<nettime> Re: Zagreb interview with Michael Hardt

[Brian Holmes <brian.holmes@wanadoo.fr>]

Hi Ognjen (and all you Hardt/Negri readers) -

Let's go just a little further with this. You write:

  "i was wondering would a reader of the interview have the same
impression that i had, that is, that communism Hardt calls for is
"communism" in quite a special meaning. but it is this enchanted dance of
the multitude on the edge of fascism that worries me most.  ... this
totalitarian potential of Empire that Zizek warns about stems not only
from its appeal for global citizenship. this loosely bounded solidarity, a
movements' ability to "recognize their common project" is exactly the
strategy of totalitarian movements."

Well, I actually didn't read it that way. You know, I've been saying for
years that we really need much broader solidarities, to face up to the
transnational power now wielded by capital, and by those parts of the
state-systems that support capital's global extension. And I don't think
the movements Hardt is talking about are potentially fascistic in any way,
he's basically talking about the kind of people who went to Porto Alegre
and hung out on its fringes.

In the course of the last two or three years, though, some things have
radically changed. With the transition to Europe, as with "globalization"
generally, there is a crisis in representative democracy. The governments
can no longer represent many people's desires for a better life, because
as the countries lose sovereignty, the governments lose power to do
anything accept render their states, enterprises and the most adaptable
part of their population more fit for the demands of transnational
capital. So the democratic systems come under a lot of stress, and
populism arises, mostly in a fascist form. The fascists are really a
serious problem, because they combine with and provide the excuse for the
traditional and neoliberal right to give us a new version of the
authoritarian police state, bound together with other such states in a
globalizing alliance.

But far left movements also arise, whose intentions are as yet unclear. I
situate myself there (because I believe that redistribution is necessary,
and that predatory capitalism much be controlled, if not entirely
transformed). The notion of the "multitude," as I understand it, is
supposed to encourage this far left. But the promise of the multitude is
not that of some swirling rainbow nebula of humanity, surging up in
magical mobility to change everything. That's a great image and it
translates some of the wonderful suprise of the reappearence of resistance
movvements, with new techniques. But it's not precise enough. and I think
it now should just be abandoned. Imprecise evocations open up too much
danger for populism, I think that's the point in the example of the
"Homeland War" veterans.

The promise of the multitude is that of an operative intelligence of
individuals and small groups, able to generate agency through the
networked extension of an almost personal trust, which is based both on
continuous critical debate and on cooperative action.

This new extension of agency is a potential, which at moments is realized
to some degree. It promises much more permeable organizational structures,
where you do not immediately delegate your intelligence and will to some
representative, where you engage in extensive debate and gain some agency
and productive responsability.  The experiment is to see how far these new
organizational processes can go. It seems we will need them to put any
viable solidarities into effect, as things get worse in the world, which
unfortunately they are almost sure to.

I don't think that experimentation takes place in a vaccuum, though.  
It's something like the issue I was discussing with Keith Hardt, in the
"barter" thread. Is it possible to name all those non-contractual,
non-market principles on which a multiplicity of human exchanges in
reality depend? Is it possible to acquire a much clearer understanding of
what kind of solidarities the transnational networks are based on, how and
why they function, and how they interact with existing representational
institutions? As the actually existing governments really begin to falter,
and as I see (rather closer than I'd like in France right now) the
pitiful, prepolitical hodgepodge that passes for thinking among the far
right movements, I find that the left needs clear and pratical expression
of the way we organize, the problems we face, and the specific directions
in which we are looking for solutions.

But take a movement like Kein Mensch ist Illegal. It calls for the
dissolution of all borders and it convokes a transnational cooperative
network to rework, amplifly and promote that general call, mostly through
specific actions of solidarity. Zizeck said that such a call, which is
also found in Empire, would lead to fascist resistance. In a way that's
happening - not so much because of the actions of the far left, but
primarily because of the continuing impoverishment of many countries, and
the transnational labor movements brought about by neoliberalism. To which
you can add the positive desire of people everywhere to participate in the
new mobility.

Myself, I believe one should not abandon the call for open borders in
favor of a return to closed national society (which is always a fiction).
But we have to begin to forsee the consequences of that call: in Europe it
entails at the very least development programs for the neighboring
countries, useful, productive forms of transnational credit, different
kinds of education inside the European territory (not just education
against racism!), better housing for immigrants, better wages and working
conditions. In short, quite a radical change of the economy. But a real
one, that operates in detail and does not just conjure away the hated
state in the hope that spontaneous cooperation will resolve everything.

I guess that's what Michael Hardt means when he says that we wouldn't
necessarily be better off just by getting rid of institutions like the
IMF. I wish he'd be more precise though. That's the main thing, not to go
on evoking this epochal change without any discussion of what it will
entail. Accepting the need to have a strategy to work toward that kind of
change - OK, a complex, permeable, incomplete strategy, but still a
strategy that can be constantly critiqued and made better - seems to me to
be the difference between having a political fantasy and a political
aspiration. Spontaneous cooperation without any representation would only
be possible in a world with no enemies - cf. the anarchist republic in
Spain.

By the way, I was told by a fellow in Spain the other day, that according
to the living memory of someone my friend had known, the thing that really
marked the anarchist revolution in Barcelona was that they literally threw
the money away, they threw it out into the street like garbage! After
which they invented other means of exchange. Then again, I do think we
could throw away the IMF's structural adjustment programs - and I support
the replacement of the the WTO too, as gatt.org has just announced!

best, Brian




#  distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission
#  <nettime> is a moderated mailing list for net criticism,
#  collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets
#  more info: majordomo@bbs.thing.net and "info nettime-l" in the msg body
#  archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net