninglessnessof the secret. In the case of Kane, this is the snow that
in its miniature
falls
on a child's sleigh. In the
glass dome and a name
case of the Shoah, it is an event beyond any cause that could be ratioprototype

around

nally

reconstructed.

Shoah is therefore not to be opposedto the televised Holocaust

that
an art of the unrepresentable is to an art of representawith
the classical order of representation does not
rupture
into the advent of an art
translate
of the
On the
unrepresentable.
to the norms that
it is a freeing up with
the
contrary,
prohibited
regard
and
of Laocoon's suffering
the sublime aspect of Milton's
representation
Lucifer.These norms pf representation
defined the unrepresentable.
They prohibited the representationof certain spectacles, required that a
and form be given to each particular
of subject, and
particular
type
type
demanded that the actions of characters be deduced from their psycholin accordance
with the plausibility
of
circumstances,
ogy and situational
their psychological
motivations and the existence of causesand effects.
None
of these prescriptions applies to the kind
of art to which Shoah
It is not the unrepresentable that
stands
in contrast to the old
belongs.
Instead
it is the elimination of a boundary
logic of representation.
that
the available choice of representablesubjectsand ways of
restricts
them. An anti-representative
art is not an art that no longer
representing
It
is
an
art
whose
choice
of
represents.
representable
subjects and means
the exterof representationis no longer
limited.
This is the reason why
mination
of the Jews can be represented
without
to
deduce it
having
from
the motivation
attributable to a characteror the logic of a situation,
without
to show gas chambers, scenesof extermination,
henchhaving
men or victims. And this is also the reason why
an art representing
the
exceptional characterof the genocide without any scenes of extermination
is contemporary
with a type of painting
made
of lines and
purely
art that
squares of colour as well as with a type of installation
simply
re-exhibits objects or images
from the world of the commodity
borrowed
The film

in the way
tion. The

and

ordinary

art

this unrepresentable

sary to

life.

everyday

To invoke an

of the

unrepresentable,

it is therefore necessaryto pull

that
of art itself. It is neces-

from a realm other than

make the forbidden and the impossiblecoincide,

which

supposes)
197)))

DISSENSUS)

two

violent

theoretical

introduced into
God into

Jewish

gestures.

by

transforming

the Jewish people.Second,

the

ruin

of

the

First,

religious

interdiction

must

be

on representingthe
the impossibility of representing the extermination of

art

the

representative

opposite: a lack or

an

impossibility

the prohibition

surplus

order

of representation
transformed
be

must

of representation.

inherent
into

in

its

This presumes

of artistic modernity be construed in such

a way
concept
that it lodges a prohibition within impossibility by turning
modern
art
as a whole into an art constitutively
dedicated to testifying
to the
that

the

unrepresentable.
has been used extensively for this operation:
One concept in particular
it for such ends.
'sublime'. We have seen how
reconstrued
Lyotard
have
We
also seen the conditions required for
that
reconstruction.
not
Lyotard had to invert
only the meaning of the anti-representative
but
also the very meaning of the Kantian
sublime.
To place
rupture
modern art under
the concept
of the sublime requires inverting
the
limitlessness
of both the representable and the means of representation
between
into its opposite: the experience of a fundamental
disagreement
sensible materiality and thought.
This
first identifying the
presupposes
of art's operations
with the dramaturgy
of an impossible
demand.
play
is also inverted. In Kant's work, the
But the meaning of that dramaturgy
of its agreeof the imagination
sensible faculty
experienced the limits
of its own nature and
Its failure marked the limits
ment with thinking.
It thereby also signalled the
opened up to the 'limitlessness'of reason.
this
makes
to
the
moral
from
the
aesthetic
sphere. Lyotard
passage
the
this
at
But
he
does
law
of
art.
the
of
art
of
the
realm
out
very
passage
that
of sensation
roles. No longer is it the faculty
the
cost of inverting
now it is spirit
fails
to live up to the demands of reason. On the contrary,
of approachis faulted, summoned to pursue the impossibletask
which
of
But the singularity
ing matter, of seizing the sensible in its singularity.
reiterated experience
the sensible in fact gets reducedto the indefinitely
of one and the samedebt.As a result, the task of the artistic
avant-gardes
inscribes
the shock of an alterity
in repeating the gesture that
consists
of sensible
which
quality, but ultimately
appears to be that
initially
the intractable
reveals
itself to be identical with
power of the Freudian
of the sublime
transformation
The
'ethical'
law.
the
Mosaic
or
'Thing'
and
of aesthetic
means exactly this: the joint transformation
autonomy
into one and the same law of heteronomy, into)
moral
Kantian
autonomy
the

198)))

THE ETHICAL TURN

and

one

radical
to the
of

the

the same law

The

factuality.

debt

infinite

order

The fact of
Other.But

whereby imperiouscommand
of art thus consists in
spirit with respect to a law

gesture
of

of Moses'

Godas it

is the

factual

is assimilated
testifying

to

indefinitely

is as much that
that
law of the unconscious.

becomes a submission to the law of the

Other, in its turn, is only our subjection to the

resistance

matter's
this

OF AESTHETICS AND POLITICS)

law of the

condition of being born too early.

This overturning
of aesthetics into ethics obviously
cannot be grasped
in terms
of art's becoming 'postmodem'. The simplistic
between
opposition
the modern and the postmodern prevents us from
the
understanding
of the present situation
and
transformations
their stakes. It forgets in
effect
that modernism
itself has only ever been a long contradiction
between two opposed aesthetic
two politics that are opposed
politics,
but
on the basis of a commoncore linking
the autonomy
of art to the
to
this
and therefore linking
come,
anticipation of a community
the
its
own
The
avantto
of
word
promise
very
autonomy
suppression.
garde designated the two opposing forms of the same knot joining
it conthe autonomy of art and the promise of emancipation
together
at other
times in a
tained, sometimes in a more or less confused way,
more clearly revealed their antagonism. On the one hand, the
that
way
the forms of art, and to
avant-garde movement aimed to transform
in
with the forms for constructing a new world
make them identical
On the other, the
which
art would no longer existas a separate reality.
forms
of the artistic sphere from
avant-garde preservedthe autonomy
or with
with practices of power and political
of compromise
struggle,
the
forms of the aestheticizationof life in the capitalist world. While
dream to work
or constructivist
was a Futurist
movement
avant-garde
of a new sensory
in the formation
towards art's self-suppression
of art
the
to
a
involved
world, it also
autonomy
preserve
struggle
from all forms of power and commodity aestheticization.This was not
at all in order to preserve it for the pure enjoyment of art for its own
sake but, on the contrary, as the inscription of the unresolved contrathe aesthetic promise and the realities of oppressionin
between
diction
the

world.

One

in the
of

of these politics died out

more modestcontemporary

designers

re-inventing

or the 'relational'

artists

in

Soviet

the

utopias

a community
introducing

although it lives on
architects of new cities,

dream,

of the

on the basisof new urban

an image or an

an object,

design
unusual)

199)))

DISSENSUS)

in the

inscription

landscapes of

This

suburbs.

'difficult'

could be

called

The secondwas not

abolished
by any kind of postmodern revolution. The post-modern
the
transformawas basically only ever a smokescreen
carnival
hiding
tion of the second modernism into an 'ethics' that is no longera softened
version of the aesthetic promiseof emancipation,
but its
and
socialized
no longer links art's specificity
pure and simple inversion.This inversion
to a future
but instead to an immemorial and neveremancipation,
the 'soft' version

ending

of

the

ethical

turn of aesthetics.

catastrophe.

to this is the pervading

Testifying
service of the unrepresentable and

cide, the never-ending

discourse in

catastropheof

the

art is

which

of witnessing

either

present,

placed

yesterday's

or the

in

the

geno-

immemorial

Lyotard's aesthetic of the sublime is the most

In the tradition
he
of Adorno,
succinctformulation
of this overturning.
the
line separating
summons the avant-garde to retrace indefinitely
and
communicaartworks proper from the impure mixtures of culture
to
the
tion. The aim, however, is no longer
promise of
preserve
the
immemothe
it
is
to
attest
to
On
emancipation.
contrary,
indefinitely
a lie
rial alienation that transforms
every promise of emancipation into
that will only ever be achieved in the form of infinite crime, art's answer
is to put up a 'resistance'that
is nothing
but the endless work
to which
trauma

of

civilization.

of mourning.

The historical tension betweenthe two figures of the avant-garde thus

art dedicated to
to vanish into the ethical couple of a community

tends

restoring the social bond and

catastrophelying

at

the

an

art bearing

very origin of

reproduces exactly the other transformation

political tension of right and fact vanishes

that

witness to the irremediable

bond.

This

according

transformation
to which the

in the couple formed by conwielded

sensus and the infinite
justice
against infinite evil. It is tempting
is merely the crowning
ethical
discourse
to say that
contemporary
of the new forms of domination. But this would be to pass over
moment
an
essential
point: if the soft ethics of consensusand the art of proximity
have
which
yesterday's aesthetic and political radicaUty
infinite
hard
ethics
of
to
t
hen
the
adapted
contemporary conditions,
of irremediable
evil and of an art devoted to the interminable
mourning
as
the
exact
of that radicontrast,
overturning
catastrophe, by
emerges
is the conception of time that
ethical)
cality. Enabling that
overturning

are the

been

200)))

ways

in

THE ETHICAL TURN

OF AESTHETICS AND POLITICS)

inherited
from modernist radicality,
the idea of a time cut into
decisive event. For a long while, that decisive event was that of
the revolution
to come. With the ethical turn, this orientation is strictly
inverted:
becomes ordered according to a cut in time made by a
history
radical event that is no longer in front of us but already behind us. If the
Nazi genocide
and
lodged itself at the core of philosophical,aesthetic
or five decades
after the discovery of the
political
thinking some four
camps, the reason is not only that the first generation of survivors
remained silent.Around
when
the last remaining vestiges of this
1989,
revolution
were
the
events
until
then
had linked political
collapsing,
and aesthetic radicality
to a cut in historical time. This cut, however,
that
the radicality, could be replacedonly
at the
required
by genocide
cost of inverting
its meaning,
of transforming
it into the already endured
from
which
catastrophe
only a god could save us.
I do not mean to say that
and art are totally
to
today
politics
subject
this vision. It would
of political
action and artistic
be easy to cite forms
that are independent
intervention
dominant
from, or hostile
to, that
current. And that is exactly how I understand it: the ethical turn is not
an historical necessity, for the simple reason that there is no such thing.
This turn's
strength, however, resides in its capacity to recode and invert
the forms of thought
and
attitudes
which yesterday aimed at bringing
a radical political and/or aestheticchange.The ethical
about
turn is not a
simple appeasementof the various types of dissensus between politics
and art in a consensual order.It appears
rather to be the ultimate form of
the will to absolutize this dissensus. The modernist rigour
of an Adorno,
the
of
of
to
art
wanting
expurgate
emancipatory potential
any form of
with
cultural
commerce
and
aestheticized
becomes
the
life,
compromise
reductionof art to the ethical witnessing
of unrepresentable
catastrophe.
Arendt's political purism, which
ventured
to separate political freedom
from
social
becomes a legitimation of the necessities of the
necessity,
consensualorder. The Kantian autonomy
of the moral law becomes an
to the law of the Other. Human
ethical subjection
become
the
rights
privilege of the avenger. The saga of a world cut into two becomes a war
terror.
But the central element in this overturning
is without
against
doubt a certaintheology
of time, the idea of modernity as a time
destined
to carry out an internal
once
now
disastrous.
This is
necessity,
glorious,
the conceptionof time cut into two by a founding event or by an event)
radicality

two

by a

201)))

DISSENSUS)

the
ethical
and returning
today's
configuration,
and art to their difference, entails rejecting the
their
status as cuts
fantasy
giving back to these inventions
that
are always
This necessarily
entails
ambiguous, precarious, litigious.
of time, from every thought
of a
divorcing them from every theology
to come.')
primordial trauma or a salvation

to come.
inventions

202)))

Breaking

with

of politics
of their purity,

PART

Response

III

to Critics)))

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

The Useof

The

Distinctions)

that I have

exercise

been set here is a complex

of my discourse and the bearer of

to the interpretations
that

they

have

its

possible

coherence

To respond to

I am

As

the

author

obliged to respond
or to the critiques
up the position of

others
have proposed of it,
to it. But I also have to take
establish
which
myself at a distance from
point it
fix a perspective
on my work and to suggest where
that

addressed

the other, to try to

would be possibleto

its signification,

one.

lies.

I will attempt to indicate, in

constraint,
work
and
the
objects
procedures that I apply to them, some
constants which
to other constants in the critical
respond
questions
that have been raised.I will start with a nodal point, that is my use of
such
as politics/police and the aesthetic/representaconceptual distinctions
tive regimes of art. Two features characterizethis
use:
first, I put forward
these distinctions
as replacements
for other distinctions,
and
against
them. They effectuate less another
of classification
than a type of
type
declassification.Which
is to say - and this
is the second
and related
feature - that they aim to put into question
the received distribution of
the relations between the distinct
and the indistinct, the pure and the
and the exceptional,
the same and the other.
mixed, the ordinary
Let
us take
the distinction that
has
that
spilt the most ink,
namely
which sets in contrast
the police and politics. This distinction
has often
been taken as a new version
of well-known
oppositions: spontaneity and
or instituting
act and instituted
order.
The response
thus
organization,
made is that such pure acts are doomed either to remain in their splendid
order and forthwith
to inscribe
isolation, or to disappearin the instituted
the nostalgia of the instituting
act.)
the

this

twofold

of my

205)))

DISSENSUS)

I have
yet this

no doubt contributed

conceptual

context,one that

distinction

to accrediting
had

been

this

introduced

And

interpretation.

in a

well-defined

is that of
entirely other sense.This context
theme of the 1980s: the 'return' of political
In my critique of this return,
I took as my target the idea
philosophy.
of political philosophy as such, that is, a specific idea of politics 'in
is made
itself' and a specificway in which this specificity
by contrast with
another.
The politics/police
that
come
after, even if its
politics
says
always
is
that
it
is
never
an
act,
principle
equality
prior;
logically
originary
but a paradoxical identity
of contraries.
Indeed, every common property
which
is given
as
from
one attempts to deduce the political community
deduction
divided. This is what I showed with respect to the Aristotelian
of the political animal from
the logical
animal, and to the division of this
latter
the hexis or only
the aisthesis
itself according to whether it possesses

critique

of the

lends

it an

dominant

of language.

Therefore,
from

every

if

this

attempt

isolates politics,
to see politics as the direct

opposition

principle of community.

Now,

dispensing

with

it

is in

order to

effectuation

separate it
of a

single

this figure of the one also

of the two, two ways of contrasting

two
figures
The first figure contravened
with a certainimpurity.
a conis the one transmitted
tradition,
by the Marxist tradition. In this
of signifiers and institutions
of
trast is made between the illusory
purity
of economic
processes and class conflicts.Followpolitics and the reality
it summons
formal democracy to
Marx,
ing in the footsteps of the young
the political revolution to that
of the
the court of real democracy,
and
'human revolution'.
In its opposition
also refutes
to that distinction, the politics/policebinary
of the two, which is essentially an inversion of the
the other major figure
between
Marxist
schema.
This second figure is presented as an opposition
- and social indistinction
freedom
political distinction - and therefore
or necessity
or even as an opposition between 'living together',
'living
well' or the 'common good' and bare life. In the essay 'TenTheseson
I take as my explicit target
notion
of 'political life' , that
Arendt's
Politics',
I
her
between
and
the
sodal.
is,
politics
opposition
object that it is precisely
an anti-political
of
the
that
marks
off a specific
realm
the
logic,
police,
logic
is ultimately
reserved for political
acts in this way - which
to say for beings
As I underwhose own businessand destination
it is to engage in politics.
an activity
that retraces the line, that)
stand it, politics is, on the contrary,

implies dispensing with

the

206)))

purity

of politics

THE USE

OF DISTINCTIONS)

of the
cases of universality
and capacities for the formulation
or social.
domestic
common, into a universe that was considered private,
into question every principle
The police/politics opposition,then,
puts
of being.
There is no domain
that
marks
out positive spheres and ways
of the political as opposedto that of the social and domestic obscurity.
on the one
that
there is no distinction
separates
appearance,
Similarly,
hand, from reality, on the other. Appearance is not the mask of a given
reality. It is an effective re-configuration of the given, of what is visible,
and therefore of what
can be said about it and done with respect to it. It
is never any opposition between two
also
follows
from this that
there
opposedsides;with the realm of police institutions, on one side,and the
forms of pure demonstration of authentic egalitarian
on the
subjectivity,
and
'democratic'
other. There is no parliamentary
comedy to set in conin a specific
trast to the heterogeneous communitarian
embodied
power
From the moment that
the
word equality is
world.
group or collective
from the
inscribed in the texts of laws and on the pedimentsof buildings;
under
a common
moment that a state institutes procedures of equality
of votes,
there is an effectiveness of politics,
law or an equal counting
of distribueven if that effectiveness is subordinated to a policeprinciple
tion of identities, places and functions. The distinction
between
politics
and police takes effectin a reality that always retains a part of indistincThere is no world
tion. It is a way of thinking
the mixture.
through
of pure politics
that
exists apart from a world of mixture. Thereis one
introduces

are-distribution.

and

distribution

The opposition

is,

in

similar

alterities: the

between the aestheticand

fashion,
identity

representative

a way of putting
into
question
have
of art and the oppositions that

of art
regimes
and
identities
been made to

of
it. At issue is to question the anhistorical univocity
such as 'art' or 'literature'
the manner in
and,
correlatively,
discourse
which
they thus set up temporal breaks.Indeed,the dominant
- submits the
on art - modernist
discourse
relationship between time
and
to a very strange usage. By separating
out the specificity of
eternity
art
from
the discourse
on art, it posits the anhistoricity of its concept.
as the end point of a
however, this anhistorical art appears
Conversely,
historical teleology:with Mallarme,
Mondrian
or Schonberg, art is to
in its reality, the autonomous activity
that
it has
have become finally,
function

within

notions

always been, in its concept.

to the massive use of

leads

Thus, the
a historical

alleged rejectionof

'historicism'

teleology.)
207)))

DISSENSUS)

I have
yet this

no doubt contributed

conceptual

to accrediting
been

had

distinction

this

And

interpretation.

in a

introduced

well-defined

is that of
entirely other sense.This context
theme of the 1980s: the 'return' of political
I took as my target
In my critique of this return,
the
idea
philosophy.
of political philosophy as such, that
is, a specific idea of politics 'in
itself' and a specificway in which this spedficity
is made
by contrast with
another.
The politics/police
that
come
after, even if its
politics
says
always
an
is
that
it
is
never
act,
principle
prior;
equality
logically
originary
but a paradoxical identity
of contraries.
Indeed, every common property
is given
as
from
one attempts to deduce the political community
which
divided. This is what I showed with respect to the Aristotelian
deduction
of the political animal from
the logical
animal, and to the division of this
the hexis or only
the aisthesis
latter
itself according to whether it possesses

context,one that
a

it an

lends

dominant

of the

critique

of language.

Therefore,
from

every

this

if

isolates politics,
to see politics as the direct

opposition

attempt

it

is in

order to

separate it
of a

effectuation

single

this figure of the one also

implies dispensing with two figures of the two, two ways of contrasting
with a certain impurity.
The first figure contravened
the purity
of politics
a conis the one transmitted
tradition,
by the Marxist tradition. In this

principle of community.

Now,

with

dispensing

of
of signifiers and institutions
trast is made between the illusory
purity
of economic
processes and class conflicts.Followpolitics and the reality
it summons
formal democracy to
Marx,
ing in the footsteps of the young

the court of real democracy,

and

the

political

revolution to

of

that

the

revolution'.

'human

to that distinction, the politics/policebinary

also refutes
major figure of the two, which is essentially an inversion of the
Marxist schema. This secondfigure
is presented
as an opposition between
- and therefore freedom - and
social
indistinction
distinction
political
or necessity or even as an opposition between 'living
together',
'living
well' or the 'common good' and bare life. In the essay 'TenTheseson

In

its

opposition

the other

I take

Politics',

as my explicit

is, her opposition

an anti-political
reserved for

whose own
stand
206)))

it,

between

Arendt's

target

politics

notion

the sodal. I

and

of 'political

object

that

it is

life',

that

precisely

the logic of the police,

that
marks off a specific realm
in
which
to say for beings
acts
this
is
ultimately
political
way
it is to engage in politics.
As I underbusinessand destination

politics

logic,

is, on

the

contrary,

an

activity

that retraces the

line,

that)

THE USE

OF DISTINCTIONS)

cases of universality
and capacities for the formulation
of the
domestic
or social.
common, into a universe that was considered private,
The police/politics opposition,then,
into question every principle
puts
that
marks
out positive spheres and ways of being. Thereis no domain
of the political as opposed to that
of the social and domestic obscurity.
there is no distinction
that
on the one
Similarly,
separates
appearance,
hand, from reality, on the other. Appearance is not the mask of a given
reality. It is an effective re-configuration of the given, of what is visible,
and therefore of what
can be said about it and
done with respect to it. It
also
follows
from this that
is never any opposition between two
there
opposedsides;with the realm of police institutions, on one side,and the
forms of pure demonstration of authentic egalitarian
on the
subjectivity,
other. There is no parliamentary
and
'democratic'
comedy to set in contrast to the heterogeneous communitarian
embodied
in a specific
power
world.
From the moment that
the
word equality is
group or collective
inscribed in the texts of laws and on the pedimentsof buildings;
from the
moment that a state institutes procedures of equality
under
a common
law or an equal counting
of votes,
there is an effectiveness of politics,
even if that effectiveness is subordinated to a policeprinciple
of distribution of identities, places and functions. The distinction
between
politics
and police takes effectin a reality that always retains a part of indistinction. It is a way of thinking
the mixture.
There is no world
through
of pure politics
that
exists apart from a world of mixture. Thereis one
introduces

are-distribution.

and

distribution

The opposition

is,

in

similar

alterities: the

such as

notions
which

they

representative

a way of putting
into
question
of art and the oppositions that
have

identity

within

function

between the aestheticand

fashion,
it. At

issue is to question the anhistorical

'art' or

thus set up

of art
regimes
identities
and
been made to

'literature'

and,

correlatively,

temporal breaks.Indeed,the

univocit

y of

the manner
dominant

in

discourse

- submits

the relationship between time

out the specificity of
art
it posits
the anhistoricity of its concept.
as the end point of a
however, this anhistorical art appears
Conversely,
historical teleology:with Mallarme,
Mondrian
or Schonberg, art is to
have become finally,
in its reality, the autonomous activity
that
it has
always been, in its concept. Thus, the alleged rejectionof 'historicism'
leads to the massive use of a historical
teleology.)
on art
and

modernist

discourse

to a very strange
eternity
from
the discourse
on art,

usage. By

separating

207)))

DISSENSUS)

I am
the existence of historical regimesof identification,
precisely to undo this knot of the anhistorical and the
has not always existed
teleological. In the first place, art in the singular
as a univocal
There have always been arts, in the sense of forms
reality.
which
of know-how. Therehave sometimes
been divisions such as that
and
art
set in contrast the liberal arts and the mechanical arts. But
as
we
know
have
two
them
existed
for
about
literature,
today,
only
as radically new ways of
centuries. They did not come into existence
but
as
new
of
identification.
When
Madamede Stael cast
doing
regimes
in its new sense, she was very
to
forth
the word litterature,
careful
a change to the poetics codifiedby
stipulate that she was not proposing
the theoreticians
of belles lettres. All that
she said that she had changed
and society.
There
was the conception
of the relationship between lettres
In postulating

endeavouring

it became
on the basis of which
rupture
paint in the old fashion and necessaryto do it in
a new way, no point of return that brought
a shift from an art of
about
an
art
the
to
of
or
of
presence
unrepresentable. But there
representation
is a slow re-configuration
that
the
same
of doing/making
provides
ways

is,

in

fact,

impossible

no historical

to

write

point of

or to

a new visibility
a metaphor, a [rottis,
a use of light and of shadows - with
new
and new form of intelligibility
on the basis of which
ways of doing/
of regimes of art undermines
making arise. In other words,the concept
elements
the idea of an historical
with respect to the constituent
rupture
which
of art. It undermines,
then, the games of opposition under
have sought to conceive of the idea of an artistic 'modernity':
people
transitive /intransitive,
presence/representation,
representation/unrepreconstitutive
sentable. These concepts profess to designate
entities, or
two
and
two
forms
of
distinct
between
moments
principles,
constituting
art. But such a distinction
is purely
imaginary and pertains to nothing
real.
'The sun had not yet risen', the phrase that
Woolf's
begins
Virginia
The Waves, is no more intransitive than the Homeric phrase 'rosy-fingered
Humaine
'I
dawn'. And the first sentence of Robert Antelme's L'Espece
went to piss; it was still night' has no more to do with any unrepresentable than the inaugural line of Iphigenie,
whose
model it distantly echoes:
2
it's your king that wakes you'.
'Yes, it's Agamemnon,
do not
The
notions
of transitive and intransitive
designate
any real
difference; all they do is repeat the presupposition accordingto which,
from a specific moment onwards, art is no longer what it was, and, in no
longer being what it was, has finally become what it is in itself, in clear-cut)

208)))

THE USE

contrast

it is

to what

autonomous reality
something else.

not: an

in contrast

immobility

in

contrast

to what is nothing

more

OF DISTINCTIONS)

to a circulation, an
than a means for

as to what
it is that makes this
of
presupposition
difference of new art so insistent.
My answer
is the following:
this insistence
has resulted from the blow to the system
what pertained
to art was classified and judged. Because reprewhereby
a specific
does not refer to a type of artistic
sentation,
exactly,
procedure,
to
constituent or a specific
texture
of
the
ontological
things pertaining
a
art, but instead to a set of laws for the composition of elements within
it is that the arts do/make and what
for identifying what
distinregime
them from other ways of doing/making.
Therein
lies the paradox
guishes
The

question

the identity of

remains

art

and

the

the vanishing of every statuary

of the autonomy of art: it signifies
boundbetween the inside and the outside. If non-representation
or the
of art, then it can only be
unrepresentable can be positedas the essence
to a dominant regime in which
because, conversely, art is submitted
is
and
representable,
representable in whatever
way. It is
everything
where
all
normative
at
the
differences
precisely
point
disappear between
beautiful
and
villainous
and
subjects, noble and vile genres,and proper
of art can come to be expressed
improper expressions; that the 'difference'
or interdiction, of representation, and that
as the
people
impossibility,
can start to concern themselveswith
a mode of language that
inventing
in
is specific
to literature. One might
of a transcendental
illusion
speak
the Kantian sense: an illusion
is to some extent necessary,induced
that
by the very functioning of our organizing
categories.
an illusion
But the fact that
is necessary does not make its claim to be
the criteany more valid. In the first place,
providing us with knowledge
ria for the 'specificity' of art and of the 'specificity' of artistic
modernity
have no cognitive value. All they
do is re-state the presupposition of
that
Furthermore,
however, art's specificity is by no means
specificity.
specific to it. The binaries of presence/representationand of transitive/
intransitive are only two different ways of operating the simple difference
between the same and the other, by inverting
the values of the positive
and the negative.But behind
this formal game it is easy to recognize
the master figures
of western
religious tradition: 'presence' is the spirit
flesh that abolishes the distance between the letter
become
and the law;
the unrepresentable is the unpronounceablename
of the unfigurable
God who speaks in the cloud. Similar to the way that the complement to)
ary

209)))

DISSENSUS)

the

notion

specificity
figure

of the
result

of religious

anhistoricity

in an

of

identification

art

is teleology,

of

that

basic

claims about art's

specificity

with

the

alterity.

To make a distinction
between
then, is not to say that from
regimes,
and such a moment
onwards
it became impossible to create art in
in 1788 art was part of the representative regimeand,
the same way; that
in 1815,
defines
not two
part of the aesthetic regime. The distinction
an
but
two
of
not
between
two
epochs
types
functioning;
opposition
constituent
but
one
between
two
t
wo
laws
of
principles
composilogics,
of perception
and of intelligibility;
not
between
two
tion, two modes
two principles of co-existence. It is
principles of exclusion but between
to define historically
the
of the aesthetic regime of
possible
emergence
art
as a law of global functioning,
however
its elements
have different
and the global functioning
does not exclude 'anachronisms':
temporalities
pictorial abstraction is above all another way of seeing Rembrandt's Night
and Rubens' Descentfrom
the Cross; and, conversely, the directives
Watch
the
with
great Hollywood producers to their directorsaccord
given
by
the principles by which Voltaire
and
Diderot
would correct Corneille or
Greuze.
The aesthetic
regime of art is characterized
by its multi-temporality,
the unlimitedness
of the representable and the metamorphic characterof
its elements.
No moment arrives at which
of colour chase away
beaches
naked women and battle horses (Maurice Denis). Instead, there is a
of unlimited
between a brush stroke, a splotch
principle
substitutability
of blue,
a corsage, an effect of light,
the
of a woman's
representation
a depiction
of bourgeois life in Holland or of the popularpast-times
body,
of Parisians,
the homage given by one painter
to another; between a
a metaphor,
a dosage of ultraviolet
a slowing-down,
an
love,
(Epstein),
acceleration, a chute de phrase or a cut between two shots.
This
is not to say that
this marks
an entry into the reign of 'anything
is itself a determigoes'. Or to put it another
way, the 'anything
goes'
nate relationship
between
a quod, something of importance and a
This
determinate
between contraries defines
relationship
negation.
I have
what
called a 'sensory exception' (sensible
a selfd'exception),
is
a
sensible
weave
that
inhabited
differing
self-differing thought.
by
From
the expressions
of artists
to the
utterances
of philosophers, a
constant
of the aesthetic
is
this
of the fact
coincidence
regime
precisely
and the non-fact, of the known
and
the unknown,
of the willed and
the unwilled.)
such

210)))

THE USE

What

is it

that

distinguishes

this

thinking

Let's us take an

OF DISTINCTIONS)

from other ways of

thinking

as a
of which
art is the process is always
the
point of comparison: 'The truth
truth of the sensible qua sensible.'
The difference is that,
for me, there is
no such thing as the sensible qua sensible. What Kant teaches us is that
there
are many various kinds of the sensible. The sensibleis always
a certain
between sense and sense, a certain
sense
of the sensible.
configuration
in particular,
the sensible pertaining
to art and that pertaining
to
And,
the beautiful only ever conjoinin the mode of 'the dissensual', since art
cannot
but know and to will,
the beautiful can only
while
be thought
of
as that which
not res\037lt from
does
or will. There are, then,
knowledge
two ways of thinking
this gap. We can seek to closeit in order to posit an
univocal essenceof art as the 'truth of the sensible qua sensible'.
This
reduction of the alterity
of the sensible to itself can only
be carried
out by
favouring a same that takes the figure of the other. As such, the truth of
the sensible is its being the 'event of the idea'. In Kantian
terms,
every
aesthetics is an aesthetic of the sublime,
a self-vanishing
aesthetics, that
is to say, in essence, an ethics.
The secondway consists in inhabiting the gap. Thisis the properof what
Kant calls the 'aesthetic idea', which,
for my part, I call the 'image-phrase'.
Aesthetic ideasare inventions
that
transform
the willed and the unwilled,
the known
and the unknown,
the fact and the non-fact. Theseare
the
that give art its sensible quality, what we might
inventions
call its ontology.
In other words,the ontology
is
of art under the aesthetic regimeis what
weaved
the
of
their
inventions
art
dissensuses, by
by
by instituting
one sensible world in another:
the sensible world in which
the
placing
the
in
in
which
the
sensible
world
underobeys
concept,
imagination
and
relate to each other without
This
standing
imagination
concept.
artistic
inventions
construct
ontology has, then, a remarkablestructure:
the effectiveness of the ontologicaldifference
that
presuppose.
they
is referable to as
Constructing the effectivenessof what one pre-supposes
a verification.
The arts, in practice, verify
the ontology
that renders them
possible.But that ontology has no other consistencythan that which is
constructed by these verifications.
between
of arts is the same as
My approach to the distinction
regimes
to that
between
politics and police: it is a critical thinking in the Kantian
about what it is that renders possible the
sense, that is a way of thinking
differences that are instituted
a sensible domain.)
by such-and-such
the

artistic

exception?

expressionof

Alain

Badiou's

211)))

DISSENSUS)

Which is also to
art or politics. A
which

say by
critical

institution

the

a domain

such-and-such

thinking
of such

of

such

as

according

to

product

of

intelligibility,

a way of thinking
domains is conceived as the
is also

critical operations or dissensuses.This means

that these domains exist
as they are litigious. They rest neither on a difference
insofar
in
grounded
the nature of things
nor on a disposition of Being.They have a differential
existence
that is subject to forms of verification,
that
of
is, processes
of
loss
of
a
certain
of
Same:
disidentificaalteration, processes
processes
of disappropriation
or of indifferentiation.
tion,
is distinguished from that
of certain
others with similar
My attempt
historical experiences and proximate problems and formulations
by a
difference in conceiving
the heterogeneous,
of conceiving
it
by a way
that does not ascribeit another
ontological
power. I have tried to con-

ceiveheterogenesisthrough
shocks between worlds,

a type
shocks

but

of thinking and activity

between
worlds in

that

produces

the same world:

of elements.

and re-configurations
that my theoretical interest in dissensus
is someI
that
share
with
others.
of
it,
however,
thing
many
My
way
conceiving
is quite different
to theirs.
Nearly all the other authors, whether deador
that
are relevant for conceiving dissensustoday,
share one
alive,
actually
and the same idea of consensus,
and they all give the same name to its
as Arendt
and Lyotard,
political
figure: democracy. Thinkers as different
or Milner
all posit a certain idea of democracy
as
Badiou, Agamben
conceive
it in terms of Plato's arithmetic
consensus, that is to say they
as the regime of the indistinct
or indifferent
mixture. Democracy,
equality
re-distributions,

re-compositions,

Indeed, it

is obvious

for them, is the regimeof

of commodities or the 'flat

paper for

Mallarme.

It is

the

indifferent

flow

of ink'

count, similar to the circulation

that is characteristic of the news-

the power of the

bad multiple

which

circulates

itself
by exchanging itself in a zero-sum
game and by reproducing
all contrast
it with the power of difference:the
identically. These thinkers
that which contains a principle of alterity,
a supplementary
multiple,
good

power.

This may

be a superpower:the

Arendtian

power

of beginning,

(Negri), or even an inexchangeable

or Milner'sone-in-addition).
truth-event
As
(Badiou's
supplementarity
on
that
or
that
such, either they ground
politics
supplement,
superpower,
or else they contrast it with
a completely
different principle of the
community (Milner'spastoral
government).
They place democracy in
to a principle of heterogeneity. Heterogeneitymay
be a figure)
opposition
or the

l12)))

vitality

of

the

multitudes

THE USE

of the

or an

being of
overcoming

identified with
For

part,
of giving

my

beings -

infinite

or

multitudes,

grounding

OF DISTINCTIONS)

a true politics

of politics in communism. It may, on the contrary, be

the other
of being, blocking the communitarian power.
I took this logic by the other
horn. I took the singular

the power of the heterogeneous,or of the one-more,

the
name of the demosand, as a result,
of setting
democracy in opposition
to consensus. This is a way of saying that there is no such thing
as a
no
of
difference
or
of
real,
heterogeneous
ontologicalprinciple
political
In its stead, there
difference in relation
to politics, no arkhe
or anti-arkhe.
is a principle
of equality,
which is not the 'proper' of politics, and which
has no world of its own,
other than that traced by its acts of verification.
Political subjects are not defined
power
by the exercise of a different
or a superpower, but
way in which forms of subjectivation
by the
the topography
of the common. This is to say that political
re-configure
is a matter of compositionand not of constitution.
This
heterogeneity
of
the
restson
a
different
idea
of
the
conception
homogeheterogeneous
of consensus.
idea
From my point of view, consensus
neous, a different
is definednot by the indifferent mixture of equivalents. It is defined by
the idea of the proper and the distribution
of the places of the proper
and the improper this idea implies. It is the very idea of the difference
betweenthe proper and the improper that serves to separate the political
out from the social,art from culture, culture from commerce, and so on.
The
that breaks with consensus in exercising
the power of the onething
It is, in art, the possibility
that
a metaphor
in-addition is substitutability.
a metaphor
or a play of
or a play of light and shadow be no more
than
of
it may be the power of a love
or a testimony
light and shadow or that
a specifictime and world. It is the possibility
that
a thing be a work
and
In politics, this is the demos as the abolition of every form
a commodity.
of every way of producing a correspondencebetween the
of arkhe,
of governing
and a I disposition'
to occupy these places. The oneplaces
in-addition
is the power
of the indistinct
that
undoes
the divisions by
the places inhabited by the same and the other.
undermining
Thereis,then, no subject possessing a power of rupture
or of unbinding,
no subject that exercises
an ontological
of
power
exception. The exception
is always
The
to
attain
the
of the 'proper'
exception
ordinary.
attempt
entails a process whereby
the
ends
proper
up disappearing in the
indifferentiation
of ethics. I will briefly
evoke two examples here of this
dialectic
of the proper. The first
is the
self -cancellation of political)
stance

213)))

DISSENSUS)

work; the second, the

of the proper of art in
we know,
the Arendtian
reprises
Lyotard's.
Agamben,
critique of the
of Man and of the Citizen, that
is to say the idea that
there
is an
Rights
inherent deception in the very division of the political subject into man
and citizen. He reprises the structure
of the dilemma
that Arendt
applies
to these Rights. Either
it is the case that
the rights
of the citizen are the
of man,
but man as such, bare man,
at
man, has no rights
rights
simply
are
therefore
all, as is well shown by the refugees
example
they
purely
the rights of man are in fact the rights
illusory; or else, on the contrary,
of the citizen, those that fall to him by means of his belonging to a state.
The
difference
The reason
for the dilemma,
is, then, a simple tautology.
for Arendt,
resides
in the confusion between political and non-political
the
confusion
between two different
lives
life,
(bios and zoe). From my
of view, politics exists at preciselythe point
at which this division
point
is put into question.
And the interval
between
man and citizen is the
is to
If, on the other hand, the aim
operator of this re-division.
really
these
of
out
two
forms
to
make
an
actual
distinction
life,
separate
between
politics and the social, then it can only result in an assimilation
of 'pure politics'with the sphere of state action. This may be done in the
and launching
gentle way through promoting the 'return' of the political
tirades about living together and the common good, which
in the last
aim,
3
the
instance, at exulting
plan. This may be done in the more
Juppe
pessimistic tones of the theory of the state of exception accordingto
in the
which
habeas corpus and the Rights
of Man
reveal their truth
Nazi genocide, itself ultimately
also
to
our
democratic
homogeneous
The concepts
of state of exception and of bare life are, then,
normality.
in which
all intervals are abolishedand no interval
names for a modernity
is left open for political practice.
The same dialectic
is at work
in Lyotard's opposition between the
the
of art, which he placesunder
productions
sign of the sublime, and
the forms of circulation of culture and commodities.I shall refer to his
realist, abstract and
polemic against
trans-avant-gardism:
Intermixing
the
motifs
on
same
canvas,
hyperrealist
Lyotard
says, implies that the
tastes of shoppersand critics has triumphed. Yet, this taste is no taste at
all. A difference
therefore
has to be postulatedbetweenthe sensorium
of
art and that
of cultural
and market 'commerce'. But there
is only one
to confer a real difference
is to)
on a sensible weave: this
by which
way
difference

self-cancellation

14)))

a la Arendt
of

that

the

occurs

in Agamben's

modernist

thought

THE USE

OF DISTINCTIONS)

site of the manifestation of a heterogeneouspower,

in other
of a suprasensiblepower.This is exactly what occurs in Lyotard's
work. The power of the heterogeneous power is first given
as the shock
of the aistheton.
But
this aistheton, presented initially
as the quale of an
irreducible sensorygiven, in fact turns out to be a purely
indeterminate
'the event of a passion', says Lyotard,
element:
the pure power of the
non-substitutable or of the non-reciprocable,the power
that does not
circulate. So, it is not long until, by the mediation
of the Lacanian
the shock of the aistheton becomes assignedto the Mosaic
law. The
Thing,
it
'specificity' of art that was in need of being saved is a pure alienation:
is the pure witnessing
of the power of the Other and of the irredeemable
debt toward
that
other power. To want
to attain,
against the 'democratic'
- communicational
admixture
or market - the pure difference
of art,
in the ethico- religious relation to the
leads to spoiling
that'
difference
it the

make

words,

absolutely Other.

point that seems to me to

for
the
differencesintroduced
tendency
by
is the

That

and of

of right

to

morality,

this becoming-indistinct, it
an absolutization of distinction.
is

which
The

will

overturned

politics

and art,

the indistinction
can be rigorously
the fundamentalism

in
disappear
seems
to me,
It is

present:

necessitates

the
those

but

also

of

ethics.

Yet,

conceived

as

of the proper

a fundamentalism of the absolutely

into

to accomplish
the distinction
a superpower
onto

to distinguish
sophico-politico-aesthetic

our

characterize

other.

the power
The philorupture.
of the conflicts of

conferring

of dissensus or of
scene thereby becomesthat

the multitudes
comprising the core of the
to
it
force
destined
break
of the infinite truth
Empire
(Negri);
transits
and
which
collectives
artworks
of the state of
(Badiou);
political
life (Agamben);
and
the Law
bare
of the Thing
exceptiondetermining
in the encounter with
the
(Lyotard); of the abyssal liberty
experienced
of the Thing (Zizek). Theseforms
of superpower-in-competition
horror
on one and the same superpower:the
are all ways of capitalizing
superin the notion of the
of truth that, once upon a time,
was wagered
power
in turn was wagered in Lenin's
superpower of 'productiveforces',which

superpowers: superpowerof
and

the

'Marx's theory is all-powerful because it is true'.

expression:
in which that all powerfulness describeda
Once there was a happy
time

famous

beautiful

the true,
history.

chain
which

Since

The power of theory was the power

of
that
of the masses and of
of the structure,
have become disjoinedfrom one another,)

of equivalences.
the power

was

these

powers

215)))

DISSENSUS)

has taken on diverse

First, there is the dominant
figures.
as a reference or asa stopping
to all the others:
point
in this
the power of the Thing,
becomes
figure the power of the structure
of the truth as irreduciblealterity
that
holes in the chain of
punching
was by and large fulfilled:
the
knowledge. Lacan'sself-fulfilling
prophecy
revolutionaries
who sought a master truth
found
it in this figure
of
rise to diverse strategies.
absolute
has given
alterity. This confrontation
of avoidance,
such as that
which
asked
a different form of
Strategies
a
nd
another
of
unconscious
the
means with which
type
psychoanalysis
to re-affirm the immanent superpowerof the productive
forces (Negri);
and
of diversion,
such as the polymerization
of the
strategies of forcing
strike of truth
into
of infinite truths (Badiou) or a inverting
of
processes
horror
into an affirmation
of abyssal
freedom (Zizek).
All
these
versions of the all-powerfulness of the true have
revamped
one thing in common. They reset the power of dissensuswithin an ontoof Being, the pass of
logical principle of real difference:the prolificness
the strike of the Idea, the encounter with
the Infinite,
Horror
and/or
the
- or if necessary
Law. They proclaim the existence of an ontological
- power of the Other, which
a leap outside
enables
counter-ontological
of the ordinary
of consensual
series
experience. What is thereby founded
is that strange
which
contemporary
figure of apophatic dogmatism,
in the name of the Real that
points to the good names and
expressions
all the names.
disperses
While all these encounters and re-routings
of a superpower were
I
At the
to
be
elsewhere
and
otherwise
taking
place,
happened
occupied.
to a few words,
to understand
the power pertaining
time, I was trying
and emancipation.
I was working on the encounters,
words like proletarian
boundaries
and
whose effect consists in separating
individuals
passages
from the realm of the sensoryexperience
to which
they were assigned.
on the name
Rather than
of the Other and the atomic form
of the
with the Other, I was working
of alteration,
encounter
on processes
of sites and of the re-composition of forms
of expeof the re-distribution
with
rience. Rather than
the superpower
of the true tearing
the
open
tissue of knowledge, I was concerned with
the
and
pre-suppositions
the verifications of the equality
of intelligences.
This was not due to any
difference
of principle;
things just turned out this way. In order to
think
what I was dealing with,
the
of that which
superpower
through
informed of it, of no use)
transpires elsewhere was, without
my being
the superpower

figure

216)))

which

serves

THEUSE

OF DISTINCTIONS)

the notions and the

to me. Simply I applied myself
to elaborating
tions that enabled
me to account for such processesof alteration

of verification.
it seemed to me that
time,
In one respect, it enabled
which remained opaque
the latter had to ignore if

distincand

procedures
With

virtues.
of things

and

that

casesthat

respect, by
and

permitted
substituting

re-compositions

tained the space of

this

limitation

or this

an understanding
in

the

they

dramaturgies
were to hang

lack also had

its

of a certainnumber
of the superpower

onto the exemplary

In another
of rupture
to function.
a topology of possibles and their displacements
for the efficacy protocols of the superpower, I mainat the critical
inventions
of politics and art open
their

axioms

when
Marxist
economic
point when the great teleologieswere inverted,
into
the necessity of the capitalist
world
market,
necessity was turned
when the 'return of politics' becamethe flag that concealed the consensual undertaking
to efface
politics, when the promises of emancipation
that
had been attributed
to artistic
were transformed
into the
modernity
testimonies of immemorial
and when the discourse of the
alienation,
In these circumstances, affirming
end resounded almost
everywhere.
the power
of the equality of intelligences and the exigencyof its verification, the democratic dispersionof the circular logic of the arkhe and the
the
more
tension of contrarieswithin
aesthetic
regime of art seemed
of
radical
experience
profitable than basing myself on the supposedly
the heterogeneous. Indeed,I have been able to observe, as we all have,
of
most
radical
forms of affirmation
the way in which the apparently
into
their
artistic
and political difference were transformed
contrary,
the inversion
of modernist
radicality
namely radical ethicalindistinction:
of the
in the
the inversion
cult of the image and of testimony;
nostalgic
of the political into pure consent to the management
proclaimed purity
of economic
of the most
necessity, and indeed into the legitimation
brutal
forms
of warring imperialism.
that my refusal to ontologize a principle
of the
So, I wasled to consider
heterogeneous,
my refusal of all ontologies of superpower,was not a
shameful
before the duties of philosophy or the parasitical
capitulation
exercise of the hysteric living off the deconstruction of the master's
discourse,but the thoroughgoing
practice of another idea of philosophy.
and art
This idea of philosophy is homogeneous to all the ideasof politics
that I have strived
to develop.
It is an idea of philosophy not as an edifice
domain)
to be built wherein all the various practicesare assignedtheir

217)))

DISSENSUS)

tradition
on its closure, but
principles, nor as a historical
meditating
in the order
accidental activity. Not as a necessaryactivity,
inscribed
of things
and demanded
by the quest for Being, calledupon
by the needs
of other sciencesand activities,
or borne along by an historial
destiny, but

and

as an

as a
just
tion

chance,

supplementary

as well not
and

without

activity

which,

like politics and

art,

could

is an activity without justificahave existed.Philosophy

name
is itself a
any specific place, becauseits proper

situated
at the junction of different
discourses
of
reason.
This
under
is
the
types
junction placed
sign of
in the sense that I defined in my book of the same name,
disagreement
that
is as a conflict over homonyms,
a conflict
between one who says
white
and another
who says white.
bound,
Philosophy as I conceiveof it is this place and this activity,
to work on the homonymies:
owing to its own problematic
homonymy,
and
so
man,
art, justice, science, language, freedom, love, work
politics,
on. Only there are two ways
to deal with homonyms. One is to proceed
to purify
to identify the good name and the good sense and disthem,
the
is often the practice of the so-calledhuman
bad.
Such
and
perse
social sciences, which boast that
leave
to
only
philosophy
they
empty or
names.
Such is often the task that
definitively
philosophers
equivocal
also give themselves. The other way
considers
that every homonymy
and of action, and that
the problem
is therearranges a spaceof thought
fore neither to eliminate
the prestige of homonymy, nor to take names
back to a radical indetermination,
but to deploy the intervals
which
put
the homonymy to work.
In this way, it is possible to define a certain
of
dissensual
practice
an
of
undermines
all
as
de-classification
that
philosophy
activity
policing
of domains and formulas. It does so not for the sole pleasure of
de constructing
the master's discourse, but in order to think the lines
and passages are constructed,according
accordingto which boundaries
to which
critical
they are conceivable and modifiable.This
practice
of philosophy
is an inseparably egalitarian,
or anarchistic,
practice,
since it considers
and
narratives, testimonies, investigations
arguments,
all
as
the
inventions
of
a
in
a
common
metaphors
equal
capacity
in
of
common
the
instituted
then,
divisions,
language. Engaging
critique
our interrogations into what
we are able
paves the way for renewing
to think
and to do.)

problematichomonym,
and

18)))

different

Notes)

EDITOR'S
1

Clement
Greenberg
of modernity
lies

gressesby

becoming

of painting

history

The

masterpiece

aware

argued, for example, that the process

in which
each art develops and proof its medium specificity. Progress in

identicalwith

thus becomes

the

of

conquest

of Ranciere's

political

and Philosophy,

Politics

thought

La Mesentente

trans. Julie

is translated

Rose,Minneapolis:

Press, 1999 (French original: 1995).The basis

for most of his ideas on aesthetics
were
first worked out in La parole
muette: essai sur les contradictions
de la litterature, Paris: Hachette, 1996,
which
has yet to be translated into
unfortunately
English.
translation
Lesson
trans.
Emiliano
English
forthcoming: Althusser's
Battista (Continuum: London,2010).
For more
on this point see chapter 3 of La Mesentente as well as the
book in which his unique concept of equality
first
received
its full
Le
Maitre
lecons
sur
l'
intelexpression
ignorant: cinq
lefons
emancipation
Paris: Fayard, 1987, published in English
as The Ignorant
lectuelle,
Schoolmaster:Five Lessonsin Intellectual
trans. Kristin Ross,
Emancipation,
University

way

etc.

as Disagreement:

famously

in the

the

'flatness'
2

INTRODUCTION)

of Minnesota

Stanford: Stanford
some of his

5 In

University
work

dissensus

artistic

Ranciere

from

Press,
has

political

1991.
tended
litigation

to mark the
through

the

differenceof
of

concept

contrariety.
6

See,

for

Foucault's

Randere's comments on the relation

practice of theory and his practical commitments

example,

between
in

his)

219)))

NOTES)

of Consensual Times, trans.

2010 [French
(forthcoming

Chronicles
Continuum,

CHAPTER
1

220)))

ONE)

translation
of the 'Ten Theses on
English
Bowlby and Davide Panagia and published
online in the journal Theory and Event 5: 3, 2001. My translation
remains
indebted
to their work.
Translator's
note: Ranciere plays on the doublemeaning
of avoir-part
as
both having
a share/role
in something, a 'partaking'
and as a 'partition',
in the
sense of the action of separating
two or more persons or things,
or
a thing whose presence divides
into
two.
(the community)
something
a polemical demonstration, it is useful
Because this partaking
involves
also to think
of it in the old English
sense
make
of to partake - to impart,
but also to take part with (someone)
and thus to take sides.
known,
Translator's
note. The wordplay here is on the
idea
of an 'inter-est'
both
to a principle of interrelating
and to the idea of societal
referring
in her
'interest'. Ranciere
is invoking
an Arendtian distinction
found
The Human
Condition
(see pages 50-58).
The Human Condition
Hannah
of Chicago
Arendt,
(Chicago:
University
Press, 1958), p. 177.
Demes
or divisions
of ancient Attica.
(in Greek demoi) were townships
with Cleisthenes's
reforms
importance
They took on a specialpolitical
in 508
BC. The reforms made enrolmentin the citizen-lists
of a deme
a requirement for citizenship.Prior to that, citizenship had been based
in a phratry
or family
on membership
The establishment
of the
group.
deme as the fundamental
unit of the state weakened the aristocratic
that had dominated the phratries.
family
groups
See Democracy and Political
Theory
(Minneapolis:
University of Minnesota
Part IV: 'On the Irreducible Element'.
Press,1988),especially
For Althusser's
account of the subject of ideologyas a product
of interin Lenin and
pellation, see 'Ideology and IdeologicalState Apparatuses'
York: Monthly Review Press, 1971),pp. 85-126.
(New
Philosophy
See Arendt's
On Revolution
chapter titled 'The SocialQuestion' from
Books,
(New York: Penguin
1990), especially pp. 68-71.
an extended
4 of DisFor
discussion of this concept,
see chapter
trans.
Julie
Rose
of
Minnesota
agreement,
(Minneapolis: University
Press, 1999 [French original,
1995]).)

note.

Translator's
Politics'

Steven Corcoran, London:

original, 2005]).)

was

The first

by Rachael

NOTES)

TWO)

CHAPTER
1

as a paper in a series in commemoradelivered

Derrida at the BirkbeckAdvanced
Studies
Centre in the
Humanities,
published
May 2005. It was then
along with the other papers
UK: Palgrave
in the series as Adieu Derrida, ed. Costas
Douzinas
(Hampshire,
here
with
modifications.
84-100.
It
is
Macmillan, 2007), pp.
reprinted
238c-d.
Plato,
Menexenus,

was

This

essay

tion

of Jacques

3 Derrida,

Politics

The

Translator's

initiative

trans. George Collins, London:Verso,

of Friendship,

93-113.
Commission was

1994), pp.
Original,
The Trilateral
note:

1997(French
4

originally

of David

Rockefellerin

Noam

1973.

at

founded

the

wrote the

Chomsky

of the Trilateral Commission in 1981:

composition
of world
are drawn from the three components
capitalthem are the
ist government, the 'US, Europe and Japan.
Among
in corporate law
heads of major corporations and banks, partners
affairs - the familiar mix
firms, Senators, Professorsof international
Third
in extra-governmental
See Radical Priorities, Revised
groupings'.
ed. C. P. Otero (Oakland:A.K.
For the arguEdition,
Press,
2003).
consult
the book-length
ments to which Rancierehere refers,
report
issued by the Commission
written by M. Crozier, S. P. Huntington
- Trilateral Commission Task
and J. Watanuki, The Crisis of Democracy
ForceReport no. 8 (New York: NYU Press, 1975).
5
Les Penchants criminels de 1'Europe
Milner,
democratique
[The Criminal
Editions
Tendencies of Democratic Europe] (Paris:
Verdier,
2003).
6 B.
Le Meurtre
du Pasteur [The Murder of the Pastor] (Paris:
Levy,
of

following

the

'Its members

Editions
7
8
9

Plato,
See,

Verdier,

See

Derrida,

preface to the revisedFrench

Gallimard,

Sacer (Stanford:

essay of the present

edition

of

1998).

Stanford

1998

Press,

University

collection,'Who

is the

Subject of the

of Man?'

Specters of Marx

1993]), p. 85.
13

(Paris:

1995]).

original,

the next

Rights
12

politique

Homo

Agamben,

[Italian
11

See also the

Dis-agreement.

Aux bords du
10

2004).

Republic, Book VITI, 563c-d.

The Laws, Book ill, 690c.

Plato,

(New York:

J-F. Lyotard,
'The Other's
Human Rights (New York:

Rights',

Basic

Routledge,

in

Books,

S. Shute

1994

[French

and S. Hurtey,

1994), pp.

original,
eds.

On

136-47.)
221)))

NOTES)

THREE)

CHAPTER
1

Edmund

Burke,

Reflections on the

in France,

Revolution

ed. J. G.A.

Pocock,

of publication,
Hacket, 1987 [original
year
1790]).
(Indianapolis:
York: Harcourt
Hannah
The Origins of Totalitarianism
Arendt,
(New

Brace, 1951), pp. 297-98.

3

Ibid.,

4 Ibid.,
5

p. 293.

p. 297.

The History of Sexuality

volume
1: The Will to Knowledge,
Foucault,
Books: London, 1992 [French original,
trans. Robert Hurley
(Penguin
at the College de France,
1976]
); and Society Must Be Defended:Lectures
Bertani
and Alessandro
Fontana, trans. David
1975-1976,Ed. Mauro
Allen
Lane, 2003 [French original
1997]).
Macey,(London:
The Will to Knowledge: Volume One of the History of
Michel
Foucault,
Michel

Sexuality, trans. Robert

(French
7
8
9

10
11
12
13

14
15
16

222)))

and

Harmondsworth:

Books,

Penguin

\"Society Must Be Defended\":

Lectures

1990
at the

Collegede France, 1975-76,trans. David Macey,New York: Picador, 2003

1997).
(French original,
Duncker
and Humblot, 1922).
Carl Schmitt, Politische Theologie
(Berlin:
Homo Sacer.

Agamben,
Ibid.

Ibid.
Origins of Totalitarianism,
Homo Sacer.

Arendt,
Agamben,

p. 294.

trans. A. E. Taylor
(Princeton:
Bk.
690a-d,pp. 1284-85.
3,
1989),

Plato,

Princeton

Laws,

See 'The

Other's

Lyotard,

'The

Rights',

Other's

in

On Human

Rights', p.

University

Press,

Rights.

136.

Ibid.)

CHAPTER
1

1976);

original,

Hurley,

FOUR)

at
essay is based on a paper delivered
munism, conferenceheld at the University
7-9 November 2003.

This

the

'Indeterminate

of Frankfurt,

ComGermany,

and Holderlin, The Oldest System Programme of German

Schelling
1987
London
and New York:
Continuum,
Behler,
Idealism, ed. Ernst
(German original, 1797).)
Hegel,

NOTES)

FWE)

CHAPTER
1

This

was published

interview

in

French

in Multitudes in

Negri,

Empire

June 2002. See

http://multitudes.samizdat.net.
2

4
5

Antonio
University Press, 2000),p. 60.
and

Hardt

Michael

Harvard

(Cambridge:

p. 394.

Ibid.,

Ibid., p.

397.

pp. 399-400.
and
Negri

Ibid.,
Antonio

Michel

Hardt,

Mass:

Cambridge,

Empire,

Harvard

University Press, 2000.)

SIX)

CHAPTER
1

conducted

Interview

essay is a
on 2 February

This

at the

slightly

modified

2002 in

the

of a

version

framework

in March

paper given

in

of 'Franco-American

2000.)

New

York

Dialogues'
by

at

University.)

EIGHT)

In the French
Presidential election of 2002, the xenophobic,
rightacceded
to
wing nationalist candidate, Jean-MarieLe Pen, successfully
the second round to challenge an incumbent
Chirac. The
Jacques
of all political forces, including
the French
Communist
uniting
Party,

Trotskyists and Lionel Jospin's Socialist

media campaign
fascism,

CHAPTER
1

online

of Laure
Adler and Tom Bishopand co-organized
Culture and the Center for French Culture
and
Civilization

York

CHAPTER
1

posted

initiative

France

New

and

Alliez

SEVEN)

CHAPTER
1

by Eric

Friedrich
Elizabeth

ensured

that

warning

Party,

that Chirac won

with

accompanied

was being

democracy

a Soviet-style

by a vast

undermined

by

score.)

NINE)

von

Schiller,

M.

Wilkinson

Press, 1967

Letters on the
and L.A.

[German original,

Aesthetic
Willoughby

Education of Man, trans.

(Oxford:

Clarendon

1795]).)

223)))

NOTES)

note:
as mentioned
distinguishes between three regimes

Translator's

representativeregime

and

of

aesthetic

the

Jacques Ranciere, The Politics

the Sensible, trans. Gabriel Rockhill
see

Elie

10
11

12

13

Les

Halles

is

further

details,

original,

were the
variously

Skin's

Penguin Classics,

Ass, (Harmondsworth:

1831]).

central markets of nineteenth-century

translated

English. The title

his first novel centred

into

Simon Watson

Zola's

Paris;
is

The

literally
on

entirely

Taylor

(New

the

York:

Exact Change, 2004 [French

original,
1926]).
Let's
Entertain
(2000) and Au dela-du spectacle (2000-01).
2003
Adorno,
London,
of Modern Music
(Continuum:
Philosophy
[German original,
1949]).
G.W.F Hegel, Introductory Lectureson Aesthetics,
trans. Bernard Bosanquet
with
an introduction
by Michael Inwood (Harmondsworth:
Penguin
Classics, 2004 [German original,
1835-8]).
Robert
The Human Race, trans. Jeffrey Haight
and
Annie
Antelme,
Mahler (Marlboro: Marlboro Press,1992[French
original,
1947]).)

See

TEN)
Politics and the
(Ithaca: Cornell University

Rousseau,

Theatre

1758]).)
224)))

regime. For

Aesthetics: The Distribution

of
an introduction
by Slavoj

Cres,1927).

The Wild

Underbelly of Paris, and it was

working class.
Louis
Paris Peasant, trans.
Aragon,

CHAPTER
1

regime, the

the ethical

1897]).
L 'Esprit des Formes(Paris:

de Balzac,

Honore

novel

with

Ranciere

introduction,

original,

Faure,

1977 [French
8

of the

art:

Zizek (Continuum: London,2004 [French

2000]).
original,
Hegel, Schelling and Holderlin, The Oldest Systematic Programme of
German
ed. Ernst Behler (London and New York:
Idealism,
Continuum,
1987 [German original, 1797]).
Immanuel
trans.
James
Creed Meredith
Kant,
Critique of Judgement,
2007 [German Original 1790]).
Press,
(Oxford: OxfordUniversity
A Throw of the dice will never abolish chance,
in
Mallarme,
Stephane
Mallarme: Collected Poems, trans
and
with a commentary
Stephane
Weinfield
Henry
by
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994
[French

the

in

Arts:

Letter
Press,

to M.
1968

D'Alembert

[French

on

the

original,

NOTES)

See Brecht's
a parable

play The Resistible

on the rise of Hitler

Rise

of Arturo Ui (German
the complacency

1941),

original

of those who

and

enabled it

of 1930s
to happen.
The play is set in the gangsterland
in his
Chicago in the midst of economic turmoil and presents Arturo
of
bid to gain
control
of the Cauliflower Trust
(the
representative
German capitalism and the Junker Class).
3
See Godard's
Pierrot le fou (1965).
4
the War
See Martha
RosIer's series of photomontages titled
Bringing
the
Home (1967-72). Comparewith her more recent series Bringing
War Home: House Beautiful,
new series (2004).
5 Chantal Akerman's film was first screened in 2001 and released in
as On the Other Side.
English
6
as Yanda's Room.)
Pedro
Costa's film was released in 2000

CHAPTERELEVEN)
1

Melehy

The Names of History:

with a forewordby

Honore

de Balzac,

Ranciere,

Minnesota Press,1994[French

1901

[French

Poetics of Knowledge,
(Minneapolis:

On the

trans.

1992]).

original,

The Country
Parson,
original, 1839]).)

Hassan

University of

White

Hayden

(Boston

Dana Estes

& Company,

CHAPTERTWELVE)
1

and

Deleuze

Gilles

Felix

Tomlinsonand Graham
1994
2

The

[French

original,

origin of this text

2004 for a

November

by the

Laboratorio

Guattari,

Burchell

Brecht's
under

e Pesquisas da

Hugh
York,

modified.

Fortaleza(Brazil)
resistance'

Subjetividade

of Daniel

initiative

et

Press: New

Lins to

of

in

organized
the Federal

whom I extend

thanks.)

warm

CHAPTER

University

colloquium called 'Art

de Estudos

1fans.

is Philosophy?

1991]), pp. 176-77.Translation

was a paper presented at

University of Ceara at the

my

What

(Columbia

THIRTEEN)
Saint Joan
the

impact

workers' demonstrations

of the Stockyards
of the Wall
and

(German
Street

the

crash,

original, 1929-31), written

the brutal repression

onset of the

of
Great Depression,is set)
225)))

NOTES)

Alfred
You

workers' quarters and stockexchange

the slaughterhouses,

amid

of a

Chicago.

mythical

The Wrong Man

Hitchcock,

(1957); Fritz

Lang,

Fury

(1936) and

Live Once

Only

The

Hitchcock,

(1937).
House of Dr

Edwards

(1945);

Lang,

The Secret behind

the

Door (1948).

4 See
5

'The Other'sRights',

Giorgio

trans.

in On Human Rights.
Remnants
The Witness and the Archive,
of Auschwitz:
Agamben,
1999 [Italian
D. Heller-Roazen(New
York:
Zone
Books,
1998]).

original,

the
Phonebook Customers was commissioned through
Art Society and in 2002 was loaned from the Musee
d'Art Moderne,
Paris, to the South London Gallery.
he based
was director and screenwriter for Contempt
Godard
(1963);
Pierrot le fou (1965) on a novel by Lionel White, Obsession (1962); Vivre
States as My Life to Live and as
sa vie (1962) was released in the United
It'sMy Life in the United Kingdom. Passion (1982) was followed by In
Praise of Love (2001),
Germany Year 90 Nine Zero (1991) and History(s) of

6 Boltanski's

Contemporary

the
8

Cinema

Gerard

This

(1988-98).

Wacjman,

text was

the Caixa,which
CHAPTER

L'Objet du

presented
focused

in

siecle(Paris:Verdier,

March

2004

on 'Geographies

1998).

in Barcelona at the

Forum of

of Contemporary Thought'.)

FOURTEEN)

was presented at a colloquium organizedby Jean-Clet

called the 'Division of the Sensible'that took place on 5 June
2004 at the College Internationale de Philosophie.
2
is 'je suis alle pisser:il faisait
in the French original
Antelme's
phrase
is 'Oui, c'est Agamemnon,
encore
nuit', while the phrase from
Iphigenie
t' eveille. With their twelve syllables and caesura in
c' est ton roi qui
the middle,
both sentences echo one another,
reproducing
exactly the
rhythm of the alexandrine as all the French students of Antelme's
had learnt
it.
time
2 Alain
from May 1995 to June 1997.
minister
Juppe was French
prime
in France
was
His
to make major cutbacks to the socialsystem
plan
to protect
the
since
met with nationwide
1968,
strikes,
May
largest
1

This

essay

Martin

social
226)))

gains.)

Index)

Chantal
De l'autre cote 149

Ackerman,

critical

116,178,201
der neuen Musik 129
115-17, 120, 123-33, 176

Ador.no,Theodor
Philosophie

the

aesthetic,

freedom

Aesthetic

aesthetic

176-8
of politics

aesthetics

Giorgio

Agamben,

115-20, 124,

4, 141-2, 148
64, 65-7, 74-5,

93-4,192,212,214
55, 64, 70
Holocaust
66

on the
Das iilteste

Antigone

Robert
humaine

132, 208

84

Louis

Le paysan de Paris 126,

Hannah
5, 28-30,

167
55, 57, 63-4,

67,71,201,206,212,214
Condition 29-30
TheOrigins of Totalitarianism 63
On Revolution
39
Politia

art

128)

95

125-6

cure de village 158, 165

La Peau de chagrin 125, 162

Le

127, 164

Charles

Baudelaire,

Behrens, Peter 121

187

Human

Aristotle 37,

exhibition)

211-12, 215-16

Balzac, Honore de

Arendt,

The

(art

81, 119

Alliez, Eric
Aragon,

169-83

of

resistance

Alain

37, 222n. 7
132, 208

159, 163,

173,176,205,207-10

Etienne,

6, 22-3,

134-5

art

14, 156,

representative

Badiou,

Louis

Espece

181-2

Lyotard

paradox of political
as practice 149

Balibar,

des

Systemprogramm

148

134-41,

ethical 14, 137

deutschen ldealismus
Althusser,

Antelme,

of

efficacy

Au-dela du spectacle

Sacer

Homo

149, 193-4

142-5,

for Deleuze 181

for

Revolution

116-23, 138-9,

14-16,

173-4,179,205,207-10

39

John

Adams,

aesthetic

155-6

27-9,37,91

117-29

three regimes of,)

Benjamin,

Walter

Boltanski,

Christian

Lesabonnes
Brecht,

Bertolt

126, 164, 167

145-6, 193

du telephone

Der aufhaltsame
Aufstieg
Vi 224 n. 2
Die heilige Johanne der
Schlachthofer

Burden,
Burke,
Bush,

Chris

145, 193

142
des Arturo

185-6,

225 n. 1

145

EdInund 55,57,63
100-1, 110, 186

George

vs Goebbels 109)
227)))

INDEX)

43,76-9, 82-3,89-90,

capital, capitalism

Clint

Eastwood,

105-11,129,178,185,199,217
Mystic River (2002) 186-7

Carl,

64-5

Schmitt

Castel, Robert

221 n.

Noam

Chomsky,

community

33, 36, 40, 70, 100,188

81

community

as power

159,207,213

Communist

Manifesto

far- right political

Elie
Faure,

163-6
Madame Bovary
Foucault, Michel

170-1

70, 154-5

61

as distribution

sensible 54

50

paradox
for Plato

of

News

French

as practice

59

as rupture

31-4, 51-3

Spectres

De Stael,

of

45

56-7,

140

1848

Fukuyama, Francis 58)

58

German Romanticism

161, 208

Giotto
Greenberg,

191,218

of 211
sensible 36-7,

structure

141, 157-9)

160

122

Godard, Jean-Luc 142,194

41

as essenceof politics
69, 80,
37-8,
139-40, 173, 176,180,

the

of 1789

161, 176

De la litterature
161-2
De Tocqueville,Alexis
Dissensus
2-5, 8

ontological

election

Revolution

French

45,52-3,58-60

Germaine

distribution of

122

of2002 107

de l' amitie
de Marx

64, 93

de savoir

presidential

32-3,40,53,60,70,213

Politiques

64-5, 92-5

110

Fra Angelico

58

45-7,

49-50

Dendda,Jacques

228)

La volonte
Fox

165

129,

defendre la societe 64-5

et Singulatum
94-5

Omnes

of the

as paradox

IIfaut

33-4

democracy

166

et Pecuchet

Bouvard

que la philosophie

challenge of

116, 153-6,160,

Flaubert, Gustave

154

Gilles 169-83

Athenian

146

Peter

Fischli,

democracy

141, 148-9

fiction, labour of

Barbey
128
Guy

Qu'est-ce

147

Rene

Fernandez,

Costa, Pedro 151)

Deleuze,

parties 107

L'Esprit des formes 122

Feldmann, Hans Peter 146

188-9

148-9,

143-4,

demos

81

184-202

ethics 184, 193)

83
78, 80

optimal form of 106-7

Plutocratic consensus 105-11

Debord,

the

turn,

of separation

consensus 2-5, 42,71-2,100,

D'Aurevilly,

and sensibility

intelligence

ethical

76-83

communism

of

80-1, 85-6, 156,

33, 54,

3-5

equality

33

consensual

87, 90

Empire

Cleisthenes

46

The

Economist,

95

92,

Habermas,

21 9

Clement

Jurgen

f.n.)

Hals, Frans 122

G. W. F 123-5, 130, 174-5
Hegel,
iiber die Asthetik 130
Vorlesungen
Hitchcock,

Alfred

186-7)))

INDEX)

Holocaust 48

Human

series) 132

of

aesthetics

Rights

198-9)

30, 32

Homer,

Lecture on
59, 72, 191
the sublime 130-1,

International

Amnesty

television

The (D. S.

Holocaust,

Iliad 32
178

Odyssey

Hussein, Saddam

47, 54

Mallarme,

120-1
of 106-9

121

coup de des

Un

Iraq war

116,

Stephane

46)

principle

insecurity,

196

Black Square

Samuel

Huntington,

Kazimir

Malevich,

160

Hugo, Victor

125
Manet, Edouard
Marx, Karl 55, 62,76, 82-3,120,127,

105-10)

164,206

117-18, 122-4,

Juno Ludovisi

126,

138,177)

1968

May

Kant, Immanuel
Kritik der

123

19

96, 126

86-7,

metapolitics

Michelet, Jules 162

211
121,

Urteilskraft

131, 176

Koons, Jeff 128

48-9, 212
de l'Europe

Jean-Claude

Milner,

LesPenchants

127)

Kulturkritik

122
in France 6,

Masaccio

Wassily

Kandinsky,

94

Grundrisse

Criminels

48-9

democratique

Moliere

Lang,

Misanthrope 136

187,216

Lacan,Jacques
186-7

Fritz

Shoah (film)

132,

Laurette, Matthieu
Claude

Lenin,

Vladimir

Lessing,

196

Multitudes

Negri, Antonio

34

212, 215-16

Nietzsche, Friedrich 130, 175)

215

Gotthold Ephraim
Oedipus

der Weise

135
128

49
Benny
Le Meurtre du pasteur 49
165
literariness
157-8,

159, 163-4, 167

of

definition

155
Francois

de Gouges

59-60, 72-3,

57, 68

147)

Lucy,

Plato 34, 40-1, 49-52,54-5,

137, 139
Gorgias 31, 40
Laws

45
14, 40,

49

40, 49

Statesman

people, the

vs. the

79,

30-1,40,50,70

Republic

116,181-2,191-2,198,200,

214-15)

Orta

Menexenus

Loos, Adolf 121

Jean

at Colonus 34

Olympe

Levy,

Lyotard,

87)

also Empire

see

Let'sEntertain
(art exhibition)
Levi, Primo 131-2

literature

(journal)

147-8

Laokoon 196
Nathan

William 120

Morris,

Le Clezio,G.M.J 175
Lefort,

135

Tartuffe

Claude

Lanzmann,

33,

multitudes

84-90)
229)))

INDEX)

156

poetry

Schelling,

Hegel on 124
120-1

on

Mallarme

123

W. J

F.

von
Schiller, Friedrich
138, 176-7

police 36-7,42,53,56,92,95,108,

die iisthetische

Ober

205-7

philosophy

politics

27-44,

vs.

biopolitics

42-3
79-80, 84-5, 92,

28, 40-1,

51-3,

139,152,205-7

176-7

Schlegel, August Wilhelm

Schmitt, Carl 65

125

politics of aesthetics

14, 116-19,

124,

130, 178

Arnold

Schonberg,

91-6

September 11 attacks on the Twin

Towers 97-9, 104,108,188

politics

126, 133-42,148,176,178-9 sodal, the 96-5

of literature
152-68, 160,
Strauss, Leo 28)

Proust,

Marcel

162-8
164, 179-80)

Vecelli 125
Titian,
Trilateral Commission

46)

Randere, Jacques 6

Lamesentente

79, 84,91
Les noms de l'histoire 157

Riegl, Alols
right

of

Von Trier, Lars

of Man

and the

Citizen

55-6,

Martha

132, 197

Kane

Citizen

Winckelmann, Johann
Joachim

116

Alexander

Romantic poetics

Welles, Orson

166-7

Rimbaud, Arthur

RosIer,

190

125-8

The

Rousseau, Jean-Jacques 136-7

a M. D' Alembert
Lettre
sur les
spectacles 136-7

138

Wodiczko, Krysztof 147

Woolf,

142

Worringer,
wrong

208

Virginia
208

Waves

Wilhelm 121

7, 91

absolutization of

73-4)

Rubens, Peter Paul

Descent from the
Donald

Cross210
46-7)

Rumsfeld,

movement

sans-papiers

230)

Yilao,

Bai

The People

(workers

without papers)
Sartre,Jean-PatU

189)

146

David

Weiss,

62- 3,

rights

65-7,70-1,74-5,214
Rodchenko,

185-6,

Dog\037lle(2002)

interference 102-3
Man 64, 68

vs Humanitarian
Rights

135

Mahomet

121

of humanitarian

Rights

122

160

Voltaire

210

Watch

125

Vico, Giambattista

Rijn 122,
Night

Diego

Velasquez,

Vermeer, Johannes
von

Harmenszoon

Rembrandt,

90

153-4,163-4)

131,

Erziehung des

115,

Menschen

political

115-18,

146)

Zizek, Slavoj 7, 215-16

Zola, Emile
Le ventre de Paris 126)))