CRITIQUE AND RECUPERATION IN TWENTIETH CENTURY
PHILOSOPHICAL DISCOURSE
Volume I of II
A thesis submitted to the University of Manchester for the
degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Faculty of Arts, 1989.
Sarah Jane Plant
Department of Philosophy
2
Abstract.
The recupera tion of cri tical discourse provides the central
theme of the text, which considers the accounts of this
phenomenon developed in the philosophical, cultural, and
political discourse of the twentieth century. It is argued that
the theories of the Si tua tionis t International represent the
most sophisticated treatment of this and other problems of
cri ticism,
and
the
Si tua tionis t
movement
is
considered
throughout the text.
Discussions of the Marxist conceptions of alienation and
ideology give particular emphas is to
Marx, Lukacs, Gramsci,
and Marcuse, and the role of art and the avant-garde is
considered in relation to Dada and Surrealism. The legacy of
both these political theories and artistic
movements is
considered in discussions of a number of cultural and
poli tical movements including the events in France in 1968.
This legacy is also discussed in relation to poststructuralism,
the treatment of which includes accounts of the work of
Foucault, Irigaray, Kristeva and Baudrillard.
The text combines an elucidation of the history and
theories of the Situationist International with a broad survey
of philosophical accounts of the nature of critical thought.
3
No portion of the work referred to in this thesis
has been submitted in support of an application for
another degree or qualification of this or any other
university or other institute of learning.
The research for Criti ue and Recu eration in Twentieth Centur
Philosophical Discourse was lnance
y a Brltls Aca emy Major
State Studentship, held between January 1986 and December 1988.
The work was supervised by Or David Lamb and completed in the
Department of Philosophy, University of Manchester, from which
I received my B.A.(Hons) in 1985.
4
Acknowledgements.
This thesis has grown with the help of all those who have
shared their friendship, knowledge, and experiences with me
during its development. The biggest thanks go to my
supervisor, Dr David Lamb, for a perfect anticipation of the
role of post-revolutionary intellectual guide; my parents,
Hilda and Philip, for keeping my feet on the ground and my head
in the clouds; and my cat, Pushka, forgiven for every
interruption. Also my friends, especially those who have
contributed their time and political, philosophical, and
cultural knowledge and literature to this project, including
Andi Chapple, Bruce Bingham, Colin Wilson, Dave Pimperton,
Declan O'Neill, Dennis Gould, Donald Gillan, Ed Jones,
Fiona T. Wardle, Fran Belbin, John Bartrick, Julie Thompson,
Martin Hodgson, Nigel Spencer, Paul Sandelson, Phil Dennison,
Rosalind Mellor-Brooke, Sesn Barker, and Vivienne Taylor;
members of the Philosophy Department, University of Manchester,
1982-1989, especially Mrs Pat Robinson, Mr Harry Lesser, and
Mr Steven Priest; students of philosophy at South Trafford
College, 1985-1989; Pronto Engineering Ltd.; and all those in
resistance to the poverty of everyday life.
6
Contents.
Volume I
Introduction.
11
1. The Spectacle of Alienation.
16
ALL THAT IS SOLID MELTS INTO AIR
17
THE SITUATIONIST ANALYSIS
21
MARXISM AND ALIENATION
The alienation of prosperity
26
29
THE SOCIETY OF THE SPECTACLE
Commodification
The fate of critical discourse
40
48
2. Marxism and Ideology: the Critical Distance.
57
36
LUKACS' CONCEPTION OF TOTALITY
The critique of reification
Truth and ideology
58
62
66
CONCEPTIONS OF IDEOLOGY
The development of ideology
71
74
GRAMSCI AND THE STRUGGLE FOR POWER
Counter-hegemony
The case of Futurism
The critique of hegemony
80
86
96
99
THE POLITICS OF ONE-DIMENSIONALITY
The transformation of the working class
104
109
THE MEMORY OF PLEASURE
Repressive desublimation
116
127
7
REPRESSIVE TOLERANCE
Counter repression
130
134
THE AESTHETIC DIMENSION
Art as an affirmation
Art as the form of one-dimensionality
144
151
163
3. Dada and Surrealism: the Tactics of the Avant-Garde.
174
DADA - ATTEMPTING THE IMPOSSIBLE
Capitalism's Great War and Dada's Great Refusal
Every advertisement has a silver line
Chancing everything
175
178
182
187
THE POLITICAL ATTACK
Every man his own football - Dada in Germany
The end of Dada
Dada in distortion
195
199
205
209
SUICIDE, SILENCE - OR SURREALITY
The legacy of Dada
A surrealist tradition
216
218
221
THE SURREALIST PROJECT
The Surrealist unconscious
Automatic writing
The paradox of rational derangement
Playtime in the city •••
••• and beautiful women
227
228
231
236
240
247
THE SURREALIST REVOLUTION
Legitimate defence?
Political responsibilities
Surrealism and anarchy
Surrealism in servitude
254
258
263
266
272
8
Volume 11
4. Building the Ha~ienda.
282
THE AVANT-GARDE HERITAGE
Recuperation
Detournement
The limits of recuperation
283
294
299
306
THE CRISIS IN FRANCE
The 1966 Strasbourg Scandal
Under the cobblestones
Suicide, silence - or revolution
The recuperation of the May events
317
317
327
334
346
THE ORANGE AND WHITE, THE BLACK AND THE RED
Kabouters and Provos
Poland's Orange Alternative
Metropolitan Indians
Buy now while stocks last
351
351
355
357
366
5. Poststructuralism: Webs Without Spiders
376
THE CHALLENGE OF NIHILISM
The impact of the May events
377
385
FOUCAULT: POWER AND KNOWLEDGE
From hanging to tagging
The production of the subject
The production of repression
397
407
410
414
EPISTEMOLOGICAL IMPLICATIONS
The hyperreal and imaginary
418
423
THE END OF CRITICISM?
The tyranny of the multiple
The need for conceptualisation
Kristeva and the flag of convenience
Drifting into nonsense
430
433
439
445
451
9
6. The Return to Reality.
457
THE SILENT MAJORITY
The reemergence of opposition
Nomadology in practice
458
462
467
THE TACTICS OF CRITICISM
Arming the chairs
471
479
THE IMPASSE OF POSTSTRUCTURALISM
483
Conclusion.
492
Illustrations.
494
Footnotes.
505
Bibliography.
541
10
'''I don't like belonging to another person's dream", she went
on in a rather complaining tone: "I've a great mind to go and
wake him, and see what happens!'" (Lewis Carroll)
'There can be no such thing as indifference .•• living means
being partisan.' (Antonio Gramsci)
'I don't know how radical you are, or how radical I am. I am
certainly not radical enough. One can never be radical enough;
that is, one must always be as radical as reality itself.'
(Lenin)
'It is still the first of May today and little by little we are
expecting something ••• ' (Gertrude Stein)
11
Introduction.
'Authority tries to recuperate even the most radical gesture.'
(Situationist cartoon)
This
thesis
is
concerned
with
the
analyses
of
criticism
developed throughout the philosophical, cultural, and political
discourse
of
the
twentieth
century.
These
analyses
are
considered in relation to the recuperation of critical thought
and practice within the structures to which it is addressed. It
is
maintained
integration,
that
all
criticism
is
vulnerable
to
this
which is not, however, an inevitable feature of
thought, practice, or discourse. An awareness of the means by
which recuperation is effected is indispensable to the success
of any critical project.
The
first
Situationist
chapter
explains
International,
a
the
basic
movement
tenets
discussed
of
the
throughout
the text. Writing in the context of the apparent affluence of
the
pos twar
period,
the
Situationists
developed
Marx's
theoretisation of alienation and gave it a central role
in
their characterisation of capitalism as a spectacular society.
They argued tha t
the alienation of capitalist relations of
production permeates
that
a
loss
experience.
of
all
control
The
social and discursive relations
and
purpose
Situationists'
dominates
elucidation
so
everyday
of
the
implications of this extreme alienation for critical thought,
12
culture, and political practice facilitated their development
of
the notion of recuperation which constitutes
the central
theme of this text.
The recuperation of criticism defined by the Situationists
is more usually interpreted in terms of the integration or cooption of critical ideas within a dominant ideology. The second
chapter therefore considers the development of the notion of
ideology,
paying
Engels,
Lukacs,
hegemony
mere
particular attention
and
Gramsci.
The
to
the
work of
latter's
Marx,
postulation
of
an ideological totali ty which extends beyond a
body
of
thought
to
an
all-encompassing
world
view
presented unprecedented difficulties for the identification of
truth and
reality
necessary
to
the
cri tical
project.
These
problems led to Marcuse's departure from the Marxist framework.
In his account of the one-dimensionality of experience, Marcuse
looked to the Freudian unconscious to provide the free space
from which criticism of the existing reality might be possible.
The implications of this approach
of
for subsequent
art, sexuality and critical discourse
are
discussions
considered in
some detail.
Marcuse's
assertion
dimension,
free
from
capi talis t
relations,
of
the
the
necessity
constraints
contradicts
and
of
an
aesthetic
distortions
of
the perspective adopted by
the practi tioners of avant-garde art.
Equally concerned wi th
the problems of social criticism, the Dadaists and Surrealists
advocated the
life.
transcendence of all barriers between art and
Both Dada and Surrealism developed an awareness of the
problems of their recuperation within the structures of art,
13
li tera ture, and cultural orthodoxy,
to the extent tha t
their
attempts to evade this integration determined the nature and
direction of their work. This third chapter
read both as
a study of
significance
of
its
can therefore be
the practice of criticism and
historical
context,
and
a
the
theoretical
account of the conditions on which it proceeds.
The
fourth
chapter
explains
the
implications
of
the
Si tua tionis t grounding in this avant-garde tradition for its
critical analyses. A consideration of the movement's historical
emergence from the Dadaist, Surrealist, and Lettrist movements
prefaces a detailed discussion of the
critique and recuperation.
the
This is followed by an account of
events in France, 1968,
Situationists
in which the influence of the
the
wider
avant-garde
particular attention;
this
is
which
section
of
and
Situationist analyses of
this
chapter
tradition
is
given
also
the case in
the
final
looks
at
of
other
a
number
political and cultural movements in which the ideas of Dada,
Surrealism,
and
the
Situationists
can
be
traced.
It
is
maintained that the Situationists' development of Marxist and
avant-garde
tools
of
criticism has
had
a
significance
for
contemporary culture which is rarely acknowledged.
This
point
is
developed
in
the
considera tion
of
poststructuralist philosophy in
the fifth chapter.
For many
poststructuralist
terms
critical
writers,
the
employed
by
theory and presupposed by its political and cultural practice
are 'always already'
defined and constituted by the social and
discursive relations in which they arise. The nihilism of this
analysis
presents a fundamental challenge to the notions of
14
both criticism and recuperation.
Paying particular attention
to
this
the work of Michel Foucaul t,
chapter considers
the
influence of the analyses of criticism achieved in the avantgarde and the events of 1968 on
poststructuralist analyses. It
is maintained that although poststructuralism appears
to mark
a definitive break with the tradition of critical thought which
preceded it,
the
the impera ti ve to cri ticise, and so to develop
foundations,
critical
reasons,
project
and
continues
directions
necessary
to
the
to
itself
in
all
assert
poststructuralist analyses.
The final chapter argues that this continuity is largely
due
to
the
anticipation
poststructuralism
reject.
in
the
the
the
critical
by
the
Influenced
Situationists,
of
central
tradition
analyses
poststructuralists
of
it
ideas
of
claims
to
Marxism
develop an
and
the
account
of
alienation and spectacularisation which denies the existence of
an
authenticity
or
reality
to
which
such
terms
might
be
opposed. Its descriptions of contemporary society are akin to
those presented by the Situationists, but the possibility of
criticism is
lost.
The poststructuralist
rejection of
the
critical project is fraught with inconsistencies, most of which
derive from its failure
critical tradition.
to acknowledge its grounding in the
The suggestion that all discourse should
develop an awareness of the historical conditions in which it
operates is a central claim of this
constituted by
a
thesis,
which is also
number of other themes.
The thesis maintains that there is an ineluctable tendency
inherent
in
the
most
partial
of
criticisms
towards
the
15
development
of
experience and
a totalising framework, in which fragments of
isolated phenomena can be
interpreted.
The
separation of art, politics, philosophy, and the experience of
everyday life is
critical
therefore characterised as a constraint on
thought
which
ensures
that
its
concerns
are
recuperated into the dominant discourse or structure to which
it
is
addressed.
The
development
of
an
awareness
of
the
condi tions
on which cri ticism proceeds
is
essential
to
the
production
of
successful
tactics
and
forms
of
critical
discourse and practice.
The philosophical theories considered in this thesis are
characterised by
their interest in cultural criticism.
They
cannot therefore be properly addressed without an awareness of
the
historical
developed.
and
conditions
For this reason,
been given to the
political
social
which
they
have
a great deal of attention has
avant-garde critique and its engagement with
practice
activities of the
in
throughout
the
twentieth
century.
The
Situationist International have also been
given a prominence which they rarely receive but continue to
deserve.
The awareness
of
the
condi tions
of
the
cri tical
project cultivated by this movement provides a context most
appropriate
analysis.
for
the
continued
development
of
critical
16
1. The Spectacle of Alienation.
'The immense smile of the whole earth has not sufficed us: we
have to have greater deserts, those suburbless cities and dead
seas.' (Breton and Soupault)
The notion of alienation is central to Marxist and other social
theories; here it is discussed in relation to the concepts of
commodification
Situationist
and
spectacularisation
International.
A
developed
discussion
of
alienation in Marx's own work facilitates the
the Situationist analyses
tha t
of
as they
the
the
most
coherent
and
enduring
role
of
consideration of
Lefebvre,
and Cardan. Of
those social critics who addressed the apparently
the pos t-war years,
the
developed concurrently with
theoris ts such as Marcuse,
socie ties of
by
prosperous
the Si tua tionis ts developed
account
of
the
tendencies
inherent in the development of capitalism, particularly as they
affect
the
possibility
of
critical
discourse.
Many
of
the
issues raised in this chapter, including Marcuse' s notion of
one-dimensionality,
ahistorical
nature
the
of
role
of
avant-garde
capitalism,
consideration throughout the text.
receive
art,
a
and
the
detailed
17
ALL THAT IS SOLID MELTS INTO AIR
The
authors
of
Philosophy
Made
Simple
have
observed
that
capitalism
'has shown itself amazingly inventive in solving
difficulties
which
arise
within
it.'
[1]
This
ability
to
develop and respond to crises and critiques
reappears in a
number of
Whi le
theory
social and
considers
capitalism,
a
discursive
this
number
of
s truc tures.
Marxis t
flexibili ty
to
be
peculiar
to
other strands
of
philosophical
and
cultural criticism suggest that it is an essential feature of
all structures, institutions, and relations.
According to Marxist analysis, the continual expansion of
capitalism
is
intrinsic
to
its
survival.
In
The
Communist
Manifesto, Marx and Engels asserted that the ruling class finds
it
necessary
to
everywhere.' [2]
'nestle
everywhere,
establish
connections
It creates 'a world after its own image', and
is engaged in a perpetual process of invention and refinement
of
its
mechanisms
domination.
Capitalist
dependent on constant innovation and
development.
For
dependen t
the
of
Marxist,
the
existence
of
a
society
ruling
class
is
is
on that of a working class, and the expansion and
development
of
proletariat.
the
It
bourgeoisie
is
this
necessitates
movement
which
has
that
of
the
informed
the
history of critical discourse throughout the twentieth century.
As capitalist relations expand into more areas of life, so the
areas
of
multiplied
domination,
and
exploitation,
intensified.
concern beyond the means and
This
and
alienation
observation has
relations of
are
extended
production to the
18
superstructural and
capitalism.
ideological
structures
and
relations
of
The importance of these areas does not surpass
that of the means of production within Marxist theories, but it
has
led to
system
is
the assertion
tha t
increasingly
dependent
institutions.
breadth
of
These
the health of the capi talis t
institutions
domination
on
the
on
its
superstructural
exert
an
unprecedented
whole
of
dissemination of the ideology of the ruling
The
'dominant
ideology
thesis',
society
in
their
which
these
class.
to
observations have led, receives its most coherent elucidation
in Gramsci's account of the development of bourgeois hegemony,
which asserts that capitalism develops a resistance to economic
crisis
by
its
ability
to
dominate
the
entire
context
and
atmosphere of social life. Gramsci advocated the development of
a counter-hegemony, an ideological and superstructural context
in which the interests of the proletariat can be promoted.
Marcuse's work,
which
capi talism
In
this no tion was developed to the ex treme in
promotes
a
one-dimensionali ty
of
thought,
language, and social experience. It is at this point that the
theoretical importance
away,
as
tlie
the economic base begins
ideological
capitalist system
This
of
mechanisms
which
to slip
support
the
assume an increasing significance.
development
has
led
to
the
pos ts truc turalis t
assertion that the structures and relations of domination which
pertain within capitalist
society
economic base and, moreover,
are not
dependent
on
the
are not specific to capi talism.
This position abandons the possibility of defining social and
discursive
relations
as
a
whole
or
totality.
They
are
not
19
determined by the attempts of the ruling class to sustain the
system which gives it power, and they do not develop according
to the progress of the means of production.
relations
Ins tead, these
are seen as fragments which interact wi thout any
determination,
purpose, or direction; this means that there is
no possibility of changing
them,
since there is essentially
nothing to change. Criticism of the prevailing relations cannot
address them as a structure or system, and can speak from no
perspective
outside
of
the
all-encompassing
web
they
constitute. Any notion of a central dichotomy or division such
as
that
between
the
ruling
and
the
working
class
has
no
meaning, and the possibility of criticism as it is conceived
within all dialectical thought is lost.
The notion of ideology is also abandoned in this movement.
Poststructuralist
Kristeva,
writers,
such
as
Foucault,
Lyotard,
and
reject the possibility of any conception of truth or
reality to which ideology is opposed, since they argue that all
meaning arises within the complexity of social and discursive
relations.
validi ty:
Moreover,
the
notion
of
recuperation
there are, according to this
loses
its
thesis, no in teres ts,
discourses, or perspectives in a relation of contradiction to
that which exists. Where such opposition
that
is
being witnessed is
appears to arise, all
the internal development of
the
existing relations. This position raises unprecedented problems
for
the
critical
project
since
it
effectively
denies
the
possibility of any grounds on which a critical distance from
the object of criticism might be established.
At
time,
ground
however,
it
has
proved
to
be
fertile
the same
for
20
philosophical thought: poststructuralism encompasses a series
of
sophisticated
critiques
of
language,
meaning,
precondi tions of knowledge, and alleges tha t
neglected by writers in the
and
the
these are areas
dialectical tradition.
Poststructuralism seems
to
epitomise
the
experience of
extreme alienation and has assumed the role of the dominant
intellectual
expression
of
the
late
twentieth
century.
It
conjures a rootless world in which meaning is self-referential,
reality
constantly
elusive,
define;
informing
philosophical,
understanding, it has
and
authenticity
cultural,
impossible
and
to
political
encouraged a challenge to all notions of
solidity, certainty, and foundation, and so to the possibility
of dialectical criticism.
Nevertheless, poststructuralism is merely the culmination
of
the
development
difficulty
always
of
of
dialectical
establishing
formed
a
major
a
thought,
foundation
preoccupation.
for
for
The
which
the
criticism
has
loss
of
reality
theorised by poststructuralism as a real state of affairs was
characterised by Marx as the appearance which capitalism would
adopt
as
it
developed.
observation that
described.
The
Communist
Manifesto,
the
'all that is solid melts into air' expresses
the need to cri ticise
poststructuralism,
In
appearance and search for reali ty; in
it expresses a reality which can only be
The concluding chapters of this
thesis maintain
that the central insights and breadth of poststructuralism have
been anticipated within the dialectical tradition and can be
developed there with a greater sophistication and consistency.
21
THE SITUATIONIST ANALYSIS
The problems of criticism indicated above have been explained
wi thin the Marxis t
ruling
ideology,
tradi tion in terms of the dominance of a
and by
poststructuralism in
The
discursive
nature
of
reality.
criticism,
whether
theoretical
negation or
contradiction of
system
production.
of
or
former
Such
criticism
of
the
suggests
that
arises
as
the
ideology
and
the
vulnerable
to
practical,
the dominant
terms
is
reinterpretation in the terms of the dominant ideology as long
as the system of production on which it is based is unchanged.
Poststructuralism, on the contrary, argues that the notion of
the
'dominant
include all
ideology'
can
be
extended
without
limit
to
existing discourse, even that which is critical of
the prevailing system of relations.
Both Marxist and poststructuralist accounts challenge the
validity
of
criticism.
possibili ty and
Although
the necessi ty of
Marxism
cri ticism,
upholds
the
the
is
theory
dependent on the practical realisation of its cri tique.
The
tautologous nature of this position by no means devalues it,
for it is obvious tha t
the Marxis t cri tique 'can be realised
only with the political revolution.
this offers no criteria by which
efficacy
of critical forms
to this transformation,
Nevertheless, by itself,
to
judge the strength and
which, in the absence of or prior
must continue to be effected within
the existing discourse.
In
the
1950s and
1960s,
the Situationist
International
developed an analysis which attempted to bridge these positions
22
and produce an account of how cri ticism of the totali ty of
social,
political,
and
movement
developed
a
cultural relations
can proceed.
The
critique
'society
the
of
the
of
spectacle', in which the alienation identified by Marx is held
to
characterise
the
totality
of
social
and
discursive
relations.
In
The
Origins
of
Modern
Richard
Leftism,
Gombin
identified the major themes of the Situationist analysis. The
central of these is that all human relationships:
have
been
impregnated
with
the
rationale
of
mercantile exchange. Life is thus experienced at one
remove, it has become a show in which everything is
incorpora ted.
This is the phenomenon to which the
Situationists refer to as a spectacle.[3]
As
Gombin observed,
this
'critique of everyday
life is
not
supposed to be purely an analysis; it is supposed to lead to
revolutionary praxis.' [4]
Moreover, this cri tique
involved
the assertion that the spectacle 'has invaded not only society
but also its contradiction: opposition has become just as much
a matter of spectacle',
in which dissatisfaction itself has
become 'frozen into a piece of merchandise.'
Capitalist
[5]
society is considered as the inversion of the potential its own
economic
and
possibility
freedom
technological
of
from
a
society
material
development
of
has
unleashed:
the
unprecedented
creativity
and
stand
an
necessity
is
said
to
in
increasingly flagrant contradiction to that which exists.
The
spectacle
illegitimate
reality.
since
And
is
self-legitimising
it
is
based
on
a
because
of
the
reality
denial
of
and
ultimately
of
historical
history
and
the
necessity of historical change, its supersession is inevitable.
23
Although it claims to represent the end of history,
merely a moment in historical time.
it
is
Its supersession entails
the cultivation of a historical consciousness
and a critique
of the recuperation and negation of this consciousness effected
in the past.
This understanding
was developed throughout the work of
the Si tua tionist International.
Their journal, Interna tionale
Situationniste, was published from 1958-1969, and their theses
were
The
formally stated in
publication
of
this
Debord's Society of the Spectacle.
text
and
Vaneigem's
Revolution
of
Everyday Life in 1967 established the basic tenets of a theory
which had developed from
the cri tique advanced by Dada, and
culminated in the revolutionary movement in France 1968.
The
Situationists
avant-garde. They
synthesised
Marxism and
the
artistic
considered the existing totality of social
and discursive relations to be based on and produced by the
capitalist mode of production,
and accepted
that capitalism
involves the division of society into two classes, one which
rules and one which works.
The working class is alienated from
the products of its labour because these, like the means of
production themselves, are owned by the ruling class.
Similarly, the movement criticised the separation between
art and life,
avant-garde
a division which had preoccupied the artistic
since
the
beginning
of
the
twentieth
century,
leading movements such as Dada and Surrealism to extend the
forms
and areas of legitimate critique.
It was out of this
tradition that the Situationist International grew,
emerging
in
movements
1957
as
a
convergence
of
various
avant-garde
24
previously opposed to
the specialisation of art.
Everyday Life in the Modern World,
In
his 1947
Lefebvre had asserted that
the critique of the alienation inherent in everyday life could
be effectively made by the avant-garde.
The revival of art and of the meaning of art has a
practical, not a "cultural" aim: indeed, our cultural
revolution has no purely "cultural" aims, but directs
culture
towards
experience,
towards
the
transfiguration of everyday life ••• This can also be
stated as follows: "Let everyday life become a work
of art! Let every technical means be employed for the
transformation of everyday life!" [6]
The Situationists applied
every
."
aspect
of
life.
Marx's account of alienation to
The
movement
considered
both
the
expressions and the desires of individuals to be subject to the
aliena tion
worker.
imposed
on
the
commodi ty and
experienced by
the
Like the humanity of the worker and the use-value of
the material object, human desire and the discourse in which it
is
expressed
are
vulnerable
to
commodification;
within alienated social relations
they
arise
and receive their meaning
within them.
Most
theorists
recognise
that
critical
discourse
is
subject to some process of integration and assimilation into
that which is supportive of the prevailing system, but few are
able to provide a satisfactory account of this process.
The
Situationists
tried
to
recognise
and
embrace
the
all-
encompassing
nature
of
alienation
and
still
retain
the
Although
they
possibility
and
suggested tha t
necessity
of
its
negation.
the whole of life as it is experienced under
capitalism is in some sense
alienated from itself,
this did
not lead them to postulate either the inevitability of this
alienation or the impossibility of its critique.
They depicted
25
everyday experience as a realm both circumscribed by capitalist
relations and the ground of their subversion.
was pursued in the Situationists'
This characterisation
consideration
suggested
of
that
the
fate
capitalism
of
is
critical
capable
discourse.
of
They
immobilising
and
integrating any critical discourse, in the same sense in which
it
finds
it
both
necessary
and
domination to all areas of life.
possible
to
extend
its
They did not intend this
observation to entail the inevitability of the survival of this
system, but were concerned to show its contingency by their
account of what is, in effect, the worst possible scenario for
critical thought.
Observing that the most antagonistic of positions can be
brought within the confines of the structures or relations it
addresses,
the
Situationists
argued
that
critical discourse
must be vigilant to the means by which this is effected and the
possibility of evading it. They recognised that criticism and
its
object
do
not
meet
in
a
vacuum,
determined by the dominant relations.
of unalienated,
or authentic
The
experience
but
in
a
context
absence of a realm
on which
cri tique
might be based does not preclude the success of the critical
project; on the
contrary, it necessitates the
development of
a tactical awareness of the conditions on which it proceeds.
The Situationist International brought together a host of
political, philosophical, and artistic traditions of thought.
It was
from Marxism,
however,
that
the movement derived its
central ideas, particularly in its development of the Marxist
understanding of alienation.
26
MARXISM AND ALIENATION
In the 1844 Manuscripts, Marx emphasised that alienation is not
merely the consequence of the capitalist political economy, but
is
also
'in
the
process
of
production,
within
productive
activity itself.' [7]
In what does this alienation consist? First, that the
work is external to the worker, that it is not a part
of his nature, that consequently he does not fulfil
himself in his work but denies himself, has a feeling
of misery, not of well-being, does not develop freely
a physical and mental energy, but is physically
exhausted and mentally debased. The worker therefore
feels himself at home only during his leisure,
whereas at work he feels homeless.
His work is not
voluntary but imposed, forced labour. It is not the
satisfaction of a need, but only a means for
satisfying other needs.
Its alien character is
clearly shown by the fact that as soon as there is no
physical or other compulsion it is avoided like the
plague. Finally, the alienated character of work for
the worker appears in the fact that it is not his
work but work for someone else, that in work he does
not belong to himself but to another person. [8]
The suggestion that the worker is at home 'during his leisure'
presupposes
the
possibility
of
unalienated
existence
and
experience within capitalism.
Nevertheless,
production
are
Marx made
constitutive
relations within capitalism.
it clear that the relations of
not
only
of
labour,
but
all
The alienation of the workers'
relation to the products of their labour is produced by the
commodification of labour. Both the material product and the
humanity
of
the
worker
are
reduced
to
the
status
of
commodities, goods whose sole purpose and meaning is granted
them by their value in terms of capital and exchange. As Lukacs
wrote in History and Class Consciousness,
'the commodity form
27
facilitates
the
equal
exchange
of
qualitatively
different
objects'. [9]
It is no accident that Marx should have begun with an
analysis of commodities when ••• he set out to portray
capi talis t society in its totali ty and to lay bare
its fundamental
nature. For at this stage in the
history of mankind there is no problem that does not
ultimately lead back to that question and there is no
solution that could not be found in the solution to
the riddle of commodity-structure. [10]
Most
significantly,
the
commodification
of
labour
is
productive of a system of social relations which is constantly
reproduced in the labour process:
Through alienated labour ••• man not only produces his
relation to the object, and to the process of
production, as alien and hostile men; he also
produces the relation of other men to his production
and his product, and the relation between himself and
other men.[ll]
In this way capitalism ensures that its mode of production is
perceived as the necessary form of social reality:
alienated
production is presented as the reality of daily life.
The mys tery of the commodi ty form,
therefore,
consists in the fact that in it the social character
of men's labour appears to them as an objective
characteris tic.. • There is a physical relation
between
things.
But
it
is
different
with
commodities.
The commodity form, and the value
relation between the products of labour which stamps
them as commodi ties, have absolutely no connection
with their physical properties and with the material
relations arising therefrom. It is simply a definite
social relation between men, that assumes, in their
eyes, a fantastic form of a relation between
things ••• This I call the fetishism which attaches
itself to the products of labour, so soon as they are
produced as commodities, and which is therefore
inseparable from the production of commodities. [12]
Moreover, this alienation entails
not merely the loss of the
self but its enslavement: the humanity of the individual is not
only surrendered, bu t
the individual.
turned agains t and rendered hos tile to
28
The externalisation of the worker in his product
implies not only that his labour becomes an object,
an exterior existence but also that it exists outside
him, independent and alien, and becomes a selfsufficient power opposite him, that the life that he
has lent to the object affronts him, hostile and
alien.[13]
According to Marx, objects produced in these relations are
commodities by virtue of
their objectification of the human
activity of labour:
The more the worker expends himself in work, the more
powerful becomes the world of objects which he
creates in the face of himself, and the poorer he
becomes in his inner life, the less he belongs to
himself ••• The worker puts his life into an object,
and his life then no longer belongs to him but to the
object.
The greater his activity, therefore, the
less he possesses.
What is embodied in the product
of his labour means not only that his labour becomes
an object,
takes on its own existence, but that it
exists outside him, independently, and alien to him,
and tha t i t stands opposed to him as an autonomous
power.[14]
The commodity relation is therefore constitutive of all social
relations. However,
implica tions
of
Although
argued
he
Marx was not concerned with many of the
the alienation inherent
that
the
in these relations.
dissemination
of
commodity
relations throughout society ultimately entails the alienation
of the worker even at leisure, the problems that arise from the
absence of unalienated experience were not fully assessed.
rhis is largely because the stage of development reached
by capitalism in the nineteenth century did not warrant such an
analysis.
Even
though
Marx
could
state
that
the
whole
of
capitalist society was pervaded by the alienation of commodity
relations,
the
necessity
of
developing
a
critique
of
the
implications of this pervasion was only produced by the refined
form of capitalism developed in the twentieth century.
29
The alienation of prosperity
The Situationist thesis, particularly as it was formulated in
Guy Debord's The Society of the Spectacle, challenges little
of
Marx's
conception
of
alienation.
Debord
wrote
that
alienation remains at the base of social life and constitutes a
profound
separation
produced.
between
real
life
and
life
as
it
is
His innovation was to consider the implications of
the extension of the alienation of labour to all areas of life,
particularly cultural and political critique.
The Situationists considered
conviction
that
Marx to have retained the
'the worker feels at home only during his
leisure, whereas at work he feels homeless'
[15],
throughout
his work.
In a definitive break from this
presupposition,
Debord saw
alienation disseminated through
everyday life in
its entirety.
The man separated from his product himself produces
all the details of his world with ever increasing
power, and thus finds himself ever more separa ted
from his world. The more his life is now his product,
the more he is separated from his life. [16]
The alienation of labour and production is extended to leisure
and
consumption:
a
'surplus of collabora tion'
is demanded.
'Alienated consumption becomes for the masses a supplementary
duty to alienated production. '[17]
This development of the critique of alienation advanced by
Marx in the 1844 Manuscripts is the central feature of
critique of a number of post-war,
post-Marxist,
contemporary
defined
capitalism.
This
Marcuse [18], 'bureaucratic' by
was
as
the
analyses of
'advanced'
by
Cardan [19], and 'spectacular'
30
by Debord [20J. While diverse and even conflicting analyses
result in
these concepts, each is engaged in the development
of Marx's notion that the products of alienated labour become
'an alien and hostile force' to the worker. It was argued that
the control of the productive forces was no longer sufficient
for the health and survival of capitalism; instead,
dependent
on
disseminate
its
continued ability
to
institutionalise
and
the relations of alienated production.
The theoretical significance of alienation
in
this was
the consumerism of the post-war period.
was grounded
For some, notably
Marcuse, the 'consumer society' of the 1960s was not merely a
contingent and temporary feature of capitalism but marked the
development of a new form of society necessitating new forms of
social
critique.
For
this
the
Situationists,
consumerism
of
period,
whils t
explanation,
merely represented
however,
requiring
a
the
proper
the latest manifestation of
the same system and therefore
required essentially the same
treatment
Marx
to
nineteenth
century
introduction
of
consumption
as
as
that
applied
by
capitalism. [21J
Nevertheless,
the
a
principle of equal significance to production is characteristic
of the theories of this period, concerned as they were with the
extension of alienation into what
the
'everyday'.
While
they
Henri Lefebvre
developed
conflicting accounts
from this emphasis,
that
not
only
integral
also
those
of
alienation
producers,
but
is
entertainments, lifes tyles, and ideas.
defined as
diverse
and
even
they each sugges ted
to
people's
consumers
of
role
as
goods,
In other words,
they
31
agreed
with Marx that the greater the worker's
activity, 'the
less he
possesses',
in which
impoverishment
held
but
saw
operates
capi talis t
the ac ti vi ties
extended beyond labour.
social relations
consumption as well as the
consumption
capitalism
because
to
be
of
They all
reproduced in the
to be
production of commodities.
The majority of the theories
hold
this
considered in this section
significant
the
for
twentieth
apparently
latter's
century
boundless
propensity for economic growth and expansion. This was said to
require
the
constant
innovation
of
commodities
cultivation of new needs for them to satisfy.
capitalist relations enter into the
and
the
In this process,
leisure and
humanity of
the individual safeguarded in the early Marx; they pertain to
all areas of everyday life. In One-Dimensional Man, published
in 1964,
Marcuse wrote that in advanced capitalist society:
The people recognise themselves in their commodities;
they find their very soul in their automobile, hi-fi
set, split-level home, kitchen equipment.
The very
mechanism which ties the individual to his society
has changed, and social control is anchored in the
new needs it has produced.[22]
Lefebvre pointed out
that political
theory pays
Citing
attention to the fate of everyday experience.
Ulysses
as
one
of
the
subjective experience of
earlies t a t tempts
to
little
Joyce's
unders tand
the
'the wealth and poverty of everyday
life', a task which necessitated the exploitation of language
to 'the farthest limits of its resources, including its purely
musical potentialities', Lefebvre identified the post-war years
as:
a turning point of history, in which alienation
assumed a new and deeper significance; it deprived
everyday
life of
its
power,
disregarding
its
productive and creative potentialities, completely
32
devaluing
it
under
ideologies. [23]
the
spurious
glamour
of
The poverty of everyday life produced by this alienation was
emphasised
by
Lefebvre,
Marcuse,
Debord,
and
Cardan;
according to the latter:
the
struggle
of
human
beings
against
their
alienation, and the ensuing conflict and split in all
spheres, aspects, and moments of social life ••• These
are the conditions for a revolutionary activity in
the present epoch - and they are amply sufficient.
[24]
This
interest
in
observa tion tha t
alienation
was
specialisation,
also
encouraged
by
the
the division of labour,
and
what Lukacs had defined as the quantitative - as opposed to
qualitative - emphasis of capitalism,
advancement of capi talis t
increasingly
automised
communication
and
socie ty.
and
were increasing with the
technological
administration
to an
Their application
was
society
of
mass
instrumental
in
the
critiques of this period.
One consequence of
itself
the
product
of
the
'new technology'
economic
of capi talism,
was
growth,
seen
as
the
unprecedented dissemination of an ideology which effectively
denies
the
existence
of
alienation
in
this
growth,
and
presents capi talism as
a
cohesive,
contented
whole.
apparent
the
working
class
seen
passivity
of
was
as
The
a
consequence of this domination, an observation which also has
its origins in Lukacs' vocabulary of reification.
This is akin
to Marx's notion of alienation; indeed, Callinicos has observed
that Lukacs read Marx's Capital
as an analysis of 'the way in
which the reification of the worker, his transformation into a
commodity, is reflected in all the different aspects of social
33
life.' [25]
Lukacs' His tory and Class Consciousness
made it
clear that the system of commodity relations entails the denial
of human relations.
Kearney put this particularly well: 'When
the commodity is fetishised, consciousness is reified.' [26]
The
concern with
the
reproduction
and
dissemination
rather than the production - of social and economic relations
has dominated post-war analyses of capitalism. Marcuse asserted
that
contemporary
thought
capitalism
altogether:
has
perpetrated
'Technological
political rationality', he wrote,
most telling evidence
new
rationality
modes
has
of
become
a statement for which 'the
can be obtained by simply looking at
television or listening to
the AM radio for one consecutive
hour for a couple of days, not shutting off the commercials,
and
now
and
developed
then
switching
the hypothesis
the
that
station.'
the
[27]
Marcuse
extension of
capitalist
domination into everyday life entailed the integration and end
of the working class.
Although the Situationists, Lefebvre, and Cardan
committed to the project
with
Lukacs
they
remained
of proletarian revolution,
considered
that
the
relations which are constituted by the
in common
totality
of
the
base of production are
also constitutive of it, and that the analysis and criticism of
these relations is central to the revolutionary project.
For
many
of
the
reproduction
and
Marxist
productive
theorists
base,
dissemination of
and
hence
the
who
sustained
analysis
of
the critique
the
relations and ideology was superstructural
secondary
to
the
proper
business
Concentration on the base of production,
of
critique.
they argued,
would
34
render a cri tique les s vulnerable to the merely apparen t and
superficial changes effected in the superstructure.
Marcuse's
acceptance
structural
of
these
changes, is said to be
both Marcuse and
fluctuations
as
enduring,
symptomatic of a failure on the part of
a number of his contemporaries
to transcend
the contingent conditions of their immediate social situation.
[28]
This is certainly true of Cardan's work. Both the 1965 and
1974 editions
of his
example, presented
Modern Capitalism and Revolution,
for
the prevailing conditions of capitalism as
'fairly full employment and ••• bvoyant overall demand'[29], and
saw
the
increasing
necessitating
a
bureaucratisation
libertarian
development of capitalism
has
of
all
reaction.
areas
The
been manifested in the ruling,
as
it no
life
subsequent
shows that this libertarian impulse
rather
than the working
class: capitalism no longer manifests itself as
jus t
of
bureaucratic,
longer enj oys high levels of employment
and
demand.
Whilst to some extent the Situationists endorsed the view
that the constitution of the working class was significantly
different from that theorised by Marx,
they entered into the
debate in order to prove, rather than disprove, the existence
and significance of the proletariat. In contrast to a number of
the
theorists
considered
above,
Debord
claimed
tendencies of advanced capi talism had extended,
that
the
ra ther
than
reduced, the working class, which is 'objectively enlarged by
the movement of disappearance of the peasantry and by extension
of the logic of factory labour to a large sector of "services"
35
and
intellectual
theorist,
Raoul
professions.'
Vaneigem,
[30]
Another
tersely
countered
Situationist
those
who
suggested that the working class had disappeared:
Where on earth can it be? Spirite~ away? Gone
underground? Or has it been put 1n a museum?
Sociologi Disputant. We hear from some quarters that
in
the
advanced
industrial
countries
the
proletariat no longer exists, that it has disappeared
forever under an avalanche of sound systems, colour
TVs, waterbeds, two car garages and swimming pools.
Others denounce
this as sleight of hand and
indignantly point out a few remaining workers whose
low wages and wretched conditions do undeniably evoke
the nineteenth century... the hunt is on for the
starving, for the last of the proletarians. [31]
In contrast, the Situationists saw the proletariat extended to
all
those
who
have
lost
control
proletariat and the possibility of
diminished, wrote
over
their
lives.
The
class consciousness has not
Debord:
It remains irreducibly in existence within the
intensified alienation of modern capitalism: it is in
the immense majority of workers who have lost all
power over the use of their lives and who, once they
know this, redefine themselves as the prole taria t,
the negation to the core within this society. [32]
The Situationist definition of capitalism as a spectacular
society distinguishes it from the movements with which it was
contemporary.
Although both Lefebvre and Cardan had
a great
influence on the Situationist thesis, it constitutes the most
profound
and
alienation.
coherent
development
of
Marx' s
notion
of
As such, it retains an intensity which is absent
in the work of many of the theses which shared this base, and
continues to provide an appropriate framework for
of both capitalism and the function of critique.
the analysis
36
THE SOCIETY OF THE SPECTACLE
The
Situationists
experience,
planning,
from
the
were
concerned
with
which
they
derived
contemporary
and
past
all
areas
of
criticisms
daily
of town
avant-garde,
and
the
functional and poetic uses of language.
We still have to place everyday life at the centre of
everything.
Every project begins from it and every
realisation returns to it to acquire its real
significance.
Everyday life is the measure of all
things: of the fulfilment or rather the unfulfilment
of human relationships, of the use of lived time, of
artistic experimentation; of revolutionary politics.
[33]
into a thorough
The concern wi th the everyday was developed
account of the spectacular nature of capitalism.
The
Situationists
held
that
the
principal
effect
of
capitalist organisation is to render individuals spectators of
a world over which they appear to have no control. The social
whole manifests itself as an ahistorical system invulnerable to
change
and
constitute
resistant
and
to
the
influence
reproduce
it.
This
of
the
people
who
spectacularisation
of
experience was identified as the consequence of the alienation
at the heart of the capitalist mode of production. But for the
Situationists, it was important to have as analysis of how this
effect is reproduced throughout the social whole.
tha t all experiences,
process
of
ideas,
spectacularisation
They argued
and practices are subj ect to a
which
removes
them
from
the
context of lived experience to a remote and inverted world to
which
the
spectator.
only
possible
relation
is
the
passivity
of
the
37
As its
name suggests, the movement opposed this passivity
with activities it defined as the 'construction of situations'.
The
intention
here
spectacularisa tion
was
and
to
effect
reifica tion
through the dissemination of an
all
areas
of
everyday
framework,
the
Situationists
consciousness
grounded.
provides
Thus
a
of
capi talis t
historical
existence.
the
negation
base
in
socie ty
within
this
historical
that
which
the
consciousness of
Working
maintained
of
criticism may
be
they retained the dialectical conception of
criticism inherent in Marxism and established the possibility
of an authentic participation in history as the contradiction
of
the
facade
of
ahistoricism
maintained
by
spectacular
society.
The
material abundance of the 1960s was considered by the
Situationists
effect
on
this
reduced
in
terms
basic
of
impoverishment:
material
survival,
'As
of
the
notion
that
the
poverty
it has
profound in terms of our way of life.' [34]
rejection
which had no
to be a contingent arrangement
has
been
become more
The Situationist
working
class
has
'disappeared' in contemporary capitalist society hinges on this
emphasis on daily life, since it suggests that the definition
of the proletariat as those forced to work in order to survive
has not been superseded, but merely takes a different form. The
term 'poverty' was extended to cover all aspects of life.
if people censor the question of their own everyday
life, it is both because they are aware of its
unbearable misery and because sooner or later they
sense - whether they admit it or not - that all the
real possibili ties, all the desires tha t have been
frustrated by the functioning of social life, were
focussed there, and not at all in the specialised
activities or distractions. That is, awareness of the
profound richness and energy abandoned in everyday
38
life is inseparable from awareness of the eoverty of
the dominant organisation of this life. [35J
The Situationists rejected the notion that the achievements of
capitalism are
to
be
seen
in
the
possibility of
increased
leisure: as we have seen, this 'free time' is considered to be
as determined by the processes and relations of commodification
as
tha t
spent in work.
The use of this
time involves
the
acquisition of commodities -
the goods necessary to leisure
activities
and,
of
all
sorts
more
significan tly,
the
consumption of roles and activities themselves.
Any activity
is presented as
a
package which promises
satisfaction if it is consumed in its entirety: to put up a few
shelves is to be a 'DIYer', a role which
to adopt
an appropria te
bears the imperative
lifes tyle wi th all
tools from the right shop to which one
the
appropriate
must drive in the right
car, wearing the correct clothes and accompanied by the perfect
family.
Such are the dreams constructed on
the basic need for
shelves,
yet they are intrinsically unable to sa tisfy since
they are intended only as incentives to their
commodi ties and
not,
therefore,
as
consumption as
fulfilments.
Everyday
activities and the roles and lifestyles they carry have a built
in obsolescence identical to
that intrinsic in the material
commodity. The Situationists posited an impoverishment which is
belied by the wealth of choice and opportunity presented in
capi talis t
socie ty:
one
chooses
between
spectacles,
or
preordained ways of living, whose only charm is that they are
removed from one's own experience.
This
removal
cannot
be
overcome
by
the
choice of
a
particular form of commodified life: such a choice launches one
39
on
a
journey
towards
a
horizon
of
fulfilment
that
recedes
constantly with the proliferation of new commodities and is
intrinsically dissatisfying
since
the
alienation it aims
to
supersede is inherent in the choices themselves:
False choice within spectacular abundance, a choice
which consists of the juxtaposition of competing and
united spectacles and in the juxtaposition of roles
(signified and carried mainly by things) which are at
once exclusive and overlapping, develops into a
struggle of fantastic qualities designed to give
passion to adhesion and quantative triviality. [36]
While the erection of shelves is not intrinsically trivial, its
spectacularisation
are
watching
The feeling that they
renders it banal.
themselves
live
rather
than
haunts the spectators of modern capi talism.
living
It
themselves
is of course
possible to have the shelves without the matching family, but,
as Vaneigem wrote:
the mechanism of the alienating spectacle wi e lds such
force that private life reaches the point of being
defined as that which is deprived of spectacle; the
fact
that
one
escapes
roles
and
spectacular
categories
is
experienced
as
an
additional
privation.[37]
The Situationists argued that it is impossible to experience
life under capitalism: all that is possible is the continuation
of the struggle for survival for which there is no longer any
material necessity. The reality, the meaning, the immediacy and
the
significance
of
actions
is
denied
within
a
system
of
rela tions that places its members a t one remove from itself.
'No one', said Debord, 'has the enthusiasm on returning from a
venture that they had on setting out on it. My dears, adventure
is dead.' [ 38]
40
Commodification
The
Situationists'
conception
of
the
spectacle
is
to
be
understood as a development of
the
alienation of the worker
identified
1844
Manuscripts.
by
Marx
in
the
For
the
Situationists, this separation is extended with the development
of capitalism
so that the experience of life in its entirety
becomes alien and removed.
totality
capitalist
of
social,
Alienation is constitutive
political,
and
Paraphrasing,
society.
cultural
and
of the
relations
developing,
in
Marx's
account of the alienation of the worker, Debord wrote:
The more he contemplates the less he lives: the more
he accepts recognising himself in the dominant images
of need, the les s he unders tands his own exis tence
and his own desires.
The externality of the
spectacle in relation to the active man appears in
that his own gestures are no longer his but those of
another who represents them to him. This is why the
spectator
does not feel at home anywhere, because
the spectacle is everywhere. [39]
Alienation has therefore become integral to the experience of
everyday life not merely in the production of commodities, but
also in their multiplication, enjoyment, and consumption. And,
according
to
Debord,
the
alienation has become the
manufacture
and
reproduction
of
end of capitalism and the central
means by which it is perpetuated.
The entire life of societies in which modern
conditions of production reign announces itself as an
immense accumulation of spectacles.
Everything that
was
directly
lived
has
moved
away
into
a
representation. [40]
Thus the spectacle
'corresponds to a concrete manufacture of
alienation.' [41]
It constitutes the removal of everyday life
from
an
immedia te
representation.
and
real
experience
to
a
realm
of
41
This ultima te alienation is based on
the production of
alienated commodities: for the Situationists, there is no part
of experience that is not alienated and then represented as the
natural consequence of social organisation, as the embodiment
of the real quali ties of experience.
And precisely because
there is no experience that is excluded from this separation
because Marx's worker is not even free from alienation 'in his
leisure, in his humanity' - the whole of social experience is
inverted as a representation of itself. Debord considers that
the world
'which the spectacle makes visible is the world of
the commodity dominating all that is lived.' [42]
The spectacle is the moment when the commodi ty
attained the total occupation of social life.
relation to the commodity is not only visible,
one no longer sees anything but it: the world
sees is its world. [43]
has
The
but
one
This 'total occupation' is a consequence of the economic
growth of capitalism which:
frees societies from the natural pressure which
demanded their direct struggle for survival, but at
that point it is from their liberator that they are
not li bera ted. •• The abundance of commodi ties, that
is, the commodity relation, can be no more than
augmented survival. [44]
The production of commodities is sustained by their ability to
sa tis fy
demand:
accumulation,
in
the
ini tial
stages
of
capi talis t
the production of commodities is sustained on
the grounds that it sa'tisfies the needs of survival shel ter, clothing.
food,
The abundance of commodi ties beyond such
provision is the consequence of the acceleration of production
demanded by capitalism:
Whereas
in
the primi tive
phase of capi talis t
accumulation,
"political
economy
sees
in
the
prole tarian only the worker", who mus t receive the
minimum indispensable for the conservation of his
42
labour power without ever considering him "in his
leisure, in his humanity", this position of the ideas
of the dominant class is reversed as soon as the
degree of abundance attained in the production of
commodities demands a surplus of collaboration from
the worker. The worker, suddenly washed of the total
scorn which is clearly shown to him by all the
modali ties of organisation and survei llance of
production, finds himself each day, outside of
production, seemingly treated as a grown up, with a
zealous politeness under the mask of a consumer. [45]
This entails the cultivation and extension of new needs and the
advertisement and promotion of an extended realm of commodities
able
to
satisfy
them.
But
these
commodities
must
also
be
justified in terms of their provision of the means of survival:
they must be shown to be necessary. 'The satisfaction of basic
needs
remains
the best safeguard of alienation;
it is best
dissimulated by being justified on the grounds of undeniable
necessities.'[46]
Thus, the scope of the things that may be commodified and
presented as essential and
necessary to survival is broadened,
so that the notions of survival, poverty and scarcity are not
eradicated,
but
reinforced
by
the
economic
successes
of
capitalism : 'nowadays lack of satisfaction is measured in the
number of cars, refrigerators, T.V.s ••• to be rich today is to
possess the greatest number of poor objects.' [47] In spite of
the satisfaction of demands for material survival, daily life
remains 'governed by the reign of scarcity'.
Everyday life is organised within the limits of a
scandalous poverty, and above all because there is
nothing accidental about this poverty of everyday
life: it is a poverty that is constantly imposed by
the coercion and violence of a society divided into
classes, a poverty historically organised in line
with the evolving requirements of exploitation. [48]
43
Both the consumption of commodities and the scope of the 'raw
materials' from which they may be made and so engaged in the
system of exchange is extended.
Commodification is extended beyond the realm of objects to
encompass all aspects of everyday life which, according to the
Situationist thesis, is
rendered spectacular in its entirety.
This is a position which has its most profound implications in
the analysis of discourse,
since, for the Si tua tionis ts,
all
thought and expression is equally vulnerable to the process of
spectacularisation.
The equivalence and reification which is
imposed on material obj ec ts,
1ifes ty1es,
and experiences
is
extended to discourse so that meaning is also circumscribed by
the spectacle in which it appears.
The
extension
commodi ties
and
of
the
experienced perfects the
the
totality
of
alienation
manner
in
to
the
which
consumption
everyday
life
of
is
identification of the individual with
capitalist
relations;
it
alienation of the individuals from themselves.
constitutes
the
Commodities are
presented as spectacles, a term which is intended to signify
their alienation from the individual who produces, consumes,
and
lives within
the relations
imposed by
them.
As
Perlman
wrote:
The things which the worker buys with his wages are
first of all consumer goods which enable him to
survive, to reproduce his labour power so as to be
able to continue selling it; and they are spectacles,
objects for passive admiration.
He consumes and
admires the products of human activity passively. He
does not exist in the world as an active agent who
transforms
it,
but
as
a
helpless,
impotent,
spectator. [49]
'Life', he observed, 'is exchanged for survival'.[SO]
44
The alienation on which the spectacle is based is also its
end, its ultimate production, as the production of commodities
necessitates
the
reproduction
of
commodity
relations:
the
consumption and production of commodities is indeed necessary
for
survival, but this survival is not that of the individual,
but the alienation on which capitalism is based.
In the performance of their daily activi ties, the
members of the capitalist society simultaneously
carry out two processes: they reproduce the form of
their activities and they eliminate the material
conditions to which this form of activity initially
corresponded ••• They are under the illusion that
their activities are responses to natural conditions
beyond their control, and do not see that they are
themselves the authors of these conditions. The task
of capitalist ideology is to maintain the veil which
keeps people from seeing that their own activities
reproduce the form of their daily life. [51]
The society in which people place and recognise themselves is
constituted
by
the
commodities
and
production and
consumption of
alienated
consequent
reproduction
social,
the
of
cultural and political relations which enforce and disseminate
the
alienation
of
the
social
reality.
This
reality
is
a
of real social
spectacular version, or rather an inversion,
relations, in the same way that the reality of the commodities
produced by the worker is the removal and represen ta tion
of
the worker's humanity.
Regardless
experience
the
of
their
ability
apparently
to
acquire
unlimi ted choice
them,
people
and variety
of
commodities as constituting and vindicating capitalist society.
As a totality, these commodities appear capable of satisfying
any need, fulfilling any desire, and realising any dream. But
it is precisely as a totality that they are able to satisfy: in
isolation,
the
commodity
is
impoverished and disappointing,
45
since
its
only
spec tacular
commodity
meaning
society
is
and
in which
alienated
from
value
is
derived
it
arises.
[52]
the
individual
from
the
Because
the
shapes
the
and
social relations within which the world is experienced,
it is
intrinsically disatisfying.
Indeed,
it
is
this
very
failure
of
the
commodity
to
satisfy the needs and desires of the population that provides
the excuse for its replacement with a new commodi ty and thus
ensures
the
manufacture
continued
of
survival
alienation:
of
'From
capi talism
the
automobile
and
the
to
the
television, all the goods selected by the spectacular system
are also its weapons for a constant reinforcement of "lonely
crowds'"
[53].
unique and
Commodi ties
ultimate
which
products,
are
one
day
presented
the very best and
as
the very
latest goods, are replaced and forgotten the next:
The pres tigious character of a product comes to it
only from its having been placed for a moment at the
centre of social life, as the revealed mystery of the
final goal of production.
The object which was
prestigious in the spectacle becomes vulgar the
moment it enters the house of the consumer, at the
same time that it enters the house of all the others.
Too late it reveals its essential poverty ••• [54]
The
exis tence
of
the
commodi ty
is
intended
solely
for
the
reproduction of commodity relations; every product represents
'the hope
for a
dazzling shortcut
to
the promised land of
social consumption' [55], but the fulfilment of this promise is
possible
only
commodities,
a
with
desire
the
attainment
which
excites
of
the
the
totality
of
accumulation
of
commodities but which is ultimately insatiable:
every commodity taken alone is justified in the name
of the grandeur of producing the totality of objects
of which the spectacle is an apologistic catalogue •••
the
already
problematic
satisfaction
which
is
46
supposed to come from the consum2tion of the
ensemble, is immediately falsified S1nce the real
consumer can touch only a succession of fragments of
this commodity happiness, fragments in which the
quality attributed to the ensemble is obviously
missing every time. [56]
The
spectacle
appears
as
experienced only partially.
a
happy
whole,
but
it
nothing more than "that which appears is good,
[57]
be
'The spectacle presents itself as
It says
an enormous unut terable and inacessible actuality.
good appears.'"
can
that which is
Whatever arises in the spectacle does so
in the terms of the spectacle: as an alienated commodity.
This commodification also
roles
and
lifestyles.
applies
Like material
to ways of
commodities,
living,
these
are
presented as proof of the variety and possibility offered by
capi talism:
they are, moreover, a further means by which the
identification
with
the
totality
relations is reinforced.
imposed
by
the
commodity
'Forgetting life, one can identify
with a range of images, from the brutish conqueror and brutish
slave at one pole to the saint and pure hero at the other.'
[58]
The stereotyped images of the star, the poor man, the
communist, the murderer-for-love, the law-abiding
citizen, the rebel, the bourgeois, will replace man,
putting
in his
place
a
system of
mUlticopy
categories ••• [59]
It
is clear from this tha t
the commodi ties and choices that
arise within the totality of spectacular society are denied any
intrinsic value and appear, instead, as equivalent. The choice
of goods, lifestyles, or systems of ideas, is irrelevent, since
these commodities have a significance only in relation to the
perpetuation and constitution of the whole: 'it is the system
alone which must continue.' [60]
47
The satisfaction no longer given by the use of the
abundant commodity is now sought in its value as a
commodity:
it is the use of the commodit~ being
sufficient to itself; for the consumer t ere is
religious fervour for the sovereign liberty of the
commodity. Waves of enthusiasm for a given product,
supported and spread by all the means of information,
are thus propagated with lightning speed. A clothing
style emerges from a film; a magazine promotes night
spots which launch varied fads. •• Reified man
advertises the proof of his intimacy with the
commodi ty. •• The only use which is s ti 11 eXI?ressed
here is the fundamental use of submission. [61J
Commodification renders
all
things
equivalent:
their
derives solely from their definition as commodities.
status
And it is
this same equivalence which the Situationists see as imposed on
all areas of life; indeed, they suggest that the totality of
lived experience is itself constituted by the circulation of
commodities and reproduction of alienated relations.
The implication of this profound alienation is that the
experiences
of
the
commodification
spectator
renders
them
are
always
equivalent
and
removed;
their
reduces
their
intrinsic value to that of the commodity. Experienced as real
they are, indeed,
cons ti tuti ve of
reali ty, but
a t the same
time they are unreal and emptied of their meaning. Everyday
life is
'policed and mystified by every means •••
a sort of
reservation for good natives who keep modern society running
without understanding it.' [62]
If the spectacle engenders passivi ty to the extent that
Debord
defined
it
as
'the
nightmare
of
imprisoned
modern
society which ultimately expresses nothing more than its desire
to sleep' [63], it would seem that participation and activity
constitute
its
negation.
This
is
indeed
solution offered by the Situationists,
the
basis
of
the
since they considered
48
that it is participation in history which the spectacle denies.
However,
the
desire
for
participation
is
itself
rendered
spectacular since it too arises within the system of commodity
relations
cons ti tutive
of capi talism.
emergence of forms of
the
desire
for
This
resul ts
in
the
'pseudo-participation': means by which
participation
is
apparently
satisfied
but
authentically absent. All desires are reduced in the same way:
the Situationists also
collective',
alienated
and
forms
spoke,
even
of
for example,
the
of
the
'pseudo-
'pseudo-revolutionary'.
real
experience
have
the
presenting the appearance,
though not
the reali ty,
effect
Such
of
of their
fulfilment.
The fate of critical discourse
It is clear that a phenomenon such as
DIY
is~fate
illusory participation; more pertinent
desire to participate in history itself
aliena tion of capi talism.
dissatisfaction
which
For
might
the
begin
constitutes such an
the.
of the conscious
and so to overcome the
Situationists,
such
an
even
the
awakening
of
historical consciousness 'itself became a commodity as soon as
economic abundance was able to extend its production to the
treatment of such a raw material' [64]. This
the
flexibility
indicates
the
and
breadth
fundamental
of
the
difficulty
underlines both
commodity
relation
and
of mounting a critique
that can be truly said to be in opposition or contradiction to
the spectacle. The Situationists identified the ability of the
spectacle to commodify anything as its ultimate strength:
if
49
dissatisfaction and dissent can be marketed and consumed like
material goods, surely anything which arises in the spectacle,
no
matter
how
hostile,
can
become
supportive
of
it.
The
Situationists saw this ability to recuperate as fundamental to
the survival of capitalism, since it intends the denial of the
very possibility of contradiction, negation, and opposition.
In
addition,
therefore,
the
Situationists
developed
a
tactical consciousness of their project, recognising that the
dialectical
nature
of
effortless
progress
towards
character
of
the
criticism
must
criticism
society
be
capitalism
therefore
given
deals
an
ensure
in
a
way
it
an
The
particular
the
object
of
maximises
the
constitutes
which
The means and mechanisms by
effectiveness of its critique.
which
not
revolution.
which
analysed
does
with
attempts
unprecedented
to
priority
negate
and
it
were
theorised
in
terms of the 'recuperation' and 'd€tournement' of discourse.
These
terms
particularly
appear
throughout
those published in
Situationniste.
Excerpts
from
the
Situationist
the
journal
the
twelve
texts,
Internationale
editions
of
this
journal have been published in English in two collections. [65]
The edi tor of one of these,
Ken Knabb,
Si tua tionis ts
'recuperation'
to
that was
to it,
used
the
term
sys tern's recovering some thing
explained
los t
tha t
denote
the
' the
bringing
back into the fold a potential revolt against it.' A radical
act or idea, he continued:
can be recupera ted by being pigeonholed wi thin the
dominant categories, integrated into the spectacle as
a confusionist or extremist foil which thus serves to
complement and reinforce the system, while not
necessarily obtaining the approval or implementation
implied by cooption. [66]
50
The Situationists identified this form of integration
as the
central means by which capitalist society is able to withstand
the critiques and subversions effected against it.
recuperation,
critical
forms
of
movements,
opposition
ideas,
or
retain
the
gestures,
but
Subject to
appearance
are
of
somehow
rendered ineffectual and unrealisable. This is because they are
effectively
taken
out
pf
history
and
integrated
into
the
spectacle: as such, they become constitutive and supportive of
the whole they intended to negate. The Situationist response to
this situation was to advocate the practice of
d~tournement,
the turning around or reclamation of all that which is subject
to spectacularisation and recuperation.
Each of these notions
is returned to throughout the discussions in this text.
For
the
representation of itself;
rela tions
life
Situationists,
it is
is
experienced
not merely distorted
of alienated production,
as
a
by the
but cons ti tu ted by
them.
'Reality rises up within the spectacle, and the spectacle is
real.'
[67]
The spectacle is
world, its added decoration.
of the real society'.
tha t of alienation,
'not a supplement to the real
It is the heart of the unrealism
[68] The notion of recuperation,
like
implies the appropriation of something.
'Power', wrote Vaneigem,
'lives off stolen goods. It crea tes
nothing, it recuperates.' [69] This recuperation of subjective
desires and the will to consciousness occurs in all aspects of
life. Capitalism must:
sidetrack the desires whose satisfaction is forbidden
by the ruling order. For example, modern mass tourism
presents cities and landscapes not in order to
satisfy authentic desires to live in such human or
geographical milieus;
it presents them as pure,
51
rapid, superficial spectacles (spectacles from which
one can gain pres tige by
reminiscing about) •
Similarly, striptease is the most obvious form of the
degradation of eroticism into a mere spectacle.[70]
Situationists'
The
conception
of
society
as
both
real
and
unreal is the consequence of this extension of Marx's alienation
to
the
vision
totality of
of
capitalist
the
lived experience.
world
society
is
which
has
alienated
The spectacle is
become
in
objectified'
itself:
it
is
'a
[71];
based on
alenation, it requires alienation, it produces and reproduces
alienation.
The alienation of the whole is displayed in its
existence as
a spectacle,
a removed
and glamorous
totality
which denies the very existence of the alienation on which it
is based and precludes the possibility of existence outside
itself.
Debord suggested that every object, individual, or social
experience that arises within the totality of commodified and
spectacular relations is already constituted by these relations
and represents and reproduces the alienation of the whole in
which it arises.
'All individual reali ty has become social,
directly dependent
on
social
force,
shaped
allowed to appear only because it is not.' [72]
reached an extreme in Debord:
it is
by
It
it.
is
Alienation has
the eradication of the
i n trinsic value of people, objects and social organisation in
favour of the homogenous equivalence of economic values.
Debord's cri tique
of
~he
free
realm discerned by
appears to leave him without the possibility of
which
contradicts
totality
of
the
the
spectacle.
spectacle
renders
If
the
experience
existence
unalienated
Marx
of
the
expression
impossible, where is critical theory to turn for the evidence
52
of its existence?
are
cultivated
If it is suggested that
in
order
to
ensure
needs and desires
the
perpetuation
of
capitalist production and the reproduction of alienation, it is
not possible,
as Debord accepts,
to point to the neglect of
true needs as evidence of the failure of capitalism.
'Without
doubt, the pseudo-need imposed by modern consumption cannot be
opposed by
any genuine
need or desire which is not
shaped by society and its history.' [73]
and
dissatisfaction
themselves
arise
Similarly,
within
itself
critique
the
alienated
relations of the spectacle and must therefore be phrased in the
existing discourse of the spectacle.
When analysing the spectacle one speaks, to some
extent, the language of the spectacular itself in the
sense that one moves across the methodological
terrain of the society which expresses itself in the
spectacle... It is the historical moment which
contains us. [74]
Nevertheless, to say that something is allowed to appear
because it is not assumes the reality of something that it !!
to which
the
is
not
might
be
opposed.
The
Situationists
considered that in spite of the all-encompassing nature of the
spectacle, the contradictions of capitalism are not reduced by
its
spectacular
magnified
by
its
manifestation
extensions.
but
are,
on
the
contrary,
Debord's
use
of
the
words
'alienation' and 'inversion' suggests the continued existence
of a subject, an 'unalienated' or 'true' individual or social
reality.
Because of its assertion that reality is constituted
by the spectacle, the Situationist thesis requires, but would
seem
to
preclude
contradiction
to
the
possibility
of,
this
spectacular
reality
constitute a critical theory.
a
point
if
it
of
is
real
to
53
Situationist
point
of
of
the
spectacle as the 'historical moment which contains us'.
This
The
contradiction:
it
is
thesis
contained
does
have
in
the
such
a
definition
conception establishes a base from which the existing society
of
the
spectacle may be cri ticised:
change and consciousness.
belies
its
the base of his torical
denial of history
The spectacle's
suscept i bility
to
The
change.
Situationists
defined the spectacle as a contingent moment of history which
legitimises its existence by its presentation as an ahistorical
given.
If it is true that historical consciousness
by the spectacle, an effective critical theory
is stifled
must be capable
of rekindling this consciousness.
Debord suggested that an understanding of the development
of
the
commodity
constituted
can
by
encourage
commodity
a
critique
relations.
of
The
the
society
spectacle
is
a
continual proclamation of the end of history in the same way
that
the
commodity
is advertised as
product. In relation to the commodity,
becomes
historical'
[75],
for
the ultimate and
final
'whatever was absolute
capitalism
necessitates
the
reproduction of commodity relations through the production of
new commodities.
'Every new
lie
of
advertising
is
also
an
avowal of the previous lie'. [76] In other words, the commodity
which is heralded as the ultimate achievement of capitalism is
constantly superseded;
change wi thin
the
historical
moment.
excellence
with
changes.' [77]
this
testifies
to the necessi ty of
spectacle and exposes
the commodi ty as
'That
its
the
which affirmed
most
perfect
own
impudence
a
definitive
nevertheless
54
Similarly,
Debord
manifestation
of
characterised
Marx's
the
spectacle
characterisation
of
as the
bourgeois
philosophy as the declaration that 'there has been history, but
there is no longer any' [78J; it is not only the commodity, but
the society constituted by its
as
the
'end of history'.
relations which presents itself
Again,
the fleeting status of
commodi ty
reveals its own essential contingency and
its
in
role
the
maintenance of
the
the
exposes
alienated relations
of
capitalism. This shows that even the society which denies the
possibility of change requires the perpetual development of new
commodities.
The possibility of an awareness of historical
change is thus implicit in the society that precludes it.
The spectacle's dependence on the
therefore said
equally
to be
fundamentally
denia 1 of his tory is
flawed,
necessary to its existence.
since change
is
Spectacular society is
reproduced and maintained by its ability
to ensure that the
desire to participate in history is constantly recuperated into
the
desire
commodi ties,
to
participate
roles,
in
or lifes tyles.
the
acquisition
Moreover,
of
new
capi tal ism is
dependent on the participation of those who live under it: when
the Situationists identified passivity as the characteristic of
everyday life,
they were not suggesting that
this
passivity
manifested itself as disaffiliation or apathy, even if this is
often the case. On the contrary, they asserted that the desire
to participate in the shaping of reality is constantly diverted
into participation in
point made
by
the shaping of capitalism.
Vaneigem when he
socie ty ensures tha t
observed
that
This
is
a
spectacular
'a tas te for change becomes a change of
55
taste': all needs and desires to determine one's own destiny
become those to consume the products of the very society which
denies the possibility of such control.
Alienation
remains
the
real
base
on
which
capitalist
society is founded and the latter, in spite of its presentation
as
a
'happy,
unified
whole',
is
intrinsically incapable
of
effecting a definitive concealment of its base. It is grounded
in
the
production
of
commodities
and
the
reproduction
of
commodi ty relations,
and is therefore the consequence of the
class
production necessi ta tes.
division
this
'The unreal
unity proclaimed by the spectacle is
the mask of the class
division on which the real unity of
the capitalist mode of
production rests.' [79]
or
alienated
No matter how spectacular and removed
the
fundamental division
experience
of
society
becomes,
the
of the classes ensures that it is always
experienced as an alienation from something.
Capitalist relations are intended to conceal the existence
of alienation,
so that to
recognise
alienation is also to
assume a position in contradiction to that propagated by the
existing
society.
The
recognition
of
alienation
is
the
achievement of a historical consciousness which is able to see
capitalism
not
as
the
'historical
moment
consciousness
is
end
which
therefore
clas s di vis ion which,
of
history
contains
that
us.'
capable
nevertheless,
but
merely
This
of
as
the
historical
perceiving
facili ta tes and,
the
indeed,
necessitates it. This position is very close to that adopted by
Lukacs.
Indeed, in an implicit vindication of the Situationist
56
thesis, Kearney described Lukacs' definition of reification as
referring:
indirectly to the fetishisation of market commodities
and directly to the alienation of human consciousness
as it becomes something abstracted, isolated, frozen,
dehumanised
a passive spectator of its own
alienated labour, bereft of its productive rapport
with the social totality. [80]
In the following chapter, an investigation of
and Class Consciousness
which,
in turn,
Lukacs'
History
introduces a discussion of ideology
facilitates an
examination of the work of
Gramsci and Marcuse. Subsequent chapters on Dada, Surrealism,
and the avant-garde heritage of the Situationist International
provide the grounding necessary for
this
movement,
in
which
the
further consideration
notions
of
recuperation
of
and
detournement, and the problems of criticism to which they are
addressed, are examined in some detail.
57
2. Marxism and Ideology: the Critical Distance.
'The individuals composing the ruling class possess among other
things consciousness, and therefore think.' {Marx and Engels)
Lukacs' work illustrates the extent to which the problems of
alienation are bound to those of ideology, and in many respects
anticipa tes the work of the Si tua tionis ts.
Here a number of
Marxist conceptions of ideology are considered, culminating in
a discussion of Gramsci's notion of hegemony. The difficulties
of
discerning
truth
and
ideology and alienation
reality
in
a
world
dominated
by
are raised, and the possibility and
necessity of so doing questioned. These problems emerge with a
renewed intensity in
work
marks
notions
of
a
the analyses developed by Marcuse, whose
watershed
ideology
and
in
the
development
alienation.
of
the
Marxist
Marcuse considered
the
possibility of establishing a critical base to be of vital
importance
to
the
critical
project.
Presenting
an
all-
encompassing one-dimensionality of experience, he looked to the
Freudian notion of the unconscious
to provide the free space
from which criticism of the existing reality might be possible.
Marcuse's work on art, sexuality and critical discourse are all
considered
in
detail
in
this
chapter.
Although
fundamental inconsistencies in his work, their
there
are
elucidation is
essential if the subsequent course of critical theory is to be
understood.
58
.-
LUKACS' CONCEPTION OF TOTALITY
Debord's text, The Society of the Spectacle, has much in common
wi th
Luk~cs'
His tory and Class Consciousness.
Al though this
connection is obvious to anyone familiar with the texts,
commentators
have
mentioned
or developed
it.
Debord
few
shared
Lukacs' emphasis on historical consciousness as the antidote to
alienation;
like
Debord,
Lukacs
characterisation of the bourgeois
result of its
referred
to
Marx's
conception of history. The
denial of history was defined by Luk§cs as the
situation in which:
it ceases to be possible to understand the origin of
social institutions. The objects of history appear as
the immutable, eternal laws of nature. History
becomes fossilised in a formalism incapable of
comprehending
tha t
the
real
nature
of
sociohistorical institutions is that they consist of
relations between men. On the contrary, men become
estranged from this as the true source of historical
understanding
and
cut
off
from
a
true
and
unbridgeable gulf. [1]
That this has much in common with the Situationist thesis is
clear from Debord' s analysis of the
'fetishisation of facts'
achieved by capitalism, in which
'one can't see the totality
for
is said about
all
the details.
Everything
this
society
except what it really is: a society dominated by the commodity
and the spectacle.' [2]
Lukacs argued that it is capitalism's ability to obscure
the reality of history that enables it to survive.
Reality as
a whole, he suggested, is alienated from its historical self in
the same way that the worker is alienated from the product and
the process of production.
Much of Lukacs' work was developed
from this position, since it forced him to present a rigorous
59
explanation of how it is possible for a critique to be true
within and in spite of this alienated reality.
For
product
Lukacs,
is
cultural,
the
alienation
constitutive
and
poli tical
particular disciplines -
of
of
all
the
producer
other
economic,
re la tions,
and
to
from
social,
assume
such as poli tical science,
the
art,
that
or
literature - operate with an autonomy from this foundation is
to fail to comprehend that society exists as a totality.
The capi talis t separa tion of the producer from the
total process of production, the division of the
process of labour into parts at the cos t of the
individual humanity of the worker, the atomisation of
society into individuals who simply go on producing
wi thou t rhyme or reason, mus t all have a profound
influence on the thought, the science, and the
philosophy of capitalism. [3]
The failure
to perceive the real constitution of society is
defined by both theorists as the absence of a critique of the
totality.
According to Lukacs, what he defines as 'bourgeois
rationalism' isolates and fragments: it involves the study of
'isolated,
highly
specialised
areas
by
means
of
abstract,
rational special systems.' [4] As such, it neglects to consider
the interdependence and mutual influences of a complex society.
Nevertheless, it is bourgeois rationalism which, denying
the dependence of social and discursive reality on the economic
base, claims the path to universality and
truth.
Marxism's
recognition that social and discursive relations operate as a
totality
based on the alienation of the worker enables it to
adopt a perspective which negates the ahistoricism of bourgeois
thought and exposes
the it as
the expression of particular
interests rather than universal truths.
60
In making this point,
claim to
Lukacs stated that Marxism's own
truth is sustained by this perspective, which sees
capitalism not as a timeless given, but a moment beyond which
history will pass.
It is
this dialectical understanding of
history which distinguishes Marxism from bourgeois thought and
not,
as
is claimed by its bourgeois cri tics,
empirical da ta
such as the size or strength of the proletariat.
The blinkered empiricist believes that every piece of
data from economic life, every statistic, every raw
event already constitutes an important fact. In so
doing, he forgets that however simple an enumeration
of "facts" may be, however, lackin~ in commentary, it
already implies an "interpretation • [5]
In contrast, 'in the teeth of all these isolated and isolating
facts and partial systems, dialectics insists on the concrete
uni ty of the whole'. [6]
Marxism sees reali ty as a synthesis
of diverse elements which must be interpreted in the terms of a
totality, not as isolated fragments.
In Marx the dialectical method aims at understanding
society as a whole. Bourgeois thought concerns itself
with objects that arise either from the process of
studying phenomena in isolation, or from the division
of labour and specialisation in the different
disciplines...
Marxism,
however,
simultaneously
raises and reduces all specialisations to the level
of aspects in a dialectical process. [7]
For Lukacs, it was not:
the primacy of economic motives in historical
explanation that constitutes the decisive difference
between Marxism and bour$eois thought, but the point
of view of the totality l ... ] Proletarian science is
revolutionary not just by virtue of its revolutionary
ideas which it opposes to bourgeois society, but
above all because of its method. [8]
Dialectical
thought
'recognises
the autonomous
facts
of our
world as interrelated aspects of a socio-historical process,
thereby integrating them into a dialectical totality.' [9]
61
The
division
control
the
between
means
of
those
who
production
produce
and
produces
a
those
who
fundamental
difference in the experience of the two classes. Consciousness
of history is implicit in the activity and experience of the
worker; the denial of this consciousness, however, determines
the perspective of the bourgeois. The awareness that history is
not an abstract force, but something that has to be made, is
therefore
implicit
in
the worker's
reality.
It
is
for
this
reason that the proletariat:
enetrate the reali t
of societ
and
trans orm 1t 1n 1tS entlrety. For t s reason,
"criticism" advanced from the standpoint of class is
criticism from a total point of view and hence it
provides
the dialectical uni ty
of
theory
and
practice. In dialectical unity it is at once cause
and effect, mirror and motor of the historical and
dialectical process. [10]
It is this awareness of society as a totality within history
that
enables
Marxism
overcoming point
whose
to
of view'
'unprecedented
a
postulate
as belonging
socio-historical
unique
'relativity-
to
the
proletariat,
position
affords
a
sweeping view over the topography of capi talism, a view tha t
permits
them
to penetrate
just where
bourgeois
thought
had
occluded the truth.' [11]
This allowed Lukacs to postulate the proletariat as
only
exception
to
the
dictum
conditions give rise
to contingent
statement
vital,
since
assertion
tha t
entails
is
the
material
[12]
Such a
social
totality
of
a
all experience and discourse
the relations
Indeed,
stated
that
contingent
thought.'
the notion
consti tuted by
Lukacs
that
'the
is
based on aliena ted production.
Marxism
is
true
only
'within
a
particular social order and system of production. As such, but
62
only as such, is its claim to va1idi ty absolute'. [13] I t is
therefore only its development of a his torica1 consciousness
to claim the absolute truth of history
that enables Marxism
and so distinguish itself from bourgeois thought. This enabled
Lukacs to claim that reality is both socially constituted and
'the arena of objectivi ty'. For Kearney,
Luk§cs' posi tion is
that:
meaning is neither something simply created by the
human subject over and against the real world ( •• )
nor something determined by anonymous laws of natural
causali ty, but a "potential" for human praxis and
consciousness residing within this world as history.
[14]
The reality of capitalism, obscured by its denial of history
and its presentation as a self-contained and immutable given,
can be exposed and negated by the proletarian recognition that
all social and discursive relations co-exist as a totality.
The critique of reification
In
the
1967
'Preface'
to
History
and
Class
Consciousness,
Luk§cs criticised the emphasis on alienation and, specifically,
the concept of reification, in his original text. He identified
a
confusion
alienation
in
and
History
and
Class
objectification,
Consciousness
and
suggested
between
that
this
characterised alienation as an inescapable aspect of the human
condition.
This is a position he traced to Hegel ('in the term
alienation
he
includes
every
type
of
objectification')
and
discerned in the work of phenomenologists and existentialists
such
as
Heidegger,
Sartre,
and
Arendt.
For
such
thinkers,
63
alienation is, in some form, an inevitable attribute of social
life
and
one
not
specific
to
capitalism.
In
Sartre,
for
example, the separation of the Self and the Other is the cause
of an inevitable, and unresolvable, tension.
According
to
Lukacs'
'Preface',
his
own
writings
on
reification were the result of the same confusion. The original
text had declared, for example:
Every contemplative, purely cognitive stance leads
ultimately to a divided relationship to its object •••
For every purely cognitive stance bears the stigma of
immediacy. That is to say, it never ceases to be
confronted by a whole series of ready-made objects
that cannot be dissolved into processes.
Its
dialectical nature can survive only in the tendency
towards praxis and in its orien ta tion towards the
actions of the proletariat. [15]
In a critique of this position, Lukacs accepted that some form
of objectification is indeed a necessary aspect of reality, but
argued that this form of reification should not be confused
wi th
the alienation which is
specifically produced by
In the equation of the two
relations of capitalist society.
concepts,
Lukacs
inevitability
reflected,
and
necessary
the
he
made
of
alienation
share
objectification.
amounted to the:
false
identification
of
opposed,
fundamental
categories.
For
objectification
1S
indeed
a
phenomenon that cannot be eliminated from human life
in society.
If we bear in mind
tha t
every
externalisation of an object in practice (and hence,
too, in work) is an objectification, that every human
expression
including
speech
objectifies
human
thoughts and feelings, then it is clear that we are
dealing with a universal
mode of commerce between
men.
And
in
so
far
as
this
is
the
case,
objectification is a neutral phenomenon; the true is
as much an objectification as the false, liberation
as much as enslavement. [16]
the
This
64
Nevertheless,
Lukacs'
Consciousness
does
position
expose
in
the
and
History
continual
danger
Class
of
the
reification of critical discourse. If it is untrans1ated into
practice,
he wrote
then,
discourse
is
subject
to
the
same
process of commodification and alienation as the object and the
human
subject.
Discourse can
therefore overcome this
stasis
only:
if it remains critically aware of its own tendency to
immediacy inherent in every non-practical stance and
if it constantly strives to explain critically the
mediations, the relations to the totality as a
process~
to the actions of the proletariat as a
class. L17]
In his
original postulation of an
all-encompassing
form
of
alienation, Lukacs made it clear that all social and discursive
relations are produced by the essential alienation of the means
of production. This led to his assertion that Marxism, in spite
of
its
dialectical perspective,
against
attempts
consequent
to
rob
imperative
to
it
must be constantly vigilant
of
its
historicism
and
its
action.
In spite of Lukacs' revision of his earlier work, it is
argued that it facilitated an awareness of the problems facing
cri tica1 discourse wi th which this inquiry is concerned. The
assertion that the relations of capitalism, even as they arise
in
discourse
suggests
and
thought,
are
relations
of
reification,
that critical discourse must attempt to overcome the
objectification to which Lukacs attributed inevitability in his
'Preface'.
Lukacs
In
his
suggested
discourse
is
critique
that
inevi table
of
this
earlier
position,
the objectification he discerned in
and
necessary
to
all
thought.
Although he distinguished the inevitability of objectification
65
from the contingency of alienation,
this position returned him
to the postulation of some inescapable human condition.
This debate has continued to inform both Marxist and nondialectical
philosophies
and,
as
Lukacs
acknowledged,
the
popularity of History and Class Consciousness was largely due
to his identification of the pervasion of reification and his
emphasis on practice as the antidote to its effects on
theory.
This is essentially the position adopted by the Situationists,
whose
analysis
possibility
of
the
its
detournement
of
identification
of
necessity
practice.
of
the
recuperation
of
was
critique
based
commodification of
The
dialectical
on
discourse
nature
of
and
the
the
same
and
the
both
the
Situationist analysis and Lukacs' thought prevented either from
remaining
trapped by
the postulation of an all-encompassing
form of alienation, since for both, the reality of historical
consciousness allowed the postulation of the
existing totality
as a mere moment in history.
The
suggestion
that
some
form
of
objectification
is
necessary and inevitable to all thought and discourse receives
its
most
extreme
pos ts truc turalis t
formulation
philosophers
For these thinkers,
in
the
work
of
the
considered in later chapters.
this objectification is not specific to
capi talism,
nor can it be said to be the consequence of a
particular
system
Ultimately, they
of
means
and
relations
of
production.
assert that the identification and, moreover,
the negation, of a social totality
is untenable, a posi tion
which
of
forces
them
cri tical discourse
into
the
itself.
denial
the
This posi tion
possibility
of
is vulnerable
to
66
Lukacs'
objections
to
the
bourgeois
rationalism he
even in His tory and Class Consciousness,
possibility
of
a
transcendent
relations
can
be
objectifications
of
context
since it denies the
within which
specific
and
considers
the
society
inevitable
and
interpreted,
contemporary
discerns
necessary.
The poststructuralist philosophers hold
that reality is
constituted by discourse, and that any criticism is necessarily
an affirmation.
It wi 11 be maintained
tha t
this posi tion is
same
but
can,
at
the
cri tical
tool.
If
Lukacs'
time,
be
concepts
of
ultimately
untenable,
appropriated
as
reification
and
criticisms,
they too have facilitated much rigorous analysis.
In
particular,
a
the
they
totality
necessi ta ted
are
a
vulnerable
renewed
to
similar
analysis
of
the
Susser observed tha t
for
problem of ideology.
Truth and ideology
In The Grammar of Modern Ideology,
Lukacs,
Marxism showed
disembodied,
field
of
that
'there could no
unaffilia ted cogni tive
human
interest.'
'And
realms
from
longer be any
beyond
this
rule',
the
force-
he
adds,
'Marxism was in no position to exempt itself.'
Hence, in its attempts a t self-vindication Marxism
faced an intolerable choice: either to appeal to an
Archimedean shelter of the same type that it had so
effectively debunked in rival ideologies; or, in a
manner no less compromising, to concede that its
ambitious
Weltanschauung
was
nothing
but
an
expression
of
the
material
interests
of
the
proletariat. [18]
67
This expresses the difficulty of establishing an objective base
both within and in contradiction to bourgeois rationality and
society.
In his discussion of this paradox, Susser wrote:
Lukacs, the epigone of Marxism writing in an age of
unprecedented reflexiveness, carries the argument on
to its complete consummation.
If there are no
cognitive havens and each method lives in the closest
possible intimacy with specific material interests,
Marxism, as the vantage point of the proletariat, is
viable only so long as the proletariat continues to
function as an historical entity. [19]
'So thoroughly', he added,
'does Lukacs identify Marxism with
the historically-conditioned consciousness of the proletariat
and reject
it as
an independent
and supra-temporally valid
doctrine that he foresees its eventual obsolescence. I [20]
Lukacs therefore defined Marxism as an ideology; because
of the
division of the classes, it is the consciousness of
partial interests and a specific
perspective.
Lukacs,
embattled
the
'ideology
of
'ideological
expression'.
consciousness
bears
an
the
But
at
historical
the
Marxism is, for
proletariat';
its
same
this
time,
consciousness
imperative to the transformation of the whole.
Luk~cs'
and
the
solution
was therefore to rephrase the dich 0 t omy between 'truth'
a nd
'ideology' by effectively claiming both values for Marxism.
With unexampled boldness and ingenuity, Marxism
argued tha t the choice was a false one dictated by
the logic of pre-dialectical points of view... The
resolution was
as
simple as
it was radical;
proletarian
"consciousness
is
nothing
but
the
expression of historical necessity." [21]
This position, that the working class is capable, by virtue of
the necessity of its proximity with the system of production,
of developing a consciousness of the history that constitutes
reality,
enabled
Lukacs
to
distinguish
between
the
real
68
consciousness that is inherent in capitalist social relations
and
the
possible
consciousness
of
these
defined
as
relations
as
a
totality.
Real
consciousness
awareness
of
a
group
particular
class'·,
is
or
individual
possible
the
within
consciousness
'actual
the
as
self
limits
'the
of
class's
collec tive consciousness of its "obj ec ti ve possi bi li ties" of
his torical realisa tion'.
consciousness
[22]
constitutes
The union of these levels of
the
moment
in
which
the
actual
working class develops the hitherto possible consciousness of
history.
It entails a movement beyond the false consciousness
which restricts itself to
the expression of immediate class
interests to the consciousness of the totality as a historical,
and therefore mutable, system of relations. This is the moment
of praxis, of revolutionary action, since the proletariat acts
'by recognising its situation'. [23]
Lukacs' analysis enabled him to hold two positions which
might easily be considered incompatible.
He could
state
that
the analysis of capi tal ism is itself condi tioned by, or the
product of, capitalist social relations and can therefore claim
no
universality
or
meaning
capitalism constitutes
rela tions ,
beyond
these
relations.
Since
the totality of social and discursive
a consciousnes sand analys is or cri tique of this
totality is necessarily within it and to some extent determined
by it.
On the other hand, Lukacs could also claim that it is
possible to present a critique which is capable of collapsing
this
problem.
historical,
Because Marxism
it bears
a
critique
recognises
of
the totality as
capitalism at
its
most
69
fundamental
and
vulnerable
most
point:
its
claim
to
ahistoricism.
Marxism is a critique which bears the necessity of change,
since it is merely the expression of historical reality. Thus
for Lukacs, it is possible to resolve the contradiction between
the all-encompassing nature of the totality and the possibility
of perceiving capitalism
as a
'moment in historical time'.
Mere recognition of the totality is not enough:
the totality
has
the arena of his tory,
the realm of
Consciousness
totality
to be perceived as
action
and
critique.
comprehend it as
of
the
must
'the his torical moment which contains us.'
[24]
Marxism advocates and depends upon practice.
characteristic which distinguishes it from
and
It is
bourgeois
this
theory,
enables it to remain free from the objectifications and
fragmentation
totality.
that
Critical
negation only
would
deny
its
sense
of
movement
and
theory is capable of effecting any sort of
if
it bears
this
imperative to action.
A
cri tical theory which does not do so is fa ted to remain not
only the
product of, but also productive of, the totality in
which
arises.
it
Lukacs'
criticisms
of
the
positivism of
bourgeois rationality and the pessimism of Hegelian alienation
are based,
like his attacks on positivism and determinism in
Marxism itself,
both
on the position that a critical theory must
con tradic t
the
totality
of
existing
relations
and
recognise its situation within it. Critical theory will remain
an
affirmation
of
the
totality
for
as
long
as
it
incapable of exposing this contradiction in practice.
remains
70
So what has become of this imperative to action? It is
suggested
in
this
inquiry
that
the
safety
valves
of
the
prevailing system of social and discursive relations recuperate
even the most radical, dynamic critiques in such a way as to
empty
them of their critical function and necessitate their
affirmation of the totali ty. A radical theory, no matter how
great the imperative to action it proclaims, is vulnerable to
defusal in this sense, so that critical discourse must address
itself to the very ability of the totality to contain it. The
effects of this recuperation and the possibility of avoiding it
are questions to which this discussion continually returns.
71
CONCEPTIONS OF IDEOLOGY
Lukacs'
characterisation of Marxism as an ideology marked a
departure,
originally
made
by
Lenin,
from
the
notion
of
ideology presented in Marx and Engel' s The German Ideology,
where
ideology was
represents
the
conceived as
partial
that body of thought which
interests
of
the
ruling
class,
as
opposed to the truth of the universal interests of the working
class.
Although aspects
Marxist writings, it
of
this
text were revised in
later
offers a succinct account of the tenets
of historical materialism on which Lukacs' work is based.
The arguments of The German Ideology were conducted within
the
context
of
an
attack
on
the
philosophy
of
the
Young
Hegelians. The central idea of the text was that people produce
themselves through labour: they do not, on the one hand, bear a
fixed,
unchanging,
biological nature,
nor,
on the other,
they develop in accordance wi th some spiri tual essence.
do
The
idealism of this last Hegelian assertion implies that society
is the realisation of ideas; the production of these ideas, the
social
base
from
which
they
arise,
and
their
role
in
legi timating society, is obscured so tha t social arrangements
appear
as
a
given
or
inevitable
manifestation
of
the
development of ideas.
As
its
ti tIe suggests, The German Ideology presented a
critique of this idealism as an ideology on the grounds that it
prioritised
ideas
over
reality
without
any
regard
for
the
constitution of these ideas and the influence of the social
base on their formation.
In short, idealism was said to ignore
72
the production of these ideas which,
in a class society, is
controlled by and hence
interest of
serves
the
the ruling
class.
If.. • we detach the ideas of the ruling class from
the ruling class itself and attribute to them an
independent existence ••• without bothering ourselves
about the conditions of production and the producers
of these ideas, if we ignore the individuals and
world conditions which are the source of the ideas,
we can say, for instance, that during the time the
aris tocracy was dominant,
the concepts honour,
loyalty, etc., were dominant, during the dominance of
the bourgeoisie the concepts freedom, equality, etc.
[25]
In such a schema,
the ideas which serve
to legi tima te
the
ruling class are presented as serving the interests of all:
there is a need on the part of the ruling class to 'represent a
particular interest as general or the "general interest" as
ruling.' [26]
For each new class which puts itself in the place of
one ruling before it, is compelled, merely to carry
through its aim, to represent its interests as the
common interest of all members of society, that is,
expressed in ideal form: it has to give its ideas the
form of universality, and represent them as the only
rational, universally valid ones.[27]
This
covert
movement
from
the
particular
characterises
ideology
as
both
the
to
product
the
general
of
and
the
legitimation of class domination. The pejorative sense of the
ideological which this entails is preserved in the assertion
tha t
a
proletarian revolution
domination
itself
will
bear
-
a
revolution agains t
class
no
such necessity
will
and
therefore constitute the 'end of ideology'.
This whole semblance, that the rule of a certain
class is only the rule of certain ideas, comes to a
natural end, of course, as soon as class rule in
general ceases to be the form in which society is
organised.[28]
73
While there is a ruling class, however, its ideas are 'in every
epoch the ruling ideas,
material
force
of
Le.
society
the class which is
the ruling
at
its
is
the
same
time
ruling
intellectual force.' [29]
The
people
basic
are
history.
assertion
of historical
both
the
products
and
Ideas
and
consciousness,
materialism
producers
'legal
of
a
is
that
material
relations'
and
'political forms'
originate in the material conditions of life, the
totali ty of which Hegel, following the example of
English and French thinkers of the eighteenth
century, embraces within the term "civil society" •••
the anatomy of this civil societ~ has, however, to be
sought in political economy. [30J
In The German Ideology, civil society is the 'true focus and
theatre
of
all
history';
it
is
'the
form
of
intercourse
determined by the existing productive forces at all previous
historical
stages
Ideas
consciousness
and
determined
by
and
this
in
its
turn
determining
arise wi thin civil
history:
'life
is
these.'[31]
socie ty
not
consciousness, but consciousness by life.' [32]
and
are
determined
by
The rela tions
of production provide the 'real foundation, on which rises a
legal
and
political
superstructure
and
to
which
correspond
definitive forms of social consciousness.' [33]
The
materialism
significance
of
of
'legal,
such
passages
political,
does
religious,
not
deny
the
artistic
or
philosophic - in short, the ideological forms' [34] of society.
Nevertheless,
it
ideological
and
to
the
that
of
implies
that
the
critique
of
the
superstructural relations, whilst necessary
totality
of
insufficient to its destruction.
capitalist
relations,
is
It suggests that social and
74
ideological
relations,
ideas
and
consciousness,
change
and
develop as the result, and not the cause, of material change
and development.
On this basis,
the end of ideology is the
necessary consequence of the end of class domination.
The development of ideology
In Lenin's work, notably What Is To Be Done?, ideology lost the
negative
Lenin
connotations
argued
that
domination within
developed by
carried
in
The
German
development
of
a
critique
it
the
a class
of
class
inevitably a
critique
Operating within
a class
society is
the working class.
Ideolog:i.
society, therefore, Marxism itself represents the interests of
a particular class; it presents these interests as universal
and is itself characterised by the movement from the particular
to
the
universal.
The division
of
capitalism,
and the supersession of
entail
end
the
of
ideology.
But
society
is
intrinsic
to
this system will indeed
the
existence
of
class
division and confrontation necessitates the promotion of class
interests.
Ideology
is no
longer the expression of merely
bourgeois interests which can be opposed by the 'true' general
interest of post-revolutionary society, but the expression of
the interests of any class.
Bourgeois ideology must therefore
be countered and negated by the ideology which universalises
and represents the interests of the working class: Marxism.
McCarney observed that in this conception, the ideological
is defined in terms of its participation in the confrontation
between bourgeois and working class interests.
75
The
distinguishing
feature
of
its
forms
of
consciousness is that they participate in this
struggle.
That is to say unless ideas have some
bearing on questions of the legitimacy of the social
arrangements of class society, there could be no
point in labelling them "ideological".[35]
Lenin's position did not mark a divergence from, but rather the
developmen~
of the concept of ideology as theorised by Marx.
McCarney wrote that it was Marx's great insight that ideology
is 'the medium through which the class struggle is conducted in
theory.' [36]
Lenin's work did, however, entail the rejection
of an epistemological conception of ideology, which holds that
ideology generates illusion and false belief about a reality
which is accessible through the superior form of scientific
knowledge.
consider
The weakness of this conception is that it fails to
the possibility
that
expressive of covert class
either
conception
of
scientific
in teres ts.
ideology
for
thought
is
itself
,The implica tions
Marxism's
own
claim
of
to
scientific status will not be developed in detail here, but it
should
be
pointed
out
that
the
recognition
of
Marxism's
ideological character does not necessaoly impede this claim.
Callinicos suggested that a theory can participate both in
ideological
and
scientific
discourse.
He
developed
this
position with reference to the philosophy of science proposed
by Lakatos,
for whom
the research programmes of
scientific
investigation are considered in their social context.
Ma rxism
can be considered a science to the extent that it participates
in such a research programme; this enables it to operate with
the autonomy of a scientific theory whils t recognising that
this aumnomy is itself relative to the social and ideological
context in which it is conducted.
76
Ideologies
differ
from
the
sciences
not
in
representing raw, unconceptualised experience (which
does not exist), but in the lack of their relative
autonomy, their existence within relations of power,
which circumscribe their possible utterances within a
given ideological disourse.[37]
Callinicos
considered
that
'Marxism •••
differs
from
other
theoretical
discourse
in
disdaining
to
conceal
its
'ideological' connotations.' [38]
It is Marxism's existence as
a product of and response to the political economy and civil
society within which it arises which defines it as an ideology,
and its recogniton of this position, which gives the theory its
analytic and political strength.
The development of the political conception of ideology that concerned less with the epistemological status of a system
of thought than its critical efficacity, has been encouraged by
the increasing complexity and significance of the mechanisms of
civil
society.
Ideological
structures
are
seen
to have
a
stabilising effect on the economic base, a development which
can be traced back to Lenin's observation of the importance of
ideological confrontation.
As Callinicos observed:
Once the overthrow of capitalism was no longer
thought to be guaranteed by the workings of the
economy,
then
the
mechanisms
supporting
or
undermining the capitalist order became the object of
theoretical analysis.[39]
Lukacs
and
themselves
Gramsci
with
are
these
among
those
mechanisms
in
who
have
discursive
concerned
and
social
relations. Like Lukacs, Gramsci considered capitalism's ability
to foster a sense of ahistoricism and inevitability to be vital
to its survival.
Indeed, Gramsci suggested that the totality,
or
of
'hegemony',
by
the
dissemination of the dominant ideology of the bourgeoisie.
In
relations
is
held
together
77
other words, ideological influence is considered to be as vital
a conquest as that of the economic base, since the ideology
denies the significance of
this base,
its consti tution as a
totality, and the possibility of its supersession.
Gramsci's work, considered in detail below, is therefore a
statement of what has become known as the 'dominant ideology
thesis'.
As defined by Abercrombie, Hill, and Turner in their
book of the same name, the dominant ideology thesis holds that:
modern capitalist society ••• maintains and reproduces
itself through the eff ec ts of a "dominant ideo logy"
which successfully incorporates the working class
into the existing social system, thereby perpetuating
its subordination. [40]
This suggests that it is by consensus rather than coercion that
the capi talis t
critique
of
sys tern is sus tained and,
ideological
domination
is
beyond this,
tha t a
as
to
important
the
revolutionary project as that of economic domination.
In
his
critique
of
this
position,
Conrad
Lodziak
considered it to have arisen solely from 'the need to explain
the
failure
of
the
class
struggle
revolution predicted by Marx',
to
materialise
in
the
and described the posi tion as
'not so much a "thesis" as a self-evident truth amongst the
majority of the Left.'
contested
in
his
It is a 'truth' which Lodziak
[41]
argument
that
'the
consciousness
of
the
subordinated is best understood not in terms of ideolo gy, but
more in
terms
of needs-based motivation.'
These needs
are
defined as arising from the 'power of economic necessity and
state coercion'
such that the
'reproduction of relations of
domination and subordination can be explained without recourse
to
the
dominant
ideology
thesis.
The
subordinated
are
78
materially,
incorporated into the
rather than ideologically
social sys tern. '
[42]
Lodziak argued that the assertion that the working class
accepts the dominant ideology implies that it also has some
commitment to this body of ideas.
accurate
empirical
problematic,
evidence
and,
shows
evaluation
of
any
case,
that
the
'required
appears
populations
of
to
be absent
advanced
resignation,
and
the
he
suggested,
is
bulk
of
sociological
degree
of
ideological
amongst
capitalist
Lodziak suggested, more evidence
disorientation,
either,
in
motivation
'passivity,
The possibility of the
a
majority of
societies.'
There
the
is,
to suggest the prominence of
bewilderment
marginalisation'
and
in
confusion,
working
class
consciousness.
There are a number of problems with Lodziak's account, the
most important of which hinge on his assumption that
active
commi tment to the dominant ideology is a precondi tion to the
validity of the thesis. He failed to entertain the possibility
that the apparent passivity of the working class is itself the
product
of
a
dominant
inevitability
of
change.
account
Luk~cs'
An
ideology,
capitalism
of
the
and
one
denies
ideological
which
the
asserts
the
possibility
of
realm
in
terms
of
totality or Debord's spectacle would allow a dominant
ideology thesis to see the very absence of commitment to the
details of a body of ideas and discourse as evidence for the
domination of the working class by an ideology of ahistoricism
and alienation.
Such an ideology might be said to preclude the
79
possibility of alternative social arrangements and, moreover,
that of its achievement through purposive human action.
Gramsci's work was in part an
attempt to bring together
the .assertions
that capitalism depends both on a
ideology and
the
on
dependence between
economic base.
dominant
He sugges ted a mutual
the consensus encouraged by the ideology
and the enforcement of
economic necessity and state coercion,
such that capitalism is equally dependent on the two.
From
this
of
position,
Lodziak's
assertions
seem
reminiscent
a
society in which the workers are, quite literally, in chains,
physically unable to act other than in the ways dictated to
them.
80
GRAMSCI AND THE STRUGGLE FOR POWER
Gramsci's work is concerned with questions of the conquest and
maintenance of poli tical power. He dis tinguished between the
coercive
aspects
legitimation
of
and
political
popular
power
appeal,
and
its
sources
and
considered
of
the
establishment of some sort of ideological consensus to be vital
to the success of political control.
In the development of this thesis, Gramsci emphasised the
mechanisms of civil s9ciety, which he defined as
consciousness, ideology,
and the superstructural institutions
through which they operate.
only
to
the extent
those of
But this emphasis was necessary
that Marxist theory had,
mistakenly,
in
Gramsci's view, tended to neglect it: Gramsci did not intend to
undermine
the
fundamental
political control
priority
and its
of
foundation
direct
in
and
coercive
the economic base.
Nevertheless, Gramsci was unequivocal in his belief tha t
the
institution of a dominant ideology and its dissemination into
mass consciousness is necessary to the
a position which
unders tanding
Kearney,
led him to
survival of capitalism,
emphasise
the necessity
for
of the means by which this is achieved.
'Gramsci's
account
of
how
class
interests
a
For
mask
themselves as cultural values, which in turn mask themselves as
natural
instincts,
represents
arguably his
most
significant
contribution to contemporary Marxist theory.' [43]
While
Gramsci's
basic
thesis
assertion
that
structure,
it did imply that
ideology
is
did
not
determined
the conques t
contradict
by
of
the
the
economic
ideological
81
control is central to the negation
of capitalism and therefore
accorded the superstructure a significance of its own.
Base
determines
that
superstructure
only
in
the
broadest
sense
allows a social system to be defined in economic terms.
Beyond
this, wrote Gramsci:
The claim presented as an essential postulate of
historical materialism, that every fluctuation of
politics and ideology can be presented and expounded
as an immediate expression of the structure, must be
contested in theory as primitive idealism. [44]
What Gramsci was most eager to contest was
the idea that a
crisis in the economic structure will inevitably determine a
crisis
in
the
'ensemble of
embraces
superstructure and,
relations',
the
two.
the
Gramsci
most
importantly,
totality or
was
in
the
social whole
that
concerned
the
with
identification of the mechanisms by which such a crisis in the
whole is presented,
seeing
this as a project vital to the
understanding of capitalism's ability to withstand structural
crises.
Gramsci noted that the Western democracies were developing
a form of capitalism in which civil society becomes
'a very
complex
to
s true ture
and
one
which
the
is
resistant
catastrophic
'incursions'
of
element
(crisis,
depressions,
etc.).' [45]
The accelera tion of this
tendency,
which Gramsci foresaw as the future
immediate
the
of capitalism, was defined
as the movement towards 'hegemony', here described by Boggs as:
the permeation throughout civil society - including a
whole range of structures and activities like trade
unions, schools, the churches, and the family - of an
entire
system
of
values,
attitudes,
beliefs,
morality, etc. that is in one way or another
supportive of the established order and the class
interests which dominate it. [46]
82
The notion of hegemony can therefore be seen as the result of
an
analysis
of
the
resistance of
fluctuations
of
the
'immediate
the
social
economic
whole
element'.
to
the
In
the
Prison Notebooks, Gramsci wrote:
it may be ruled out that immediate economic crises of
themselves produce fundamental historical events;
they can simply provide a terrain more favourable to
the dissemination of certain modes of thought. [47]
Much of Gramsci' s writing was devoted to the question of how
this dissemination can be effected in the face of the hegemony
of capitalist relations.
Gramsci identified the workings of capitalist or bourgeois
hegemony
as
responsible
for
restricting
or
concealing
the
impact and potential of structural crises; the influence of the
dominant ideology is asured by the foundation of a hegemony of
beliefs, attitudes, institutions and apparatuses which mystify
the
structure
supersession.
of
capitalism
and
the
possibility
of
its
McLellan wrote that for Gramsci:
While the bourgeoisie continued to exercise such a
cultural hegemony, a proletarian revolution was
impossible...
As
long
as
capitalist
hegemony
persis ted, the prole taria t remained unaware of the
contradictory
nature
of
society
and
of
the
possibility of transforming it. For a necessary part
of the ideological hegemony of the capi talis ts was
their ability to present their own interests as those
of society as a whole.[48]
Hegemony is thus able to consolidate the consent of the people,
to stabilise and conceal the problems raised in the economic
base, and to hide the coercive nature of the ensemble of social
relations.
Its existence ensures that economic crises do not
become crises in this ensemble, and that local rebellions fail
to develop into revolutionary critiques.
Where hegemony appeared as
fulfilled a role that guns
a strong
and tanks
force, it
could not
83
perform. It mystified power relations, public issues
and events; it encouraged a sense of fatalism and
passivity towards political action; and it justified
every
type
of
system-serving
sacrifice
and
deprivation.
In short, hegemony worked in many ways
to induce the oppressed to accept or "consent" to
their own exploitation and daily misery.[49]
Callinicos
has
observed
hegemony had the meri t
that
Gramsci's
concern
of highlighting the fact tha t
with
'class
domination is not something that automatically arises from the
economic base, but has to be organised.'
part
of
this
organisation
perpetuation of consent.
[50]
the
involves
An essential
extraction
and
The broad base of legitimation which
this ensures is both produced by and productive of the coercive
structure manifest in the
economic base: Gramsci encouraged a
dialectic between force and consent, and, correspondingly, base
and superstructure, and economics and ideology, in which each
is dependent on the other, and the crisis of one is inadequate
to the collapse of
In the Prison Notebooks, he
the whole.
wrote:
The "normal" exercise of hegemony is characterised by
the combination of force and consnt, which balance
each other reciprocally without force predominating
excessively over consent.
Indeed, the attempt is
always made to ensure tha t force would be based on
the cons en t of the maj ori ty expressed by the socalled organs of public opinion - which, therefore,
in certain situations, are artificially multiplied.
[51]
Gramsci's position is clearly far from denying the importance
of force and coercion.
Nevertheless,
Gramsci asserted tha t
physical coercion -
the force of economic necessity or the immediacy of legal and
institutional
enforcement
maintaining political control.
is,
by
itself,
incapable
of
These coercive aspects of the
84
State are themselves dependent on their ideological acceptance
by the broad mass of those on whom they are exercised.
The
ruling
as
class
'dominant';
must
present
it must
itself
as
'leading'
lead on the basis of its
as
well
legitimation,
which Gramsci clearly considered to be indispens ble to the
func tioning of
the s ta te.
It follows
from
this
that
some
disequilibrium or break in the cohesion of the hegemony is not
merely advantageous but necessary to a crisis in the ensemble
of relations.
Only with the development of an ideological
crisis does the possibility of a 'frontal attack' on the system
emerge, since only a rupture in the hegemony can reveal the
coercive base of the political system.
Gramsci
derived
this
terminology
military
from
Machiavelli, to whom he devoted much of the Prison Notebooks.
Machiavelli,
he wrote,
'brings everything back to poli tics,
i.e. to the art of governing men, of securing their permanent
consent ••• ' [52]
Machiavelli's concern with the strategies and
tactics
necessary
to
the
securing
directly
related
to
Gramsci's
of
such
interest
in
a
consensus
the
notion
is
of
hegemony, and exercises a great influence over his poli tical
vocabulary.
When he
described
the
increasing complexity
civil society in the Western democracies, Gramsci wrote:
In Russia, the state was everything, civil society
was primordial and gelatinous; in the West, there was
a proper relation between state and civil society,
and when the state trembled a sturdy structure of
civil society was at once revealed. The state was
only an outer ditch, behind which there stood a
powerful system of fortresses and earthworks: more or
less numerous from one s ta te to the next, it goes
wi thou t saying - but this precisely necessi ta ted an
accurate reconnaissance of each individual country.
[53]
of
85
Such localised analysis is prioritised in Gramsci's work as an
essential part of the 'war of position' that is the necessary
prelude to
the
'war of movement',
the frontal attack of a
direct political challenge to state power.
is
constituted
by
ideological
The war of position
challenge
to
the
dominant
hegemony wherever it appears: across both social and political,
cuI tural and economic fronts.
Gramsci's
have
of
broadened
the
ideological control
conception
the
is exercised and,
achievement is to
areas
in
which
consequently,
extended the scope of Marxis t analysis.
such
to have
The development of
hegemony is seen to assume an increasing importance wi th the
con tinuing development of capi talism in Wes tern democracies.
As
this
process
continues,
so
the
necessity
of
provoking
ideological crisis gains in significance.
Gramsci 's assertion of hegemony as the dissemina tion of
the
dominant
ideology
into
an
increasingly
complex
civil
society might seem to imply the necessity of such a crisis.
This
is
the
same problem as
that
posed
to notions
of
the
totality or the spectacle: hegemony may explain the ideolo gica l
integration of the people, but if it is conceived in too weak a
form, it loses its explanatory role, and if, on the other hand,
it is held to exert complete domination, the possibility of a
successful cri tique
is precluded. Marcuse' s
thesis of one-
dimensionali ty is subj ect to the same difficul ty.
whereas Marcuse
sides tepped
However,
the problem byes tablishing a
further dimension of the unconscious, Gramsci had developed the
problem of hegemony not in order to leave it unresolved, but to
effect
its
negation.
Gramsci's
analysis
of
capitalism's
86
dependence on
the propagation of a supportive world view by no
means ensures its survival.
Gramsci discerned a
fragility
and vulnerability within
hegemony and highlighted the extent to which disequilibrium is
always present.
In spi te of the exis tnece of hegemony,
the
everyday experience of the working class is in contradiction to
the dominant ideology it bears.
A socialist consciousness,
Gramsci argued, is implicit in this experience, and it is this
which provided him wi th the solution to the problem posed by
hegemony.
Counter-hegemony
Gramsci's notion of the counter-hegemony dominates his writing
and underlines
his conviction that an alternative ideology,
with the scope, cohesion, and popular appeal of that imposed by
capitalism,
project.
is
necessary
to
Gramsci conceived
the
success
of
the
critical
counter-hegemony as an
'anti-
State', a developed world view capable of negating the totality
of relations disseminated within the capitalist state.
I
The
possibilities
of
the counter-hegemony
exis ting consciousness of the
experience
is
said
by
rest
in
the
'man-in-the-mass', whose daily
Gramsci
to
be
at
odds
with
the
theoretical consciousness encouraged by the bourgeois hegemony.
This theoretical consciousness:
can indeed be his torically in opposition
to his
activity.
One might almost say that he has two
theoretical consciousnesses (or one contradictory
consciousness): one which is implicit in his activity
and which in reality unites him with all his fellow-
87
workers in the practical transformation of the real
world; and one, superficially explici t or verbal,
which he has inherited from the past and uncritically
absorbed. [54]
In
the
light
of
this
position,
Gramsci
assessed
the
significance of the Trade Union movement, cri ticising it for
concealing and rehabilitating this implicit consciousness.
The
unions
considered
were
to
integrate
the
dissatisfaction spawned by the consciousness produced by daily
experience into opportunis t
extent,
Gramsci
retained
To this
and reformis t demands.
a
commitment
to
the
notion
of
'spontaneous consciousness' endorsed by Rosa Luxemburg; a faith
in
the
consciousness
that
experience of capi talism.
arises
out
of
the
immediate
Ul tima tely Gramsci shared Lenin's
view that any spontaneous consciousness is likely to be the
product, rather than the negation, of the dominant ideology.
But
Gramsci's early critiques of the 1920s preserved the idea
that the trade unions
already
integrated,
do not reflect a consciousness which is
but
are
themselves
responsible
for
the
integration of the original spontaneous consciousness and the
dissemination of the bourgeois hegemony.
The unions, Gramsci
argued, operate purely in the economic sphere and, as such, are
in the business of selling or representing their members as
wage-earners
rather
than
raising
their
consciousness
as
producers.
Gramsci advanced a similar critique of the Italian
Socialist
Party:
to
the
extent
that
the
unions
and
the
Socialis t Party focussed opposi tion and cri tique, he argued,
they did so on terms controlled by and defined by the state.
In other words, they opera te wi thin the hegemony and make no
attempt at its analysis or
negation.
88
Gramsci's
critique
of
the
reformis t
organisa tions '
inabili ty to integrate and divert poli tical consciousness by
their failure to develop the consciousness of daily experience
was
developed
Marxism itself.
to
a
critique
of
economistic conceptions
of
Like Lukacs, he argued that such analyses of
capitalism reinforce, rather than negate,
bourgeois ideology.
Disillusioned with the emphasis on the economic structure which
emerged from the Second International, Gramsci was convinced
that:
socialist revolution would not come mechanistically
from the breakdown of the capitalist economy but
would have to be built, that is won through purposive
human action within a wide range of historical
settings. [55]
Gramsci considered Lenin and the Bolsheviks to have developed
such an analysis, defining them as 'living rather than abstract
Marxists
who
seized
conscious
action,
Revolution
insted
historical
initiative
who
acted
upon
the
of
waiting
for
material
"ripen".' [56] Here a
through
actuality
selfof
the
conditions
to
dynamic form of Marxism is invoked; one
capable of establishing a dialogue with the specific conditions
in
which
mechanistic
it
operated,
theory
which
as
opposed
leads
only
to
an
to
economistic
the
'awai ting a sort of miraculous illumination.'
quietism
or
of
[57] This las t
attitude, already identified by Lukacs, was regarded by Gramsci
as having a disast r ous effect on mass consciousness.
Each individual,
seeing that despite his nonintervention, something does still happen, tends to
think that there exists, over and above individuals,
a phantasmagorical being, the abstraction of the
collective organism, a kind of autonomous divinity,
which does not think wi th any concrete brain but
still thinks, etc. [58]
In the light of the discussions of Debord and
Luk~cs
above,
89
Gramsci might here be said to be identifying the alienation of
the individual from the historical consciousness of purposive
action and change.
It was
alienation
the necessity
which
revolutionary
1920,
led
of overcoming
Gramsci
to
organisation and
Gramsci's work
his
its
emphasised
this
passivity
theoretisation
central
tasks.
the role of
the
and
of
the
Prior
to
factory
council; although he was later to move away from the councilist
posi tion,
some of his bes t writing was achieved wi thin this
paradigm. The council, he suggested, has all the advantages of
the
localised
shop-floor
union
whilst
also
being
able
to
develop a political awareness of the worker as a producer:
Starting off from this original cell, the factory,
seen as a unit, as an act that creates a particular
product, the worker proceeds to the comprehension of
ever vaster units, right up to the level of the
nation itself - which is in its entirety a gigantic
apparatus
of
production,
characterised
by
its
exports, by the sum of weal th it exchanges for an
equivalent sum of wealth coming in from every part of
the
world,
from
the
various
other
gi gantic
apparatuses of production into which the world is
divided.
At this point the worker has become a
producer, for he has acquired an awareness of hi s
role in the process of production, at all its levels,
from the workshop to the nation and the world ••• he
becomes a communist ••• he becomes a revolutionary •••
he arrives at a conception of the ItS ta te", 1. e. he
conceives a complex organisation of society, a
concrete form of society, because this is nothing but
the form of the gigantic apparatus of production
which reflects
through all the novel, superior
links and relations and functions inherent in its
very enormity - the life of the workshop.[59]
In Gramcsi's early work, the factory councils embodied a form
of organisation whch could be reproduced beyond the factory and
across all areas of life.
Moreover, they were regarded as the
proper means by which a counter-hegemony could be developed
from a
socialist consciousness
within the parameters of a
90
system of organisa tion capable of 'counterposing itself as a
whole to capitalism'.[60]
Gramsci's version of council communism was a response to
and a development of the concentration of industrial workers in
the urban centres of Italy, in which the councilist movement
did indeed enjoy a rapid growth.
Following the failure of the
councilist strikes in 1920, Gramsci increasingly identified the
Party organisation as the most appropriate means of developing
a socialist consciousness.
remained critical of the
But he
Leninist notion of a vanguard Party, and retained the idea of
the workers' council as the basis on which an effective, and
mass, Party might be bui 1 t.
In Boggs' view, Gramsci's basic
concern remained that of 'how to move the oppressed beyond the
immediacy of their everyday concerns without at the same time
obliterating their spontaneous energies.'[61]
The solution of
this
of
problem necessitates
the
intervention
an
'external
political force'; only this would be able to:
reverse the omnipresent trend towards reformism and
opportunism.
Only
a
centralised
organisation
composed of full-time professional cadres could
mobilise the popular s tra ta around socialis t goals
and preserve revolutionary identity in a largely
antagonistic milieu. [62]
The
task which Gramsci assigned
to
the mass Party was
that of the development of a counter-hegemony.
Marx t s assertion of
the
Gramsci drew on
'necessi ty for new popular beliefs,
that is to say a new common sense, and with it a new culture
and
a
new philosophy
which will
be
rooted
in
the
popular
consciousness with the same solidity and imperative quality as
tradi tional beliefs.' [63]
such
a
broad
consciousness
Mos t importan tly, Gramsci asserted
as
a
necessary
prerequisite
to
91
revolution.
This
entails
the
development
of
a
system
of
beliefs, an alternative hegemony within that which constitutes
bourgeois society.
Ideas and opinions are not spon taneous ly "born"
in
each individual brain: they have had a centre of
forma tion, of irradia tion, of dissemination, of
persausion - a group of men, or a single individual
even, which has developed them and presented them in
the political form of current reality. [64]
The
mass
Party,
operating
consensual basis on which
as
this
centre,
provides
the
capitalism can be challenged in its
entirety.
This basis for the Party shares Lenin's use of the
notion
of ideology as a combat i ve rather than 'true' body of thought.
Lenin
argued
that
the
Party
must
develop
a
socialist
consciousness to counter the ideology of the bourgeoisie.
Since there can be no talk of an independent ideology
formulated by the working masses themselves in the
process of their movement, the only choice is
either bourgeois or socialist ideology. There is no
middle course (for mankind has not created a "third"
ideology, and, moreover, in a society torn by class
antagonisms there can never be a non-class or an
above-class ideology.)[65]
Lenin's vanguard Party organisation is intended to effect the
development of this socialis t ideology.
in What
Is To Be Done?,
The Party, he argued
must have both a mass base and a
professional core:
We mus t have. • • trade unions and organisa tions
everywhere and in as large a number as possible and
with the widest variety of functions; but it would be
absurd and harmful to confound them with the
organisa tion of
revolu tionaries,
to efface
the
border-line between them, to make still more hazy the
all too faint recognition of the fact that in order
to serve the mass movement we must have people who
will
devote
themselves
exclusively
to
Social
Democra tic
ac ti vi ties, and tha t such people mus t
train themselves patiently and steadfastly to be
professional revolutionaries. [66]
92
This
demarcation
between
the
revolu tionaries, adopted by
professional
and
the
mass
of
Gramsci af ter his disenchan tmen t
with the councils, can easily lead
to conceptions of the Party
as a domineering vanguard imposing the uni ty,
training,
and
organisation identified by Lenin as central to the success of
the revolu tionary proj ec t.
For Lenin, only a vanguard Party
could
process
ensure
that
'in
the
of
their
movement',
the
consciousness of the working class is not continually swallowed
by
the dominant ideology.
In Gramsci's conception, the Party was not intended as an
elitist vanguard concerned with the imposition of theory;
was
broadly
everyday life.
'organic' :
constituted and based across
it
the spectrum of
Its intellectuals and theorists were said to be
workers
developed wi thin the Party framework to
express and communicate the consciousness of their class. The
Party was not isolated, but involved in all areas of social
life; conscious of the influence of the dominant ideology, it
takes on an educative and guiding role: it attempts to build a
mass, socialist consciousness.
Gramsci described the Communist
Party as:
the instrument and historical form of the process of
inner
liberation
through which
the worker
is
transformed from executor to initiator, from mass to
leader and guide, from brawn to brain and purpose.
As the Communist Party is formed, a seed of liberty
is planted tha t will sprout and grow to its full
height only after the workers' State has organised
the requisite material conditions ••• the worker takes
his
place
in
the
Communist
party
and
there
"discovers" and "invents" original ways of living,
collabora tes "conscious ly" in the world's ac ti vi ty,
thinks, forsees, becomes responsible, becomes an
organiser rather than someone who is organised. [67]
93
Gramsci's
Nevertheless,
Lenin's,
a
betrays
conception
certain
degree
of
of
the
dis trus t
spontaneous consciousness of the working class.
the
dominance
that
of
bourgeois
spontaneous
ideology,
consciousness
will
Party,
like
of
the
In recognising
both
theoris ts
be
determined
sugges t
by
the
prevailing hegemony;
the Party is intended to provide a focus
for
socialist
and
climate
domination.
On
of
the
other
consciousness
hand,
it
will
Gramsci considered the potential for a
be
to
counter
this
remembered
that
socialist hegemony
to
lie in the daily experience of the worker that is 'implicit in
his activity'.
Thus
the
postulation
of
hegemony
or
a
totality
of
capitalist relations might be seen to preclude the possibility
of the authentic experience of everyday life, thus undermining
Gramsci's
class.
fai th
in
the
'real
consciousness'
of
the
working
But Gramsci' s emphasis on the nature of this he ge mony
facilitated his critique of a broad range of the features of
capitalism
and
provided
extent
to
which
expression,
are
ideas,
Gramsci's assertion
that of
him
with
modes
of
constituted
by
tha t
the bourgeoisie
the
means
behaviour
the
to
analyse
the
production,
and
dominant
hegemony.
the socialis t hegemony mus t counter
involves him
in
the
search
forms of communication, organisation, and activity.
for
new
This led
to his concern with the question of the organisational basis of
the
socialis t
hegemony.
Gramsci' s
advoca tion
of
mass
participation and Lenin's vanguardism are both the resul t
their analyses of
the
of
nature and influence of the dominant
ideology and the best means of countering it.
94
For Gramsci,
hegemony
must
the form of organisation within the counter-
be
the
negation,
rather
than
the
equivalent
counterpart, of the bourgeois organisation; it must be capable
of 'counterposing itself as a whole to capitalism'.
emphasis was
on
the breadth and flexibility
of
Gramsci's
the council
based organisation: the system is intended to be participatory
and directly democratic, allowing for diversity and equality.
For Lenin, on the other hand, the emphasis was on the most
efficient means of bringing about the revolutionary moment in
which such questions could be frui tfully raised.
critiques
of
cultural
and
discursive
To develop
relations
in order
to
achieve their specific negation is, in this conception, to be
running before learning to walk: such considerations should be
limited to their immediate bearing on the structural, economic
constitution of capitalism,
since any attempt
to solve them
within the existing framework will be diverted or determined by
the dominant ideology.
The problem with this position is that
it assumes the accuracy of its demarcation of that which has an
'immediate bearing' on the capitalist structure.
For Gramsci,
it is clear that every aspect of life is sufficiently immediate
to
warrant
dominant
critique.
ideology
To
ignore
throughout
structures and relations
the
the
dissemination
totality
of
of
the
capitalist
is to fail to ripen the conditions
necessary for a conquest of the economic base.
Gramsci's
from
his
attempt
to distance
the revolutionary
Party
bourgeois forms of organisa tion was undoubtedly due to
analysis
explicitly
of
the
critical
effects
of
a
dominant
discourse,
as
well
as
on
hegemony
the
on
implicit
95
spontaneous
Gramsci
consciousness
posed
discourse
in
resolution,
bourgeois
of
the
working
the problem
of
the
participation of
the
ideology
dominant
in
class.
order
to
Indeed,
cri tical
seek
its
which he found in the wholesale contradiction to
posed
relations
by
the
Party
organisa tion.
Similarly, his observation that the spontaneous consciousness
of the working class
is integrated into the dominant he gemony
is a problem posed in order to facilitate its resolution in the
notion of counter-hegemony.
The
diversity
concerns
is
indicative of the scope of the Marxist party he espoused.
His
involvement in
of
Gramsci's
intellectual
workers' education [68], and
his interest in
literature and art and the importance of the dissemination of
cultural ideas, point to the need for analysis and critique in
The counter-hegemony cannot
every area and on every front.
restrict itself to the obvious forms of ideological or economic
negation.
In 1920, Gramsci wrote:
The proletarian revolution cannot but be a total
revolution.
It consists in the foundation of new
modes of labour, new modes of production a nd
distribution that are peculiar to the working
class...
This
revolution
also
presupposes
the
formation of a new set of standards,
a new
psychology, new ways of feeling, thinking and living
that must be specific to the working class, that must
be created by it, that will become "dominant" when
the working class becomes the dominant class •••
Together wi th the problem of gaining poli tical and
economic power, the proletaria t mus t also face the
problem of winning intellectual power ••• it must also
think about organising itself culturally. [69]
The
extent
developed
to
which
such
a
cultural
perspective
the
existing
continued Gramsci,
'i t
should still be possible to pose the
questions
and
outline
the
is
most
limited
be
within
fundamental
hegemony
can
but,
characteristic
96
features of the development of the new civilisation.'
Gramsci
attempted precisely such a project in his early considerations
of the Futurist movement.
The case of Futurism
The
early
Futurist
worshipful of speed,
manifestos
you th,
were,
vi tali ty,
like
its
and war;
art
works,
the weak and
slow were swept aside in the dawn of the new age of machine,
flight, speed, and action.
Although these early texts contain
few overtly poli tical references,
they were revolutionary in
the sense that they challenged a host of bourgeois values, not
least those of the Church,
in
the context of a radical and
adventurous art.
The
Italian
Socialist
Party,
discerning
no
socialist
content in the Futurist movement, ignored it altogether.
For
Gramsci, this neglect was symptomatic of a failure to address
cultural and artistic developments;
Futurists' later
the movement
alignment
he regarded
the
I talian
to fascism as a lost opportunity:
could have contributed to the construction of a
socialist hegemony.
Futurism, he argued, presented the Left
with a chance to engage in a cutural attack on the he ge mony.
Indeed, according to Gramsci, it was for the want of a counterhegemony
that
the
Futurist
socialist
consciousness,
movement
since
only
became
the
alien
to
the
existence
of
an
awareness of all the fronts on which the dominant hegemony must
be
opposed can prevent rebellion from 'either being absorbed
97
by the prevailing hegemony or perhaps even channelled in the
direction of reactionary populism.'
alternative
and
popular
world
view
[70] The existence of an
would
lead
hostile to the bourgeoisie, such as Futurism, to
a
movement
work within
the broad framework of the counter-hegemony.
It is difficult
to say whether
the presence of such a
socialist world view would have influenced the Futurists
to
such an extent: the seeds, if not the flowers of fascism were
discernible
in the earliest of their works. Nevertheless,
the
impetus for Gramsci's support of Futurism came from the early
sympathies it won from
a number of workers' groups, who:
showed that they were not afraid of destruction,
certain as they were of being able to create poetry,
paintings and plays, like the Futurists; these
workers were supporting historicity, the possibility
of a proletarian culture created by the workers
themselves.[7l]
Gramsci clearly considered the avant-garde to be capable of
expressing an
significance
historical
by
any
form
consciousness
in ways denied
any
of
determinism.
The
economic
Futurists, he wrote:
have
destroyed,
worrying if the
destroyed,
destroyed,
new creations prod~ced
not even
The main virtue of Gramsci's position is, however, that it
recognises the necessity for the investigation of new forms of
artistic creation and expression; he sees, in other words, the
98
present domination of such areas by the hegemony of capitalist
society.
The
battlefield
for
the
creation
of
a
new
civilisation is ••• absolutely mysterious, absolutely
characterised
by
the
unforeseeable
and
the
unexpected.
Having passed from capitalist power to
workers' power, the factory will continue to produce
the same material things that it produces today. But
in what way and in what forms will poetry, drama, the
novel, music, painting and moral and linguistic works
be born? •• Nothing in this field is foreseeable
expect for this general hypothesis: there will be a
proletarian
culture
(a
civilisation)
totally
different than the bourgeois one ••• [73J
This
view
allows
the
most
disparate
of
movements
to
be
seriously considered in terms of their revolutionary potential:
all forms of dissent, in all areas, are regarded as expressions
their own
of cri tique and negation in
terrain.
Gramsci's
conception of a mass Party organisation is intended to ensure
that the engagement of an artistic movement in the socialist
hegemony
would
not
be
restrictive.
In
this
respect,
his
POsition is quite different from that adopted by the French
Communist Party in relation
that
the
Surrealists
Marxists.
no
such
to Surrealism:
could
not
be
both
the PCF declared
Surrealists
Gramsci seems, on the contrary, to have insisted
distinction.
considered
that
new
Unlike
forms
of
the
Marxists
discourse,
of
the
PCF,
expression,
and
on
he
and
organisation - as well as production - need to be constructed
Within
a climate of socialist thought, to which movements such
as Futurism would inevitably turn as the implications of their
critique developed.
Because his conception of Marxism was not res tricted to
the economic sphere of necessi ty and coercion,
but
included
the superstructural concerns of ideology and culture, Gramsci
99
considered the whole spectrum of structures and relations to be
Worthy
of
analysis
eXpression
of
an
and
critique.
It
was
historical consciousness,
the
Futurists'
rather
than
the
specific works they produced, which brought them to Gramsci's
attention and expressed the potential of their participation in
revolutionary
discourse.
Thus
Gramsci
saw
that
such
movements, reproduced in every aspect of experience,
should be
constitutive
be
of
counter-hegemony.
the
This
would
made
POssible by the
councilist and participatory basis of the mass
Party:
form
of
organisation
implici t
in
the
a
new
consciousness
building
experience of
daily
on
the
life
and
disseminating it as an explicit historical consciousness.
Thus
the counter-hegemony develops as the complete expression of the
consciousness of the proletariat.
The Crltlque
°
°
of hegemony
The theoretis~tion of hegemony and the consequent
cOunter-hegemony
is
undoubtedly
the
great
Gramsci's work, but there are a number of
Posi tion.
necessity of
achievement
of
problems with his
Gramsci' s defini tion of the hegemony of bourgeois
SOCiety
as
depends
lead him to argue that any form of opposition must
occur wi thin
the
the
ideological
domination
on
which
framework of counter-hegemony if
capitalism
it is
to
aVoid absorption by the dominant hegemony.
The problems in
th ls perspective can be seen in
relation to
the Futurist
o
tnovement.
100
Gramsci
argued
both
that
the
cultural
avant-garde
is
necessary to the development of counter-hegemony and that the
exis tence of
counter-hegemony
is
neces sary
Significance of the avant-garde.
to
the
poli tical
In more general terms,
this
SUggests that criticism and opposition cannot operate outside
an alternative world-view, but are at the same time the tools
wi th which it
is bui 1 t.
It
is
this paradox which has
lef t
Gramsci's work vulnerable to reformist interpretation. He can
easily
suggest that the achievement of counter-
be seen to
hegemony is a gradual and mainly ideological process, involving
the development and dissemination of a socialist consciousness.
As Gramsci spoke of counter-hegemony as an
seems
tha t
he
presupposed
the
'anti-Sta te',
possibility
of
such
it
a
COnstruction within the confines of an ideology already defined
as dominan t.
The
significance accorded
SUperstructure
in
his
thesis
can,
as
to
the
ideological
Callinicos
wrote
of
Althusser:
easily be used to justify a political stategy based
on the assumption tha t the working class and its
allies can win control of the ideological state
apparatuses first and thereby attain political power
without any violent confrontation with the capitalist
state machine. [74]
Although Gramsci made it clear that ideological conquest is the
necessary prerequisite to revolution, he did not intend it to
SUbstitute the
not
assume
that
conquest of the means of production.
He did
ideas,
in
revolutionary
could
opera te
a
vacuum, and remained firmly within the tradition of The German
~Olog~'s
statement
that
the
'existence
of
revolutionary
ideas ••• presupposes the existence of a revolutionary class.'
[75] Indeed, Gramsci's primary concern was with the development
101
of a climate conducive to the survival of the consciousness of
this class.
The
development
of
this
climate
of
counter-hegemony,
including
new forms of expression, organisation, ideology, and
the
of
means
its
dissemination
into
popular
consciousness,
must OCcur within a bourgeois society which is itself defined
as a dominant hegemony: a totality of structures and relations
which reproduce bourgeois ideology.
This is the problem noted
above with reference to the possibility of establishing forms
Of organisation which are able to minimise their participation
w'lt h in the hegemony and
hegemonic function.
so retain their critical and counter-
It is, moreover,
the same problem as that
identified in Lukacs' work: Marxist analysis exposes capitalism
as a totality vulnerable to negation,
and so establishes
the
necessi ty
wi thin
the
of
effecting
this
nega tion
and
agains t
totality.
The basic Marxis t
posi tion
is clear in Rosa Luxemburg' s
Conviction that chains must be broken where they are forged.
The
totality
economic
can
base
only
on
be
overcome
by
it is
based.
which
the
negation
But
of
the
Gramsci's
identification of capitalist hegemony and the necessity of its
sOcialis t
which
equivalent was
sees
OCCUpying
the
an
based
mechanisms
on
and
an
analysis
ideology
of
of
civil
increasing
significance
to
Ca .
Pltalism.
The
resul t
of
sugges ted,
tOtality
able
to
is
this,
withstand
he
attempts
the
at
capi talism
society
survival
of
is
tha t
the
in
the
negation
economic sphere through its ability to impose and disseminate
the dominant ideology throughout the totality.
This, in turn,
102
leads to the necessity of a counter-hegemony; an alternative
totality.
Implicit in Gramsci's work is the idea that the growth of
civil society occurs in two senses: on the one hand, it becomes
more diverse and fragmentary as the result of the integration
of an increasing variety of areas of everyday life into the
dominant hegemony and, on the other, it becomes more unified by
Virtue
of
the
presentation
of
extension
this
of
this
double
influence.
movement
which
It
is
the
distinguishes
Gramsci's work from much Marxis t theory, which has tended to
negel ect the diversification and fragmentation which capitalism
requires,
and from poststructuralist theory which emphasises
this aspect to an extent which denies the existence of a social
whole.
Gramsci' s notion of hegemony does provide us wi th a
serious attempt
to resolve
Ca .
Pltalist development.
these
disparate
analyses
of
The analysis of the growth of civil society in Gramsci's
was
anticipated
by
the
analysis
reVolution in The German Ideology,
of
the
bourgeois
in which Marx and Engels
argued that any revolution which replaces one ruling class with
another is able to do so because it represents the interests of
mOre people than the previous one.
The effect of this is that
People are integrated into the ruling class:
When the French bourgeoisie overthrew the power of
the aristocracy, it thereby made it possible for many
proletarians
to
raise
themselves
above
the
proletariat,
but
only
insofar
as
they
became
bourgeois.
Every new class, therefore, achieves its
hegemony only on a broader basis than that of the
class ruling previous ly, whereas the opposi tion of
the non-ruling class against the new ruling class
later develops all the more sharply and profoundly.
Both these things determine the fact that the
struggle to be waged against this new ruling class in
103
its turn, aims at a more decided and radical negation
of the previous conditions of society than could all
previous classes which sought to rule. [76]
In effect, Gramsci applied this analysis not only the course of
revolutionary change, but also to the internal development of
capitalist society.
The German Ideology described the process
Whereby those interests which oppose those of the ruling class
are
integrated
into
the
latter.
This
achieves
a
broader
hegemony and, at the same time, provokes an opposition that is
both more
sharp
and
profound
and
embodies
negation'.
In Gramsci's analysis too, capitalism is unable to
prevent the emergence of opposition.
basic
contradiction
dependent
on
of
its
'more
radical
This is because of the
structure:
the cooperation of
a
the
ruling
class
is
the working class,
but
the
eVeryday experience of the latter remains in contradiction to
the interpreta tion it receives wi thin the dominant ideology.
Capitalism has therefore developed in such a way as to prevent
the maturity of such opposition into a revolutionary critique
and, where such a critique of the totality arises, to render it
ineffectual.
Every negation and critique which fails can be
shown to strengthen capitalist hegemony: what was intended as
negation becomes affirmation. It is this which necessitates the
development of a 'more radical negation' at every point.
All
Marxist
theories
consider
that
this
negation
must
alWays be that of the totality: as the latter progresses, so
its critique must find a point of negation from which it may be
considered a contingent, rather than a given arrangement.
It
is the dialectical understanding of history which provides
MarXist critique with this point.
In a significant departure
104
from
this
ideology
such
position,
is
Marcuse
disseminated
thoroughness
that
integra ted wi thin it.
considered
throughout
all
that
the
capitalist
consciousness
Only the realm of
dominant
society
and
with
discourse
is
the unconscious,
he
argued, can provide a point of negation to capitalist hegemony.
This position develops Lukacs' notion of the totality and
Gramsci's
theoretisation
dimensionality
which
prOpagating
spectrum of
a
of
hegemony
suggests
unified
social and
and
that
narrow
into
a
thesis
of
one-
capitalism
succeeds
in
world
across
the
view
discursive relations.
Such a
strong
thesis facilitates and necessitates a thorough critique of the
features of
for
no
contemporary society but, at the same time, allows
point
from
which
to
cri ticise
the
totali ty.
This
forced Marcuse into the untenable invocation of the unconscious
mind
as
the
only
realm
uncontaiminated
influence of the dominant hegemony.
and
free
from
the
105
THE POLITICS OF ONE-DIMENSIONALITY
.2!te-Dimensional
Man,
one
of
Marcuse' s
most
popular
and
influential books,
is a treatise on the ability of advanced
capitalist
to
society
integrate
all
dissenting
interests.
Central to his thesis is the assertion that this integration is
more comple te than a t any previous time, and tha t
the basic
freedom, authenticity, truths and meanings of individuals have
become dominated by a plethora of interconnected relations of
domination,
authority,
repression and distortion.
The very
instinctual structure, the language and the rationality of this
Society are integrated into a single dimension which precludes
the possibility of change.
This scenario reappears throughout
Marcuse's work, and his efforts were continually turned towards
the possibility of a definitive rupture with this system. The
extent of its integration makes the possibili ty of true and
authentic consciousness problematic:
rationality,
language,
and
Marcuse
sensibili ty
asserted
as
the
a
new
necessary
Contradiction to one-dimensional society.
For Marcuse,
Only
of
an
advanced capitalism is the reproduction not
economic
system
but
network of ideological values,
and satisfactions.
dimension
rationality
eXistence
and
and
of
consciousness,
also
of
this
expectations,
integrated
needs,
desires,
Consciousness is restricted to a single
experiences
reality.
two
only
Whereas
consciousnesses,
Marcuse
truncated
considered
conceptions
of
Gramsci
perceived
the
or
contradictory
one
consciousness
to
be
integrated within the Gramscian hegemony in its entirety. There
106
is
no
longer
a
contradiction within
consciousness,
operates instead within a single dimension.
longer
a
between
profound
the
obscured.
contradiction
constituent
Only
the
classes
unconscious
And as there is no
in
consciousness,
of
capitalist
mind
opposed to this singular dimension:
which
can
so
that
society
is
provide
a
realm
defined in the Freudian
terms of the pleasure principle, Marcuse's
unconscious is the
source of a multi-dimensional thinking which is the negation or
refusal of the reality principle.
In his analyses of advanced capitalism, therefore, Marcuse
worked within a fundamentally Freudian, rather than a Marxist
framework.
affluent,
Marcuse
'a
characterised
society which develops
advanced
to
a
capitalism
great
extent
as
the
material and even the cultural needs of man - a society which,
to use a slogan, delivers the goods to an ever larger part of
the population.' [77] This achievement is both the strength and
the weakness of capi tal ism :
it removes
the
'mass basis'
for
liberation in its integration of the working class, and at the
same time it
poses wi th increasing clari ty the contradiction
between how
its
resources
are used and how they could or,
Ultimately, ought to be used.
Marcuse argued tha t the condi tions of domina tion
advanced
capitalism
warrant
a
new
form
of
analysis
C.ritique.
We know very well that the social mechanisms of
manipulation, indoctrination, repression which are
responsible for this lack of a mass basis, for the
integration of the majority of the oppositional
forces into the established social system. But I must
emphasise
again
that
this
is
not merely
an
ideological integration; that it is not m~rely a
social integration; that it takes place prec1sely on
the strong and rich basis which enables the society
under
and
107
to develop and sa tis fy material and cultural needs
better than before. [78]
Marcuse
asserted
that
the
entire
individual
is
reified
according to the economic and ideological demands of advanced
capi talism, so there is no longer any reason to suppose that
the producing class has a privileged perspective which escapes
this
reifica tion
capitalist
and
dimension.
which
might
'Capitalist
therefore
progress
reduces the environment of freedom,
negate
the
not
only
thus
the "open space" of the
human existence, but also the "longing", the need for such ·an
environment.' [79]
Capitalism now produces, for the majority of the
population of the metropoles, not so much material
privation as steered satisfaction of material needs,
while making the entire human being - intelligence
and senses - into an object of administration geared
to produce and reproduce not only the goals but also
the
values
and
promises
of
the
system,
its
ideological heaven.
Behind the technological veil,
behind the political veil of democracy, appears the
reality of universal servitude, the loss of human
dignity in a prefabricated freedom of choice. [80]
This
thesis
the
entails
construction
of
a
'new
senSibility' as a prerequisite to social transformation. Akin
to
Gramsci's project of the establishment of a counterhegemony, Marcuse's sensibility is subject to the same paradox
of the necessity and the impossibility of such a construction
Within the totality of capitalist relations.
However, whereas
Gramsci's
counter-hegemony
is
to
relations
and
within
structures
an
attempt
and
as
eXperience of workers' councils or the mass
new sensibility is based on unconscious
denied
by
the
one-dimensionality
of
a
develop
result
Party,
of
new
the
Marcuse's
desire, repressed and
thought
Within capitalism, of the unconscious mind.
and
experience
Gramsci's factory
108
councils
produce
and
reproduce
a consciousness
tha t
is
the
negation of capitalist ideology, forms of organisation, social
relations
and
cultural
life;
in
Marcuse's
work
it
is
the
unconscious mind which produces and reproduces the negation of
a consciousness
The
dominated by capitalism.
tension between
constructing
an
the necessi ty and impossibili ty
alternative
world
view
within
a
of
reality
constituted by capitalist relations is therefore all the more
serious for Marcuse, since the thesis .of one-dimensionality all
but precludes the possibility of an alternative dimension.
For
LUkacs and, to a lesser extent, Gramsci, consciousness of the
totality in historical terms
active
negation.
consciousness
capitalist
is
is itself an imperative to its
integral
to
the
entirely
new
form
this
has
consciousness
of
that
of
the
in
and
that
an
sensibility,
is
become
so
of
individual
the
consciousness,
such
transcendence
the
insufficient for
dimension;
means
thesis
Marcuse's
a
new
embedded
necessary.
It will be argued here that Marcuse's postulation of the
Unconscious
mind
as
a
'free
realm'
on
which
such
a
consciousness might be built is untenable; even if it were to
be the source of desires which are the negation of the existing
arrangement of reality, the problem of their
the confines
of a consciousness already
d'
1mensional is insurmountable.
expression within
defined
as
one-
109
The transformation of the working class
In Qne-Dimensional Man, Marcuse argued that the perspective of
the proletariat can no longer be accepted as that of a class
in Contradiction to capitalism.
In order to ensure the
reproduction of the system as a whole, needs, desires, and the
field
from
which
manipula ted by
means
tha t
they
may
be
chosen
are
the demands of capi talism.
determined
and
For Marcuse,
this
people are encouraged to consume the alienated
commodities
they
were
once
coerced
merely
to
produce,
a
Situation which has transformed the nature and constitution of
the proletariat,
whose interests are integrated and confused
With those of the established social and discursive reality.
Re argued that
the assimilation of the proletariat is both
economic and ideological: it is robbed of
the objective need
and the subjective will to revolution.
Marcuse did
not suggest, however, that the
conditions of
domination and servitude which constitute capitalism disappear
in this development. On the contrary, he argued that they are
eXercised
with
a
sophistication which
belies
the
increased
breadth and profundity of their influence:
The extension of exploitation to a larger part of the
population, accompanied by a high standard of living,
is the reali ty behind the facade of the consumer
society; this reali ty is the unifying force, which
Integrates, behind the back of the individuals, the
widely different and conflicting classes of the
underlying population. [81]
The
basic
attribute
of
capitalist
society
is
the
one-
dimensionality of its consciousness, an4 the fundamental form
of its
domination is
that
of
the repression of alternative
110
dimensions.
that
is
In this schema, it is not merely the working class
dominated,
but
the
common
psychic
base
of
all
individuals that is repressed.
This led Marcuse to suggest that the Marxist definition of
the working class is inapplicable to the modern conditions of
capitalism.
Thus the masses are no longer simply those who are
dominated, but rather the governed who are no longer
in
opposi tion,
or whose
opposi tion
itself
is
integrated into the positive whole, as a calculable
and manipulative corrective that demands improvements
in the appara tus.
Wha t was previous ly a poli tical
Subject has become an object, and the antagonistic
interests that were previously irreconcilable seem to
have passed over into a true collective interest.[82]
The
individual
relations,
Social
becomes
goals,
control
is
a
microcosm
and
aspirations
not
merely
and
of
enforced
embodiment
of
the
capitalist
society.
from
but
above,
has
become 'introjected': disseminated at a profound level through
individual
and
private
experience.
This
introjection
of
capitalist values and relations means that they become 'second
nature'
or
therefore
'biologically
rooted'
integrated within
and
in
the
individual
identified
with
who
the
is
social
\\thole.
In Counterrevolution and Revol t,
the
demands
made
of
capitalist
cOnstituted by its relations.
Its
Marcuse sugges ted
society
are
population does
that
themselves
not make
authentic expressions of need and desire but identifies with
those which sustain the prevailing social organisation.
This
means that a transformation of the social whole will involve
the libera tion of
authentic desire.
Thus capi talism is not
Only able to satisfy needs, but also to define and cultivate
111
them·,
its
transformation
must
therefore
also
be
the
transformation of needs and desires.
In Marxist theory, originally, impoverishment meant
privation, unsatisfied vital needs, first of all
ma terial needs.
When this concept no longer
described the condition of the working classes in the
c;tdvanced industrial countries, it was reinterpreted
l.n terms of relative deprivation: relative to the
available social wealth, cultural impoverishment.
However, this reinterpretation suggests a fallacious
continuity in the transition to socialism, namely the
amelioration of life within the existing universe of
needs.
But what is at stake in the socialist
revolution
is
not
merely
the
extension
of
satisfaction within the existing universe of needs
not the shift in satisfaction from one (lower) level
to a higher one, but the rupture with this universe,
the qualitative lea~.
The revolution involves a
radical transformatl.on of needs and aspirations
themselves. [83]
This Position was developed in One-Dimensional Man, in which a
distinction is drawn between true and false needs.
are those
'biological needs'
of food,
The former
clothing, and shel ter;
~hereas the latter are:
those which are superimposed on the individual by
particular social interests, in his repression: the
needs which perpetuate toil, aggressiveness, misery,
and injustice... Most of the prevailing
needs to
relax, to have fun,
to behave and consume in
accordance with the advertisements, to love and hate
what others love and hate, belong to this category of
false needs. [84]
It is the introjection of these false needs that ensures that
capitalism enjoys the allegiance of the individual, whose own
true needs it denies and represses.
In An Essay on Liberation,
MarcUse wrote:
In
the
advanced
capi talis t
countries,
the
radicalisation of the working classes is counteracted
by a socially engineered arrest of consciousness, and
by the development of and satisfaction of needs which
perpetuate the servitude of the exploited. A vested
interest in the existing system is thus fostered in
the instinctual structure of the exploited, and the
rUpture within the continuum of repression
a
112
necessary ~recondition
occur. L85J
A clear dichotomy between
of
liberation
does
not
needs and their satisfaction - as
could be said to characterise economic privation - is concealed
by the closed circle of manufactured needs and satisfactions.
The result of this is that people:
recognise themselves in their commodities; they find
their soul in their automobile, hi-fi set, splitlevel home, ki tchen equipment.
The very
mechanism
which ties the individual to his society has changed,
and social control is anchored in the new needs it
has produced. [86]
Marcuse applied this cri tique not only to the circulation of
gOOds,
but
also
the
'means
of
mass
transportation
and
communication, the commodities of lodging, food and clothing,
the irresisti ble output of the entertainment and information
industry',
which
'carry
with
them
prescribed
attitudes
and
habits, certain intellectual and emotional reactions which bind
the consumers more or less pleasantly to the whole.' [87]
The possibility of change
In
,
two
his
'Introduction'
contradictory
industrial
society
to One-Dimensional Man, Marcuse posed
hypotheses',
is
one
being
that
capable of containing
'advanced
qualitative
Change for the foreseeable future'; the other, that 'forces and
tendencies exist which may break this containment and explode
this society.'
[88]
Marcuse continued to identify the working
class
these
forces
amongst
and
tendencies;
in An
Essay
~, for example, he wrote:
By virtue of its basic position in the production
process, by virtue of its numerical weight and the
on
113
weight of exploitation, the working class is still
the historical agent of revolution. L89]
On the other hand,
labour shares
the
middle
he argued tha t 'the maj ori ty of organised
the stabilising,
classes,
as
counterrevolutionary needs of
evidenced
by
their
behaviour
as
consumers of the material and cultural merchandise ••• ' [90] by
Virtue of its sharing the stabilising needs of the sys tern' ,
a , conserva t·l. ve,
Marcuse considered the working class to be
eVen
counter-revolutionary force.' The working class is still
Objectively
the potentially revolutionary class,
SUbjective awareness of its position.
mUch of
the Marxist
Marcuse diverged
thought
aWareness necessary to
no
This is a restatement of
considered above,
only in his
but has
assertion
that
from
the
which
subjective
the proletaria t' s self-realisa tion is
mOre deeply concealed by the relations of advanced capitalist
SOCiety. This unprecedented integration of the working class
means
that
the
possibilities
revOlutionary consciousness
Nevertheless,
of
the
development
of
a
are greatly reduced.
Marcuse considered that
the
technological
aChievements of capi tal ism have rendered the end of economic
necessity a real possibility.
The basic needs of sustenance
and shelter can be satisfied by the progress of
industrial
countries,
legitimation for
thus
robbing
them
of
the advanced
a
fundamental
the maintenance of alienated production and
forcing them to manufacture new needs. With the development of
the technical means to overcome and satisfy the demands of the
realm
of
necessi ty,
transformation
of
qUalitatively
different
there
quantity
appears
into
age.'
' the
quality,
[91]
In
chance
the
leap
of
into
the
a
114
automation, for example, Marcuse saw a 'dimension of free time
in which man's private and societal existence would constitute
itself.
This would be the historical transcendence toward a
new civilisation.'
Organise
society
[92]
In
according
other
to
words,
the demands
the
imperative
of
a
to
restrictive
reality principle concerned only with the struggle for survival
is lost, although its artificial perpetuation is necessary to
the survival of the capitalist mode of production.
This led Marcuse to advocate a utopian consciousness.
Industrial civilisation has reached the stage where
most of what could formerly be called Utopian now has
a
"topos"
among
the
real
possibilities
and
capabilities
of
this
civilisation...
Political
interes t in maintaining the s ta tus quo rather than
logical or scientific impossibilit~ today meakes real
Possibilites appear as Utopian.[93J
Marcuse
advocated
a
form
of
critical
analysis
capable
of
developing and fusing consciousness of the limits of existing
So °
Clety with that of the possibilities and validity of their
imaginative appropriation:
'radical ideas cease to be utopian
once the means to realise them exist, and at that point they
become
subversive
of
POlitical content.' [94]
the
social
order
that
denies
their
Utopianism is seen as an antidote to
the integrating powers of one-dimensionality which, he argued,
have precluded the possibility of a revolutionary working class
Consciousness.
SOCiety
to
Marcuse therefore looked to other sections of
carry
tranSformation.
the
Those
consciousness
groups
of
possibili ty
marginalised
by
and
one-
dimensionali ty,
amongs t
which Marcuse numbered
students,
ho
lPPies, artis ts,
and in tellec tuals,
re tain the possi bili ty
Of its negation. It is essential to the critical project that
115
SUch a negation can be made. If the working class can no longer
be said
to
experience the contradiction of
its relation
to
capitalism, a new critical base must be established.
Marcuse made it clear that dialectical
critique
cannot
be abandoned because of a contingent change in the conditions
of capitalist relations.
What if the forces that were to bring about the
transformation are suppressed and appear to be
defeated?
Little as the theory's truth is thereby
contradicted, it nevertheless appears then in a new
light which illuminates new aspects and elements of
its object ••• This situation compels theory anew to a
sharper
emphasis
on
its
concern
with
the
potentialisites of man and with the individual's
freedom, happiness and rights contained in all its
analyses. [95]
Regardless of
capi talis t
the
society,
one-dimensionali ty propaga ted by advanced
Marcuse asserted tha t
the contradictions
remain. Their concealment does not entail the abandonment of
the critical project but reasserts the necessity of exposing
these contradictions and the conditions under which they are
concealed. No longer able to pose this contradiction in Marxist
terms, Marcuse opposed a new form of thought, experience, and
behavl' OUr to eXlstlng
"
rea l't
1 y:
the radical change which is to transform the existing
society into a free society must reach into a
dimension of the human existence hardly considered in
Marxian theory - the "biological" dimension in which
the vital imperative needs and satisfactions of man
assert themselves. [96]
The Source of ,this consciousness, the imagination, desires, and
inst'lnc ti ve needs of the
unconscious mind, provides Marcuse
~ith the critical base from which the one-dimensionali ty of
capitalism may be negated.
116
THE MEMORY OF PLEASURE
If the nature of the individual is determined by the network of
capitalist
relations,
Marcuse
nevertheless
asserted
the
eXistence of a 'constant and fundamental reservoir of psychic
energy as the basis of thought and activity' [97]
the prevalent dimension.
opposed to
'With the publication
of his Eros
~d Civilisation in 1954, Marcuse adopted Freud's distinction
between the reali ty principle and the pleasure principle to
support this notion.
This enabled him to propose that
organised
solely
according
principle and at
Pleasure principle.
by
pleasure
principle,
dimension
from
all
of
which
repression of Eros,
of
the
reality
the
is
that
conceived
is
expressions
of
at
as
odds
ensues:
a
with
repressed
the
fantasy,
dry
art,
'metaphysical and poetic truths', and
radical political dissent.
the
the
one-dimensionality
speculation, sexuality,
are
demands
The realm of the unconscious, constituted
the
rationality
the
to
the cost of
advanced capitalism is
Such areas of thought and behaviour
liberation:
diverted
and
distorted
~ithin the confines of the reality principle, they nevertheless
emerge in contradiction to the latter. The unconscious mind is
therefore accorded a political significance in Marcuse's work;
it provides the common, objective, and ahistorical
base with
~hich capitalism, as the prevalent organisation of the reality
principle, might be negated.
In common with other Freudian revisionists, such as Fromm
and Reich, Marcuse held that the political implications he drew
117
from Freudian theory were implici t in the la t ter.
the
individual
is
governed by
gratification:
'in
terms
organism
is
directed
of
the
its
search
for
instinctual
towards
procuring
For Freud,
pleasure
and
structure,
the
pleasure:
it
is
dominated by the pleasure principle: the instincts strive for
Pleasurable release of tension,
needs.'
[98]
However,
for painless satisfaction of
the search for sa tisfaction is always
mitigated by the environment, the reality principle, in which
it
occurs.
Freud
therefore
maintained
that
some
level
of
instinctual repression is necessary to the functioning of all
SOCieties.
Freud's postulation of the inevitability of repression is
incompa tible wi th
that must
the Marxis t
be overcome
is
instinctual organisation.
a
assertion
feature
of
that
the domination
social,
rather
than
Philip Rieff noted the contrast:
For Marx, the past is pregnant with the future, with
the proletariat as the midwife of history.
For
Freud, the future is pregnant with the past, a burden
of which only the physician, and luck, can deliver
us. •• Revolution could only repea t the prototypal
rebellion against the father, and, in every case,
like it, be doomed to failure. [99]
Marcuse
also
accepted
that
some
level
of
repression
is
necessary to the functioning of society: the instincts are, he
¥lrote:
unsuited for the construction of a human society in
which a relatively secure satisfaction of needs is to
be possible ••• Thus, for culture and civilisation to
emerge, the pleasure principle has to be replaced by
another principle. one which makes society possible
and sustains it: the reality principle. [100]
Although Marcuse advocated the necessity of some mediation of
desire and considered the expression and realisation of raw
desire to be incompatible with the
establishment of society,
118
he did not argue that the extent of the repression necessary to
social
functioning
jUdged according
is
to
a
the
advanced capi talism,
constant;
social
structures
can
level of repression exercised.
there is
a surplus
be
In
of repression;
an
unnecessary imbalance between the pleasure principle and the
reality principle.
This
si tuation
revolution
which
principle.
can only
be
redressed
establishes
the
priority
through a
of
the
social
pleasure
'Civilisation arises from pleasure: we must hold
fast to this thesis in all its provocativeness'. [101] Although
Marcuse maintained
Freud's insistence on the inevitability of
the domination of the reality principle, he argued that in a
free Society,
a form of
the reality principle should manifest itself as
social organisation in as
Possible
with
the
desires
minimised
when
the
of
reality
great a harmony as
Eros.
Repression
principle
is
is
will
be
constructed
to
accommodate and reflect the demands of the pleasure principle.
This
thesis
entails
authentic expression of
the
the
assertion
that
Eros
is
the
individual and, as a consequence,
that its repression is the denial of the individual.
Mass production and mass distribution claim the
entire individual... In this process, the "inner"
aimension of the mind in which opposi tion to the
s ta tus quo can root is whi ttled down.
The loss of
this dimension, in which the power of negative
thinking...
is
at
home,
is
the
ideological
counterpart to the very material process in which
advanced industrial society silences and reconciles
the opposition. [102]
Marcuse suggested that the alienation identified by Marxism has
therefore
become
entrenched
to
such
an
extent
that
revOlutionary change as previously conceived is insufficient to
119
the transformation of the totality of relations.
Alienation is
not immediately experienced as an anomaly or privation: it has
become the reality of advanced capitalist society.
This identification is not illusory but reality.
However, the reality constitutes a more progressive
stage of alienation. The latter has become entirely
objective;
the
subject which
is
alienated
is
swallowed up by its alienated exis tence.
There is
only one dimension, and it is everywhere and in all
forms. [103]
The realm which is the source of liberation and contradiction
is denied
in an
alienation of
the conscious
self
from
its
unconscious desires; an alienation which is experienced as real
Within the one-dimensionality of advanced capitalist society.
Nevertheless , Marcuse's theory of instincts treats the desires
Of
the
unconscious
in
terms
of
a
universal
reality
Persis ts in spi te of its denial and repression.
which
It is this
UnderlYing reality which facilitated Marcuse's analysis of both
the conditions
of domination in advanced capitalist society,
and the possibilities of their
Marcuse's
. FreUdian
utopian ism
ideas
in his
is
work.
criticism and
a
clear
development
Speculative
cOnstructions of future possibilities
negation.
and
of
the
imaginative
and desired scenarios
are characterised as the introduction of the pleasure principle
into the affairs of the reality principle.
POSited as
the source of antagonistic
Utopianism
is
forms of experience,
thought, and social relations developed not only in relation to
the eXisting forms but also constituted by those imagined and
desired.
In
An
Essay
Uto p '
lanism not as:
on
Liberation,
Marcuse
characterised
120
regression to a previous stage of civilisation, but
return to an imaginary temps perdu in the real life
of mankind: progress to a stage of civilisation where
man has learned to ask for the sale of whom or what
he organises his society; to the stage where he
, checks and perhaps even halts his incessant struggle
for existence on an enlarged scale, surveys what has
been achieved through centuries of misery and
hecatombs of victims, and decides that it is
enough ••• [104]
The framework of the possible, the desired, and the imagined
~hich
is
facilitated
unconscious ,
by
renders
the
common
psychic
base
of
the
such thought valid wi thin a broadened
ConCeption of ra tionali ty.
Moreover, wi thin the unconscious
there is not merely the possibility of an imaginary age of
ciVilisation,
but
the memory of past individual experiences
unconstrained by the demands of the reality principle.
~ith Freud, Marcuse posited the
experience of
In line
'polymorphous
perversity' as the 'original' sexuality of the individual for
~hich the whole environment is eroticised.
Organism
'in
all
potential
field
its
for
activities
and
In infancy,
relationships
sexuality,
dominated
by
the
that
form of sexuality
is
the
a
pleasure
Principle.' [105]
Marcuse suggested
original,
this
merely
the
desire.
As such the liberation of
but
also
the
authentic
is
not
expression
of
the memory of
these pas t
eXperiences 'yields critical standards which are tabooed by the
Present ••• The recherche du temps perdu becomes the vehicle of
future liberation.'[106]
In the 'polymorphous perversity' of
early childhood, sexuality is unspecific in terms of the areas
of
ero tic pleasure and the nature of the search for
gratification:
in terms
of
their object,
the
indifferent with respect to one's
instincts are
own and other
121
bodies; above all they are not localised in specific
parts of the body or limi ted to special functions.
The
primacy
of
genital
sexuality
and
of
reproduction ••• is ••• a late achievement of the
reality principle, that is, a historical achievement
of human society in its necessary struggle against
the pleasure yrinciPle, which is not compatible with
society. [107
This pregenital sexuality is brought into line with the demands
of the prevailing reality principle; the energies which might
otherwise
continue
POlymorphous
to
be
expended
the
search
for
channelled
into
the
the social organisation.
This
perverse gratification
production and reproduction of
in
is
process necessitates the 'desexualisation' of the individual, a
repression of desire which is exercised through its diversion,
sUperficial
satisfaction,
or
denial.
Taboos
are
imposed
against desires which contradict the
effective operation of
the reali ty
tha t
principle
becomes self-policing;
to
the extent
their
enforcement
sexuality is allowed to surface only in
~ays which allow for the smooth functioning of the organisation
Of reality
and entail the 'desensualising' of sexuality
through,
for
example,
the
mediation of
love,
which Marcuse
describes as 'one of the greatest achievements of civilisation
.. and
one
of
the
latest.
It
alone
makes
the
patriarchal
mOnogamous family and healthy "nucleus" of society.' [108] The
reality principle exerts its power over 'one's own nature, over
the sensual drives that want only pleasure and gratification.'
[109]
Marcuse
asserted
that
the
values
and
ca .
Pltalism are introjected in the individual
relations
of
to the extent
that they have become 'second nature' or 'biologically rooted'
SUch
that
'the
counterrevolution'
is
'anchored
in
the
122
ins tinc tual s truc ture. ' [110] They are accepted by the en tire
individual as real and
authentic at the expense of the true
authenticity of desire.
The supersession of capitalism thus
entails
of
the
extrication
liberation of the unconscious.
the
authentic
individual:
For Marcuse,
the
this meant that
the development of a Gramscian counter-hegemony must be more
than the construction of an authentic consciousness; it must be
the liberation of the authenticity of the unconscious realm.
Marcuse suggested that social values exert an influence on
the individual at a most fundamental level.
Those disseminated
\\7ithin advanced capitalist society have become so entrenched
that
an
entirely
establishment
of
an
new
sensibility
entirely
new
must accompany
society.
Marcuse
the
argued
that 'changes in morality may "sink down" into the "biological"
dimension and modify organic behaviour.'
Once a specific morality is firmly established as a
norm of organic behaviour, it is not only introjected
- it also operates as a norm of "organic" behaviour;
the organism receives and reacts to certain stimuli
and "ignores" and repels others in accordance wi th
the introjected morality, which is thus promoting or
impeding the
function of the organism as a living
cell in the respective society ••• unless the revolt
reaches into this "second" nature, into these ingrown
patterns,
social change will remain "incomplete",
even self-defeating. [111]
Marcuse
,
argued
that
a
revolution
radical transvaluation of values'
that
does
not
entail
a
[112] will be partial and
hence unsuccessful, and that only the
cultivation of a new
senSibility within the existing society and in order to cause a
rUPture with it, can ensure that such a transformation will be
trUly of the totali ty.
The depth of the acceptance of the
dam'lnant values means
that this sensibility must be developed
123
as a precondi tion
for revolutionary change in
totality of the capitalist system.
the base and
'A qualitatively new mode
of existence can never be envisaged as the mere by-product of
economic and political changes, as the more or less spontaneous
effect of the
new institutions which constitute the necessary
prerequisite. I
[113J
This
new mode
of
existence
must
be
prefigured by:
a type of man with a different sensitivity as well as
consciousness: men who would speak a different
language, have different gestures, follow different
impulses: men who have developed an instinctual
barrier aganist cruelty, brutality, ugliness. [114J
Just as Gramsci argued the necessity of a counter-hegemony, a
socialist
consciousness,
so
Marcuse
extended
this
to
the
necessity of a socialist sensibility which cannot wait until
,
after the revolution' to be realised.
A Marxist analysis cannot seek comfort "in the long
run".
In this "long run", the system will indeed
collapse, but Marxian theory cannot prophesy which
form of society (if any) will replace it. Within the
framework
of
the
objective
conditions,
the
aLternatives (fascism or socialism) depend on the
intelligence and the will, the consciousness and the
sensibili ty, of human beings.
I t depends on their
still existing freedom. [115J
The
new
sensibility
ins tinc ti ve
,
grounded
in
and unconscious des ires
Or diverted within
the
is
the
authenticity
of
which are ei ther denied
one-dimensional society. Marcuse identified
'biological need
for
freedom'
as
one
of
those demands
~hich must be satisfied and for which no adequate substitution
can be provided'.
This need for
liberation is continually
frustrated by the domina tion of the reality principle, since
all liberation 'depends on the consciousness of servitude, and
the emergence of this consciousness is always hampered by the
124
predominance of needs
and satisfactions
which,
to a great
extent, have become the individual's own.' [116]
The persistance of the desire or need for liberation is
eXplained by the
assertion that
COntinually recalls
which
integral
the unconscious dimension
'past stages of individual development at
gratification
is
obtained.
And
the
past
COntinues to claim the future: it generates the wish that the
paradise
be
created
on
the
basis
of
the
achievements
of
capitalism.' [117]
To compare potential freedom with existing freedom,
to see the latter ~n the light of the former,
presupposes that at the present stage of civilisation
much of the toil, renunciation, and regulation
imposed upon men is no longer justified by scarcity,
the struggle for exis tence, poverty, and weakness.
Society could afford a high degree of instinctual
liberation without losing what it has accomplished or
putting a stop to its progress.
The basic trend of
such liberation as indicated by Freudian theory,
~ould
be the recovery of a large part of the
~nstinctual energy diverted to alienated labour, and
its release for the fulfilment of the autonomously
developing needs of individuals. [118]
this
recovery
of
the
self
is
intended
as
a
fundamental
challenge to the ra tionali ty of one-dimensionali ty which has
developed at the expense of the
imagination, desire, fantasy,
and a whole host of other states and experiences of the world.
the
virtue of Freudian theory is tha t such experience is
validated by its own authenticity.
As
a
fundamental,
independent
mental
process,
phantasy has a truth value of its own, which
corresponds to an experience of its own, namely, the
surmounting
of
an
antagoni s tic human
reality.
Imagination envisions the reconciliation of the
individual
with
the
whole,
of
desire
with
realisation, of happiness with reason. [119]
the prevalent conception of reason is truncated and confined to
the demands made of it by the reality principle, which requires
125
the smooth and uninterrupted affirmation of that which exists.
This
essential
positivism
denies
the
possibility
Contradiction in thought as well as social relations,
defined by Marcuse as
only
a
the
functioning
Parameters
of
one-dimensional
Circulation
within
relations
of
and was
technological ra tionali ty concerned
with
a
of
of
reality
domination,
thought
within
experience.
principle
reason
becomes
the
narrow
Confined
to
characterised
by
instrument
of
an
domination.
The development of reason as an instrument of liberation,
in which the reality principle could be guided by the liberated
desires of the pleasure principle, is therefore posed as the
necessary
precondition
of
revolutionary
change.
Such
a
development cannot be relied on to appear as a consequence of
economic transformation.
Indeed, it
must be developed within
and in contradiction to the conditions of domination of onedimensional
society
since,
by
virtue
of
reason as
an
reason
is
the prerequisite of critique.
forms
of
thought
instrument of domination,
which
can
challenge
a
the
prevalence
of
liberated form of
The liberation of
the
prevailing
one-
dimensionality is the prerequisite to political action; indeed,
i
t assumes such an importance that the liberation of reason
becomes
of
change
in
reconstruction of society
demands
'a new language to define
an
agent
itself.
Further,
the
and communicate the new 'values' (language in the wider sense
which includes words, images, gestures, tones)'.
the degree to which a revolution is developing
3ualitatively
different
social
conditions
and
relationships may perhaps be indicated by
the
development of a different language: the rupture with
126
the continuum of domination mus t also be a rupture
with the vocabulary of domination.[120]
Marcuse
saw precisely
poetry
of
the
such a
Surrealist
rupture with
movement,
the
language
in
the
subcultures
of
the
1960s, and the discourse and events of 1968.
Marcuse developed the notion of
a
realm of thought and
experience which has an independence and validity outside of
the exis ting conceptions
of reason and reali ty.
From
this
realm, a liberated rationality, suffused with the constructs of
the
imagination,
Cultivated
as
fantasy,
the
desire,
or
refusal
and
creativity,
negation
of
can
be
one-dimensional
thought and experience. Thus Marcuse sought not to restore an
historical
consciousness,
governed
by
realisa tion of
the
but
pleasure
desires
and
an
imaginative
principle,
the products
one
which,
will
demand
of
imagination
the
the
denied and repressed by the exis ting reali ty principle,
the
destruction of
this
the system of relations which effects
repression,
and the construction of a society in accordance
~ith these
desires.
Critical
discourse
must
therefore
engage
in
the
development of this liberated rationality; to this end it must
COUnter
relations
positivist affirmations of the existing concepts and
by
introducing
fantasy
and
speculation
and
imagination into its own critical discourse: 'without fantasy,
all philosophical knowledge remains inthe grip of the present
and past and severed from the future, which is the only link
between philosophy
and
the
real history
of mankind.'
[121]
Analysis of the given should be abandoned in favour of
the
Critical negation of that which is given from the perspective
127
of tha t which is
possible or desired.
The antagonisms that
Were once clear - particularly tha t between classes - having
been diffused, contradiction must be developed on a new level:
that between the real and the desired.
Repressive desublimation
The instinctual striving
cannot grant'
for
'a gratification which culture
persists in spite of
its denial by the one-
dimensionality of thought and experience. Erotic satisfaction
of all sorts is reduced to the demands of a specific and
trunca ted sexuali ty,
desire
to
'return'
gratification.
This
buts till
to
the
desire
there remains an ins tinc tual
stage
of
complete
persists
as
the
erotic
negation
of
advanced capitalist society and, according to Katz:
offends against the prevailing rationality of toil,
renunciation and
forbearance which sustains the
reality principle of the present epoch
the
"performance
principle"...
Accordingly,
it
has
suffered
the
fate
of
the
truly
revolutionary
opposition: imprisonment (in this case "repression")
or exile to the sheltered redoubts of art, mythology,
and
fairy
tale,
where
an
unreal
"aesthetic
rationality" is admitted to pertain. [122]
In other words,
desires
that would disrupt or threaten
functioning of society are
the
ei ther denied any expression or
else are allowed to appear in conditions defined and authorised
by the prevalent reality principle.
The surplus repression
necessary to the functioning of advanced capitalist society is
leg·ltlmised
.
by a one-dimensional rationality itself affirmative
of the one-dimensionality of the experience of reality. Marcuse
aSs e r t ed, however, tha t the exercise of surplus
repression
128
means that the reality principle is always in an antagonistic
relation to
the repressed desires.
These are removed from
consciousness, but are constant by virtue of their domination
of the unconscious mind.
Marcuse argued that advanced capitalist society is able to
satisfy
desires
proclaim
and
their
,interrupting its one-dimensionali ty.
This occurs
,
repressive desublimation'
liberation
of desire.
Marcuse
without
through the
observed,
for
eXample, that advanced capitalism allows an unprecedented level
of sexual freedom, although it should be noted
that the
generalisation
of
this
observation
has
been
rendered
problematic by the 'return to Victorian values' of the later
twentieth
century.
liberalisation
of
liberation
desire,
affirms
of
Marcuse
Nevertheless,
to
be
the
and,
by
extension,
the
allowed
only
inasmuch as
it
norms
sexual
considered
the existing reali ty principle.
results is of a very specific kind.
The sexuali ty which
It is that of 'the sexy
office and sales girls, the handsome, virile junior executive
and
floor
worker';
it
operates
in
an
overtly
sexual
but
Strangely unerotic environment:
Shops and offices open themselves through huge glass
windows and expose their personnel; inside, high
COunters and non-transparant parti tions are coming
down. The corrosion of privacy in massive apartment
houses and suburban homes breaks the barrier which
formerly separated the individual from the public
existence and exposes more easily the attractive
qualities of other wives and other husbands. [123]
Thus although the sexuality permitted within one-dimensionality
is
,
'infinitely
Part
and
more
parcel
of
nowhere its negation.
realistic,
the
daring,
society
uninhibited',
in which
it
it
is
happens,
but
What happens is surely wild and obscene,
129
virile and tas ty, qui te immoral -
and, precisely because of
that,
In
perfectly
harmless.'
[124]
effect,
a
compromise,
heavily weighted in favour of the reality principle, is reached
With
the
desires
of
the
pleasure
principle.
These
are
permitted an expression as long as they affirm or accord with
the functioning of the social organisation.
Marcuse extended this analysis
to all desires repressed
by the one-dimensionality of the reality principle since, as he
wrote in One-Dimensional Man,
'this society turns everything
it touches into a potential source of progress and of
eXPloitation, of drudgery and satisfaction, of freedom and of
oppression.'
instincts
[125] Nevertheless, Marcuse' s assertion tha t the
provide
a
common
psychic
base
on
which
the
POssibilities of contradiction and change are based entails the
acceptance of a universal structure to consciousness.
In spite
Of
contain
the
capacity
of
advanced
capitalist
itself within a single dimension,
possibili ty
desire
tha t
society
to
there remains the constant
the reali ty or authentici ty of
will emerge in opposition to it.
ins tinctual
130
REPRESSIVE TOLERANCE
The title of one of his most controversial essays, 'repressive
tOlerance'
is
work.
extends
It
a notion
considered above
which
which appears
the
notion
and considers
contradicts
and
throughout
of
repressive
that
the
therefore
Marcuse's
desublimation
toleration of
threatens
that
the
one-
dimensionality of advanced capitalism is used as an effective
means of denying the contradiction and disarming the threat.
In Eros and Civilisation,
repressive
society,
development
are
defined as
values
Marcuse
individual
happiness
contradiction
in
to be
observed tha t
to
society;
realised wi thin
become themselves repressive.'
[126J
and
this
'in a
productive
if
they
are
society,
they
This is applied in One-
~nsional Man to the values of freedom of speech, thought and
conscience: 'Once institutionalised, these rights and liberties
shared the fate of
the society of which they had become an
integral part'[127J;
'Under the rule of a repressive whole,
liberty can be made into a powerful instrument of domination.'
[128]
Independence of thought, autonomy, and the right to
political opposition are being deprived of their
?asic critical function by a society which seems
7ncreasingly capable of satisfying the needs of the
1ndividuals through the way in which it is organised.
Such a society may justly demand acceptance of its
principles
and
institutions,
and
reduce
the
oPposi tion to the discussion and promotion of
alternative policies within the status quo. [129J
This s1tuation
.
is variously described as the , happy marriage of
the Positive and the negative' and the 'flattening out if the
COntrast
(or
conflict)
between
the given
and
the
possible,
131
between the satisfied and the unsatisfied.'[130]
What Marcuse
wished to convey is the difficulty of sustaining any position
in Contradiction to the established organisation of reality.
One-dimensionality
antagonistic
in
the
operates
dimensions,
whole.
Thus
not
the
by
exclusion
of
but their integration and inclusion
th e
appearance
0f
con t ra d'1C t'10n
,
1S
maintained to the detriment of any real distinction.
In
'Repressive
Tolerance',
Marcuse
stated
that
the
development of advanced capitalist society into the democratic
totali tarianism of one-dimensionali ty means tha t
the exercise
Of 'pure tolerance', the impartial acceptance of all opinion or
action,
has no place in ei ther the exis ting society or the
forces
that
Political
seek
to
theory,
change
it.
The
tolerance
of
liberal
specifically
that
defined
by
Mill,
presupposes an equality and rationality which is absent in oned'lmensional
society, in which 'false consciousness has become
the general consciousness'.
[131]
The achievement of such
aUthentic tolerance is therefore dependent on the establishment
of
such equali ty and rationality, a self-determination and
aUtonomy of thought,. and this in turn is said to entail the
Practice of intolerance towards the forces which
prevent this
development.
The
belief
competition
is
that
ideas
integral
nev ertheless
determines
ob J' ect' ,
1v1ty,
and
and
engage
one-dimensional
to
tolerance
opinions
context
in
,
occur.
It is
in
a
society,
the
which
fair
which
balance,
the whole which
determines the truth'[132], wrote Marcuse, and since the whole
is defined as repressive and one-dimensional,
that which is
132
defined as true, and therefore encouraged or tolera ted, will
also be repressive. Thus:
the exercise of poli tical rights (such as voting,
letter-writing to the press, to Senators, etc.,
protest demonstrations with a priori renunciation of
counterviolence)
in
a
society
of
total
administration,
serves
to
strengthen
this
administration by testifying to the existence of
democratic liberties which, in reality, have changed
their content and lost their effectiveness. [133]
Marcuse
asserted
that
the
tolerance
democratic liberties is a chimera. The
enshrined
in
such
appearance of a true
impartiality and objectivity is retained within a society which
denies the possibility of change in the whole. The result is
that:
those minorities which strive for a change of the
whole itself will, under optimal conditions which
rarely prevail, be left free to deliberate and
discuss, to speak and to assemble - and will be left
harmless and helpless in the face of the overwhelming
~ajori ty.
This majori ty is firmly grounded in the
l.ncreasing satisfaction of needs, and technological
and mental co-ordination, which testify to the
general helplessness of radical groups in a wellfUnctioning social system.' [134]
While
'all points of view can be heard',
the whole wi thin
Vihich they are presented means that they assume an equivalence
Vihich robs them of their intrinsic significance: 'the stupid
oPinion is
one,
treated with the same respect as the intelligent
the misinformed may
talk as
long as
the informed,
and
Propaganda rides along wi th educa tion, truth wi th falsehood.'
The ' marketplace of ideas is organised and delimited by those
Viho determine the national and the individual interest',
so
that 'opinions and "philosophies" can no longer compete
peacefully for adherence on rational grounds.' [135]
133
It is clear that the
thesis of one-dimensionality has an
unprecedented breadth. False consciousness is accepted as real;
meaning
is
defined
within
a
narrow
rationality;
circumscribed by the interests of the whole.
truth
is
The prevailing
discourse is sustained not by the exercise of intolerance - the
coercive prevention of opposition and dissent - but by virtue
of
its
tolerance.
Almost
anything
is
tolerable
within
a
COntext which denies the possibility of fundamental change.
Other words can be spoken and heard, other ideas can
be expressed, but, at the massive scale of the
conser~ive
majority ( ••• ), they are immediately
"evaluated" (i.e. automatically understood) in terms
of the public language - a language which determines
a priori the direction in which the thought process
moves. Thus the process of reflection ends where it
started: in the given conditions and relations.
Self-validating, the argument of the discussion
repels the contradiction because the antithesis is
redefined in terms of the thesis. [136]
The implication of this is that dialectical thought, and hence
er' ,
1 tlcism,
is denied:
'in a democracy with totalitarian
organisation, objectivity may ••• foster a mental attibrle which
tends
to
obli terate
informa tion
and
the
difference between
true and
false,
and
wrong. '
[137]
indoctrination,
right
Contradiction is allowed to arise because the possibili ty of
its
development into a serious threat is denied by the
preval'll' ng
one-dimensionality;
on 1 y
t he
threat
of
violent
assault has tolerance withheld.
Under a system of constitutionally guaranteed and
(generally and without too many and too glaring
exceptions) practiced civil rights and liberties,
oPposition and dissent are tolerated unless they
issue in violence and/or in exhortation to and
organisation of violent subversion.
The underlying
assumption is that the established society is free,
and that any improvement, even a change in the social
structure and social values, would come about in the
normal course of events, prepared, defined, and
tes ted in free and equal discussion, on the open
134
marketplace of ideas and goods.[138]
Marcuse asserted that pure tolerance is possible only with the
aChievement of a society not dominated by particular interests.
,
Free and equal discussion can fulfil the function attributed
to it only if it is rational - expression and development of
independent thinking,
extraneous
free from indoc trina tion, manipula tion,
authority.'[139]
Objectivity presuppose
that
Pure
tolerance
'the people must
and
authentic
be capable
of
deliberating and choosing on the basis of knowledge, that they
mUst have access to authentic information, and that, on this
basis,
their
evaluation
must
be
the
result
of
autonomous
thought.' [140] Since one-dimensionali ty is cons ti tuted by the
manipulation the framework in which
SUggested that
meaning arises,
the achievement of free,
equal,
Marcuse
and rational
debate necessitates the denial of that which would oppose it.
COunter repression
In his advocation of some form of counter repression, Marcuse
is close to the Leninist position that bourgeois ideology must
be COuntered by proletarian ideology; for Marcuse, the exercise
of repressive
tolerance must be opposed by
the exercise
intolerance.
if it is necessary to break the established universe
of meaning ( ••• ) in order to enable man to find out
what is true and false, this deceptive impartiality
would have to be abandoned ••• But this means that the
trend would have to be reversed: they would have to
get information slanted in the opposite direction •••
This rupture - prerequisite and token of all freedom
of thought and of speech - cannot be accomplished
within
the
established
framework
of
abstract
tolerance and spurious objectivity because these are
of
135
Thus
precisely the factors which precondition
against the rupture. [141]
the
the
involves
the
'inhuman'
and
'restoration
repression
,
of
what
of
freedom
Marcuse
of
thought'
defines
as
mind
repressive' thinking [142].
Marcuse
asserted
repressive, but
Of a form of
distortion
to
that
such
also irrational.
reason
be
an
which
tolerance
is
not
merely
This entails the postulation
survives
instrument
of
its
one-dimensional
liberation.
Marcuse's
endorsement of the notion of authenticity, of the individual,
So .
Clety, and consciousness, meant that he is able to contrast
the possibility of its realisation with its denial in existing
sOCiety.
This identifies a contradiction between the existing
and the possible to which Marcuse returned throughout his work.
In
spite
of
the
repression
and
containment
of
one-
dimens lona
.
1·lty, a conSClousness
.
..
..
capa bl e 0 f crl. t·lClslng
eXlstlng
SOCiety is possible: 'the experience and understanding of the
ex·
lstent society may well be capable of identifying what is not
conducive
to
a
free and rational society,
dis torts
the poss i bili ties
SOCiety
is directly opposed to freedom and reason and:
of
what impedes
its creation.'
[143]
and
Exis ting
compels the vast majority of the population to earn
~heir
living in stupid, inhuman and unnecessary
Jobs ••• conducts its booming business on the back of
ghettos,
slums,
and
internal
and
external
colonisation...
is
infested with
violence
and
repression. • • and,
in
order
to
sus tain
the
profi table productivi ty on which its hierarchy
depends, utilises its vast resources for waste,
destruction, and an ever more methodical creation of
conformist needs and satisfactions. [144]
Cons C10usness
.
of existing society as repressive is made
Possible
by
the
discrepancy
between
the
achievements
of
136
advanced capitalism - cultural, philosophical, and especially
technological -
and
the poverty
and
one-dimensionali ty
of
their use. This poses a contradiction that becomes increasingly
clear as capi talism continues to develop.
The contradiction
between
that
the
real
and
the
possible
is
between
one-
dimensional and authentic consciousness, and since the latter
includes the dimensions repressed in the unconscious mind, it
develops
as
the
of
nega tion
the
existing
COntradiction between the given and the possible,
So .
Clety produces a consciousness
In
reality.
the
repressive
capable of discerning this
COntradiction.
This provided Marcuse with the basis on which to develop a
critique of existing society
conception
repressed
of
dimensions
as irrational in contrast to the
a
rational
of
thought
society which draws
to
further
on
authentic
the
human
interests.
TOlerance of free speech is the way of improvement,
of progress in liberation, not because there is no
objective truth, and improvement must necessarily be
a compromise between a variety of opinions, but
because there is an objective truth which can be
discovered,
a~ertained
only
in
learning
and
Comprehending that which is and that which can be and
ought to be done for the sake of improving the lot of
mankind. [145]
'l'his
critical
substitutes
consciousness
eXercised by one-dimensional society with
those
forces
which
seek
its
the
tolerance
that of tolerance to
supersession
in
favour
of
a
rational, egalitarian, and free society.
As such, it realises
that
Suppression
tolerance
is
a
'partisan
goal'.
of
the
regressive ones 'is a prerequisite for the strengthening of the
Progressive ones.'
[146]
So although
freedom of thought and
137
eXpression is defined as a precondi tion to freedom from onedimensionality,
tOlerance.
and
this
seems
to
imply
some
notion
of
But this tolerance:
cannot be indiscriminate and equal with respect to
the contents of expression, neither in word nor in
deed; it cannot protect false words and wrong deeds
which demonstrate that they contradict and counteract
the possibilities of liberation ••• where freedom and
happiness themselves are at stake: here, certain
things cannot be said, certain ideas cannot be
expressed, certain policies cannot be proposed,
certain behaviour cannot be permitted without making
tolerance an instrument for the continuation of
servitude. [147J
Thus the realisation of an authentic tolerance is possible only
through
and
'intolerance toward
opinions,
a tti tudes,
and
the
prevailing policies,
extension
of
tolerance
at ti tudes,
to
policies,
and opinions which are outlawed or suppressed.'
[148J
Marcuse's claim is really tha t
the democra tic means and
values with which advanced capitalist society can be challenged
are deSigned to lend it affirmation and support. To speak of a
rUpture
in
these
liberties
is
to
endorse
those
expressions
~h'
lch the society does outlaw and suppress: violent subversion
Of
,
the
democratic
Freedom is
a
process:
liberation,
a
the
exercise
of
intolerance.
specific ' his torical process
in
theory and practice, and as such it has its right and wrong,
its truth and falsehood.' [149J
Marcuse's identification of a
rational and egalitarian society
as the only possible
en .
Vlronment of pure tolerance led him to advocate intolerance
Of the forces that
sustain one-dimensionality
and so prevent
the
this
development
realisation
of
environment.
This
is
POSSible only in the framework of an emancipatory rationality:
138
'In the
society at
large,
the mental
space
for
denial and
reflection must first be recreated.' [150]
Nevertheless, in
'Repressive Tolerance', Marcuse insisted
that the proletariat no longer embodies this space: 'The forces
of emancipation cannot be
identified with any
social class
~hich, by virtue of its material condition, is free from false
ConSciousness.
Today,
hopelessly
dispersed
throughout the society •• ' [151]
If the proletariat
no longer
occuPies
a
privileged function
in relation
critical
negation
of
the whole,
negation assumes
they
the
are
rational
an unprecedented
eXpression wherever it appears.
to
the
construction
significance,
of
this
as does
its
It is for this reason that a
critical consciousness must be developed as the 'mental space'
in which 'forces of emancipation' can flourish.
In a world in which the human faculties and needs are
arrested or perverted, autonomous thinking leads into
a 'perverted world': contradiction and counter-image
of the established world of repression. And this
Contradiction is not simply stipulated, is not simply
the product of confused thinking or phantasy, but is
the lo~ical development of the given, the existing
world. l152]
Marcuse's
claim
tha t
a
true consciousness
can be
developed
through rational reflection, coupled with his assertion that
this consciousness is largely
absent by virtue of the oned lmensionality
'
meant that the
of advanced capitalism,
nece Ssary rupture in democratic liberties must be exercised
against
the
will
Stabilising force.
of
the
majority,
already
And if this rupture
defined
as
a
entails the subversion
and violence which alone are not tolerated by the
existing
SOCiety,
this
that
negates
the
will
be
justifiable
impossibility
of
on
change
the
grounds
established
by
it
one-
139
dimensionality.
Such extremes are
whole of society is
justifiable 'only if the
in ex treme danger.
I
maintain
tha tour
Society is in such an emergency si tua tion , and tha t i t has
become the normal state of affairs.' [153]
Marcuse's
conclusion
is
inescapable:
intolerance
is
necessary for the establishment of the equality and autonomy of
thought presupposed by
this
intolerance?
tolerance. Who,
Marcuse
suggested
'learned
to
think ra tionally
through
the
institution
dictatorship
of
free
is to exercise
that
those
and autonomous ly'
of
men'.
then,
the
context
domination of advanced capitalist society,
small number indeed.'[154]
have
will do
so,
'democratic
a
In
who
educational
of
the
total
'this would be a
Marcuse argued that some notion of
'd'
lctatorship' is therefore necessary since we are faced not
With a choice between democracy and dictatorship but two forms
of
dictatorship:
one
which
exercises
repressive
tolerance
towards its critics and one which would not tolerate this form
of repression.
However, in his 1968 Postscript to 'Repressive Tolerance',
Marcuse stated
that 'the alternative to the established semi-
democra tic proces s is no t a dicta torship or eli te, no ma t ter
how intellectual
democracy.'
This
or
intelligent,
struggle is
but
the
struggle
partly
'the
fight
for
real
against an
ideology of tolerance which, in reality, favours and fortifies
the conservation of the status quo
of inequality and
discrimination' and, as such, it will involve the practice of
'd'
1Scriminating tolerance' exercised by some minority capable
of achieving a rational
understanding of this reality.
140
The tolerance which is the life element, the token of
a free society, will never be the gift of the powers
that be; it can, under the prevailing conditions of
tyranny by the majority, only be won in the sustained
effort of radical minorities, willing to break this
tyranny and to work for the emergence of a free and
sovereign
maj ori ty
minori ties
intolerant,
militantly intolerant and disobedient to the rules of
behaviour which tolerate destruction and suppression.
[155]
Can intolerance really be invoked as a means to the achievement
of
tolerance?
asserted
a
'difference
Marcuse
between
revolutionary
and
reactionary
violence,
between
violence
practised by the oppressed and by the oppressors' [156], but
th'1s leaves us with the question of the validity of violence or
intolerance exercised on behalf of the oppressed. This again
returns us to the necessity of an emancipatory rationality, a
l'b
1 erated consciousness, an autonomy of thought.
Clearly Marcuse's thesis involves the assertion that such
a
consciousness
must
restored
be
or
developed
as
the
Precondition to the rupture in the whole that might establish a
free ,
equa 1 ,
' lsoc1ety.
'
and rat10na
Marcuse
' d
recognl.se
t he
Paradox of this position. The consciousness which could repress
regressive
forces,
would
recognise
that
'where
freedom
and
hapPiness themselves are at stake: here, certain things cannot
be said,
cannot
be
certain ideas cannot be expressed, certain policies
proposed,
certain
behaviour
cannot
be
permitted
~ithout making tolerance an instrument for the continuation of
Servi tUde
[157].
already
presupposes
,
But its abili ty to practise intolerance
the
radical
goal
which
it
seeks
aChieve' [158], such that:
the
systematic
withdrawal
of
tolerance
toward
regressive and repressive opl.nl.ons and movements
could only be envisaged as resul ts of large-scale
pressure which would amount to an upheaval. In other
to
141
words, it would presuppose that which is still to be
accomplished: the reversal of the trend. [159J
How, therefore, is such a consciousness to be achieved, when
all the forces Marcuse identifies with advanced capitalism are
Committed to its denial? In terms which anticipate those later
developed by Foucault, Marcuse
suggested that 'resistance at
particular occasions, boycott, non-participation at the local
and small group level may perhaps prepare the ground' [160J for
a
consciousness
longer
no
can
which
proletarian negation of the whole.
be
sought
in
the
Authenticity is all but
precluded by the false consciousness of the majority, and it is
the 'radical minority' which must cultivate the 'mental space
for denial and reflection'
notions
of
specific
in the
resistance
'society a t
and
localised,
large'.
The
small
scale
critique are intended to facilitate this mental space through
their diversity and autonomy.
Taken
Sets
of
together,
re la tions
such areas
produce
the
of
resis tance to particular
space
for
the
Grea t
Refusal
\\1hich Marcuse claimed to see in the events of 1968. Marcuse
SUggested that this refusal can break through the totality of
one-dimensional relations
to cons ti tute
a critique of
this
totali ty. Marcuse saw the counter-cul tural resis tance offered
by
the
s tuden ts
aesthetic ,
and
and
hippies,
environmental
blacks,
movements
gays,
to
f eminis t,
prefigure
the
cOnstitution of this critique.
For
Marcuse,
a
rupture
in
consciousness
Prerequisi te for the nega tion of the totali ty.
was
the
Nevertheless,
the problem remains that all attempts at such a rupture will
themselves
be
received
within
the
context
of
one-
142
dimensionality.
vUlnerable
Tolerated
to
,
the
very
that
the
problems
Repressive Tolerance'.
observation
by
latter,
identified
they
by
will
be
Marcuse
in
This point was made by Marcuse in his
a
'within
repressive
society,
even
Progressive movements threaten to turn into their opposite to
the degree to which they accept the rules of the game.' [161]
To accept the rules of the present notion of tolerance would
therefore be to welcome one "s own repression.
And yet, on the
other
tolerance
Cr'
hand,
it
is
only
by
virtue
,
ltlque can exist at all.
of
this
Marcuse seems to have suggested
that cri tique would be more effective if
subjected
to
that
rather
than
a
tolerant
t1arcUse
wrote that this situation
it was
suppressed
repression.
Indeed,
'implies the necessity, for
the dissenting group or individuals, to become illegitimate if
and When the established legi timacy prevents and counteracts
the development of dissent.' [162]
This, then, is one answer to the question of how critique
is
to
avoid
the
repression
of
tolerance.
But
in
his
development of the notion of the aesthetic dimension, Marcuse
Presented a different, and contradictory, argument in which
art'lstic discourse
does not need to be illegitimate in order
to eXpress
the nega tion of reali ty, but merely separa te from
it. The aesthetic dimension must be preserved
in precisely the
same kind of reservation decried above.
Marcuse
asserted
tha t
the
truths of art,
poetry,
and
metaphysics are treated with the same hostility as authentic
sexuality.
Trapped by their repression, art, sexuality and all
eXpressions of fantasy and desire, can be desublimated within
143
the repressive society
to
the
demands
of
the
only within the confines and according
reality
principle.
As
such,
to
be
tOlerated within the totality entails a loss of distance and
difference;
the essential negativity of desire is lost as its
desublimated and distorted version becomes an affirmation. Art
can escape this, however, since it provides a form in which the
de .
Slres can be expressed and interact and yet still be in
Contradiction with the dominant reality principle.
144
THE AESTHETIC DIMENSION
In !he Aes thetic Dimension, Marcuse asserted tha t art is the
mOst significant of all the expressions of desire since it has
an intrinsic political significance.
Whereas
the notions of
repressive desublimation and repressive tolerance suggest that
authentic desire
allowed
to
is
concealed by
appear
the
wi thin
the
forms
repressive
in which it
whole,
is
Marcuse
considered artis tic expression to consi tute a realm which is
necessarily the negation of the existing reality.
In the case of sexuali ty, or radical poli tical demands,
tOlerance
involves
eXclusion
would
totali ty.
Marcuse
identifying
the
interests
and
integration
pose
an
into
the
unacceptable
presented
means
by
demands
of
a
the
contradiction
similar
which it
repressive
is
dominant
to
this
of
art,
serve
the
analysis
made
to
reality
whole:
principle.
Integrated in this way, art becomes affirmative of the totality
and
loses
its
essential
avant-garde
tradition
recognised
the
nega ti vi ty.
considered
separation
of
Both Marcuse
in
the
following
art
and
everyday
and
the
chapters
life.
But
~hereas the latter attacked this separation on the grounds that
it prevents the possibili ty of a cri tique of the totali ty,
MarcUse argued that this separation susta1ns
.
t h e negativity of
art and ensures the continuing possibility of contradiction.
As
long as it remains
a separate discourse, art constitutes the
realm in
which negativity can be sustained through the
eXpresSion of desire in a form autonomous from the demands of
the reality principle.
145
For Marcuse, the aesthetic was the intrinsic negation of
the real, since the form of art is in contradiction to that of
reality. It is not what the artists say that is important, but
the fact that they say it in ways and according to principles
and values quite distinct from those of the dominant form of
reality.
The
dimension
of
negation
of
the
principles
very
the
aesthetic
and
represents
meaning
of
the
one-
dimensionality. Marcuse was therefore resistant to attempts to
integrate
art
and
the
existing
reality
principle,
and
sYmpathetic to all that tends towards the maintenance of art
as the expression of another and
radically different
experience of the world.
Marcuse had to recognise tha t
reality is more often seen as
the separa tion of art and
a
repressive
tolerance,
the
eXercise of which can be traced back to the early development
Of
capitalist
societies.
In
One-Dimensional
Man,
he
aCknowledged tha t
'the transcending truths of the fine arts,
the aesthetics of life and thought, were accessible only to the
few
wealthy
SOCiety',
and
and
saw
educated
the
was
the
fault
of
a
repressive
division
of
art
from
the
everyday
eXperience of reality as necessary to the development of
Ca .
Pltalism.
But he also argued tha t a r t 'also provided a
Protected realm in which the tabooed truths could survive in
abstrat integrity - remote from the society which repressed
t h em .'[163] Indeed,
Marcuse contended that this separation is
being eroded with the mass culture of one-dimensional society,
to
the
detriment
of
the
entire
critical
project.
This
he
146
intended not as a defence of the elitism of artistic discourse,
but a plea for the maintenance of an artistic dimension.
On the other hand, the avant-garde's own critique of the
totality insists
Ca Pl. talis t means
that
the
artists'
disassociation
of production also ensures
from
their removal
from the struggle to change the means of production.
Eagleton
made
this
point
in
Literary
Theory,
in
Terry
which
observed two tendencies at work in the Romantic poets.
they
the
he
While
hailed li tera ture as 'one of the few enclaves in which
the creative values expunged from the face of English society
by industrial
believing
Can
capitalism
can
be
celebrated
and
affirmed',
that the 'transcendental scope of the poetic mind
provide
a
living
criticism
of
those
rationalist
or
empiricist ideologies enslaved to "fact"'[164J, their work also
stressed:
the sovereignty and autonomy of the imagination, its
splendid remoteness
from the merely prosaic matters
of
feeding one's children or stru~gling for
political justice. If the "transcendental' nature of
the imagination offered a challenge to an anaemic
rationalism, it could also offer the writer a
Comfortingly absolute alternative to history itself.
[165J
Eagle ton argued tha t
the
consequence of
the belief in
the
aUthenticity and autonomy of artistic expression is that the
~riter is
'increasingly driven back to the solitariness of his
o~n creative mind'.
The products of this creative mind are
similarly confinedrothe social context: the image of art as the
~ork of an isolated genius is compounded by the limitations of
its
reception. The artist has a privileged access to the truth,
and the audience has a privileged access to the poet.
147
However, Marcuse
artist
from
argued tha t
the disassociation of the
the development of capi talism rendered art
'a
refuge and a vantage point from which to denounce the reality
established through domination.' [166] Central to this argument
is
the
assertion
that
the
artistic
form
is
in
some
sense
emancipatory; that it represents a radically different and more
authentic experience of reali ty from
that determined by
the
reality principle. Marcuse defined art in terms of fantasy, the
impulse to create that which is desired, but does not exist in
reality.
Together with other expressions of Eros, the artistic
realm is one of recollection of instinctual values and desires.
,
Art is perhaps the most visible return of the repressed: not
Only
on
level.
the
individual
but
also
The
artistic
imagination
on
the
generic-historical
shapes
the
"unconscious
memory" of the liberation that failed, or the promise that was
betrayed. '[167]
The
incompatibility
of
artistic
forms
and
values with the demands of the dominant reality principle is
defined
by
Marcuse
as
the
token
unconscious recollection of desire.
of
the
truth
of
this
Art is grounded in the
fantasy and creativity of the unconscious mind:
The radical quali ties of art, tha t is to say, its
indic tment of the es tablished reali ty and its
invocation of the beautiful image of liberation are
grounded precisely in the dimensions where art
transcends its social determination and emancipates
itself from the given universe of discourse and
behaviour while preserving its overwhelming presence.
[168]
None
bet
of
this,
however,
was
inten d e d
to
deny
the
relation
Ween art and reality. Indeed, it is the fact that art arises
from social experience that gives it its critical potential.
All fantasy is a rethinking of that which exists or, as Adorno
148
described
.
l.t,
'the
ability
to
take
elements
of
being
and
transform them into the opposite of being, simply by bringing
them into a new constellation', and the process
'whereby the
eXistent is changed.' [169J Adorno considered that the fiction
of art is 'always decomposable into elements derived from real
life', and in Counterrevolution and Revolt, Marcuse described
the negative impact of artistic transformation thus: , By
becoming
shapes
Ordinary
components
and
use
of
colours
and
are
the
aesthetic
insulated
function;
thus
form,
words,
against
their
are
freed
they
sounds,
familiar,
for
dimens ion of exis tence. ' [170] Again it is clear tha t
made Possible by
the
formal
a
new
this is
difference between art and· the
Principles which organise existing reality.
This difference implies that artistic creation does indeed
occur according to an entirely different set of principles,
ValUes, and techniques to those which pertain in the rea li ty
principle. Marcuse argued tha t art is a manifes ta tion of the
Union of the experience and principles of reality and the
des·
lres and emancipatory values of the pleasure principle. In
att, reali ty is rearranged according to this las t principle.
The artistic
form
therefore
eXperiences
denied
by
Ptovides
a
discourse
facilitates
one-dimensionality
which
reveals
the
expression
and,
the
of
as
such,
breadth
and
POSsibilities of reality.
Art's separation from the process of material
production has enabled it to demystify the reality
produced in this process. Art challenges the monopoly
of the established reality to determine what is
"real", and it does so by creating a fictitious world
:v- hich is nevertheless "more real than reali ty
ltself".[171J
149
Operating
within
the
principles
of
Eros,
art
will
reveal
dimensions of reality denied by a system of domination.
No matter how much Art may be determined, shaped,
directed by prevailing values, standards of taste and
behaviour, limi ts of experience, it is always more
than other than beautification and sublimation,
recreation and validation of that which is. Even the
most realistic oeuvre constructs a reality of its
~wn; its men and women, its objects, its landscape,
1ts music reveal what remains unsaid, unseen, unheard
in everyday life. [172J
This is made possible by the constitution of the artistic form
in terms of a rationality unfettered by
the demands of
the
reality principle.
Marcuse defined artistic form as the essential mediation
Of desire.
The root of the aesthetic is in sensibility. What is
beautiful is first sensuous: it appeals to the
senses; it is pleasurable, object of unsublimated
drives. However, the beautiful seems to occupy a
Position half way between sublimated and unsublimated
objectives ••• It seems that the various connotations
of beauty converge in the idea of Form.
In the
aesthetic Form, the content (matter)-rs assembled,
defined, and arranged to obtain a condition in which
the immediate I unmas tered forces of the ina t ter, of
the "material', are mastered, "ordered".[173J
Reality is not let loose in an anarchic fashion in the work of
art , b ut transformed according to a different set of principles
from
those
which
pertain
in
the
reality
principles provide a new framework in which
principle.
These
meaning and truth
arise. Form masters desire, but this control is a part of
the
repression
necessary
to
civilisation.
mastery, desire could not be expressed at all.
re'
1nforced by Adorno:
Without
such
This point was
However strong his torically the tendency towards a
:ecurrence of pleasure may be, pleasure remains
1nfantile when it asserts itself directly and without
mediation. Art absorbs pleasure as rememb rance and
150
longing; it does not copy it, it does not seek to
produce pleasure as an immediate effect. [174]
Artistic
form
represents
Pleasure
principle
and
the
union
of
the
the
constraints
desires
of
the
of
the
reali ty
principle; its authenticity is assured by the dominance of the
Pleasure principle in its constitution.
Form is the negation, the mastery of disorder,
violence, suffering, even when it presents disorder,
violence, suffering. This triumph of art is achieved
by subjecting the content to the aesthetic order,
which is autonomous in its exigencies ••• The content
is thereby transformed: it obtains a meaning (sense)
which transcends the elements of the content, and
this transcending order is the aypearance of the
beautiful as the truth of art. [175J
Form provides a
framework which is both rational and erotic,
real and imaginative,
in which the desires of the unconscious
are made manifest and accessible to consciousness.
Art provides a separate and contradictory context to that
in wh';ch its materials normally appear; t h e wor k 0 f art is:
4
"taken out" of the constant process of reality and
aSSumes a significance and truth of its own. The
aesthetic transformation is achieved through a
reshaping of language, perception, and understanding
So that they reveal the essence of a reality in its
appearance: the repressed potentiali ties of man and
nature. The work of art thus represents reality
whilst accusing it. [176]
The result of this is that a world 'other than and yet derived
from'
.
ex~sting reality is created. The work of art:
gi ves word
and tone and image to tha t which is
silent, distorted, suppressed in the established
;eality. And this liberating and cognitive power,
~nheren t in art, is in all its styles and forms •••
Thus we can say that, in the aesthetic order, things
are moved into their place which is not the place
they
"happen
to
have",
and
that,
in
this
transformation, they come into their own. [177]
Marcuse's assertion that the given reality is itself alienated
from the authenticity of human experience led him to suggest
151
that art is the achievement of a second alienation, in which
the given is removed and experienced in a different context
that restores its authenticity.
The artis tic alienation makes the work of art, the
universe of art, essentially unreal - it crea tes a
world which does not exist, a world of Schein,
appearance, i llus ion. Bu t in this trans forma tion of
reali ty into illusion, and only in it, appears the
subversive truth of art.
In this universe, every
word, every colour, every sound is "new", different breaking the familiar context of perception and
understanding, of sense, certainty and reason in which
men and nature are enclosed. [178]
Art
therefore
represents
a realm
reassessed and criticised.
from which reali ty can be
Further, this realm is grounded in
the authenticity of the human imagination, fantasy, and desire.
This allowed Marcuse to consider art as the intrinsic negation
of
the
Posi tion
aliena ted reali ty
does
not,
of
however,
one-dimensional society.
preclude
the
This
possibility
Of asSessing art in terms of its ability to achieve this second
al'lenation.
Art as an affirmation
In The Aesthetic Dimension, Marcuse stated:
'Art can be called
reVOlutionary in two senses.'
In a narrow sense, art may be revolutionary if it
represents a radical change in style and technique.
Such a change may be the achievement of a genuine
avant-garde, anticipating or reflecting substantial
changes in society at large ••• Beyond this, a work of
art can be called revolutionary if, by virtue of the
aesthetic transformation, it represents,
in the
exemplary
fate
of
individuals,
the
prevailing
unfreedom and the rebelling forces, thus breaking
through the mystified (and petrified) social reality,
an opening the horizon of change (libera tion) • In
this sense, every authentic work of art would be
152
revolutionary, i.e. subversive of perception and
understanding, an indictment of established reality.
[179J
However , inauthentici ty is possible in the work of art.
Marcuse,
For
the essential negativity of art can be lost in its
abandonment of the aesthetic as a dimension distinct from the
given reality.
by
the
reality
dimension
will
Since this reality is governed and so repressed
principle,
be
desublimation of art
art
subjected
which
to
abandons
the
same
its
separate
repression.
The
in one-dimensional society entails
its
integration within this dimension and the loss of its critical
function.
In this process, art becomes affirmative.
Marcuse wished to preserve the notion of art as a form in
wh'
lch values such as harmony and beauty
preserve a
transcendent truth and meaning which is the negation of that of
the re a l'l.ty prl.ncl.ple.
,.
One obvious consequence of this position
is
that
art
should
remain
true
to
its
own
principles
and
oPerate within its own form to the exclusion of participation
in
h
ot ers. This forms the basis of Marcuse' sat tacks on the
Poli tical partisanship of art,
its mass consumption, and the
avant-garde attempts to negate it altogether.
In the first instance, Marcuse argued that the negativity
of art must be exercised in l.ts
'd
.
own omal.n.
The
tension
between
affirmation
and
negation
precludes
any
identification
of
art
with
revolutionary praxis.
Art cannot represent
the
:evolution, it can only invoke it in another medium,
ln an aesthetic form in which the political content
becomes metapolitical, governed by the internal
necessity of art. And the goal of all revolution - a
world of tranquility and freedom
appears in a
totally unpolitical medium, under the laws of beauty,
of harmony. [180]
153
This Suggests that art should assume the role of preserving,
CUltivating,
and
reproducing
sensibility necessary
the
expression
to political
of
the
transformation.
new
It
is
enOugh for the artist to preserve the artistic Form in which
this sensibili ty can be developed; the eli tism which resul ts
from this is an unfortunate, but inevitable consequence of the
gap between the authenticity of art and the false consciousness
Of the one-dimensional reality.
If "the people" are dominated by the prevailing
system of needs then only the rupture with this
system can make "the people" an ally afiainst
barbarism. Prior to this rupture there is no place
among the people" which the writer can simply take up
and which awaits him.
Writers must first rather
create this place, and this is a process which may
require them to stand against the people, which may
prevent them from speaking their language.
In this
sense, "elitism" today may well have a radical
Content.[181]
MarcUse
advocated
aCCompany
the
'a
material
revolution
and
in
perception
intellectual
which
reconstruction
will
of
SOCiety, creating the new aesthetic environment.' [182]
The rational transformation of the world would then
lead to a reality formed by the aesthetic sensibility
of man.
Such a world could... embody, incorporate
the human facul ties and desires to such an extent
that they appear as part of the objective determinism
of nature - a coincidence of causality through nature
and causality through freedom. [183]
In a f
ree society, he suggested, 'for the first time men would
'
~ Wlth the eyes of Corot, of Cezanne, of Monet, because the
see
percept'lon of these artists h as h
d to f orm t h is reality.'
e Ipe
18
[ 4]
The role of art in a society antagonistic to its
realisation is to cultivate this new
sensibility.
For this sensibility to develop in contradiction to the
eXisting
reality,
the
alienation
of
artistic
and
poetic
154
meaning
is
to come'.
necessary for 'the sake of a reconciliation still
[185]
Marcuse sought
dimension from any
to pro tec t
the aes the tic
preemptive integration, and was untroubled
by the eli tism inherent in this posi tion: 'If art, because of
this alienation, does not "speak" to the masses,
\\fork of
this is the
the class socie ty which creates and perpe tua tes the
masses ••• ' [186]
Further, 'the fact that the artist belongs to
a Privileged group
negates neither the truth nor the aesthetic
quality of his art.' [187] This reveals the extent of Marcuse's
faith in the authenticity of the artists'
consciousness and
perception and their ability to convey this vision through the
aUthenticity of the artistic Form. The validity of both these
C.lai ms 1S
' open to a number of challenges.
Marcuse charged art with the task of expressing the truth
and
meaning proper to its form as the negation of that which
arises within one-dimensional experience.
attempts of
realist art
This means that the
to represent the given reality are
both misguided and self-defeating.
No matter how affirmative, "realistic" the oeuvre may
be, the artist has given it a form which is not part
of the reali ty he presents and in which he works.
The oeuvre is unreal precisely inasmuch as it is art:
the novel is not a newspaper story, the still life is
not alive, and even in pop art the real tin can is
not in the supermarket.
The very Form of art
Contradicts
the
effort
to
do
away with
the
segregation of art to a "second reality",
to
translate the truth of the productive imagination
into the first reality. [188]
Marc.
POl'
Use postulated a huge difference between
aesthetic and the
,
1t1cal discourse.
The distance between the universe of poetry and that
of politics is so great, the mediations which
~alidate the poetic truth and the rationality of
1magination are so complex, that any short cut
between the two realities seems fatal to poetry •••
155
The latter seems to draw all its power and all its
truth from its otherness, its transcendence. [189]
The negative power of art appears not in its commitment to
pal'1 tlcal
,
cri tique,
but its protection of the vision of the
Possible that
l'S necessary
to development
of
the poli tical
critique. In art, therefore:
~he radical refusal,
the protest, appears in the way
ln which words are grouped and regrouped, freed from
~heir familar use and abuse. Alchemy of the word; the
lmage, the sound, creation of another reality out of
the exis ting one - permanent imaginary revolu tion,
emergence of a 'second history' within the historical
Continuum. Permanent aesthetic subversion - this is
the way of art. [190]
A fUrther consequence of the alienation inherent in Marcuse's
aesthetic
,
repressive
theory
is
that
desublima tion'
it
of
enabled
him
art
wi thin
to
criticise
the
one-dimensional
sOCiety.
the Frankfurt School
This is a development within
tradit'10n of cultural criticism, in which the mass consumption
of Culture is considered to distort l'tS content.
In other
\\tords, the form in which culture is presented determines the
aUthenticity of its expression and renders it affirmative.
'R
In
emarks on the Redefinition of Culture', Marcuse wrote:
the
integration
of
cultural
values
into
the
established society cancels the alienation of culture
from civi lisa tion. • • The resul t:
the autonomous
critical contents of culture become educational,
elevating, relaxing - a vehicle of adjustment. [191]
MarcUse Suggested that the mass consumption of art within the
cOnfi
nes of a repressive and one-dimensional rationality and
SOCiety rendered it affirmative of this context and, as such,
an '
1nstrument of repression.
156
This
is
essentially
the
thesis
applied
speculative thought, and radical dissent:
in
one-dimensional
constraints. Here,
society
it
renders
to
sexuality,
their participation
them
subj ect
to
its
is the transcendence of art which is
10s t in thl.' s process.
Today's novel feature is the flattening out of the
antagonism between culture and social reality through
the obliteration of the oppositional, alien, and
transcendent elements in the higher culture by virtue
of which it constituted another dimension of
reali ty. • • This
liquidation of two dimensional
culture takes place not through the denial and
rejection of the "cultural values" but through their
wholesale incorporation into the es tablished order,
through their reproduction and display on a massive
scale. [192]
With the closing of the gap between art and reality, the
Great
Refusal of one-dimensionali ty expressed in the artis tic form
and the aesthetic sensibility:
~s in turn refused; the "other dimension" is absorbed
l.nto the prevailing state of affairs. The works of
alienation are themselves incorporated into this
society and circulate as part and parcel of the
equipment
which
adorns
and
psychoanalyses
the
prevailing state of affairs. Thus they become
commercials - they sell, comfort, or excite. [193]
It Was on this basis that Marcuse launched his critique of the
mass culture he observed in the 1960s. In One-Dimensional Man,
MarcUse saw the dissemination of 'high culture' as a means of
enSuring its equivalence wi th other forms of one-dimensional
d'
l.scourse. ' I t is good tha t , almos t everyone can now have the
fi
ne arts at his fingertips, by just turning a knob on his set,
Or by just stepping into the drugstore. In this diffusion,
how
eVer, they become cogs in a cul ture-machine which remakes
their content.' [194]
157
As an example of
this development,
Marcuse ci ted the
presentation
of
classics'.
The paperback sold in the supermarket places the
,
certain
artistic
and
literary
works
as
work in a context which transforms its content; in other words,
the artistic form is lost:
coming to life as classics, they come into life as
other than themselves; they are deprived of their
antagonistic force, of the estrangement which was the
very dimension of their truth ••• If they once stood
in
contradiction
to
the
status
quo,
this
Contradiction is now flattened out. [195]
In this process, the essential alienation of the work of art
and the negation inherent in its form and values is abandoned.
What has been invalidated is their subversive force,
their destructive content - their truth. In this
transformation, they find their home in everyday
living.
The
alien
and
alienating
oeuvres
of
intellectual culture become familiar goods
and
services. [196]
The .
lmplication of such statements is that the participation of
art in the discourse of one-dimensional society is inevitably
detrimental to its critical project. This, then, was Marcuse's
COntribution to the analysis of the recuperation of critique:
Participation entails affirmation of the repressive whole.
With this inevitability in mind, Marcuse characterised the
aVant-garde as the attempt to conflate art and reality, to fuse
the artistic and
the everyday experience in a more
transformation of reali ty than
radical
that made possible by an art
restricted to the aesthetic dimension. For Marcuse, 'the effort
is d
oomed to failure.'
Certainly, there is rebellion in the guerrilla
thea tre, in the poe try of the "free press", in rock
music - but it remains artistic without the negating
Powers of art. To the degree to which it makes itself
part of real life, it loses the transcendence which
opposes art to the es tablished order - it remains
158
t
immanent in this order
one dimensional,
succumbs to this order. 197]
and
thus
The avant-garde is chastised for its elaboration of:
anti-forms
which are constituted by
the mere
atomisation and fragmentation of tradi t ional forms:
poems which are simpoly ordered prose cut up in verse
lines, paintings which subs titute' a merely technical
arrangement of parts and pieces for any meaningful
whole,
music
which
replaces
the
highly
"intellectual", "otherworldly' classical harmony by
a highly spontaneous, open polyphony. But the antiforms are incapable of bridging the gap between "real
life" and art. [198]
Thus the avant-garde attempts to effect 'not only the political
but also, and primarily, the artistic attack on art in all its
forms,
on art as Form itself.'
[199]
against "form" only succeeds in a loss
But this
'rebellion
of artistic quality:
illusory destruction, illusory overcoming of alienation.' [200]
~he eruption of anti-art in art has manifested itself
ln many familiar forms: destruction of syntax,
fragmentation of words and sentences, explosive use
of ordinary language, compositions without score,
sonatas for anything. And yet, this entire deformation is Form:
anti-art has remained art,
supplied, purchased, and contemplated as art.[201]
The failure of the anti-art movement to overcome the notion of
art is therefore considered by Marcuse to be a consequence of
the nature of art and not, as he suggested in his discussions
of other forms of rebellion, of the political constitution of
the totality.
This is an inconsistency which necessitates the
COllapse of Marcuse's entire position.
Marcuse alleged that
the supersession of the
alienation
of
art is not merely undesirable but ultimately impossible, in
advanced capitalist society or any other.
The rebellion
against art fails because the artistic form continually
reas
serts itself.
Anti-art will necessarily be absorbed within
its d'lmension since it remains an expression of artistic form.
159
The redeeming, reconciling power of art adheres even
to the mos t radical manifes ta tions of non-illusory
art and anti-art. They are still oeuvres: paintings,
sculptures, compositions, poems, and as such they
have their own form and
wi th it their own
order: their own frame (though it may be invisible),
their own space, their own beginning, and their own
end. [202]
In 'Art as Form of Reality', Marcuse insisted that it is 'the
Form of art as different from non art, and it is the art Form
itself which frustrates the intention to reduce or even anull
th'ls difference, to make art "real", "living".' [203] Efforts
to produce the absence of form are considered to be 'activities
of frustration, already part of the new culture industry and
the museum culture'. [204]
Although Marcuse was clearly
concerned with the political
implications of the integration of art, he suggested that antiart '
ls a misnom ~ 'because it merely adds to the culture industry
and fails
to make any attack on the one-dimensionality that
PrOmotes it. It is form which constitutes the political nature
of art, such that the attack on form is also on the critical
fUnction of art.
~nvalidating the cherished images of transcendence by
lncorporating
them
into
its
omnipresent
daily
reality, this society testifies to the extent to
which insoluble conflicts are becoming manageable to which tragedy and romance, archetypal dreams and
anxieties are being made susceptible to technical
solution and dissolution. [205]
Art must be real:
:part and parcel of life - but of a life which is
ltself the conscious negation of the established way
of life, with all its institutions, with its entire
material and intellectual culture, its entire immoral
morality, its required and clandestine behaviour, its
work and its fun. [206]
160
In
the
following
chapters,
the attempts of avant-garde
movements to escape integration within the category of art will
be examined
in
some detail.
Vulnerable
to
Marcuse's
degrees,
can
be described
Both Dada and Surrealism are
attacks,
as
since
anti-art
both,
to
movements.
varying
But
the
cOnclusions which are drawn from these discussions suggest that
the integration of anti-art into the category of art deserves
an analysis closer to that effected by Marcuse in relation to
the radical
in
'Repressive
political dissent described
TOlerance'.
In other words, the anti-art attempt is frustrated
not
inevitability
by
the
implication of Form in a
of
the
Form
totality of
of
art,
but
by
the
social and discursive
relations produced by the fundamental alienation of capitalism.
For Marcuse,
however,
the recuperation of anti-art into
the category of art was not, in itself,
a political problem.
He observed: 'The wild revolt of art has remained a short-lived
ShoCk, quickly absorbed in the art gallery, within the four
~alls
, in the concert hall, by the market, and adorning the
Plazas and lobbies of the prospering business establishments'
[207],
but this is a consequence of the inevi tabili ty of
attis t].' c form rather than a feature 0 f t h e
system of commodity
telations which Marcuse identified wi thin advanced capi talis t
SOCiety. Thus for Marcuse, the avant-garde reduces the critical
al'
1enation of art as effectively as its mass consumption. Each
of these appropriations of art entails its assumption of a form
Other than its own.
But this reconciliation with reality is
illUsory; its attempt to supersede form self-defeating.
161
In 'Art as Form of Reality', however, Marcuse argued that
this reconcilation was
posi tion which
is
premature,
closer
to
MarcUse sugges ted here tha t
the goal
reality
of
the
that held
by
impossible.
the
In
a
avant-garde,
the realisation of art should be
revolutionary
project.
The
prospect
of
a
dominated by the pleasure principle in the form of the
aesthetic dimension
Which
but not
the
aliena tion
is
presented as
of
art
is
no
a
real possibility,
longer
inevi table.
in
'The
essential otherness of art ••• can be reduced only to the degree
to which "reali ty itself" tends towards Art as reali ty' sown
Form , that is to say ••• with the emergence of a free
SocietY.'[208]
Here, the realisation of art, the eradication
Of the distinction between the aesthetic and the real, is seen
as Possible with the realisation of the social revolution.
This revolution is still dependent on the cUltivation of
the
new
sensibility,
and
this
is
in
turn
the
task of
the
artist. The alienation of art from one-dimensional society is
St'
111 necessary, but this alienation is no lpnger required in
POst-re vo 1 ut10nary
'
,
soc1ety:
the realisa tion of art can only be the event of a
qualitatively different society in which a new type
of men and women,
no longer
the subj ec t
of
exploitation, can develop in their life and work the
vision of the suppressed aesthetic possibilities of
men and things.... wha t Marx called "the sensuous
approriation of the world". The realisation of Art,
the "new art" is conceivable only as the process of
constructing the universe of a free society - in
other words, Art as the Form of Reality. [209]
In Counterrevolution and Revolt, however, Marcuse returned
to his central thesis that the pleasure principle in which
artistic
form
its
meaning
will
receives
always,
and
nec
essari ly, be dominated by a repressive reali ty principle.
162
Only
the
reduction
of
this
repression,
the
eradication
of
surplus repression, is feasible. To some extent, this position
can be attributed to Marcuse's disillusion with the events of
1968 which had failed to fulfil the revolutionary transition he
discerned at the time. In this later text, Marcuse considered
the notion of art as the form of reality ambiguous.
I~ was supposed to indicate an essential aspect of
l1beration, namely, the radical transformation of the
technical and natural universe in accordance with the
emancipa ted sensibili ty (and ra tionali ty) of man. I
still hold this view. But the goal is a permanent
one: tht is to say, no matter in what form, art can
never
eliminate
the
tension
between
art
and
reali ty... To interpret this irredemable alienation
of art as a mark of bourgeois (or any other) class
Society is nonsense. [210J
Indeed, in the same text, Marcuse went as far as characterising
the
realisation of art as barbaric.
At the optimum, we can envisage a universe common to
art and reali ty, bu t in this common universe, art
would retain its transcendence. In all likelihood,
people would not talk or write or compose poetrYi la
rose du monde would persist. The "end of art' IS
c~nce1va
e on y if men are no longer capable of
d1stinguishing between true and false, good and evil,
beautiful and ugly, present and future. This would be
the state of perfect barbarism. [211J
SO
Ultimately, for Marcuse, the notion of art as the form of
teality is one which should guide the cons truc tion 0 f a new
sensibility and so a new society, but never be attained;
indeed, its realisation would be
detrimental and is, in any
case
, impossible. This position not only contradicts Marcuse's
eatli
er writings on art, but also involves a number of problems
Ptoper to itself.
163
Art as the form of one-dimensionality
In £"ounterrevolution and Revol t, Marcuse offered a number of
Cr't'
1 1cisms of his own aesthetic theory, the most significant of
~hich
suggests
stabilisation in
that
'the
aesthetic
the repressive
repressive. '[212]
form
society and
is
a
factor
thus
is
of
itself
Marcuse's denial of this charge is valid
Only in terms of the Freudian context in which he worked; from
the point of view of the avant-garde or Marxist critique, it is
open to a variety of charges encapsula ted in the cri ticism
Cited above.
The most obvious of these concerns the role of the avantgarde artist and the question of artistic content.
form as
Marcuse saw
the essential characteristic of art such that even
those expressions of
anti-art or realism are really art and,
as such, alienated from one-dimensional reality.
Since it is
this alienation which constitutes the antagonistic and critical
fUnction of art, it would
lose l'ts negative role.
seem tha t even anti-art can never
This means that the avant-garde, in
SPite of its misguided attacks on the separated form of art,
retains its critical function.
Marcuse's complaint against the
avan t-garde still stands, since h
' "
e can cr1t1c1se
t h em for their
fa'
llure to develop their true critical function.
In 'Art as
Form of Reality', for example, he wrote:
r believe that the authentic avant-garde of today are
not those who try desperately to produce the absence
of form and the union with real life, but rather
those who do not recoil from the exigencies of form:
who find the new word, image and sound which are
. capable of 'comprehending' reali ty as only Art can
comprehend - and negate it. [213]
164
the.
This suggested that the artist must be aware of~nature of form
and the artistic project. The more the work of art contradicts
the existing reality, the more authentic it will be. However,
in its critical stance towards art itself, the avant-garde also
Operate s
on the basis of a critique of the existing reality.
For the movements considered below, alienated art is intrinsic
to this reality and cannot be excluded from
Marcuse refused
to
entertain
its critique.
the notion
that
the art
which arises within a repressive society could be repressive
itself.
For him,
repressed
can
art has
return
in
its own context,
an
authentic
wi thin which the
expression
of
its
antagonism to the existing society. The avant-garde, however,
has
tended
to
view
art with
the
same
suspicion
it
adopts
towards other cuI tural categories,
values,
and ins ti tu tions.
It
such
beauty,
has
suggested
that
notions
as
harmony,
creativity and imagination may themselves be constituted by the
one-d'l.mensionality in which they arise. To speak of form as a
mediation
is,
after
all,
to
invite
the
criticism
that
any
mediatl.' on between the real an d t h e l.mag
'
inedWl.
' 11 b e dominated
by the reality principle and so rendered affirmative. In this
caSe ,
the
form
would
constitute
of
notion
the
very
reconciliation of the two dimensions which Marcuse decried for
its
,
prema turl. ty and barbarism in his considerations of
the
various manifestations of integrated art.
Of course, the authenticity of art asserted by Marcuse is
cO nt '
l.ngent on the validity of the Freudian distinction between
the
'
prl.nciples of pleasure and reali ty. The exis tence of an
OVerly repressl.ve
,
"
1 e cons1gns
'
'
rea I'l.ty pr1nc1p
t h e d eS1res
of the
165
Pleasure
principle
to
unnecessary
distortion
COnsigned to the unconscious realm, they
as elements essential to
and
authentic desires.
~ithin
one-dimensional
and
denial;
nevertheless persist
human consciousness, as real needs
These desires cannot be expressed
society
since
their
tolerance
or
desublimation is repressive. But in a separate dimension, the
aesthetic,
they can be brought to consciousness,
since this
dimension is itself constituted by desire and is therefore the
authentic context for its expression.
The
assertion of the
the authenticity of artistic form is clearly dependent on the
acceptance of Freudianism. Without this theoretical basis, the
notion of art as essentially negative is problematic.
Nevertheless, this thesis did enable Marcuse to define the
artists' vision
as the authentic
expression of that which is
denied by the existing reality principle within the context of
an
aesthetic
itself alienated
is
form
that
from
and
antagonistic
to
this
vangUardist
thesis
principle.
advocated
in
This
is
essentially
the
'Repressive Tolerance'
with
reference to the elite's access to the transcendent truths of
an em anc1patory
.
rationality,
and
e I sewh ere in
terms
of
the
aUthenticity of the Great Refusal of youth.
In each of these
cases,
is
the
new
sensibility
they
develop
grounded
in
repressed desire, the authentic desublimation of which is the
prerequisite of social revolution. Although the working class
may b
e still be considered necessary to this transformation,
its
struggle is far from constituting the vanguard of a new
cOns .
C10usness.
166
Ul tima tely, however,
that
the
privileged
there is
access
to
li t tIe reason to suppose
a
transcendent
presupposed by these new vanguards is possible.
dimension
Marcuse not
only insisted that such a transcendent reality exists, but also
that artists, intellectuals, students, and so on,
are somehow
immune to the one-dimensionality of society and discourse and
do indeed have
access to authentic truths. Wi thin Marcuse' s
o\Vn thesis of one-dimensionali ty, is it not more likely tha t
artists
will
be
integrated
ConSciousness and, further,
into
the
prevailing
false
that the form in which they work
\ViII be determined by the ideological interests of the given
reality?
Only with the reiteration of the Freudian principles
on \Vhich his thesis is based can Marcuse rebuff these problems.
The avant-garde's attempts to expose the separation of art
from everyday reali ty as intrinsic to the tota I'1 ty of social
and d'lscursive relations is far more conducive to the success
Of M
arcuse's proj ec t to induce a new sensibili ty.
I t is in
MarcUse's schema that the work of art might most easily become
affirm a t'lve and lose 1tS
"
, 1 f unc t'10n, S1nce
,
th e art1st
'
cr1t1ca
is
uncritical of the nature of the form in which expression is
Inade.
This means tha tart, conceived purely in terms of its
negation of the real,
uSed for adornment,
might easily become escapist:
decoration,
and
temporary
fantasy
elevation.
Marcuse's attack on mass culture decried precisely this effect,
but because he attributed it to the loss of the distinction
bet
\Veen art and reality, he failed to consider the question of
the intention with which this
PlaCing all
the emphasis on
integration is
effected.
the sanctity of artistic
By
form,
167
Marcuse condemned its loss regardless of whether it is effected
as a negation or an affirmation of the existing reality.
In One-Dimensional Man, Marcuse defined
Placing of
tolerance as the
the undesirable in a separate reservation.
In a
statement which contradicts his later writing on the aesthetic
dimension, Marcuse wrote:
This hos ti li ty is mos t sweeping where it takes the
form of toleration - that is, where a certain truth
value is granted to the transcendent concepts in a
separate dimension of meaning and signficance (poetic
truth, metaphysical truth). For precisely the setting
aside of a special reservation in which thought and
language are permi t ted to be legi tima tely inexact,
vague, and even contradictory is the most effective
way of protecting the normal universe of discourse
f[ rom being serious ly dis turbed by unfi t ting ideas.
214J
The
establishment of such a reservation for 'unfitting ideas'
removes the possibility of their
conflict with those which do
fit the demands of the reality principle. In terms of Marcuse's
basic thes';s
... ,
this sugges ts tha t
repressive whole is allowed so
.
.
t h e~r
to 1 era t~on
that
they pose no
w~. t h in
the
threat or
Contradiction to this whole but are merely dimensions which
testify
to
the
benevolence
and
plurality
of
the
totality.
SUrely, then, critique should become intolerable in the sense
PropOsed in
the discussion of repressive tolerance above, in
\qh'
l.ch Case , the avant-garde's railings against the alienation
of
art would be more effective than its acceptance.
Marcuse
refu
sed
to apply this to the aes thetic dimension which, by
~irtue
of
the
authenticity
of
form,
is
exceptional
in
abil'
l.ty to define its own 'reservation' or realm.
!he radical quali ties of art, tha t is to say, its
~ndictment
of the established reality and its
~nvocation of the beautiful image of liberation are
grounded precisely in the dimension where art
transcends its social de termina tion and emancipates
its
168
itself from the given universe of discourse and
behaviour while preserving its overwhelming presence.
[215]
Marcuse's
belief
in
the
authenticity
of
artistic
form
renders all further discussion of the political function of art
art untenable. For Marcuse, all art is political in
its
OPPOsition
to
reality,
and
no
further
assessment
of
its
POlitical significance is necessary to prove its authenticity.
While it is
true
determines
its
tha t
meaning
the context in which a work appears
and
effect,
the
definition
of
this
COntext in terms of the absence or presence of artistic form is
less obvious. How can we be sure that artistic form is indeed
the authentic expression of desire? What assurance is
that art
is
there
not integrated along with other discourses
Values wi thin
the one-dimensionali ty
it
MarcUse might just as easily have argued
intended to
and
oppose?
that art alienated in
a separate dimension is in a reservation, out of the reach of
the consciousness of the people and unable to have any critical
impact whatsoever;
that the artistic form is as dominated by
the reali ty principle as is any other expression wi thin onedimensionality; and that the desires it conveys are themselves
distorted by their very appearance within this alien dimension.
Where
COnVerge,
the
approaches
however,
is
in
of
Marcuse
their
common
and
the
avant-garde
assertion
that
the
realisation of art, if it is possible at all, is dependent on
reVOlution in the totality of social and discursive relations.
Bath See a role for artistic expression in the critique of the
eXisting reality, but neither alleges that the realisation of
art . .
~lthln the existing reality would be possible or desirable.
169
For Marcuse,
revolution
reali ty,
the revolution that is to be accomplished is a
not
merely
but in
in
the
the values
organisation
and
of
the
existing
principles on which it
is
organised.
To varying degrees, this is true for both Dada and
Surrealism,
but
it
is
also
the
case
that
both
movements
reCognised their ul tima te dependence on the achievement of a
So .
c1al revolution.
This posi tion is not unique to movements
flourishing in an era in
Working
cOherent
class
retained
which Marcuse might argue that the
its
potency:
it
received
its
most
articulation in the work of the Situationists who
shared Marcuse's historical context.
This reveals
approach and
that
the essential difference between a Marxist
adopted
by Marcuse.
For
the
latter,
the
analYsis of the alienation produced and reproduced in
class
So .
C1ety should be superseded by a concern with the repression
of desire in a society in which alienation is complete with the
establishment of a single dimension. This means that the forces
of domination and liberation have to be realigned:
now involves
desires
the insti tution of
and needs
domination
repression on the authentic
of individuals,
whose class
posi tion
largely irrelevan t to the validi ty of their expressions.
is
In
one-dimensional society, only the liberation of the repressed
dimension can restore individuals to themselves, and Marcuse
Supports anyone who expresses this liberation. For the Marxist,
however , domination involves the reproduction of an alienation
which 1S
.
grounded in the separation of the worker from the
Products of labour; in other words,
the insti tution of class
SOCiety. It is therefore those engaged in the class struggle,
170
rather than the erotic return, who are defined as the agents of
change.
Most significantly, however, Marcuse diverged from Marxism
in h'1S assertion that the form of domination and alienation he
identifies
in
terms
of
repression,
are
functioning of this and all other societies.
necessary
to
the
In this respect,
Marcuse tends towards the position criticised by Lukacs in his
'Preface'
to
History
and
Class
Consciousness:
alienation
is
seen as an inevitable part of the human condition and not at
all peculiar to capitalism.
to sUcceed
the
If an analysis of the totality is
, it must consider domination to be the product of
base
or
centre
of
this
totality.
d'
1mensionali ty,
rooted
in
consciousness,
Marcuse's
is
rootless
onein
reality. His conception of the totality may be broad, and his
analYses
are
commendable
their
for
scope.
But
without
this
Connection to the basic production of the totality that would
,
a I'1enat10n
make
specific
to
a
certain
se t
of
rela tions
of
dominat'1on, Marcuse can only conc 1 u d e t h at 1t
'
is an inevitable
characteristic of social and aesthetic life.
This fundamental shift from a society defined in terms of
alienation to a repressive whole
brought Marcuse face to face
~ith accentuated versions of the problems encountered by Lukacs
and Gramsci.
Whereas
these theoris ts
had merely to struggle
~ith the problem of false consciousness as an alienated form of
a tru
e, and discernible, his torical consciousness, Marcuse' s
thesis
of repression
was thrown even deeper into the problem
Of the
nature of this true consciousness and the possibility of
&ainin g access
'
,
,
to and cu lt1vat1ng
1t.
P ostu l
'
at1ng
a
, common
171
PSYchic
base',
uncovering
Marcuse
its
set
himself
the
impossible
task
ahistorical
truths.
For
Lukacs
Gramsci,
truth develops historically and must be
and
of
constructed out of the
interplay between subjective awareness and objective reality.
Nevertheless,
~ithin
the
Marcuse's
inevitability
struggle
he
posed
to
reach
enabled
him
a
solution
to
present
criticms of advanced capitalist society
which had the merit of
POSing
the
the
question
consitutes
of
the
extent
of
integration
that
Committed to the exegesis of the
the totality.
conditions
of
consciousness
rather
than
those of
production,
MarcUse presented an analysis of capitalism as stronger, more
absorbant, flexible and hegemonous than it had appeared in past
Cr'
,
ltlques.
This necessitated the treatment of a wide range of
areas of social and discursive life and ensured that
analyses can be useful as tools of social
Marcuse's
criticism. But this
is Only the case to the extent that they consider alienation to
be the product of and unique to the existing society; without
this,
it
is
not alienation,
but some
of
its
effects,
that
constitutes the object of his critique.
Marcuse
succeeded
ideOlogical
safeguards
in
raising
developed
by
the
ques tion
capi talis t
analyses of the totality become ever broader,
a~areness
assumes
of
an
accepted
the
Painted
only
a
and
crisis
in
the
society.
As
such a
necessities
significance.
the
of
tactical
criticism
Ultimately,
it
whole
escape
can
is
, but this only increases the need for a critique
means
to
possibilities
unprecedented
that
recuperation
of
the
of
by
the
which
areas
such
from
a
crisis
which
a
is
prevented.
cri tical
rupture
Marcuse
might
172
develop, and
indicated some of its characteristics. He did so
in terms of a thesis which postulates both the difficulties and
the necessity
of
an
authenticity
of
presented arguments which suggest
consciousness,
that
and
he
this authenticity
is
accessible through a reasoned thinking capable of exposing and
negating
the
nature
unreality
of
the
of
the
social
prevailing
whole.
In
irrationality
this
respect,
and
Marcuse
COntinued the Marxis t cri tical project, diverging from it in
his conception of the form of this negation.
For example,
~here
a
Gramsci
considered
the
development of
COns C10Usness
"
as a product of a counter- h egemony
proliferation
of
~Ork"
lng class,
consciousness
councils
Marcuse
in
the
and
saw
local
consequently
socialist
based in the
grounded
in
the possibili ty
of an
and
resistance
classless
the
authentic
of
a
Plethora of autonomous movements.
Such
comparisons
Continuity
of
theories.
Projects.
~idened
the
should
not
dialectical
obscure
thought
the
essential
employed
in
these
Contradiction and negation are central to their
To
differing
degrees,
both
the
definition
of
totality
the
Gramsci
and
and
Marcuse
both,
as
a
COnsequence , found the establishment of a contradiction,
and
hence
increasingly problematic. Marcuse,
a cri tical base,
having widened
the
totality
the defini tion
of
to
an
unp
recedented degree, had to go to unprecedented depths - those
of the unconscious _ 1"n order to seek the negation of this
Subsequent theories,
POStstructuralism ,
tOtality
to
have
such an
specifically those presented by
continued
to
broaden
that
it
is
extent
the
notion
of
precluded
from
its
173
discourse: the notion becomes so all encompassing and pervasive
that it is quite literally impossible to criticise.
The avant-garde movements considered below were constantly
tempted
towards
this
position
encountered in the development of
by
the
difficulties
they
their own critiques.
Both
Dada and Surrealism
considered that the separation of art and
life was
to
intrinsic
t'ela tions and tha t
the maintenance
of capi talis t
social
the realisa tion of art was fundamental to
any revolutionary perspective. The study of the development of
their
practical
work
and
theoretical
analyses
reveals
the
Weaknesses of Marcuse's position and provides the basis for a
further
examination
of
the
offered by poststructuralism.
Situationist
thesis
and
those
174
3. Dada and Surrealism: the Tactics of the Avant-Garde
'The whole world and everything in it has slid a bit to the
left with us.' (Tristan Tzara)
Marcuse's
on
observations
diametrically
opposed
practitioners
of
to
the
the
aesthetic
perspective
avant-garde
art,
adopted
who
are
dimension
by
the
advocate
the
transcendence of all barriers between art and life. Here, two
mOvements
whose
influence
reasserts
itself
twentieth century are considered in
SUrrealism developed
an awareness
recuperation
the
within
some detail.
of
structures
throughout
the
of
problems
art,
the
Dada and
of
their
literature,
and
CUltural orthodoxy, to the extent that their attempts to evade
this integration determined the nature and direction of their
work.
Both
movements
produced
recuperation which represent
Problems
can
considered
therefore be
analyses
of
criticism
and
a significant development of the
throughout
this
read both as
a
thesis;
study of
this
discussion
the practice of
criticism and the significance of its historical context, and a
theoretical account of the conditions on which it proceeds.
175
DADA - ATTEMPTING THE IMPOSSIBLE
Dada is commonly defined as a nihilistic art movement which
flourished during and immediately after the First World War.
The validi ty of
chapter.
Few
this defini tion will be challenged in
serious
commentators
consider
it
this
adequate,
however, and many are uncertain and confused about the precise
nature of their subject.
In 1953, a discussion of Dada in the
l1mes Literary Supplement asked:
How are we to define, let alone confine, a movement
which cannot be identified with anyone personality
or place, viewpoint or subject, which affects all the
arts, which has a continually shifting focus, and is
moreover
intentionally
negative,
ephemeral,
illogical, and inconclusive. [1]
Although lamenting the problems
and
commentators,
aChievements
delighted
of
this
posed by Dada to its critics
the movement.
since
the
testifies
The Dadais ts
to know they continue
Problems,
also
statement
defiance
to
would have been
to be responsible for
of
the
categorisation
such
and
classification is something they worked hard to maintain.
The statement also recognises the breadth and fluidity of
Dada.
There is no single figure, and certainly no leader, to
emerge from the movement.
Ball,
Emmy
DUchamp,
Hennings,
Man Ray, Picabia, Hans Arp, Hugo
Sophie
Tauber,
Tristan
and
Zurich, Berlin, New York,
Paris, Hannover, Cologne, and Moscow were
which
including
Marcel
the Herzfeld brothers, Huelsenbeck, and Hannah H~ch
\Vere among its participants,
in
Tzara,
they
worked.
Moreover,
their
some of the cities
media
were
varied,
poetry, performance, painting, collage, photography,
cinema , typography, and numerous combinations of each.
This
176
breadth
was
largely
cultivated
order
in
to
avoid
the
cOnstraints of partial definition. The Dadaists' awareness of
the degree
to which such definition would hamper their project
determined the whole direction of the movement.
Dada was not short of its own definitions;
manifestations abound in them.
It
has
its various
been described as
'a
state of mind'; a 'gasometer of jangled feelings'; a 'quantity
of
life
transformation';
effortless
transparent,
in
the
and
gyratory
'chameleon of rapid and self-interested
change' and 'as useless as everything else in life'. According
to
Ribemont-Dessaignes,
Sanouillet has
'Dada
[2].
Michael
'encountered and classified over a
hundred
sentences
in manifestos,
beginning
with
does"
"Dada
is
very
letters,
is .....
or
happy'
poems
or other
writings,
"Dada
wants" •••
or
"'Dada
... this or that. " For Sanouillet, this sugges ted that
Dada was engaged in a genuine attempt to convey its meaning:
,
In no
other movement or
li terary
school
I
know did
the
eXponents go to so much trouble to try to indicate what it was
that made their enterprise worthy of interest.' [3]
Plethora of definitions is more accurately
attempt to evade definition by others.
its abili ty
to define
itself was
But the
interpreted as the
Dada recognised that
essential
to
the
task of
determining its own nature and course. As Hans Richter wrote,
,
Dada invited, or rather defied, the world to misunderstand it,
and fostered every kind of confusion.' [4]
The
academic
establishment
has
also
risen
to
this
ProVocation in its attempt to reach a definitive explanation of
the origin of both the word and the movement 'Dada'.
Again,
177
the Dadais ts
have made
appropriate
understanding
neglected
in
Huelsenbeck's
the
its
search
explanation
task particularly hard,
of
the
for
was
movement
such
that
has
factual
the
and
often
an
been
information.
word
Dada
was
,acc1dentally
.
discovered by Hugo Ball and myself in a German-
French dictionary ••• ' [5], whereas Hans Arp's account insisted:
Tris tan Tzara found the word Dada on February 8,
1916, at six o'clock in the afternoon: I was present
with my twelve children when Tzara for the first time
uttered this word which filled us with justified
enthusiasm. This occurred in the Cafe de la Terrasse
in Zurich and I was wearing a brioche in my left
nostril. [6]
In 1921, Man Ray and Duchamp asked Tzara' s blessing for the
naming of
their review New York Dada,
in response to which
TZ ara added a further piece to the puzzle:
You ask for authorisa tion to name your periodical
Dada.
But Dada belongs to everybody.
I know
excellent people who have the name Dada.
Mr Jean
Dada; Mr Gaston de Dada; Francis Picabia' s dog is
called Zizi de Dada... Dada belongs to everybody.
Like the idea of God or of the toothbrush •••
Hallelujah of ancient oil and injection of rubber.
There is nothing abnormal about my choice of Dada for
the name of my review.
In Swi tzerland I was in the
company of friends and was hunting in the dictionary
for a word appropriate to the sonorities of all
languages.
Night was upon us
when a green hand
placed its ugliness on the page of Larousse
pointing very precisely to Dada - my choice was made.
I lit a cigarette and drank a demi-tasse. [7]
The contradictory nature of Dada's statements about itself
Should be seen not as the source of confusion but the starting
Point for the analysis of a movement such as Dada. In his 'Dada
Manifesto on Feeble and Bitter Love', Tzara wrote:
There are some people who have said: dada is good
because
it isn't bad, dada is bad, dada is a
religion, dada is a poem, dada is a spirit, dada is
sceptical, dada is magic, I know dada.
My dear colleagues: good bad, religion poetry, spirit
scepticism, definition definition,
that's why you're all going to die
178
,
and you will die, I promise you.
The great mystery is never a secret, but its known to
a few people.
They will never say what dada is. [8]
Thus',
he
s ta ted elsewhere,
'the foundation
of
dadaism
is
represented not as the foundation of a new school but as the
repudiation of all schools.
a point of view.' [9]
There is nothing absurd about such
Indeed, in terms of the Dadaist attempt
to remain in control of its own project, the establishment of a
school to end all schools, an anti-school of anti-art, was only
as
absurd
as
the
'war
to
end
all
wars'
to
which
it
was
reacting.
Nevertheless,
attempts
to use and define Dada in terms
other than its own have persisted within the discourses of art
and literature.
Such definitions distort the Dadaist project,
\\7hich was commi t ted to the cri ticism of these discourses and
the institutions in which they arise. The Dadaists recognised
that definition in terms of an art movement or literary school
\\7ere attempts to bring Dada wi thin the domain of es tablished
Structures and saw that their ability to define and determine
their own project was necessary to their critical function.
Capitalism's Great War and Dada's Great Refusal
Dada is
most
frequently
characterised in
relation
to
those
movements, particularly Cubism and Surrealism, which preceded
and
succeeded
it.
understanding of
mOvement
for
the
which
This
context
merely
stylistic history and
such
considerations
allows
for
influences
were
the
on
a
intrinsically
179
insignificant. Indeed, matters of style were important only in
so far as they served to expose and challenge the
Context in which
historical
Dada arose. Dada was 'first and foremost an
Outburst of indignation and anguish at the debacle of Western
values in the prolonged savagery of war.' [10]
Dada emerged in 1916 from a group of refugees, deserters,
and dissenters from the First World War.
Emmy Hennings and
Rugo Ball were responsible for the establishment of the Dadaist
Cabaret Voltaire in Zurich,
a city which had already housed
Jo yce , Lenin, and Borges [11].
'I was sure', wrote Ball, 'that
there must be a few young people in Switzerland who, like me,
¥lere interested not only in enjoying their independence but
also in giving proof of it.' [12]
Cabaret opened,
He was not wrong: when the
Ball's diaries recall
that it was
'full
to
bursting. '
About six in the evening, when we were still busy
hammering and putting up Futurist posters, there
appeared an oriental looking deputation of four
little men with portfolios and pictures under their
arms, bowing poli tely many times.
They introduced
themselves: Marcel Janco, the painter, Tristan Tzara,
Georges Janco, and a fourth, whose name I did not
catch.
Arp was also there, and we came to an
unders tanding wi thou t
many words.
Soon Janco' s
opulent Archangels hung alongside the other objects
of beauty and, that same evening, Tzara gave a
reading of poems, conservative in style, which he
rather endearingly fished out of the various pockets
of his coat. [13]
The Cabaret became the focus for an attack on the values of art
and literature which spawned a critique of the values of the
CUlture as a whole.
Marcel Janco
described the atmosphere in
¥lhich the Dadaists worked:
We had lost confidence in our 'culture'. Everything
had to be demolished. We would begin again after the
tabula rasa.
As the Cabaret Voltaire we began by
shocking the bourgeois, demolishing his idea of art,
180
a t tacking common sense, public opl.nl.on, education,
institutions, museums~ good taste, in short the whole
prevailing order. [14J
Dada's
a t tack
literature.
was
centred
Nevertheless,
extent to which
on
this
the
focus
domains
of
art
and
led it to consider the
cultural values were implicated in the social
and discursive relations it considered responsible for the war.
The movement's
subversions of
its
of
critique
the
art were
totality
of
merely the basis for
social
and
discursive
relations. Hugo Ball's account of the Cabaret's intentions is
as expansive as that of Janco:
The ideals of culture and art as a programme for a
variety show - that is our kind of Candide against
the times.
People act as
though nothing had
happened. The slaughter increases, and they cling to
the pres tige of European glory.
They are trying to
make the impossible possible and to pass off the
betrayal of man, the exploi ta tion of the body and
soul of people, and all this civilised carnage as a
triumph of European intelligence. [15J
Dada
saw
the
fine
sensibilities,
impeccable
good
taste
and
implacable confidence of the bourgeoisie as indicative of the
system of values and relations which had produced
the war.
In
its eyes,
young people all over Europe had been killing each
Other
the
in
names
of
'Culture',
'Honour',
'Reason',
and
'C'lVilisation'; these were the values they, in turn, set out to
destroy.
Indeed, Dada set itself the task of a destruction greater
than that effected by the war: the destruction of the causes of
~ar.
Tzara's pronouncements reveal the extent of this project:
Let each man proclaim: there is a great negative work
of destruction to be accomplished. We must sweep and
clean.
Affirm the cleanliness of the individual
after the state of madness of a world abandoned to
the hands of bandits, who rend one another and
181
destroy the centuries. Without aim or design, without
organisation: indomitable madness, decomposition.[16]
As has been suggested, the very absence of coherent or declared
design in the Dadaist
project was maintained in an effort to
increase the chances of its ability to destroy the structures
it despised.
This
exercise
destruction
of
was
disrespect,
sometimes
ridicule,
meaninglessness of the word 'Dada'
attempted
and
the
scandal.
The
itself aimed to expose the
Contingency and vacuity of established values.
to everything
through
Made to
refer
under the sun and nothing in particular,
the
word was intended to infiltrate the ranks of concepts such as
,
Truth' and 'Reason' and set itself up as their rival.
Dada's
impact was such that it could not be ignored, and the press,
the artistic and the political authorities alike were forced to
speak
of
it
in
those
tones
reserved
for
conventional
disciplines and movements.
Those who had contempt for Dada ••• could never ignore
the fact that the word 'Dada', which they disparaged,
and was synonymous with that which was most worthy
of condemnation, was in reality a term that had
knowingly and mockingly been chosen by those very
same people tha t they wished to make fun of. Jean
Paulhan expressed it very clearly when the press
revealed its intention to boycott Dada: 'If you must
speak of Dada you must speak of Dada / If you must
not speak of Dada you must still speak of
Dada.'
[17]
Dada was a nonsense word in a world of meaningful words, and
its very presence challenged the quality
and certainty
of all
sUch classifications.
Dada's declared destructive intention and its repudiation
of all forms of construction testifies to its hostility to the
values of its society.
But it is misleading to infer from this
182
that the movement was nihilistic. Its negations were effected
in the hope that new possibilities of living would emerge from
the wreckage it left in its wake. Although Dada declared itself
an anti-art
and agitated against the
notions of
genius and
individualism inherent in the prevalent conception of art, it
Was not against the making, saying, and showing of things in
which art is engaged.
on the
What it did oppose was any
restriction
means by which things are made and the ends to which
they are used.
Dada rode slipshod over the conventions of
perfec tion and
order, harmony and beauty, appropria te media
and
literary
form.
Art
and
literature
were,
nevertheless,
merely the fronts on which Dada attacked the whole spectrum of
bOurgeois
values
and
relations;
they
were
its
point
of
departure for a devastating critique of the whole.
Every advertisement has a silver line
Tzara's
attitude
eXample
of
the
to
poetry
tactics
Dada
provides
used
us
and
with
an
excellent
shows
the
political
implications of their techniques.
Take a newspaper.
Take some scissors.
Choose from this paper an article of the length you
want to make your poem.
Cut out the article.
Next carefully cut out each of the words that make up
this article and put them all in a bag.
Shake gently.
Next take out each cutting one after the other.
Copy conscientiously in the order in which they left
the bag.
The poem will resemble you.
And there you are - an infinitely original author of
charming sensibili ty, even though unapprecia ted by
the vulgar herd. [18]
183
In
one
movement,
this
advice
undermines
the
values
of
creativity, structure, and originality,
and effects a critique
of
the
journalistic
writing
as
well
as
'vulgar
the
importance
of
during
First
herd'
of
literary critics.
An
appreciation
particularly
the
of
newspaper,
the
the
mass
World
media,
War
is
essential to the understanding of the impact of such writing.
Bergius observed that the Dadaists saw the press as 'the medium
~hich creates illusions while claiming for them an authenticity
and objectivity.'
By seeming to produce art-works in a similar spirit,
the Dadaists pilloried the Press, attacking its
mechanised,
stereotyped
and
reified
language,
exposing its tendency to reduce everything to a
single level by the juxtaposition of the most
disparate and contradictory items, and declaring it
to be a means of categorising and controlling man.
[19]
Dada's reconstructions of the language of the newspaper exposed
the extent to which words were reified and language turned into
a sUccession of cliches.
by
Tzara were
survive
this
The random configurations suggested
intended
to
indicate
the possibili ties
process:
the
article
and,
by
extension,
which
the
journalistic use of language itself, has its objectivity, its
immutable
quality,
undermined.
arrangements are possible,
Tzara
showed
that
other
that the construction promoted in
the mass media is merely one of an infini te varie ty of more
interesting
and
appropriate
forms
of
discourse.
When
Tzara
declared that the cut-up poem would resemble its arranger, he
made a serious point.
The individual is aliena ted from the
jargon of the press and so from language itself; the cut-up is
a
reclamation of the language of capital and war.
184
Complying
with
Tzara's
instructions,
the
poet
creates
Something valid out of the random conjunction of words from the
article which
article and
becomes
something
the poem are
Dada's rearrangement has
from
else
a
fashioned from
poem.
Both
the
the same material;
the effect of liberating the words
their hackneyed associa tions
and configurations and
so
qUestions the validity of the original construction. The cut-up
diSplays
its
arbitrary
nature
and
challenges
the
original
article to justify its claim to be anything more.
the work of the poe t. They
Tzara's advice demystifies
Completely reject every formal rule of poetry - poetry becomes
a matter of chance - and deny the originality of the poet - the
Poem is a recons truc tion of another's work.
Undermining the
notions of creativity and genius by providing a way for anyone
to work wi th words,
reveal both
extent
to
Stripped
the possibilities
which they
of
the collages of words were intended to
the
inherent
are denied
legitimation
in
language and
the
in conventional discourse.
they
acquire
in
their
proper
COntext, advertisements, newspaper articles, and poems appear
as mere arrangements of words.
Many
Dada
texts,
manifestos,
cOnstructions were made in this way.
poems,
and
visual
The process was extended
to typefaces too, which were becoming increasingly varied with
the
development
of
printing
techniques.
In
the
press,
typefaces serve to emphasise or minimise the impact of words
and the information they convey.
Beyond the headlines,
the
tYpe is uniform, with variety only when strictly necessary.
In
COntrast,
Dada printed its
texts with a wild combination of
185
type faces , punctuations and grammars, so drawing attention to
the most spurious of words and whispering the important ones in
the lower case. Mos t
Were
importantly, such manipulations of type
intended to expose those effected by the press.
Hausmann's optophonetic poems pushed this technique to its
extreme: they were created by the printer pulling letters out
of their boxes at random.
and
reconstruction
lettering;
of
collage
Photomontage - the manipulation of
original
the
and
printed photographs
assemblage
of
words,
and
pictures,
Objects, and so on without regard for the rules of appropriate
media; multi-media performances and cut up poems: each of these
techniques aimed at the subversion of the rules of creation and
COnstruction normally acceptable as art.
The phonetic poem, with which Ball began to experiment in
19 17, raises a number of further issues in its development of
these
techniques.
'f m s b
Ball's
'0 Gadj i
Beri Bimba',
Hausmann' s
w', and Schwi t ter' s 'Ursonate' are among the mos t
Well-known of these poems.
They may be considered as cut-ups
in which the process of rearrangement is extended to letters,
and anticipate
the development
of
France after the Second World War.
the
into
'grea t
the Lettrist movement
[20]
Hausmann wrote that
step by which total irra tionali ty was
literature
took
place
with
the
in
introduced
introduction
of
Phonetic poem' [21J, as Hugo Ball explained:
••• in these phonetic poems we totally renounce the
language that journalism has abused and corrupted.
We must return to the innermost alchemy of the word,
we must even give up writing secondhand; that is,
accepting words (to say nothing of sentences) that
are not newly invented for our own use. [22J
the
186
That Ball could regard all words as irretrievably corrupted by
the culture they serve is an indication of the sense of crisis
and
the
poli tical consciousness
experienced by
the Dadais ts.
To Suggest that we must be suspicious of words themselves is to
consider
their
very
use
a
collaboration
with
the
existing
structures of social and discursive relations.
These
destructive
poems
phonetic
rejections.
fascination with
were
The
the visual
not,
experiments
and aural
however,
merely
left
with
Ball
impact of
letters
a
and
sounds and led him to search for a new system of signs to be
found in a
'primeval'
Social apparatus,
and in madness,
memory,
'untouched by logic and by the
that emerge in
when
the unconsciously
the barriers are down;
With its own laws and its own form.'
inevi tably
revealed
glimpses
of
tha t
infantile
is a world
[23] Dada's destructions
another
order;
at
the
least they provided the impetus to search for one.
negations of culture,
very
In their
the Dadaists made something of a return
to nature, and there are frequent references to the unconscious
Or
prerational
however,
given
mind.
These
the significance
underlying
orders
later accorded
were
not,
them by
the
Surrealists, and the nature the Dadaists sought had little in
common with the ordered,
century
science.
mechanistic conceptions of nineteenth
Nevertheless,
there
is
a
tension
between
those Dadaists, like Arp, who saw the revelation of the new in
their work,
and others,
such as Tzara, who were committed to
the destruction of the old.
187
Chancing everything
The use of chance characterised all Dada's projects, but the
Dadaists
fluctuated
between
seeing
chance
as
pure
and
meaningless, random and absurd, and searching for its source
and meaning. Dada's hostility to laws and principles meant that
it could not wholeheartedly embrace the notion of chance as a
law of nature.
On the other hand,
every deviation from the
PUrsui t of chance seemed to involve some compromise wi th the
structures and orders it wished to subvert.
Arp certainly saw
na ture as
the domain of chance.
He
Wrote:
i love nature but not its substitute ••• in many
points however i have to count myself among the ugly
men who let reason tell them to put themselves above
nature ••• dada wanted to destroy the rationalist
swindle for man and incorporate him again humbly in
nature ••• dad a is as senseless as nature and life •••
the earth is not a fresh-air resort and the idyllic
prospectuses of the earth tell lies. nature does not
run along the little thread on which reason would
like to see it run. [24]
This is a theme to which
desire to 'cure
Arp often returned.
He spoke of his
human beings of the raging madness of genius
and return them modestly to their rightful place in nature',
and of
Dada being
nonsense.
'for
the senseless,
which does
not
mean
Dada is senseless like nature.' [25] Arp prioritised
nature in contradiction to the order of society, but it led him
to the notion of an essential order within nature, and enabled
him to speak of the na tural law of chance.
Penetra te
through
things
to
the
essence
Wrote, and his collages, wood reliefs,
Poems reveal this quest.
of
'We sought
life'
[26],
and 'Arpenden'
to
he
random
Arp described the construction of his
188
Collages
in
which
the
pieces
are
arranged
'automatically,
without will.'
I called this process "according to the law of
chance", which embraces all laws and is unfathomable
like the first cause from which all life arises, and
can only be experienced through complete devotion to
the unconscious.
I maintained tha t
anyone who
followed this law was creating pure life. [27]
Arp's nature is beyond the categorisations and structures of
reason, and although he considered it to be more 'real'
than
that which can be reached and confined in this way, he made no
claims for it as the herald of an alternative form of order.
'Life is a puzzling puff of wind, and what comes out of it can
be no more than a puff of wind'. [28]
In the Dada movement as a whole, there was little attempt
to theorise or define the reality of life as anything more than
this.
Dada
was
more
concerned
with
destruction
than
rebuilding.
Nevertheless, the tension between the search for
a
reality
fundamental
beyond
culture,
and
overturn all notions of an essential reali ty,
the
desire
to
remained,
and
Often developed into that between the irrational and
rational.
We were all fated to live with the paradoxical
necessity of entrusting ourselves to chance while at
the same time remembering that we were conscious
beings
working
towards
conscious
goals.
This
contradiction between rational and irrational opened
a bottomless pit over which we had to walk. [29]
Complete
surrender
denial of Dada's
as
to
chance
would
have
necessitated
the
goals; even the most partial of these, such
the
destruction
of
conscious
response
to
art,
a
was
not
particular
an
state
arbitrary,
of
but
affairs.
a
The
Dadaists recognised that to be ruled by chance alone would have
been to forego all notions of a purpose or direction.
189
problems
The
associated
with
the
challenge
to
all
principles are clear in relation to the 'anti-philosophy' which
Dada developed alongside its 'anti-art'. In a consideration of
history, for example,
Tzara quoted Descartes:
"Je ne veux meme
a eu des avant
m01,
appeare
0
one 0
our
publications. It signified that we wanted to see the
world wi th new eyes, that we wanted to be able to
reconsider the new foundation and to test the justice
of the notions imposed by our elders. [30J
This was not ahistoricism, since Dada's rejection of the past
and its desire to make a clean sweep was not the denial of the
past but the recognition of its supremacy and significance.
Dada rejected the notions and expressions, the individuals and
art movements of the pas t
precisely because it saw them as
productive of the present it despised. And this rejection knew
no
bounds:
to
the
list
of
values
and
categorisations
it
attacked were added the philosophical notions of reason, logic,
and truth, and the moral values of liberty, fraternity, honour,
and responsibility.
As with the rejections of art, literature,
and history, the derision of these notions was the recognition
of and the attempt to expose the profundity of their influence.
Dada accepted that none of these concepts could be totally
denied:
the rejection of language must occur in relation to
language,
just as
his tory.
This
the refusal of history must occur within
remains a paradox wi thin which all cri tical
movements are fated to work; indeed, it has shaped the course
not
only
of
movements of
the
avant-garde
but
the twentieth century.
also
Dada
Variety of tactics to deal with this tension.
the
philosophical
employed a wide
190
Tzara's
manifestos
epitomised
this
tactical
project.
Paradox and contradiction,
juxtaposition and consfusion,
deliberately
critique
fostered
and
embraced
within,
or
a
from
encompassing notions
as
reason
Kuenzli has compared Dada
with
in
order
were
to
effect
deconstruction,
of
such
and
this
truth.
In
a
all-
context,
Nietzsche and Eco:
In deconstructing the cultural sign system through
their own sign productions the Dadaists attempted to
convince their audience of the arbi trary nature of
signs, and thereby to liberate them from the prison
of their murderous social order. [31]
Nietzsche's critique of this
'sys tern of signs'
as a cul tural
invention, his attacks on centrality of logic, and his extreme
relativism are certainly present in Tzara, whose name, changed
from Sami Rosens tock,
Nietzsche's
subversion
Poems,
is
thought by
Zarathustra.
of
objects
photomontages
The
which
and
some to be derived from
cut-up
techniques
characterised
presentations
Dada's
of
all
and
the
collages,
kinds
can
certainly be interpreted as deconstructions of the culture, and
Tzara's
manifestos
are
clear
paradox
posed
the
necessity
CUlture.
lay
by
attempts
of
to
deconstruct
operating
within
the
this
Having established that the solution to this paradox
solely
in
the
transformation,
Tzara
double bind.
achievement
could
not
of
be
social
expected
and
to
cultural
escape
this
But in the same way that Dada failed to achieve
the social revolution yet succeeded in revealing its necessity,
TZ ara succeeded in exposing the existence of this paradox and
revealing its implications for critical discourse itself.
'What we need', wrote Tzara in the 'Dada Manifesto',
Strong,
straightforward,
precise works which will be
'are
forever
191
misunders tood. '
complication.
[32]
'Logic' ,
he
Logic is always false.
'is
continued,
a
It draws the superficial
threads of concepts and words towards illusory conclusions and
Centres. '
[33]
Unrelenting.
alleged
Tzara's
attack
on
logic
and
reason
was
His hostility to these notions stemmed from their
culpability
in
arrangemen t of social,
the
perpetuation
of
the
dominant
poli tical, and cultural relations;
of
logic, he said:
Its
chains
kill,
an
enormous
myriapod
that
asphyxiates independence.
If it were married to
logic, art would be living in incest, engulfing,
swallowing its own tail, which still belongs to its
body, fornicating in itself, and temperament would
become a nightmare
tarred and
feathered
wi th
protestantism, a monument, a mass of heavy, greyish
in tes tines. [34]
The
attack
on
promoted
logic
an
extreme
relativism.
'Philosophy', Tzara continued:
,
is the question: from which side shall we look at
life, God, the idea or other phenomena. Everything
one looks at is false. I do not consider the relative
result more important than the choice between cake
and cherries after dinner. [35]
There is no ultimate truth', he declared; 'the dialectic is an
amusing
machine
whuch
guides
us
(in
banal
faSdon)
to
the
attitude
of
OPinions which we would have held in any case.' [36]
Tzara
life'.
advocated
the
'I-don't-give-a-damn
The possibility of expressing this ambivalence to life,
logic, language, art, and reason, and at the same time working
~ithin them, was raised by Tzara a number of times.
He wrote,
for example, 'I write a manifesto and I want nothing, yet I say
Certain things, and in principle I am against manifestos, as I
am also against principles.' [37] And it was the statement of
this paradox which provided Tzara, and Dada as a whole, wi th
192
the possibili ty of
transcending it.
The contradictions and
hYPocri s ies into which Dada was forced were entered into and
embraced.
I am wri ting this manifes to to show tha t you can
perform contrary actions a t the same time, in one
single, fresh breath; I am against action; as for
continual con tradic tion, and af firma tion too, I am
nei ther for nor agains t them, and I won't explain
myself because I hate common sense. [38J
The manifestos did not merely describe such tactics but also
put
,
them
into
splendid
operation.
One
of
Tzara's
Unpretentious Proclamations' reads: 'Prepare the action of the
geyser of our blood - the submarine formation of transchromatic
aeroplanes, metals wi th cells and ciphered in the upsurge of
images.' [39]
The reaction against logic, reason, and common sense must
be seen in the context of wha t Bergius has described as
,
one
dimensional
effected by
cultivation
of
the
rational
the positivism and scientism of
the
faculties'
the nineteenth
century.
The products of reason were seen to take on an
independent existence and to trample men underfoot;
the world of objects was seen to encroach more and
more upon the human sphere, claiming man and
eventually turning him into an object as well. [40J
It Was the inadequacy of reason to the task of comprehending
and enjoying the world that Dada sought to expose.
'Perhaps
You will understand me better', Tzara
wrote,
tell you
that
penetrates
Dada
is
a
virgin
microbe
that
'if I
with
the
insistence of air into all the spaces that reason has not been
able to fill with words or conventions.' [41] Gabrielle BuffetPicabia related this to the reaction against the war when she
~rote: 'We were all convinced of the decline of reason and its
193
experience, and alert to the call of another reason, another
logic,
which demanded
symbols.' [42]
a
different
experience and
different
In his 'Note on Poetry', Tzara added:
Logic no longer guides us, and though it is
convenient to have dealings wi th it, it has become
impotent, a deceptive glimmer, sowing the currency of
sterile
relativism,
and
we
consider
it
from
henceforth a light tha t has failed forever.
Other
creative powers, flamboyant, indefinable, gigantic,
are shouting their liberty on the mountains of
crystal and prayer. [43J
Such powers were inevitably compromised by their expression in
Conventional
terms
and
forms.
inevitability
lead
it
to
the
Dada's
embrace
recognition
of
of
this
contradiction
and
hypocrisy: it was forced into existence as a lie and this it
accepted and exploited with relish.
In
'Monsieur
Manifes to',
AA
the
Tzara declared:
longer than a second [44]
Antiphilosopher
'Lying is
sends
ecs tasy -
us
this
which las ts
there is nothing tha t las ts longer.'
This was prefaced by a remarkable passage in which he
aserted tha t he lies,
and also that he does not lie;
in so
dOing he illustrated the dilemma into which a movement such as
Dada
is
Practising
forced.
The
rest
of
the
passage
finds
this refusal.
In the scalp of notions I implant my 60 fingers and
brutally shake the curtains, the teeth, the bolts of
their joints.
I shut, I open, I spit. Careful! The moment has come
when I should tell you
that I've been lying.
If
there is a system in the lack of system - that of my
proportions - I never apply it.
In other words, I lie. I lie when I apply it, I lie
when I don't apply it, I lie when I write that I lie
because I do not lie - because I have lived the
mirror of my father - chosen from the profits of
baccarat - from town to town - for myself has never
been myself - for the saxophone wears like a rose the
assassination of the visceral car-driver - he's made
of sexual copper and the leaves of racecourses. Thus
Tzara
194
drummed the maize, the alarm and pellegra where the
matches grow. [45]
Dada gave itself over to the nonsensical in an effort to avoid
the
influence
of
its
culture;
that
this
threw
it
into
Contradiction to itself as well exposes the degree to which the
prevailing
structures
revolutionary critique.
and
relations
pervade
even
the
most
195
THE POLITICAL ATTACK
Dada's provocative tactics of absurdity and chance were used
in order to subvert the bourgeois values inherent in art and
literature.
Chance,
for
example,
was
instrumental
in
the
Subversion of the notion of individualism since it undermined
the notion of the artist as a genius with privileged access to
higher truths and deeper realities.
Duchamp's works, particularly his 'ready-mades', epitomise
sUch provocations. He
displayed objects such as a hat rack and
a snow shovel, whose choice 'was based on a reaction of visual
i!!difference with a total absence of good or bad taste •••
[46]
As Richter noted, Duchamp:
declared that these ready-mades became works of art
as soon as he said they were.
When he 'chose' this
or tha t obj ect, a coal-shovel for example, it was
lifted from the limbo of unregarded objects into the
living world of works of art: looking at it made it
into art! [47]
Most
famous
of
all
Duchamp's
'ready-mades'
tUrned on its back and signed
'R. Mutt'.
~hich
rejected
he
named
Fountain,
was
is
his
urinal,
When the urinal,
by
an
exhibition
Committee in 1917 on the grounds that it was plagiaristic and
,
a plain piece of plumbing' [48], Duchamp's
answer to
these
Charges was:
Whether Mr Mutt with his own hands made the fountain
or not has no importance. He CHOSE it. He took an
ordinary article of life, placed it so that its usual
significance disappeared under the new title and
point of view
created a new thought for that
object.
As for plumbing, that is . absurd.
The only
works of art America has given are her plumbing and
her bridges. [49]
Duchamp's work exci ted the Dadais t
concern with the objects
196
and
experiences of everyday life, and challenged
of plagiarism and originality.
the notions
It was effectively asking: what
artist does not take the objects of ordinary experience and
raise them to the level of art?
Is the bourgeois notion of art
So very distinct from that offered by 'Mr Mutt'?
Duchamp's work had the effect of destroying the means by
which art may be judged as
'original'
or
'plagiaristic'
questioned the very validity of such a distinction.
of plagiarism only makes
sense
and
The notion
in a discourse which has
a
strong belief in the notions of individuality and uniqueness
and which applies
the notions
works
'ready-made'
of
art.
The
of property and ownership
declares
that
there
are
to
no
originals, since works of art and works of plumbing alike are
made out of the same world; ultimately, wrote Duchamp,
'Since
the tubes of paint used by the artist are manufactured and
ready-made products we must conclude that all the paintings in
the world are ready-mades aided.' [50]
Such tactics as
the use of
the ready-made,
the object
chosen without regard for the rules of artistic creation, have
the effect of completely undermining the values of art:
the
notion of 'the work of art' loses all significance. This loss
of meaning immediately poses the question of the way in which
meaning develops and the extent to which it can be chosen, in
the sense
in which
meaning as 'art'.
Duchamp
'chose'
to give
the urinal
its
This was the challenge which Dada threw to
the bourgeoisie: when its values can be so easily undermined,
from
where
Established
does
it
principles
derive
and
their
values
certainty
which
had
and
meaning?
hitherto
been
197
sacrosanct
were
rendered
vulnerable
challenge.
'The Dadaist', wrote
and
Arp,
shifting
by
this
'thought up tricks to
rob the bourgeois of his sleep' and 'gave the bourgeois a sense
of confusion and distant,
yet mighty rumbling,
so that his
bells began to buzz, his safes frowned, and his honours broke
out in spots.' [51]
Dada provocations were intended:
to show the bourgeoisie the unreality of his world,
the nullity of his endeavours, even of his extremely
profitable patrioteerings.
This of course was a
naive undertaking on our part, since the bourgeoisie
has less imagination than a worm, and in place of a
heart has an over-life-size corn which twitches in
times of approaching storm - on the stock exchange.
[52]
Arp's own naivety in explaining that of Dada should not conceal
the validity of his words;
the bourgeoisie did indeed need a
crisis on the level of economy to seriously disturb it, a point
developed below.
Nevertheless,
brave
attempt
to
Dada can at leas t be said to have made a
upset
the
'good
burghers'
[53].
Dada's
Performances are a further example of its abili ty to illici t
the
disgust,
Performance
outrage
of
and
phonetic
contempt
poems;
of
the
Dada's
bourgeoisie.
'brutist'
The
concerts,
consisting of 'sighs of love, volleys of hiccups, poems, moos
and miaowing'
[54] and the s imul taneous poems in which three
texts in three languages were read at the same time: each of
these
,
stagings
produced
the
effects
of
language
as
rhythmical noise' [55]. The simultaneous poem, wrote Ball:
carries the message that mankind is swallowed up in a
mechanistic process. In a generalised and compressed
form, it represents the battle of the human voice
against a world which menaces, ensnares, and finally
destroys it, a world whose rhythm and whose din are
inescapable. [56]
mere
198
Dada attempted to provoke the bourgeoisie to the recognition of
the emptiness and chaos of the world they believed to be so
comfortable and secure.
Having earned the contempt of the bourgeoisie, Dada turned
this to its own advantage.
Dada, wrote Picabia:
is like your hopes, nothing
Like your heaven, nothing
Like your idols, nothing
Like your politicians, nothing
Like your heroes, nothing
Like your artists, nothing
Like your religions, nothing. [57]
In his 'Lecture on Dada,' Tzara was equally damning:
I know you're expecting some explanations about Dada.
I'm not going to give you any. Explain to me why you
exist. You've no idea. You'll say: I exist to make
my children happy. But you know its not really true.
You'll say: I exist to protect my country from
barbaric invasions. That's not enough. You'll say:
I exis t because God wants me to.
Tha t' s a tale to
tell the children. You'll never know why you exist,
but you'll always allow yourselves to be easily
persuaded
to take life seriously.
You'll never
understand that life is a play on words ••• [58]
Dada
was
able
determination
to
to
sustain
remain
repeated affirmations
of
negations of all meaning.
this
answerable
its
To
a t tack
because
only
to
of
itself.
own meaninglessness
its
Its
stood
as
the bourgeoisie's dismay,
the
Dadaists responded: 'like you, we are nothing'; to its disgust,
they
said:
COntinues:
'like
you,
we
are
disgus ted' •
Tzara's
lecture
'The beginnings of Dada were not the beginnings of
an art, but those of a disgust.'
Disgust with the magnificence of philosophers who for
3000 years have been explaining everything to us
(what was the use?), disgust with the pretension of
those artists who were god's representatives on
earth, disgust with passion, with real, morbid malice
applied in cases where it isn't worth while, disgust
with a new form of tyranny and restriction, which
only accentuates men's
ins tinc t
for
domination
instead of allaying it,
disgust with
all the
199
catalogued categories, with the false prophets behind
whom financial interests must be sought, with pride
or with illness, disgust with people who separate
good from evil, beauty from ugliness ••• [59]
That the First World War motivated this disgust cannot be
over-emphasised, but it is interesting to note that Dada made
little mention of the war itself and was concerned to expose
the cultural and political values and structures which caused
it.
Dada has been described as a 'great Flood', an
wipe the cultural slate clean.
It
attempt to
attacked the bourgeoisie
for its ignorance or denial of the horror of the war and the
reality of the 'civilised' values in whose name it was fought.
As
such,
its
Nevertheless,
criticisms
were
essentially
political.
the promotion of a political programme or even
the development of a consistent critique was anathema to the
majority of Dadaists.
For them, Dada should reject politics as
it rejected art;
vehemently opposed to all programmes
principles,
refused to define it in poli tical terms.
they
and
Dada was, however, quite different wherever it appeared, and in
Berlin,
the
political
critique
implicit
in
Dada
elsewhere
received an overt expression and commitment.
Every man his own football
The atmosphere in post-war Berlin was very different from that
Of neutral Zurich in 1916.
Mass strikes and agitations against
the war were encouraged throughout Germany by the Spartakists,
and by the end of the war, the country was on the brink of a
200
revolution.
Berlin Dada allied itself to the revolutionary
movement with enthusiasm, and as Richter observed:
The Berlin Dadaists might well look down on their
Zurich colleagues, who had admi t tedly insul ted the
citizenry in all the approved ways, but had no real
collapse of the Established so-called Order, no
revolution to their credit. [60]
In Berlin, he continued, 1they had a real revolution, and they
decided
to
join
in.'
Dada-type
provocations
had
existed
throughout the war, during which 'police censorship had not,
even in Germany, attained that degree of perfection for which
the succeeding decades have no doubt received due honour in
Hades' [61J; poetry and prose critical of the war machine had
been disseminated for some years.
As early as 1913, Ball and
Leybold had published the journal Revolution in
Munich, and,
as Kleinschmidt noted, although it is customary 'to ascribe the
rebellion against the military-industrial establishment to the
reaction aroused by the first World War ••• in fact, rebellion
had been brewing since the turn of the century.' [62J
Huelsenbeck,
Gros z ,
and
Hausmann,
Joannes
Baader
the
were
Herzfeld
brothers,
George
among
prominent
Berlin
the
Dadaists. Their productions became explicitly political and the
journals edited by earl Einstein, for example, were banned as
Soon as
developed
they appeared.
by
Dada
were
The techniques and artis tic tactics
used
as
a
means
to
propogate
such
material, as is clear from Walter Mehring's description of the
distribution of one journal.
We hired a char-a-banc of the sort used for
Whitsuntide outings, and also a little band, complete
with frock coats and top hats, who used to play at
ex-servicemen's funerals.
We, the edi torial staff,
paced behind,
six
strong,
bearing
bundles
of
Jedermann sein eigner Fussball instead of wreaths •••
201
Along the streets of dingy grey tenements, riddled by
the machine-gun fire of the Spartakus fighting and
sliced open by the howitzers of the Noske regime~ the
band was greeted with cheers and applause ••• [63J
He added that the phrase 'every man his own football':
entered the Berlin language as an expression of
contempt for authori ty and humbug.
The periodical
even looked like becoming a best-seller - and would
have, if we had not been arrested on our way home •••
(We carried a supply of gummed labels saying 'Hurra
Dada!' for sticking on the walls of police-station
cells.)[64]
In Cologne,
Max Erns t
figured in a group which pursued
similar activities, and although less politically rigorous than
its Berlin counterpart,
Cologne Dada allied itself wi th the
proletarian revolution too.
Ernst collaborated with Baargeld
in the production of a left wing paper, the Ventilator, which
Was distributed at factory gates and attained a circulation of
20,000
by
the
Occupation.
time
it
was
banned
by
the
British Army
of
This sort of political activity was not conducted
to the detriment of what is understood by Dada in terms of its
artistic activities,
but was integral to it.
the Berlin and Cologne Dadaists
important Dada practices.
Indeed,
developed some of
both
the most
In particular, Ernst's collages ('No
one has known better than Max Ernst how to turn pockets inside
OUt')
[65],
group's
collective
assemblages,
and
Berlin
Dada's
photomontage were
important
contributions
to
Dadaist
the
techniques and tactics.
That Dada manifested itself in such different ways whilst
at the same time retaining its own identity is indicative of
its
Own
flexibility
and,
moreover,
its
Poli tical climate in which it erupted.
Wherever it arose, and al though
dependence
Dada was
on
the
different
a number of the ci ties and
202
COntexts in which it operated have not been discussed here,
Zurich,
Cologne,
and
Berlin
suffice
to
illustra te
the
importance of the political context to the form taken by Dada.
The
events
in
Berlin,
for
example,
gave
Dada
not
a
new
direction, but a concrete base and a common purpose with the
forces of social revolution which enabled it to develop its own
direction.
Berlin
Dada
made
the
politics
of
Zurich
Dada
explicit.
Even the latter had extended its criticisms beyond
bourgeois
values
restricted
to
the
bourgeois
structure;
it
had
not
itself to the artistic domain but had sought to
expose the social whole in which this realm ex is ts.
it occurred,
Wherever
therefore, Dada was responsive to the political
climate in which it worked,
whether this
is defined as
the
basic influence of the First World War or the particular impact
of the rising in Germany.
The
significance
of
Dada's
material
recognised by a number of commentators.
origins
has
been
Richter commented that
COlogne's the Ventilator was less committed to the revolution
than its Berlin counterparts.
'It must be recalled', he wrote:
tha t Cologne was a long way from the firing a t the
Berliner Schloss or in Charlottenburg and knew
nothing of the murders of the Landwehrkanal, or the
assassination of Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg.
Berliners saw all this on their doorstep, if not in
their own living rooms. [66]
Similarly,
Short considered the
1919 to have had a fatal
reVolution was defea ted,
'rout of
the revolution'
impact on Berlin Dada.
in
When the
'Dada ac tivi ty. •• went into decline
and soon petered out.' [67]
It is true that Dada remained aloof from direct political
commitment - although the Herzfeld brothers joined the German
203
Communist
Party
(KPD)
in
1918,
their
involvement
was
exceptional - and it is not suggested that the Dadaists were
fighting on the streets as revolutionaries.
Kleinschmidt was
correct in his observation that:
the dadaists in the years 1916-1918 had no political
programme, offered no political alternatives to the
oppression by the military-industrial establishment,
nor did they join ranks with the workers and sailors
who had begun to rebel openly. [68]
Dada's armoury was equipped for a war of words and pictures and
little more, and its possibilities were limited as a result.
This does not, however, undermine the assertion that Dada had
poli tical intentions and a poli tical impact.
\\Tas incapable of realising its aims,
\\Tere broad and revolutionary,
which,
Al though Dada
even in Zurich,
it made it clear tha tits
\\Tas with the very structures of its society. Dada
war
desired the
sUpersession of art not as an end in itself but for the sake of
a society in which the rift between art and
life could be
healed,
the course
of
tha t
a
in which art could be
lived
out in
eVeryday life.
Dada's
realisation
removed
from
achievement
was
its
awareness
such
the end of art as a specialised discipline,
the
rest
of
experience
entailed
the
aChievement of a social revolution which a movement such as
Dada was unable to effect. I t
considered its subversions of
necessary, but insufficient, to such a transformation, so
that 'Dada had a chance for realisation with the Spartakists,
\\Tith
the
revolutionary
practice
of
the
German
proletariat.
Their failure made the failure of Dada inevitable.' [69]
204
Nevertheless, it was the recogni tion tha t
art and other
Cultural structures were inextricably linked with the totality
of relations that enabled Dada to develop the
broad political
consciousness responsible for its attempts to remain distinct
from existing discursive and social relations. Dada recognised
that the destruction of art was impossible in isolation from
tha t of
the sys tern of values and relations as a whole,
without
such
minimised.
a
destruction,
Dada's attempt
its
impact
was
to destroy art was
and
necessarily
the point of
departure for a wider attack which it was powerless to enact,
but although it used
its
totality
of
values
structures,
Social
and
political
and
subversions of art to expose the
change
recuperation of Dada inevitable.
has
its
inability
made
to
the
effect
subsequent
Indeed, while the definition
Of art may be broadened as a result of an antagonism such as
that effected by Dada,
such a movement cannot pose a serious
threat to either the values and structure of art or those of
its society. As a result, Dada survives in a fragmentary form.
This fragmentation is most evident in Dada's treatment as
an
artistic
movement;
a
characterisation
which
denies
the
Significance of its material origins, its tirades against the
bourgeoisie, and the breath and scope of its attacks.
aSpects
of
Dada
are
not
ignored,
but
adjuncts
to
its
supposed
aesthetic
concerns.
Dadaists
argue
reCognition
it
that
Dada was
received.
Grosz
considered
responsible
and
for
Herzfeld,
These
as
mere
A number
of
the
partial
for
example,
Wrote:
our only mistake was to have been seriously engaged
at
all
with
so-called
art.
Dada
was
the
breakthrough, taking place with bawling and scornful
205
laughter; it came out of a narrow, overbearing, and
overrated milieu, and floating in the air between the
classes, knew no responsibility to the general
public.
We saw then the insane end products of the
ruling order of society and burst into laughter. We
had not yet seen the system behind this insanity.
IT DAWNS
The pending revolution brought gradual understanding
of this system. There were no more laughing matters,
there were more important problems than those of art;
if art was still to have a meaning, it had to submit
to those problems. [70]
Although Dada is remembered as an artistic school above all
else,
it
did
all
it
could
Indeed, there are lines
\\7hich trea t
to
avoid
characterisa tion.
of subsequent revolutionary cri tique
Dada in poli tical terms,
Subsequent chapters.
this
That a
a legacy considered in
characterisation of Dada in terms
of its political activity is possible is due to the skill with
\\7hich it attempted to avoid appropriation in terms other than
its own.
Dada's
'suicide' in 1921 was effected
in a direct
attempt to minimise its subsequent recuperation. Nevertheless,
that Dada could not escape appropriation by the artistic and
commercial structures it attacked displays the extent to which
it was dependent on the forces of social revolution to effect
the supersession of these structures.
The end of Dada
It is clear that Dada was faced with a problem of effecting a
tadical critique of its culture, language, and society whilst
at the same time speaking as a cultural and social phenomenon.
Among the
tactics employed by Dada in its attempt to minimise
206
the extent to which it was compromised by the structures within
which it
worked was
the refusal
to engage in coherent and
comprehensible explana tions of anything, particularly itself,
which aimed at the evasion of this problem.
'Nothing is more
Pleasing than to baffle people. The people one doesn't like',
wrote Tzara in his 'Lecture on Dada'. [71]
Nevertheless, Tzara
recognised that this tactic, in spite
of its immediate successes, was necessarily limi ted.
'DADA
remains within the European frame of weaknesses', he conceded.
'It's shit after all but from now on we intend to shit in
different colours so as to adorn the zoo of art with all the
flags of the consulates.' [72] Dada's blatant acceptance of the
dilemma into which it was forced was turned by Tzara into an
idictment of the system which necessitated this position.
But
although Dada was infinitely flexible - 'DADA has 391 different
attitudes and colours according to the sex of the president'
[73] - it was unable to sustain its attack indefinitely. The
Dadaists considered that their critique of the totality must
be mounted on every front:
bringing suspicion and doubt
to
every structure and value in order to cleanse the world of the
,
civilised carnage' of the First World War.
The realisation of
an art inseparable from everyday life was impossible to fulfil
in isolation
from
the
transforma tion of
the
totali ty.
Dada
SOught a revolution in every area of life and experience and
the freedom it expressed in its works.
The 1918
'Manifesto'
ends: 'Liberty: DADA DADA DADA; - the roar of contorted pains,
the
interweaving
of
contraries
and
freaks, and irrelevancies: LIFE.' [74]
of
all
contradictions,
207
The failure of the
revolutionary movements
in Germany
necessitated the failure of the Dadaists' project to supersede
the
of
isolation and removal
art from everyday life.
In
recognition that Dada could only hope to reveal the necessity
of a broad
transformation rather
than bring it about,
'commi t ted suicide' as a movement in 1921.
Dada
This marked the
acceptance that Dada had done all it could to promote its own
project,
and
that
its
undermine its impact.
continuation
would
only
serve
to
Only non-existence could have saved the
movement from compromise,
and only its delibera te conclusion
could sustain the self-determination it had always sought.
A number of commentators consider that Dada was
into
forced
an impasse of suicide or silence as a resul t
of
the
failure of the revolutionary movement. [75] The Dadaists were
So
conscious
that
with
compromise
their
the
very
existing
existence
structures
necessitated
that
their
some
project
became impossible to sustain. Aragon wrote: 'I was someone who
believed,
childish as it may seem, that to name the War, even
in order to oppose it, was to publicise it.'[76] It was felt by
the majority of the group that to continue the Dada project
Ylithin the structures and values
Ylould
have
cOllaboration.
involved
Dada
the
had
they so vehemently opposed
unnecessary
made
its
point
extension
and
of
revealed
this
the
necessity for revolution, but was incapable of effecting it.
The movement
the
sky,
'vanished one fine day as a meteor disappears in
leaving
behind
it
the
memory
of
its
brilliant
trajectory and the light of the numerous fires it kindles in
Passing.' [77]
208
Dada did not, however,
end wi thout controversy, nor was
its demise a simple and definite affair.
In 1922, the Berlin
Dadaists met to hear a funeral oration delivered by Tzara and
Published by Schwitters as the Conference of the end of Dada.
In
Paris,
SUrrealist
Dada
survived
movement.
in
Breton,
opposition
to
the
Soupault,
Aragon,
emergent
Tzara,
and
DUchamp were amongst those who had been working as Dadaists in
Paris since 1919; they were caught up in an amazing series of
events staged in an effort to effect some sort of escape from
the impasse reached by Dada.
What worried the Paris Dadaists
more than anything was that they appeared to have created a
public demand:
they had become popular -
acquired a taste for Dada' s
Ribemont-Dessaignes,
insults.
the bourgeois ie had
'At all costs', wrote
'they must be prevented from accepting a
shock as a work of art.' [78] As Richter recalled, Paris Dada
tried to ensure the continued effectiveness of its tactics by,
for example, the arrangement of excursions to neglected places
a
practice
later
developed
by
the
Surrealists
and
the
Situationists - and, in 1921, the organisation of the trial of
Barres.
Barres had once been an inspiration to the Dadaists, but
by the 1920s he had become the editor of a reactionary paper
and was the object of their contempt.
trial,
The staging of a mock
in which Barres was represented by a tailor's dummy,
UnSettled
the
participants
divisions between them.
and
led
to
a
series
of
serious
These were publicly displayed in 1923
at a Dada performance:
Breton hoisted himself onto the stage and started to
belabour the actors... boxed Crevel' s ears roundly
and broke Pierre Massot's arm with his walking stick.
209
Recovering from its stupefaction,
the audience
reacted... I can still hear the
director of the
Theatre Michel, tearing his hair at the sight of the
rows of seats hanging loose or torn open and the
devas ta ted
stage,
lamenting
"My
lovely
li t tIe
theatre." [79]
Such disputes signalled the arrival of the Surrealist movement,
since Breton had another answer to the apparent impasse reached
by Dada. As early as 1919 he had written to Tzara that he and
. his friends were 'nursing a project which might overthrow one
Or two worlds' [80], and Surrealism did indeed proceed in quite
a different direction in its attempt to do so.
Dada's attempts to end itself provide a further example of
its
desire
to
remain
in
control
of
itself.
Its
self-
destruction was the final and inevitable negation in a series
of negations. While Surrealism attempted to evade the Dadaist
dilemma
of
suicide
and
silence,
its
agreement
with
the
revolutionary aims of Dada presented it with all the problems
Of the
'double bind'
Dada.
Surrealism,
of cri tique and collaboration faced by
like
every subsequent
movement with
the
SCope of Dada, was to 'try to do something new/after knowing
that because of Dada nothing is new.' [81]
Dada in distortion
SUrrealism shared much with Dada, but whilst it learned 'that
reVolt, before it is anything else, is a state of mind' [82],
its
spirit was serious and literary in comparison.
Surrealism
PrOceeded with an earnest quality completely absent in Dada:
210
Dada was playful and mischievous
and bore a spontaneity and
immediacy which Surrealism endorsed but did not embody.
This playfulness has led to suggestions that Dada arose as
a manifestation of the Fool, Jung's
trickster archetype.
They turn the tables on their chastisers; mock those
who think they have a monopoly on the truth; make
fools of the powerful and wise; forcibly disclose the
animal appetites underlying apparently spiritual
ideals; sugges t that the weak are, in recognising
their weakness, stronger than the mighty; seek to
create new joy and freedom by their unabashed
contempt for authority and convention. [83]
This
aspect
of
Dada
is
often
interpreted
as
bourgeois
tomfoolery, and it is certainly true that the role of the Fool
is
traditionally
that
of
the
social
safety-valve.
Court
jesters were, after all, employed to laugh at the king.
Dada
Clearly intended to do a great deal more than this, but by the
end
of
the
movement's
activities,
it
was
obvious
that
the
establishment could turn any of its provocations into such a
safety-valve; in the role of j es ter, Dada would be harmless.
That Dada recognised this and abandoned itself in order to rob
Society of its new found security has ensured it a continuing
influence on subsequent political critique.
Dada is best
is not to sugges t
liugnet wrote,
~.'
understood as the product of its time, which
tha t i t can speak only for its time.
'Dada
is
not
a mal du
siecle,
=;..;;;....~~~==..;:;.
but
As
a mal du
[84] It did, however, express the unease, the disquiet,
and dissent provoked in many by the war.
Gleizes wrote:
The decomposing material body of the bourgeois
hierarchy has its counterpart in the decomposition of
its spiritual values.
The material body returns to
dus t, the spiri t
re turns to the void.
The Dada
movement is not the voluntary work of individuals: it
is the fatal product of a state of affairs. [85]
211
The period was also characterised by the acceleration of mass
and
media
communications,
which
machine necessary to the war.
facilitated
the
propaganda
Bergius noted that the Dadaists
were surrounded by:
illusion-producing media such as advertisements,
commodities, fashions, magazines and newspapers •••
Dada's problem was not the illusory nature of reality
but in the real nature of illusion, used by the
powers-that-be to cover over primary reality like a
coat of varnish. [86]
The Dadaists
attempted to destroy this varnish without regard
for the nature of the 'primary reality' they would reveal.
Dada was caught between the views that this would be the
revelation of a new order and that of a disordered chaos.
At
times,
the
tended
Dada
towards
discuss ions
of
na ture,
Unconscious or the instincts: cut-up poems were said to reveal
the
true
order;
random collages
to
reflect
mind.
Elsewhere, such practices were held to
of all
order,
and
arbitrary world.
to reveal
the awful
the
unconscious
be destructive
possibili ties
of an
Through photomontage and collage, the images
of Dada's world were taken apart and rearranged, and Dada was
primarily concerned with the act of destruction rather than the
search
for
a
new
order.
This
is
not
to
say
that
Dada
considered such a search hopeless, but that it recognised that
any construction within the existing structures would reinforce
them to the detriment of the Dadaist project.
What
Dada
could
do
was
expose
Structures and values it attacked.
language
of
advertisement
capital,
of
its
the
Possibilities of poetry within each:
influence
of
the
Dada's subversions of the
propaganda
commodities
the
of
its
war
and
the
revealed
the
infinite
an infinite variety of
212
messages
waiting
for
discovery
within
every
message.
The
revelation that the existing arrangement of the world and its
discourse was not axiomatic and immutable, but fluid and alive,
Was
a
powerful
damning
invocation
attacks
which
of
the
possibility of change;
accompanied
this
disclosure
the
were
an
invocation of its necessity.
It exposed both the breadth of
the
in
areas
social
of
and
life
implicated
discursive
Contingency of
the
relations,
its values
dominant
and
the
structure
fragility
and ca tegorisa tions.
of
and
It became a
critique of the totality of the prevalent system, and reached
the stage at which there was no longer any point to operating
Within it.
Sheppard noted Dada's attempt to:
subvert established order even while knowing that
this subversion could never finally succeed and was
prepared to abolish itself rather than be assimilated
by
a
society
which
would
like
to
turn
its
subversiveness into an oblique form of reassurance.
[87]
Dada's
intended
suicide,
to
avoid
together
such
with
its
recuperation;
dominant system's need to
other
it
was
tactics,
was
aware
the
identify and define anything which
Poses a threat in order to confine and disarm it.
Which refuses
since
it
to accept
cannot
be
of
such containment retains
accommodated
Dada cannot even be considered a
by
the
A movement
its potency
exis ting
s truc tures.
'movement' with accuracy:
it
consisted of loose associations, artists who rejected the name,
cOllabora ti ve
techniques,
and
and
anonymous
locations,
ac ti vi ties,
a
varie ty
of
means,
and the declarations of professed
liars. Such autonomy is threatening and provocative in itself.
The subsequent definitions of Dada as an artistic movement
entail
its
critique,
assessment,
and
exhibition
as
art;
213
conceptions
which
deny
the
intentions
of
Dada
and
are
compounded by the attributes of the category of art which it
scorned.
the
Dada attacked the use of art for the sustenance of
dominant
system
however
this
occurred,
and
saw
the
commercialisation of art as the most obvious example of this
employment.
The appearance of coffee table books on Dada, its
gallery exhibi tion,
and
the
economic value
accorded
to
its
works are as much a travesty of its original intentions as the
Use of
its
techniques
advertising,
in
which
become basic skills
in
the broader commercial world of
collage,
of
montage,
and
pastiche
the advertising specialist.
have
Although
Dada did all it could to slip through the fingers of those who
would claim and define it, the survival of the system of social
relations it attacked has
In
the
performance,
'Neo-Dada'
the
made its recuperation inevitable.
of
the 1960s,
juxtaposition
and
for
example,
repetition
of
collage,
everyday
Objects, and configurations intended to confuse and provoke are
presented:
Warhol's
Lichtenstein's
prints,
comics,
and
Rauchenberg's collages are obvious and well-known examples of
SUch techniques.
In spite of
these similarities with Dada,
Neo-Dada's existence within the discourse of art ensures it a
tOtally different effect.
The spectator
reacts:
not with shock, but with pleasure, and by opening his
purse. He buys, and he enjoys himself immensely. In
other words, he does not believe in the rebels'
rebellion at all - and the dealers and the public
galleries enthusiastically back him up in this. [88]
1'his
is
because
there
is
no
rebellion
of
the
force
and
tnagni tude of Dada, but only the appearance of rebellion;
the
tactics are used in isolation from the intentions with which
214
they were formulated.
Huelsenbeck wrote that the weapons of
Dada have been turned into 'popular ploughshares with which to
till the fertile soil of sensation-hungry galleries eager for
business.' [89]
This suggests that Dada's tactics have changed
their meaning wi th the transforma tion of their context.
The
transfer of these techniques to the conventional discourse of
art
has
removed
them
from
the
armoury
of
revolutionary
critique: they no longer constitute a threat to art, and merely
SUstain its role in the dominant structure.
This constitutes the recuperation of Dada. As a critique
Of
the
totali ty,
Dada
is denied and rej ec ted
in favour
of
classifica tion as an art movement, a li terary school, or the
precursor
to
Surrealism.
Its
end
products
and
visible
techniques are emulated and developed within this discourse to
the exclusion of the intention and spiri t of revolution wi th
~hich they were made.
Dada was concerned with the act and the
Purpose of its manifestations, each of which was presented in
an
effort
to
maintain
mOvement,
and
it
is
the
autonomy
precisely
this
and
efficacity
consciousness
of
the
which
is
absent in its subsequent portrayal and interpretations.
1962, Duchamp wrote: 'I threw the bottle-rack
In
and the urinal
into their faces as a challenge and now they admire them for
their aesthetic beauty.' [90]
Duchamp's urinal formed part of a totality of critique,
~hich attacked the notion of art itself and its place in the
prevailing system of relations.
Removed from
this context,
neither the original object nor its successors has an impact
any different from any other work of art or movement.
Dada has
215
survived in partial and fragmentary form.
It is emptied of the
meaning it intended, divorced from the everyday life it wished
to reconcile with its project,
exhibited like the works of art
it wished to negate, and sold like any other commodity.
Uncompromising
revolt
has
been
replaced
by
unconditional adjustment.
Duchamp's coal-shovel,
bottle-rack and pissoir can now be the objects of a
calm aesthetic judgement - which was exactly the
thing on which Duchamp vented his scorn some forty
years ago. The prefix Anti has become a feather-bed
on which bourgeois and art collectors complacently
recline. [91]
Although Dada killed
itself rather
than be murdered by
the
establishment, the absence of a social revolution has made its
recuperation inevitable.
Or
even
the
memory
The very survival of Duchamp's urinal
of
it
Vulnerable to this process:
Completely
is
sufficient
to
leave
it
the only means of avoiding this
would be to have never existed at all.
That this is an absurd suggestion proves that something of
Dada's spirit and intention survives. Although Dada has been
dis torted and claimed by the s truc tures i t a t tacked so tha t
its
techniques
are
now
Political intentions,
considered
in
isolation
from
its
their survival in any form means
that
the possibility of discerning the spirit and breadth of Dada's
critique remains.
Such
reclamations have indeed been made at
times of political dissent and protest in the years following
Dada,
an
observation
which
testifies
to
Dada's
continuing
POlitical relevance and suggests the ultimate impossibility of
definitive recuperation.
216
SUICIDE, SILENCE - OR SURREALITY
For the Surrealists, as for the Dadaists,
the First World War
Was devastating beyond itself, and engendered a critique of the
social order which spawned it.
The Surrealists recognised that
'the society which had sent them so gaily to death was waiting
for them on their return, if they managed to escape, with its
laws,
its
morality,
its
religions.'
professed its commitment to
[92]
revolution;
Surrealism
Peret,
for
also
example,
declared that 'a poet these days must be either a revolutionary
Or not a poet.'
[93] Whilst both movements shared the common
background
of
the
war
and
revolution,
however,
the
tactics
carried
the
they
common
employed
goal
were
of
quite
distinct.
The difference between Dada and Surrealism is often said
to be
that between negation and affirmation,
and it is
true
that Surrealism accepted and developed many of the notions such
as
creativity
Consequence
of
and
construction
this
is
that
rejected
Surrealism
by
can
be
described as an artistic and literary movement,
indeed
an
image
it
embraced.
While
Dada.
One
accurately
since this is
Surrealism
considered
Dada's total rejection of
affirmative tactics to be incapable
Of effecting change,
was equally hos tile to the exis ting
arrangements
of
impossibility of
the
Dadaist
considered
it
it
culture
ignoring
attempt
to
necessary
and
society.
these structures in
work
to
outside
subvert
them,
them
from
Observing
the
the failure
of
the
Surrealists
wi thin.
They
recognised the importance of social revolution, not least for
217
the
practice
of
an
authentic
art,
bu t
considered
tha t
some
attempt to realise art and transform the experience of everyday
life
within
the
existing
structure
was
necessary
to
its
Success. Such a project was considered capable of revealing the
nature of these structures and the attributes of the culture
and society which might replace them.
It
is
in
this
characterised as
sense
tha t
affirma tive,
Surrealism
since it was
can be
accurately
as concerned wi th
the elucidation of the new as with the critique of that which
eXists.
The new, or 'post-revolutionary' perspective developed
in the movement was
'surreali ty',
dichotomies
di vis ions
structures of
and
propagated
in
the
exis ting
society and culture are reconciled and united.
Most significant of
and the
the point at which all the
these divisions
imaginary and,
imagination.
Each
estrangement,
as
by ex tens ion,
was
the
is
seen
as
isolated
that between the real
be tween reason and
existing
component
of
the
in
artificial
the
unity
of
surreality. The Surrealists were committed to the coincidence
and reconciliation of these realms:
Everything leads us to believe that there exists a
certain point in the spirit at which life and death,
the real and the imaginary, the past and the future,
the communicable and the incommunicable, the high
and the low, cease to be perceived as contradictory.
Now it is vain to search for any other motive in
surrealist activity than the hope of discovering
that point.[94]
This hope was immediate: the Surrealists sought reconciliation
in
the
present.
In
considered necessary
the
absence
of
the
to such a unification,
social
revolution
the Surrealis ts
believed they could still seek out coincidence and encourage
its experience through their art.
To this end they sought
to
218
reveal the existence of surrealism in the art and literature of
the past, so affirming, in contrast to Dada, the
importance of
naming his torical precedents to their proj ect.
Surrealism's
historical consciousness legitimated the consideration of the
tradition it identified as its own.
Leaving Dada
Those who were
little of
later
Dada until
to
form
1920,
the
Surrealist movement
knew
when Tzara arrived in Paris
at
Breton's extravagant request. The Litterature group, with which
Breton, Eluard,
~as
Peret, Aragon,
and Soupaul t were associa ted,
shocked out of its literary complacency and immediately won
Over to
the dissent,
doubt, and rebellion of Dada.
gUise of a true Dadaist,
Breton
In the
urged:
Leave everything.
Leave Dada.
Leave your wife.
Leave your mis tress.
Leave your hopes and fears.
Leave your children in the woods.
Leave the
substance for the shadow. Leave your easy life,
leave what you are given for the future. Set off on
the roads.[95]
The Surrealists clearly considered their encounter with Dada to
have
been
necessary,
but
inadequate
and
unfulfilling,
and
although they did indeed 'leave Dada',
this
rejection was not
eXercised in a spiri t of negation but for the sake of a new
COnstruction.
They
were
dichotomies,
seduced
by
enchanted
the
by
the
coincidence
of
prospect
of
exploring
the
marvellous and the surreal, and excited by the possibility of
its communication and development.
219
Surrealism never completely escaped the Dadaist influence
and the movement can be sympathetically interpreted in terms of
the tension between Dadaist tactics of rejection and negation
and
its
own
constructive
and
affirmative
projects.
The
significance of the Dada spirit is clear throughout Surrealism.
In the Second Manifesto, Breton wrote:
Surrealism was not afraid to make for itself a tenet
of absolute revolt, complete insubordination, of
sabotage according to rule, and ••• it still expects
nothing save from violence. The simplest Surrealist
act consists of dashing down into the street, pistol
in hand, and firing blindly, as fast as you can pull
the trigger, into the crowd.
Anyone who, at least
once in his life, has not dreamed of thus putting
an end to the petty system of debasement and
cretinisation in effect has a well-defined place in
that crowd, with his belly at barrel level.[96]
Elsewhere, Breton declared his belief
of anything which takes place,
in the 'absolute virtue
spontaneously or not,
in the
sense of non-acceptance. '[97]
On
the
other hand,
Surrealism was
a
rejection
of
the
nihilism it discerned in Dada and this led it away from the
denial of meaning to its discovery and creation. 'Introduction
to the Discourse on the Pauci ty of Reali ty'
eXpression to the Surrealist
desire
gives poignant
to 'get into contact'
lNith the world.
I am in the world, really in the world, and at this
moment am depressed even by nightfall.
I know that
in Paris, on the boulevards, the beautiful luminous
signs are making their appearance •••
Why do trains carry at the same season of each year
a number of travellers which varies so little? It is
the coincidence in such matters which is impressive.
I cons tan tly indulge in such remarks, which might
pass for absurd but which give a good idea of the
obstacles which all thought may have to surmount •••
The existence, duly established in advance, of this
bouquet I am about to smell or of this catalogue I
am thumbing should suffice for me. Well, it does
220
not. I mus t assure myself of its reali ty. As they
say, I must get into contact with it.[98]
Aragon
described
his
own
movement
towards
the
search
for
meaning; in Paris Peasant, he wrote that as a Dadaist, he had
been
'basking
in anarchy
as
one
would
say
basking
in
the
sunshine. '
During those marvellous, sordid times, I almost
invariably preferred the time's preoccupations to my
own heart's
occupa tions,
and
lived a
chance
existence, in pursuit of chance, which alone among
the divinities had shown itself capable of retaining
its authority. No one had preferred charges against
chance, and some were even reinves ting it wi th a
great absurd charm ( ••• ) I felt the great power that
certain places, certain sights exercised over me,
without
discovering
the
principle
of
this
enchantment ••• Slowly, a desire sprang up in me to
find out what was the link between all these
anonymous pleasures.[99]
Finally, he recalled,
'without feeling reluctant any longer, I
set about discovering
the face
of the infinite beneath the
concrete forms which were escorting me, walking the length of
the earth's avenues.' [100]
Aragon's
Treatise
on
Style
expresses
Surrealism's
definitive rejection of Dada, in which, it was said:
everyone begins by supposing that nothing is worth
the trouble, tha t two and two do no t neces sari ly
make four, that art has no importance whatever, that
it is rather nasty to be a literary man, that
silence is golden. Ll0l]
While Surrealism embodied such a rejection of Dada, it was to
remain
suspended
between
the
conflicting
imperatives
negation and affirmation discernible in the two movements.
of
221
A surrealist tradition
Although the Surrealist movement was most active during the
1920s and 1930s, it survived until the 1960s and has exercised
a subs tantial
influence on subsequent cul ture and cri tique.
The Surrealists saw themselves expressing a reality which would
Continue to surface beyond their own activities, and discerned
a
tradi tion
structures
of
of
challenge
thought
to
and
conventional
reality
in
the
and
poe try
dominant
of
pas t
'rebels against a hyperlogical view of the world'. [102]
Rimbaud, Baudelaire and Apollinaire, Jarry, de Sade and
Lautreamont
number
SUrrealis ts;
each had
their
breaking with
time,
amongst
the
wri ters
launched an assaul t
traditional
admired
on
forms
by
the
the values
of
or material
in
their work. Of these, only Apollinaire was a living poet, and
the Surrealists'
admiration of his war poems and calligrams
meant that his review, Litterature, acted as an early focus for
the movement. Apollinaire's
invocation of l'esprit nouveau, a
new spiri t,
provided a clima te which,
affirmative,
nonetheless forced the Surrealists to reconsider
whils t
li terary and
the role of poetry in a world enchanted not by the products of
the imagination but those of capital and technology.
In Apollinaire's play La Poete Assassinee, Horace Tograth
leads the scientists in their demand for the death of the poets
Ylith the words:
True glory has
forsaken
poetry
for
science,
philosophy,
acrobatics,
philanthropy,
sociology,
etc. Today all that poets are good for is to take
money which they have not earned, for they seldom
work and since many of them (except for Cabaret
singers and a few others) have no talent and
consequently no excuse... The prizes that are
222
awarded
to
them rightfully belong
inventions, research men ••• [103]
to
works,
Apollinaire's response to the currency of such an attitude was
to declare his desire to reclaim the exci tement of invention
and discovery
for
poetry.
He considered
the
ques t
for
the
surreal to be central to this reclamation, and introduced the
word into the avant-garde for the first time.
regain
the
ability
to
discover
Contemporary experience.
the horrors
The poet must
and
marvels
'While reality was becoming in
of
many
ways more fragmented and incoherent, it was also more than ever
before
within
man's
grasp,
thanks
to
radio,
telephones,
aeroplanes and motorcars', wrote Apollinaire.
We
insisted
that
there
were
no
subjects
inappropria te to poe try, which should be broad in
scope as the front page of a daily newspaper.
It
should also reflect the speeding up of modern life.
Just as broadcasting and aviation were able to link
up in a matter of moments places that were
previously days apart, so the poet should speed up
the transition between the separate elements of his
images. [104]
The 'new spiri t'
advocated by Apoll inaire was
Poetic world
real as the Paris Metro and as immediate as
as
to discover a
the lightbulb.
Breton called Apollinaire
'the
las t
of
the poets',
an
indication that the Surrealist admiration for literary figures
of the past was
tempered by its Dadaist desire to effect a
definitive break with 'poetry' and 'literature' themselves. In
this
respect,
Breton' s
friendship wi th Jacques
Vache had
a
Strong, and Dada-like, influence on the subsequent course of
the Surrealist movement. 'But for him', wrote Breton, 'I might
have been a poet.'
[105]
Vache killed himself at the age of
twenty-three, leaving only his letters and the recollections of
223
those
who
knew
him.
And
yet,
without
actually
creating
anything, he became immortalised merely by his own existence:
'What he was mattered more than what he produced.' [106] Vach~
and Breton were twenty when they met at a military hospital in
Nantes: Breton an intern determined to become a poet; Vach~ a
soldier
recovering
from
a
leg
injury.
Vache's
outrageous
behaviour and his scorn for both the military and the artistic
made a deep impression on Breton, stirring in him a rebellion
parallel to that which was to come from Dada, of which the two
were
ignorant.
Vache
scorned
Breton's
literary
heroes,
ridiculed his poetic intentions and dashed his complacency.
Vache claimed that his
'guiding principle was umore,
by
which he meant that at a certain stage of enlightenment the
futility of life becomes comic.' [107]
Art and literature he scorned with the rest,
translating his despair into the enigmatic and
provocative gestures of his daily existence.
Once
able to leave his bed, he was often to be seen
promenading through the streets in any variety of
military uniforms. He spoke little of his past, lied
freely for amusement; and never greeted or said
goodbye to his friends, who he often ignored
altogether. Breton and he wandered through the town,
haunted cafes, and sought distraction in the local
movie theatres, entering without enquiring what film
was playing and leaving at the first sign of
boredom. [108]
His death was the ultimate example of this attitude.
Having
declared his objection to being killed in the war -
'I shall
die when I want to die and then I
else ••• '
shall die wi th somebody
[109] - he took an overdose of opium with a friend
who, it is assumed quite unintentionally, died with him. Vache
Clearly
pushed
Breton
towards
nihilism
and,
as
Alquie
has
POinted
out, 'the dialogue between the ecstatic poet and the
224
nega tor who in 1916 made fun of his li terary admira tions is
carried on in Breton for a
[110]
long time after Vache' s death.'
Vache was even free from collusion with the values he
despised;
Breton considered it Vache' s good fortune
to have
produced nothing. 'He always kicked aside the work of art, that
ball and chain that holds back the soul after death.' [111]
The Surrealists were to embrace much that Vache
despised,
and departed from his provocative and Dada-like stance. Victor
Castre described the difference thus:
Surrealism opens a large credit for man; Vache
denies him the slightest. Surrealism engages the
future, even the most distant; Vach~ considers only
the present, he has killed the future by killing
himself. Finally, surrealism finds an open door in
mystery; Vache, on the contrary, closes all doors.
[112]
Nevertheless
Vache's
impact
was
profound,
and
his
maverick
presence is discernible throughout their movement. As is the
case with Dada, the antagonism of his arguments and the force
Of his attitudes was impossible to ignore. After Vache's return
to the front in May 1916, he and Breton were to meet only once,
at the opening of Apollinaire's play, Les Mamelles de Tiresias.
Vache
protesting
at
what
literary
pretensions
by
threatening
revolver.
Breton's
was
affection
he
for
perceived
Vache
the
is
as
the
audience
play's
with
a
itself worthy
of
notice:
A ,young man, who at twenty-three had swept the
un1verse with the most beautiful look I know of, has
rather mysteriously taken leave of us. It is easy
for the critics to say he was bored: Jacques Vache
was not the man to leave us a testament ••• The man
who was painted stretched out in a deck chair, so
very fin de siecle lest he disturb the collections
of the psychologists, was the least weary, most
subtle, of us all.
Sometimes I see him; in the
streetcar a passenger points out to provincial
225
rela ti ves
"Boulevard
Sant-Miche,
the
school
[113]
quarter"; the window pane winks complicity.
The intimacy of the Surrealists'
connection with Apollinaire
and Vach€ gives these two figures a particular significance in
the
development
of
the
movement.
influences and precedents
important
Of
the
plethora
to Surrealism,
of
one more
figure, Lautreamont, is considered here.
The Comte de Lautreamont, Isidore Ducasse,
like Vach€, he was twenty-three.
died in 1870;
The Surrealists considered
him a poet whose words had the power to destroy and rebuild in
one movement.
In his Maldoror, they saw 'the expression of a
total revelation which seems to exceed human possibilities.'
[114]
Like that of Apollinaire, Lautreamont's work sought to
recapture
the
marvellous
from
the
domain
of
scientific
diScovery which was for him epitomised by Darwinian theory.
In
phrases such as 'The beetle, beautiful as the trembling hands
of
the
alcoholic',
the
Surrealists
witnessed
the
power
of
imagery of which Apollinaire had spoken; it awakened in them an
aWareness that every aspect of the world was linked with and
expressible in terms of every other.
The freedom wi th which
Lautreamont's 'beautiful as ••• ' can be used renders it a means
of
challenging
the
accepted
cOnstructions of reality.
inventory
of
conventional
With Lautreamont, wrote Breton:
I t is all over wi th the limi ts wi thin which words
used to be able to enter into relationships with
words, things with things. A principle of perpetual
motion has taken hold of objects, as of ideas,
tending
towards
their total deliverance which
implies that of mankind. [115]
Poets
like
Cultivated
Lautreamont
seemed
an
courage
uncommon
to
the
to
Surrealists
explore
the
to
have
unknown.
226
Rimbaud, who eventually rejected the poetic adventure for that
of gun-running in Africa, wrote
that the poet:
makes himself a seer by a long, gigantic and
rational derangemen~ all the senses. All forms of
love, suffering and madness. He searches himself. He
exhausts all poisons in himself and keeps only their
quintessences. Unspeakable torture where he needs
all his faith, all his superhuman strength, where he
becomes among all men the great patient, the great
criminal, the one accursed - and the su~reme
Scholar! - Because he reaches the unknown! [116J
As the Surrealist group gathered momentum and forged a stronger
identi ty,
these words
grew in significance.
Lautreamont's imagery, Apollinaire's
,
~more'
were, like Dada's chance,
themselves,
but
signs
of
horizons of the unknown.
means
of
'new spirit' and Vache's
no longer taken as ends in
to
explore
and
reveal
the
I t was this sense of discovery and
OPtimism which exci ted the Surrealis t
foundation in 1924.
The realms
group to its official
227
THE SURREALIST PROJECT
The major precursors of Surrealism had mapped out a terrain
which
the
movement
was
determined
to
negotiate.
The
'marvellous' was the term it used to encapsulate the strange,
mysterious,
surprising and coincidental.
Fascinated by the
eruption of the marvellous into everyday life, the Surrealists
made
the coexistence and interaction of the rational and the
real with the irrational and the imagined their own province.
The Surrealists sought a form of rationality broad enough
to envelop all aspects of experience, and this necessitated a
cri tique of the dominant conception of reason on the grounds
that it precludes the comprehension of vast areas of thought,
imagination, expression, and experience. In its devotion to the
moments
of
Surrealism
coincidence
looked
for
as
they
clues
as
appear
to
a
in
everyday
lasting
life,
unification.
Seeking the permanent reconciliation of the opposed realms, it
considered even the most fleeting glimpses of the marvellous to
be vital to the development of a broadened and more appropriate
rationality in which such a union could flourish.
Such moments of supreme interaction, the marvellous, arise
from 'the triggering of a contact, a dazzling one, between man
and
the
world
of
things.'
[117]
The
experience
of
the
marvellous comes haphazardly, bursting with occasional passion
and surprise into a world of mundane causality.
The marvellous
is unexpected, fresh, awesome, and vertiginous, invoking an air
of splendour and possibility.
the possible'
Breton wrote of 'the breath of
touching one in the street;
Aragon spoke of
228
'those moments when everything slips away from me, when immense
cracks
appear
in
the
palace
of
the
world.'
'I would',
he
declared, 'sacrifice my life for them.' [118] And Mabille gave
a
precise
account
of
the
importance
the
Surrealist
group
attached to the marvellous:
The main value of surrealism seems to me to have
been the reintroduction of the marvellous into daily
possibilities.
It has taught that if reality
appeared deadly dull, this is because man did not
know how to
see, his glance being limi ted by an
education deliberately designed to blind him by an
aesthetic censorship handed down to him from times
past ••• It has taught us to listen to the inner voice
which, at every minute, is capable of dictating the
poem. [119]
Surrealism's
and
that
concern is clear: the products of the imagination
which
considered
is
denied
in isolation,
by
but in
rationality
terms
of
were
not
to
be
their relation
to
reality and that which is comprehensible within reason.
This
concern necessitated some prioritisation of the irrational and
the imaginative, since the Surrealists
not only opposed their
separation, but also their neglect. But their investigation was
always centred on the surreality of their interaction and the
possibility of expressing and communicating this union.
The Surrealist unconscious
Freud's
own
beyond
conscious
concern
to
explore
rationality
and
comprehend
rendered
the
sYmpathetic to his notion of the unconscious.
fOr Freud's work - which was
the
realms
Surrealists
Their respect
apparently not reciprocated - led
to the identification of his definition of the unconscious with
229
the Surrealist realm of the marvellous; indeed, as it appears
throughout Surrealism, the unconscious mind takes much of its
character from Freudian theory.
With the development of the notion of the unconscious, the
Surrealis ts began to explore its whole contents.
Dreams and
desires were considered to represent certain truths about a
broad and fundamental
seen as
a
common
level of reali ty;
psychic
base.
The
the unconscious was
Surrealists
gave
the
Unconscious an artistic, literary, and also a philosophical and
Political application. The Communicating Vessels, published in
1932,
is
one of the most significant post-Freudian texts on
dream
analysis,
interpretations
although
of
the
it
is
cri tical
implications
of
of
reformist
Freudian
theory,
particularly in their denial of material 'obstacles to desire
and of the conspiracy against love in capitalist society' [120]
,
Today',
wrote Breton,
'there is certainly little space for
~hoever wouldh6~tily trace in the grass the wise arabesque of
the suns I have mentioned.' [121]
In
Freud's analysis,
structure and
images.
the dream bears a comprehensible
sense beyond
the manifes t
incoherence of
its
The Surrealis ts developed the Freudian
dis tinc tion
between the principles of reali ty and pleasure,
according a
greater and more profound reality to the latter, as Freud had
done,
but
whereas
Freud
concluded
that
repression
was
an
inevitable and necessary feature of any society, the Surrealist
Conception
of
this
distinction
between
the
two
realms
of
eXperience aimed to be broader and more dialectical than its
Freudian equivalent. In its rejection of Freudian reformism in
230
favour of
a revolutionary critique,
the reconciliation of the principles
opposites
they
should
considered
be
represent.
principle itself
They
less
than
in
the Surrealists sought
and the synthesis of the
considered
relation
to
that
repression
the
pleasure
to the experience of its fusion wi th
reality.
Such a repression,
Sort
of
'divide
inevitable.
In
and
which the Surrealists regarded as a
rule'
their
of
the
psyche,
is
by
no
means
efforts
to
develop
a
new
form
of
rationality capable of dealing with both aspects of experience,
the Surrealists rejected the Freudian tendency to advocate the
incorporation of
the
barely
rationality.
altered
pleasure principle
They
in
the
sought
a
terms
of
a
transformed
consciousness capable of transforming reali ty and enjoying a
surreal world.
Nevertheless,
the
Surrealists
did
sense
a
meaning
and
order underlying the experiences of the dream, the imagination,
and
moments of chance and coincidence.
not meaningless,
~bjectif').
a
like
that
Surrealist chance was
of Dada,
but objective
('hasard
Objective chance was defined as the 'recognition of
meaningful
relationship
private space of
between
events
the psyche and events
recurring
in
the
taking place in the
world of concrete objects and material circumstance.'[122]
It
was understood as the meeting point of the material world and
the
'secret
Satisfaction
appeal
or
from
awakening
wi thin'
of
[123],
desire,
the
unexpected
rapprochement,
coincidence in everyday life:
At the forefront of discovery, from the moment when,
for the first navigators, a new land was in sight to
the moment when they set foot on the shore, from the
and
231
moment when a certain learned man became convinced
that
he had witnessed
a
phenomenon,
hitherto
unknown, to the time when he began to measure the
import of his observation - all feeling of duration
abolished by the intoxicating atmosphere of chance a very delicate flame highli~hts or perfects life's
meaning as nothing else can. L124]
Such experience is striking precisely because it satisfies some
obscure inner longing. And yet this satisfaction engenders new
desires,
including
that
to
communicate
and
perpetuate
the
experience in the automatic text.
The
surreal
search
for
led
movement
the
the
experience
to
activities most propitious
experience of
love,
the surreal.
Surrealis ts
the
and
expression
investigate
the
of
the
attitudes
and
to the eruption of desire and the
At play,
discerned
on
a
the streets,
recurring
and in
spiri t
of
receptivity fostered by the breath of possibility inherent in
such experiences.
Automatic writing
The
project
of
automatic
writing
determination
to
articula te
the
writing as
in painting,
revealed
the
marvellous.
travelling,
or
Au toma tism,
in
entails
the
interference in
the
speech,
absence of conscious control or rational
Surrealist
eXpression of the 'real functioning of thought.'
A plethora of
Surrealist
described
artifacts
automatic works;
example of
however
in
and
paintings
may
be
as
Masson's automatic drawings are an excellent
the use of
Surrealist
this
technique
writing
that
in visual art.
the
It
is
investigation
of
232
automatism
is
most
rewarding,
since
it
is
here
that
the
Possibilities and problems inherent in the technique are most
clearly displayed.
Automatic writing was an attempt to capture the essence of
the stream of consciousness, to express and communicate it in
as pure and unadulterated form as possible.
Breton recalled
that it was in a dreamlike state that he first became aware of
the existence of a shadowy stream of thoughts and images which
migh t be sus tainable in the act of its transcription.
'One
evening', he related:
before I fell asleep, I perceived, so clearly
articulated that it was impossible to change a word,
but nonetheless removed from the sound of any voice,
a rather strange phrase which came to me without any
apparent relationship to the events in which, my
consciousness agrees, I was then involved, a phrase
which seemed to me insistent, a phrase, if I may be
so bold, which was knocking at the window. [125]
Aware of Freud's use of free association as therapy, Breton and
Soupault decided to 'blacken some paper' with such thought, in
a 'praiseworthy disdain for what might result from a literary
point of view.'
Surrealism valued its plas tic and li terary
work in terms of its ability to invoke the marvellous which, in
this context, is the mysterious presence of such uncontrollable
processes
of
thought.
Whereas
the
Dadaists
had
used
the
arbitrary and the chance selection of words and the elements of
Collage to ridicule belief in order, the Surrealists considered
that the absence of conscious involvement presaged the presence
of a new order and a form of consciousness broad enough to
accommodate it.
Like the Dadaists, the Surrealists saw automatism as
a
challenge to the bourgeois notions of art as the creation and
233
property
of
the
poet.
The
automatic
significance and responsibility of
it
is
the
unbridled
product
of
a
the
since
the
liberated
unconscious
and
The
absence
of
control
imagination.
transcription
reduces
the individual poet,
indicated the absence of a creative force:
is
text
rather
rather than an invention.
than
a
conscious
the automatic text
production,
Automatism is
the
a
discovery
unconcerned with
the
rules of literary convention and replaces them with an entirely
new set of principles and ends, so that poetry and art become
means of discovery:
they appear,
and
art,
in their intention and the form in which
they challenge both the conventions of literature
and
their
existence
as
realms
separated
from
the
concerns of reality. In the use of poetry to discover a broader
and truer reality, it
becomes a means by which the critique of
that which exists is effected.
The Magnetic Fields was published by Breton and Soupault
in 1919. Like all automatic texts,
fresh,
and
in
some
sense
more
it attempted to discover a
real
and
unmediated
way
of
eXperiencing the interaction of the individual and the world.
The absence of rational control over the writing was intended
to
reveal
and
Constrained by
convey
aspects
of
the
world
concealed
and
the conventions of reason and literature.
Not
only are the rules of literary form abandoned, but the content
of
the
writing
is
likewise
freed
from
the
confines
rational morality and its attendant values and taboos.
are the opening passages of The Magnetic Fields:
Prisoners of drops of water, we are but everlasting
animals.
We run about the noiseless towns and the
enchanted pos ters no longer touch us.
Wha t' s the
good of these great fragile fits of enthusiasm,
these jaded jumps of joy? We know nothing any more
of
a
These
234
but the dead stars; we gaze at their faces; and we
gasp with pleasure. Our mouths are dry as the lost
beaches, and our eyes turn aimless ly and wi thout
hope. Now all that remain are these cafes where we
meet to drink these cool drinks, these diluted
spirits, and the tables are stickier than the
pavements where our shadows of the day before have
fallen.
Sometimes, the wind surrounds us with its great cold
hands and ties us to the trees denticulated by the
sun.
All of us laugh, all of us sing, but nobody
feels his heart beat any longer. Fever abandons us.
The marvellous railway-stations never afford us
shel ter anymore; the long passages terrify us.
So
in order to go on living these monotonous minutes
must still be stifled, these scraps of centuries.
Once we loved the year's last sunny days, the narrow
plains where our eyes' gaze flowed like those
impetuous rivers of our childhood. There remains
nothing but reflections now in the woods repopulated
with absurd animals, with well-known plants.
The towns we no longer wish to love are dead. Look
around you.
There's nothing left now but the sky
and these waste plots that we shall soon end by
detesting. We touch those tender stars which filled
our dreams with our fingers.
Yonder, they told us
that there were
prodigious valleys; horse-rides
forever lost in that Far West as boring as a museum.
[126]
The
text
paints
connections
which have
a
comprehension
and
seem
to
to a different way of perceiving and expressing
the
resonance
belong
that
associations
escapes
and
rational
world. It bears as a great sense of freedom and possibility, as
though
the
expression
legitimate.
of
anything
in
any
form
becomes
Here the influence of Lautreamont is particularly
noticeable since the act of automatic writing is considered to
free
the
mind
for
the
discovery
of
images
as
diverse
and
Cardinal
has
evocative as those of the author of Maldoror.
Using
COnsidered
he
a
from
Dubuffet,
Roger
such texts to be part of the movement towards what
identifies
SUpporting
phrase
as
verbal
the
'logological
microcosm',
in
extreme'
which
of
the
language
'selfbecomes
235
autonomous,
[127]
in
and
the
arrangement
of
words
self-referential.
For Dada, the achievement of the 'logological extreme'
phonetic
poems
and
the
use
of
comple te and sufficient in itself.
chance
arrangements
is
The Surrealis ts, on the
other hand, use the autonomy of language to reveal the contents
of the unconscious mind.
The 'irrational' juxtaposition of words is an attempt to
liberate
them
from
the
rational arrangements,
Corresponding
perceives.
text
constraints
of
their
conscious
and
a practice which is held to effect a
liberation
of
the
mind
and
the
reality
it
The absence of conscious control over the automatic
introduces
an
entirely
new
set
of
rules
to
the
construction of poetry: the text is the product not of the will
to write something, but the
own sake.
naked will to expression for its
This introduces an unprecedented freedom into the
prOject of writing:
the words, and no longer the poets, are
held responsible for what they say.
The prospect of unlimited freedom of utterance is
precisely
what
attracted
the
Surrealists
to
automa tism: a si tua tion in which words could "make
love", in Breton's phrase, is a situation in which
the enticing surprises
of unreali ty will
be
maximised. [128]
Every
configuration
becomes
valid,
both
because
of
this
autonomous quali ty of language and, mos t
importantly for the
Surrealists,
words
meaning,
because
sense,
and
any
combination
comprehension.
of
Words
conveys
which,
in
some
their
conventional, and perhaps cliched, arrangements
are made to
speak of the rational and the conscious world
can reveal the
irrational and the unconscious when 'left to their own devices'
in the automatic text.
236
It is most significant that the Surrealists were concerned
not merely wi th the experience of the surreal, but wi th the
possibility of conveying it, to the ext~~t that the
of
the
surreal
Surrealists
becomes
considered
integral
their
to
its
discoveries
expression
experience.
to
constitute
The
a
critique of the existing reality and were determined that this
critique should be heard. The entire Surrealist project shared
its roots with Dada: the Surrealists were disenchanted with the
conventions of reason, reality, and conscious expression, and
their experiments with automatism were intrinsic to the attempt
to subvert and undermine such conventions.
project
of
forms
developing
of
Theirs was
expression
capable
the
of
realising such a subversion.
The paradox of rational derangement
The experiments with automatism launched the Surrealists on a
path of double agency.
They aimed to discover a means by which
they might work within the contexts of literature and art in
order to subvert these categories and their attendent values.
Soupaul t recorded a conversation which reveals the ex ten t
to
which Surrealism was the conscious adoption of tactics to this
end.
After
the
first
edition of Litterature in 1919,
the
nascent group was disturbed by the ease with which their work
Was absorbed into the French literary tradition •
••• the conversation took a sudden turn, fear of
pleas ing.
We were being welcomed from the very
beginning as successors, heirs, by our elders.
Gide, Val~ry, the Nouvelle Revue Franyaise, Jacques
Riviere, etc.
A career like any other.
It was
already understood. Shit! Would Rimb. or Lautr •••
237
them, eh?
Suddenly, it became a kind of dialogue,
like challenges exchanged ••• Deceive ••• B. defined
the work of destruction we were to undertake with
whoever else wanted to, but between us a secret
engagement ••• People must still believe that we are
poets. [129]
This makes it clear that the group decided at an early stage to
adopt tactics and techniques chosen not for their artistic or
li terary meri ts,
nor for
the immediacy of
their des tructive
power, but in terms of their long term efficacy and strength as
works independent of these values.
Their desire to effect the
subversion of reali ty and the s truc tures wi thin which it is
expressed necessitated their role as
'double agents',
who would
a
appear
to
be
engaged
in
conventional
project while secretly working to undermine it.
people
artistic
Whereas Dada
Was engaged on a project of direct engagement, confrontation or
Contestation
with
the
structures
of
culture
and
society,
Surrealism chose the pa th of subvers ion and sabotage: it set
itself up as the 'enemy within'.
This was, however, a difficult game to play.
In the first
place, we may recall the spirit in which Breton and Soupault
began
their
experiments
with
automatism:
the
'praiseworthy
diSdain' for literary quality with which they wrote.
that
people
should
Surrealists'
writing
'still
believe
that we
are
Eager
poets',
the
still accorded with certain senses of
harmony and aesthetic appeal. This is evident not only in the
largely grammatical construction of The Magnetic Fields
and
other automatic texts, but in the often conventional beauty of
their phrasing and their participation in the poetic project.
Clearly the Surrealist attempt to embrace the unknown in a
spirit of adventure and discovery was also the attempt to bring
238
it into the realm of the known, a procedure vulnerable to the
charge that it merely accounts for the unknown in terms of the
established structures and categories of that which is known.
Surrealism recognised the dangers of expressing the marvellous
in the terms of the mundane, and this awareness encouraged its
development as a revolutionary movement.
Dismayed by the ease
with which the most radical of its gestures and those of Dada
were accommodated by the structures they intended to destroy,
the
Surrealists
became
more
convinced
of
the
necessity
of
effecting a definitive transformation of society.
This realisation did not, however, deter the Surrealists
from their investigations.
They considered that the prevailing
mechanisms of thought and expression constituted a systematic
denial of the diversity of human experience, and could
only be
countered by the authentic expression of such experience.
In
this attempt, the Surrealists encounter what Russell described
as
the
'essential
avant-garde
paradox'
of
the
'rational
derangement of all the senses' of which Rimbaud wrote.
[130]
The Surrealists wanted to voyage into the unknown, but stronger
still was their desire to return to tell the tale, expressing
their adventures in terms which would elucidate their meaning.
Dada desired only the former: it did not deny the significance
of experiments with the arbitrary, but neither did it attempt
to systematise or give any meaning to such experiments beyond
their
intrinsic
reality.
ability
to
reveal
the
arbitrary
nature
of
There was, in effect, no desire to discover or create
the automatic pilot felt by the Surrealists to guide the poet's
pen.
239
It was
finally
the belief in this pilot,
distinguished
Surrealism
the unconscious,
and
Dada.
As
which
Short
has
observed, the Surrealists:
believed that all men enjoyed equality at this level
of mental activity and hence that it provided a
common basis for a new mentali ty.
Nothing could
have been further from Tzara' s ideas: in the Dada
Manifesto of 1918, he had denounced the notion
common psychic base as a myth.
Dada automatism did
not issue from a specific, privileged foyer in the
mind, filled with lost or hidden knowledge; it was a
cry from the bowels. [131]
or-a
From Freud, the Surrealists accepted not only the notion of the
unconscious
as
the
source
of
desires
frustrated
by
the
organisation of reality, but also the possibility of giving the
unconscious a rational comprehension.
The Surrealist interest
in the irrational was not developed at the expense of reason:
theirs
was
not
imagination and
the
Romantic
attempt
the unconscious,
but
to
privilege
the
the Hegelian project
of
reconciling the opposed realms.
Such a
reconcilia tion mus t,
however,
take place wi thin
the realm of reason, reality, and consciousness. The Surrealist
,
never
gives
up
discovering
the
sense
in
any
automatic
production.
To the riches of the unconscious he wishes to join
the
of
light
argued,
the
excluded as
consciousness.'
Surrealis t
[132]
unders tands
Ultimately,
as
the
experiences
various
Alquie
forms of madness from not the patient's, but
doctor's point of view.
the
In Mad Love, Breton wrote that only:
a precise and absolutely careful reference to the
emotional state of the subject to whom such things
happen can furnish any basis for their evaluation.
Surrealism has always suggested they be written like
a medical report, with no incident omitted, no name
altered, lest the arbitrary make its appearance.
[133]
240
At the very least,
the desire for reconciliation entails
the
broadening
definitions
The
of
the
of
reason
and
reali ty.
Surrealis ts demanded tha t
each should
accept tha t
previously
its
domain,
and
transform
with
the
elucidation
lain
outside
which had
itself
accordingly.
experiences
excluded
whose analysis
but
associated
problems
The
did
so
from consciousness were
of dreams
in
the
of
faced by Freud,
accorded an unprecedented validi ty,
terms
of
rational
consciousness:
it
is
consciousness that interprets the unconscious, and reason that
explains
the irrational.
The extent to which this necessi ty
might distort the contents of the unconscious throws doubt on
the entire notion of the possibility of gaining access to the
unconscious
mind.
Indeed,
the
Surrealists'
failure
to
understand the implications of these difficulties resulted in
the imposition of an unfortunate array of constraints on their
project.
Playtime in the city •••
Breton's
Nadja,
Mad
Love,
and
many
celebrate
the games of
possible
in
the
streets
and
cafes
fascination
with
games
was
the
other
chance and surprise,
of
Surrealist
texts
love and desire,
Paris.
Behind
the
Surrealists'
desire
to
perpetuate the momentary realisation of the surreal in everyday
life.
tha t i t
One of
the mos t
importan t
emphas ised participation.
fea tures
Poems,
of their play was
drawings,
collages,
241
and dialogues of questions and answers were constructed by a
number of people, generally in the manner of the well known
game 'Consequences', in which sentences are added to sequences
hidden by the folds of the paper on which they are written.
play
this
game was
to make an
'exquisi te corpse'
To
( 'cadavre
exquis'), a phrase taken from an ini tial experiment in this
technique.
The method was applied to a number of Surrealis t texts,
but it began with the construction of word games played in such
a way that 'the elements of discourse confront one another in
as
paradoxical
a
manner
as
possible
and
so
that
human
communication, from the outset diverted in this way, takes the
mind
registering
Phrases as wild
illumina tes
it
through
the
greatest
adventure.'
[134]
as 'The rouged and powdered lobster scarcely
various
double kisses',
and
'The anaemic
li t tIe
girl makes the wax-polished mannequins blush', were obtained in
these playful experiments.
The collective and collaborative nature of the game was a
subversion of the bourgeois notion of the solitary genius like
that effected by Dada.
The Surrealis ts were, however, much
more concerned with the development of a new consciousness than
the destruction of the old.
A phrase of Lautreamont's, 'Poetry
must be made by all. Not by one', was
adopted with enthusiasm
as support for this practice.
What, in fact, excited us in these composite
produc tions was the conviction that, a t the very
least, they were stamped with a uniquely collective
authority and that they were endowed powerfully with
that power of drifting with the current which poetry
should never undervalue.
wi th the "Exquis i te
Corpse" we had a t our disposal
atlas t
an
infallible means of sending the mind's critical
242
mechanism away on vaca tion and fully releasing its
metaphorical potentialities. [135]
This collective spirit pervaded all Surrealist enterprises, and
was
intended
to
evade
the
constraints
of
an
individual
consciousness and achieve a form of communal automatism and
freedom.
The exquisite corpse method also developed the subversion
of language achieved in automatic writing.
The conventional
relationships and associations between words and objects are
overturned by what
attempt to
one commentator has
referred
to
as
'solicit and at the same time conjure chance,
different causality.' [136]
the
a
Alquie invented his own series of
questions and answers to illustrate the extent to which this
different causality has an appropriate resonance of its own. He
began with a sequence of 'banal and exact' examples:
What is a hat? - What we cover our heads with. What
is a plate? - A little container from which we eat.
What is dawn? - The rise of day. What is a mirror?
What gives us back our image.
What is a
policeman? - The
guardian of order. Wha t is a
gaslight? A streetlamp. What is a dream?
An
illusion during sleep.
Swapping
the
answers
by
pairs,
he
achieved
the
following
result:
What is a hat? - A little container from which we
eat. What is a plate? What we cover our heads with.
What is dawn? - What gives us back its image. What
is a mirror?
The rise of day.
What is a
policeman? - A tube filled with hot water. What is
a radiator? - The guardian of order. What is a
gas ligh t? - An illusion during sleep.
What is a
dream? - A streetlamp.
Alquie observed that 'none of the answers obtained appears to
the spiri t
as devoid of sense.'
this is possible by virtue of the
[137]
For the Surrealis ts,
inherent ability of words to
243
throw
up
meaning
arrangement.
from
the
most
From Lautreamont,
unlikely
and
conflicting
the Surrealis ts had
learned
that every conjunction of words says something of the world and
gives it renewed expression; indeed, they placed much of their
fai th in
the possibili ty of using language
to discover and
express the layers of reality beneath those exposed by what
Breton always referred to as 'bourgeois reason'.
The Surrealists wanted to give the marvellous a reality in
the everyday,
to capture
and obj ectify
constructions
are,
the
found
chosen
and
like
for
Dadaist
their
it.
Many of
'ready-made',
inherent
their
objects
surreali ty.
The
Surrealists sought and constructed objects which had appeared
in their dreams, often combining images and words to produce
'poem-objects'
and
creations
which
were
held
to
resonance wi th the experience of the unconscious.
have
a
The found
object is said to be 'enough to undo the beauty of everything
beside
it.
In
it
alone
can
precipitate of desire.' [138J
new meaning in Surrealism:
we
recognise
the
marvellous
Creation is given a completely
the construction
of objects
and
images takes place in accordance with the dicates of desire, so
that they are placed
in the world with
a significance denied
them by 'bourgeois reason'.
This, moreover, was considered to
prefigure
the
of
cultural,
social,
desire.
This use of
challenge and
possibility
the
totality
of
and political relations in accordance with
the
so change
Surrealis t a t tempt
rearranging
techniques
life is
a
of art as
further
a means
to
instance of
the
to des troy the conception of art
separates it from the everyday.
which
244
The
Surrealists
equal candour.
turned
the bourgeois
Under the ti tIe
city
around
with
'Experimental Researches
(On
the Irrational Embellishment of a City)', a number of responses
to the question, 'should one preserve, move, modify, change or
suppress' a variety of Parisian landmarks, were published in
1933.
These exchanges include
fountain of perfumes.
'The Op~ra? Transform it into a
Reconstruct the staircase from the bones
of prehistoric animals', and 'The Palace of Justice? Raze it.
Let the site be covered by a magnificent graffiti to be seen
from an airplane'. [139]
The
Surrealists
places and
had
their
'found objects'
own
(objets
treasury
trouve)
of
privileged
in Paris;
places
such as the Tour St. Jacques and the Porte Saint-Denis, Place
Dauphine and Les Halles,
sites
peculiarly
were revered and of ten vis i ted as
receptive
to
the
Surrealist
traveller.
'I
succumb to the wonderful dizziness these places inspire in me,
places where everything I have best known began', [140] wrote
Breton in Mad Love. The city of Paris, the 'most dreamed of of
their obj ects'
[141],
plays an exal ted role in a number of ~
Surrealist texts; Cardinal described Nadja as a 'demonstration
~
surrealism' for which 'a street plan of Paris is an almost
indispensa ble accompaniment' [142] and, like Mad Love, Nadja is
Scattered with photographs of Paris and other inserts.
The city environment was important
to Surrealism because
of its concentration of people and diversity of experiences;
its breadth and inherent sense of possibility meant that it was
the ideal context and object of the movement.
of
Paris,
breathtaking
possibilities
and
In the streets
marvels,
signs
of
245
another reality, and glimpses of the strange and disconcerting
were perceived
through chinks
in
the normali ty of
everyday
reality. Breton wrote:
The street, which I imagined might communicate to my
life its surprises and detours, the street with its
disturbances and its glances, was my one true
element.
There I partook ~ as nowhere else, of the
wind of circumstance. [143j
The Surrealists strolled the city streets with the same freedom
they
exercised
in
the
automatic
absence of conscious control.
desire,
they
explored
the
text;
that
gained
by
the
Drifting according to whim and
city
and
watched
it
reveal
the
marvels of objective chance and surrea1ity.
The means were simple enough; merely buy a Sunday
ticket at a suburban railway station and shunt for
hours and hours on all the tracks of a landscape of
dislocation, on a journey whose end is never fixed
in advance. [144]
The conventional utilitarian aspects of the city were rejected
in favour of a city ordered according to its propensity to
invoke
and
satisfy desire.
In
Nadja,
Breton considered a
number of places which facilitate those 'elective sensations •••
whose incommunicability is a source of unequalled pleasure.'
[145]
Breton informed his readers they could be sure:
of not going three days without seeing me go up and
down the boulevard Bonne-Nouve11e late in the
afternoon, between the presses of Le Matin and the
boulevard de Strasbourg. I don't know, in fact, why
my steps take me there, why I almost always end up
there with no end in view, nothing but that obscure
assumption that it is here that it(?)will happen.
[146]
--
Later
in
1927,
when
the
first
passages
of
Nadja
were
published, the boulevard Bonne-Nouve11e was the site of
riots
following the execution in the United States of the anarchists
Nico la Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti in 1927. [147]
246
The
city
became
a
text
to
be
read
and
according to internal searchings and desires;
declared:
'The ground
beneath my
enormous unfolded newspaper.'
[148]
feet
is
experienced
'Soluble Fish'
nothing
but
an
Roger Cardinal developed
this point when he wrote:
In the streets, now there's a place to be, a place
for Being to complete its task, the storming of the
palace.
At the price of scattering old chestnuts,
bend an ear to the pavement and listen to your heart
beat. [149]
The Surrealist response to the city becomes the experience of
reawakened desire,
the rediscovery of forgot ten emotions and
images denied by the constraints of everyday living.
Aragon's Paris Peasant is an exploration and description
of the city no less powerful than that presented in Nadja.
Aragon discerned the marvellous within and beyond the life of
the city; his text is illustrated with tickets and price lists
and public notices of all sorts, together with experiences and
anecdotes such as that related by Valery of 'an agency which
accepted uns tamped le t ters and arranged to have them pos ted
from any desired point of the globe'. [150]
Aragon also wrote
of the anticipation and excitement of such discoveries, as in
his description of an outing with Breton and Marcel NolI.
Andre Breton proposed that we go to the ButtesChaumont, although the park was no doubt already
closed. Certain words conjure up images that go
beyond physical representation. The Buttes-Chaumont
stirred a mirage in us, one with all the tangibility
of these phenomena, a shared mirage over which we
all felt we had the same hold.
Our black mood
evaporated
in
the
light of a huge, naive hope.
At last we were going to destroy boredom, a
miraculous hunt opened up before us, a field of
experiment where it was unthinkable that we should
not receive countless surprises and who knows? a
great revelation that might transform life and
destiny. [151]
247
Later, he added:
'We entered the park feeling like conquerors
and qui te drunk wi th open-mindedness.'
[152]
Paris Peasant
attempts to give a new life to the city, to free it from the
constraints of 'bourgeois reason' and routine mundanity.
Men pass their lives in the midst of magic
precipices wi thou t even opening their eyes.
They
manipulate grim symbols innocently, their ignorant
lips unwittingly mouth terrible incantation, phrases
like revolvers. It is enough to make one shudder to
see a bourgeois family taking its morning coffee
without ever noticing the unknowable that shines
through the tablecloth's red and whi te checkered
pattern. [153]
In Paris Peasant, Aragon saw love as the state of mind capable
of destroying this mundanity. His attempt to produce a 'modern
mythology'
of the ci ty flowed easily into the desire to see
love bear such an existence.
There are lovers in the s tree ts, true lovers like
those they laugh and cry about, like those they turn
out of doors and those they celebrate in song, like
those about whom a great fuss will be made one day.
Look around: there are lovers passing by. [154]
He wrote:
'In love...
in all
love
there resides
an outlaw
principle, an irrepressible sense of delinquency, contempt
for
prohibitions and a taste for havoc.' [155] Love became a symbol
of and incentive to revolt •
••• and beautiful women
The marvellous quality of the city streets was mirrored in what
Aragon called the 'surrealist glow in the eyes of all women'
[156].
afforded
Walter Benjamin observed of Breton:
him
'Paris had already
a number of momentary illuminations when his
quest for marvels found an astonishingly real and sustained
248
satisfaction in the passion of Nadja.'
[157].
Nadja has the
freedom of the city, the mystery of the poem, and the sexuality
of the child-woman and muse. The text in which she appears is
both an exploration of the hidden marvels of the city and the
story of Breton's encounter with the mysterious figure of Nadja
herself.
As
Paris
epitomised
symbolised their
the
Surrealists'
city,
so
Nadja
women: objects of desire, figures of beauty,
muses and inspirations, childlike and powerful, mystical and
receptive.
To
love
a
woman
was
enchantress, a glamorous person.
to
love
I t was
a
sorceress,
an
to commune wi th the
source of all inspiration and marvel, to discover that beauty
'will be convulsive or will not be at all.' [158]
Nadja
guides
Breton
through
a
city
intuitions and flair for serendipity.
made
In the book,
magical
by
her
Breton's attitude to her
is indicative of the Surrealist understanding of women, love,
and eroticism,
which
tends
everything,
that
the world becomes
so
to ascribe
sexual imagery
a
'whole gallery
to
of
sexual symbols and signs that offer latent sexuality in varying
degrees.'
[159]
Its hostility to male homosexuality and the
patriarchal and often
mj
sogynist nature of its pronouncements
on women suggest that Surrealism offered only the peculiar and
restricted perspective of the
male heterosexual.
Because Nadj a is an idealised woman,
free
of
all
ties
of
domesticity
and
she appears to be
the
restrictions
of
oppression; even though the freedom of her mind which Breton so
admires
ultimately leads Nadja to psychiatric internment at
which point Breton lost interest in her fate.
saw him defining:
Whitney Chadwick
249
a poetic role for women that represented a major
step away from the complex realities of contemporary
life as they affected relations between men and
women.
Retreating not into the shadowy world of
romantic withdrawal, but instead actively defining a
role for woman in which her ego is more often
projected onto the world, he established the male
ego as superior, poetic expression as dominant.
[160]
In The Second Sex, Simone de Beauvoir observed the patriarchal
nature of the Surrealist definition of woman.
She is poetry in essence, directly - that is to say,
for man; we are not told whether she is poetry for
herself also.
Breton does not speak of woman as
subject ••• woman interests him only because she is a
privileged voice ••• Truth, Beauty, Poetry - she is
All: once more under the form of the Other, All
except herself.[161]
Germaine Berton, a young anarchist who, in 1923, assassinated
the head of the Camelots du Roi in the offices of a right-wing
newspaper,
group;
Action
her
Franyaise,
photograph
R€volution Surrealiste.
was
appeared
The
admired
in
a
by
1924
the
Surrealist
edition
of
La
Surrealists seemed to see Berton
committing this act on their behalf; their admiration for her
relieved
them of the necessity of such action and at the same
time enabled them to express and communicate it.
As
political
revolutionary,
therefore,
the
Surrealist
woman fulfils the same duties as she does in her musical role:
she bears
the experiences revered by the Surrealis ts and is
therefore as mysterious and marvellous as the world itself. She
is an object on whom desires are projected, and no significance
is accorded
to her own desires.
For
the Surrealists,
women represented all that is admirable and coveted.
were said to be more
'in touch'
wi th the world,
then,
Women
wi th
the
ability to lead the (male) poet to a similar proximity.
The
250
Surrealists revered women who rebelled against constraints, but
only
inasmuch
as
this
rebellion
accorded
with
their
own
definition of freedom and the marvellous.
The plane on which the Surrealists placed women comes in a
variety of forms,
but remains
a pedestal
involvement
large
of
movement.
of
a
number
women
in spite of
in
the
the
Surrealist
The art of women such as Leonora Carrington, Eileen
Agar, Leonor Fini, Lee Miller, Toyen, and Kay Sage, is lacking
only in appreciation:
it was not until the publication of
Chadwick's Women Artis ts and the Surrealis t Movemen t
in 1985
that the extent of women's participation in the movement was
properly acknowledged and assessed.
Chadwick
bourgeois
observed
deviation,
that
so
Breton
that
considered
'although
the
feminism
a
Surrealists
continued to extol the radical acts of specific women outside
the group', they elicited 'little more from women active in the
group
than
their
signatures
on
Surrealist
tracts
manifestos.'
[162]
Women
artists
working
Surrealists
as
and
encountered the same attitudes that prevailed in society within
the movement itself, so that
the participation of women in the
movement
to
was
insufficient
indicative of the significance
change
its
course.
This
is
of Surrealism's view of women
to the work of the movement as a whole.
As Chadwick noted, few
women artists achieved the expression of their own
sexuality
in their work and most were forced 'either to accept this male
language of female sexuality, or adapt it to their own ends, or
reject it altogether.' [163]
251
De Beauvoir's critique
except herself',
that the Surrealist woman is 'all
has serious implications for the Surrealist
project as a whole: the equation of women and desire can only
present a
truncated view of each,
yet
this contradicts
the
Surrealist conviction that its investigations were capable of
revealing the truths of the unconscious and the imagination was
also the belief that it was exploring the 'common psychic base'
within all people.
Surrealism denied
the possibility that the
desires of women are different from those experienced by men.
This
led
to the masculini ty of
its images and obj ec ts
of
desire, its idealisations of women, and reveals the prejudiced
nature of the Eros it discovered. That a group of heterosexist
men should have considered its access to the contents of desire
privileged
without
considering
the
potential
partiality
of
their conclusions suggests a serious lack of awareness.
and
The Surrealists'
belief that women are integral to desire
aligned
irrational,
with
the
the
unconscious, reveals their misogyny.
imaginative,
and
the
Their reverence is the
denial of women's subjectivity, desire, autonomy, and capacity
for self-definition.
Since these are all qualities coveted by
the Surrealists for themselves, one is forced to conclude that
the
group was
either
unaware
of
the
existence,
roots,
and
implications of their stereotyping, or that they were satisfied
with
their
position.
Whichever
of
these
unfortunate
conclusions is accepted, the contents of the imagination, the
desires,
discovered
and
are
the
unconscious
reproductions
of
realm
which
the
the
dominant
social, political, and sexual relations in the
Surrealists
structures
of
252
reality principle.
In other words, the unconscious revealed by
the Surrealists
not
is
uncontaminated by
the structures
of
consciousness to which it is allegedly opposed.
The necessity of using the conscious mind to interpret the
unconscious,
to bring it in to
returns us to the problem
the realm of human knowledge
of the realisation of the 'rational
derangement of the senses'. The
undermines
their
notion
of
possibility
that
this
realm
Surrealists' attitude to women
the
unconscious
is
really
by
raising
determined
the
by
the
conscious structures of the reality principle. It does seem a
remarkable coincidence that the products
of
the Surrealis t
unconscious should so accurately reflect those of the existing
reality.
These
considerations
highlight
the
difficulty
of
any
'unveiling of unconscious truths': it presupposes the existence
of a pre-political, pre-social self surviving in a realm 'which
had not been implica ted in the discredi t
~
of ~ other facul ties
whose grasp of reality had proved to be so fallible.' [164] The
notion of the unconscious provided the Surrealists with an area
outside of social reali ty, a realm free from its corruptions
and dis tort ions ,
a band of freedom linking all individuals.
The Surrealis ts
saw proximi ty to
women
and
children,
both
'Others'
this natural self in both
in
de
Beauvoir's
terms:
'contrasting the untutored response of the young child with our
own, we can es tima te our dis tance from paradise los t.'
This
belief
[165]
in an original or natural self legi timised
whole Surrealist project.
the
253
De
Beauvoir's
critique
of
Surrealism
anticipated
the
contemporary feminist critique which sees Freudian and postFreudian
theory
legitimise
the
using
prevalent
the claim of privileged access
sexism
in
thought. Surrealism asserted both tha t
social
behaviour
the unconscious
to
and
is a
realm of privileged knowledge and that such means as automatism
could
provide access to it.
If the Surrealists advocated a
male conception of desire in spite of their declared intention
to realise a universal desire, this
suggests either that there
is no universal reality preserved in the unconscious,
the Surrealis t
or that
access to it was prejudiced by an inordinate
degree of conscious mediation in which social relations and
structures
of
the
world
they
professed
to
despise
were
reproduced without question. These concerns and problems should
not, however, be assumed to indicate a disinterest in political
structures, since it is as a political movement that Surrealism
reveals much of its character.
254
THE SURREALIST REVOLUTION
Although
Surrealism
accepted
the
possibility
of
rational
understanding and wished to extend both the world and our means
of its apprehensions to the point of surreality, there remained
a tension in their desire to make the unknown known.
Objective chance,
for
can ei ther be seen as
example,
charging the individual with an absolute freedom, in which the
environment may be constituted and reconstituted at will and in
accordance with subjective desire, or as the total absence of
freedom, in which the individual consciousness has no control
over the signs thrust upon it by the world. This is a choice
which
Surrealism
dilemmas.
The
never
made;
indeed,
it
thrived
on
such
search for the marvellous and the expectation
that it might reveal a transformed world, became the Surrealist
desire par excellence. In Mad Love,
Breton wrote:
my eagerness to wander in search of everything •••
keeps me in mysterious communication with other open
beings, as if we were suddenly called to assemble. I
would like my life to leave after it no other murmur
than that of a watchman's song, of a song to while
away the waiting.
Independent of what happens and
what
does
not
happen,
the
wait
itself
is
magnificent. [166]
The Surrealists were
far more excited by the expectation of
its search than the discoveries to which it might lead; in
its
eagerness to maintain the openness and freedom of this search,
the movement made a commitment to the surreal which excluded
all others.
They were determined to effect revolution on a
grand scale,
but refused to accept
the determination of the
direction \ and nature of their revolt by any other authority.
255
It
is
in
this
context
that
the
Surrealist
engagement with
Marxism must be understood.
Whilst
the
proletarian
movement
revolution,
its
shared
the
Marxist
relationship
with
project
the
of
official
bearer of Marxism in France, the French Communist Party (PCF),
was
ambivalent.
The
Surrealists'
sympathies
with
Marxism
stemmed from the spirit of revolt spawned by the crisis of the
First
World
circumstances
War,
and
of
interwar
the
vacillated
years.
with
the
political
Their
affection
for
revolt as an end in itself, did little to win the sympathies of
the PCF.
But it also led the Surrealists to the recognition
that the achievement of surreality was impossible without the
realisation
of a social revolution.
Initially, as Nadeau observed,
with language encouraged their
the Surrealist experiments
belief that the juxtaposition
of words and images might itself be capable of effecting a
dislocation of reality. At this stage, they:
had no doctrine, but certain values which they
brandished like flags... But their great illusion
was to suppose that their enemies would collapse at
the mere sound of their words, or upon reading their
wri tinis.
They s till believed,
according to
Breton s phrase, in the 'omnipo tence of thought'.
[167]
Beyond their interest in language, poetic expression, and
dream experience,
the
the Surrealists were ultimately concerned
with the possibilities of transforming
everyday life.
Their
glimpses of the surreal were held to prefigure a time in which
the
surreal
whilst
would
their
constraints of
be
realised
experiments
were
in
everyday
capable
of
experience,
and
reveali'ng
the
the dominant structures of social, political,
256
and cultural relations,
the Surrealis ts recognised that they
were powerless to effect a lasting change.
The
Surrealist
group
made
many
political intent and allegiance.
clear
declarations
of
Individually, its members had
a vaiety of affiliations - Peret fought with the anarchists in
Spain and was involved with mainly Troskyist organisations, and
Dali commi tted himself to fascism -
the movement as a whole
fluctuated between adherence to and denouncements of the PCF.
During periods of conflict, the debate between Surrealism and
Marxism was
generally reduced
materialism.
the basic
to
tha t
between idealism and
The PCF argued that if the Surrealists accepted
tenets
of
Marxism,
as
they
claimed,
declare themselves Marxists and renounce
the other hand,
they
should
Surrealism.
If, on
they preferred the Surrealist project to the
Marxist, this was a mark of their rejection of materialism, the
priority and the necessity of the proletarian
revolution. For
their part, however, the Surrealists wanted to maintain
both
positions,
and
considering
materialism
the
dichotomy
of
idealism
to be overcome in their own analyses.
clear in Breton's expression of the
This is
Surrealism's predominant
political position:
In the realm of facts, on our part no ambiguity is
possible: there is not one of us who does not desire
the shift of power from the hands of the bourgeoisie
to those of the proletariat.
Meanwhile, it is no
less necessary, as we see it, for the experiments of
the inner life to continue and this, of course
without an internal check, even a marxist one. [168j
As Sartre pointed out, such a declaration is untenable for the
Marxis t,
for
i t ' would
amount
to
saying
that a
freedom of
\
spirit is conceivable in chains, at least for certain people,
257
and consequently, to making revolution less urgent.' [169] Much
Surrealist writing did little to counter such criticism.
In
1924, Breton wrote:
Things said over and over again today meet a solid
barrier.
They have riveted us to this vulgar
universe.
I t is from them we have acquired this
taste for money, these constraining fears, this
feeling for the native land, this horror of our
destiny.
I believe it is not too late to recoil
from this deception, inherent in the words we have
thus far used so badly. What is to prevent me from
throwing disorder into this order of words, to
attack murderously this oblivious aspect of things?
Langauge can and should be torn from this servitude.
[170]
On the other hand, a text from 1925 stated:
Surrealism is not a poetic form.
It is a cry of the mind towards itself and
determined in desperation to crush its fetters. And,
if need be, by material hammers. [171]
In
the
Second
Manifesto,
Breton
declared:
'I
believe
it
impossible for us to avoid most urgently posing the question of
the social regime under which we live, I mean of the acceptance
or the non-acceptance of this regime.'
[172] These s ta tements
reveal an ambiguity in the political position of the movement,
but at the same time they express a consistent passion for the
transformation of political structures, relations, and values.
The contradictions and ambiguities revolve round the conception
of how this system is enforced, the scope of its control, and
the means to overcome it.
Clearly
the
Surrealists
considered
the
PCF's
understanding of each of these problems inadequate:
they saw
the dominant system legitimised, and in part constituted, by a
complex
pattern
of
cultural
controls
manifest
in
the
mundanity of language and the separation of art and everyday
258
experience, and resulting
in the denial of the imagination and
the poverty of its role in the apprehension of the world.
the Surrealists, this denial of
indicated the necessity
For
vast areas of human experience
of the revolutionary praxis in which
they were engaged; they considered the exposure of the poverty
of our experience of everyday life a vi tal extension of the
revolutionary critique
effected by the PCF.
Legitimate defence?
The conflict which this attitude caused is best observed in the
exchange be tween
Naville
(What
Surrealism and Marxism ini tia ted by Pierre
in 1926.
can
the
In
'The Revolution and the Intellectuals
Surrealists
Do?)',
Naville
challenged
the
Surrealists to prove their revolutionary commitment by becoming
Marxists. He gave them a choice:
1) either persevere in a negative attitude of an
anarchic order, an attitude false a priori because
it does not justify the idea of revolution it claims
to champion, an attitude dictated by a refusal to
compromise
its
own
exis tence
and
the
sacred
charac ter of an individual in s trugg le that would
lead to the disciplined action of the class
struggle;
2) or resolutely take the revolutionary path, the
only revolutionary path, the Marxist path, which
would mean realising that
spiritual force, a
substance which derives from the individual, is
intima tely linked to a social reali ty which it in
fact supposes. [173]
The
Surrealist
response,
in
Breton ' s
began wi th an a t tack on the PCF' s
'Legitimate
Defence',
paper, L'humanite,
as
'unreadable', and 'utterly unworthy of the role of proletarian
education it claims to assume'[174]; the editor's request for a
259
Surrealist contribution to the publication of 'a short work of
fiction every day'
[175] was ridiculed.
unconcerned by the existence of
of freedom and revolt
That the PCF was so
constraints on the
expression
that it exercised them in its own paper
was seen to indicate the inadequacy of its activities and the
poverty of its theory. Breton condemned the PCF as reactionary
in its contempt for Surrealist activities and the limits of its
own. Declaring 'long live the social revolution, and it alone',
he argued that 'revolt alone is creative, and that is why we
consider that all subjects of revolt are valid.'
[176] One of
the central Surrealist accusations against the PCF was that it
underestimated the scope of revolutionary practice, and failed
to see the infinite complexities and intricacies of the reality
to which they adhered.
His central attack, however, was on the PCF's assumption
of the role of legislator and authority of the revolutionary
movement:
'I say tha t
the revolutionary flame burns where it
lists, and that it is not up to a small band of men, in the
period of transition we are living through, to decree that it
can only burn here or there.'
[177] In the political context,
Surrealism was
to
retain
just
as
structure
of
assimilation
determined
the
Party,
its
it
had
autonomy
from
the
sought
to
evade
within the structure of 'literature'. Central to
the the Surrealis t
response to the Marxis t
cri tique was its
claim that the movement was not literary, nor artistic,
intellectual, but a critique of the
nor
limits within which the
everyday is cons ti tuted and experienced.
'Legi timate Defence'
shows the significance of the Surrealist refusal to accept any
other definition.
260
It is not at all a question for us of awakening
words and submitting them to a learned manipulation
in order to make them serve the creation of a style,
however interesting. To observe that words are the
raw material of style is no more ingenious than to
present letters as the basis of the alphabet. Words
are, indeed, something quite different; they are
even, perhaps, everything. Let us pity men who have
understood no more about them than the literary use
to which they can put them, and who boast thereby of
preparing "the artistic renaissance which tomorrow's
social renaissance requires and suggests." What does
this artistic renaissance matter to us? [178]
Turning
to
the specific challenge posed by Naville,
Breton
sugges ted tha t Surrealism is not bound by a choice based on
distinctions it rejects.
Here... is the essential question he puts to us:
"Yes or no - is the desired revolution that of the
mind a priori or that of the world of facts? Is it
linked to marxism, or to contemplative theories, to
the purgation of the inner life?" This question is
of a much more subtle turn than it appears to be,
though its chief malignity seems to me to reside in
the opposition of an interior reality to the world
of facts, an entirely artificial opposi tion which
collapses at once upon scrutiny... Surrealism,
moreover, tends at its limit to posit these two
s ta tes as one and the same, making short work of
their so-called practical irreconcilability by every
mecxl"ls, starting with the most primitive of all,
whose use it would be impossible to justify if this
were not the case: I refer to the appeal to the
marvellous. [179]
The adoption of this
'pos t-revolutionary' perspective enabled
the
sidestep,
Surrealists
challenge.
to
but
not
avoid,
the
Marxist
Breton's final position was this:
I do not wish to be arbitrarily cast into the
"opposi tion" of a Party to which I adhere wi th all
my might, but which would, I believe, possessing
right on its side, have an answer to everything if
it were better led, if it were truly itself, in the
realm where my questions are raised. [180]
The
group's
Surreal~sts
determination
to
retain
their
identity
as
was the result of their critique of the limits of
Marxist analysis:
in
its failure to be 'truly itself',
the
261
Surrealists
saw
breadth
experience
of
Marxism
witholding
its
wi th
the
which
critique
from
Surrealis ts
the
were
concerned.
The Second Manifesto of 1929 defended Surrealism with a
renewed intensity. 'I do not see', wrote Breton, 'why we should
abstain from raising - providing we envisage them from the same
angle as that under which they, and we as well, envisage the
Revolution - the problems of love, of the dream, of madness, of
art and of religion.' [181] The argument was related by Nadeau:
Cannot a revolutionary be a lover, does he not dream
like any other man? Must one be limited to shutting
up the mad, to killing off the believers in all
religions and letting the artists chatter away in
their cafes? A strange myopia, that refuses to
envisage these problems.
If, electively, the
surrealists have seen them, by what right are they
forbidden to attempt to solve them? In the name of
the Revolution? A strange Revolution, that limits
itself. [182]
In
'For an Independent Revolutionary Art', written by Breton,
Trotsky, and Rivera in 1938, the importance of the autonomy of
the artist in the success of the revolution was underlined:
In the realm of artistic creation, the imagination
must escape from all constraint and must under no
pretext allow itself to be placed under bonds. To
those who urge us, whether for today or tomorrow, to
consent that art should submit to a discipline ••• we
give a flat refusal and we repeat our deliberate
intention of standing by the formula complete
freedom for art. [183]
This raised the broader question of the interaction of art and
movements
of
social
Rosemont considered
revolution.
The
American
Surrealist
poetry and revolution to be inextricably
linked:
Poems do not make revolutions any more than
revolutions make poems. The function of poetry, in
terms of revolution, is to destroy conventional and
limited associations and all the decrepit, stifling
myths of capitalist civilisation by liberating
262
images of desire.
The function of revolution, in
terms of poetry, is to destroy oppressive social
conditions through the self-activity of the masses,
leading to a total human libera tion, and thus to
create a situation in which poetry is realised in
life itself.
Poetry serves revolution just as
revolution serves poetrY'.
An enemy of one is the
enemy of the other. [184]
Tzara's observation that 'the social Revolution has no need of
poetry but poetry has every need of the Revolution' [185],
was
rejected by Surrealism in favour of a mutual dependence between
the two.
The Surrealists' overt
In 1934 the group
political activities were diverse.
was instrumental in the publication of 'Call
to the Struggle', a plea for action and solidarity after the
fascist riots in Paris in February 1934; Sadoul, Peret, and
Aragon
faced
activities;
imprisonment
for
their
writings
and
political
Spanish Ci vi 1 War,
as well as fighting in the
Peret was involved in the Brazilian Left Opposi tion and the
International Workers' Party; Breton worked with and in defence
of Trotsky; and many of the group were at some time members of
the
PCF.
Moreover,
the group
was
alive
to
the
political
climate in which it worked. In collaboration with the journal
Clarte, the Philosophies group, which included Henri Lefebvre,
and
the
Belgian
journal
Correspondance,
the
Surrealis ts
published the manifesto 'La Revolution d'abord et Toujours' in
1925.
The antipathy
fostered
by
the
First
World War was
refuelled . by the excesses of the Moroccan War,
'this brutal,
revolting, unthinkable phenome~'. [186] Together with Breton's
reading
of
Trotsky' s
Lenin,
bringing Surrealism closer
struggle
against
this
to
'''implacable
war
was
instrumental
the Marxist
position,
realities"
war,
to
in
the
man's
263
exploi tation of his
li tera ture. '
alliance,
[187]
fellow-man,
the prosti tution of art and
Nevertheless,
after
years
of
uneasy
the maj ori ty of those Surreal is ts who had a t
some
time belonged to the PCF made a definitive break from the Party
in 1935.
Political responsibilities
Louis Aragon became a staunch defender of the USSR throughout
the Stalinist period and rose within the PCF hierarchy. In a
text from 1935, Aragon explained his break with the autonomous
art of Surrealism:
It is time to put an end to the look-at-me-how-sadI-am style of writing. It is time to put an end to
both individual and group hallucinations, to the
partiality shown the subconscious over the sense of
sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch, to sex as a
system and to delirium as a representation of
reality ••• It is time to put an end to phony
heroism, fake puri ty, the tinsel flashiness of a
poetry more given to finding its material in the
aurora borealis, agates, statues in parks, parks
surrounding castles, castles of bibliophilic Lordsof-the-Manor ••• What we need is a return to
reality. [188]
An incidental, but interesting comparison can be made between
this passage and
Aragon' s views of a decade before, when he
wrote:
I have always placed, and place today, the spirit of
revolt far above any politics... The Russian
Revolution? Forgive me for shrugging my should ers.
On the level of ideas, it is, at bes t, a vague
ministerial crisis ••• The problems raised by human
existence do not derive from the miserable little
revolutionary activity that has occurred in the East
during the course of the last few years ••• I will
. not accept from anyone ••• a lesson in the name of
some social dogma, even that of Marx. [189]
264
The so-called 'Aragon Affair' serves as a further illumination
of
Surrealism's political concerns.
Aragon's visit to the Soviet Union in 1930 was followed
by the publication of his remarkable poem, Red Front in 1932.
Passages such as:
Kill the cops
comrades
Kill the cops
and:
Paris your intersections still twitch their nostrils
Your stones are still ready to leap into the air
Your trees to bar the roads to soldiers [190]
led
to
Aragon
being
charged
with
'provocation
to
murder'.
Breton, in spite of his dislike for the poem's reverence of the
USSR, published a defence of Aragon to which some three hundred
signatures
were
added.
The
terms
of
his
defence
are
Surrealist, rather than Marxist, and they illustrate the extent
For while Breton made the
of the dichotomy between the two.
obvious point that the consideration of a few lines of a poem
in isolation from the whole was illegitimate, he also held that
the prosecution of Aragon was invalid because poets cannot be
held responsible for their works.
as
a
free-floating
received
by
Aragon,
This invocation of the poem
and
autonomous
expression
who
clearly had
no
was
doubts
as
not
well
to
his
poli tical or poetic responsibili ties. This affair marked the
end of a period of vigorous debate: Aragon was expelled from
the Surrealist group in 1932, and Breton from the PCF in 1933.
The question of
commitment and loss of responsibility is
highlighted by Sartre who, in What Is Literature?,
criticised
Surrealism for its desire to affirm and construct the attitudes
265
and
images
confines
of
of
'greatness
the
post-revolutionary
prerevolutionary
of
its
existentialism
and
society.
enterprise',
Marxism,
totalitarian project
relations
He
recognising
Surrealism
'typical of the age'.
was
within
the
applauded
the
that,
like
engaged
in
a
But the dialectic
in which Surrealism moves was seen as fundamentally idealist:
it
assumes
tha t
the
resolution
sUbjectivity and objectivity,
of
idealism and materialism,
reason and the imagination, and
all such dichotomies, can be realised by its very invocation.
'Instead of destroying in order to construct, it constructs in
order to destroy.
Its construction is always alienated ••• the
construction is real and the destruction is symbolic.' [191]
The surrealists, once the world is destroyed and
miraculously
preserved
by
its
des truction,
can
shamelessly give full play to their immense love of
the world.
This world, the world of everyday, with
its trees and roofs, its women, its sea-shell, and
its flowers, but haunted by the impossible and by
nothingness, is what is called the marvellous in
surrealism ••• one must save onself without breaking
anything - or by a symbolic breaking - wash oneself
of the original contamination without giving up the
advantages of one's position. [192]
For Sartre,
an
the
illusory
freedom.
realisation and experience of surreality was
goal
which
Sartre argued
could
provide
only
the
mirage
of
that this point does not preserve and
unify both the subjective and the objective, but, by virtue of
its
unreality,
automatist
desire
destroys
to
them
lose
both.
awareness
He
criticised
the
control
of
and
consciousness of the self, arguing that the absence of the self
control of the subject entails the destruction of objectivity:
Any
means
were
good
enough
for
escaping
consciousness of the self and consequently of one's
situation in the world ••• It was a matter of
exploding the world, and as dynamite was not enough,
as, on the other hand, a real des truc tion of all
that exists was impossible, because it would simply
266
cause everything to pass from one real state to
another real state, one had to do one~est rather
to disintegrate particular obj ec ts, tha t i t , to do
away with the very structure of objectivity ••• [193]
Sartre's critique indicates the extent of
the divergence of
Surrealism and the humanism of both existentialism and Marxism,
and
highlights the problems inherent in the formulation of
cons truc tions and affirma tions wi thin the s truc ture of
revolutionary' society.
'pre-
When Breton declared that 'the poet of
the future will overcome the depressing idea of an irreparable
divorce
of
action and
dream'
necessarily
disagree,
but
achieve
the
social
possible.
In
[194],
responded
revolution
that
the Marxists
did not
with
the
imperative
will
make
this
spi te of its difficul ties,
to
future
many of which were
merely the consequence of the peculiar dogmatism of the PCF,
the encounter
Surrealism
between Surrealism and Marxism
developed
essentially that of
a
the
ensured
political
consciousness
proletarian
revolution.
which
tha t
was
Surrealism and anarchy
Freedom, autonomy, and the extension of the realm in which they
are
possible,
were
Breton declared that
fu t"I damental
'libert~'
to
the
Surrealist
project.
was the word that excited him
most, and the search for an absolute surreality in which the
movement was
absolute
engaged was
at
the same time a search for the
freedom of expression and
experience. It is clear
that this quest for freedom contained a number of problems, not
least in the very possibility of discovering and operating in a
267
realm
free
from
the
constraints
reality. Nevertheless, while
its
failure
to
structures,
avoid
its
of
the
existing
social
Surrealism may be criticised for
own
implication with
the
existing
the character of the movement was determined by
its attempt to analyse and overcome this collaboration. Central
to its critique of Marxism was the absence of such an awareness
in the analyses and structure of the PCF.
Surrealism
revolutionary
consis tently
commitment
refused
precluded
such
to
accept
speculation
tha t
on
the
possibilities of living, and argued that there was no sphere of
everyday
life
which
should
be
critique. For these reasons,
only
to
excluded
from
revolutionary
the Surrealists were hostile not
the lack of breadth in the PCF's critique, but to its
attempts
to
enforce
movement.
The
role
discipline
of
the
on
the broader
authority
and
revolutionary
legislator
of
the
revolution stemmed from the conviction that it represented the
sole
means
of
considered
the
proletarian
ideological
revolution.
discipline
of
The
the
Surrealists
Party
and
its
exaltation of labour to be symptomatic of the same acceptance,
rather
than
the critique,
of
the dominant
political and cultural relations.
system of
social,
They saw the Party effecting
the institutionalisation of revolutionary thought in the same
way that bourgeois society institutionalised art and literature
and divorced them from everyday life.
This critique was epitomised by the Surrealist attitude to
the idea of revolt,
the
pl1'ospec t
of
for although they committed themselves
revolution,
remained their basic political
it
was
revol t
motivation.
in
itself
to
which
'To condemn the
268
subversive
is
to condemn everything
that
is not
absolutely
resigned'[195], wrote Breton: 'It is revolt itself, and revolt
alone, that is the creator of li9hP. [196] Desnos described the
Surrealis t
group as
being held
toge ther
by
, some thing
tha t
resembled the fellowship of those who are going to blow up in a
city in a spirit of revolt'. [197]
Perhaps the most striking
image which Surrealism leaves us is that conjured by Breton in
the Second Manifesto, where he wrote:
Surrealism was not afraid to make for itself a tenet
of
tdal
revolt,
complete
insubordination,
of
sabotage according to rule, and ••• it still expects
nothing
save
from
violence.
The
simplest
Surrealist act consists of dashing down into the
street, pistol in hand, and firing blindly, as fast
as you can pull the trigger, into the crowd. Anyone
who, at least once in his life, has not dreamed of
thus putting an end to the petty system of
debasement and cretinisation in effect has a welldefined place in that crowd, with his belly at
barrel-level.[198]
The Surrealists were willing partisans whilst the Party was
seen
to
be
reluctant
to
longer
the
focus
and
initiator
comply with demands
appeared
to
be
the
case.
for
of
revolt,
but
loyalty when
Initially
were
this
no
inspired by
the
Russian Revolution and eager to find a means to express and act
on
their
hostility
for
followed
the Party
through the period of
condemnation
concerns,
of
they
any
and delineating
the
the
society,
outside
Party
of
few
Surrealists
Stalinism.
the
In
its
of
its
rather
than
bounds
stifling
They attacked it for monopolising revolt
the areas and forms in which it can be valid
and legitimate, such
within
critique
accused
encouraging dissent.
bourgeois
Party
that any critique which was not organised
framework
was
considered
counterrevolutionary and individualist deviation.
a
269
Finally,
the
cri ticised
Surrealists
the
internal
hierarchy and bureaucracy of the Party machine, seeing these
as the epitome of the extent to which the revolutionary Party
shared the characteristics and tactics of bourgeois society.
In the history of the struggle for libertion, REVOLT
belongs mos tly to the oppressed, fighting directly
for their emancipation,and REVOLUTION to their
liquidators,
however
draped
with
historicalmaterialist-necessary-united-and-all-togetherness.
[199]
It has been observed that the Surrealists were aware both of
the necessity and the problems of working within the structures
they were aiming to subvert, and their critique of the Party is
based on its failure to address the issue of its own complicity
with bourgeois structures.
The bureaucracy of the Party was
considered to be the main means by which the spirit of revolt
is absorbed and diffused:
inside it, the revolutionary becomes
a bureaucrat, the rebel a party hack. Most significantly, the
revolution becomes an institutionalised project in which the
structures of bourgeois society
are merely reproduced.
A number of commentators have seen
the political position
sought by Surrealism to be that of anarchism.
considered
that
'the
central
tenets
of
George Melly
Surrealism
are
invaluable to all who call themselves Anarchists and are drawn
towards Anarchism'[200]; and Cardinal wrote that Nadja 'should
be read,
amongst other
things,
as
a
persuasive
libertarian
manifesto.' Its political credo 'admits of an anarchist rather
than
a
Britain,
Surrealism
drifted easily into the anarchist movement [202].
A text by
Breton,
communist
'The
reading'
Colours
of
[201].
Liberty',
In
which
appeared
in
the
270
anarchist review Now
in the 1940s, illustrates the proximity
of the two movements.
The red flag, free from any mark or inscription:
this flag I shall always see with the same vision I
had
at
seventeen
when,
during
a
popular
demonstration just before the other war, I saw it
unfurled by thousands, low in the sky of the Pre
Saint-Gervais.
And yet - I feel that reasoning is
powerless to intervene here - my pulse will continue
to beat yet more powerfully at the evocation of that
moment when this flamboyant sea, in places flowing
bu thinly and restrictively, was pierced by the
soaring flight of black flags... Around the black
flags, to be sure, the effect of sheer physical
suffering could be sensed more strongly, but passion
had really burnt itself into some eyes, had left
there unforgettable points of white heat. [203]
Whilst
the
Surrealist
movement
never
expressly
identified
itself with anarchism, its critiques of the Party organisation
This aspect of the
are essentially those of the anarchis t.
Surrealist critique
is further illustrated by their attitude
to work.
While
the
Surrealists
accepted
the
priority
of
necessity of its revolutionary role,
working class and the
they rej ec ted the elevation of working class relations,
ouvrierismc,
the
the
which accompanied the Marxism of the PCF. This
attitude was anathema to the Surrealists, for whom an ethos of
play rather than work was important: 'There is no use living if
one has to work.
The event from which each man has the right
to expect the revelation of the sense of his own life ••• is not
the reward of labour.'
[204]
The realisation of the surreal,
the significance of the dream and the imagination 'presupposes
availability and only the idle can be at the complete disposal
of cfiance.'
[205]
While the PCF condemned this attitude as
bourgeois, the Surrealists did not intend
such statements to
271
be elitist.
idleness
Indeed, it was against the impossibility of such
and
the
exercised their
imposition of work
that
the
Surrealists
hostility, and they saw the PCF doing little
to promote the possibility of a society in which work was no
longer the dominant activity.
Both Dada and Surrealism wished to ensure the long term
strength and impact of their critiques.
have pointed
out,
As Cardinal and Short
the Surrealists were
'well aware of the
subtlety and skill wi th which bourgeois society can diffuse
revol t, assimilate it into the prevailing cui tural trend and
even
turn
its
products
into
luxury
goods'[206],
and
both
movements can be appraised in terms of their ability to preempt
and so avoid such recupera tions.
In spi te of its
poli tical
va c ilia tions, Surrealism was commi tted to a cri tique of the
totality of social, cultural, and political relations, and this
meant that its work had a political force.
which
the
Surrealists
sought
to
It was this effect
maintain
through
the
preservation of their work as a critique of the totality.
The
breadth of the analyses and tools in both Dada and Surrealism
is character j s tic of the avant-garde tradi tion to which they
belong.
A critique of the totality is implicit in the critique of
art
or
literature
engaged.
in
which
the
avant-garde
is
ostensibly
For both Dada and Surrealism, the subversion of art
was based on a fundamental antipathy to the social reality as a
whole
and
movements
encouraged
gave free
the
rein to
critique
of
this
whole.
Both
their cri tiques and imposed no
boundaries on their scope: in Dada, the critique of reality was
272
so
thorough
as
to
necessitate
the
conventional means of apprehending
the Surrealists,
destruction
of
all
and constructing it;
for
it necessitated a challenge to the accepted
delineation of reason and reality.
And for both movements, it
was this freedom to effect a broad critique which they sought
to preserve. The difficulties they encountered in this project
and
the
means
they
used
to counter
them determined much of
stance
adopted
both
their character.
The
critical
by
movements
institutionalisation of art and literature posed
each.
Outside
would be
of
the
art is tic
ins ti tution,
to
the
dilemmas for
their
cri tique
unheard, yet their acceptance within it entailed the
partiality of their critique and so the end of their critical
function.
the
The acceptance of the avant-garde within a part of
totali ty
it
cri ticises
not
only
removes
its
abili ty
to
criticise this part, but prevents it from assuming any critical
function in relation to the totality of social and discursive
relations.
Surrealism in servitude
The
Surrealis ts
considered
that
their
adherence
to
the
PCF
would be to the detriment of this project; they saw the Party
institutionalising Marxism and a wider sense of rebellion in
the
same
way
that
the
artistic
ins ti tutionalised express ion.
and
literary
structures
They observed the reproduction
of existing values and relations within the Party structure and
273
considered that their distance from the PCF was to the benefit
of their critique.
Nevertheless, it can be argued that the absence of this
of
sort
commitment
poli tical
Surrealism
vulnerable
to
critique.
Naville,
whose
in
the
movement
recuperation
and
challenge
has
harmless
provoked
Defence', considered this to be the case.
rendered
in
its
'Legitimate
'The moral scandals
provoked by surrealism do not necessarily suppose an overthrow
of social and intellectual values;
the
fear them. It absorbs them easily.'
have
indicated
extent
to
this
sense,
observing
in
aspects
surrealism have
of
employed for
[207] Cardinal and Short
the
'forgiven'
bourgeoisie does not
which
been
Surrealism
that
taken
out
has
been
'the
superficial
of
context
and
their own sake... Devices which were once only
means have now become ends.'
Indeed, Surrealism has
[208]
become
a respected and integral part of the very structures
against
which
it
railed:
in
the
regarded as the 'elder statesman'
1950s,
the
movement
was
of the avant-garde literary
scene, and Breton declined an offer of the Prix de la Ville de
Paris.
For all
the passion
of its
revolutionary rhetoric,
it
seems that Surrealism was not so threatening as to necessitate
its censorship or suppression: on the contrary, there are many
respects in which it is now engaged in the reinforcement and
stability of
the relations it despised.
products
Surrealism
of
are
not
only
The techniques
displayed
within
and
the
institution of art, but are also used to the commercial ends of
advertising and style.
As
works of art and techniques of
274
design,
the
appreciation
encouraged.
of
its
constructions
and
texts
is
Within these discourses, Surrealism survives as a
detail of the histories of art and literature;
nature of its critique of the totality is
the political
addressed only to
the extent that it pertains to this context.
In 1982,
the Czech surrealist Jan Svankmaj-er made a film
called Dimensions
accompany
its
described
as
points
Dialogue.
British
a
out
of
Film
In
Czech
programme notes
Institute
'self-proclaimed
that
the
tours,
"militant
Surrealism,
Svankmajer
is
surrealist"',
who
'unlike
counterpart, remains a subversive force,
which
its
Western
as yet unassimilated
by the advertising and pop industries.' [209] In 1988, however,
a
television
remake
of
commercial
one
advertisement,
of
the
while
for
Tennants
film's
less
Lager
sequences
polished than
consisting
was
of
produced.
the original,
a
The
alters
little of its content. The film depicts two heads communicating
by means of the production of objects such as shoes and laces,
bread
and
butter,
toothbrushes
and
paste,
etc.,
from
their
mouths.
Initially there is a dialogue: one head produces the laces
for
the
shoe
proferred
by
the
other,
and
so
on.
But
the
sequence degenerates into a brutal chaos of juxtaposed objects:
butter spread over the shoe,
the
lace.
The
communication;
film
the
is
a
the toothbrush in conflict with
damning
advertisement
is
commentary
selling
on
alcohol.
human
It
is
significant that the sequence bears absolutely no relation to
lager
and
so
appears
devoid
of
any
meaning
other
than
thst
bestowed upon it by its role as an advertisement. The film is
275
not only emptied of its original meaning and intention; it is
used
as
a
form
of
the
communication
which
it
has
itself
condemned. And this holds true for the avant-garde as a whole
and indeed any critical discourse which fails to realise its
intending to subvert the dominant structure, it ends by
ends:
sustaining it.
It
appears
that
Surrealism cannot
be
transferred
from
fringe to mainstream without renouncing its critical function
and losing its impact.
from the whole, to
Something seems to be lost
the effect that the movement's ability to
effect even a challenge to prevwling values
weakened.
or removed
The study of the
is undermined
and
tactics adopted by both Dada and
Surrealism has shown that the development of these movements
was
encouraged
by
their
determination
to
resist
this
recuperation.
The Surrealists, for example,
bourgeois
world
engagement'
covertly,
('Deceive!
poets'),
intending
to
agency'
adopted by
undertook to engage in the
describing
People
must
subvert
it
theirs
still
from
as
a
'secret
believe
within.
we
The
are
'double
the Surrealists determined much of
the
character and content of the movement: the dominant imagery is
that of the presence and eruption of the surreal within the
everyday.
The transformation of the
rearrangement
of
words
and
images,
context of objects, the
the
collage,
automatic
writing, and the city narrative all present a reality haunted
by the magical,
the marvellous, and
the omnipresence of the
surreal, and this is also clear in the mythology
the
Surrealists.
Mad
love,
convulsive
developed by
beauty,
objective
276
chance,
the marvellous,
dream,
the
poetic,
desire,
expectation,
woman,
creation,
the
the
city,
the
revolution,
and
expression - each is established as a principle, and worshipped
almost as a god.
Henry
Miller
identified
mediations. He argued that
hostility,
literature
as
one
of
these
in spite of Surrealism's declared
the movement's 'secret engagement' with literature
Miller contrasted his own approach to writing
became overt.
with that of the Surrealists:
Everything I write is loaded with the dynamite which
will one day destroy the barriers erected about me.
If I fail it will be because I did not put enough
dynami te into my words.
And so, while I have the
strength and the gusto I will load my words with
dynamite. I know that the timid, crawling ones who
are my real enemies are not going to meet me face to
face in fair combat. I know these birds! I know that
they only way to get at them is to reach up Inside
them, through the scrotum; one has to get up inside
and twis t their sacred en trails for them.
That's
what Rimbaud did.
That's what Lautr~amont did.
Unfortunately, those who call themselves their
successors have never learned this technique. They
give us a lot of piffle about the revolution - first
the revolution of the word, now the revolution in
the street.
How are they going to make themselves
heard and unders tood if they are going to use a
language which is so emasculated? Are they writing
their beautiful poems for the angels above? [210]
Surrealism
was
Miller.
In
brotherhood in
too
a
literary,
response
to
polite,
and
Paul
Eluard's
'Poetic Evidence',
restrained
for
invocation
of
Miller railed agains t
the
fraternal unity of the movement.
The brotherhood of man is a permanent delusion
common to idealists everywhere in all epochs: it is
the reduction of the principle of individuation to
the least common denominator of intelligibility. It
is what leads the masses to identify themselves with
movie stars and me~omaniacs like Hitler and
Mussolini. It is what prevents them from reading and
appreciating and being influenced by and creating in
turn such poetry as Paul Eluard gives us. [211]
277
Miller considered the Dadaists to have been 'more entertaining.
They had humour at least.
what
they
are doing.
The Surrealists are too conscious of
It's
fascinating
to
read about
their
intentions - but when are they going to pull it off?'[212]
dedication
Surrealism's
to
the
revelation
of
the
unconscious was compounded by its belief that its glimpses of
the surreal were the glimpses of truth.
On this
basis,
the
Surrealists began their construction of a new order with new
values and principles and consequently a new set of mediations
between the individual and the world.
The question of their
own determination by the existing structures of society was
not addressed.
women
that
It is clear from the Surrealist treatment of
these
values
and
mediating
principles
were
reproductions of the relations pertaining in bourgeois society
amd upheld by 'bourgeois reason'.
While they believed theirs
to be a true cri tigue of the totali ty of exis ting relations,
and
a
basis
Nevertheless,
on
which
new
relations
could
the principles and media tions
were often uncritical reproductions of the
In
itself,
the
construction
of
a
be
established.
they
developed
ex ~ing
relations.
set
of
mediations
legitimated by their existence in the unconscious is itself an
affirmation of conventional wisdom that
some mediation between
the individual and the world is necessary. Surrealism rejected
the raw and undefined
meaningful
experience of
Dada in favour
of
the
experience of the surreal. If it was to constitute
a critique of the existing relations, this
expressed and communicated
and
experience must be
must therefore be rendered
coherent and intelligible in the terms of the structures it
278
This necessitated the
addresses.
set
of
mediations
€~~ing
those of the
In
the
en tai Is
and.
guise
development of a cohesive
Surrealism's
engagement
wi th
structures.
of
poets,
the
Surrealists
attempted
to
subvert the structures and conventions of poetry; in the guise
of
artists,
expression
tactics
they
and
had
intended
experience
been
the
of
used
by
sabotage
art
and
the
Dadaists,
of
the
reali ty.
accepted
While
the
these
Surrealists
developed them in order to construct a new reality rather than
merely destroy the old.
In this context, the
Surrealists were
happy
that
The
to
accept
much
Dada
rejected.
Surrealists
considered it necessary to work within established discourse;
they
used the
language of the unconscious in their refusal to
merely
confuse
reali ty,
and
their
search
for
a
new
set
of
guiding principles, an absolute of surreality, to replace those
which both Dada and Surrealism rejected.
Although both movements
were
international
and diverse,
only Surrealism courted definition as a movement in the attempt
to retain its self-determination.
follow from this choice:
itself
as
a
movement
Many of its characteristics
in comparison wi th Dada,
based
in
one
city:
Paris;
membership committed to one ideal: Surrealism; and
with
a
series
leader:
of
Andre
exclusions
Breton.
and
The
movement
recriminations:
it exerted
with
a
a hierarchy
was
marked
just
as
the
by
a
PCF
insisted that its members should be Marxists above all else, so
the
members
of
the
Surrealis t
their activities. Picon
movemen tIed
it
to
group were
Surrealis t
in
all
observed that the intransigence of the
'se t i t s
face
agains t
any
concess ion or
279
consideration which, for the sake of some momentary end, might
make them lose sight of their revolutionary aims.' [213]
Although quite different from the tactics adopted by Dada,
these procedures were also intended to avoid assimilation and
recuperation.
make
itself
Surrealism sought such an identity 'in order to
heard and
preserve its
Only as
integri ty.
an
organisation can it carry on a dialogue with rivals who are
less
averse
to
establishment. '[214]
absorbed
being
'The
discipline
by
the
required
to
cultural
destroy
a
repressive society is more rigorous than that of bowing beneath
the existing yoke. '[215] Both movements considered that their
ability to evade identification and definition in the terms of
the es tablished discourse would
exis tence on their own terms.
impossible
to
identify
force
their
own
ideas
Dada pro®ded by making itself
without
paradox
and
contradiction;
Surrealism by ins is ting on its autonomy and cohesion.
both movements
believed
that
into
they were dependent
While
on
the
success of the social revolution, their attempts to cultivate
an enduring
ability to provoke some form of crisis means that
their methods can be appraised in terms of their
ability to
evade confinement and assimilation.
The
Surrealists
felt
that
many
of
their
tactics
were
successful in their resistance to recuperation. In 1965, they
declared:
Nothing having been able to reduce by assimilation
to a religious sect, to a poli tical party or a
li terary coterie - or, over the years, to really
. break our unity and our capacity for renewal - those
whom we disturb can no longer hope to drown
Surrealism in the confusion from which they derive
profit and glory. [216]
280
As the discussions in the following chapters reveal, there are
areas
of
subsequent
critique
in
which
this
red
thread
of
Surrealism has continually resurfaced, not least those which
are
engaged
cultural,
in
and
the
critique
political
of
the
relations
totality
and
so
of
face
social,
the
same
dilemmas of criticism.
In
an
interview in
the
New
Statesman
in
Jean
1987,
Schuster spoke of the historical movement of Surrealism as a
rope through which runs a red thread of las ting revol t
and
J.-F.
a
potent
critique.
'radioactive
[217]
fragment
of
Dupuis
radicalism'
also
in
acknowledged
Surrealism
which
persists in spite of its recuperation. However, he argued that
this fragment cannot be revived
the extent
to which
without an understanding of
the movement
left
itself open
to
such
integration.
Everywhere Surrealism appears in recuperated forms:
commodities, works of art, pUblicity techniques, the
language of power, a model of alienated imagination,
objects of devotion, and cultural accessories. Even
though
these
diverse
recuperations
appear
incompatible with its spirit, it is more important
to show that surrealism contained them from its
inception,
just
as
bolshevism
contained
the
"inevitability" of the Stalinist state. [218]
The
Situationists'
critical
appreciation
of
Surrealism
was
launched in an effort to pursue this analysis, and facilitated
their consideration of the problems of recuperation encountered
by the avant-garde and other critical movements. This awareness
of
the
fate
of
their
historical
precedents
provoked
the
Situationists' search for means by which recuperation might be
analysed, evaded, and countered.
CRITIQUE AND RECUPERATION IN TWENTIETH CENTURY
PHILOSOPHICAL DISCOURSE
Volume 11 of 11
A thesis submitted to the University of Manchester for the
degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Faculty of Arts, 1989.
Sarah Jane Plant
Department of Philosophy
281
Volume 11
4. Building the Hacienda.
THE AVANT-GARDE HERITAGE
Recuperation
D~tournement
The limits of recuperation
THE CRISIS IN FRANCE
The 1966 Strasbourg Scandal
Under the cobblestones
Suicide, silence - or revolution
The recuperation of the May events
THE ORANGE AND WHITE, THE BLACK AND THE RED
Kabouters and Provos
Poland's Orange Alternative
Metropolitan Indians
Buy now while stocks last
5. poststructuralism: Webs Without Spiders
THE CHALLENGE OF NIHILISM
The impact of the May events
FOUCAULT: POWER AND KNOWLEDGE
From hanging to tagging
The production of the subject
The production of repression
EPISTEMOLOGICAL IMPLICATIONS
The hyperreal and imaginary
THE END OF CRITICISM?
The tyranny of the multiple
The need for conceptualisation
Kristeva and the flag of convenience
Drifting into nonsense
6. The Return to Reality.
THE SILENT MAJORITY
The reemergence of opposition
Nomadology in practice
THE TACTICS OF CRITICISM
Arming the chairs
THE IMPASSE OF POSTSTRUCTURALISM
282
283
294
299
306
317
317
327
334
346
351
351
355
357
366
376
377
385
397
407
410
414
418
423
430
433
439
445
451
457
458
462
467
471
479
483
Conclusion.
492
Illustrations.
494
Footnotes.
505
Bibliography.
541
282
4. Building the Ha~ienda.
'Who wants a world in which the guarantee that we shall not die
of starvation entails the risk of dying of boredom?' (Vaneigem)
The Situationist International, already considered in relation
to the tradition of political theory in which it developed, is
considered here in terms of the avant-garde heritage. After an
introductory examination of the movement's historical emergence
from
the
Dadaist,
Situationist
developed
and
analyses
of
critique
some
detail.
This
in
consideration
of
influence
the
of
Surrealist,
the
events
in
Lettrist
and
the
recuperation
are
discussion
France,
Situationists
movements,
and
1968,
the
prefaces
a
in which
the
wider
avant-garde
tradition is given particular attention; this is also the case
in the final section of the chapter which looks at a number of
other movements in which the ideas of Dada, Surrealism, and the
Situationists
can
be
traced.
It
is
maintained
that
the
Situationists' development of Marxist and avant-garde tools of
criticism has had a significance for contemporary culture which
is rarely acknowledged. This chapter reveals this influence in
its
discussion
disputation;
of
those
moments
which
of
follow
political
make
it
and
clear
cultural
that
the
Situationists have been equally important to the development of
subsequent philosophical critique.
283
THE AVANT-GARDE HERITAGE
In
The History of
surrealis t
s ta te
the
Surrealism Maurice Nad e au declared
of
'eternal'.
mind
Nevertheless,
he
acknowledged that 'there was, strictly speaking, a surrealist
movement, its birth more or less coincident with the end of the
Firs t
World War,
its dissolu tion wi th the beginning of
the
Second.' [1] The completion of the book in 1944 did indeed seem
to herald a decline in the immediacy and effectiveness of the
movement.
Breton, for example,
having spent the war years in
America, returned to Paris in 1946 and involved himself in the
study of the occult and mystical implications of Surrealism.
Nevertheless,
while exis tentialism is credi ted wi th exerting
the major influence on the philosophy and culture of post-war
Western Europe,
a number of groups continued to develop the
Surrealist critique of the totality.
Prominent
Surrealist'
among
group.
these
was
At
inaugural
its
Dotremont introduced the ideas
the
Belgian
'Revolutionary
meeting,
of Henri Lefebvre.
Chris tian
Expelled by
the PCF in 1958, Lefebvre' s 1947 cri tique of the poverty of
everyday life had emphasised the significance of avant-garde
practice. Supported by this thesis, Dotremont proposed
'surrealist activity
must
everyday life.' [2]
In an attempt to fulfil this imperative,
Dotremont
Revolutionary
left
the
take
place within
tha t
Surrealists
together wi th Corneille,
Appel,
Noiret,
formed
[3];
in
the
group
Cobra
1953,
Jorn
Jorn
the context
in
1948
of
and,
and Cons tant,
formed
the
International Movement for an Imagist Bauhaus, in which he was
284
later joined by other Cobra members, the Nuclear artist Enrico
Baj,
and
Guiseppe
International
Pinot-Gallizio.
Lettrist
movement,
[4]
Together
with
the
these
currents
were
to
contribute to the formation of the International Situationist
movement in 1957.
The
Lettrist
movement
emerged
in
the
1940s
under
the
eccentric guidance of Isidore Isou, who was joined by Maurice
Lemaitre
in
1950.
against
the
Gombin
described Lettrism as
increasing
conformity
and
a
rebellion
respectability
of
Surrealism and, as such:
a phenomenon comparable with dadaism ••• an attempt at
the total sabotage of art, at finding a style of life
which enriches the real world, etc.
Clearly, these
new "fumblings and stammerings" were no more than a
pale copy of the project of Tzara and Huelsenbeck,
but they had the advantage that they re launched a
handful of young people on the search for the
absolute. [5]
The Le t tris ts
definitive
aimed
to comple te
the Dadais t
pro j ec t
by
the
deconstruction of words so that poetry might begin
again on the basis of
a language of liberated letters. Isou
centred the movement around the notion of creation, by which he
proposed the elevation of
the individual
to the divine role
previously assumed by God.
Both he and Lemaitre have produced
an enormous body of theoretical texts to which they continue to
add:
libraries
editions
of
bibliographies
music,
all
their
of
aesthetics,
over
the
journals,
Lettrist
world
stock
the
latest
texts
psychology,
on
publishing
the
of
poetry,
cinema,
photocopied
which
economics,
political theory. Lemaitre emphasised the
the movement,
rough
contain
mathematics,
theatre,
and
political content of
journal Front de la Jeunesse
alongside the more li terary reviews such as Ur, Poesies, and
285
Lettrisme,
but
this did li t tIe to temper the inf luence of
ISou's megaomania and
passion for creation and abstraction on
the movement as a whole.
Nevertheless, Lettrists such as Debord and Wolman saw the
the potential for a 'dada-type cuI tural sabotage'
[6] in the
movement: they organised the interruption of Easter High Mass
in the Notre Dame in 1950 (at which the priest was kidnapped
and
impersonated by
Chaplin's
one
'Limelight'
of
the Lettrists),
press
conference
and
in
sabotaged
1952.
Such
interventions earned them Isou's contempt,
and in 1952 they
spli t
the
from
the Le t tris t
Lettrists.
movemen t
to
form
In terna tional
The International Lettrist movement initiated many
of the analyses which were to be developed in the Situationist
International.
The attack on Chaplin was a protest against the
'unanimous, servile enthusiasm' he enjoyed as a celebrity and,
by
extension,
a
critique
of
the
spectacular stardom is encouraged:
urgent
exercise
especially
of
when
freedom
they
is
present
society
in
which
'We believe that
the
destruction
themselves
in
such
the most
of
the
idols,
name
of
freedom.' [7]
The notion of the everyday provoked an interest in the
environment, particularly that of the city, and the possibility
of a new analysis of urbanism.
Formula for a New Urbanism,
published
by the nineteen year-old Chtcheglov in the journal
Potlatch,
declared:
have
to
s train
'We are bored in the city.'
to s till discover mys teries
billboards •• '
[8]
invocation of
a
In
a
manner
'new spirit',
reminiscent
he
wrote:
'We really
on
the
sidewalk
of
Apollinaire's
'our
imaginations,
286
haunted by
the old archetypes, have
remained far behind the
sophistication of machines ••• abstraction has invaded all the
architecture
contemporary
arts,
particular.
in
Pure
plasticity, inanimate, storyless, soothes the eye.' [9]
A mental disease has swept the planet: banalisation.
Everyone is hypnotised by production and conveniences
- sewage system, elevator, bathroom, washing machine.
This state of affairs, arising out of a struggle
against poverty, has overshot its ultimate goal - the
liberation of man from material cares - and become an
obsessive image hanging over the present.
Presented
with the alternative of love or a garbage disposal
unit, young people of all countries have chosen the
garbage disposal unit. [10]
Chtcheglov's belief in
The legacy of Surrealism is clear in
the necessity
of 'bringing to light forgotten desires and ••
And by carrying out an intensive
creating entirely new ones.
propaganda in favour of these desires.' [11]
The Lettrist texts published in Potlatch and Les Nevres
Nues developed a cri tique of archi tec ture,
urbanism, and the
avant-garde
of
and
so
began
the
developed later in the work of
World
Congress
of
Liberated
critique
the
spectacle
the Si tua tionis ts.
The Firs t
Artists
in
1956
initiated
the
alliances between the International Lettrists, the Movement for
an
Imagist
Association
Bauhaus,
[12],
and
the
London
which coalesced
in
Situationist International in 1957. The
Psychogeographical
the
formation of
major
themes
the
of the
early Situationist texts recurred throughout the history of the
movement.
The mul tiplica tion of desires and the
'intensive
propaganda'
in
effort
'expose
the
their
favour
appalling
was
contrast
effected
in
between
constructions of life and its present poverty.'
declared:
an
the
[13]
to
possible
Debord
287
We need to work toward flooding the market - even if
for the moment merely the intellectual market - with
a mass of desires whose realisation is not beyond the
capacity of man's present means of action on the
material world, but only be¥ond the capacity of the
old social organisation. [14J
This
proj ec t
marked
the
political
in
the
boundaries
and
barriers
convergence of
Situationists'
the artis tic and
attempt
between
such
to
areas
the
creativity
presently
confines of an art
stifled
and
separated from
destroy
the
life.
The
of
Situationists conceived political revolution as
the
a
release of
restricted
within
the
the rest of daily life,
a
release which constitutes the participation in history denied
by capitalist society.
Just as in the first half of the nineteenth century
revolutionary theory arose out of philosophy (out of
critical reflection on philosophy, out of the crisis
and death of philosophy), so now it is going to rise
once again out of modern art - out of poetry - out of
its supersession, out of what modern art has sought
and lromised, out of the clean sweep it has made and
of a 1 the values and rules of everyday behaviour.
[15]
Like
both
the
Situationists
Dadaists
and
considered
the
Surrealists,
that
artistic
therefore,
the
and
political
intervention are engaged in a mutual dependence.
For Debord,
this meant that:
The seekers of an experimental culture cannot hope to
realise it without the triumph of the revolutionary
movement, while the latter cannot establish authentic
revolutionary conditions without resuming the efforts
of the cultural avant-garde toward the critique of
everyday life and its free construction.[16]
This
interdependence
was
also
poetry
and
revolution
'It
is
relation
between
throughout
the
avant-garde.
poetry
the
service
at
of
formulated
not
revolution,
in
terms
which
of
the
surfaces
a
matter
of
putting
but
rather
of
putting
288
revolution a t
the service of poetry.
It
is only in this way
that the revolution does not betray its own project.' [17]
In one of the Situationists'
founding documents,
Debord
described the construction of situations as the epitome of this
convergence of the political and the artistic projects.
The life of a person is a succession of fortuitous
situations, and even if none of them is exactly the
same as another the immense majority of them are so
undifferentiated and dull that they give a perfect
impression of similitude ••• We must try to construct
situations, that is to say, collective ambiances,
ensembles of impressions determining the quality of a
moment. [18]
The construction of situations was therefore conceived as the
attempt to expose the possibilities of life in contradiction to
those
offered
defined
the
constructed
within
moment
capitalist
of
situation,
society;
revolution
in
which
as
the
a
the
Situationists
truly
collectively
creation
of
a
chosen
environment in which to live would at last become more than a
political dream or an artistic creation.
It is clear that the Situationists' emergence out of the
avant-garde
tradition
shaped
the
whole
of
the
movement.
Creativity, spontaneity, play, and the desire to participate in
the
free
development
and
crea tion
hallmarks of Dada and Surrealism.
their precursors'
communication,
of
the world,
were
The Situationists developed
concerns wi th the ci ty environment,
chance
and
the
recognition of this heritage,
the
game;
critical
in
poe tic
their
they developed the analyses of
the avant-garde in order to explain and overcome the apparent
insolubility
encountered.
of
the
difficulties
these
movements
had
289
With
their
admiration
for
the
Surrealist
cityscapes of de
Chirico, the poetry of Lautreamont, and the tactics of Dada,
the Situationists shared much of the Surrealist heritage.
The
Surrealist
movement
functional
character
had
promoted
a
subversion of
the
city
the
banality
of
its
experience which was also developed by the Si tua tionis ts.
In
of
the
and
'Methods of Detournement', Debord declared: 'Life can never be
too disorienting', in support of which he mentions a friend who
'had just wandered through the Harz region of Germany while
blindly following the directions of a map of London.' [19]
Architecture and the urban
significant for
de Stijl,
environment have always been
the avant-garde: in movements such as Bauhaus,
and Constructivism,
it is seen as epitomising the
union of art and life sought by the avant-garde. In 1923, Van
Doesburg had written: 'We have to realise that art and life are
no longer separate domains.
Therefore the idea of art as an
illusion unconnected with real life has to disappear.' [20]
A
short manifesto by Jacques Fillon, carried by Potlatch in 1954,
declared:
'Architecture
must
reach
the
point
of
exciting
passion.
We could not consider any more limited constructural
undertaking. •• We will issue a reminder tha t the task is to
invent new games.' [21]
In his 'Introduction to a Critique of
Urban
suggested
Geography',
Debord
a
number
of
city
games
similar to those developed by the Surrealists which would also
explore
the
role
of
chance
experiment
with
new
forms
of
discovery.
The idea of the derive, or
drifting,
prefigured in the
Surrealist experiments with 'automatic walking', was developed
290
by
the
Le t tris ts
into
a
theory
of
'psychogeography',
which
Debord defined as 'the study of the precise laws and specific
effects of the geographical environment, consciously organised
or not,
on the emotions and behaviour of individuals.'
[22]
Fillon also developed the importance of the urban environment
to such games: 'Big cities are favourable to the pastime which
we call derive ••• the technique of locomotion without a goal.'
[23]
For Ch tcheglov,
this
sort of aimless s trolling would
become the principle activity of the inhabitants of the postrevolutionary city who, no longer constrained by the functional
imperatives of the present environment, would be free to create
their own and live in it as they chose.
Chtcheglov's
vision
of the new city was heralded by the
statement: 'The hayienda must be built', a phrase which enjoys
a
continuing
significance
in
contemporary
culture
[24].
'Everyone will live in his own personal cathedral, so to speak.
There will be rooms more
and
houses
where
be
irresis tibly
architecture
one
conducive to dreams than any drug,
cannot
alluring
was intended
help
to
but love.
travellers. '
as a
[25]
Chtcheglov
the
house,
of
the
Such
an
'means of experimenting with
a thousand ways of modifying life':
possibilities
Others will
mobile
considered
changeable
city
environments, and the establishment of such areas as a 'Bizarre
Quarter' ,
a ' Happy Quarter',
a ' Sinis ter Quarter',
and the
'changing of landscapes from one hour to the next' which would
result in 'complete disorientation.' [26]
This Lettrist
Situationists
as
vision of
the new city was
a
of
means
subverting
the
used by
the
old.
The
291
Situationists did not seek disorientation for its own sake, but
engaged it in the specific goal of contesting the totality of
social relations; according to Debord:
rough experimentation toward a new mode of
behaviour has already been made wi th wha t we have
termed the d~rive, which is the practice of a
passional journey out of the ordinary through rapid
changing of ambiances ••• But the application of this
will to playful creation must be extended to all
known forms of human relationships ••• [27]
A
Indeed,
it
is
Situationist
this
purposefulness
movement
from
all
which
others:
distinguishes
the
the
and
tactics
techniques of the avant-garde no longer retained the vestiges
of ends in themselves which they still, in spite of Dada and
Surrealism's
consciousness,
political
assumed
in
these
movements. The Situationist critique of urbanism, its images of
play, poetry, the game and the 'happening' were all used to the
end of the transformation of the totality. Debord, for example,
wrote
tha t
'The si tua tionis t
game is dis tinguished from
the
classic conception of the game by its radical negation of the
element of competition and of separation from everyday life.'
[28]
Poetry,
for
the
Si tua tionis ts
no
less
than
their
predecessors, had a particular significance encouraged by the
increasing
permeation
of
commodity
relations
throughout
the
experience and discourse of the everyday:
'Poetry is becoming
more
the
and
more
clearly
consumer society,
the
empty
space,
antimatter,
since it is not consumable.'
of
[29] For the
Situationists, Dada's subversion of language ensured it a role
in the political critique of its society.
The innocence of words is henceforth refuted ad
language is revealed as "the worst of conventions",
something that should be destroyed, demystified,
292
liberated. Dada's contemporaries did not fail to
emphasise its will to destroy everything (that
"demolition job", Gide worried),
the danger it
represented to the dominant sense. After Dada it has
become impossible to believe that a word is forever
bound to an idea: Dada realised all the possibilities
of language and forever closed the door on art as a
speciality. It definitively posed the problem of the
realisation of art. [30]
The Situationists were more concerned with the notion of poetic
communication as the contradiction to the functional uses of
language promo ted by
the spectacle,
rather
than wi th poe try
itself. Thus:
whereas surrealism in the heyday of its assault
against the oppressive order of culture and daily
life could rightly define its arsenal as "poetry
without poems if necessary", it is now a matter for
the SI of a poetry necessarily without poems. [31]
This
emphasis
on
poetry
for
forms
of
communication
of
the
search
contradict
those
is
evidence
spectacle.
of
the
which
Situationists'
exist within
Poetry
but
continually
resurfaces within spectacular society and can be said to be
produced
by
it
rather
than
in
contradiction
to
it;
nevertheless, its useless visions have a powerful message which
does negate the functionalism and order of capitalism and it is
therefore essential that it is kept in a separate and elitist
realm.
'A mass of poetry is naturally preserved in the world,
but nowhere are there the places, the moments or the people to
revive it, communicate it, use it.' [32] If poetry is prevented
from its realisation in the spectacle it remains a specialised
and elitist discourse:
The masses, i.e. nonruling classes, have no reason to
feel concerned with any aspects of a culture or an
organisation of social life that have been developed
not only without their participation or their
control,
but
even
deliberately
against
such
participation or control. [33]
293
In their conception of
poetry,
the Situationists intended a
form of communication between people as
subjects rather than
reified beings; whilst such communication is precluded by the
all-encompassing
nature
meaning
in
poetic
discourse
nature
and
to
persist
nonutilitarian
of
the
will
spectacle,
by
convey
glimpses
of
its
virtue
of
its
reality
of
the
experience.
Such
glimpses
prefigure
the
possibilities
of
a
post-
revolutionary world in which poetry, as Lautreamont declared,
will be made by all; in which it will constitute the totality
of relations and communication.
Every revolution has been born in poetry, has first
of all been made with the force of poetry. This is a
phenomenon which continues to escape the theorists of
revolution ••• but which has generally been sensed by
the counterrevolutionaries.
Poetry, whenever it
appears, frightens them ••• The moment of real poetrx,
which has "all the time in the world before it I,
invariably wants to reorient the entire world and the
entire future to its own ends. As long as it lasts
its demands admit of no compromising. [34]
Poe try was held to be the nega tion of the func tionalised and
alienated
communica tion
of
commodi ty
relations.
The
Situationists considered the critique of language essential to
that of spectacular society itself:
We should also understand the phenomenon of the
insubordination of words, their desertion, their open
resistance, which is manifested in all modern writing
(from Baudelaire to the dadais ts and Joyce), as a
symptom of the general revolutionary crisis of the
society.[35]
'Rediscovering
poetry',
they
added,
indistinguishable from reinventing revolution.'
'may
become
294
Recuperation
The
Situationists
capable
of
considered
revealing
the
that
critical
'unreal
unity
theory
must
be
proclaimed
by
the
spectacle' as 'the mask of the class division on which the real
unity of the capitalist mode of production rests.' [36] Debord
argued that capitalism must
out
of
guides
revolutionary
'above all prevent a new setting
thought';
it
is
this
imperative
which
the whole system and must therefore be understood and
countered by critical theory.
With reference to the fate of
the avant-garde critique, he wrote that the bour~isie:
was aware of the danger of surrealism.
Now tha t i t
has been able to believe that surrealism was the most
radical and disturbing movement possible.
It thus
cultivates a sort of nostalgia for surrealism at the
same time as it · discredits any new venture by
automa tically reducing it to a surrealis t dej a-vu,
that is, to a defeat which according to it is
defini tive and can no longer be brought back into
question by anyone. [37J
The
tolerance
and
acceptance
of
Surrealism
is
extended
in
return for the negation of its critique; moreover,
it is used
as
subsequent
a
means
to
discredit
and
undermine
innovations and cultural subversions.
integration of
movements
such as
all
This suggests that the
Surrealism and Dada is
merely repressive, as Marcuse would suggest, but entails
appropriation
by
the
status
quo:
not
their
the recuperation of their
tactics renders them means to the perpetuation of the existing
system.
Debord suggested that the avant-garde is manipulated
in order
to
permitted
check
the
precisely
effectiveness
because
its
of
its
critique;
permission
existence as a critique of the totality.
nega tes
it
is
its
295
In
this
critical
way,
movement
the
is
appearance
maintained
The
cri tique is des troyed.
of
the
while
avant-garde
the
reality
as
of
acceptance of Surrealism as
a
its
a
critical movement of the past is encouraged in order to negate
its critique of the present.
'Former moments of contestation
survive fragmentarily and lose their artistic (or postartistic)
value
to
the
precise
extent
they
have
lost
the
heart
of
contestation.' [38] Once recuperated, such movements reproduce
the forces that 'dominate present social life both officially
and
in
novelty
fact:
as
noncommunication,
such,
for
the
bluff,
rapid
frantic
turnover
of
desire
for
arbitrary
and
uninteresting gadgets.' [39]
Recuperation
is made possible by the commodification of
ideas and attitudes, which are said to be produced,
consumed,
and reproduced in the same way, and with the same effects of
equivalence and
impoverishment,
as
material commodities.
In
'Basic Banalities', Vaneigem wrote:
A travesty of antagonism, power insists that everyone
should be for or against the Rolling Stones, le
nouveau roman, the obscenity laws, Chinese food, LSD,
short
skirts,
the
United
Nations,
pop
art,
na tionalisa tion, thermonuclear war and hi tchhiking.
Everyone is asked their opinion of every detail to
stop them having one of the totality.[40]
The
fact
that
vindication
of
this
list
Vaneigem's
of
concerns
point:
such
is
so
issues
dated
pass
is
a
through
social discourse at a rate which denies their intrinsic meaning
and so renders them banal and easy to forget. It is interesting
to note that in the twenty years since Vaneigem compiled this
list
of
examples,
the
general
areas
of
concern
remain
unchanged. Not The Rolling Stones, but Acid House; not LSD, but
296
Ecstasy and Heroin; not nationalisation, but privatisation. It
is clear that these issues have no intrinsic equivalence,
but
they are all
same
posed a t
the
same
level and given
the
significance. Moreover, the rate of the turnover ' of such issues
has accelerated in the intervening years so that, in a matter
of weeks, issues such as the deterioration of the ozone layer
and
the
possibility
of
salmonella
in
eggs
arise
and
are
superseded.
Vaneigem
suggested
that of the commodity,
and
particularity.
that
this
acceleration
is
precisely
which also belies its own significance
Issues
which
strike
at
the
totality
of
social organisation are rendered equivalent with those at its
periphery
and
are
consequently
devalued
and
beli t tIed.
Privatisation becomes as partial an issue as the latest pop
music.
As long as it [life] fails to break free of the
context imprisoning it (a break that is called
revolution), the most authentic experience can be
grasped, expressed, and communicated only by way of
an
inversion
through
which
its
fundamental
contradiction is dissimulated. In other words, if a
positive project fails to sustain a praxis of
radically overthrowing the condi tions of life ••• it
does not have the slightest chance of escaping being
taken over by the negativity that reigns over the
expression of social relationships: it is recuperated
like the image in a mirror, in inverse perspective.
[41]
The imposition of equivalence, vacuity, and partiality on
the
commodified critique
phenomenon
within
commodification
only of
of
and
constitutes
supportive
critique
revolutionaries
involves
its
of
the
recuperation
the
spectacle;
as
a
the
categorisation not
in spectacular roles,
but also of
their critiques. Defined in the terms they rejected,
critical
297
movements are transformed into commodities whose consumption is
reproductive of the relations of spectacular society.
Debord
described
avant-
this
transformation
with
reference
to
the
garde.
One of the contradictions of the bourgeoisie in its
phase of liquidation is that while it respects the
abstract principle of intellectual and artistic
creation, it at first resists actual creations, then
eventually exploi ts them.
This is because it must
maintain a sense of criticality and experimental
research
among a minori ty, but mus t
channel this
activity
towards
strictly
compartmentalised
utilitarian disciplines
and avert
any concerted
overall critique and research.
In the domain of
culture the bourgeoisie strives to divert the taste
for innovation, which is dangerous for it in our era,
toward certain degraded, :imocuous and confused forms
of novelty. [42]
The Situationists argued that capitalism is obliged to present
a plethora of opportunity and choice, diversity and freedom of
in
expression
experiences.
order
This
satisfy
to
also
enables
the
it
society of tolerance and freedom,
to
demands
present
an appearance
for
such
itself
as
a
which belies
the inauthenticity of the possibilities it offers. The desire
for change and innovation which receives its expression in the
avant-garde
is
developing
into
recuperated
the
desire
in
order
to
prevent
it
from
for
change
tha t
would cons ti tute
historical consciousness.
Currents
of
criticism and
innovation are
cast
into
the
role of producers of consumable packages of attitudes, goods,
and
discourses;
their
commodi ty rela tions,
products
are
arise
within
the
therefore commodified and,
system
as
of
such,
denied their intrinsic meaning. They are not merely emptied of
meaning,
but
commodity
relations.
the
meaning
they
do
This
means
that
bear
they
is
constituted
are
defined
by
and
298
understood in terms of the totality of relations they sought to
oppose.
Whilst
they
retain
the
appearance of
contradiction,
dissent, or disatisfaction, they are invoked in support of the
existing
totality.
critique
A
which
fails
to
achieve
the
supersession of the totality - as is the case with all previous
critiques of bourgeois society -
is necessarily vulnerable to
the process of commodification and recuperation:
by
revolutionary
cri tique
abandoned on the battlefield,
are
like
'Words forged
partisans'
weapons:
they fall into the hands of the
counterrevolution and
like prisoners
forced labour.' [43]
In this way:
of war are subjected
to
the most corrosive concepts are emptied of their
content and put back into circulation in the service
of maintaining alienation: dadaism in reverse. They
become advertising slogans ••• Concepts of radical
critique suffer the same fate as the proletariat:
they are deprived of their history, cut off from
their roots ••• [44]
The art and poetry which aris es in the spectacle cannot escape
the constraints of commodity relations and the paradox of its
existence in the spectacle:
'The ambiguity of "revolutionary
art"
the
lies
in
the
fact
that
revolutionary
aspect
of
particular spectacle is always contradicted and offs €·t
reactionary element present in all spectacles.'[45]
any
by the
In 1962,
Kotanyi wrote:
Since the beginning of the movement there has been a
problem as to what to call artistic works by members
of the SI. It was understood that none of them was a
situationist production, but what to call them? I
propose a very simple rule: to call them antisituationist. We are against the dominant conditions
of artistic inauthenticity. I don't mean that anyone
should stop painting, writing, etc. I don't mean that
that has no value. I don't mean that we could
continue to exist without doing that. But at the same
time
we know that all will be recuperated by the
society and used against us.[46]
299
Nevertheless, the possibility of revolutionary art remains
and,
indeed,
gains
in
importance
with
the
colonisation
of
everyday life identified by the Situationists. 'After dadaism,
and in spite of the fact
able
to
recuperate
a
that the dominant culture has been
sort
of
dadaist
art,
it
is
certain
that artistic rebellion in
continue
to be recuperable into consumable works.'
Surrealists'
was
unnecessarily
by
Situationists
the
to
vulnerable
from
the next generation will
faith in the authenticity of their
considered
far
[47]
The
works of art
to
render
them
recuperation
through
the
fragmentation and commodification of their critique.
We will not repea t the mis take of the surrealis ts,
who put themselves at the service of the revolution
right when it had ceased to exis t.
Bound to the
memory of partial and rapidly crushed revolution,
surrealism
rapidly
became
a
reformism
of
the
spectacle, a critique of certain forms of the ruling
spectacle that was carried out from within the
dominant
organisation
of
the
spectacle.
The
surrealists seem to have overlooked the fact that
every internal improvement or modernisation of the
spectacle is translated by power into its own encoded
language, to which it alone holds the key.[48]
All cri tical movements must be constantly vigilant
to
their
vulnerability to recuperation within and in the support of the
existing social and discursive relations.
Detournement
The
Si tua tionis ts
developed
a
cri tique
of
reified
and
commodified language, the language of the bureaucracy and that
which
reinforces
spectacular
the
discourse.
fragmentations
In
Vaneigem described Dada as:
The
Revolution
and
of
isolations
Everyday
of
Life,
300
a funnel, sucking in all the trivia and garbage
cluttering up the world. Reappearing at the other
end, everything was transformed, original, brand new.
Though people and things stayed the same they took on
totally new meanings ••• Subversion, the tactics of
the reversal of perspective, overthrew the rigid
frame of the old world. [49]
The Dadaists, he wrote,
'built the first laboratory for the
realisa tion of everyday life.' [50] The Si tua tionis ts used the
term
detournement
to
describe
their
subversion. This notion, developed by
conception
of
this
Marien [51], is central
to the realisation of art and this critique.
Detournement is
a development of both the Dadaist and Surrealist techniques of
subversion and sabotage. It is the 'turning around', diversion,
or embezzlement
of conventional arrangements of discourse and
reality; collage, photomontage, and the juxtaposition of images
and words were used by the Lettrists in the forms of graffiti
and subverted cartoon strips.
Detournement
was
specifically
intended
to
produce
a
critique of culture and language, and although the emphasis of
the
Situationists'
work
gradually
shifted
to
more
overtly
political concerns, the methods of subversion and embezzlement
they advocated throughout were esentially those employed by the
avant-garde.
Nevertheless,
as
Debord recognised,
it was
the
avant-garde's struggle to produce an effective critique which
had
led
it
to
'transpose
into
their
sphere
of
activity
organisational methods created by revolutionary politics, and
their
action
is
connection with a
alliance of
henceforth
political
inconceivable
critique.'[52]
without
This
the poli tical and artis tic cri tique,
both Dada and Surrealism, was
some
fundamental
presen t
in
therefore necessitated by the
301
movements'
struggles
wi th
identified
by
critiques.
their
the
condi tions
For
this
of
domination
reason,
Debord
considered Dada:
to have delivered a mortal blow to the tradi tional
conception
of
culture.
The
almos t
immediate
dissolution of dadaism was a resul t of its purely
negative definition.
But it is certain that the
dadaist spirit has influenced all the movements that
have come after it; and that a dadaist-type negation
must be present in any later constructive position as
long as the social conditions that impose the
repetition of
rotten superstructures - conditions
that have intellectually already been definitively
condemned - have not been wiped out by force.[53]
For
the
Situationists,
therefore,
'the
critique
of
the
dominant language, the detournement of it, is going to become a
permanent practice of the new revolutionary theory' [54], since
'It is impossible to get rid of a world without getting rid of
the language that conceals and protects it, without laying bare
its true nature.' [55]
The exposure of the poetry inherent in
the language of information and functional control through the
d€tournement of
tha t which arises wi thin spectacular society
was
to
considered
revolutionary
be
project.
essential
Moreover,
to
the
success
of
the
such
a
practice
was
not
limited to the expansion of talents and arts since:
in addition, clashing head on with all social and
legal conventions, it cannot fail to be a powerful
cultural weapon in the service of a real class
struggle. The cheapness of its products is the heavy
artillery that breaks through all the Chinese walls
of understanding.
It is a real means of proletarian
artistic education, the first step towards a literary
communism. [56]
Plagiarism, collective art, and
a poetry that could be truly
'made by all' were facilitated by the tactics and project of
detournement:
The literary and artistic heritage of humanity should
be used for partisan propaganda purposes ••• In fact,
it is necessary to finish with any notion of personal
302
property in this area.
The appearance of the new
necessities outmodes previous "inspired" works. They
become obstacles, dangerous habits. The point is not
whether we liked them or not. We have to go beyond
them.[57]
Anything
and
which
eve~hing
might
be
appropriated
in
the
struggle to expose and develop the fundamental contradictions
identified by the Situationists at the heart of the spectacular
society must be engaged. This was true for comic strips - whose
love story speech bubbles were replaced by political comment;
works
of
classical
detourned
art
by
Jorn's
irreverent
repaintings; buildings - defaced and appropriated by graffiti;
and relationships of all sorts - turned up side down by games,
derives,
and
constructed
situations.
Detournement
was
ultimately the sense in which the Situationists conceived the
social revolution:
a gigantic turning around of the existing
social world.
The
notion
of
detournement
In
is
equally
applicable
to
their use of both class analyses
and
theoretical
ideas.
those which,
like Marcuse' s, priori tised the unconscious, the
Situationists were concerned to avoid the establishment of any
theoretical principles or mediations
beyond those considered
necessary for the success of their analysis. For this reason,
the
Situationists were
critical of the Surrealist adherence
to the Freudian notion of the unconscious on the grounds that
it limited, rather than multiplied,
the possibilities of the
imagination.
The cause of the ideological failure of surrealism
was its belief that the unconscious was the finally
discovered ul tima te force · of life, and its having
revised the history of ideas accordingly and stopped
it there.
We now know that the unconscious
imagination is poor, that automatic writing is
monotonous, and that the whole genre of ostentatious
303
surrealist "weirdness"
surprising. [58]
Although
the
Situationists
has
ceased
used
the
to
be
language
very
of
desire,
creativity and spontaneity,
they did not do so in order to
es tablish
or
some
absolute
fund amen tal
Such
principle.
conceptualisations were employed critically, and used only to
the
extent
that
they were
useful
to
the negation
of
the
spectacular society and the establishment of a contradiction
between
the
poverty of
existing
life
and
the
possibilities
inherent, but denied, in everyday experience.
In an American Si tua tionis t pamphle t,
Ken Knabb s ta ted:
'All techniques are allowed, and not only psychoanalysis: they
need
only
begin
with
a
demystified
comprehension
of
the
totality and contain their own critique.' [59] For Knabb, the
subversion
exercised
by
the
detournement
of
society
and
discourse:
does not aim to confuse, but to make things clear,
which is precisely what throws the ruling spectacle
into such a confusion. Subversion only seems to come
out of nowhere because this world is nowhere •••
d~tournement is the art that reveals its own art; it
explains how it got here and why it can't stay. [60]
It is clear that the Situationist perspective sought not to
discover some realm free of the incursions of the spectacle;
unlike Marcuse's work, the Situationist postulation of a form
of
one-dimensionality
entailed
neither
the
necessity
of
an
undistorted or free space nor the impossibility of critique
without it.
point
The Situationists took their critical base as the
from which
possible.
the
radical
negation
of
the
spectacle
is
304
This
problems
posi tion
of
presented
the
Si tua tionis ts
critique considered throughout
also gave them the possibility of
obvious',
wrote
, tha t
Debord,
wi th
this
all
the
inquiry,
but
'It is
transcending them.
no
idea can
lead beyond
the
existing spectacle, but only beyond the existing ideas on the
spectacle.'
Critical
[61]
theory
must
discourse of the spectacle to negate it:
therefore
use
the
'in the positive use
of existing concepts it at the same time includes the knowledge
of
fluidity,
rediscovered
their
of
their
necessary
destruction.' [62]
This same f luidi ty was
analyses.
advocated in relation to Marxis t
It has been observed that the Situationists adopted
an interpretation of Marxism which prioritised the historical
consciousness
of
social
and
totality. For the Situationists,
discursive
it was impossible to
alienation with alienated forms.' [63]
therefore, they
relations
as
a
'combat
Like the early Gramsci,
rejected the hierarchy and bureaucracy of both
party and union and advocated a form of council communism.
Since
the
only
purpose
of
a
revolutionary
organisation is the abolition of all existing classes
in a way that does not bring about a new division of
society, we consider any organisation revolutionary
which consistentl
and effectively works toward the
international rea isation of the absolute power of
the workers councils, as prefigured in the experience
of the proletarian revolutions of this century. [64]
1
The Situationists developed their notion of council communism
throughout their analyses,
and,
like Gramsci,
promo ted it as
the form of organisation which prefigures a
society in which
people are free to control their own lives.[65]
Like
both
Lukacs
and
Gramsci,
the
Situationists
were
critical of economistic and deterministic forms of Marxism on
305
the grounds that they were impediments to this consciousness
since they remove the possibility of active engagement in the
negation
of
the
totality.
Like
Lukacs,
they
revolutionary critique is based on a dialectical
argued
that
understanding
of history, constituted by contradiction and negation. Marxism
should be maintained as 'an understanding of struggle, not of
law.'[66]
In The Society of the Spectacle, Debord argued that
interpretations of Marxism that suggest the inevitability
of a
gradual progression to the point of revolution place unnecssary
constraints on its critical function:
The tendency to base a proof on the scientific
validity of proletarian power on repeated experiments
in the past obscures Marx's histor1cal thought, from
the Manifes to on, forcing Marx to support a linear
image of the development of modes of production •••
The linear schema loses sight of the fact that the
bour eoisie is the anI revolutionar class that ever
won
Here t e SOC10-PO 1t1ca
oun at10ns 0 t e
modern spectacle are already established, negatively
defining the proletaria t as the only pretender to
historical life. [67]
Deterministic
interpretations
fragmentation of its critique:
of
Marxism
result
in
the
'What becomes important is to
patiently study economic development, and to continue to accept
suffering
with
a
Hegelian
tranquility,
so
that
the
result
remains a "cemetery of good intentions".' [68]
Fragmentation and reification take political critique out
of
the
realm
of
struggle
and
contradiction and
allows
a
critique such as Marxism to develop the characteristics of the
commodity
or
categorisation
spectacular
critique
of
spectacle
within
discourse
the
itself.
the
and
no
totali ty
It
is
specialised
longer
but
is
left
open
to
disciplines
of
constitutes
a
specific
and,
unified
most
306
significantly, equivalent to all other discourse. This results
in
the
toleration,
indeed,
within
spectacle:
critique
the
the
encouragement
the
latter
is
of
Marxist
strengthened
. rather than undermined by the presence of a discourse which is
practised in a form bearing the
negation,
but
is as vacuous,
appearance of hostility and
removed and alienating as
the
material commodity.
The limits of recuperation
Critical
theory
must
recognise
that
it
is
the product
and
participant in the social and discursive relations it wishes to
negate,
and
vulnerable
that
to
even
the
most
radical
recuperation.
For
the
of
gestures
Situationists,
is
this
recognition was no admission of defeat or impossibility, but
the necessary starting point for any critical discourse.
imperative
to
produces
an
enables
the discourse to understand the extent to which it
remains
within
existing
learning from the failures
rigour
social
and
and
self-criticism
It
discursive
of past contestations,
which
relations;
the
rise of the revolutionary movement':
radicalised by the lessons of past defeats and with
a programme enriched in proportion to the practical
powers of modern society ( ••• ) - this next attempt
at a total contestation of capitalism will know how
to invent and propose a different use of everyday
life, and will immediately base itself on new
everyday
practices,
on
new
types
of
human
relationships (being no longer unaware that any
conserving, wi thin the revolutionary movement, of
the relations prevailing in the existing society
imperceptibly leads to a reconstruction of one or
another variant of this society). [69]
'next
307
This possibility is dependent on
an analysis of the way in
which capitalism produces, and is then forced to recuperate, the
people,
the desires,
and the discourse which would otherwise
constitute its negation.
of
imposition
The
partiality
particularly significant in relation
cri tique;
and
equivalence
is
to social and political
the spectacle's ability to commodify and recuperate
political critique
is essential to its very survival. Vaneigem
considered Marxism in these terms when he wrote:
that was
developed by
the strength of
'The theory
the armed people now
develops the strength of those who disarm the people.' [70]
Today the revolutionary project stands accused before
the tribunal of history - accused of having failed,
of having engendered a new alienation. This amounts
to recognising tha t the ruling society has proved
capable of defending itself, on all levels of
reali ty, much be t ter than revolutionaries expected.
Not that it has become more tolerable. [71]
The recuperation of dissent and critique is the denial of the
possibility of change,
contradiction, and history.
can
relation
be
observed
in
to
the
Its effect
commodification
of
revolutionary discourse, a phenomenon epitomised in the meaning
of 'revolution' itself:
If the word "revolutionary" has been neutralised to
the point of being used in advertising to describe
the s ligh tes t change in an ever-changing commodi ty
produc tion, this is because the possibili ties of a
central desirable change are no longer expressed
anywhere.
[72 ]
The Si tuationists devoted themselves to the
'reinvention'
of
revolution and the development and promotion of the possibility
of such a desirable change in the totality of social relations.
In
argued
a
damning
that
they
critique
of
facilitate
reformist
the
politics,
recuperation
Vaneigem
of
the
308
revolutionary moments of the past and so undermine those of the
future.
The left fights for an increase of comfort within
alienation, skilfully furthering this impoverished
aim by invoking the barricades, the red flag and the
finest revolutionary moments of the past. In this way
once-radical impulses are doubly betrayed, twice
renounced: first they are ossified, then dug up and
used as a carrot. "Revolution" is doing pretty well
everywhere: worker-priests, priest-junkies, communist
generals, red potentates, trade unionists on the
board
of
directors. • • Radical
chic harmonises
perfectly with a society that can sell Watney's Red
Barrel beer under the slogan "The Red Revolution is
Coming". [73]
This was not merely a lament;
Vaneigem continued to explain
that such recuperations are not effected:
without risk for the system. The endless caricaturing
of the most deeply felt revolutionary desires can
produce a backlash in the shape of a resurgence of
feelings, purified in reaction to their universal
prostitution. There is no such thing as lost
allusions. [74]
The historical consciousness which constitutes the negation of
therefore encouraged, rather than prevented,
is
the spectacle
by such recuperations. These points were also made by Debord,
who
identified
control of
time,
the
spectacle
as
all-encompassing
in
its
social and discursive relations, and, at the same
insisted
that
it can never
exercise
the
definitive
closure of meaning.
The Situationists were not concerned to discover a realm
free of the distortions and domination of the spectacle, but
argued that capitalism produces its own negation.
the desires,
The class,
and the language which can negate the exis ting
structure of power are also promoted and encouraged by it: they
are the elements which are both necessary to its survival and
necessarily
the
means
of
its
destruction.
'Capitalist
309
civilisation has
continues
to
not
yet
been
superseded
produce
its
own
enemies
Situationists
anywhere,
but
it
everywhere. '[75]
The
considered that an effective critical
theory
must therefore recognise this duplicity wherever it arises.
Conceived as the inversion of reality,
the spectacle is
continually subject to the reemergence of this reality in, for
example, the poetic expressions of the avant-garde:
Detournement, which Lautreamont called plagiarism,
confirms the thesis, long demonstrated by modern art,
of the insubordination of words, of the impossibility
of power to totally recuperate created meanings, to
fix an existing meaning once and for all: in a word,
the objective impossibility of a "Newspeak". [76]
The
existence
of
political
contradicts
or
defies
testifies
to
the
critique
and
categorisation
continual
expression
which
within
the
spectacle
impossibility
of
defintive
recuperation and possibility of the d€tournement of language,
culture, and ultimately the totality of social relations.
If it created the meaning of words there would be no
poetry but only useful "information". Opposition
would not be able to express itself in language; any
refusal would be outside it, would be purely
lettristic. What is poetry if not the revolutionary
moment of language, inseparable as such from the
revolutionary moments of history and from the history
of personal life? [77]
The
detournement
spectacular
of
society
the
functional
effected
by
the
language
promoted
avant-garde
produces
by
a
poetic expression which prefigures the forms of communication
which might emerge in a society free from the constraints of
specialised discourse and commodity relations.
that
The
Situationist
it
is
undistorted
critique
impossible
by
the
to
pursued
construct
dominant
Dada's
a
relations:
understanding
critique
which
is
like
Dada,
it
310
acknowledged that we
'live within language as we live within
polluted air.'
In spite of what humorists think, words do not play.
Nor do they make love, as Breton thought, except in
dreams.
Words work,
on behalf of the dominant
organisation of lIte. And yet ••• they embody forces
that can upset the most careful calculations. Words
coexis t wi th power in a relationship analogous to
tha t which prole tarians have wi th power. Employed
almost constantly, exploited full time for every
sense and nonsense that can be squeezed out of them,
they still remain in some sense fundamentally strange
and foreign. [78]
The detournement
context.
of
language constitutes
The words remain the same;
its
use
in
another
but the perspective from
which they are used and the ends to which they are employed are
in direct contradiction to those of the spectacle.
if we are condemned to a diet of lies we must learn
to spike them with a drop of the old acid truth. This
is just how the agitator works: he invests his words
and signs so powerfully with living reality that all
the others are pulled out of place. He is subversive.
[79]
The
use
of
language
is,
of
course,
unavoidable
in
the
formulation of critique; an awareness of the way in which words
can
be
meanings
used
to
re ,C3ug:itate
in
spi te
of
their
their
historical
role
in
the
and
subjective
valid a tion
of
the
spectacle and commodity relations, is therefore essential:
it
can produce a critique which not only subverts spectacular and
reified discourse but also exposes the use - or recuperation of
language
this
way.
people
in
a
mediations of language,
is
itself a
occurs
which
in
between
has
been
Poetic
recuperated
perpetuation of the spectacle.
communication,
transcendence
and
which
the
reified
detournement of
language
used
to
of
that
the
end
of
the
311
Fundamental to the Situationist analysis of recuperation
is the possibility of its evasion: the ability of capitalism to
recupera te even
the mos t
radical cri tique
is not
inevi table.
Considering the evasion of recuperation to be essential
to the
accomplishment of the revolutionary critique, the Situationists
advocated
the
critique
of
all
discourse
in
terms
of
its
awareness of the mechanisms of recuperation and its ability to
counteract them. In 'Basic Banalities', Vaneigem wrote:
the spontaneous acts we can see everywhere forming
against power and its spectacle must be warned of all
the obstacles in their path and must find a tactic
taking into account the strength of the enemy and its
means of recuperation.
This tactic, which we are
going to popularise, is detournement[80]
For
the
Situationists,
capitalism
survives
because
ability to ensure that the critique of the totality
of
its
'gradually
degenerates into reformist opposition. Fragmentary oppositions
are like the teeth on cogwheels, they mesh with each other and
make the machine go round,
the machine of the spectacle,
the
machine of power.'[81]
If recuperation
which
is
criticised,
is the appropriation of critique by that
detournement
is
the
appropriation
of
spectacular life and discourse to the end of the negation of
the
spectacle.
As
such,
the
notion
recognises
that
all
discourse must arise within the spectacle and be constituted by
it whilst at the same time suggesting that it can be reclaimed
to constitute the development of historical consciousness.
Even when it is co-opted and turned against itself,
r.0etry always gets wha t i t wants in the end. The
'Proletarians of all lands, unite" which produced the
Stalinist State will one day realise the classless
society. No poetic sign is ever completely turned by
ideology. [82]
312
The Situationists saw the denial of historical
consciousness
to be the purpose of the
recuperation not only of the avant-
garde, but all forms of
critical theory and political action
which expose the reali ty of his torical change.
that
any
critique which
does
bear
an
of
the
from
the
commodification
and
critique
is
itself
to
ensues
recuperation
that
alienation of
dissent
and
not
They argued
recuperation. Ultimately, the consequence of
analysis
vulnerable
this recuperation
is that the critique which intends to oppose the totality is
integra ted
wi thin
The
it.
cri tique
is
no
longer
the
contradiction, but the affirmation of the alienated relations
that constitute the spectacle.
The Si tua tionis ts
considered
themselves
nei ther
nor political theorists but critics of the totality:
artis ts
'the last
of the professions'. [83]
The role of the Situationist, the amateur-expert, the
anti-specialist, will remain a form of specialisation
until the moment of economic and mental abundance
when everyone will become an 'artist' in a sense
which artis ts have never before achieved - in the
sense that everyone will construct his own life. [84]
As has been observed in relation to the avant-garde movements
considered above, such a
critique necessitated the conscious
development of the tactics of
In
agreement
the
and
case
of
active
the
practice and organisation.
Situationist
participation
paramount, and resulted in
of
International,
the
its
were
members
a dogmatic and rigorous movement,
characterised throughout its history by a series of exclusions
and disputes. At times, Debord even assumed a Breton-like role
within the movement. Nevertheless, the Situationists were most
concerned to avoid the role of the heroic revolutionary, who
313
assumes the status of a spectator and a spectacle: expressed in
the consumption of
ma terial commodi ties
-
badges,
clothes,
attitudes and activities - the revolutionary is promoted as a
mys tified and glamorous
adopted
and
commodity.
a
role,
lifestyle
to
a spectacle,
an image
to be
be
like
other
consumed
any
The recuperation of effective revolutionary action
in this way renders
revolutionaries further examples of the
freedoms and variety of capitalist society and so renders them
the elements of its reproduction rather than its negation.
In a damning account of the pseudo-revolutionary who is
the victim and the product of this process of integration, the
Ken Knabb wrote:
'He wants to apprecia te the radical acts of
others aesthetically, as better spectacles than are ordinarily
available ••• In this sense, he is not even the spectactor of
the revolution, but only of its recuperation.' [85]
He doesn't discover, he is informed - which books are
essential, which rebellions were the most radical,
which people are ideologues, what the proper reasons
for a break are... Everywhere he turns, someone's
been there before him ••• when he comes upon a terrain
where he has not been preceded he supposes that it
can only have been because it wasn t "important
enough" - as if there weren't millions of subversive
projects worth doing, most of which haven't even been
conceived of yet. [86]
The
Si tua tionis ts were conscious
weapons of the old world,
tha t
'one of
the
classic
perhaps the one most used against
groups delving into the organisation of life, is to single out
and isolate a few of their participants as "s tars'" [87]. They
considered the role of the star or celebrity to be that of the
'agent of the spectacle' who is made to represent a particular
lifestyle and is
'the opposi te of
wished to avoid the
the individual',
and they
spectacularised and glamorous role of the
314
revolutionary.
In
'Instructions
for
Taking
Up
Arms',
the
movement declared that in its engagement in the 'reappearance
of revolution ••• the SI does not want to recruit disciples or
partisans,
but to bring together people capable of applying
themselves to this task in the years to come, by every means
and without worrying about labels.' [88]
As their name indicates, the group, like the avant-garde
before
was
them,
international and broad
further indication of their heritage is
in
its
scope.
A
in their insistence
that their analyses were not the unique creations of an elite
but the expression of a reality continually glimpsed in the
experience of the everyday. 'Our ideas', they declared, 'are in
everybody's heads.' [89]
What prevents what we say on the construction of
everyday life from being recuperated by the cultural
es tablishment. •• is the f ac t tha t a l l si tua tionis t
ideas are nothing other than faithful developments of
acts attempted constantly by thousands of people to
try and prevent another day from being no more than
twenty-four hours of wasted time. [90]
Again it is clear that it is the conviction that the critique
and supersession of
capitalism are inherent in the experience
of its alienation which provides the Situationists with their
critical base.
Countries',
the
'Conspiracy
of
In 'The Countersituationist Campaign in Various
Situationists
Equals,
a
defined
general
staff
the
movement
as
that
does
want
not
troops.' [91]
It is a matter of finding, of opening up, the
"Northwest Passage" toward a new revolution that must
surge over that central terrain which until now has
been
shel tered from revolutionary upheavals: the
conquest of everyday life. We will only organise the
detonation: the free explosion must escape us and any
other control forever. 192]
a
315
The
Situationists
attempted
to
poli tical or artis tic movement;
star-commodity
themselves
of
spectacular
evade
categorisation
recognising cuI ture as
society'
[93],
they
as
a
' the
committed
to the elaboration of a critique which would defy
attempts to integrate and define it.
In
this
the movement met wi th some success.
style of
writing, the
Situationists
sometimes
unnecessarily
complicated.
In
their
were often wilfully and
Confident
that
their
analyses were of lasting significance and would always reach
those who sought to negate the totality of capitalism, however,
they refused to clarify or define their work in the terms of
es tablished categories and theoretisa tions and,
as a resul t,
were largely ignored by mainstream intellectual and theoretical
discourse.
In the 1979 Preface to the Fourth Italian Edition
of ' The Society of the
Spectacle~
Debord wrote: 'I believe that
there is nobody in the world capable of being interested in my
book apart from those who are enemies of the existing social
order and who act efficaciously starting from this point.' [94]
Of all those who have quoted this book in order to
acknowledge some importance in it, I have not seen
one up till now who took the risk to say, even
briefly, what it was about ••• On the other hand, to
my knowledge it is in the factories of Italy that
this book has found for the moment its best readers.
The workers of Italy, who can be held up as an
example to their comrades in all countries for their
absenteeism,
their
wildcat
strikes
which
no
particular concession can manage to appease, their
lucid refusal of work and their contempt for the law
and all statist parties, know the subject well enough
by practice to have been able to benefi t from the
theses of The Society of the Spectacle. [95]
To this day there are few serious discussions or elaborations
of the movement's
analyses.
Interest has been encouraged by
the 1989 exhibitions of their art at the Museum of Modern Art
316
in Paris, and the Institute for Contemporary Art in
London; a
television programme on the Situationists and the publication
of Peter Wollen's 'The Situationist International' in New Left
Review
[96]
have
appeared
fluctuating fortunes, the
subtle
but
profound
as
a
result.
of
these
Situationists continue to exercise a
influence
revolutionary discourse;
Regardless
on
both
affirmative
and
this constitutes the central theme of
subsequent discussion.
Al though
they
recognised
tha t
proceed
on
the
basis
of
a
mass
organisation,
Situationists
did
not
pretend
to
be
its
nascent
only
claimed no
special
a
social revolu tion could
the
form.
theoretical superiority and merely
They
stated
that they were articulating an everyday resistance that would
be
recognisable
and
familiar
to
those
who
experienced
and
exercised it but which otherwise received no expression.
We don't claim to be developing a new revolutionary
programme all
by ourselves.
We
say
that
this
programme in the process of formulation will one day
practically contest the ruling reality, and that we
will participate in that contestation. L97]
Entangled by
internal
squabbles
and
theoretical differences,
the Situationist International was dissolved in 1971, and the
last issue of its journal appeared in 1969.
By this time, the
Situationists had already witnessed and participated in events
which seemed to vindicate their confidence in their analyses.
The
movement's
work
was
amongst
the
most
coherent
and
inspiring of those analyses which influenced and developed in
the
events
events
in
France
in
May
1968;
in
did indeed manifest themselves
many
respects,
these
as the realisation of
the preceding decade of Situationist theory.
317
THE CRISIS IN FRANCE
The
so-called
inciden t
but
'May
events'
part
of
in France were not
a wave
of
revo lu tionary
spread across East and West Europe,
an
isolated
action which
extended to South-East
Asia and the United States in the 1960s,
and can be traced
throughout
decades.
the
preceding
and
subsequent
Both
the
French events and the wider context in which they arose have
been considered in numerous texts, and there is no intention
here
to
rival
either
treatments. [98J
the
breadth
or
consistency
of
these
Although confined to the consideration of the
influence of the Situationists on the events in France, this
discussion
does
not
maintain
that
material
events
are
determined by particular" bodies of thought. It is concerned to
reveal the ex ten t
expressed
the
criticism
at
to which the Si tua tionis ts apprecia ted and
possibilities,
this
influence on the
time,
problems,
and
so
and
exercised
conditions
a
of
significant
critical climate in which the French events
developed.
The 1966 Strasbourg scandal
In November 1966, a group of radical
students dedicated to the
destruction of the union were elected to the Strasbourg section
of
the
UNEF
poli tical
(French
Student
Union)
without
any
specific
programme and mainly, it appears, on the basis of
the apathy of their electorate.
They
collaborated with the
Situationists on the publication of a pamphlet called On the
318
Poverty
of
Student
Life,
considered
in
its
economic,
psychological, sexual, and particularly intellectual aspects,
and a modest proposal for its remedy, funded by the UNEF and
described
in
a
local
manifes ta tion
of
a
newspaper
revol t
as
aiming
'the
first
concrete
qui te
openly
at
the
destruction of society.' [99]
On the Poverty of Student Life ••• was an exposition of the
Situationist
critique of capitalism, framed in the context of
a devastating attack on the role of the
student and cleverly
designed to provoke an extreme response in terms of both its
contents and the form in which it was produced.
declared
that
demands
capitalism
the
'mass
The pamphlet
production
of
students who are not educated and have been rendered incapable
of thinking.' [100]
The real poverty of his everyday life finds its
immedia te, phantas tic compensa tion in the opium of
cultural commodities. In the cultural spectacle he is
allotted his habitual role of the dutiful disciple.
Although he is close to the production-point, access
to the Sanctuary of Thought is forbidden, and he is
obliged to discover "modern culture" as an admiring
spectator.
Art
is
dead,
but
the
student
is
necrophiliac ••• a conspicuous consumer, complete with
induced irrational preference for Brand X (Camus, for
example), and irrational prejudice against Brand Y
(Sartre, perhaps). [101]
This critique was extended to a critique of the youth revolts
of the pos t-war period,
without a cause,
including the nihilism of the rebel
and more political manifestations such as
the British Committee of 100, the Dutch Provos, and traditional
Leftist vanguard groupings.
A small section of youth is able to refuse that
society and its products, but without any idea that
this society can be superseded. They opt for the
nihilist present. Yet the destruction of capitalism
is once again a real issue ••• [102]
319
To the specifically student orientated movements, the pamphlet
declares:
'They
must
understand
one
thing:
there
are
no
"special" student interests in revolution. Revolution will be
made by
all
the victims
of
encroaching
tyranny of the market.' [103]
repression
and
the
The particular situation of the
student is identified as a role produced and defined by the
spectacle;
only
in
students are not significant in themselves,
but
far
the
so
as
they
provide
a
clear
example
of
spectacularisation of life in terms of roles and preconditioned
patterns
of
behaviour.
The
position
of
the
student
is
interesting only in so far as it is supposedly one of knowledge
and
critical
self-awareness;
qualities
which
the
pamphlet
ridiculed.
In post-war Europe, the text asserted, 'Capital was able
to strike a new bargain with labour: in return for the mass
production of a new class of manipulable consumers, the worker
was
offered
a
role
which
gave
spectacular society ••••
[104]
included
the
in
this
role:
him
full
membership
Rebellion
student
is
of
the
and dissent
are
expected,
even
encouraged,
to revolt. This is not to the detriment, but the
affirmation
of
capitalism:
'In
the
spectacle,
a
revolution
becomes a social aberration - in other words a social safety
valve - which has its part to play in the smooth working of the
system.' [105]
the society of the spectacle paints its own picture
of
itself
and
its
enemies,
imposes
its
own
ideological categories on the world and its history ••
Real historical changes, which show that this society
can be superseded, are reduced to the status of
novelties, processed for mere consumption. [106]
320
On the Poverty of Student Life •••
was a bold statement of the
Situationist analysis of the recuperation of critique, which
nevertheless maintained the possibility - even the imminence of the supersession of the recuperative system.
The pamphlet's launch was itself intended to illustrate
the latter.
In an account of their tactics in collaborating
with the Strasbourg students, the Situationists explained
that
they stressed that the students':
legal access to money and credit was the most useful
aspect of the ridiculous authority that had so
imprudently been allowed to them, and that a
nonconformist use of these resources would certainly
have the advantage of shocking many people and this
drawing attention to the nonconformist aspects of the
content of their text. [107]
The
launch
of
the
pamphlet was
prefigured by
a
number
of
disruptions, including the display of a comic strip, The Return
of the Durruti Column, which made it clear that the electorate
had 'placed their hopes for a new lease on life in a group that
didn't
hide
its
intentions
of
militantism once and for all' [108];
scuttling
this
archaic
the pamphlet was finally
distributed at the university's official opening ceremony, when
the
Strasbourg
student
union
called
discuss its own immediate dissolution.
related,
a
general
assembly
to
As the Situationists
'This perspective immediately horrified many people',
among them the judge at the ensuing court case brought by the
university authorities to prove the illegality of the Union's
activities.
The judge's
summation provides an illuminating account of
the pamphlet's contents. 'The accused', he stated, 'have never
denied the charge of misusing the funds of the student union.
321
Indeed,
£500
they openly admi t
[sic]
for
the
to having made the union pay some
printing
and
distribution
of
10,000
pamphlets, not to mention the cost of other literature inspired
by the Internationale Situationniste'.
He continued:
These publications express ideas and aspirations
which, to put it mildly, have nothing to do with the
aims of a student union. One has only to read what
the accused have wri t ten, for it is obvious tha t
these five students, scarcely more than adolescents,
lacking all experience of real life, their minds
confused by
i ll-diges ted phi losophical,
social,
political and economic theories, and perplexed by the
drab monotony of their everyday life, make the empty,
arrogant, and pathetic claim to pass definitive
judgements, sinking to outright abuse, on their
fellow-students, their teachers, God, religion, the
clergy, the governments and political systems of the
whole world. Rej ecting all morali ty and restraint.
these cynics do not hesi ta te to commend theft, the
destruction of scholarship, the abolition of work,
total subversion
and a world-wide proletarian
revolution with 'unlicensed pleasure' as its only
goal. In view of their basically anarchist character,
these theories and proaganda are eminently noxious.
Their wide diffusion in both student circles and
among the general public, by the local, national and
foreign press, are a threat to the morali ty, the
studies, the reputation and thus the very future of
the students of the University of Strasbourg. [109]
The
scandal gave
some notoriety
nevertheless
tried
'leaders'
the Strasbourg
of
to
distance
to
the
Si tua tionis ts,
themselves
students
from
the
imposed by
who
role
the
of
media,
writing later that they
'had to defend themselves from being
recupera ted
i tern"
as
a
"news
anyone can well imagine,
or
an
in tellec tual
fad...
as
the pi tiful student milieu is of no
interest to us.' [110]
The media's response to the Strasbourg scandal was mixed:
the
Italian
imagine'
Gazetta
this
last
del
Popolo,
point,
evidently
reported
that
unable
'the
to
'well
Situationist
Interna tional, galvanised by the triumph of its adherents in
322
Strasbourg, is preparing to launch a major offensive to take
control
of
the
student
organisations.'
however,
related the Situationists'
[111]
Le
Monde,
'messianic confidence in
the revolutionary capacity of the masses and in their aptitude
for freedom'
[112] wi th some amusement.
It is true that the
Situationists did express a boundless faith in the impending
'revolutionary celebration', as the closing passages of On the
Poverty of Student Life •••
reveal:
To transform the world and to change the structure of
life
are
one
and
the
same
thing
for
the
prole taria t. •• As its maximum programme it has the
radical critique and free reconstruction of all the
values and patterns of
behaviour imposed by an
alienated reality. The only creativity it can
acknowledge is the creativity released in the making
of his tory, the free invention of each moment and
each event: Lautreamont's poesie faite par tous - the
beginning of the revolutionary celebrafion. For the
proletarian revolt is a festival or it is nothing; in
revolution the road of excess leads once and for all
to the palace of wisdom. A palace which knows only
one rationality: the &ame. The rules are simple: to
live instead of devisl.ng a lingering death, and to
indulge untrammelled desire. [113]
The populari ty of the pamphle t - quickly reproduced and
translated
into
more
than
ten
languages
unprecedented
discussion
of
Situationist
resurgence
awareness
of
the
of
informed them,
encouraged
analyses,
avant-garde
and
heritage
the
a
which
developments which were hastened by the 1967
publication of Vaneigem's The Revolution of Everyday Life and
Debord's Society of the Spectacle. The student agitations begun
at
Strasbourg
Nantes,
and
continued
throughout
Nanterre
were
1967:
involved
in
students
at
Lyon,
disruptions
and
occupa tions culminating in the forma tion of the Si tua tionis t
inspired Enrag~s in January 1968 and the heterogeneous 'March
323
22nd
Movement',
of
which
Daniel
Cohn-Bendit
was
a
leading
member, at Nanterre.
These developments culminated in the events of May 1968
which,
regardless
of
'student revolt',
their
repeated
characterisation
constituted a serious political,
as
a
economic,
and social crisis involving a sustained - and wildcat - general
strike,
the
near
collapse
of
the
Gaullist
regime,
and
the
practical
critique of every aspect of capitalist life in terms
prefigured
by
On
the
Poverty
of
Student Life...
and
other
Situationist texts.
This crisis appeared to come from out of the proverbial
blue: in 1967, Lefebvre -
not, it will be recalled, unfamiliar
with the Situationist critique - declared:
The situationists ••• propose not a concrete utopia,
but an abstract one. Do they really imagine that one
fine day or one decisive evening people will look at
each 0 ther and say, "Enough! We're fed up wi th work
and boredom! Let's put an end to them!" and that they
will then proceeed to the eternal Festival and the
creation of situations? [114]
Remembering
the
Paris
Commune,
Lefebvre
continued with
the
assertion that although such a situation 'happened once, at the
dawn of 18 March 1871, this combination of circumstances will
not occur again.'[llS]
Six months later, of course, Lefebvre's
declara tion was revealed to be
in flagrant contradiction to
the reality of the political situation.
If his
statement has
a particular irony, however, he was not alone in failing
predict the development of a revolutionary situation.
1988
commemoration
example,
expressed
workers'
revolts
of
the
the view
in
France
events,
tha t
in
to
In its
Socialist
Worker,
for
'few people
expected
mass
the
saw
1968.
Many
on
left
324
disruption
coming
from
the
students
or
other
disgruntled
minorities, but not from workers.' [116]
In a supersession of the dilemmas of criticism encountered
by the avant-garde, and a rejection of the view that a passing
prosperity removed the working class, a 1962 Situationist text
had declared:
Up to now su~v~ng has prevented us from living. This
is why much is to be expected of the increasingly
evident impossibility of survival, an impossibility
which will become all the more obvious as the glut of
conveniences and elements of survival reduces life to
a single choice: suicide or revolution. [117]
It is clear that the Situationists did foresee the form of the
crisis which emerged in 1968. This was not merely the position
asserted by the group:
'When one reads or
in 1971, Le Nouve1 Observateur wrote:
rereads the Interna tiona1e Si tua tionnis te
issues it is quite striking to what degree and how often these
fanatics have made judgements or put forward viewpoints that
were later concretely verified.' [118]
In November 1971, the
paper stated that 'The Society of the Spectacle ••• has led the
discussion of the entire u1tra1eft since its publication in
1967. This work, which predicted May 1968,
is considered by
many to be the Capital of the new generation.' [119]
The Situationists resisted the adoption of a 'we told you
so' at ti tude and, in their 1969 article 'The Beginning of an
Era',
stated:
pointed
out
Si tua tionis ts,
'we
had
prophesiea
what
was
already
in wha t
nothing.
present.'[120]
We
had
simply
Indeed,
could have been interpreted as
the
their
moment of triumph, refused all attempts to characterise them as
responsible, victorious, or prophetic,
and instead insisted:
What thus came to the light of consciousness in the
spring of 1968 was nothing other than what had been
325
sleeping in the night of "spectacular society", whose
spectacles showed nothing but an eternal posi tive
facade.[121]
For the Situationists,
this positive facade had always been
contingent
and
fragile,
appearance
of
stability
and
ahistoricism
to
attempts
to
expose
its
historicity
and
Nevertheless,
resting
on
the
ability
of
the
withstand
all
mutability.
for many commentators and analysts in 1968 and
subsequent to the crisis, the events were a complete surprise.
Sherry Turkle spoke for many when she commented:
In terms of traditional economic and political
analysis, the events were impensable, "unthinkable";
they should no t have happened... In the two years
after the events, over a thousand books appeared in
France which "made sense" of them.[122]
Many of these
analyses phrased their explanations in terms of
psychoanalytic,
rebellions,
were
cultural
ideological,
but for the Si tua tionis ts,
diversions
from
the
reality
of
and
individualist
all such explanations
a
vital
economic
and
political crisis which was unthinkable only for those who had
accepted
the
'positive
offered
fayade'
them
by
modern
capitalism.
This
fac;.ade had,
industrial
strikes
and
moreover,
been marked by a
repressive
policing
series
of
which makes
the
surprise common to both the left and the authorities even less
justifiable.
remarkable
Although
because
impoverishment
and
the
events
of
the
the
affluence,
of
apparent
or
1968
are
considered
absence
of
even
end,
the
material
of
the
working class (analyses already condemned by the Situationist
affirmation of the overwhelming presence of poverty throughout
all aspects of everyday life),
French workers were in fact
326
enj oying
the
lowes t
wages and
the highes t
taxes
in Wes tern
French
political
Europe [123].
Further,
as
Harman
pointed
out,
system was unique in its authoritarian
the
concentration of power
in the hands of de Gaulle and the absence of consultation over
the implementation of policy,
so tha t for many years,
there
was:
only one way to cope with popular discontent in the
absence of mediating structures which could persuade
people to abandon their struggles. This was to resort
to force very quickly indeed. Whereas in Bri tain,
West Germany or Scandinavia, the use of the police as
rarely a central feature of industrial disputes in
the 1960s, in France they played a central role in
guaranteeing that alienation from existing society
did not find an expression in successful trade union
action. [124]
In January 1968, for example, strikers in Caen were engaged in
running battles with the CRS (the French riot police) after the
injury of ten workers on a demonstration itself organised to
protest
against
the
heavy
police
presence.
The
student
agitations in the period immediately preceding the 1968 crisis
and in May and June of that year were met with similar force,
but, in contrast to the years of strikes and protests by the
workers, the government's tactics against the students spawned
an
unprecedented
response
on
which
the
Situationist analyses cannot be overemphasised.
impact
of
the
327
Under the cobblestones
Of
particular releva nce
to
the
questions
of
critique
and
recuperation considered throughout this text was the response
made
to
the
events
organisations; the
by
the
PCF
and
the
large
union
strikes and protests were effected against
the advice and orders of these bodies and therefore developed
as a critique not only of the established order but also these
legal and traditional vehicles of dissent. At the beginning of
May, large demonstrations in Paris were met with the violence
of the CRS: one report stated there
w ere over 600 arrests on
May 3rd [125]; another tells of 400 arrests and 800 injuries on
the demonstrations of May 6th. [126]
These events culmina ted in the police occupation of the
university dominated Latin Quarter and the celebrated 'Night of
the Barricades' the following weekend; a general strike, called
for 13th May,
brought
the country
to a
standstill and was
perpetuated through a series of wildcat strikes and occupations
which resulted in some three weeks of action by over 10 million
workers.
On
May
19th,
revolution ••• It
is
a
total
the
Observer
onslaught
on
wrote:
modern
'This
is
industrial
society. '
In a staggering end to a staggering week, the
commanding heights of the French economy are falling
to the workers. All over France a calm, obedient,
irrestistible
wave
of
working-class
power
is
engulfing
factories,
dockyards,
mines,
railway
depots, bus garages, postal sorting offices. Trains,
mails, air-flights are virtually at a stands till.
Production lines in chemicals, steel, metalworking,
textiles, shipbuilding and a score of industries have
ground to a halt ••• Many a baffled and impotent
manager is being held prisoner in his own carpeted
office.
328
The following week found the paper in more reflective mood:
The great upheaval through which France is passing is
more than a crisis of government or even of regime:
it is above all a crisis of the State. And not simply
of the French State but of the State as it has been
conceived in the Western industrial world and its
offshoots since the eighteenth century. [127]
If
the
British media
obvious
that
concerned.
in
took
France
the
events
so
seriously,
the
au thori ties
were
it
is
extremely
For a number of weeks, the army remained the only
loyal body in France but, as a conscripted force, it too was
subject to the influence of the revolutionary movement.
As a consequence, de Gaulle met with those generals based
in
West
Germany
on
'considerable
transfers
German border.'
[128]
May
29th,
and
the
of
troops
around
Times
Paris
and
on
the
Neverthless, 'Don't shoot' leaflets had
already been circulated in army barracks
[129],
Times
those
correspondent
reported
observed
of
even
and as
troops
the
based
outside France:
it is appreciated that they could only be used once,
and that only for a short while, before the largely
conscript army was exposed to a psychological
battering in a general campaign of subversion which
it would probably not withstand. [130]
Both the size and the form of the revolutionary movement meant
that it constituted a serious threat. Describing the students
and
activists
as
'guerrillas',
the
Observer
correspondent
wrote:
With bewildering speed, these political guerillas
have been hurtled into politics by an anonymous surge
of s tuden t unres t. By taking to the s tree ts, they
have set themselves against every organised political
force in France. Both Government and Opposition last
week tried desperately to contain them. Both failed.
[131]
329
The
student
factories,
occupations
first
in
spread within
the
Paris
area,
a
matter of
and
then
days
to
across
the
country. The occupation of the Nantes Sud Aviation factory of
May 14th was followed by that of the
Renault car factories at
Cleon
and
Flins;
by
much of
this
May
20th
the
whole
country
period,
the
PCF,
mainly
was
at
a
standstill.
For
through
its
journal L'humanite which, with the exception of May 15th when
strike action prevented even this paper from appearing,
had
Scorned the revolt and warned urgently against 'provocateurs',
Cons tan tly urging
the workers to return to work or confine
their
economic
demands
to
or
organisational
issues.
But
pamphlets produced in the occupied factories, as well as the
solidity
of
the
strike,
show
that
these
unheaded: an Air France leaflet declared:
warnings
went
'Like the students,
we must take the control of our affairs into our own hands'
[132], and a document from the Rhone-Poulenc workers asserted:
The action of the students has shown us that only
rank and file action could compel the authroities to
retrea t. •• the students are challenging the whole
purpose of bourgeois education. They want to take the
fundamental decisions themselves. So should we. [133]
Gestures from previous revolutionary situations were repeated:
in a tribute to the Kronstadt revolt,
the crew of the liner
France took control of the ship in Le Havre, and the barricades
which dominated the events were in part a recollection of the
tactics employed during the Paris Commune of 1871.
It was, however, the breadth of the dissent which was the
hallmark
of
the
movement
and
its
strength:
art
students
practised and demanded new forms of art; music students called
330
for 'wild and ephemeral music' [134];
out
managers
with
the
slogan:
football players kicked
'Football
to
the
football
players'; gravediggers occupied cemeteries; doctors, nurses and
the interns at a psychiatric hospital organised in solidarity
with the inmates.
The national radio and television networks
were gripped by strike action that lasted well into July 1968
as a result of government restrictions on the reporting of the
street battles of May. The Odeon theatre was occupied and, like
the Sorbonne, which was
by
the
students
extraordinary
universi ty ,
in
tha t
rather
on
evacuated by the police and taken over
May
variety
13th,
of
served
discussion
as
a
forum
and
debate.
for
an
In
the
'Young workers who "wouldn't have been seen dead
place" a month ago now walked in groups,
self-consciously,
later as
if
they
owned
at
firs t
the
place,
which of course they did.' [135]
A tremendous surge of community and cohesion gripped
those who had previously seen themselves as isolated
and impotent puppets, dominated by institutions that
they could neither control nor understand ( ••• ) The
yard
of
the
Sorbonne had
become a
gigantic
revolutionary drug-store, in which the most esoteric
products no longer had to be kept beneath the counter
but could now be prominently displayed. Old issues of
journals, yellowed by the years, were unearthed and
often sold as well as more recent material. [136]
The
huge
demonstrations
diversity of
those
of
May
involved
13th
said to
were
marked
by
involve more
the
than a
million people.
In spite of PCF attempts to keep the various
sections
demonstration
10,000
of
PCF
the
stewards
were
separate,
employed,
the
to
which
sheer
end
size
of
some
the
protest made the common cause of its participants undeniable.
Endlessly they filed past. There were whole sections
of hospital personnel, in white coats, some carryin*
posters saying "ou sont les disparus des hopitaux?
(where are the missing injured? [from the night
before]). Every factory, every major workplace seemed
331
to be represented. There were numero ous groups of
railwaymen, postmen, printers, Metro personnel, metal
workers, market men, electricians, lawyers, sewermen,
bank employees, building workers, glass and chemical
workers, waiters, municipal employees, painters and
decorators,
gas workers, shop girls, insurance
clerks, road sweepers, film studio operators, busmen,
teachers, workers from the new plas tic indus tries,
row upon row upon row of them, the flesh and blood of
modern capitalist society, an unending mass, a power
tha t could sweeep everything before it, if it but
decided to do so. [137]
PCF
attempts
to
disperse
the
march
met
with
an
hostility
exacerbated by an incident in which two policemen were trapped
and nearly lynched by the crowd before opening fire and being
rescued by PCF stewards.
It was, of course, a time of extreme optimism. Although
the PCF repeatedly ins is ted tha t
revolution,
the
predominant
the time was no t
feeling
was
ripe for
epitomised
by
a
participant in the events who wrote:
A whole new epoch has just come to an end: the epoch
during which people couldn't say, with a semblance of
verisimilitude, that "it couldn't happen here".
Another epoch is starting: that in which people know
that revolution is possible under the conditions-oI
modern bureaucratic capitalism. [138]
While the possibility may have been reawoken by the events of
1968, the ultimate reality of revolution was not: de Gaulle's
negotiations with the communist unions - who had long lost the
mandate of the workers - resulted in a large pay increase and
the gradual return to work. Although this return was violently
imposed by the CRS at a number of factories (Peugeot workers,
for example,
resisted the return and
battles with
the police
address
to
the
nation
in mid-June),
on
May
30th
were engaged in running
de Gaulle' s
led
to
huge
powerful
counter-
332
demons tra tions,
the res tora tion of order, and the end of the
revolutionary moment.
Nevertheless,
deflated by
even
the
this development:
British
at
press
refused
to
be
the beginning of June,
an
article in the Observer declared:
De Gaulle's threat of force, the hint of troops, his
shady long-arm men emerging into the daylight to
defend his shaken regime, cannot kill the sheer joy
liberated by the May revolution. Paris is filthy,
strewn with garbage and political tracts, but the
feeling is as gaily libertine as on a wartime
holiday. [139]
Little reference to the Situationists was made in the British
media.
Nevertheless, the influence of the group was clear in
both the analyses and cri tiques of capi talis t
were
developed,
and
the
tactical
manoeuvres
society which
particularly
those involving occupations and the establishment of council
systems
of
self-government
- with which they were put
into
practice.
The Situationists' view of the events is largely contained
in The Enrages and the Situationists in the Occupation Movement
- France, May-June 1968, in which Rene Vienet wrote:
in the space of a week, millions of people had broken
with the weight of alienating conditions, the routine
of survival,
ideological falsification and
the
inverted world of the spectacle ••• The festival
finally gave real holidays to people who had only
known working days and leaves of absence. The
hierarchical pyramid had melted like a lump of sugar
in the May sun ••• The streets belonged to those who
were digging them up. [140]
'Everyday life', he continued,
'suddenly rediscovered, became
the centre of all possible conquests.
People who had
their whole lives in
offices declared that they
longer
way
live
in
the
they
had
before.'
lived
could no
[141]
This
333
perspective was shared by the British papers: in the Observer,
an article of June 2nd concluded:
'As petrol dries up, people
rediscover their legs. Everybody turns hitch-hiker. The spring
air is intoxicating. "Salut camarade!"'; the previous week, the
paper had identified the object of the revolutionary critique
as:
the society organised for efficiency at the expense
of liberty, the system which "offers the people
consumer goods and calls them freedom."
It is the
system which adapts
education...
to
the mass
production of docile technocrats. It is the po.rty
s~em posing as true democracy, repression masked as
tolerance. L142J
Vienet reported that the Situationist analyses of the previous
decade were borne out in the events of 1968. 'Capitalised time
stopped', he wrote:
Without any trains, tubes, cars or work the strikers
recaptured the time so sadly los t in f ac tories, on
motorways and in front of the t.v. People strolled,
dreamed, learned how to live. Desires began to
become, little by little, reality. [143J
There was indeed a great deal of talk about desire, liberation,
creativity and realisation in 1968, a vocabulary
in which the
Situationist influence is again apparent. Moreover the events
of 1968 are often described as
'surrealism in the
[144J,
to both the
a
notion which
Situationists
and
testifies
the
durability
and
impact of
relevance
Surrealist tradition from which they emerged.
streets'
of
the
the
The Surreal is t
antipathy to work, hierarchy and bureaucracy, its emphasis on
creativity and the realisation of desires, its attitude to the
city
environment
developed
by
the
and
its
tactics
Situationists
involved in the May events.
of
and
subversion,
practised
by
were
all
all
those
334
Suicide, silence - or revolution
The realisation of art and the overcoming of the separation of
art and life was a constant theme of the events. Without the
transport sys tern or the urgency to ge t
anywhere,
the derive
became an aspect of everyday life; without the usual saturation
of mass media, people talked as never before: Alain Jouffroy
recalled the 'great joy that we experienced for the first time
in the streets of Paris during May 1968, that joy in the eyes
and on
the
lips of all
those who
for
the
first
time were
talking to each other ••• ' [145] Vienet wrote that the general
strike:
as the essential phase of a movement that was hardly
unaware of its insurrectionary character, reminded
everyone of the primordial banality that alienated
work produces alienation. The right to idleness was
affirmed not only in popular slogans like "Never
Work"
or
"Live
Without
Dead
Time,
Indulge
Untrammelled Desire",
but
particularly
in
the
unleashing of playful activity. Fourier had already
remarked how it took workers several hours to put up
a barricade that rioters could erect in a few
minutes.
The
disappearance
of
forced
labour
necessarily
coincided
with
the
free
flow
of
crea ti vi ty in every sphere:
slogans,
langauge,
behavi .our,
tactics,
street-fighting
techniques,
agitation, songs and comic strips. Everyone was thus
able to measure the amount of creative energy that
had been crushed during the time of survival, the
days condemned to output, shopping, television, and
to passivity erected as a principle . [146]
This was indeed a critique of the totality of lived experience:
even
the
Political
traditional
expressions
of
activity,
parties
unions,
and
dissent
and
were
organised
subject
to
critique.
The predominant means of organisation was instead centred
on the workers council,
a form which emerged in all of the
335
factory and university occupations as the supersession of the
bureaucracy,
hierarchy,
revolutionary party.
and
centralism
Vienet wrote:
of
even
the
'A manifestly Councillist
attitude' prevailed and, as the Observer noted, this challenge
to organisational methods was perhaps the most alarming aspect
of the revolution.
Neal Ascherson, writing in the edi tion of
May 19th, quoted Hannah Arendt in support of his assertion that
the 'revolutionaries dream of a republic of workers' councils,
a self-governing society ••• in which the "new human being" will
emerge'. For Arendt:
Whenever such councils appear, the entire party
bureaucracy from extreme Left to extreme Right treats
them with the utmost hostility ••• but even more
typical is the strangely persistQnt way in which the
people proposes them when it actually gets round to
raising its voice. [147]
Two weeks later, the paper reported:
the embattled strikers ••• raised the cry for a
'government of the people.' It was horribly clear
that the spark of revolution, struck by the student
extremists, had found tinder on the shop floor./
Suddenly, revolution seemed everywhere in the air,
feared or hoped for. [148]
The Dadaist, and Surrealist struggles for autonomy and distance
from
the
official
bastions
of
the
French
left,
and
Situationists' consistent advocacy of council communism
the
were
thus legitimised in the critiques effected by the strikers of
1968.
This antipathy
identification
to traditional forms of organisation and
was also clear in the anonymity of the revolt.
It has already been observed that the Situationists refused to
Cons ti tute themselves as a party of any sort:
there were of
course merely a handful of members at this time and the group
336
itself was insignificant in comparison with the vast numbers of
people
identifying
themselves
as
situationists
or
carrying
situationist ideas and practices.
To
the
chagrin
authorities,
heritage
the
were
and
confusion
tactics
of
practised
the
of
the
media
Situationists'
throughout
the
and
the
avant-garde
May
events.
The
Observer declared:
France
is
in
revolutionary
ferment.
Who
is
responsible? Who put the spark to the dead wood? In
the permanent disorderly festival of the Sorbonne,
drunk on a week's total freedom, all seems confusion
and spontanei ty. I t is hard to believe tha t anyone
anywhere is pulling the strings ••• [149]
And,
by
way
reporter
of
an
amusing
wrote
of
the
contrast,
a
Situationist
News
of
the
World
International:
'Their
general headquarters is secret but I think it is somewhere in
London.
They
are
situationists;
not
students,
travel
they
but
are
what
is
everywhere
and
exploit
discontent of students.'
[150]
noted
most
significant
was
that
that
one
revolu tionary
of
the
movement
More serious ly,
'i t
known
as
the
the Observer
strengths
cannot
be
of
the
clearly
identified ••• It is raw explosive power.' [151]
This reemergence of
the
defiance of categorisation
was
used
poli tical
by
both
tool.
specialisa tion,
defy
Dada
In
tacti
avant-garde
reinforces the assertion
and
their
Surrealism
cri tiques
as
of
an
essentially
vanguardism
and
the Si tua tionis ts had reasserted the need to
identification
of
any
sort:
their
own
rejection
of
categorisation as an artistic school or political movement was
effected
as
a
grounds
that
it
critique
would
of
such
necessarily
compartmentalising
weaken
their
on
the
ability
to
337
effect
a
critique
identification
of
purpose,
were
each
demands
could be
of
a
the
totality.
of
demands,
set
considered
to
In
a
other
leader,
be means
recuperated within
words,
the
or
a
by which
the
simple
radical
exis ting whole.
The
abilitr of the prevailing discourse to identify and name such
demands in its own terms is necessarily its ability to satisfy
them in its own terms
too:
revolutionary demands
reformist, critiques of the totality partial,
thus become
and spontaneous
insurrections organised.
In 1968,
out
of
the demands of both workers and students arose
critiques
of
their
specific
situations,
but
almost
instantaneously
found their expression in demands which were
impossible
satisfy
to
within
revolutionaries
of
impossible;
revolutionary
the
1968
the
quite
existing
society.
The
literally
demanded
the
moment
passed
only
when
their
expectations were reduced to those which the system could cope
with, such as
the reform of the universities, greater freedom
of
higher
the
press,
wages
and
more
worker-management
co-
operation.
The most interesting example of this form of recuperation
involved the identification of leaders or, more importantly in
terms
of
the
Situationist
analysis,
revolution.
On May 23rd,
for example,
articles
both Marcuse
and
on
stars
of
the
1968
the Guardian published
Cohn-Bendi t
under
the heading:
'Students in Revolt - and two of the men responsible'.
Vienet
observed that Geismar, a Maoist student leader, and Sauvageot,
head of the UNEF, were also cast in the role of leaders of the
movement;
in
the British press,
it was
the Trotskyist Alain
338
Krivine who was most frequently identified as being in charge
of the events. Of Cohn-Bendit, Sauvageot, and Geismar, Vienet
wrote that they became:
the apparen t leaders of a leaderles s movement. The
press, radio, and television, in their search for
leaders, found no-one besides them. They became the
inseparable and photogenic stars of a spectacle
has tily pas ted over
the revolutionary reali ty ••••
This trio of ideological charm of 819 varieties could
obviously only say the acceptable - and therefore the
deformed and recuperated - tolerated by such a means
of transmission. While the real meaning of the void
which had proyelled them out of the void was purely
unacceptable L152]
For the Situationists, a leader less revolution was resistant to
recuperation:
in
Marcusean
terms,
it
was
an
intolerable
si tua tion which had to be overcome by the identification of
stars and leaders responsible for the events. This is basically
an attempt to deny the possibility that people are capable of
Organising themselves: it is recuperative because it brings the
movement into
the structures of dominance, organisa tion,
specifically alienation
which are
at
the heart of
and
existing
social relations. By this process, the participation in history
promoted
the
by
Situationists
and
realised
by
the
revolutionaries of 1968 was recuperated into the passivity of
the spectator.
This
aspect
of
the
events
is
particularly
significant
because of the tacit acknowledgement that the 'stars' of the
movement were
indeed
invented and
imposed
Marcuse's theses of One-Dimensional Man,
the
event$,
reporter
in
were
a
May
seen
on
the
movement.
far from influencing
to
be
in
contradiction
edition
of
the
Observer
to
noted
them.
A
that
'In
Berlin, the philosopher Herbert Marcuse, who preaches that the
339
tradi tional working class has become so "integrated" tha t i t
will never rebel, met angry cri ticism this week'
Cohn-Bendi t
[154]
In
[153],
and
claimed to have never read a word of his work.
many
respects
the
events
were
compatible
with
Marcuse's perspective on the nature of revolutionary change and
the new sensibility
with which it would be achieved. It would
seem that the optimistic revisions in Marcuse's
Essay on Liberation can be attributed to
post-1968 An
his need to live up
to the status of guru of the revolution imposed on him by the
media.
In 1987,
the New Statesman raised the question of
Surrealist influence on 1968 with
of
ACTUAL,
the
Suggestion
that
Paris-based
'the
Jean Schuster, now director
Surrealist
situationists
thunder in 1968', he responded:
the
archive.
stole
the
To
the
surrealists'
'If you read their revue and
Raoul Vaneigem's writings attentively you'll see that
isn't a single new idea in them.' [155]
there
The fact that there
is a direct lineage between Surrealism and the Situationists
gives this view some credence, although it is clear that the
Situationists'
clearly
not
acceptance
without
of
Surrealism
difference.
was
critical
and
Seale
and
Nevertheless,
MCConville, in their Red Flag, Black Flag: French Revolution
1 9 68, described the Situationist International as
incarnation
of
surrealism'
[156],
and
the
'a latterday
intimacy
of
the
movements is clear in both the tactics employed in 1968 and the
spirit in Which they were effected.
A
special
issue
of
L' Archibras,
the
last
official
Surrealist journal edited by Jean Schuster, appeared in June
340
1968 and declared:
'We have dreams as our supplies. We have
discoveries as our arms. Desires are the only things which do
not
die.'
It
included
a
'Portrait
of
the
Enemy'
which
declared: 'realism was condemned to death on May 3rd 1968' and
condemned, amongs t others, de Gaulle, the PCF,
'all poli tical
parties, unions, and realist institutions animated by fear of
the imagination which expands consciousness
desire
to
change
recuperation'.
In
and fear of the
reality',
and
the
spite
this
enthusiasm,
of
'realist
tactic
of
however,
the
December issue of the journal gave little mention to the May
events. [157]
As
an
movement,
es tablished
significance
to
the
events.
But
Surrealism was
certain
of
little
resonances
are
particularly clear. Perhaps the most remarkable is to be found
in Aragon's poem 'Red Front' which, nearly forty years earlier,
had sung:
Paris your intersections still twitch their nostrils
Your stones are still ready to leap into the air
Your trees to bar the roads to soldiers •••
We can also recall Desnos' description of the Surrealist group
as
being
held
together
by
'something
that
resembled
the
fellowship of those who are going to blow up in a ci ty in a
spirit of revolt', or Breton in the Second Manifesto, where he
wrote
that Surrealism was
tenet of
total revolt,
'not afraid to make for
complete insubordination,
itself a
of sabotage
according to rule, and ••• it still expects nothing save from
violence. '
Both the slogans of the period and the means by which they
were
communicated
graffiti
on
the
walls
and
often
on
341
treasured
statues
and
works
of
art
were
dis tinc tly
Surrealist. The slogans which appeared at the beginning of May
included
and
'Live without dead time!', 'Play without shackles!',
'They're
buying
your
'Night of the Barricades',
surreal:
'Society
is
a
happiness.
Steal
it! ';
after
the
they were more angry but no less
man-ea ting
flower',
'Comrades,
if
everyone was doing this ••• ' and 'I came in the cobblestones'.
In
the
believe
Sorbonne,
in
the
'I
take my desires
reality
of
my
for
desires'
reali ty because
was
I
sacreligiously
painted across a wall, along with 'What if someone burnt down
the Sorbonne?',
'Art is dead! Don't consume its corpse', and
'Run for it! The old world is behind you.' [158]
These
slogans
were
recognised
as
being
rooted
in
Surrealism and nurtured by the Situationists by many observers.
Rosenberg's
characterisation
streets'
developed
was
by
of 1968 as
Vienet's
'surrealism in the
statement
that
'the
phrases of the two books of Situationist theory which appeared
in the last weeks of 1967 were written on the walls of Paris
and several provincial ci ties ••• '
[159],
and another wi tness
recalled that the corridors of the Sorbonne
'sprang to life in
a
much
firework
of
luminous
mural
wisdom
of
it
of
Situationist inspiration' [160]
Perhaps the most famous and significant of these was the
slogan
'Under
the cobbles,
the beach',
an expression which
captured both the tactics of the revolutionaries, for whom the
cobblestones
provided
the
most
obvious
weapons
against
the
police, and the symbolic meaning of this d~tou~!1_~men~ of the
streets.
Another
graffito
in
the
Sorbonne
read:
'The
most
342
beautiful sculpture is the sandstone cobble, the heavy square
cobble, the cobble you throw at the police.'
the
critique
of
the
separation
of
art
and
This reinforces
life
made
by
Dadaists, Surrealists and Situationists alike: Andr~ Fermigier,
for
example,
points out
tha t
Duchamp' s
'ready-made'
finally
realised its revolutionary potential when it took the form of
paving-stones which the students threw at the CRS.' [161]
For many, the events of 1968 were the very realisation of
art promoted and prophesised in this tradi tion. The Observer
described the events as
'a vas t national "happening'"
[162] ,
and Michel Ragon wrote:
For nearly two months the Sorbonne, the Odeon, and
the en tire La tin Quarter were permanent happenings.
At the same time the ci ty was rediscovering one of
its functions, which is to create festivities ••• It
was only with the battles between police and students
that it took on the aspect of a happening and of a
holiday. As if to add to this impression, the police
force wore costumes. They no longer looked like the
ordinary
police
of
joyless
towns,
but
were
transformed into a stage army with all the classic
accessories of theatre shields and knights'
helmets. [163]
Ragon failed to mention that this theatrical air was compounded
by the reclamation and use of costumes from the occupied Odeon
theatre
in
the
street
battles
with
the
riot
police.
Nevertheless, he identifies the essentially surreal nature of
the events as they involved the turning around or subversion of
the city and the release of creative energy with which it was
accomplished.
During the May Revolution, the city once again became
a center of games, it rediscovered its creative
quality; there instinctively arose a socialisation of
art - the great permanent theatre of the Od~on, the
poster studio of the ex-Ecole des Beaux-Arts, the
bloody ballets of the CRS and students, the open-air
demonstrations and meetings, the public poetry of
wall slogans, the dramatic reports by Europe No 1 and
343
Radio Luxembourg, the entire nation in a s ta te of
tension, intensive participation and, in the highest
sense of the word, poetry. [164]
Anonymous, cheap, and an instant form of communication, the use
of graffiti in the May events epitomised the avant-garde dream
of
art
realised
in
the
practice
of
everyday
life.
A
transformation of its environment, graffito was as powerful a
form of subversion and engagement as the literal deconstruction
of the streets. Vienet described it as a form of
vandalism'
[165],
the
detournement
of
the
'critical
'landscape
of
alienation'.
In a definitive account of the Situationist project, the
use
of
its
vocabulary
of
alienation,
recuperation,
and
1eto urnement, and the extent to which its critique was realised
in the events, Vienet wrote that the Situationists:
had denounced and fought
the "organisation of
appearances" of the spectacular stage of commodity
socie ty, had for years very precisely foreseen the
explosion and its consequences. The critical theory
elaborated and
publicised
by
the
Situationist
International
readily
affirmed...
that
the
proletariat had not been abolished; that capitalism
was continuing to develop its own aliena tions; and
that this antagonism existed over the entire surface
of the planet, along with the social question posed
for over a century ( ••• ) When the Situationist
International formulated a coherent theory of this
reality it also showed the negation of this reality
in the combined realisation of art and philosophy in
the liberation of everyday life. Thus the theory was
both radically new and took up all the old truth of
the provisionally repressed proletarian movement.
[166]
The reasons for the failure of the revolution
have merely been
touched on here and, as wi th the celebrations of the events,
there is no shortage of analyses, regrets, and recriminations
about its end. It is however
suggested that the recuperation
of the spontaneity, magnitude, and creativity of its
critique
344
is largely responsible for the movement's
its
challenge
to
the
totality
of
failure to sustain
social
and
discursive
relations with which it began. Reclaimed by the unions' demands
for higher
workers'
wages
own
which had
demands
the
never
figured
strikes
and
highly
in
the
occupations
were
finally containable: removed from the dynamism of history and
the cri tiqueof the totali ty,
the demands of the workers were
realisable within the existing system.
The failure of the revolutionary movement in France should
not,
however,
obscure
the
insights which
terms
of
question
of
the
the
provide.
In the firs t place,
its
recuperation
assessment
of
critique can
it mus t be remembered tha t
reemergence of the tactics of the avant-garde in 1968
in spite of
in
the
occurred
the recuperation of movements such as Dada and
SUrrealism considered above.
The distortion of Dada and the
servitude of Surrealism were intended to preclude the critical
uses
for
which
their
tactics
were · in tended;
it
seems,
therefore,
that the recuperation of the avant-garde cri tique
identified
in
this
inquiry
has
not
been
definitive:
they
reappeared in a critical form not only in 1968 but also in
a number of other and diverse political and philosophical
Contexts considered in the chapters below.
In
the
tactics
of
the Dutch Provos
and Kabouters,
the
Italian Autonomists, Poland's Orange Alternative, and British
punk, Dadaist, Surrealist, and Situationist tactics made their
presence felt.
Moreover, the same forms of critique appear in
the
and
analyses
pos ts truc turalis t
practices
of
the
phi losophers and artists.
postmodernist
and
It is maintained
345
that this last phenomenon also testifies to the 'red thread of
surrealism' identified by Schuster [167]. Unlike the moments of
political critique in which the tactics of the avant-garde have
appeared,
however,
the
case
of
poststructuralism is obscured by
pos tmodernism
the fact
and
that these recent
schools of thought and art assert the impossibility of critique
as conceived in this tradition.
The mos t significant pos ts tructuralis t and pos tmodernis t
analyses arose as a direct response to the events of 1968.
Their hostility to the authority of theory,
reality,
and
entirely
constituted
relations:
these
postmodernist
the
assertion
by
a
of
a
complete
of
attributes
analysis
are
world
caught
of
the tyranny of
shifting meaning
network
of
discursive
poststructuralist
in
the
paradox
of
and
being
indebted to the May events whilst at the same time denying the
validity of their critique. It will be argued that these recent
analyses are themselves recuperations of the tactics practised
and theorised by Dada, Surrealism, and the Situationists.
The
recuperation
of
the
Situationist
thesis
itself
is
dealt with in the concluding chapter of this inquiry; here, all
that remains
to be considered is
the treatment of
the 1968
revolution as an historical event in terms of its vulnerability
and resistance to subsequent recuperation.
346
The recuperation of the May events
The twentieth anniversary of the May events was greeted with a
blaze of publicity and enthusiasm which failed to appear in
1978; as Reader observed, 'the tenth anniversary was greeted in
the French left-wing press with silence ( •• ) or with anecdotal
reminiscence.'[168] In a pull-out supplement at the beginning
of 1988,
however,
revolution will be
the New Statesman declared:
'In 1988
televised'
tha t
and predicted
the
the year
would contain:
Something for everybody. Biff cartoons will have a
field day; die-hard situationists will denounce
recuperation on a grand scale; Marxism Toda:( will
produce T-shirts decorated with tanks and warn1ng us
against provocateurs. [169]
A number
of books
appeared,
including
!ight, The Year of the Barricades,
and
David Caute' s
Sixty-
Ronald Fraser's 1968,
A. Student Generation in Revolt; the 'stars' of the movement
were
engaged
documentaries;
in
a
plethora
journals
and
of
radio
newspapers
and
television
all
poli tical
of
complexions published some form of comment or analysis.
The most striking references to the events appeared in the
form of advertisements. A 1988 edi tion of Ci troen' s consumer
magazine,
Frontlines,
carried
an
production
techniques
entitled
'French
article
discussing
Revolution',
new
and
a
nUmber of the large banks, including Lloyds, Barclays, and the
National Westminster
than a
passing
produced publicity which contained more
reference
to
the
events.
'At
NatWest',
for
example, 'we have a range of services to help you handle your
money,
so
that
you can get on with your work while
still
347
enjoying student life.' This view of student life is asserted
as
if
Strasbourg's
critique
of
its
poverty had never
been
practised, yet the success of the advertising campaign in which
it appeared was in fact dependent on these events.
The publici ty comprises a series of subverted poli tical
images:
an
revolutionary
of
the
the
images
appropriation
overt
critique.
Each
of
propaganda
is
of
of
young,
strong, vaguely socialist realist-looking people: a dark-haired
man looking into the distance: 'Future'; a fair man with hands
on hips and the word 'Independence'; a dark-haired woman waving
'Freedom' ,•
her hand:
and
a man
and a
woman
toge ther,
he
shouting with one hand cupped around his mouth and the other on
the shoulder of his silent companion: 'Action'.
The cover of the booklet in which they
according
to
one
Na tWes t
worker,
the mos t
appear - and,
popular of
the
accompanying pos ters given away by the bank - reads'S tuden t
88'. All the lettering on these posters is reminiscent of the
ink blocking of an ad hoc printshop, and '88' is conveniently
resonant
both
advertising
graphically
terms,
the
and
technique
historically
is
simple:
to
'68'.
In
the product
is
suffused with both a familiarity and glamour which opening a
bank account
might otherwise
lack.
Such
images appealed
to
students twenty years ago and can do so again. Of course, the
Contents and intention of
the appeal is qui te distinct from
those of 1968: the 'Action' page states: 'we'll have everything
ready for you to collect -
just pay in your grant cheque •••
Don't forget, it can take a week to print a cheque book so make
348
your
arrangements
now' ,
--
'Future'
while
'When
suggests:
you
eventually decide to buy a home, ask us for a mortgage.'
Such
appropriations
of
critical
material
do
not
go
unnoticed, of course, but they are usually accepted as part of
the inevitable passage of ideas through history: fashions and
styles are said to come and go with a mysterious autonomy, on
which his torical events are one influence amongs t many. This
perspective on developments such as the NatWest advertisement
is also that which sees the integration of anti-art within art
as inevitable, if a little regrettable: such appropriations are
rarely subject to any further analysis. It is to the credit of
the
Situationist
analysis
was
International
posed
in
the
that
the
notion
of
validity
of
such
recuperation,
which
challenges the necessi ty of the integra tion of cri tique and
facilitates the development of tactics to avoid it.
To
consider
the
advertisement
NatWest
a
concrete
example of the recuperation of critique is to reject the view
that the original discourse is copied without consequence. On
the contrary,
the concept of recuperation implies
appropriation
has
some
detrimental
effect
on
the
that this
critical
Content of the discourse: developed as a means of criticism of
the
totality,
it
is
subsequently
used
in
its
support.
The
meaning of critical discourse is recuperated in this process:
tactics
developed
as
negating
are
turned
around
to
become
affirmative.
As the later discussion of poststructuralism reveals, the
description of such discourse as
'original'
li terally:
to
it makes
li t tIe
sense
cannot be taken
speak of an
original
349
discourse either in the sense that something can be thought or
uttered
for
unmediated
first
time
or
in
terms
of
expression of
an
immediately
discourse
accessible
as
the
reality.
Surrealist attempts to produce automatic writing were met with
the realisation that some level of conscious mediation was an
inevitable
consequence
recognition,
which
of
the
informs
attempt
Lacan' s
to
avoid
assertion
it.
This
that
only
psychosis allows an escape from a discursive reality, is taken
to its extreme in Baudrillard's contention that the only escape
is mindless
passivity or death.
Both Lacan and
Baudrillard
would therefore deny the notion of recuperation any credence,
since there is no possibility of an original discourse to be
recuperated.
The Situationist thesis provides the basis for an analysis
of recuperation which does not require there to be an original
discourse
prior
to
appropriation.
The
Situationists
anticipated the poststructuralists in their assertion that all
discourse is produced by the totality in which it arises, since
they
identify
encompassing
this
totality
an
from an upright one:
the
or
inversion
inverted
reality
alienation
poststructuralism,
as
spectacle,
of
is
an
all-
reality.
For
indistinguishable
there is no context in which the latter
can be considered to have any claim to a 'more real reality'
Or
authentic
truth;
the
dichotomies
between
appearance, and truth and ideology, together with
reality
and
all forms of
critical theory which presuppose their validity, are therefore
rendered illegitimate.
350
The
Sugges ts
Situationists'
that
tactical
use
of
conceptualisations
cri tique does not require the reali ty of an
Archimedean point or the authenticity of a true desire to be
asserted as the negation of the reality and the desires of the
spectacle.
In
the
recognition
that
it
arises
within
this
totality, critical discourse adopts the tactics of subversion
and
detournement
used
in
avant-garde
and poli tical cri tiques of capitalism;
critiques
of art
the spectacularisa tion
of all aspects of everyday life theorised by the Situationists
does not
involve
the
impossibility of
poststructuralism but,
on
the
critique asserted by
contrary,
merely
extends
its
legitimacy and the means with which it can be made. As Vi~net
wrote of
the May events,
the strikes
and occupations
'very
rapidly reached every sector of social life.'
The fact
that
the strike had...
extended to
activities which had always escaped subversion in the
past
radically
affirmed
two
of
the
oldest
assertions of the Situationist analysis: that the
increasing modernisation of capitalism brings with it
the proletarianisation of an ever-increasing part of
the population, and that as the world of commodities
extends its power to all aspects of life, it produces
everywhere an extension and deepening of the forces
that negate it.[170]
It is clear that the Situationists can still posit a reality
,
stood on its feet'
spectacle.
in contradiction to the reality of
Recognising
the
difficul ties
which
the
the
all-
encompassing nature of the spectacle raises for its criticical
negation, their analysis does not assert the impossibility of
critique,
but rather argues
for
the necessity of developing
tactics capable of subverting, d€tourning, and resis ting the
recuperative powers of an identifiable totality.
351
THE ORANGE AND WHITE, THE BLACK AND THE RED.
Kabouters and Provos
In the Netherlands, the 'Provos' and later the 'Kabouters' were
also
engaged
in
the
exercise
provocations
and
subversions.
of
The
Dadaist
and
Surrealist
Dutch
Provo
movement
appeared in 1965, dedicating itself to the provocation of Dutch
socie ty and the 'Dreary People of Ams terdam'. Roel van Duyn,
author of a book on Kroporkin [171], was amongst those whose
activities
earned an initially repressive response from
the
authorities and an extraordinary level of popular support for
attempts to construct a 'counter-society', a notion made famous
by the 'white plans' for free bicycles, streets, and housing.
The Provos
won 13,000 votes and one sea t
elections
in
Amsterdam,
and
regarded
themselves
manifestation of a new, heterogeneous class:
The first
in the municipal
as
the
the Provotariat.
issues of Provo declared the journal:
a monthly sheet for anarchists, provos, beatniks,
pleiners, scissor-grinders, jailbirds, Simple Simon
stylites, magicians, pacifists, potat~-chip chaps,
charlatans,
philosophers,
germ-carr1ers,
grand
masters of the queen's horse, happeners, vegetarians,
syndicalis ts, Santa Clauses, kindergarten teachers,
agitators,
pyromaniacs,
assistant
assistants,
scratchers and syphilites, secret police, and other
riff-raff.
PROVO has to choose between desperate resistance and
submissive extinction.
PROVO calls for resistance wherever possible.
PROVO realises that it will lose in the end, but it
cannot pass up the chance to make at least one more
heartfelt attempt to provoke society.
PROVO regards anarchism as the inspirational source
of resistance.
PROVO wants to revive anarchism and teach it to the
young. [172]
352
The Provost new class was constituted as the collection of
all those who rejected the passivity and impotence of their
lives.
Van
Duyn
wrote:
'What
really
makes
us
mad
is
the
individual's lack of influence on events.'
The 'happening',
events
described
as
the
participation
can
be
at
creation
which
of
a
the
Provos
context
in
excelled,
which
is
such
experienced:
A happening is an attempt to seize at least the
little part in things that you ought to have and that
the authorities try to take away from you. A
happening is therefore a demonstration of the power
you would like to have - influence on events. [173]
This desire
for participation,
contact,
and involvement has
been observed running throughout the Dadaist, Surrealist and
Situationist
projects:
we
can
recall
eXpressing his desire to really
world.
Breton,
for
example,
'get into contact' with the
Similarly, de Jong identified the importance of the
imagination to the movement.
In spite of all the differences, the group that
started the Provo movement had this in common:
imagination, which they could neither express in
their daily lives and work in the factory, nor in
their jobs, nor at the university, nor in traditional
politics and opposition movements. [174]
Again
like
Dada,
the
Provos
were
united
by
no
general
conception of their aims:
'''We agree to disagree", they said'
[175].
imperatives
But
the
tactical
of
their
provocations
entailed the development of a concerted attack on the pillars
of Dutch society, particular~ the Church, the Royal family, the
security
forces
and,
symbolically,
the
Lieverdje
statue
in
Amsterdam, detourned in true Surrealist fashion as the symbol
of the 'addicted consumer' [176].
Police
led
to
protests
which
The severe responses of the
declared
'The
police
is
our
353
dearest
friend',
a
slogan
'terrifying battle-cry'
whose
[177].
irony
made
it
into
a
This sort of provocation was
exercised in the pamphlets and manifestos distributed by the
Provos, many of which carry traces of Tzara's ravings against
the bourgeoisie and in favour of the refusal of reason.
Most Dadaist of all was the 1967 happening to declare the
'Death of Provo'.
ac tions
los t
Like Dada, the Provos 'realised that their
their
originality'
[178],
observation
that
meaning
a
af ter
situation
they
exacerbated
authorities
'the
had
had
los t
their
de
Jong's
by
adopted
a
more
intelligent policy concerning happenings and demonstrations.'
Nevertheless,
the
movements'
determination
to
end
itself,
rather than allow its defeat at the hands of the authorities,
Was
an
effective
provided
a
point
peculiar
in
itself,
political
and
climate
its
in
Surrealist tactics continued to be used
provocations
the
Netherlands:
sporadically until
their reemergence in 1970 with the Kabouters.
Developing the anarchist theme of the development of an
alternative,
gnomes,
or counter-society,
produced
numerous
the
papers,
Kabouters,
including
organised happenings
and
declared
Q.range Free
State in
1970.
Less
predecessors,
the
Kabouters
the
Kabouterkrant,
foundation
confrontational
produced
dressed as
alternative
of
the
than
their
plans
and
imaginative reforms for every area of Dutch life, and in the
1970 election, they won 11% of the vote,
five council seats in
Amsterdam,
on
and
a
further
twelve
councils throughout the country.
seats
other
municipal
354
For the Situationists, this participation in the electoral
process was a mark of the attitude shared by both Provos and
Kabouters that the system was fundamentally resistant to change
and could be merely be resisted and provoked. A Provo text, for
example, declared their rejection of the 'inevitable political
and military holocaust.'
In On the Poverty of Student Life ••• ,
the Provos were described as:
an aspect of the las t reformism produced by modern
capi talism: the reformism of everyday life... the
Provo hierarchy think they can change everyday life
by a few well-chosen improvements. What they fail to
realise is that the banality of everyday life is not
incidental, but the central mechanism and product of
modern capi talism. To des troy it, nothing less is
needed than all-out revolution. The Provos choose the
fragmentary and end by accepting the totality. [179]
Regarding
the
sys tern's
survival as
inevi table,
the ultimate
Consequence of the Provost and Kabouters' actions was merely to
decorate and enliven it.
Their adoption and development of the
Situationist critique of urbanism was effected to the end of
improving the city environment with the result that Amsterdam
still retains its reputation as a playful city of relaxed moral
codes.
But the fact
that the sexual freedoms which resulted
from these provocations were merely explicit manifestations
of
the
and
so
gives
the
existing
constituted
Situationist
and
a
form
impoverished
of
critique
forms
repressive
of
the
of
sexuality,
desublimation,
Provos
and
Kabouters
some
credence.
The Dadaist and Surrealist tactics used by the Provos and
Kabouters lacked the context of a critique of the totality and
Were
quickly
recuperated
as
a
result.
Nevertheless,
their
practices emerged again in 1987 in Poland, where the illegal
355
union Solidari ty had begun to head towards the legali ty and
reformism it achieved in 1989.
POland's Orange Alternative
The emergence
of
the
'Orange Alternative'
testified
to
the
ability of the tactics developed by Dada, Surrealism, and the
Situationists
to withstand
the
recuperations
made of
them.
There are many connections between the Polish movement,
the
Dutch phenomena considered above and, beyond this, the Dadaist
and
Surrealist
tactics
theorised by
the
Situationists:
the
movements' protagonists dress as gnomes like the Kabouters and
exercise
forms
of
provocation,
detournement,
and
subversion
common to each of these movements.
In 'Oranges and Lemons', an article published in Here and
!io~
[180],
celebrated
Geroge
Branchflower
noted
that
the
movement
International Children's Day (1st June 1987) with a
happening in which
'dozens of participants dressed as gnomes
or smurfs with red hats danced in the streets and distributed
sweets.' October 7th, Poland's Official Day of the Police and
Security
Service,
was
marked
by
an
enthusiastic
march
in
Wroclaw to thank the police, in which they were showered with
flowers ,
and
embraced
by
arrest.
The
streets
'were
Christmastime 1987,
,
real
,
the
participants
prior
to
their
flooded with Santa Clauses'
at
leading to the arrest of both bogus and
Santa Clauses and a 2,000 strong demonstration calling
for the 'release of Santa'.
356
These subversions of the everyday have been encouraged
the development
groupings
and
of close
youth
ties wi th more orthodox
organisations.
by
poli tical
Distributions
of
toilet
paper, sanitary towels, and a call for the 1987 Referendum on
social policy
to be
slogan
Twice!',
'Vote
favoured with a
show
Orange
200%
turnout with
Alternative
using
the
its
Surrealist heritage to express specific political demands and
expose
the
deficiencies
of
the system,
projects which have
Continued up to the time of writing, culminating in a call by
one of
the movement's
Major',
for
a
protagonis ts,
trans-European
Waldemar Frydrych,
happening
in
which
'The
everyone
dresses up as policemen.
Branchflower
observed
that
Orange
Alternative
has
flourished 'by outwitting and embarrassing the authorities who
maintain a system which relies on a single version of the truth
for its survival and who are used to a more direct form of
protest.'
Although
no
connection
is
movements,
and Orange Alternative is
made
with
said to be
the
Dutch
'so called
because orange is a non-political colour in Poland - there is a
nascent White Alternative in Warsaw', Branchflower did observe
that
'familiar with Andr~ Breton and the Situationists', the
movement has sought to 'encourage self-expression and activity
without
a
activities
particular
are
set
intended
to
of
political
'avoid
the
demands.'
star
system
These
of
the
official (Solidarity) opposition', although it is interesting
that the movement has assumed something of a mythological role
as the significance of the changes in eastern Europe, nascent
at the time of writing, begins to be realised in the west.
357
evasion of the recuperation of its activities; nevertheless,
the movement's capaci ty to embarrass and provoke the Polish
authorities has recently been subject to such integration.
On
one demonstration, for example,
'instead of meeting the usual
heavy-handed
they
police
response
were
merely
officially
announced over the tannoy 'and here comes Orange Alternative'
thus efficiently defusing their potentially disruptive effect
by
simply
incorporating
Branchflower observed:
them
into
the
celebrations.'
As
'i t should be noted... tha t the skills
necessary to reveal the mUltiple meanings within reality are in
hot demand in the world of advertising and marketing', a form
of
recuperation
which
implemented in Bri tain.
he
suggested
has
long
since
been
But the significance of the Polish
experience is that the recuperation of eff ec ti ve tactics and
techniques
of
provocation
definitive:
Dadaist
and
and
subversion
has
Surrealist provocations
not
been
continue
to
arise in spite of attempts to render them impotent and rid them
of their political force.
Metropolitan Indians
The influence of the Situationists extended to
Italy in the
1960s, particluarly during the period of unrest known as the
'hot autumn' of 1969. This influence was maintained into the
1970s, largely through the work of Gianfranco Sanguinetti who
Published his True Report on the Last Chance to Save Capitalism
in Italy under the pseudonym Censor. When the text appeared in
1975, it was first circulated amongst government ministers and
358
then
figures
of
the
literary
establishment;
this
tactic
Convinced everybody that the text was the work of a minis ter
since,
as
the newspaper L' Europeo commented,
knew were too
'the things he
important and too precise' to be the work of an
outsider. The revelation in 1976 tha t i t was
the work of a
young Situationist caused a major scandal but,
as L'Europeo
noted:
Anyone who is familiar with the situationists knows
that the immediate objectives of their philosophy are
provocations and scandals carried out with coolness
and precision. With his Censor coup, Sanguinetti has
simply given a
crowning manifestation of
the
situationist technique of scandal. [181]
The
Italian
events
of
1977 marked
the
continuation
of
the
Situationist influence, although they also reflect the growing
significance of post-1968
French philosophy, particularly that
developed by Foucault and Deleuze.
The
Italian
experience
was
interpreted
less
as
an
extraordinary rupture and more in terms of an ongoing 'strategy
of refusal'
present in Italian political and industrial life.
Strikes and protests throughout the 1950s and 1960s were marked
by
a
refusal
of
the
work
ethic
and
factory
organisation.
Sylvere Lotringer notes that this
strategy had been theorised
by such groups as Quaderni Rossi
(Red Notebooks) and Classe
Qperaia (Working Class) throughout the 1960s.
as Mario Tronti, Toni Negri,
notions
of
Theorists such
and Ri ta di Leo developed the
subversion which can be traced in
avant-garde,
Situationist, and poststructuralist critiques.
Tronti, for example, was concerned with the implications
of the necessity to work 'inside and against' capitalism. In
Lhe Strategy of Refusal(1965), he defined the working class as
359
'at one and the same time, the articulation of capital and its
dissolution.
Capitalist
antagonistic
wi11-to-strugg1e
development.' [182]
of
revolutionary
power
seeks
to
use
the
workers'
as
motor
of
its
a
own
Tronti also identified the central problem
activity
within
capitalist
society:
the
existence of the latter precludes the possibility of organised
revolutionary critique,
precludes
the
and
existence
of
the
success
of
capitalism.
such a
Capitalism
critique
and
its
revolutionary critique can 'only exist together for the brief
period of the revolutionary crisis.'
The working class cannot constitute itself as a party
within
capitalist
society
without
preventing
capitalist society from functioning. As long as
capitalist society does continue to function the
working class party cannot be said to exist. [183]
Critique
therefore
occur
'inside
in
an
effort
to
revolutionary
crisis
in
which
improvement
the
must
prevailing
system
of
system are
and
reach
reformist
against'
the
this
moment
of
demands
for
the
refusal
to
superseded by
'a
manage the mechanism of society as it stands, merely to improve
it - a 'No' which is repressed by pure violence.' [184]
The
articulation
of
this
refusal
by
the
Italian
left
during the 1960s and 1970s did indeed lead to extraordinary
degrees of repression:
the 1975 Legge Rea1e legalised
Shoot to kill policy adopted towards
resu1 ted in
the deaths
the
terrorist suspects and
of 150 people between May 1975 and
December 1976 [185]; according to one commentator, there were
Some 3,500 'political prisoners' in Italy in 1980. [186]
Such measures were 1egi timised by the wave of terror is t
activity in Italy during this period: the Red Brigades, whose
360
activities culminated with the kidnapping and murder of Aldo
Moro in 1978, posed a serious, if unwelcome,
offensive
and
more
traditional
challenge to less
forms
of
critique.
The
Autonomist movement, known as the Movement of '77, rose to this
challenge
with
a
critical
analysis
poststructuralism of
Foucault
and
derived
Deleuze,
the
from
the
Situationist
analyses of the spectacle and detournement,
and the avant-
garde
The
practices
rejected
of
,
the
Dada
and
Surrealism.
Autonomists
official means of critique: the structure and demands
unions
cultural
work' ,
of
and
the
party
transformation,
demands
similarly
mass
were
superceded
creativity,
expressed
by
and
the
by
those
of
refusal
of
Surrealis ts,
developed by the Situationists, and defined by Beradi as 'the
dominant themes of the Movem'e nt of '77.' [187J
1977 saw renewed student resistance, mass demonstrations,
and the deaths of a number of protestors. University campuses
in Rome, Bologna, and Padua were occupied by students, young
workers, the unemployed and the disaffected. All this occurred
against a background of industrial action:
first
in 1971,
Italy's
general strike had been supported by some 11 million
Workers,
and
industrial
dissent
had
continued
in
the
intervening period.
Negri was charged with being the covert leader of the Red
Brigades, an accusation he strenuously denied, pointing to his
PUblished critiques of terrorism in general and the Brigades in
particular. The prosecution concerned itself with showing that
sUch writings
were a
diversionary cover
for
Negri's
'real'
interests. Although the accusations against Negri were clearly
361
unfounded, his engagement with the Autonomist movement makes
the circumstances of his trial particularly interesting.
The
Movement's
its
emphasis
on
the
diversity
and
autonomy
of
struggles was directly opposed to the activities of the Red
Brigades, whose centralised structure and aims were criticised
by Negri during his trial.
this
distinction
is
The prosectors' refusal to accept
indicative
of
the
Italian
authorities'
wider attempt to conflate the activities of the Red Brigades
and the Autonomis ts.
This can be seen as
example of the a t tempt to
the mos t
striking
recuperate the activities of the
Autonomists.
The
Movement
realised
that
its
strength
lay
in
its
diversi ty, particularly in its defiance of ca tegorisa tion in
traditional revolutionary terms. The Italian State's attempt to
align it wi th the Red Brigades can therefore be seen as the
a t tempt
to
preferably,
define
as
the
Negri's
Movement as
arrest
a
shows,
terroris t
organisation
with
identifiable
an
leader who could be shown to be responsible for the activities
of both the Brigades and the Autonomists. The latter wished to
,
supersede' the centralised terrorism of the Brigades: to move
from the attack on centralised power to guerilla warfare based
on the beliefs expressed by Negri,
that 'no State power exists
Outside the material organisation of production; that there is
no
revolution except as a transitional process in the making
and partly realized. r [188]
The
Autonomists
contended
that
the
plurality
of
their
struggles and the diversity of the areas and relations in which
they appeared were their strength; all attempts to narrow their
362
activities
to
a
single
contradiction
were
resisted.
Their
analyses and tactics were therefore adopted because of their
perceived
Dada,
political
exigency:
the Surrealis ts,
exactly
the
grounds
on
which
and the Si tua tionis ts proceded before
them. The Movement was constantly engaged in resistance to the
power of the authorities to name and identify and so recuperate
it
within the terms and categories of existing social and
discursive relations,
and this engagement in turn determined
the nature of the Movement.
This
can
be
clearly
observed
in
the
tactics
of
the
'Metropolitan Indians', who disrupted and subverted city life.
The resonance of their activities with those of the Dadaists,
SUrrealists
and
Situationists
is
again
undeniable:
recall
Breton and Vach~'s visits to the cinema, or the Situationists'
£erives when reading
Indians
Maurizio Torealta, according to whom the
'habitually break into shops and appropriate useless
goods ••• They also frequently appear at the most elegant movie
theatres
in
groups
of
about
thirty
people,
naturally
after
visiting the most expensive restaurants where they obviously
did not pay.' [189]
Mass activities included the 1976 meeting
in
'18,000
Milan
at
which
proletarian
youths
performed
gigantic sun dance' [190]; thousands also attended a
a
meeting
in Bologna in 1977.
Such 'guerrilla' activities as 'autonomous price setting'
were
conducted as
inconsis tencies,
conscious
the
critiques;
playful and
the
absurdities
ironic activi ties
of
and
the
Indians were all conceived as attempts at effective subversion
or sabotage.
363
Whoever paints his face taking the marks as an
arbi trary characterisa tion of a future people;
whoever appropriates in an exhaustive way all
possible terms and treats language as a science of
imaginary solutions; whoever refuses to explain
himself and, despite this omission, doesn't stop
robbing, nor in fact engages in any collective
practice - such a person is the agent of subversions
which have great significance. Every element in the
subversion of a system must be of a superior logical
order. [191]
Such an account might be taken from a Tzara manifesto;
imperative to be unidentifiable,
in disguise, or as a
the
secret
agent involved in the perpetration of concealed and un traceable
subversions, appears clearly in the work of Dada, Surrealism
and the Situationists. The Italian debt to this tradition is
unmistakable:
We hypothesise, then, the coming of an era which
replaces the bearers of truth (divided unions,
political groups with their identifying signs and
their banners) with intelligence and shrewdness. This
era will be based on the social possibilities of
falsehood,
on
the
technological
possibilities
resulting from the destruction of rules, on the free
exchange of products, simulation, the game, the
nonsense argument, the dream, music. [192]
These same resonances are present in the
accoun t
Torea I ta
provided of the Bologna meeting in 1977, in which the analyses
of
the
city,
the
territorialisation
occupation
and
subversion
of
of
space,
and
the
de-
the
geography
and
fUnction of an area common to these critiques are clear.
Torrealta
observed
that
the
conventional
form
of
the
meeting place was used by a minority of those who gathered in
Bologna,
while:
Another part of the Movement, the majority, entered
the ci ty, sleeping anywhere in the streets, under
porticoes, creating an enormous curtain, exploiting a
few upright statues in a small square, conveying
funiture and chairs outdoors, conducting discussions
and seminars in thousands of small groups, passing
ou t the li t tIe i llegali ties that had been produced
364
for the occasion (fake train tickets, drugs, keys to
open telephone coin boxes and traffic lights, etc.)
[193J
These people are characterised as nomads, the wanderers through
the city, the subverters of its purpose, the reappropriation of
its space. This section of the Movement:
chose not to establish a city; they decided to
con tinue being
nomads, but a t the same time enter
the ci ty of the enemy's language - a ci ty that is
always strengthening its fortifications
even if
only to remain silent, sitting around, smoking,
sleeping. We have termed them nomads but perhaps it
is more correct to call them sophists, in a position
to simulate, to enter and leave the walls, to master
diverse languages as the situation demands, in a
position to play-act, falsify, create paradoxes,
sabotage, and disappear once again. [194J
Dada's tactics of inconsistency and illogicality; its
of every
attempt at
definition and
defiance
identific ation and
the
emphasis on the experiences of everyday life - epi tomised in
the distribution of forged tickets, keys, and so on in Bologna
- were used by the movement to the same ends of deconstruction
and
subversion
as
those
common
to
Dada,
Surrealism,
the
Situationists, and, as is discussed below, poststructuralism.
This
is
mos t
clear
in
the examples of
the
free
radio
stations which blossomed in Italy at the time and were banned
in 1977. Most famous of these was Radio Alice which ran from
February 1976 to March 1977 and was described by Beradi as the
,
symbol
of
this
period,
of
that
unforgettable
year
of
eXperimentation and accumulation of intellectual, organisation,
Political, and creative energies.' [195] The idea of free radio
epitomises
'the design, the dream of the artistic avant-garde
- to bridge the separation between artistic communication and
revolutionary transformation or subversive practice - became in
365
this experience a reality.' Indeed, the Autonomists considered
free radio to be an example of the possibility of articulating
dissent and critique in an unrecuperable form:
All the "unstated" is emerging: from the Chants de
Maldoror to the struggles for reducing the work-day.
It speaks in the Paris Commune and in Artaud's
poetry, it speaks in Surrealism and in the French
May,
in
the Italian Autumn and in immediate
liberation; it speaks across the separate orders of
the language of rebellion. Desire is given a voice,
and for them, it is obscene.
Alice looks around, plays, jumps, wastes time in the
midst of papers illuminated by the sun, runs ahead,
settles down elsewhere.[196]
A publication
following
the
British
disturbances
of
1981
observed that Radio Alice:
had any number of taped "subversive" cultural infils
combining music, poetry and comment that were used as
sandwiching between phone-in programmes ••• the radio
station was used to inform insurgents of police
manoo u.vres. [197]
Although
it
was
acknowledged
at
the
fUnctions in the order of discourse'
time
that
'everything
[198], it was also said
that the Radio Alice broadcasts could indicate the
the uncanny,
the 'uns ta ted "
'silence,
tha t which remains to be said',
which 'frightens.' [199]
By the practice of the Dadaist abandon it effected, Radio
Alice asserted:
'The practice of happiness is subversive when
it becomes collective'
means
to brea the
[200], and declared that 'To conspire
toge ther. ' [201]
Thus Radio Alice and
the
Autonomists in general used the tactics of the avant-garde in a
rejection of
'L et ' s not
discourse about
liberation
talk about desires anymore,
for
its
practice.
let's desire:
we are
deSiring machines, machines of war.' [202] This point was taken
to
an
extreme
when
Torealta
ended
his
discussion
of
the
366
Metropolitan Indians with the statement:
to
do
before
concluding
is
finally
'What is left for us
to
forget
about
the
Metropolitan Indians and once again prevent a Movement from
becoming a
fetish..
'[203].
Discussion of
the
phenomenon
subjects it to the confines and constraints of discourse: this
was the point made by Dada's dissolution of itself in 1921 and
echoed in the 'death of Provo' in 1967.
Nevertheless, it seems that such critiques must enter into
discourse
in
order
to
be
useful
to
subsequent
critical
movements: it will be recalled that the Situationists' central
criticism of Dada was its failure to acknowledge its historical
precursors.
Moreover,
the
Situationists
recognised
that
critical tactics are developed within the totality they wish to
negate
and
are,
as
a
discourse.
Thus
Radio
subversion of its medium.
consequence,
always
Alice
simultaneous
was
a
already
within
use
and
For the Situationists, this is not
the impasse, but the promise of criticism:
it must proceed as
a constant engagement in and subversion of discourse at one and
the same time.
Buy now while stocks last
Some
of
became
those
familiar
involved with
with
Situationist
the Angry
Brigade.
ideas
They
series of bombings in the late 1960s and early
in
Britain
engaged
1970s, and
in
a
had
a grasp of the tactical exigences of its project which betrayed
367
the Situationist influence. Although Debord had warned against
the spectacular characteristics of terrorism, the Angry Brigade
tried to promote a sense of anonymity and ubiquity which earned
them an inflated
notoriety and long prison sentences. Their
targets were symbolic and usually had some specific relevence:
The Minister of Employment, Robert Carr, had his house bombed
during
a
strike
and
demonstrations
against
the
Industrial
Relations Bill; Bryant's home was bombed during the builder's
strike in 1971;
1970.
and the Miss World contest was attacked in
The maj ori ty of a t tacks claimed by the Angry Brigade
involved only the destruction of property.
Many of the Angry Brigade's communiqu~s
national
newspapers.
All
explained
the
were published in
reasons
behind
the
group's actions and advocated the destruction of the mechanisms
of control:
'To believe that OUR struggle could be restricted
to the channels provided to us by the pigs, WAS THE GREATEST
CON.
And
we
started
hitting
them. '
[204]
A
.
communl.que
/
cOinciding wi th the bombing of the Biba boutique in Chelsea
read:
"If you're not busy being born you're busy buying" •••
The future is ours.
Life is so boring there is nothing to do except spend
all our wages on the latest skirt or shirt.
Brothers and Sisters, what are your real desires?
Sit in the drugstore, look distant, empty, bored,
drinking some tasteless coffee? Or perhaps BLOW IT UP
OR BURN IT DOWN. [205]
.
The Brigade's critique of capitalist society had much incommon
with the Situationists. 'We build the prisons and then we live
in them. We produce shi t and then we eat it.'
[206]
Agains t
all external controls and structures, they put their faith in
the 'autonomous working class' and propagandised in favour of
368
immediate action and the
The
realisation of desires.
Brigade's efficiency meant
that
they were
Angry
taken seriously by
In the Times, it was reported:
the establishment.
Scotland Yard and security officials are becoming
increasingly
embarrassed
and
annoyed
by
the
activities of the Angry Brigade, who cannot now be
dismissed as a group of cranks. Some senior officers
credit the group with a degree of professional skill
that has seldom been experienced. [207]
An
editorial
in
revolution
the
Evening
creeping
across
Standard,
Bri tain ' ,
'The
red
badge
declared:
of
'These
guerrillas are the violent activists of a revolution comprising
workers,
students,
teachers,
angry •••
[208] For their own part, the Brigade cultivated an
of
a
large,
dissenters:
They
diffuse,
'The AB is
have guns
in
for
homosexuals,
and
image
striving
unionists,
unemployed
'
women
trade
and
liberation.
unidentifiable
They
are
collection
all
of
the man or woman sitting next to you.
their pockets and anger in their minds.'
[209]
Now we are too many to know each other.
Yet we recognise all those charged with crimes
agains t property as our brothers and sis ters. The
Stoke-Newington
6,
the
political
prisoners
in
Northern Ireland are all prisoners of the class war.
We are not in a posi tion to say whether anyone
person is or isn't a member of the Brigade. All we
say is: the Brigade is everywhere •••
Let ten men and women meet who are resolved on the
lightning of violence rather than the long agony of
survival; from this moment despair ends and tactics
begin. [210]
The
idea
of
a
ubiquitous
effective
in
that
'members'
and gave the impression to the authorities that the
it
allowed
but
unidentifiable
anyone
to
threat
consider
was
themselves
capture of a few individuals would do little to undermine the
Brigade:
'THEY COULD NOT JAIL US FOR WE DID NOT EXIST'[211].
Lending some support to this notion,
the head of the
Woolwich
369
Arsenal
Laboratories
claimed
that,
in
addition
to
the
25
incidents for which Brigade members were tried, more than 1,000
bombings had passed through his
laboratory between 1968 and
mid-1971.
The Angry Brigade's tactics were clearly designed to avoid
the spectacularisation and hierarchy normally associated with
terrorist activities. Their dissemination of a name which could
be adopted by anyone meant that the origin of their activities
was
difficult
the
Situationist
declaration: 'Our ideas are in everyone's minds.'
This tactic
found
its
to
way
trace
into
and
propogated
contemporary
cultural
movements
too:
'multiple names', the idea that 'a single name should be used
by a group of individuals, several magazines or music groups'
[212] was popularised by the British group BLITZ INFORMATION in
the mid-1970s;
they
invited to 'become Klaos Oldanburg'. In
America, the name Monty Cantsin was launched as an 'open popstar'; more recently, the names Karen Eliot, Mario Rossi, and
Bob
Jones
have
been
put
into
circulation
'as
a
means
of
subverting the star-system and questioning bourgeois notions of
identity.'
[213]
The leaf le t which launched the name Karen
Eliot declared:
Anyone can become Karen Eliot simply by adopting the
name, but they are only Karen Eliot for the period in
which they adopt the name ••• When one becomes Karen
Eliot one's previous existence consists of the acts
other people have undertaken using the name. [214]
The experiment has also been carried into pUblishing: Smile has
been adopted as a multiple name for magazines in a number of
European and American cities.
370
The influence of Dada, Surrealism, and
is clear
throughout
accompanying
the
1987,
Eliot
Karen
the mul tiple name
'Desire
In Ruins'
advocated
the Situationists
conspiracy.
In
notes
ins talla tion in Glasgow,
plagiarism
in
the
Dadaist
tradition.
Given the total colonisation of daily life by
Capital, we are forced to speak the received language
of the media ••• we aim to re-invent the language of
those who would control us. While we refute the
concept of
'originali ty' ,
we do not find
it
problema tic tha t the idea of plagiarism implies an
original. Although we believe all 'human creativity'
is accumulative ( ••• ), it does no t trouble us that
there is, in the pas t, a 'point of origin'... The
plagiarist ••• recognises the role the media plays in
masking the mechanisms of Power, and actively seeks
to disrupt this function. [215]
One edition of Smile declared itself an 'International Magazine
of Mul tiple Origins' and contained a devas ta ting cri tique of
the Situationists. In a total rejection of all the mediations
of
art,
culture,
imagination,
and
creativity,
the
paper
declared desire to be 'in ruins', and saw the Situationists as
recuperators of the immediacy of the moment.
It advocated a
nihilism close to that asserted by Baudrillard:
'the negative
power
of
the
mass,
of
their
slack,
of
the
refusal
of
creativity, threatens to pull down the moral isms on which all
separations
attitude and
are
built.'
that of
[216]
The
parallels
between
this
the poststructuralist philosophers are
made in the concluding chapters. It is a
nihilism which was
also present in the punk movement, in which the influence of
the Situationists in Britain was most clear.
An attack on the established values of music, culture, and
Society, punk provided a vehicle for the growing disaffection
of
the
post-sixties
which
shocked
the
British
public
and
371
es tablishmen t.
I ts of ten devas ta ting attacks on royalty,
the
culture industry, and the political authorities
made punk
potent
as
phenomenon.
safety-valve.
However,
Once used
to
it
also
operated
a
a
social
seeing people wi th pink Mohican
haircuts, the public became almost thankful that the rebellion
was not more intrusive.
In many respects, punk was a product of the Situationist
critique.
Two
graphic
artist,
Pistols,
were well-versed
involvement
,
of
with
its
and
leading
Malcolm
King
in
protagonists,
McClaren,
manager
Situationist
Mob,
Jamie
ideas.
of
Reid,
a
the
Sex
McClaren's
'pro-Situationist'
a
group
specialising in violence at the bus-shelter level' [217] whose
members
dispersed
into
the Angry
Brigade or what has
been
termed the 'sociological situationism' of the universities, had
made him aware of the problems associated with criticism and
recuperation. In 1968, Reid met McLaren.
'One thing I really
came to understand then along with Malcolm was how ideas get
disSipated and absorbed in England'
[218], he wrote.
Reid's
Suburban Press, six issues of which appeared in 1970, had 'a
shit-stirring
format,
with
thorough
poli tics and council corruption,
research
into
local
mixed wi th my graphics and
some Situationist texts.' [219]
My job, graphically, was to simplify a lot of the
political jargon, particularly that used by the
Si tua tionis ts. Far from being an obscure group in
the mid 1960s, by the time of the Paris riots in
1968 they had captured headlines around the world
and the imagination of a generation.[220]
MUch of punk continued the tradition in which the Situationists
had worked. Operating musically as art that could be made by
anYone, punk reestablished the Dadaist critique of culture and
372
broke down the distinctions between art and life. Its graphics,
for
which
Reid
d€tournement:
was
largely
responsible,
cut-up
newspaper
articles
were
and
those
of
parodies
of
official notices were 'turning the media back on itself'. [221]
Graphics
such as
those
in a
Belgian holiday brochure were
appropriated so that their cartoon characters no longer said
'Its Just
.
a short excursion to see won d er f u I historic cities ' ,
but
'A cheap holiday
in
either
peoples'
misery'.
When
the
Qetourned version of the material appeared on the sleeve of
liolidays in the Sun, the travel company sued and Reid had to
destroy the original.
Reid's
attack
on
the
culture
inspired
by
new
towns,
supermarkets, and superstars, was ingenious. Authentic looking
stickers reading were produced, reading: 'Buy now while stocks
last';
'This store will soon be closing owing to the pending
collapse of monopoly capitalism and the world wide exhaustion
of
,
raw
materials';
and
Lies', was stuck onto
Onto
vehicles;
and,
'This
store
newspapers;
during
the
welcomes
shoplifters'.
'Save petrol, burn cars'
miner's
strike,
sOmething for the miners' replaced 'Save It'.
'Switch
on
An apparently
official invitation to move to a new town declared: 'A New Town
like the Old Town - but NEW!'
New Towns are being built, in the middle of the
countryside, away from strikes, tenants committees,
claimants'
unions,
occupations,
shoplifters,
vandals, smog, dirt and noise. Away from all
distractions, so you can get on with the job. [222]
Conscious of the problem of recuperation, Reid made many of his
graphics refer to specific incidents or themes to prevent them
from becoming 'decor for trendy Lefties' bedrooms'. [223]
373
Punk was also a detournement of the culture industry and
an attack on the notions of originality, genius, and talent. It
emerged
out of a critique of the music industry's monopoly on
expression
the
through
over-production
of
'superstars'.
Informed by the Situationist critique of the star system, punk
spawned
a
generation
of
little
bands,
small
studios,
and
independent record companies, as well as some very big ones.
Nevertheless,
the
unknown author
of The
End of Music,
described punk as 'a bowdl erised realisation of Lautreamont's
maxim "Poetry made by all ••• '"
[224]
There was no desire to negate music ( ••• ) merely to
made it free, but leaving intact the antagonistic
structure which turns audience against performer,
creator against consumer and vice versa in a
relationship of near reciprocal alienation. [225]
the End of Music was equally damning in its attack on McLaren,
who:
had been friendly with individuals versed in the
Situationist critique in England and had picked up
some of the slogans and attidues of that milieu.
Realising nothing much was to be made through
revolutionary subversion... His shop 'Sex' was
opened up in King's Road, Chelsea which sold Tshirts on which were stencilled, 'Be reasonable
demand the impossible', which now meant, buy some of
my kinky gear ••• and help make me a rich man. [226]
The
text
alleged
Situationists'
extent
work;
that
McLaren
had
Stewart
Home,
however,
recuperated
the
emphasised
the
to which the movements grew concurrently.
Reid,
for
eXample, had provided the graphics for the 1974 edi tion of
Ch .
rlS topher Gray's Leaving the Twen tie th Century, the firs t
cOllection of Situationist texts to be published in English,
and
wrote that the use of 'The Nice Drawing' in both this book
and as
the sleeve of Satellite
'first made public the link
374
between the Sex Pistols and Situationism.' [227]
For The End
~f Music, however, the Situationist critique:
after being suitably doctored ••• could be used as a
force able to keep pop and music kicking as
pacification agent of the young proletariat both in
terms of channelling energy
into hierarchical
aspiration, fake liberation from drudgery and the
goal of a higher level of wage slavery with all its
alluring but alienated sexual appeal. [228]
It would seem that it is not a question of identifying who
stole which
ideas;
plagiarism.
It is
recuperation
is
not
to
be
equated with
the recuperation of dissent and effective
critique which is discernible in punk; the author of The End of
.Music argued that reggae is similarly guilty of lending the
SUpport of its radical sentiments to the record industry while
at
the
veneer
of
preserving
a
same
time
rebellion.
Nevertheless,
there
are
some
excellent
examples
of
the
recupera tion of Si tua tionis t ideas by the punk and pos t-punk
moghuls. For example, Tony Wilson's club, the Hayienda, opened
in Manches ter in 1982 as a
'disco,
videotheque,
and venue'
which aimed to 'restore a sense of place: "the Hac;.ienda must be
bUil t" .'
[229] Taken from Ch tcheglov' s cri tique of the ci ty,
the Ha~ienda does little to reassert or develop these ideas and
now forms an integral and unremarkable part of Manchester life.
Like the movements considered above, poststructuralism is
indebted to the critical and avant-garde traditions considered
in this text. However, it uses the tactics of these traditions
to entirely different ends:
implicit in poststructuralism is
the denial of the possibility of ascribing any aim, direction,
or
meaning to such tools. Poststructuralist analyses allege
the invalidi ty of history,
truth, and reali ty, and so render
375
the notions of critique and recuperation illegitimate. In so
dOing,
they lapse into a curious combination of nihilism and
positivism which, at the same time, bears all the hallmarks of
the
critical movements which preceded them. The use of tactics
intended for
the negation of
the whole in a context which
denies the possibility of intention, negation, or the social
totality,
constitutes
their
recuperation:
poststructuralism
places these tactics in a totally different context and employs
them against their purpose.
according
Nevertheless,
to
the
Si tua tionis ts,
the
recuperation of ideas, meanings, and practices in this way can
never
be
definitive.
cons id era tions
Surrealism
of
in
This
has
the survival
the
Dutch,
been
borne
out
in
the
and reemergence
of
Dada
and
Italian,
British,
and
Polish
movements. Similarly, no
ma t ter how orthodox and acceptable
both
become,
punk
and
reggae
the
potential
for
their
reclamation remains. Plans were laid in 1987 for a 'Reclaim the
Ha~ienda'
evening designed to reveal the origins of the club
and the sense of place it claimed as its purpose. Songs about
ghettos and police repression provide the background music in
many inner city areas and
DJs on pirate radio stations and in
dance halls use reggae to relay news and advice not accessible
to the authorities.
The limits of
recuperation are, moreover,
apparent
development
of
in
the
poststructuralism,
a
consideration of which shows that its use of the vocabulary of
Political and artistic critique continually draws its analyses
back into a context in which cri tique and recuperation are
meaningful terms.
376
5. Post-structuralism: Webs Without Spiders
'To each his own bubble: that is the law of today.'
(Baudrillard)
For
many
poststructuralist
writers,
contradictions
such
as
those between madness and sanity, alienation and authenticity,
, ideology
and
truth,
are
framed
in
terms
'always
already'
defined and constituted by the relations of power and knowledge
in
which
they
arise.
possibility
of
possibility
is
project
undermined
is
particular
unfounded,
to
it
presupposes
the
such
oppositions;
if
might
seem
critical
establishing
attention
theory
Critical
to ' the
point
the
of
work
of
that
the
collapse.
Michel
Foucault,
this
Paying
this
chapter identifies these problems as they arise in a number of
poststructuralis t
analyses,
appear
a definitive break with the
to
mark
and maintains
tha t
critical thought which preceded them, they merely
although they
traditions
of
develop, and
sometimes reiterate, problems and solutions which have appeared
throughout
the
various
Marxist
and
avant-garde
critiques
considered in this text. This position is confirmed with the
observation that the imperative to criticise, and so to develop
the foundations, reasons, and directions necessary to critical
thought, continually reemerge in even the most nihilistic forms
of poststructuralist analysis.
377
THE CHALLENGE OF NIHILISM
Poststructuralist thought marks the culmination of the critical
theories considered in this inquiry.
It postulates a framework
in which dialectical thought is no longer possible: a totality
so all encompassing that it must properly be seen as a web of
fragments without necessity or
determination. Social relations
can no longer be defined in terms of an hegemonous whole;
the
analysis of the totality must be superseded by the study of an
enormously
complex
series
of
specific
and
unpredictable
relations which manifest themselves throughout the social body.
Taken to this extreme, the notion of totali ty collapses upon
itself; the whole is nothing other than the sum of its parts,
and
it
is
therefore
in
terms
of
parts
that
social
and
discursive relations must be understood.
It is this collapse of the totality which informed many of
the theoretical debates surrounding the Italian events of 1977.
In
The
Social
Factory,
Negri
and
Tronti
redefined
the
pro le taria t as anyone oppressed by 'social capi tal', and the
factory as the whole of society. [1] This extension of Marxist
terminology
was
accomplished
through
the
analysis
of
the
muliplication of sites of oppression and resistance which was
said to entail
power.
the redundancy of any centralised notion of
In his discussion of the Autonomis t
identified
'the paradox of
movement,
a domination which is
Beradi
exercised
without any government, a controlling of the system which is
exercised
without
a
governing
of
precondition of political critique.
the
system'
[2J
as
the
The absence of coherence
378
and planning which this entails,
the s tra tegic
exercise of
and the tactical, rather than
power,
is
particularly strong
in
Foucault's work, which asserted that all meaning arises out of
the interplay of relations of power.
For Foucault, knowledge is impossible to develop, analyse,
or criticise
outside of these power relations.
Knowledge of
madness, for example, is exercised as power over the mad. It
defines
the
terms
in
which
madness
is
distinguished
from
reason, it identifies those who fulfil its criteria, and its
enforcement of control over them is
knowledge.
Likewise,
the particular mechanisms
power over the mad is exercised
this knowledge.
the enforcement of
Madnes s canno t
its
through which
generates the development of
be experienced,
spoken of other than in the terms of
this
thought,
interplay,
or
which
Foucault defines as the discourse of madness. Madness takes its
total meaning from within the relation of power and knowledge
which constitutes it, and to speak of madness at all is always
and necessarily to contribute to this discourse.
Moreover,
this
argument
entails
the
equation
of
the
reality of madness with its discourse, and means that an appeal
to an experience of madness which is silenced or concealed by
its discourse cannot be made, since the reality of madness is
entirely constituted by the relations of power and knowledge in
which
it
problems
has
for
arisen.
the
This
project
of
position
raises
criticism.
unprecedented
A critique
of
the
discourse of madness establishes a new discourse and merely
COntributes to the network of relations
receives its meaning and its reality.
in which
madness
The loss of any notion
379
of a pre- or nondiscursive reality in which criticism of the
discursive construction of madness can be grounded means that
the
critical
project
is
no
longer
engaged
in
a
logic
of
Contradiction with its object, but of identity.
Foucaul t
equated power with knowledge,
arguing tha tall
discourse is necessarily an imposition of power, so that the
process of naming is actually a production or creation of that
which is named. To bring experience into existence in this way
is to give it a discursive reality: only as an unnamed event or
experience can it truly be said to · be itself,
to be real or
authentic. And yet it is precisely in this state that it is
incapable of articulation: silent and unthought, the experience
has a reali ty which,
brought into discourse, is always known
as
dis tort ion , cons traint, or confinement
an interpretative
of some sort. Taken to its extreme in the work of Baudrillard,
this
thesis
discourse:
itself,
asserts
the
and
reali ty.
real
that
that
is
which
reality
is
entirely proscribed by
always,
therefore,
an alienation
of
it
alienated
from
no
is
can
have
The meaning which arises wi thin discourse is always
self-referential,
since
discourse
circumscribes
the
reality
Within which meaning can be given.
It is this assertion which has enabled poststructuralism
to
advance
the
thesis
that
legitimated
by
claims
to
express
authentici ty,
or
truth.
meaning,
affirma tive are
. productive
Purport
of
equally
the
critical
forms
reality
a
discourse
predisursive
The
cri tical
of discourse
they
analyse.
cannot
be
reality,
and
the
produced by
and
The
reality
they
to represent constantly eludes and slips from their
380
grasp.
Nevertheless,
poststructuralist
it
is
analyses,
also
almost
in
the
case
spite
of
that
the
themselves,
continued to assert that the traces of that which is silenced
and neglected,
echoes,
or
reality.
forgotten and
disruptive
This
denied by discourse remain
potentialities,
facilitated
their
within
attempt
as
discursive
to
construct
discourses which respect and attempt to convey these gaps and
deficiencies of discourse,
their own theses,
a goal which,
is self-defeating,
by the dictates of
since all discourse is
necessarily coercive of that which it names.
To
Contented
some
extent,
itself
with
therefore,
the
revelation
coercive nature of discourse:
COunter this.
poststructuralist
of
it exposed,
the
writing
intrinsically
but was unable to
But this poststructuralist project entails the
search for forms of experience and discourse which embody the
resis tance of
these
traces and gaps.
This search requires
Some notion of the nature of that which is denied by discourse:
in both Foucault and Deleuze, for example, this is defined as
the specificity and immediacy of the event.
Such a
definition
of
the
real
which
is
already
in
COntradiction to the basic thesis that the real is impossible
to name - entails the evaluation of discourse on the basis of
the extent to which it respects or denies the reality
of the
traces which remain. Foucault opposes his 'genealogy', Kristeva
her 'semiotic', and Deleuze the notion of 'nomadology', to the
unifications of theory, on the grounds that theory involves the
covert exercise of power on that which it names. The multiple,
discontinuous,
and decentred forms
of
thinking developed by
381
Deleuze and
their
Foucault remain coercive and interpretative,
recognition
exercise
of
power
of
the
inevitability
renders
of
discourse
them subversive of
the
as
but
an
prevailing
forms of totalising theory.
The
pos ts tructuralis t
account
of
the
ubiqui ty
and
inevitability of domination and alienation has its precedent in
LUkacs' early assertion that alienation is necessary regardless
of the nature of the social system. The consequence of this was
that alienation is not specific to capitalism but a feature of
all social relations.
same inevitability:
In Marcuse' s work,
repression bore
the
again, it is not specific to capitalism,
but a necessary feature of social life. In the discussions of
these analyses
above,
it was maintained
tha t
the
impasse
to
which each leads must ultimately be refused if criticism is to
be
possible.
postulation
produces
Neverthless,
of
an
was
also
asserted
that
all-encompassing
and
ubiquitous
obstacle
and
analyses
it
techniques
which
can
the
facilitate
identification and criticism of a specific form of social and
discursive
relations.
A similar
posi tion
is
adopted
in
the
following discussions of poststructuralism. Paradoxically, the
assertion of a framework within which criticism is impossible
can be used to the benefit of the critical project.
The
loses
its
possibility
of
paradoxical
using
fa~ade
POststructuralist analyses,
poststructuralism
when
it
is
in
this
way
realised
that
the
in spite of their professed break
with the critical tradition, are merely developments within it.
The
possibili ty
Posed
by
the
of
passing
though
the
Si tuationist
analysis
of
impasse
the
of
cri ticism
spectacle
is
as
382
applicable
to
poststructuralism
as
it
is
to
the
forms
of
Marxist and avant-garde critique considered above. In each of
these traditions, it is the dialectical nature of thought - the
identification
and
supersession
of
contradictions
which
produces the impasse of the impossibility of criticism. But it
is also this dialectic which enables it to develop the means of
reestablishing negation and contradiction, and so entails the
reassertion of the possibility of criticism.
reached
this
impasse
of
criticism
Poststructuralism
through
a
systematic
destruction of the means by which it might escape it, robbing
its analyses of any possibili ty of judging,
cri ticising,
or
negating that which exists. Tactics designed to these last ends
were
therefore
legi timacy.
used
by
Indeed, it
poststructuralism
to
is maintained that
deny
their
the Si tua tionis t
theses anticipated those developed by poststructuralism to such
an extent
perhaps
that
even
the latter can be seen as
recuperating,
and
plagiarising,
analyses
the
Situationist
and
critical tradition in which they were developed.
Nevertheless,
the
return
to
Nietzsche
and
the
anti-
dialectical nature of the poststructuralist analysis renders it
fundamentally opposed to this tradi tion.
Whils t there are a
host of
the two movements,
superficial
similarities
between
the nihilism of poststructuralism shows that its use of avantgarde
tactics
and
Situationist
theory
is
made
in
quite
a
different context. Many poststructuralist writers invoked the
Nietzschean concept of the will to power in their analyses of
philosophical discourse and poli tical cri tique.
eXample,
endorsed
a
form
of
'active
Lyotard,
nihilism'
as
for
the
383
reconstitution of the critical project: 'Push decadence further
still and accept, for instance, to destroy the belief in truth
under all its forms.' [3J
The
Situationist attitude to such nihilism was clear in
Vaneigem's
paraphrase of de Sade' s Republican declaration:
'Nihilists:
one
effort
more
if
you
are
to
become
revolutionaries!' Vaneigem accepted the distinction between the
passive nihilism of despair and hopelessness, and the active
nihilism advocated by Lyotard. But in his characterisation of
passive
its
nihilism as
form
active
counterrevolutionary,
as
prerevolutionary:
Vaneigem defined
its
resistance
is
active, but divorced from the past from which it has developed,
the direction in which it moves, and the meanings it invokes in
its support.
For the Situationists,
the Nietzschean will
to
power:
is the project of self-realisation falsified
divorced from communication and participation. It is
the passion for creation, for self-creation, caught
up in the hierarchical system, condemned to the mill
of
repression
and
appearances.
Prestige
and
humiliation, authority and submission: the only
music to which the will to power can dance. [4J
In
a
critique
poststructuralism,
,cr~" t~cises
process',
which
which
Vaneigem
entirely
is
maintains
appropriate
that
active
to
nihilism
the causes of disintegration by speeding up the
and must be
'combines
transcended in favour
consciousness
of
past
of a discourse
renunciations
with
a
historical consciousness of decomposi tion.'
[5] For Vaneigem,
the weakness
to appreciate
of Dada
lay in its
failure
the
history of nihilism in which it worked and the need to develop
tactics to avoid the fate met by previous nihilist critiques.
384
Lemert and Gilman made a similar critique of Foucault.
They suggested that there are three notions he would wish to
reject but cannot do without, since he is 'up against problems
in contemporary social
theory:
the status of
the social
in
social history, the role of subjects in historical action, and
the
place
of
rationality
in
Commending Foucault' s attempt
revolutionary
politics'.
[6]
'to dismantle and decentralise
the false unity of power; to struggle against the localisation
of power in techniques and tactics', they observed that 'behind
this struggle there is no conception of a social rationality in
which politics would become more than an act of negation.' [7]
Can a critical perspective be introduced into
political practice solely through the field made
available by a history of dispersed events and
radical transformation$? Does not a critical theory
of history demand an analysis of interests operating
in history? Is it possible to speak of a politics of
freedom without a
theory of
the subject as
constituted in its historical self-formation through
freedom? [8]
Lemert and Gilman suggested that these are 'hard questions' to
which
'Foucault
discussions
gives
which
only
ambiguous
follow,
it
is
answers'
[9].
In
maintained
that
the
these
difficulties and ambiguities are due to the Nietzschean context
in which Foucault and other poststructuralist writers worked; a
return to the dialectical thought inherent in the Situationist
notion
of
the
spectacle
as
the
inversion
of
historical
consciousness may give the questions and answers an ease and
clarity which they otherwise lack.
The poststructuralists were
greatly, influenced by
of 1968 and
the
events
artistic and social critique which emerged
in which each of
forms
of
at this time. While
they placed these ideas in a context which denied
project
the
the critical
these traditions was engaged,
the
385
influence of these movements on the poststructuralists means
that the possibility of criticism continually reasserts itself
throughout their work.
The impact of the May events
The
poststructuralist
and
theory
must
be
distrust of the authority of discourse
understood
in
relation
authoritarian nature of the May events.
The
to
the
claim that
antithere
'- is no undistorted, unalienated, or revealed truth, developed
from
the
Leaders,
was
1968
cri tique of all
manifestations
of
authority.
specialists and experts, and all those whose power
legitimated
rejected.
on
the
basis
that
they
'knew best',
were
Areas in which power was exercised with a subtlety
which had hi therto concealed it were exposed, resul ting in a
proliferation of forms of resistance.
As Gordon has noted, it
Was
facilitated
this
practical
critique
which
Foucault's
analyses of power.
The waves of new forms of working-class revolt
(factory
occupation,
sequestrations
of bosses,
'popular justice') and the dispersed struggles in a
whole
range
of
social
institutions
(housing,
schools, prisons, asylums, hospitals, the army,
social workers, magistrates and lawyers ••• ) made the
exis ting social forms of the exercise of power •••
increasingly visible.[10]
This proliferation of areas and forms of resistance in the May
events was transferred into the discursive realm as a challenge
to the
though t.
orthodox
ca tegories
The s tric t
of
delineations
philosophical and
be tween
forms
poli tical
of cri ticism
386
were
thrown
into
question
Surrealist techniques,
by
the
example
of
the
use
of
for example, in political critique.
The ability of forms of theoretisation and organisation to
legislate on behalf of critical thought was rejected by many of
the
poststructuralists,
philosophers'
such
as
as
well
as
some
of
the
'new
Glucksmann.
The
latter,
for
example,
criticised the paternal authority of the 'master thinkers' such
as
Hegel,
who
'have
never
given
us
anything
but
delicate,
Subtle, and interminable observations from the point of view of
the dominator; in their eyes, the dominated, trapped in their
particularity,
received
a
have
succinct
.tostmodern Condition
no
point
of
view. '[11]
This
appraisal
in
Lyotard's
report
is
a critique of
narratives' of, for example, Marxism and
Like Foucault,
events
rebellion
on
The
the master or
'meta-
Freudianism.
[12]
Lyotard, who had been active in the May
and a member of
considered such bodies
Socialisme ou Barbarie with Cardan,
of
theory
to
assert an
illegi tima te
truth value. Other forms of narrative, such as fairy stories
and folktales,
are prefaced and
legi timised by a spoken or
implied 'once upon a time': they are self-validating. That
it
happened
who
heard
'once upon a time',
it
pretention
from
to
y'
is
or was
sufficient
what Lyotard or
'told to me by X,
validation;
Foucaul t
there
would wish
is
to
no
call
prediscursive truth. The claim to truth is seen to occur within
the
discourse.
totalising
In
theory,
the
case
however,
of
an
bodies
appeal
is
of
scientific
made
to
or
reason,
dialectic, and truth as the transcendental values by which they
are judged. For Lyotard, such claims to legitimation belie the
387
essentially story-telling nature of scientific discourse; it is
merely
a
narrative
elevated
to
the
status
of
objectivity.
Reason too is self-validating but, unlike the folktale, refuses
to preface itself with a 'once upon a time' or 'as told to me
by ••• ' condi tion.
In other words, it conceals the discursive
nature of its conceptualisations and methodological conditions.
Emerging from the events of 1968,
criticisms
of
the
'totalitarianism'
such theses extended
of
the
theories
and
practices of the state, the party, unions, and the university,
into
critique
structures
which
the
res is tance of particular experiences or desires arises.
In
a
of
unifying
all
to
1973, Deleuze declared: 'the problem for revolutionaries today
is
to
uni te wi thin
the
purpose
without
falling
into
the
of
the particular
despotic
and
struggle
bureaucratic
organisations of the party or state apparatus' [13], a trap to
which he opposed the freedom of a 'deterritorialised' thought
of the sort developed by Nietzsche, whose discourse is 'above
all nomadic; its statements can be conceived as the products of
a mobile war machine
and not
administrative
machinery,
bureaucrats
pure
of
the utterances
whose
reason. '[14]
of a
philosophers
Nietzsche,
rational
would
wrote
be
Deleuze,
,made thought ~nto
. a machine of war - a battering ram - into a
nomadic force' [15].
own
genealogy
and
It is this force which Foucault, with his
transgressive
knowledge,
invoked
in
his
analyses.
Foucault's
the basis
resistance.
of
criticism of
the
totalising thought was made on
essential irreducibility but impotence
of
Discourse should engage in a constant exposure of
388
the inevitability of its imposition of power, such that its own
domination
is
overtly
exercised.
This
exposure
of
covert
relations of power constitutes a subversion of the discourse in
which it remains concealed.
Totalising
theory,
some prediscursive truth claim, is accused of
dependent
on
solidifying and
petrifying the essential dynamism and flux of power relations,
a
position
which
enabled
Foucault
to
distinguish
between
different forms of discourse on the basis of their affinity or
otherwise with this dynamic flux.
Those which construct grand
theories were said to impose a unitary and static framework on
an otherwise dynamic and multiple network of relations.
discussion
of
Deleuze,
Foucault
argued
that
In a
dialectical
thought entails such an imposition.
Dialectic
does
not
liberate
differences;
it
guarantees, on the contrary, that they can always be
recaptured.
The
dialectical
sovereignty
of
similarity consists in permitting differences to
exist, but always under the rule of the negative, or
as an instance of non-being.
[16]
FOUcault also asserted
that the tendency to totalise prevails
in the existing arrangement of this network and dominates and
preconditions
conflicts,
the
play
of
differences,
power
relations.
anomalies,
and
Faced
with
contradictions,
dialectical thought gathers them into a unified totality and
denies
essential
dynamism
of
the
relations
of
power
and
knowledge.
In its analyses of particular issues, local conflicts, and
specific
events, dialectical thought evades the 'always open
and hazardous reality of conflict'
[17],
denying
divisions
and differences any intrinsic intelligibility other than that
they assume in the context of the whole. Analysis, according to
389
Foucault, should not construct totalising theories, but concern
itself with specific mechanisms
of a s tra tegic knowledge.
local
manifestations,
of power, and the construction
Power mus t
since
it
is
be unders tood in its
in
the
diversity
and
specificity of particular power relations that the dynamism and
discontinuity of what is theorised as a social whole can be
understood. The intellectual should no longer be seen as the
bearer of
truth,
rationality and justice;
after 1968, wrote
Foucault:
the intellectual discovered that the masses no
longer need him to gain knowledge: they know
perfectly well, without illusion; they know-rar
be t ter than he and they are certainly capable of
expressing themselves. But there exists a system of
power which blocks, prohibits, and invalidates this
discourse ••• Intellectuals are themselves agents of
this system of power. [18]
This sort of understanding was developed by Foucault and other
poststructuralist writers in a response to the debilitating and
reactionary role assumed by PCF intellectuals in the events of
1968.
Foucaul t
fundamentally
claimed
that
illegitimate.
this
The
everyday life are denied by the
vanguardis t
specific
intellectuals~
role
was
experiences
of
imposition of a
totalising perspective which interprets everything in terms of
the social whole and, for Foucault,
'''The whole of society" is
precisely
that
not
be
Some thing
to
[19]
The
which
should
be des troyed.'
considered
except
as
'reality'
which
the
intellectual claims to reach on behalf of 'the masses' has no
prediscursive meaning and is constructed rather than revealed
by those who claim theoretical superiority.
In his theoretisation of the unconscious as a fluid and
dYnamic realm structured like a language rather than a constant
390
vessel, Lacan developed the notion of an absent reality. With
coherent social critique thrown into crisis by doubts about the
possibility
of
understanding
reality
without
distorting
or
imposing theory upon it,
one of the dominant influences in
intellectual
aftermath
life
in
the
of
the
May
events
psychoanalysis,
an interes t
spawned by Marcuse' s
encouraged
by
the
Lacan.
Marcusean
emphasis
sanctity
of
the
offering
a
more
work
on
human
of
the
Turkle has observed,
with
the
of
and
the
many
political conception
theses and
Disillusioned
necessity
subject,
was
repression
saw
of
Lacan's
analyses
psychoanalysis.
As
'involvement with the new psychoanalytic
CUlture was a way of continuing contact with the personal and
Political issues which May 1968 brought to the surface.' [20]
The explosion of interest in psychoanalysis after
1968 was foreshadowed by many of the May slogans and
graffi ti,
which expressed the desire to get close
to
immediate experience and emotion and to break
down the boundaries between
reali ty and fantasy,
the rational and the irrational. [21]
This
imperative
can
be
seen
in
the
POststructuralist writers, many of whom
works of Lacan and Derrida,
notion of
which
work
of
a
number
of
were prefigured by the
challenge
the humanis t
the subject
and the prediscursive conception of
reality presupposed by
Marx and Freud. Both Lacan and Derrida
emphasised language as the realm in which all truth, reality,
and subjectivity is constituted such that the possibility of
meaning outside or prior to discourse is precluded. A brief
consideration of Lacan's work makes this position clear.
Deleuze,
those who
Gua t tari,
developed
orders of 'reality'.
Irigara y
and Kris teva are amongs t
the Lacanian identification of
One of these orders
three
necessarily remains
391
out of the reach of consciousness and meaning; beyond this, the
'symbolic'
order,
into
which
the
infant
enters
with
the
acquisition of language and the use of symbols, is opposed to
the realm of the 'imaginary', in which the object and the word
exis t
in a fused,
but false and alienated uni ty. Nei ther of
these
realms
can
be considered
an
order
symbolic
is
in
to
which
be
'real',
symbols
although
intervene
the
between
experience and reality and remove i t s till further from the
imaginary.
In contrast to the Freudian opposition between the reality
principle and the pleasure principle, Lacan's duality does not
identify the imaginary as
the reali ty or authentic realm of
desire.
and
Psychoanalysis,
still
less
political
change,
cannot therefore be considered to be a return of the repressed
in
any
sense,
authentic
than
the
repressed
imaginary
is
no
more
dominant
symbolic.
However,
Lacan
could
since
the
still posit a notion of the real which persists as an absence,
that which is always sought but impossible to
articulate: a
reality which we 'can never know'. [22]
Trying to describe the real in words is itself a
paradox because definitionally the real lies beyond
language. It is defined within the linguistic system
as something beyond and outside of it. I t is the
precategorical and the prescientific, the reality
that we must assume even though we can never know
it. [23]
This
position
has
received
a
interpretations,
most
of
assert
escape
structures
from
the
which
of
the
plethora
that
symbolic
of
different
the
definitive
sought
by
the
revolutionaries of May 1968 is ultimately impossible, so that
there is no
i beach
under the cobbles tones' •
For Levy,
for
392
example,
such an escape is possible only for the individual
entering into the 'presymbolism' of psychosis. Others, such as
Kristeva, used the linguistic nature of Lacan's symbolic realm
to
posi t
the
opposi tion
of
the
semiotic,
which
is
'chronologically anterior and syntachronically transversal to
sign, syntax, denotation, and signification.' [24]
Guattari, and Irigaray
the
possibility
of
Deleuze,
considered Lacan's thesis to introduce
what
Turkle
described
as
a
'political
naturalism', in which the flux of the unsocialised individual
aSSumes a privileged political position.
The Situationist debt to the avant-garde is obvious. Its
tactics
of
the
ca tegorisa tion;
most
derive,
and
resistance
its attempts to turn power on itself,
importantly,
tactical
detournement,
its
struggle
recognition
against
of
the
recuperation,
and,
necessity
were
all
to
of
a
lessons
learned from Dada and Surrealism.
The emphasis on desire and
creativity
avant-garde
and
the
emergence
of
techniques
as
Political practices during the events of 1968 also had a great
influence
on
the
LYotard considered
pos ts truc turalis t
wri ters
considered here.
that
of 1968
showed that art
the events
must:
come out of the museum and suppress itself as art
and as a leisure activity directed to people who are
exhausted by alienation. And its coming out would be
a transgression. If you start building mobiles and
variable volumes, digging trenches or covering
advertising pos ters wi th colour in the middle of
town, you are patently transgressing the order of
the
institution
and
exposing
its
repressive
character. [25]
In terms borrowed from the Situationist vocabulary, he asserted
that
this
last
practice
shows
that
'the
poster
which
was
393
benignantly inviting us to phantasise was but a pseudo-phantasy
regulated by the system, and that whoever wants to depart from
the rule is rejected.' [26]
In
poststructuralist
terms,
as
or
defined
deconstruction
this
sort
of
practice
is
demystification.
These
are
methods practised freely in poststructuralism:
of
the precondi tions
categorisation;
the
of cri ticism;
the
disintegration
separation
of
similarities;
evidence,
can
all
be
and
seen
the
as
the
of
the genealogy
nomad's refusal
of
unities
the
collage
of
same
and
historical
techniques
of
deconstruction as those effected by the Oadaists, Surrealists,
and Situationists.
Lyotard's concern with the avant-garde was encouraged by
the forms
of poli tical practice which emerged in 1968. Like
both Oada and Surrealism, he criticised the separation of art
and political critique and lamented the existence of a separate
realm
in
which
art
proceeds
distinct
from
everyday
life.
Lyotard shared the Situationist vocabulary of recuperation in
his rej ec tion of this separation, for which he held
'Marxis t
iialectics considered as a religious like ideology' responsible.
It was as a result of the
rejection of this ideology,
'that
practices which are much more closely related to the acivity of
the
"artist"
tradi tional
than
they
are
to
political
sense began
to
develop as
activities
soon as
May
in
the
1968
in
France and have been adopted by movements such as the German
SOS.' [27]
It is absolutely obvious today, and has been for
quite
some
time
that,
for
one
thing,
the
reconstitution
of
traditional
political
organisations, even if they present themselves as
ultra-leftist organisations, even if they present
394
themselves as ul tra-leftis t organisations is bound
to fail, for these settle precisell into the order
of the social surface, they are 'recovered", they
perpetuate the type of activity the system has
instituted as political,
they are necessarily
alienated, ineffective...
"avant-garde" research,
etc., actually make up the only type of activity
that
is
effective,
this
because
it
is
fUnctionally ••• located outside the system; and, by
definition,
its
function
is
to
deconstruct
everything that belongs to order, to show that all
this "order" conceals something else, that it
represses. [28]
This
tribute
suggested
that
the
practices
the
avant-garde
developed in its critique of art are entirely appropriate to
the critique of a system of power relations.
Moreover, Lyotard
considered that it is only in this context that they can resist
recuperation by this system.
'Avant-garde' he defined as
'an
antidotal word coined by the spirit of capitalism that enables
it to recuperate any isolation.' [29]
This continuity between poststructuralism and the avantgarde awareness
of
the
condi tions
of
cri ticism reveals
the
impact of the May events on subsequent French philosophy. With
Foucault
too, avant-garde tactics were used assiduously:
both
he and his work made every effort to resist definition and
categorisation
resist
and
within
expose
the
existing
discourse.
domination
of
This
discourse
attempt
to
constituted
Foucault's struggle to divert the recuperation of his analyses.
Unlike many French intellectuals,
attempts
to
publicise his
life;
Foucault resisted all
poli tically,
he
concerned
himself with a number of left wing causes whilst refusing any
alignment.
I think I have in fact been situated in most of the
squares on the political checkerboard, one after
another and sometimes simultaneously: as anarchist,
leftist,
ostentatious
or
disguised
Marxist,
nihilist,
exp ' licit
or
secret
anti-Marxist,
395
technocrat in the service of Gaullism, new liberal,
etc... None of these descriptions is important by
itself; taken together, on the other hand, they mean
something. And I must admit that I rather like what
they mean. [30]
This resistance to identification was intended to preserve
the
essential mul tiplici ty and diversi ty of his work and ensure
that
it could never be entirely circumscribed by a particular
style, school, or movement.
This tactical awareness was also present
in
Foucault's
inconsistency, his unique approach to historical evidence, the
montage and collage of information and speculation he employed,
and
his
refusal
of
the
constraints
epistemological convention.
of
methodological
In all these respects,
and
Foucaul t
Was anticipated in the approaches practiced and theorised by
Dada,
Surrealism,
the
and
Situationists.
Moreover
the
Vocabulary he adopted was rooted in political and avant-garde
critique: for example, sabotage, resistance, struggle, and the
tactics of the guerrilla,
Foucault's
work
and
are all terms which recur throughout
that
of
other
poststruturalists.
The
rejection of authority displayed here was a direct response to
the May events of 1968.
The challenge to dialectical thought
mounted by Deleuze's nomadology and
'drifting'
thought,
r~volutionary
Lyotard's assertion of a
carried the Situationist derive and the
barricade into theoretical discourse.
For Baudrillard, even
the search for
the 1968 events brings them under the
such lessons from
imposition of meaning:
to analyse the events is to seek depths and truths which are
Ultimately impossible to grasp. Baudrillard suggested that the
essential achievement of 1968 was
the impossibili ty of ever
396
discovering its
'true meaning':
it was,
qui te li terally,
an
eVent without consequence.
May '68 was an illogical event, irreducible to
simulation, one which had no status other than that
of coming from someplace else
a kind of pure
object or event. Its strangeness derives from a
logic of our
own system, but not from its own
history •••
May '68 is an event which it has been
impossible to rationalise or exploi t, from which
nothing
has
been
concluded.
It
remains
indecipherable. [31]
For Baudrillard, this indecipherability, the way in which the
events
constantly
elude
the
recuperation
of
interpretation,
means that 1968 remains free from the domination of meaning.
But it also implies that the revolution was 'the forerunner of
nothing'
[32],
and
can
be
neither
criticised
nor
affirmed
without being subject to some manipulation or distortion.
Each
of
these
interpretations
marks
a
return
problems wi th which both the avant-garde and Marxis t
to
the
thought
have been engaged. The problem of a dominant ideology and
an
all-encompassing alienation faced wi thin Marxism and cri tical
theory, and the dilemma of suicide or silence posed by Dada,
tackled by Surrealism, and brought into the political realm by
the Situationists, are all placed in philosophical thought with
the poststructuralist project.
397
FOUCAULT: POWER AND KNOWLEDGE
Foucault's
thesis
recuperation.
itself as
entails
the
redundancy
the
notion
of
It is no longer the case that criticism asserts
the negation of its object and
integration
of
or
recuperation
within
it.
is
then subject to
Rather,
criticism
arises in an internal rela tion to the discourse it addresses
and
is
always
constituted
Nevertheless,
Foucault's
cri tical or otherwise,
or
claim
is
preconditioned
that
all
caught in an
by
its
object.
discourse,
whether
internal relation
to
itself, can be used to facilitate the sort of awareness of the
problems and conditions of criticism advocated throughout this
inquiry.
Indeed,
Foucaul t
intended his own
Power
have
critical
function
to
condi tions.
relation
a
His was a
to
resistance
in
'genealogy' of
relation
to
cri tique which recognised its
its
object
and
sought
from
this
internal
identification
of
a
criticism and
the
possibility of
framework
means
or
internal
tactics
perspective.
which
these
of
Foucault's
precludes
dialectical
negation did not
therefore
prevent him from developing an analysis of the possibilities of
tactical
resistance
possibility
in
reintroduction
all
of
and
struggle.
The
poststructuralist
some
notion
of
appearance
thought
critical
of
this
entails
the
thought
and
the
meaning,
and
necessity for an analysis of its recuperation.
Foucault
reality,
are
argued
that
historical
knowledge,
constructions
truth,
which
have
no
status
Outside of this history. This history is not dialectical in the
sense identified by critical theory, but the development of a
398
discontinuous and diverse network of relations of knowledge and
power, in which meaning
is the product not of a teleological
development according to a single determining principle, but of
a
plethora
power.
of
diverse,
Like
discourse
the
of
and
often
conflicting
Si tua tionists,
existing
society
historical contingency.
relations
Foucaul t
cri ticised
its
of
for
denial
its
of
the
own
But he extended this critique to the
discourse of critical theory itself, on the grounds that it too
denies the historical constitution of its conceptualisations.
Foucault argued that an unprecedented level of concealment
and denial distinguishes the power relations that constitute
eXisting
society
discourse
and
from
their
earlier
manifestations. Power is no longer the obvious prerogative of a
central source, but is disseminated throughout the social body
and
exercised
Because
every
over
power
area
of
actually
produces
this
dissemination
multiplied
with
discursive
relations
are
these
so
characterised
life and
thought.
areas,
they
are
that
social
and
levels
of
by
new
discontinuity and fragmentation.
This perspective extended to a critique of the discourse
which sets itself up in opposition to this reality as a whole.
As
it developed wi thin
discourse has
totality;
a
intended
whole
the Marxis t
the
based
on
tradi tion,
cri tical negation
the
system
of
revolutionary
of
domination,
with the implication that it
instrument
of
liberation.
Foucault
social
production
analyses all social phenomenon in terms of this
This f acili ta tes its cri tique of reason as
the
and
foundation.
an ins trument of
could be used as an
argued
that
such
an
399
assertion is dependent on the possibility of the existence of a
pre- or nondiscursive notion of that which is to be liberated:
an individual, a class, or a realm which is antagonistic to the
dominant form of reason in which it arises.
are constructed in
That these notions
the interplay of relations
of power and
knowledge is constantly denied in critical discourse. Foucault
therefore considered his own work to be a resistance
transgression
connection
of the
taboo imposed on
to or
the intimacy of
the
between relations of power and forms of knowledge.
On these grounds, Foucault rejected the notions of meaning
and history inherent in both structuralism and Marxist critical
theory, introducing a measure of unpredictabili ty
In his critique of Marxism,
into each.
Foucault did not deny that history
is determined by ma terial development,
but argued tha t
this
determination coexists with a plurality of influences and often
unpredictable
factors.
Relations
of
power
arise
within
and
constitute all areas of human life; those inherent in relations
of production are merely one manifes ta tion of
the relations
which constitute social and discursive relations as a whole.
This
thesis
did
not,
however,
prevent
Foucault
from
characterising existing society in Marxist terms: along with
other
vocabularies,
he
employed
the
language
capital in the development of his own thesis.
of
class
and
But he did so
Without any faith in the intrinsic validity of Marxism, and in
the context of a critique of its fundamental premises.
Foucault's use of Marxist conceptualisations is indicative
of the basic problem of
his work. His critique of Marxism was
the inevi table consequence of his cri tique of the social and
400
discursive
relations
which
pertain
throughout
society.
Foucaul t discerned and undermined the presupposi tions of the
eXistence of a true consciousness, an authentic subject, and an
objective
analysis
of
the
whole
of
society
wherever
they
appear. Nevertheless, Foucault could not avoid the use of the
conceptualisations
and
theoretisations
of
bodies
such as Marxism. The relations he criticised are
which he also had to work.
Foucaul t
problems which this entails;
of
thought
those within
could no t overcome the
nevertheless, his attempts
to
confront and recognise them give his work a unique value.
The problems he discerned in Marxism are, in one way or
another,
inherent in all discourse;
they all arise from the
denial of the necessary relation of knowledge and power. To be
sUre,
the critical
identified
the
theory · of Marx and
collusion
between
the Frankfurt School
forms
of
knowledge
and
structures of power, but Foucault redefined this collusion in
terms of a conflation.
All structures of knowledge, he argued,
are the immediate and inevitable corollaries of relations of
Power.
For
Foucault,
constituted by
each
individual
area
of
social
life
is
the discourse in which it is conceived,
and
operates with a 'relative autonomy' akin to that developed by
Althusser. This is not autonomy with respect to
the economic
base, however, but to other areas; it is relative in the sense
that
there
is no
rigorous or consistent connection between
them. Each develops concurrently, but according to its
proper
Conditions and circumstances, out of 'tactics ••• invented and
organised from
the starting points of
local conditions
and
401
particular needs.' [33] I t is the response, the development of
mechanisms of power and formations of knowledge,
to specific
situations
which
social
discursive
relations
determines
the
and
development
encourages
of
them
in
and
certain
directions, 'prior to any class strategy designed to weld them
into
coherent
ensembles.'
[34]
Thus
the
constituents
of
reali ty,
the individual, society, and all conceptualisa tions,
meanings,
and material demarcations are the products of
the
tactical development of power relations.
It should be noted that these ensembles don't
consist in a homogenisation, but rather of a complex
play of supports in mutual engagement, different
mechanisms of power which retain all their specific
character. Thus where children are conceived at the
present time, the interplay of the family, medecine,
psychiatry, psychoanalysis, the school and justice
doesn't have the effect of homogenising these
different instances but of establishing connections,
cross-references, complementarities and demarcations
between them which assume that each instance retains
to some extent its own special modalities.[35]
A particular structure of power relations does not, therefore,
arise in a strategic or holistic way, but almost by accident.
The result at any given time is the
product or culmination of
a complicated historical web of power relations, which cannot
be defined other than in terms that themselves constitute power
relations.
These relations of power are also relations of knowledge.
Although
Q!SCipline
it
was
and
developed this
only
in
his
later
writings,
Punish
and
Power/Knowledge,
particularly
that
Foucault
notion of power, it is true that, as Lemert and
Gill an point out,
'Foucaul t,
in each of his books, has been
uncompromising in the insistence that power and knowledge are
fused in the practices that comprise history.' [36]
Foucault
402
postulated a 'perpetual articulation'
of knowledge and power,
an analysis which he developed to the point of speaking of
power/knowledge
as
Configuration
constitutive
of
an
connection,
placed
in
is
such
a
single
intimate
concept.
all
The
social
power/knowledge
relations
there
can
be
and,
no
discourse or gesture which can escape their definitive control.
Nothing can be opposed to power/knowledge since everything must
of necessity arise within it.
Foucault's
of
conception
these
relations
as
the
discontinuous and diverse constituents of a discursive reality
means tha t he rej ec ted the idea that power relations or the
social reali ty they cons ti tute are in any sense unified. He
did,
however,
consider
that
there is a
'general effect'
of
power, which signifies nota unified force controlling the way
in which power
is
exercised,
but
its
common
and
recurring
tendencies. Foucault provided a number of examples of the way
in which this general effect
develops. In his discussions of
madness, for example, he wrote:
the bourgeoisie never had any use for the insane but
the procedures it has employed to exclude them have
revealed and realised a political advantage, on
occasion even a certain economic utility, which have
consolidated the system and contributed to its
overall functioning. The bourgeoisie is interested
in power, not in madness, in the system of control
of infant sexuality, not in that phenomenon itself.
The
bourgeoisie
could
not
care
less
about
delinquents,
about
their
punishment
and
rehabilitation,
which economically have
little
importance, but it is concerned about the complex of
mechanisms with which delinquency is controlled,
pursued, punished and reformed etc. [37]
This means that institutions and apparatuses are manifestations
Of a history of power relations constituted by the development
of
tactics
to
deal
with
particular
problems
in
localised
403
circumstances.
What is perceived as a strategy or system of
power is really the 'general effect' of the tactics used in its
exercise.
The analysis
thematic
of capi talism entails
of all power relations within the
their reduction
to wha t
is
really only a general effect.
Foucaul t
asserted tha t
there is no overall s tra tegy or
determining factor other than the exigencies of the maintenance
and
development
of
power;
similarly,
power
is
not
issued,
disseminated, imposed, or promoted by a particular source, but
arises in every moment and area of social life.
One impoverishes the question of power if one poses
it solely in terms of legislation and constitution,
in terms solely of the state and the state
appara tus. Power is qui te different from and more
complicated, dense and pervasive than a set of laws
or a state apparatus. [38]
Foucault's project was to trace the history of power.
But his
conflation of power and knowledge means that this history must
not embody any teleology or
break
such
from
transcendence, and it was as a
of
conceptions
history
that
Foucault
characterised his work initially as archeological and, in later
Works, genealogical. His own work necessarily arises within the
POwer/knowledge relations which this genealogy exposes, and it
fulfils a critical function only inasmuch as it exposes these
relations
as
Possible.
Although
POwer/knowledge
the
conditions
Foucault
relation,
he
Precondition of all discourse.
in
which
discourse
could
not
criticise
could
identify
In the discourse
it
as
is
the
the
of critical
theory, he argued, this relation has been denied and neglected;
in those
which cons ti tute
the general
effect of
capi talis t
domination, it is deliberately concealed. It is only from the
404
perspective of the underside of power that this relation, and
its impact on the whole of social and discursive relations, can
be understood.
However, it remains the case that
no one individual or
class can be defined solely in terms of its position on the
underside of power.
Distinct classes made up of individuals
with power and those without it are no longer applicable.
An
individual is the effect and the articulation of a plethora of
Power
relations,
and
so
embodies
a
number
of
diverse
experiences of power: as the 'element of its articulation', the
individual is both the domination and the exercise of
power.
'We have then a distribution of heterogeneous interdependent
POssibilities and forms of exercising power within a "strategic
field" of relations, an ensemble of powers that cross-cuts the
distinction between the haves and the have-nots.' [39]
It is
perceives
only in
the
specific situations
underside
of
power,
that
and
the
only
individual
from
these
situations that power can be understood at all. In any relation
Of power, the attempt should be made not to identify those who
exercise
power,
but
those
on whom
power
is
exercised
specific situations.
Theories of government and the traditional analyses
of their mechanisms certainly don't exhaust the
field where power is exercised and where it
functions. The question of power remains a total
enigma. Who exercises power? And in what sphere? We
know with reasonable certainty who exploits others,
who receives the profits, which people are involved,
and we know how these funds are reinvested. But as
for power ••• we know it is not in the hands of those
who govern... Everywhere tha t power exis ts, it is
being exercised. No one, strictly speaking, has an
official right to power; and yet it is always
exerted in a particular direction, with some people
on one side and some on the other.
It is often
in
405
difficult to say who holds power in a precise sense,
but it is easy to see who lacks power. [40]
Power relations can only be understood from this perspective,
which is itself implicated in and
defined by them.
A form of exercise of power may be defined by the
nature of the resistances it produces, confronts,
fixes in place and manages. The mUltiple points of
resistance established by an ensemble of power
relations thus play the role of support as well as
that of adversary or target. Resistances are always
already implicated in power relations as their
'irreducible vis-a-vis'.[41]
So power relations must be understood from the point of view of
those on whom power is exercised.
However, the resistance that
arises in this perspective is consituted by it;
'derive their means of struggle,
their very social location
from the prevailing form of power.'
effect ,
a reaction
resistances
[42]
Resis tance is an
to power and is, as such, determined by it
in its entirety.
Foucault's
studies
of
the
exclusion,
containment,
and
institutionalisation
of
those
considered
sick,
insane,
cr'lmlnal,
,
or otherwise deviant, were presented as evidence in
SUpport of his claim that
the development of the mechanisms
which prevail in these areas is cons ti tutiv~ of those which
pertain
throughout
social
relations.
In
The
Birth
of
the
£l!ni£, Foucault showed that the development of the discourse
Of medicine in terms of the accumulation and consolidation of
its knowledge parallels
its administrative and institutional
history. The intellectual and material history are equally the
products of and the means of the exercise of power within the
d'
lScourse. For example, the introduction of confinement for the
Sick and
the creation of
the clinic provided a centralised
406
organisation without which the study of sickness and the sick
would
have
been
impossible.
The
institutionalisation
of
sickness and the accumulation of knowledge occur in the same
movement: the will to knowledge is also the will to power; the
necessities
of
the
exercise
development
of
knowledge.
of
power
are
those
of
By extension,
the
acquisition
the
of
knowledge and the abili ty to exercise it is as one wi th the
acquisition and exercise of power.
The consequence of this development is that all discourse
and consequently all meaning arises in an inextricable relation
to power, such that the concepts 'sickness' and 'health', for
example, are defined wi thin and in turn consi tute the power
relations in which they arise. The notion of a healthy body is
therefore discursive:
it
takes
its
entire meaning
from
history of power re la tions in which it has arisen.
the
Foucaul t
described the development of the discourse of demography in
these terms:
The great eighteenth century demographic upr1s1ng in
Western Europe, the necessity for coordinating and
integrating it into the apparatus of production and
the urgency of controlling it wi th finer and more
adequa te power mechanisms cause "population" wi th
its numerical variables of space and chronology,
longevity and health, to emerge not only as a
problem but as an object of surveillance, analysis,
intervention, modification etc. [43]
This analysis means that concepts such as 'population' take all
their reality
and meaning from the discourse within which they
arise.
The reality of
individuals,
society and population,
is
entirely
the product of this discourse, a play of tactical
relations
of
power.
Foucault
developed
this
thesis
in
407
Discipline
and
Punish.
The
development
of
the
prison,
the
criminal, and the human subject of which the criminal is one
manifestation, are all products of the history of the discourse
of power re la tions. To study this his tory from the point of
view of those on whom power is exercised in the context of one
discourse, that of punishment, is to reveal the mechanisms of
Power which constitute the general effect of power throughout
society.
general
Foucault's
effect
to
writing
be
on
punishment
the movement
away
identifies
from
power
as
this
the
perogative of a single sovereign to the dissemination of power
relations throughout the social whole.
From 'hanging to tagging
Foucaul t
traced the development of the power relations which
characterise the general effect of power in the rest of society
in the history of the prison. The prison represents an overt
manifestation of the power relations which are exercised less
obViously elsewhere, since it is 'the only place where power is
manifested in its naked state, in its most excessive form, and
~here it is justified as a moral force ••• What is fascinating
about prisons is that,
for once, power doesn't hide or mask
itself.' [44] The history of the power relations of the prison
illuminates the history of those throughout society.
Foucault used the example of Bentham's 'Panoptican' prison
to
illustrate
the
development
of
power
relations.
Panopticen, a circular prison built around a central
The
well from
408
which constant but concealed control could be maintained, was
designed to produce an effect of continual observation.
Since no prisoner can be certain of when he or she
is not being observed, the prisoners are constantly
obliged to police their own behaviuour for fear of
possible detection: the Panoptican makes possible a
new, radically more effective excercise of power,
"without
any
physical
constraint
other
than
architecture and geometry." [45]
This development disperses power from a central power base to
the
point
at
which circulates
through
'progressively
finer
channels, gaining access to individuals themselves,
to their
bOdies,
[46]
their
ges tures,
exercise of power
effectiveness
developments
this
impetus.
their daily
actions.'
The
carries its own momentum towards increasing
and
and
all
efficiency,
tendencies
the
Thus
such
that
all
the
other
it displays are consequences
Panoptican
appears
as
a
of
more
hUmanitarian form of punishment, in which the prisoners are not
Under the immediate and brute control of the guards. They are,
however,
subject
to
that of
the ever present and anonymous
Power of 'Just a gaze.'
An inspecting gaze, a gaze which each individual
udner its weight will end by interiorising to the
point that he is his own overseer, each individual
thus exercising this surveillance over, and against
himself.
A superb formula:
power exercised
continuously and for what turns out to be a minimal
cost.[47]
Foucaul t
explained
the popularity
of
the
Panoptican not
in
terms of its humanitarianism, since its aim is really 'not to
Punish less, but to punish better; to punish with an attenuated
severity perhaps, but in order to punish with more universality
and necessity'
[48],
but
in
terms
of
its
provision
of
'a
formula applicable to many domains' which captured the spirit
Of the
transi tion from
monarchical power
epi tomised in
the
409
French
Revolution.
Its
design
characterised
that
of
the
nineteenth century itself.
One doesn't have here a power which is wholly in the
hands of one person who can exercise it alone
and
totally over the others.
Its a machine in which
everyone is caught, those who exercise power just as
much as those over whom it is exercised. This seems
to me to be the characteristic of the societies
installed in the nineteenth century.
Power no
longer substantially identifies with an individual
who possesses or exercises it by right of birth; it
becomes a machinery that no one owns. [49]
Foucault therefore identified the Panoptican as the epitome of
the dissemination and delegation of power in nineteenth century
Society.
The consequence of this dispersal, developed through the
twentieth
become
century,
is
that
the
prevailing
internalised
by
all
those
they
power
involve.
relations
In
his
own
discussion of the Panoptican, Bentham wrote:
'I t
is necessary
for
the
eyes
the
inmate
inspec tor;
to
this
is
wrong-doing. '[50]
efficient:
the
be
to
los e
This,
inmate
ceaselessly
the power and almos t
for
is
under
Foucaul t,
isolated,
only unable, but also unwilling
is
of
an
the idea of
power at
its mos t
self-disciplined,
and not
to do wrong.
The principles
Of the Panoptic9n have been developed in the twentieth century
With the introduction of the electronic tagging of prisoners in
which the very building is no longer necessary to the inmates'
COntrol.
the
Further, the techniques of surveillance epitomised by
Panoptican
property
and
have
the
been
prevention
introduced
of
civil
to
the
protection
disorder:
the
Circuit TV used as a security device in the shop,
stadium
operates primarily
as the
of
closed
street, or
threat of surveillance and
410
would be equally effective regardless of whether the screen is
monitered or not.
Such developments in the mechanisms and exercise of power
are clearly conceived as responses to specific circumstances;
the
mechanisms
of
power
developed
in
the
discourse
of
punishment enter into an interplay of haphazard influences with
those inherent in other discourses.
discourses,
their
'mutual
network of relations,
It is the play of these
engagement'
in
a
discontinuous
that constitutes the reality that arises
within them.
The production of the subject
The
history
of
the
prison
is
also
the
history
of
the
individual, shaped by the distinction between the criminal and
the accepted,
a history of mechanisms of power transferred and
eXercised wi thin other discourses.
Foucaul t
sugges ted,
for
eXample, that the forms of discipline developed in the punitive
discourse
were
used
in
that
of
material
production,
and
considered the prevailing structure of social and discursive
relations
'panoptican'.
Poster
observed
that
Foucault
saw
advanced capitalist society characterised by a configuration of
relations of power and knowledge which:
constitutes an imposing presence over advanced
industrial society, extending to the most intimate
recesses of everyday life. The form of domination
characteristic
of
advanced
capitalism
is
not
exploitation,
not
alienation,
not
psychic
repression, not anomie, not dysfunctional behaviour.
It is instead a new pattern of social control, that
is embedded in practice at many points in the social
411
field and that constitutes a set of structures whose
agency is at once everyone and no one. [51]
Foucault's history of the prison is, in short, a history of the
conditions
on
established;
this
facilitated
his
which
meaning,
emphasis
critique
truth,
reality
and
on
the
conditions
of
the
analysis
ul tima tely the conception of cri ticism,
of
of
are
knowledge
power,
and
implici t in Marxism
and other forms of critical theory.
Foucault considered
that
the majority of political and
philosophical studies of power
define it primarily in terms
of repression and domination, and understand it as a negative
force
issuing
strategy.
from a central
source according
to a unified
The first of these he challenged in Power/Knowledge:
If power were never anything but repressive, if it
never did anything but to say no, do you really
think one would be brought to obey it? What makes
power hold good, what makes it accepted, is simply
the fact that it doesn't only weigh on us as a force
tha t says no, but tha t i t traverses and produces
things,
it induces fleasure,
forms
knowledge,
produces discourse. [52
If power is not a negative and dominating force, neither can
its exercise be identified solely in terms of the state and
state apparatuses,
a ruling class or ruling individual.
The
attempt to distinguish such a centre of power, or sovereignty,
is misguided.
Power is omnipresent, but this is:
not because it would have the privilege of gathering
everything under its invincible unity, but becaus e
it is produced at every moment, at every point, or
rather in relation between points.
Power is
everywhere; not because it engulfs everything, but
because it comes from everywhere.[53]
Thus power is not exercised from
a single base, in a single
direction, but is without source or foundation.
412
Foucault's analysis of power rejects
that which sees a
Sovereign subject exercising power over a dominated, repressed,
Or exploi ted subj ect. The individual is always engaged in a
number of diverse and often contradictory relations of power
which continually cons ti tute and recons ti tute it.
selves', he wrote,
OUr
time
the
'Our own
'may be the grea tes t realis t illusions of
whole
private,
individual,
mental,
inner
entities we take for granted as being what we are.' [54] Power
is not an abstract force,
held by a single subject, whether
this is understood as a class or individual, but is inherent in
and constitutive of the notion of the individual. Power is:
employed
and
exercised
through
a
netlike
organisation ••• individuals circulate between its
threads;
they
are
always
in
a
position
of
simultaneously undergoing and exercising power. They
are not only its inert or consenting targets; they
are also the element of its articulation. L55]
As Dews wrote, Foucault's individual:
is not to be conceived as a sort of elementary
nucleus, a primitive atom, a multiple and inert
material on which power comes to fasten or against
which it happens to strike, and in doing so subdues
or crushes individuals. In fact, it is already one
of the prime effects of power that certain bodies,
certain
gestures,
certain
discourses,
certain
desires, came to be identified and constituted as
individuals. [56]
This, essentially, is the significance of Foucault's studies of
the clinic, the prison, and a plethora of other areas in which
the individual is placed as an object of study. The form which
sUch areas of discourse take determines
Objects.
Individuals
are
therefore
the na ture of their
the
products
of
an
historical interplay of discursive relations in which they are
Constantly produced and reproduced as
Power relations.
the general effect of
413
This
assertion
undercuts
the
assumptions
of
critical
theory, for whom the subject is essential. The central terms of
alienation
and
SUbject, whose
repression
presuppose
the existence of a
authenticity or completeness is constrained or
denied by the exercise of power. For Marcuse, critical theory
is dependent
Habermas
on the
declared
possibility of the authentic subject, and
t h a t ' the
theory
of
the
subj ec t
is
fundamental to the development of critical rationality.'
[57]
For Foucault, however, the subject is not denied but created by
Power; it is the product of the history of relations of power
and
knowledge. As Minson pointed out:
What distinguishes Foucault's treatment of these
frequently
rehearsed
motifs
of
anonymity,
objectification and so forth is that no appeal is
made (at least prima facie) to a prior human ethical
subjectivity whose incalculable essence discipline
threatens
to
envelop
in
a
straight jacket
of
conformity. That which resists normalisation far
from simply representing an obstacle is the sine qua
~ of discipline's operation, discipline does not
merely repress individual differences, and offends
against humanist virtues, but rather produces them
as its supports. [58]
This view is substantiated by Foucault's own claims about his
work. In
Madness and Civilisation, for example, he wrote:
We are not trying to reconstitute what madness
itself might be, in the form in which it first
presented itself to some primitive, fundamental,
mute, scarcely articulated experience, and in the
form in which it was later organised (translated,
deformed, travestied, perhaps even repressed) by
discourses, and the oblique, often twisted play of
their operations. [59]
Foucaul t' s
search was not for
eXperience of madness,
the original or prediscursive
but the history of the conditions in
which the discursive experience of madness has developed.
414
The production of repression
In The History of Sexuality, Foucault presented a
provocative
inversion of the repressive hypothesis which substantiates his
rejection of the subject and can be
a critique of
read as
Marcuse.
He argued that it makes no sense to speak of an
original
or
authentic
subject
who
is
then
subject
to
the
constraints of power in the form of repression,
since it is
the
individuals.
exercise
Discourse
on
of
power
that
the
individual
actually
produces
determines
the
nature
of
the
individual which is therefore volatile and shifting according
to the
power rei a tions
in which
the discourse,
and so
the
individual, are produced. Rajchman pointed out that Foucault
did not attempt to write:
a history of madness, sickness, crime, or sex, but a
history of how it ever came to be taken for granted,
in a whole range of contexts, that abnormalities are
kinds of mental disease, that sickness is only the
dysfunction of an individual anatomy, that there
exists criminal personality types it is best to lock
up, or that there is something called Sex residing
in each of us as a dangerous truth tha t mus t be
exposed. [60]
Each of
these
questions
challenges
individual, the authentic subj ec t,
the notion
of
the
real
and the legi timacy of the
discourses which define them.
Foucault declared his intention to examine:
the case of a society which, for more than a
century, has loudly castigated itself for its
hypocrisy, talked endlessly of its own silence,
persisted in recounting in great detail the things
of which it does not speak, denounced the power it
exercises and promised to free itself from the very
laws that made it function ••• The question I would
like to ask is not, Why are we repressed? but
rather, Why do we say, with such passion, such
resentment against our recent past, against our
present
and
against
ourselves,
that
we
are
415
repressed? By wha t spiral have we come to declare
that sex is denied, to show openly that we hide it,
to say that we silence it, while, all the time,
expressing ourselves in the most explicit words,
striving to reveal it in its darkest reality,
affirming it in the positivity of its power and its
effects? [61]
In
Marcuse's
work,
repression
indicates
the
denial
of
an
original, free, and authentic sexuality, the 'memory' of which
SUstains the critical negation of its permitted expression. For
Foucault,
the
discourse
on
the
repression
of
sexuality
COns ti tutes the forms of sexuali ty which arise. Sexuali ty is
not constrained, repressed or denied by power, but produced by
it; as the embodiment of power relations, the whole discourse
of sexuality - its discussion in, for example,
moral, social,
POlitical, medical, and psychoanalytic terms - is constitutive
of its subject.
To speak of an original or primal sexuality,
as Marcuse did,
is to presuppose both that there is a natural
state prior to discourse, and that a discourse able to express
it
is
possible.
critique:
if
This
it
indicates
stands,
the
severity
of
Foucault's
authentic
subjects
and
authentic
discourse are impossible. Any critical theory which is based on
these presuppositions is seriously undermined.
Of course,
Marcuse argued that sexuality is controlled by
the reality principle and that the forms in which it expresses
itself
are determined by its existence within capitalism. But
Sexual desire
remains ins trinsically incompa ti ble wi th this
System ,
the
since
relations
introjected into the subject.
of
power
are
imposed
on
and
For Marcuse, there is still a
sense in which the authenticity of the subject is distorted by
and so contradicts the relations of power in which it exists,
416
whereas
Foucaul t
saw
an
intrinsic
compa tibili ty
between
sexuali ty and the relations of power in which it arises. The
liberation
of
sexuality
desublimation was
decried
attacked by
by
Marcuse
Foucault
as
repressive
on quite
different
grounds: liberation is no less chimerical, but this is because
it is merely the production of a different, but no more or less
authentic , sexuality. As Poster pointed out,
dismisses
the
sexual
desublimation ,
Foucault
revolution
treats
it
as
'While Marcuse
as
mere
repressive
an
extension
of
the
Profusion of discourses on sexuality.' [62]
Similarly,
Society
the
'repression'
involves not
of
its silencing,
discourse to the point of obsession.
sexuality
but
the
in
Victorian
renewal of
Sexuali ty
its
'was not an
activity which was repressed, but an extensive development of
knowledge/power
which
shaped,
constituted,
and
controlled
practices according to complex rules.' [63] Foucault explained,
for example, that:
The state must know what is happening with its
citizens' sex and the use they make of it, but each
individual must also be capable of controlling the
use he makes of it. Between the state and the
individual, sex became an issue and a public issue
no less; it became invested by a whole network of
discourses, new forms of knowledge, analyses and
exhortions.[64]
FOUcaul t
cri ticised the repressive hypothesis on the grounds
that
it
is
relation
to
based on
a
knowledge.
flawed
conception of
power and
its
Any
of
true
sexuality
is
notion
cOnstituted by the same network of discursive relations said
to repress
it.
The play of power relations generates the
d'
1Scourse of sexuality which itself constitutes the reality of
seXual experience.
The conviction that sexuality is silenced
417
and denied by its discourse is therefore based on the mistaken
assumption
that
there
is
any
reality
or
authenticity
to
the struggle for
the
sexuality outside of this discourse.
The repressive hypothesis
entails
liberation of something which was never repressed, and so leads
to the mistaken conclusion that to speak of sex is a
political
act, an attack on power, or a transgression of the taboo
silence it imposes.
In the cri tique of repression,
and
'ancient
fUnctions of prophecy are revived.'
Tomorrow
sex
will
be
good
once
more.
The
denunciation of repression makes it possible to
bring together, wi thout anyone noticing, concepts
that a fear of ridicule or a cynical view of history
prevents most of us from putting side by side:
revolution and pleasure. What sustains our desperate
eagerness to speak of sex in terms of repression is
no doubt the opportunity it affords us to speak out
against the powers that be, to tell the truth and
to
promise
true
ecstacy;
to
link
together
enlightenment, liberation and the enjoyment if new
leasures; to speak at one and the same time of the
thirst for knowledge, a determination to change the
law
and
the
hoped
for
garden
of
earthly
delights.[65]
For
Foucault,
Proliferation
the
institutionalisation
discourses
and
areas
of
of
sexuality,
interest,
and
the
the
varieties of regulation, explanation, and judgement, all create
and multiply the forms of sexuality. In common with
aspects
Power.
of
the
subject,
sexuality
would
not
all other
exist
without
418
EPISTEMOLOGICAL IMPLICATIONS
Foucault maintained that resistance to the covert exercise of
Power inherent in all discourse is possible by the exposure of
its inevitability.
While no discourse can be outside of the
web
of
of
relations
power
and
knowledge
that
constitutes
discourse, resistance is possible through the exposure of this
inevi tabili ty.
dialectical
This
is
thought
the basis for
which,
he
Foucaul t' s cri tique of
argued,
is
dependent
on
prediscursive concepts which are themselves the products and
the exercise of power.
Foucault argued that this denial is particularly clear
the notions of ideology and aliena tion.
in
Ideology presupposes
the existence of a true discourse to which it is opposed, and
alienation
the
existence
of
the
authentic
subject
of
this
truth.
What
troubles
me
with
these
analyses
which
priori tise
ideology
is
that
there
is
always
presupposed a human subject on the lines of the
model provided by classical philosophy, endowed with
a consciousness which power is then thought to seize
on. [66J
Ideology implies the existence of a subject and conceives power
as a purely imposing mechanism, gaining control of a hitherto
autonomous individual consciousness. For Foucault, on the other
hand , both the subj ec t
and the truth are cons ti tuted by the
POWer relations in which they arise. The notion of ideology is:
always in virtual opposition to something else which
is supposed to count as truth. Now I believe that
the problem does not consists in drawing the line
between
that in a discourse which falls under the
category of of scientificity or truth, and that
which comes under some other category, but in seeing
419
how effects of truth are produced within discourses
which in themselves are neither true nor false. [67]
This confirms Foucualt's emphasis on the conditions of truth,
the
bases
on
which
the
meanings
and
distinctions
between
reason and unreason are established. All meaning is the product
of power relations: mechanisms of study, definition, analysis,
conceptualisation, and theoretisation
of power.
are also the
mechanisms
The exercise of power involved in the analysis of
phenomena such as sexuality or criminalisation is the constant
production and creation of a discursive reality.
Dews has observed that Foucault's thesis asserts that 'the
mere fact of becoming an object of knowledge represents a kind
of enslavement. Cognition is a form of domination.' [68] Unlike
the
analyses
of
domination
implicit
in
critical
theory,
Foucault did not consider knowlege to be merely a means through
which a particular form of power is enforced since, like the
prediscursive conception of the subject, this view of knowledge
implies that it has an autonomy
and dynamic of its own which
is Used to the external ends of power. For Foucault,
the domination implied by knowledge does ' not reside
in its instrumental value, or in the coercive
institutions which form the precondition of its
elaboration, but rather simply in the fact that it
imposes an order on disorder, reduces non-identity
to identity. [69]
Foucault did not consider the domination inherent in knowledge
in purely pejorative terms. All cognitive experience involves
the imposition of power on the world, but this imposition is
also the precondition of the discourse that, for Foucault,
COnstitutes reality.
420
All critical theory acknowledges the collusion of forms of
knowledge
with
forms
of
power:
Gramsci
considered
that
bourgeois ideology was more complex than a set of ideas and
involved the condi tions on which this
ideology is produced,
such that truth is a product of the system in which it arises;
Marcuse saw the repression inherent in capitalist society as
the distortion
of
reason
itself
in
favour
of
a
functional
rationality; and the avant-garde, epitomised in this case by
Breton,
regarded
the
exis ting
conception
of
reason
as
contingency
and
'bourgeois'.
Each
of
these
analyses
historicity of truth:
relations.
But
recognised
the
its determination by the existing power
Foucault
considered
that
each
implies
the
possibility of an authentic truth,
distorted by the demands of
an
an
identifiable
power
base,
implication
he
found
unacceptable. Similarly, the notion of ideology, even where it
is opposed by a counter-ideology, rather than the 'truth', is
challenged on the grounds that it still asserts the possibility
of
the
Original
end
of
reason,
ideology.
which
The
search
implies
that
for
an
authentic
or
for
a
prediscursive
SUbject and reality, is not merely mistaken, but dangerous,
s·
lnce it can only ever result in the dissemination of a mode of
thought which remains, necessarily in Foucault's schema, a mode
Of domination. The search for authenticity is essentially the
result of the failure to appreciate the intimacy of power and
knOwledge. For Lemert and Gillan:
Foucault's history is a critical analysis of the
socially contingent nature of truth gained by
crossing the divide between the true and the false.
The historical reality of the will to truth is its
complicity with power and not its neutrality or
421
freedom from evalua tive judgements... Ideal truth
does not liberate discourse from power, but tightens
power's control. The taboo under which power and
knowledge are placed reinforces an oppression made
more effective because it cannot be criticised.[70]
Foucaul t
therefore identified power/knowledge as the base of
all social and discursive relations; the constitutive principle
of reality which cannot be negated.
It
was
for
this
reason
that
Foucault
Specificity of experience, the point
studied
the
at which the subject,
truth, and meaning are produced. His genealogy was the attempt:
not to take as a whole the rationalisation of
society or of culture, but to analyse such a process
in several fields,
each with reference to a
fundamental experience: madness, illness, death,
crime, sexuali ty, and so forth... I would like to
sugges t. • • a way tha t is more empiric 0. 1, more
directly related to our present situation, and which
implies more relations between theory and practice.
It consists of taking the forms of resistance
against different forms of power as a starting
point ••• for example, to find out what our society
means by sanity, perhaps we should investigate what
is happening in the field of insanity. [71]
Foucault's concern was therefore with the conditions in which
meaning, reason, truth, and knowlege arise.
It is significant, however, that this last passage refers
to Foucault's areas of study as 'fundamental experiences.' This
SUggests that the absence of prediscursive reality does not
preclude the
identification of
some
forms
of experience as
having a greater reali ty than tha t they assume in discourse.
Indeed, Foucault often implied that there is a some notion of
Originality
which
\\lrote, for example,
is
dominated
or
denied
,
and its
discourse:
he
of sex being 'driven out of hiding and
forced to lead a discursive existence',
the body
by
pleasures'
as
the
[72] and referred to
fundamental
experience
422
which is appropriated by the discourse of sexuality and the
sUbj ec t.
This
sugges ts
that he remained concerned wi th
the
establishment of some notion of originality or reality which is
placed
in
contradiction
to
the
form
it
is
given
in
discourse.
It would
spite of
Foucault's
rejection of the repressive hypothesis,
it remains
the case
that something
indeed produce
which
is
seem,
is repressed:
denied,
domination
of
Baudrillard,
therefore,
but
this
something.
whose
text
that
in
power may
denial
remains
an
that
an
exclusion
or
argument
advanced
by
attempt
to
This
is
Forget
Foucault
was
an
Complete Foucault' s project by the eradication of even this
possibility of contradiction and resistance. For Baudrillard,
FOUcault's work is merely a reworking, rather than a rejection,
of
the
repressive
extension ,
hypothesis
advanced
by
Marcuse
and,
by
the assertion of some notion of a fundamental or
rediscursive reality in all dialectical and critical thought.
Baudrillard developed this objection to the point at which all
concepts of such a reality are superseded by the hyperreality
of
simulation
in his
own work.
He
postulated a
completely
discursive world devoid of all external reference.
The relationship between Foucault and Baudrillard is akin
to that between Locke and Berkeley. Addressing Locke's theory
Of perception, Berkeley argued that there were no grounds on
which Locke could defend the materiality of some qualities of
an obj ec t
(size, shape, solidi ty, and so on) while asserting
that a perceiver is necessary to others (such as colour and
423
texture). As soon as
the immateriality of some qualities is
introduced, he argued, it must be extended to all.
However,
while
Berkeley
succeeded
in
addressing
the
inconsistencies of Locke's argument, he did so only through the
introduction of a new set of problems, not the least of which
Was the existence of God.
Similarly, while the basic critique
of Foucault offered by Baudrillard is valid, it is maintained
that his conclusion is open to identical objections to those
raised agains t Foucaul t: Baudrillard was also engaged in the
reassertion of contradictions based on some notion of the real,
Without
This
which
his
fundamental
notion of the hyperreal has no meaning.
inconsistency
arises
elsewhere
in
POststructuralism, ' and testifies to the continual reemergence
of the
terms of cri tical
theory:
the assertion of reali ty,
meaning, and the possibility of criticism are the indispensa ble
attributes of discourse.
The hyperreal and imaginary
Baudrillard argued that Foucault's postulation of power as the
thematic within which everything must be placed is merely the
SUbstitution of one totalising theory for those criticised in
FOUcault's
work.
tOtalisa tion:
To
be
sure,
it
is
no
longer
the
same
the struggle of the proletaria t priori tised by
Marxism or that of the
Freudian unconscious are abandoned in
favour . of
and dynamism of
relation.
the fluidi ty
the
power/knowledge
424
Foucault, he wrote, places us in 'a full universe':
a space radiating with power but also cracked, like
a shattered windshield still holding together.
However, this "power" remains a mys tery - starting
from despotic centrality, it becomes by the half-way
point a "multiplicity of force relations" ( ••• ) and
it
culminates
at
the
extreme
pole,
with
resistances ••• 1l73]
But as Baudrillard pointed out, 'if power were
infiltration
long
ago
ad infini turn
have
Baudrillard's
thesis
ceased
of the social field,
meeting
with
magnetic
it
would
any resistance.' [74]
isolation of the inconsistencies in Foucault' s
reveals
construction
this
the
which,
thematic
in
spite
of
power
as
of
Foucault's
an
arbi trary
claims
to
the
Contrary, Baudrillard insisted will be read as a true theory
rather than a spec~fic perspective.
Foucault's is not... a discourse of truth but a
mythic discourse in the strong sense of the word,
and I secretly believe that it has no illusions
·about the effect of truth it produces. That, by the
way, is what is missing in those who follow in
Foucault's footsteps and pass right by this mythic
arrangement to end up with the truth, nothing but
the truth. [75]
Foucault
did
not
present
his
thesis
as
'the
truth',
and
BaUdrillard was quite correct in his observation that it should
not be read as such. Power understood as a term which refers to
the reality of the world is another totalising and falsifying
recapture of the flux it was intended to free.
Baudrillard proposed an alternative principle: seduction,
~hich he
defined
as
the
endless
play
of
appearance
and
disappearance which the principle of production - applied to
economics,
the
unconscious,
or
power
denies
with
impOSition of meaning.
Everywhere one seeks to produce meaning, to make the
world signify, to render it visible. We are not,
the
425
however, in danger of lacking meaning; quite to t~e
contrary, we are gorged with meaning and it 1S
killing us. As more and more things have fallen into
the abyss of meaning, they have retained less and
less of the charm of appearances.[76]
The
'''liberation''
of
meaning
as
appearances'
is
defined
revolutions' ,
to
which
the
destruction
of
essential
occupation
of
and
'the
Baudrillard
opposes
'secret'
the
circula tion of appearances. The search for meaning below and
beyond that which appears is
'we
can
wear
ourselves
interminable and fruitless, since
out
in
materialising
things,
in
rendering them visible, but we can never cancel the secret.'
[77] It is, of course, pointless to ask what this secret is,
since its articulation gi vesi t a meaning which destroys its
secrecy: discourse makes it disappear.
The cycle of appearance
and
discourse
disappearance
is
never-ending:
can
merely
describe the seduction of appearances in which it is engaged
and cannot overcome it. Its tactics must be:
To divert,
to set up decoys,
which disperse
evidence, which disperse the order of things, the
order of desire ••• to slightly displace appearances
in order to hi t the empty and s tra tegic heart of
things. [78]
For Baudrillard, the naming in which discourse is engaged could
not be seen as a liberation, nor even a production,
but the
simultaneous appearance and disappearance of reality.
As soon
as naming occurs,
Baudrillard,
tha t which is named is los t: according to
psychoanalysis effects
the disappearance of
the
unconscious: by bringing it to light, it is no longer a hidden
Or repressed realm,
its reali ty is
los t.
Indeed,
all theory
should be seen as an event in itself; it 'maintains absolutely
no re la tion wi th anything a tall'
[79]; when ideas of reali ty
are named, 'I immediately try to make them disappear. '[80] This
426
Conjuring
was
Baudrillard's
effort
to
avoid
the
dominating
effects of discourse which seeks meaning and totalisation, both
of which he identified in Foucault's work.
Baudrillard's
extreme reluctance
to
impose
the meaning
implied by discourse was due to his respect for the intrinsic
secrecy,
the
undecipherable,
uncodifiable,
and meaningless
essence of reality. In Baudrillard's work, it is the purity of
the
meaningless
happening
that
constitutes
resistance
to
discourse, so that his work, like that of Foucault, retains the
presupposition that there is still something on which discourse
imposes itself,
Indeed,
and, moreover, some imperative to identify it.
Baudrillard accepted
this point when he declared:
'What interests me ••• is the possibility of a pure event, an
event
that
can
no
longer
be
manipulated,
deciphered by any historical subjectivity.'
interpreted,
[81]
or
This pure
eVent is seduction, in which:
Things make events all by themselves, wi thout any
mediation, by a sort of instant commutation. There
is
no
longer
metaphor,
rather
metamorphosis.
Metamorphosis abolishes metaphor, which is the mode
of language."
the possibility of communicating
meaning. [82J
Of COurse, Baudrillard's event is forever secret, since it is
destroyed in
the moment of articulation,
but
this does
not
alter the antagonistic nature of its presence, or absence, in
Baudrillard's schema.
of play,
For Baudrillard, theory becomes a matter
a game for which
'The discourse of truth is qui te
!!mPly impossible. It eludes itself. Everything eludes itself,
everything
scoffs
at
everything elusive.' [83]
its
own
truth,
seduction
renders
Of his own theory, he wrote: 'There
is nothing to be had from it' [84]; like Foucault's analysis,
427
it is a mythic discourse in which, 'strictly speaking, nothing
remains but
a
sense of dizziness,
with which you can't do
anything.' [85]
Baudrillard's prioritising of the world of appearances, or
rather
of
the
process
of
appearance
and
disappearance
seduction - brings us to the world of the hyperreal, in which
the 'scintillation of being'
[86]
circumscribes reali ty,
in
which 'you can't do anything.' In his discussions of seduction,
Baudrillard was effecting a critique of the search for meaning
wherever it appears. Seduction is:
ineluctable, and appearance always victorious. Of
course we are witnessing a proliferation of systems
of meaning and interpretation which seek to clear
the path for a rational operation of the world ••• At
the same time it is evident that all these systems
are prevented from producing anything based on truth
or objectivity. Deep down everything is already
there... the impossibility for all systems to be
founded on truth, to break open the secret and
reveal whatever it may be. [87]
The strategy of thought which seeks meaning, even in the most
reduced sense achieved by Foucault, 'can only exacerbate itself
in a strange impotence', searching for truths which have never
eXisted.
Only
misguided
appearances
remain
out
of
the
control
'fury
unveil
the
truth' ;
there
to
of
is
this
no
interpretation that can explain seduction, and no system that
can abolish it.
Strategies to effect the critical negation of
reali ty are thwarted a t every level by Baudrillard' s thesis:
cr' ,
ltlque, negation, and reality have no meaning in the
hyperreality of appearance. Nevertheless, Baudrillard could not
resist identifying seduction as 'our last chance', by which he
meant
that
the
'autonomy
of
appearance',
its
inevitable
428
defiance of attempts to give it meaning and reality (all of
which
necessarily
result
in
its
disappearance),
effects
a
Continual resistance to the codifications and systematisations
of discourse. This enabled Baudrillard to propose appearance as
the ground of a new resistance, a thesis which finds parallels
in the work of other poststructuralist writers.
This dissolution and invalidation of
the immediacy and
dynamism of experience was developed by Foucault:
We have employed a wide range of categories - truth,
man, culture, writing, etc. - to dispel the shock of
daily occurrences, to dissolve the event. The
obvious
intention
of
these
famous
historical
continui ties is to explain; the eternal return to
Freud, Marx, and others is obviously to lay a
foundation. But both function to exclude the radical
break introduced by events. In the broadest sense,
both the nature of events and the fact of power are
invariably excluded from knowledge as presently
constituted in our culture ••• On the other hand, the
proletariat develops a form of knowledge which
Concerns the struggle for power, the manner in which
they can give rise to an event, respond to its
urgency, avoid it, etc., this is a knowledge
absolutely alien to the first kind because of its
preoccupation with power and events. [88]
In Deleuze, as well,
relations
is
the
'codified'
process by which the flux of power
in
theory
is
criticised on grounds
similar to those presented by Foucault: it is not prediscursive
reality that is dominated, but the dynamism of experience.
Let us return for a moment to those states of
experience that, at a certain point, must not be
trans lated into representations or fantasies, mus t
not be transmitted by legal,
contractual,
or
institutional codes, must not be exchanged or
bartered away, but, on the contrary, must be seen as
a dynamic flux that carries us away even further
outside ••• The state of experience is not subjective
in origin, at least not inevitably so. Moreover it
is not individual. It is a continuous flux and the
disruption of flux, and each pulsional intensity
necessarily bears a relation to another intensity, a
point of contact and transmission. This is what
underlies all codes, what escapes all codes, and it
429
is what the codes themselves
convert, and mint anew. [89]
seek
to
translate,
For both Foucault and Deleuze, the experience of power and the
events which emerge from power relations are not prediscursive,
but constituted by discourse and so subjugated, dominated, and
yet created
by
power relations.
I t
is by virtue of their
discursive meaning that they are areas of resistance to power,
and not because of their fundamental claim to reality or truth.
We are
left wi th
Contradiction
or
the paradox of
antagonism
is
a
thesis
identified,
in which a
but
cannot
articulated without its loss. As Mark Poster wrote:
theory faces
domination
be
'Critical
the formidable task of unveiling structures of
when
is
one
no
dominating,
nothing
is
being
dominated and no ground exists for a principle of liberation
from domina tion.'
[90]
Nevertheless, the shock of the event
appears
sort
of
as
some
fundamental
Foucault, Deleuze, and Baudrillard:
remains
something
to
be
unveiled,
or
denied
reality
in
the very fact that there
even
if
this
task
is
interminable or impossible, suggests the reintroduction of the
POSSibility of criticism.
430
THE END OF CRITICISM?
According to Callinicos,
that
the
poststructuralist thesis means
'any attempt to overturn the prevailing apparatus would
lead to the establishment of a new set of oppressive power
relations.' [91J Adorno also considered that Foucault leaves us
with a
'submissive
standing
respect'
is
left
gives
the
of knowledge entirely constitute
the
'uncontested',
impression that
'forms
and
for
the
given,
for
Dews,
which
Foucault
social reali ty which they describe and analyse', such tha t a
critical form of knowledge is impossible. [92J
If all relations of power are also relations of knowledge,
so that
discourse is constituted by these relations, it would
seem that it is impossible to develop a discourse critical of
either
prevailing
knowledge
POwer.
This
that
means
or
any
the
prevailing
resistance
to
relations
power
and
of
the
discourse in which it is expressed are inextricably intertwined
With
the
relations
of
power
against
which
it
struggles.
Critical
discourse
enters
into
the
relation
of
power
it
resists.
Its
conceptualisations
are
not
confined
to
the
immedia te experience of power,
Unified analysis which dissolves
but are placed in a body of
the
immediate experience of
power. The expression of resistance is therefore necessarily in
COllaboration with the exercise of power; any sort of counterdiscourse can, at the most, criticise the concealment of power
rela tions and recognise its own implication wi th them.
This
means that all resistance occurs within power relations and is
therefore supportive of the arrangement of power it resists.
431
Foucault
did
indeed
state
that
power
relations
ubiquitous and constitutive of all societies. However,
are
'To say
that one can never be "outside" power does not mean that one is
trapped and condemned to defeat no matter what.'[93]
The analysis of power-mechanisms has no built-in
tendency to show power as being at once synonymous
and always victorious. It's a matter rather of
establishing the positions occupied and modes of
actions used by each of the forces at work, the
possibilities of resistance and counter-attack on
either side. [94]
Although
Foucault
rejected
the
possibility
of
critical
negation, he gave an account of political resistance and the
POssibilities of a counter-discourse. Foucault suggested that
although the web of relations of power and knowledge cannot be
oVercome,
the taboo imposed on them can be transgressed and
they can be resisted. Foucault claimed that resistance to the
Power/knowledge configuration is both possible and valid, since
there
'are no relations of power without resistances.'
[95]
Although it is impossible to establish a critical base of the
kind
sought by the Frankfurt School, resistance is integral to
and produced by the relation of power and knowledge, and it
is
from the perspective of resistance to power that its relations
can be unders tood:
'the view of the underside and limi t
of
Power is indispensible for an analysis of its apparatuses.'
[96]
Research concerned with that which resists and escapes the
theoretisations and bodies of unified discourse
can be seen as
a cOUnter-discourse, hailed by Foucault as a 'philosophy of the
PeoPle'
[97] and an
'insurrection of subjugated knowledges.'
The knowledge which escapes the domination of discourse
432
is not prediscursive, but it is outside of the power-knowledge
relation:
neglected,
nevertheless
both
denied,
the
silenced
product
relation. As soon as it is
and
and
the
excluded,
constituent
it
is
of
this
articulated, this knowledge is no
longer merely subjugated by power, but becomes the agent of its
exercise.
It
is
the
knowledge of
difference which
Foucault
argued is constantly denied by the discourse of similarity and
Uni ty produced by the power/knowledge configuration.
'In the
specialised areas of erudition as in the disqualified popular
knowledge there lay the memory of hostile encounters which even
up to this day have been confined to the margins of knowledge.'
[99]
Similarly, Deleuze advocated a nomadic thought,
which
wanders through ideas without attachment or entrenchment, and
LYotard a radical pluralism, which develops as many specific
discourses as there are specific desires.
However,
such poststructuralist
theses
are
in
constant
danger of undercutting their own legitimation, since there is
no more
reason
to
suppose
that
fluidity,
and
discontinui ty are in any sense more real or authentic
than
conCeptualisations
are
such
as
specificity,
history
and
society
they
intended to supersede.
Baudrillard warned that Foucault's
work , for example, should be read as a mythic discourse which
makes no truth claims: to seek such solidity, he argued, would
be to exert the very imposi tion of power which genealogical
discourse subverts. Taken literally, therefore,
nothol.ng tha t can be said wi thin pos ts tructuralis t
there
Since there is no basis on which to say anything.
This
is
discourse
is
Presented as a proud assertion by Baudrillard, so tha t i t is
433
impossible to deduce anything not only from poststructuralism
but from any discourse or experience. However, it is maintained
here that the impotence of poststructuralism does not entail
that of all discourse.
The pos ts truc turalis t
denial of any truth claim in its
analyses does not alter the fact that it
prioritises
certain
forms of experience and articulation.
Thus an evaluation is
made,
unity,
and
an
imperative
identified:
totality,
and
meaning are opposed by mUltiplicity and fragmentation; reality
and truth by hyperreali ty and simulation. This priori ty can
develop
into
a
authoritarianism
tyranny
for
an
theory
no
less
than
the
which poststructuralism claims is inherent in
totalising critique.
likely
of
Indeed,
analysis
this eventuality is all the more
which
does
in
fact
seek
meanings,
realities, and evaluations, while insisting on the redundancy
of such notions.
A clear
example of
the consequences
of
maintaining the absence of foundations whilst simultaneously
establishing them is to be found in the work of Luce Irigaray,
whose critique of unitary discourse is perhaps the most lucid
and daring of those presented in the poststructuralist genre.
The tyranny of the multiple
Irigaray placed great emphasis on the investigation of who it
is that controls the production of discourse. Her answer, that
it is men, leads her to draw a fascinating distinction between
and
female
discourse.
Whereas
the
totalisation
of
434
discourse was criticised by Foucault, and its meaningfulness by
Baudrillard, Irigarary's critique of discourse was effected on
the basis of its masculinity. It is male discourse, she argued,
that
is
itself.
unitary,
totalising,
and
This
essentially
because
is
bears
pretensions
male
beyond
discourse
is
an
interpretation of the world experienced through the medium of
the male body.
The centrality of the phallus as a productive
source and origin finds its expression in the singularity and
simplicity of the seminal text: the world experienced through
the male body is phallocentric.
Women's
desires
are
subject
to
the
definitions
and
domination of this male discourse. Women's sexuality has always
been defined by this discourse as a lack or absence, a 'hole'
~hich needs the completion of the penis for its satisfaction:
According to these theorists, women's erogenous zones
are no more than a clitoris-sex, which cannot stand
up in comparison with the valued phallic organ; or a
hole-envelope, a sheath which surrounds and rubs the
penis during coition; a nons ex organ or a masculine
sex organ turned inside out in order to caress
itself. [100J
The centrality of the phallus characterises both men and women:
the singularity of male desire is imposed on the woman, whose
eXclusion from the production of discourse culminates in the
denial of her own desires.
These
desires
neverthless
persist
in
spite
of
their
denial, since, for Irigaray, they are rooted in a woman's body.
In Contradiction to
discourse,
Organ:
the characteri s ation it receives in male
women's sexuality is not centred on a single sexual
there
is
a
multiplicity proper
to
the woman's
body
through which she experiences the world. In The Sex that is Not
435
~ (1977), Irigaray
argued that a woman 'experiences pleasure
just about everywhere ••• one can say that the geography of her
pleasure
is
much
more
diversified,
more
multiple
in
its
differences, more complex, more subtle than is imagined.'[lOl]
Irigaray
insis ted
tha t
women have a
fundamental quali ty
of
self-containment which has no need of the penis and is actually
interrupted and constrained by male desire.
of
a
woman's geni tals are li terally in touch wi th each other,
so
that a
The
lips
woman has an 'autoeroticism' which is:
very different from man's. He needs an instrument in
order to touch himself: his hand, woman's genitals,
language ••• But a woman touches herself by and within
herself directly, without mediation, and before any
distinction between
activity
and r.assivity
is
possible.
A woman "touches herself' constantly
without anyone being able to force her to do so, for
her sex is composed of two lips which embrace
continually. Thus, within herself she is already two
- but not divisible into ones - who stimulate each
other. [102]
Excluded from the production of discourse, women are forced to
accept the defini tions imposed on their pleasure by men. But
the persistance of their desires manifests itself in a woman's
speech,
in which,
denied the ability to articulate its
own
desires, nevertheless expresses them 'betwee~ the lines'. The
mUltiplicity of the woman's body is therefore voiced in her
speech, in which
the spoken engages in a constant play with
that which is unsaid.
This 'Womanspeak', le parler femme,
emerges between women
and disappears in the presence of men.
In her statements - at least when she dares to speak
out - woman retouches herself constantly .•• One must
listen to her differently in order to hear an "other
mean in " which is constantl
in the
rocess of
weavl.ng
at
t e
tl.me
y
436
embracing words and yet castin~ them off to avoid
becoming fixed, immob[lised.[I03
Like
Baudrillard,
constantly
of
Deleuze,
and
Foucault,
Irigaray
was
on guard against the petrification and singularity
discourse.
subversion
Women's
or
disruption
desires
assert
of
discourse
this
themselves
but
as
a
cannot
be
brought within its confines without being reduced to the male
desires
which constitute
aCCOunt of "woman speak" :
Spoken.'
[104]
it.
'I
simply
one speaks
cannot
it,
Women have no means
give
you
an
it cannot be meta-
to speak
about
their
desires, but they are always engaged in the speaking of them,
an engagement which surfaces as inconsistency, contradiction,
and meaningless chatter: '''she'' goes off in all directions and
in
which
"he"
is
unable
to
discern
the
coherence
of
any
meaning.' [105]
It is in discussions about
feminism such as this that the
concerns of poststructuralism surface most clearly. Irigaray's
identification of the devastating implications of the exclusion
Of women from the history of discourse places us before the
Problem
of
how,
as
we are
women,
able
to
speak when
the
language in which expression is possible is defined without and
against
us.
It
is
clearly
impossible
uncritically in this discourse,
for
women
but without it,
to
engage
there is no
POSSibility of saying anything at all.
Irigaray's
speech
about
discourse:
solution
their
was
desires
this practice -
that
and
women
instead
must
refrain
practise
from
them
in
the introduction of multiplici ty,
Play, and diffusion - does not attempt to establish a new and
riVal discourse,
since this
would merely contribute
to
437
petrification 0 f discourse. On the contrary, women's wri ting
must engage in the subversion, the detournement, of discourse.
In Irigaray's own work, this is practised through mimeticism,
the
mimcry
of
male
discourse.
Toril
Moi
observed
that
Irigaray's:
impeccably theoretical discourse is displaced and
relocated as a witty parody of patriarchal modes of
argument. If as a woman under patriarchy, Irigaray
has, according to her own analysis, no language of
her own but can only (at best) imitate male
discourse, her own writing must inevitably be marked
by this. She cannot pretend to be wri ting in some
pure feminist realm outside patriarchy: if her
discourse is to be received as anything other than
incomprehensible
chatter,
she
must
copy
male
discourse. The feminine can thus only be read in the
blank spaces left between the signs and lines of her
own mimicry. [106]
Women
must
write
both
in
and
against
the
discourse
of
patriarchy: they must turn the discourse that has produced them
around so
that it
10gic.'[107]
'is possible
to exceed and disturb
this
It is not therefore a question of producing a
Women's logic which would rival that of male discourse, nor of
merely naming repressed desires, since both projects are always
already
determined
by
the
discourse
in
which
they
arise.
Ra ther,
the mul tiplici ty of women's desires mus t be put into
Practice in discourse. The experience of the world through the
mediation of a woman's body must be brought into a subversive
Play with the interpretation it is given by men.
The coherence of Irigaray's thesis
is entirely due to her
identification of the specificity of women's desires.
This is
legitimated by the claim that the body through which the world
is experienced determines the nature of desire: man is singular
and unified; woman is multiple and fluid. The biological nature
438
of this distinction ensures that women's desires persist in
Spite
of
their
denial
by
male
therefore,
there
is always
something
opposed:
women's
desires
in
are
discourse.
For
Irigarary,
to which discourse
contradiction
and
pose
is
a
Continual, though silenced, threat to its domination.
This analysis clearly returns us to the necessity of the
establishment of some notion of the real in all discourse. In
Irigaray's
work,
however,
biological
difference,
a
this
reality
position
manifests
which
implies
itself
the
as
very
reductionism and foundationalism which she eschews. Moreover,
Irigaray's alliance of women with multiplicity, fluidity, and
dynamism can be read as a complici ty, rather than a cri tical
engagement,
with
the
categories
in
which
women
have
been
defined in male discourse. Her emphasis on the physical body is
necessary to her analysis, but the postulation of biological
difference can also be interpreted as an uncritical acceptance
of the conventional account of the origin of patriarchal power.
As Toril Moi has noted:
Irigaray's failure to consider the historical and
economic specificity of patriarchal power, along with
its ideological and material contradictions, forces
her into providing exactly the kind of metaphysicial
defini tion of woman she declaredly wants to avoid.
She thus comes to analyse "woman" in idealist
categories, just like the male philosophers she is
denouncing.[108]
Irigaray's assertion of a discourse in which ideas are never
immobilised or brought into a unifying and totalising discourse
is therefore contradicted by her own failure to escape this
petrification. It is maintained, however, that this paradox is
due not to inadequacies specific to Irigaray's work, but to the
relUctance
of
much
poststructuralist
discourse to recognise
439
the inevitability of some assertion of reality or authenticity,
and the necessity of meaning and evaluation. Discourse cannot
aVoid
this
context.
poststructuralism
That
wishes
Position. Any project to
to
this
is
precisely
make
does
not
the
invalidate
point
this
undermine or criticise discourse must
itself have some motivation and intention and must therefore be
based on some conception of truth and reality.
The need for conceptuali~ion
The problems which face the articulation of mUltiplicity and
specificity are not peculiar to Irigaray's work. Foucault, for
eXample, asked:
is it not perhaps the case that these fragments of
genealogies are no sooner brought to light, that the
particular elements of the knowledge that one seeks
to disinter are no sooner accredi ted and put into
circulation
that
they
run
the
risk
of
decodification, re-colonisation? [109]
As
he
observed,
'those
uni tary
discourses,
which
firs t
disqualified and then ignored' these fragments and differences:
are, it seems, quite ready
now to annex them, to
take them back within the fold of their own
discourse and to inves t them wi th everything this
implies in terms of their effects of knowledge and
power. And if we want to protect these only lately
liberated fragments are we not in danger of
ourselves constructing, with our own hands, that
unitary discourse to which we are invited, perhaps
to lead us into a trap, by those who say to us: "All
this is fine, but where are you heading? What kind
of unity are you after?" [110J
For Baudrillard, the ultimate form of resistance to this trap
\olas silence:
the passivity or disaffiliation of
Foucaul t also considered
the masses.
this trap inevi table. In his work,
440
resistance to it takes the form of exposing this inevitability
in all
discourse,
an
exposure
which
must
inevitably
occur
Within discourse.
It is not therefore silence which provides
the
a
solution,
but
discourse capable
of
exposing
its
own
shortcomings; a discourse which recognises the constraints its
conceptualisations will inevitably impose, and tries to subvert
their domination.
In a sense, therefore, critical discourse must convey the
truth
about
truth:
that
it
is
inconceivable
outside
of
a
Contingent history of discursive and social relations. Lemert
and Gillan point out that:
For Foucault to analyse knowledge in terms of power
involves a constant questioning of his own language.
If power is in knowledge, then its analysis as
knowledge must subject specific concepts to the
critique of their own limits. [111]
Foucault recognised this necessity and
made it clear that his
own work was not immune from the imposition of power entailed
by all conceptualisations and theoretisations. This imposition
can only be mitigated by the recognition that we need to use
concepts
- and so to exercise power - in our engagement with
reality, such that concepts like the subject,
criminal , and
so on,
are necessary
to
the insane, the
the critique of
the
discourse which has created them.
This means that criticism is necessarily implicated in the
discourse it attacks: critical discourse can, at the most, hope
to expose the extent to which it too is bound to involve the
impOSition of power. But
it should refuse to use concepts as
though they were representations of a prediscursive reali ty,
since this would be the concealed use of power, and instead it
441
should make it clear that it uses these concepts not because
they are 'real' in this sense, but because they are necessary
to
all
discourse.
challenged
In
'The
Subject
and
Power',
Foucault
his own analyses in this way:
Do we need a theory of power? Since a theory assumes
a prior objectification, it cannot be asserted as a
basis for analytical work. But this analytical work
cannot proceed without an ongoing conceptualisation.
And this conceptualisation implies critical thought
- a constant checking. The first thing to check is
what I should call the "conceptual needs". I mean
that the conceptualisation should not be founded on
a theory of the object - the conceptualised object
is
not
the
single
criterion
of
a
good
conceptualisation. We need a historical awareness of
our present circumstance. [112]
This historical awareness was promoted by Foucault throughout
his work:
his concern was always wi th the genealogy, ra ther
than the history, of power relations. Genealogy is particular
and localised, since it is in specific areas that power can be
jUdged, not as a totality. It does not engage in the logic of
dialectical criticism, but transgresses it through the 'freeing
of differences' which requires:
thought without contradiction, without dialectics,
without negation; thought that accepts divergence;
affirmative thought whose instrument is disjunction;
thought of the multiple
of the nomadic and
dispersed multiplicity that is not limited or
confined by the cons traints of similari ty; thought
tha t does not conform to a pedagogical model (the
fakery of prepared answers), but that attacks
insoluble problems ••• [113]
The tenets of political critique should therefore be grounded
not on some notion of transcendental history or authentic
SUbjects, but on the recognition that they are conceived as
tes·~stances to particular arrangements of power relations. The
terms and conceptualisations with which they resist should be
442
considered
as
relations
against which they struggle.
On
this
reappear
the
products
basis,
throughout
and
Marxist
instruments
terms
Foucault' s work.
and
of
the
power
conceptualisations
In Power/Knowledge,
he
wrote:
It is impossible at the present time to write
history without using a whole range of concepts
directly or indirectly linked to Marx's thought and
situating oneself within a horizon of thought which
has been defined and described by Marx. One might
even wonder what difference there could ultimately
be
between
being
a
historian
and
being
a
Marxist.[114]
Foucault's
analyses
of
power
relations
preven t him from speaking of capitalism,
wi thin a Marxis t
necessary
framework;
indeed,
did
not
clas s,
therefore
and society
he argued that
this
is
because the vocabulary of Marxism is constitutive of
the political discourse in which he participated.
It arises
Within and contributes to the production of the relations of
POWer and knowledge at work in existing society. Such a body of
theory
should be
Cri tically;
used
its concepts
selectively,
partially,
and
always
treated as weapons for use in
the
gUerrilla activity that constitutes resistance to the exercise
Of power.
It is not that these global theories have not
provided
nor
continue
to
provide
in
fairly
Consistent fashion useful tools for local research:
Marxism and psychoanalysis are proofs of this. But . I
believe these tools have only been provided on
condition
that the theoretical unity of these
discourses was in some sense put in abeyance, or at
leas t curtailed, divided, overthrown, caricatured,
threatricalised or what you will. [115]
rheories such as Marxism should recognise themselves for what,
in Foucaul t' s conception, they really are:
fOr the
critique of existing power relations.
analyses
useful
443
For Foucaul t,
which
can
tactics,
be
theories
used
partially
recognising
Configurations · of
should be conceived as
that
power
as
or
temporarily
as
they
emerge
wi thin
the
discourses
they
toolki ts
guerrilla
the
same
criticise.
Political discourses
'make a lot of
relations of forces:
"struggle" is the word used most often.
Yet
use of the language of
it seems to me tha t people sometimes hesi ta te to follow
through the consequences of this, or even to pose the problem
implicit in this vocabulary.' [116]
Official knowledge has always represented political
power as arising from conflicts within a social
class ( ••• ) or, perhaps, as a conflict genera ted
between the aristocracy and the middle class.
Popular movements,on the other hand, are said to
arise from famines, taxes, or unemployment, and they
never appear as the result of a struggle for power,
as if the masses could dream of a full stomach but
never of exercising power. [117]
Foucault's debate with Chomsky includes an interesting series
of exchanges which make his position clear.
With
arguments reminiscent of those presented by Marcuse,
Chomsky asserted:
There is no longer any social necessi ty for human
beings to be treated as mechanical elements in the
productive process; that can be overcome and we must
overcome it by a society of freedom and free
association, in which the creative urge that I
consider intrinsic to human nature, will in fact be
able to realise itself in wha tever way it will.
[118]
In response to this position, Foucault admitted that he was
nei ther able to define,
propose,
an
ideal
'nor for even stronger reasons,
social model
for
the
functioning
of
SCientific or technological society.'
If you say that a certain human nature exists, that
this human nature has not been given in actual
sOciety the rights and possibilities which allow it
to realise itself ••• if one admits that, doesn't one
to
our
444
risk defining this human nature - which is at the
same time real and ideal, and has been hidden and
repressed until now - in terms borrowed from our
socie ty, from our civilisa tion, from our culture?
[119]
For Foucault, it was inevitable that such terms will not only
be borrowed, but actually constituted by the same play of power
relations that constitutes cultural and social formations:
the real political task in a society such as ours is
to criticise the workings of institutions, which
appear to be both neutral and independent; to
criticise and attack them in such a manner that the
political violence which has always exercised itself
obscurely through them will be unmasked, so that one
can fight against them. [120]
The implications of the
conflict between Foucault and Chomsky
are clear in Foucault's challenge to
justice.
When
disobedience,
Chomsky
breaks
the
Chomsky's conception of
law
in
an
act
of
civil
Foucault asked, 'Are you committing this act in
Virtue of an ideal justice, or because the class struggle is
useful
and
necessary?
Do
you
refer
to
ideal
justice ••• ?'
Forcing Chomsky to acknowledge his assumption of some form of
justice which is denied wi thin exis ting society, a notion of
justice which therefore legi timises the breaking of the law,
Foucault accepted that such a notion of justice is central to
all social struggles. But
the invocation of justice is really
the exercise of power, rather than the expression of a truth.
JUstice is invoked:
as an instrument of power; it is not in the hope
tha t finally one day, in this or another society,
people will be rewarded according to their merits,
Or punished according to their faults. Rather than
thinking of the social struggle in terms of
"justice", one has to emphasise justice in terms of
the social struggle. [121]
JUstice is a notion which is conceived as an instrument for the
ach·
1evement of power, not by virtue of its intrinsic properties
445
or
meaning.
In
his
clearest
statement
of
this
position,
Foucault asserted:
the proletaria t doesn't make war wi th the ruling
class because it considers such a war to be jus t.
The proletariat makes war with the ruling class
because, for the first time in history, it wants to
take power. And because it will overthrow the power
of the ruling class, it considers such a war to be
just. [122]
Notions of justice, authenticity,
and human nature are not,
therefore, precluded from Foucault's political vocabulary: they
are introduced
as tactical invocations in support of a claim
to power. They are responses to our conceptual needs, to our
need to articulate experience, which can be satisfied only at
the cost of the loss of its specificity.
This experience can
Only be articulated in the discursive web of
bodies of theory
and relations
of power,
and yet without
this
there
possibility
of
and
is
no
resistance
articulation,
still
less
of
critique.
Kristeva and the flag of convenience
The paradox of
the need and impossibility of cri ticism and
conceptualisation was developed in the work of Julia Kristeva,
\\Those sympathies with political critique and that of
the
artistic avant-garde returns us to one of the central claims of
this inquiry: that the concerns addressed by poststructuralism
are merely restatements of those developed in this tradition.
Kristeva's analysis enabled her to make many of the claims
uPheld by Irigaray without the same dependence on a
biological
446
Or
erotic
foundation.
She
too
followed
unders tanding of the
'symbolic'
as
'the social and cultural
order
live
in
which
Subjects.' [123]
we
our
lives
as
Lacan
conscious,
in
her
gendered
This symbolic order was defined by Lacan and
developed by Kristeva as fundamentally phallocentric, that is,
centred around the transcendental significance of the phallus
as the ordering principle of experience.
unformed and heterogeneous,
becomes
Desire, a t
that
firs t
for possession and
Control, the motivating force of the subject.
The language in
which
based
this
desire
is
expressed
is
always
on
the
transcendental signifier of the phallus and is determined
by
the desire
and
for
singularity and
stability,
organisation
rationalisation.
This results in the intrinsic tendency of discourse to
unify and consolidate itself according to the principles of a
seminal
reason.
From
a
feminist
perspective,
the
Phallocentricism of discourse means that women 'have no access
to the symbolic order in their own right.'
[124] The work of
both Kristeva and Irigaray constituted a challenge to the
om .
nlprescence of Lacan' s symbolic order; this, in Kris teva' s
work, took the form of the challenge of the semiotic.
Kristeva shifted the emphasis of all linguistic research
away
from
the concern wi th
language as
a
structure
to
a
Process in which signification or meaning is dependent on those
who are speaking.
This is essentially the assertion tha t the
COntext
intention
and
the
with
which
language
is
used
determines its meaning. Thus the language which is constituted
by and supports the phallocentticity of meaning can always be
447
turned around and used agains t itself when those who use it
intend to do so.
Kris teva argued that
biological
the feminine is not an effect of
difference
but
phallocentricism of language.
notions
produced
is
'Woman'
and
and
discourse
by
authenticity. Women are therefore
discourse and
constituted
within
'the feminine'
have
no
the
are
intrinsic
constituted by phallocentric
condemned to use this discourse to speak of
themselves and articulate their own desires.
Women are also
defined negatively within this discourse and have been excluded
from its production, but, as such, they constitute a point of
resistance or opposition to it. Thus discourse creates its own
negativity which can be used against it. It is in this way that
Kristeva was able to articulate the category of woman without
the
necessity
of
prediscursive
a
notion
of
biological
specificity.
Like Foucault, therefore, Kristeva argued that we use the
terms of discourse to undermine or subvert the use to which
they are put. The exclusion of women from the production of
discourse does not imply tha t i t is impossible for women to
speak,
but
merely
differently.
d'lfference
suggests
that
women
must
use
language
Whereas phallocentric discourse asserts sexual
as
a
given
and
treats
'woman'
as
a
natural,
prediscursive, and biological category, the notion of 'woman'
mus teb
' d
,
,
. t'
recogn~se
asd
a '~scurs~ve
~mpos~ ~on
an d used as a
convenient label with which to resist the domination of 'men'.
~risteva
of
defined this practice as semiotic. Female modes
signification
are
not
concerned
with
the
phallocentric
448
structure of language, but the way in which it is used
in the
Control and organisation of experience. The semiotic is prior
and
opposed
heterogeneity
to
the
symbolic,
and
is
and non-rationality
of
the
present
in
the
experience of
the
Young child; it is playful, multiple, and diverse, and is the
Use of language as a contingent and dynamic tool rather than
refering to a fixed and prediscu~ve reality.
Kristeva
therefore
advocated
a
strategic definition
of
woman, as 'that which cannot be represented, that which is not
Spoken,
that which
remains
outside
naming
and
ideologies.'
[125] As Wheedon observed, the 'semiotic, female aspect of
Sign'f'
, ••• can put into question the stability and
l. l.catl.on
apparent permanence of economic and social structures.'
[126]
Kristeva's
share
woman,
and
her
woman's
writing,
does
not
Irigaray's prediscursive foundation, but is used as an attempt
to
, un d erml.ne
'
the phallocentric order that defines woman as
marginal in the first place.' [127] Toril Moi wrote:
Kristeva does not have a theory of 'femininity', and
even less of 'femaleness'. What she does have is a
theory of marginality, subversion and dissidence. In
so far as women are defined as . marginal by
pa triarchy, their struggle can be theorised in the
same way as any other struggle against a centralised
power structure. [128]
In an
interview
from
1976,
'Woman
can
never
be
defined',
Kristeva argued:
The belief that "one is a woman" is almost as absurd
and obscurantist as the belief that "one is a man". I
say "almost" because there are many goals which women
can achieve: freedom of abortion and contraception,
day-care centers for children, equality on the job,
etc. Therefore we must use "we are women" as an
advertisement or slogan for our demands. [129]
Chris Wheedon placed this assertion in
Kri
steva's work as a whole when she wrote:
the
context
of
449
Kristeva's
use
of
the
signifier
"woman"
is
deconstructive in the sense that she argues that
there is no essential womanhood, not even a repressed
one and that feminist practice cannot be directed at
achieving or recovering some sort of essential state.
It can only be defined in terms of what it rejects
and wha t is not. Poli tically the notion of being a
woman is at best a useful, temporary political
strategy for organising campaigns on behalf of
women's interests as they are currently defined
within patriarchy. [130]
Of particular significance in this position is the possibility
of its application to discourses other than the feminist.
The
marginal
in
and
subvers i ve
na ture
of
women's
presence
Phallocentric discourse - the semiotic use of language as an
agitation against its symbolic structure - is not peculiar to
women but is common to any struggle against a centralised and
unifying totality.
Kris teva 's work supports the claim made throughout this
inquiry that the avant-garde prefigured the forms of struggle
and resistance advocated by poststructuralism. Kristeva
concerned
to
draw
out
the
implications
of
this
was
heritage.
Indeed, in Revolution in Poetic Language, these are precisely
the implications which Kristeva drew from her work. She argued
that
the
struggles
of
diSSident intellectuals,
ground
and
critique of
,
cry,
the
are
the
and women occupy
therefore
subversion.
sounds,
the
proletariat,
engaged
The
in
semiotic,
gestures
of
a
the
avant-garde,
the same marginal
common
project
which appears
the
baby'
and
in
of
the
'rhythm,
prOSody, word game, the no-sense of sense, laughter' [131], is
produced in all these struggles against the domination of the
sYmbol'lC.
450
Kris teva argued that it is
the dynamic of recupera tion
that characterises the power structures which both produce and
are
countered
by
these
Agi tat ion on behalf of the
struggles
against
the
symbolic.
repressed is common to all these
movements, where repression is not seen as that which operates
on an original, authentic, or prediscursive truth, but simply
in terms of tha t
which is excluded or denied. All of these
movements are negative in their rela tion to the presence of
existing discourse.
which
their
Advocating an
struggle
is
analysis
coopted
or
of
the means
recuperated
by
by
this
discourse, Kristeva wrote:
As long as it has not analysed their relation to the
instances of power, and has not given up the belief
in its own identi ty,
any libertarian movement
(including feminism) can be recuperated by that power
and by a spiri tuali ty tha t ,may be laicized or openly
religious. The solution? •• Who knows? It will in any
case pass through that which is repressed in
discourse and in the relations of production. Call it
"woman" or "oppressed classes of society", it is the
same struggle, and never one without the other. [132]
This
suggests
that
the
feminist
should not hang on
to
the
notion of woman as an identity beyond its temporary use as the
negation of that which exists. It is precisely this awareness
that was reached by Dada and Surrealism. In both movements, the
dangers
of
the
establishment
of
rival
principles
of
equal
solidity to those of the discourse they oppose were recognised.
Dada encountered this problem in relation to chance, Surrealism
in
terms
of
the
unconscious.
Elevated
to
determining
principles, such notions lose their tactical functions and are
dissolved into the very structures against which they agitate.
The
critical use
of
existing
discourse must
therefore
Place it in a fluidity which its conventional use denies: the
451
vocabularies
of class,
gender,
and art mus t
be employed as
tactical tools, and:
reject
everything
finite,
definite,
structured ,
loaded with meaning, in the existing state of
society. Such an attitude places women on the side of
the explosion of social codes: with revolutionary
movements.[133]
The
refusal
of
a
static
identity,
clear
in
both
Dada
and
SUrrealism and theorised by the Si tua tionis ts, was therefore
endorsed by Kristeva as an essential aspect of the struggle
against recuperation.
The
cultivation
of
heterogeneity
within
discourse
is
fUndamental to this task.
Kristeva praised all writing which
creates
gaps
plural and
fluid
attempt
to
petrification
and
discourse.
and
spaces,
subvert
the
meanings
in
the
solidification
of
'For at least a century', she writes, 'the literary
avant-garde ( ••• ) has been introducing ruptures, blank spaces,
and holes into language ••• a force that has not been grasped by
the linguistic or ideological system.' [134]
The avant-garde
is subversive of the symbolic order through its practice of a
semiotic play with this order: a laughter or jouissance which
is subversive of its definite solemnity.
Drifting into nonsense
Kristeva's work is tempered by her acceptance of the Lacanian
inSistence of the necessity and inevitability of the symbolic
Order.
Heterogenei ty can interrupt,
but never overcome
this
order; as is the case with Foucault's fragments, as soon as the
452
multiplicities of meaning or the play with the nonsensical is
brought to light, it is immediately reclaimed or recuperated.
This is clear in Kristeva's discussion of the avant-garde as a
form of laughter. To make someone laugh, she wrote, is to 'tear
Open
the
symbolic'.
But
it
is
simultaneously
to
lose
the
essential charge of this urge to produce laughter.
In order to make the irruptive charge pass into
discourse so that the addressee may laugh, the
instigator of laughter, just like the artist, must
bind or rebind the charge. This new binding is
already a dis-position, a new prohibition which
prevents a drifting-into-non-sense [derive] as well
as pleasure ••• The laughter of the one who produces
that laughter is thus always painful, forced, black:
both the prohibition to be lifted and the prohibition
necessary to the articulation of the utterance weigh
heavily on him. In other words, he replaces the
effect of laughter with the production of new devices
(new texts, a new art) ••• [135]
Thus, she continued, the 'pleasure obtained from the lifting of
inhibitions is immediately invested in the
production of the
new. '
Every practice which produces something new (a new
device)
is
a practice of
laughter:
it obeys
laughter's logic and provides the subject with
language's advantages. When practice is not laughter,
there is nothing new; where there is nothing new,
practice cannot be provoking: it is . at best a
repeated, empty act. [136]
This posi tion is informed by the Dadais t a t tempt to produce
Constant innovation and their antipathy to repetition. However,
it
is
clear
that
for
the Dadais ts,
this hos tili ty was
the
Product of a political awareness which identified not discourse
Per se, but discourse as it occurs within capitalist relations,
as a recupera ti ve body.
This body is redefined in Kris teva 's
work
the
an d ,
by
extension,
poststructuralist
thesis
as
a
453
whole,
as an awareness of the inevi tabili ty of recuperation
within all discourse.
Nevertheless,
Kris teva
placed
the
struggle
of
the
proletariat in the same context as that of women, the avantgarde, and all marginalised and dissenting interests. For her,
these groups are dissenters from the totalising and solidifying
nature of a discourse which is not specific to a particular set
of
social
and discursive
relations
but common
to
all.
Her
constant reference to the power structure,
or the system, is
inconsistent
inevitability
with
her
analysis
of
the
of
domina tion by discourse, but reasserts itself throughout her
work.
This
is
because
Kristeva,
like
other
poststructuralist
writers, was using analyses and tactics which were intended to
effect
political
change.
Brought
within
the
sphere
of
a
totality of discourse which is not subject to change of this
kind but only to resistance and a continual agitation,
these
tactics demand the reintroduction of some notion of a mutable
totality.
This is a point which Moi
touched upon in her
critique of Kristeva.
In the end, Kris teva is unable to account for the
relations between the subject and society. Though she
discusses in exemplary fashion
the social and
political context of the poets she studies... it is
still not clear why it is so important to show that
certain literary practices break up the structures of
language when they seem to break up little else. She
seems essentially to argue that the disruption of the
subject, the sujet en proces displayed in these
texts,
prefigures
OL
parallels
revolutionary
disruptions of society. But her only argument in
support of this contention is the rather lame one of
comparison or homology. [137]
454
For Allon White, Kristeva's politics 'remain purified anarchism
in a perpetual state of self-dispersal.' [138]
These
criticisms
suggest
Kristeva's
that
analysis
requires some political context which is precluded by its own
tenets.
On
its
own,
Kris teva' s work
implies
tha t
poli tical
struggle is to be redefined as resistance to the symbolic, a
Position which enables her to define all struggles against the
codifications of the symbolic as revolutionary.
But this is a
Position
priority
which
presupposes
the
privilege
or
of
heterogeneity, flux and difference and implies the culpability
of the symbolic as the realm which dominates, represses, and
recuperates this dynamism. The merit of Kristeva's work is that
her emphasis on the semiotic provides us with a means by which
this new political critique might proceed: like Foucault, she
Was
concerned
to
discourse
which
totalising
thought.
establish
agitates
The
as
the
possibility
of
a
the
antithesis
of
symbolic
liberation of
language is
counteror
therefore
Posed as the form in which social liberation is reinterpreted:
'the subject of a new political practice must
be the subject
of a new discursive practice.'[139]
This position places the struggles against the structure
of power
in abeyance,
since it
is no
longer
structure, but the discursive practice tha t
the principle of domination.
It implies
the poli tical
is challenged as
that the domination
identified in discourse is not specific to a particular set of
Power relations but is an essential feature of articulation and
thought. But it also carries the imperative to find means by
Which this domination might be resisted, an imperative which is
455
clear in feminism's
inherently cri tical s ta tus.
Domination
cannot
be
but
considers
Foucault's
concern
with
nomadology,
Irigaray's
overcome,
specificity,
whether
one
Deleuze's
multiplicity, or Kristeva's heterogeneity, the need to assert
the
possibility
of
some
'beach
beneath
the
cobblestones'
continually reemerges.
It is the existence of this reality, whether or not it is
accessible, which is necessary to all discourse and provides
the
possibility
of
criticism.
For
the
poststructuralists,
criticism cannot be conceived as a negativity or contradiction:
this would entail a return to the possibility of a discourse
capable
of
relations.
analysing
and opposing
a
specific
set
of
power
Clearly this is impossible where discourse
itself
is defined as the realm in which both dissent and affirmation
are
produced.
The
recuperation of
poststructuralists
negativity
is
argued
an inevitable
that
feature
of
the
all
discourse. They also, however, asserted that resistance to this
recuperation is equally necessary. And in order to effect this
resistance, they developed those
and
foundations
critical
thought
POststructuralism,
which
have
and
without
conceptualisations, tactics,
characterised
which
it
is
the
history
of
impossible.
In
these forms of resistance still come from
somewhere and move in some direction,
even if both of these
Points are eternally elusive and cannot be defined.
direction
is
itself
POststructuralism,
Chosen
and
precluded
by
in which the means
evaluated
have
no
a
strict
But this
reading
of
by which it might be
foundation.
Poststructuralism
therefore produces its own subversion: we have no reason to
456
privilege flux or heterogeneity over unity and totalisation.
To speak of reasons in this way is possible only in a context
in which there is a political necessity for critique and the
possibility of effecting it.
Poststructuralism
gone
has
some
way
towards
the
satisfaction of both these requirements in spite of its claim
to
the
contrary.
acknowledge
its
But
because
political
of
this
interests
claim,
and
it
fails
to
and
so
intentions,
produces a weakened and circui tous cri tique. The problems it
identifies as insurmountable in the critical theory of Marx or
Marcuse are
intrinsic
to
its own analyses:
the need
for
a
cri tical dis tance remains its guiding force.
This is because
the presupposi tions
all
of
cri tical
discourse.
As
theory
are
the
we have
seen,
inevi table
features
of
Foucault,
for
eXample,
did present a view of the prediscursive world:
an
interplay of diverse and discontinuous relations which have to
be ordered and constrained as a precondition of knowledge. Some
form of ordering and imposition is necessary and inevitable; it
is the very fact that thought can hold the world steady for a
moment that makes discourse, with its attendant definitions of
truth, reason, and reality, possible.
This
continuity
between
poststructuralism
and
critical
theory is clear in relation to the work of the Situationists.
The
following
recuperation
chapter
as
POststructuralists,
they
the
considers
appear
accounts
of
in
theses
Situationists,
the
and
criticism
and
of
the
throughout
the
traditions of critical thought considered in this text.
457
6. The Return to Reality.
'Professor Baudrillard is determined to prove that the world is
flatter than a pancake'. (Here and Now)
This
concluding
chapter
indicates
poststructuralist
analyses
were
the
extent
anticipated by
to
the
which
critical
tradition they claim to reject. Having observed the influence
of the critical tactics of the avant-garde on the genre, it is
argued here tha t
Marxism and the Si tua tionis t
cri tique have
eXerted an influence so strong that poststructuralism fails to
leave such cri tical theory behind and becomes a weakened and
less coherent version of these analyses.
Nevertheless,
the
POststructuralist attention to the anomie and uncertainty of
Contemporary
life has
led to
its exertion of a
significant
influence on philosophical and social discourse, an influence
encouraged
by
the
emergence
of
a
cultural
atmosphere
of
POstmodernism. While the nihilism of these 'post' projects
has
a superficial appeal, it is maintained that the most productive
of the poststructuralist analyses have already appeared in the
,
modernist'
critiques
Situationists.
of
the
avant-garde,
Marxism,
and
the
458
THE SILENT MAJORITY
The poststructuralist thesis is most accurately characterised
as a version of the analysis developed by the Situationists
which denies it any critical imperative. It takes the analysis
of the spectacle, as an all-encompassing and productive domain,
to a conclusion in which it is appears as the inversion of
nothing. This is most clear in the work of Baudrillard, who
asserted:
there is no more spectacle, no more stage, no more
theatre, no more illusions, when everything becomes
immediately transparent, visible, exposed in the raw
and
inexorable
light
of
information
and
communication. We no lon~er partake in the drama of
alienation, but are in t e ecstaey of communication.
[1]
For Baudrillard, there can be no reality to which the spectacle
is opposed; the ahistoricism of the spectacle is considered not
as the mere interruption of history, or the historical moment
in which we are caught, but the end of history.
In
Baudrillard's
work,
the
possibility
of
critique
nevertheless survives and, in spite of his insistence that the
ecstaey
of
communication
places
us
in
a
completely
self-
referential world in which 'reality' is quite meaningless and
impossible to identify,
the real reemerges as the ground of
some form of criticism. It is maintained that this is also true
for other poststructuralist writers: although their use of the
VOcabulary and tactics of the Situationists and other schools
Of critical theory is intended to undermine the validity of
criticism,
the need for
reasserts itself.
some critical function continually
459
Baudrillard's appropriation of the Situationist thesis is
easy to discern. In his 1968 The System of Objects, Baudrillard
defined
reality
as
an
interminable
cycle
of
meaningless
consumptions in which a 'potentially infinite play of signs is
thus
instituted
individual
which
with
an
determination. '[2]
erodes
society
illusory
sense
Simulcra
and
while
of
providing
freedom
Simulations,
and
the
self-
published
in
1981, developed this perspective to the point at which there is
no reali ty to define, but a self-referential hyperreali ty,
a
world:
constructed out of models or simulcra which have no
referent or ground in any "reality" except their
own. A simulation is different from a fiction or a
lie in that it not only presents an absence as a
presence, the imaginary as the real, it also
undermines any contrast to the real, absorbing the
real wi thin itself. Ins tead of a "real" economy of
commodities that is somehow bypassed by an "unreal"
myriad of advertising images,
Baudrillard now
discerns only a ~perreality, a world of selfreferential signs. L3]
In both
texts,
the
possibili ty
of
a
cri tical
discourse
is
precluded since it inevitably 'lends credibility precisely to
those illusions already exposed.' [4]
Baudrillard
therefore developed the debate on the nature
and possibility of criticism identified throughout this inquiry
to
an
unprecendented
cri tique mus t
extent.
Foucault's
assertion
be superseded by resis tance wi thin
the
that
force
field of power relations is extended still further, so that the
grounds on which resistance is possible are challenged in turn.
SUbjecting Foucault's analysis of power and resistance to the
same critique he mounted of totality and critique, Baudrillard
Pos tUla ted a new cul ture,
'one tha t is impervious to the old
460
forms
of
resistance and
impenetrable by
theories
rooted
in
traditional metaphysical assumptions. Culture is now dominated
by simulations...
origin,
objects and discourses
no referent,
that have no
no ground or foundation.'
[5] As
firm
Mark
Poster observed:
As the politics of the sixties receded so did
Baudrillard's radicalism: from a posi tion of firm
leftism he gradually moved to one of bleak fatalism.
In Symbolic Exchange and Death (1976) he searches
deperately
for
a
source
of
radicalism
that
challenges the absorptive capacities of a system
with no fixed determination, a world where anything
can be anything else, a society, in short, dominated
by the digital logic of the code. Baudrillard's
pathetic conclusion is that only death escapes the
code ••• a truly symbolic act. [6]
This position is most clear in Baudrillard's assertion
is in
'the shadow of
the silent majorities'
that
that it
the only
ground of possible resistance is to be found. In his book of
the same name, Baudrillard argued that by their disaffiliation,
the masses constitute the same antagonistic absence of meaning
as
that
Baudrillard
discerned
in
the
meaninglessness of terrorism aims a t
magic of social abstraction',
still
grea ter,
more
terrorist
the masses,
by its own
anonymous,
act.
The
'tha t whi te
'black magic of a
arbi trary
and
hazardous
abstraction.' [7]
Even in
this
schema
of
the end of
the spectacle,
the
Possibili ty of negation and resis tance reasserts itself. The
majorities' refusal of meaning and is heralded by Baudrillard
as the only possible ground of resistance,
resis t
since the masses
'not only poli tical or ideological labelling, but the
very attempt to call them into being and endow them with any
Collective properties at all.' [8] Mere appearance, the event
461
about which nothing can be said, and the refusal to search for
meaning and articulation, are prioritised.
Sylvere Lotringer described Baudrillard' s
position most
accurately with the phrase: 'A successful event leaves nothing
behi nd
it.'
[9]
Permitting
no
foothold
retaining appearance, the masses also escape
for
discourse,
recuperation into
the discursive attempt to give them meaning: the seduction of
appearances
is
irreducible
Asserting the priority of
and
the
majorities,
to
the
production
of
meaning.
the implaccable silence of the event
Baudrillard
returned
to
the
notion
of
resistance. In The Ecstasy of Communication, he wrote:
There is, in this sense, a contemporary strategy of
seduction which would counter the surveillance and
computer processes, the ever more sophisticated
methods of biological and molecular control and
retrieval
of
bodies,
all
the
procedures
of
identification
(which
have
replaced
those
of
alienation), of forced identity, of detection of
dissuasion. [10]
With a few rhetorical questions, Baudrillard gave the tactics
of such a strategy.
How does one disguise oneself?
How does one dissimulate oneself?
How does one parry in disguise, in silence, in the
game of signs, indifference
in a strategy of
appearance?
Seduction as an invention of stratagems, as a
disguise for survival, as an infinite dispersion of
lures, as an art of disappearance and absence, as a
dissuasion which is stronger yet than that of the
system. [11]
Brought within the political context, Baudrillard's strategy of
seduction opposes the production of meaning to those who are
excluded
from
or
refuse
it.
POlitical
tactic
with which
COUntered.
Like
the
Passivity
the
is
activity
Situationists,
presented
of
Baudrillard
as
the
production
is
argued
that
462
power requires the participation of the masses. In his work,
however,
it is by their inertia, rather than their critical
negativity, that the people subvert the exercise of power.
The reemergence of opposition
Baudrillard established the indecipherable, the inert, and the
absent
as
the
characteristics
of
that
which
resists
the
exercise of power. Correspondingly, power is defined as
the
imposition of meaning, participation, and presence.
Lyotard
used the Surrealist practice of the derive to establish
a
similar division between his drifting thought and the alleged
solidi ty of dialectical cri tique. As it was theorised by the
Situationists and realised in the events of 1968, the derive
constituted
according
the
use
of
to principles
the
city
environment
and desires
to
ends
and
which contradicted
the
fUnctional basis of which it was constructed. This technique of
the derive as a detournement of the environment was used by
LYotard to quite different ends: those which deny the validity
of such a contradiction.
In 'Adrift', Lyotard asked:
Where do you cri ticise from? Don't you see tha t
criticising is still knowing, knowing better? That
the critical relation still falls within the sphere
of knowledge, of realisation and thus of the
assumption of power?
Cri tique mus t be drifted out
of. Better still: Drifting is in itself the end of
all critique. [12J
This
critique of dialectical thought was developed by Lyotard
in ~riftworks. Far from being universal and objective, critical
negation is defined as 'a selective activity' in which:
such and such an experience, a declaration, a work
of art, a political initiative, a libidinal position
463
is exhibited in its deficiencies, negated thus,
considered to be one from the point of view of its
limit and not at its affirmativitr, challenged to
equal the object of the critic s desire, i.e.
infini ty,
universali ty,
necessi ty:
it will be
accepted or rejected ••• [13J
For
Marcuse,
of
course,
it
was
the
positivism
of
one-
dimensional thought that was attacked as the legitimation of
advanced capi talis t
society;
in Lyotard,
dialectical thought
unwittingly supports and affirms the existing arrangements of
power.
Negating. This activity is deeply rational, deeply
consistent with the system. Deeply reformist: the
critic remains in the sphere of the criticised, he
belongs to it, he goes beyond one term of the
posi tion but doesn't alter the posi tion of terms.
And deeply hierarchical: where does his power over
the criticised come from? he knows better? he is the
teacher, the educator? he is therefore universality,
the Uni versi ty, the S ta te, the Ci ty, bending over
childhood,
nature,
singularity,
shadiness,
to
reclaim them? The confessor and God helping the
sinner save his soul? This benign reformism is
wholly compatible with the ~reservation of the
authoritarian relationship. [14J
As a poststructuralist deconstruction, however, the derive is
used to undermine the possibility of its critical use.
This is
also true of Kristeva' s definition of derive as a 'driftinginto-non-sense', and Deleuze's wandering nomad thinkers, first
introduced by the Dadaist Picabia, who declared: 'One must be a
nomad, pass through ideas as one passes through countries and
Cities.'[15J
In spite of its rejection of the possibility of critical
thought,
it
is
clear
that
the
poststructuralist
thesis
displays all the trappings of an analysis that does facilitate
critique; it
Political
remains framed in the vocabulary of the radical
discourse.
Baudrillard's
talk
of
strategies
and
464
evasion exposes the inevitability of his belief that there is
some reason
to develop
a
s tra tegy and
something
for
it
to
evade. The fundamental inconsistency of this position emerged
when
Baudrillard
analysis.
In
found
it
necessary
with
interview
his
to
qualify
his
entire
Lotringer,
'Forget
Baudrillard', he said:
It is impossible to think that theory can be nothing
more than fiction. Otherwise no one would bother
producing theory any more. You have to believe that
going somewhere is not just a metaphor. And then, if
it is a challenge, in any case there is a partner.
It is no longer a dialectic, but there is a rule of
the game. Somewhere there must be a limit that
constitutes the real in order for there to be
theory. A point where things can stick, or from
which they can take off. [16]
By his own acknowledgement, therefore, theory necessitates some
notion of reality. It cannot be mere play, but must be play for
a purpose.
The
nihilism
requirement:
of
Dada
Tzara's
is
a
absurdi ties
perfect
and
example
of
this
illogicali ties
were
intended as tirades against the bourgeoisie, protests against
the war, subversions of the system.
Dada-type
provocation
in
Poland
The recent explosion of
is
effected
for
similar
reasons: Orange Alternative is ridiculous not on account of its
lack of purpose precisely because it ridicules the State.
In a
recent interview, the movement's leading protagonist was asked:
'Do
set
up
happenings
in
totalitarianism
of
the
under
you
response he declared:
system
order
which
to
expose
the
we
live?'
In
'I do them because I do them, but one
does things because of, or for something ••• ' [17]
Lyotard was also willing to concede this point; indeed, he
Went
much further than Baudrillard
in
the
return to some
465
notion of real experience.
tendency
to
isolate
inherent
in
the
In 'On Theory', he wrote that the
contradictions
specificity
of
and
impose
experience.
meanings
Theory
is
cannot
therefore be a mere fiction, nor is its function:
only to understand, but also to criticise, i.e. to
call into ques tion and overturn
a reali ty, social
relationships, the relationships of men with things
and other men, which is clearly intolerable. And as
far as I am concerned, tha t is the dimension of
politics. It isn't only the assumption of power, it
mus t consis t in the overturning of a mys tified or
alienated reality. [18]
Moreover, the universalisation for which totalising theory is
criticised
is
implicit
in
the
experience
of
the
everyday.
Theory is made possible by the experience of alienation and the
need to analyse and criticise the nature of the system which
perpetuates it.
if
there aren't indices which refer
to
the
possibility of a systematic understanding of things,
indices that function negatively in sum, which are
like holes in this experience, holes through which
one is going to see, or attempt to see, at least,
what organises this lacunary experience which is
tha t of capi talis t society wi th its alienation •••
then there is no possibility of theory. I don't say
that the theory becomes necessary. If the actual
conditions of experience didn't already contain - in
a negative way - the index of a universality, there
is no reason why this uni versali ty could be
constructed as a system. [19]
This
suggests
that
the
construction
of
theories
might
not
alWays be detrimental to the discontinuity of experience, but
COuld manifes t
itself as
the expression of deficiencies and
absences implicit in this experience. The articulation of these
absences can therefore be said to bring them into contradiction
to the presence of existing discourse, and it is out of this
Contradiction that the theoretisation of that 'which organises
this lacunary experience' is possible.
466
We have seen that poststructuralism effectively asserts
the completion or inevi tabili ty of the phenomenon defined by
the
Situationists
conceptual
tool
alienation and
already
as
is
recuperation,
quite
ideology,
effected;
there
so
redundant.
recuperation
is
no
that
its
Like
terms
is
said
possibility
use
as
a
such
as
to be
of
an
always
original
SUbject or prior to recuperation. Nevertheless, it seems that
recupera tion and the a t tempt to avoid it remain the guiding
principles
behind
the
pos ts truc turalis t
thesis;
wha t
is
different is the nature of the recuperative body and that which
is recupera ted.
This
is
clear in
Foucaul t' s
assertion
that
priority must always be given to:
the claims to the attention of local, discontinuous,
disqualified, illegitimate knowledges against the
claims of a unitary body of theory which would
filter, hierarchise and order them in the name of
some true knowledge ••• [20]
Moreover, both Lyotard and Foucault introduce some conception
of a structure or system of power responsible for recuperation.
Writing on the avant-garde, for example,
recuperation
Lyotard argued that
is peculiar to a specific structure of power.
What was once part of the avant-garde always becomes
part of the rear-guard and, as such, loses its
disruptive power. That is the strength of the
capitalist system, its capacity for recovering
anything and everything.[21]
This suggests that the poststructuralist analysis has absorbed
the conception of recuperation in its
there
is
a
sense
in
which
implicit acceptance that
experience
and
ideas
can
be
appropriated by interests or relations to which they opposed.
This ambiguity is also present in Foucault's consideration
Of recuperation.
467
I don't agree at all with all this talk about
"recuperation". What's taking place is the usual
strategic development of a struggle ••• For each move
by one adversary, there is an answering one by the
other. But this isn't a "recuperation" in the
leftists'
sense.
One
has
to
recognise
the
indefiniteness of the struggle - though this is not
to say it won't some day have an end ••• [22]
In the context of an infinite play of power and resistance,
recuperation loses the critical edge it assumes in a context in
which the struggle does have an end, but even here, Foucault
does not preclude
this possibility. The ambiguity is present
throughout the poststructuralist
project.
NOmadology in practice
The inevi tabili ty of some purpose,
cri tique
is
clear in
reason,
and direction to
the appropriation of pos ts truc turalism
made by the Italian Autonomists. The Autonomists accepted much
of
the
poststructuralist
assertion
that
power
is
analysis,
particularly
disseminated
throughout
Foucault's
social
and
discursive relations, necessitating a mUltiplicity of sites of
resistance.
This
perspective
facilitated
the
autonomous
development of these sites but did not, however, preclude the
possibility
criticism
of
of
their
a
coherence
'general
effect'
eXigencies of this analysis
impossibility of
as
a
of
'general
power.
The
effect'
of
practical
did not therefore result in the
the collective critique of an
identifiable
sYstem.
This
treatment
POststructuralist thesis,
entailed
some
changes
to
the
to the extent that it can be seen to
468
have been used as a tactical tool, a flag of convenience, in
itself. In a discussion with Baudrillard, Lotringer suggested
to him that
is precisely what occu~ed:
The Italians - particularly certain figures of the
Autonomia movement
when confronted with an
emergency situation, found in certain of your
propositions, even if they were disenchanted ones,
instruments that they immediately tried to use
politically. Instead of respecting your own ends (or
their absence as ends ••• ), they took certain of your
conceptual tools capable of being reinvested in
particular situations. [23]
And
in
a
development
of
this
point,
Lotringer and
Marazzi
revealed the extent to which the political context involves the
reinvestment of the concrete situation into poststructuralism:
If "the end of poli tics" means the search for new
dimensions of antagonism on levels other than the one
defined by concrete needs (wage struggles, the
"attack on income" as a refusal of poverty, etc),
then within the Italian movement the "end of
politics" has a different meaning, not at all
psychologistic, literary or philosophic. For there
the "end of politics" involves a search for new
political areas of struggle, new territories for the
massification of the struggle. In Italy, the French
theories, like those of Foucault, Deleuze, Guattari,
and Baudrillard too, are immediately translated into
the Movement's language, that is, into concrete
struggle. [24]
This use of the poststructuralist thesis reintroduces it into a
realm in which the identification of a structure of domination
specific to the political system was deemed essential. But it
\\Tas recognised that
the use of poststructuralist tactics in
this manner involved the rejection of its 'own ends' and their
appropriation to those of political critique.
Nevertheless, it is also clear that it is impossible to
speak
of
links and
local
and autonomous
struggles without
discerning
continuities, to the extent that talk of a 'system'
Or 'structure' of power again resurfaces in Foucault' s work.
469
His account of the nature of localised resistance employs this
vocabulary without apparent difficulty:
women, prisoners, conscripted soldiers, hospital
patients, and homosexuals have now begun a specific
struggle against the particularised power, the
constraints and controls, that are exerted over
them. Such struggles are actually involved in the
revolutionary movement to the extent that they are
radical, uncompromising, and nonreformist and refuse
any attempt at aiming a new disposition of the same
power with, at best, a change of masters. And these
movements are linked to the revolutionary movement
of the proletariat to the extent that they fight
against the controls and constraints which serve the
same system of power. [25]
From this it is clear that Foucault found it necessary to link
his discontinuous struggles to that of a distinct class against
a definable system.
This is also clear in Gua t tari 's description of
'future
forms' of struggle as 'multi-centred'.
For the last decade "battle lines" widely different
from
those
which
previously
characterised
the
traditional workers' movement have not ceased to
mUltiply: (immigrant workers, skilled workers unhappy
wi th the kind of work imposed on them,
the
unemployed,
over-exploited
women,
ecologists,
nationalists,
mental patients,
homosexuals,
the
elderly, the young, etc.). But will their objectives
become just another "demand" acceptable to the
system? Or will vectors of molecular revolution begin
to proliferate behind them? [26]
These questions imply that Guattari's 'micro-revolutions' must
develop into some form of strategic and coordinated onslaught
if their tactics and demands are not to be recuperated within
the exis ting power s truc ture.
this
s tra tegy
does no t
totalising critique,
must
be
For Gua t tari,
involve a re turn
but means
'multi-centred'
or
to
the necess i ty of
the demands
of
that resistance to the whole
molecular.
Nevertheless,
it
is
difficult to see how the 'proliferation of vectors' is to be
470
dis tinguished from a unified cri tique.
context
of
practical
prioritised
by
critique,
Foucault
and
inevitable movement towards
It
appears
that
the
the
Indeed, placed in the
fragments
Guattari
are
of
resistance
caught
in
an
the criticism of the totality.
tendency
to
totalisation
and
evaluation is not absent from poststructuralism to the extent
tha t even Baudrillard would like to sugges t.
maintained,
therefore,
that
the
I t is further
failure
of
the
poststructuralist attempt to dispense with such discourse is
due to the inevi tabili ty of the assertion of some notion of
foundation,
reality, structure and direction.
of
the
Lacan,
fundamentally
postulation
inaccessible,
of
is
a
real,
necessary
As in the work
even
to
if
it
is
discourse.
The
poststructuralist claim that this imperative can be escaped is
illegitimate.
471
THE TACTICS OF CRITICISM
The poststructuralist analyses have drawn political attention
to the necessity of extending
the areas of resistance to the
limits
in
of
framed.
language
and
reason
which critique
This imperative was already present in
itself
is
the both the
attempts of Dada and Surrealism to to subvert discourse, and
the
various
Marxist
challenges
authori ty of
theory,
structure,
projects were
considered by
to
the
and organisa tion.
the Situationists
which facilitated their analysis in terms of
is
maintained,
POststructuralism
therefore,
were
legitimation
the
that
anticipated
by
All
in
a
and
these
context
recuperation.
central
tenets
the
of
work
It
of
the
Situationists. Moreover, the theoretical presuppositions of the
Marxist and avant-garde traditions in which they developed can
withstand the criticisms levelled at them by poststructuralism.
This effectively means
that
there is no possibility of
articulating resistance without immediate integration into the
all-encompassing play of discourse. This position can only be
cOuntered by a context in which some notion of contradiction,
totality, and history is possible. Such a context is provided
by the Situationists, whose analyses, devoid of their political
intent, reappear in the poststructuralist thesis as reminders
of the impossibility of change in the totality.
The
validity
of
any
notion
of
prediscursive
reality
constitutes the central disagreement between poststructuralism
and
the critical
tradition.
Arguing
that such a reality
impossible to articulate, the poststructuralists inferred
is
from
472
this
that
criticism
based
impossible.
However,
this
on
any
position
notion
of
reality
based
on
fundamental
is
is
misconceptions about the nature of dialectical criticism. As it
is
used
by
both
Marxism
requires
the
example,
alienation
the
and
establishment
of
Situationists,
contradictions
authentici ty,
and
proletariat,
the
ideology
and
criticism
between,
for
the bourgeoisie and
and
truth.
For
the
poststructuralists, these terms are equally the products of the
social
and
discursive
relations
in
which
they
arise:
both
alienation and authenticity are constituted by these relations
and no privileged truth value can be accorded to one of them.
Authenticity,
they
argued,
cannot
therefore
be
opposed
to
alienation in the development of a critique of alienation.
However,
dialectical
criticism
does
not
require
its
Contradictions to be based on Archimedean truths. Its notions
of tru th,
reali ty, and authentici ty are his torical products.
The Situationists, for example, could recognise that any notion
of
authentici ty
conceived
wi thin
capi talis t
society
is
constituted by this totality and has meaning only within this
COntext in
the
same way
that
the proletariat
is both
the
product of capitalist social relations and the ground of their
COntradiction.
The conceptualisations of Marxism therefore escape many of
FOUcaul t ' s
cri ticisms
and
historical
contingency
of
concepts
and
notions
such
desire,
Situationist
use
of
sa tis fy
spontanei ty, and participation,
his
as
demands
for
the
theories.
The
creativity,
also sa tis fy these demands.
These terms are constructed as part of the Situationist attempt
473
to contradict the principles on which the ahistoricism of the
spectacle is based.
Their antagonism to these principles is
intended to widen and expose the contradictions between the
advertised wealth and the experienced poverty of everyday life.
Desires are promoted not because of any essential validity or
status such as that accorded them by Freud and Marcuse:
they
are developed in the effort to establish the critical process.
It
is
reality
therefore
are
capitalism
possible
to
assert
both
that
desires
equally
the
products
of
capitalism,
produces
and,
moreover,
is
dependent
and
and
that
upon
these
desires for its survival.
This point is clear in the Situationist conceptualisation
of participation. The desires and experiences of everyday life
conceptualised
by
the
Situationists
can
be
seen
not
as
a
presocial or even a prediscursive reality recuperated into the
society
and
discourse
of
the
spectacle,
but
experiences
preconditioned on the dominance of the spectacle. The need for
participation is produced
by the spectacle to the end of its
OWn survival: capitalism is dependent on the participation of
its members,
but it constantly ensures
that
the desire
for
participation which it cultivates does not extend to the desire
to
participate
in historical development.
The contradiction
identified by the Situationists need not therefore be construed
as tha t
between pseudo-participation and its authentic form,
but the contradiction between the desire for participation set
in motion and required by the spectacle, and the poverty of the
means by which it might be satisfied.
474
Cri ticism involves
articula tion of experience, and
the
this requires conceptualisations and theories. The dangers of
notions
such
as
participation,
authenticity,
and
class
becoming ossified, and exerting a tyranny of their own, have
been observed in relation to all the terms used by critical
discourse.
Although
such conceptualisations
should be used carefully,
in
and mediations
the recogni tion that they are
necessarily the products of the totality they aim to overturn,
the awareness of this internal relation does not invalidate
their use as critical tools.
Kristeva's
convenience'
is
use
of
the
an
excellent
term
'woman'
example
of
as
a
'flag
the
way
in
of
which
poststructuralism can be used as a critical theory which has no
reference
possibility
to
prediscursive
of
discourse.
reality
but
Although
still
many
allows
other
the
feminist
cri tiques depend upon a biological defini tion of 'woman'
and
presuppose the possibility of a return to the authentic or the
original woman, Kristeva's analysis recognises the historical
Contingency of such definitions and, as Wheedon pointed
out:
requires attention to historical specificity in the
production, for women, of subject positions and modes
of femininity and their place in the overall network
of social power relations. In this the meaning of
biological sexual difference is never fixed. It is a
site of contest over meaning and the exercise of
patriarchal power. [27]
Toril Moi argued that women are defined
denies
and
diminishes
them;
the
within a context which
meaning
of
'woman'
is
circumscribed by this framework. But this cannot be allowed to
silence or paralyse women: although meaning has been produced
against the interests of women,
'this is not to say that we
475
could
or
should
avoid
naming
simply
that
it
is
a
more
slippery business than it seems, and we should be alive to the
dangers of fetishization.' [28]
Kristeva's use of the term 'woman' without reference to a
prediscursive realm did not prevent her from from using it to
identify a real set of people. It merely required that critical
discourse should recognise tha t i t s meanings are necessarily
derived from the context in which they are used.
Criticism
should see this as the precondition of its project, and develop
a tactical awareness of its procedures in order to expose and
resist the domination of the context against which it agitates;
in
other
words,
historical
critical
contingency
discourse
and
should
constitution
of
recognise
the
the
and
terms
analyses it uses.
This tactical awareness of criticism, prefigured by the
Situationist analysis of recuperation,
POststructuralism. Whereas
is present throughout
recuperation was specific to the
spectacle for the Situationists,
the poststructuralists tend
rather to consider all forms of discursive codification to be
recuperative of the 'reality' of the dynamic, desiring flux.
While this implies the inevitability of recuperation,
it also
means that it can never be definitive: resistance is equally
inevitable.
Deleuze, Gua t tari, and Foucaul t, have
desiring
machine,
activist
in
the
response
nomadic
to
warrior,
each invoked the
and
the
guerrilla
their own pos tula tion of an all-
encompassing network of power relations. Thus:
the very conditions that make the State or the World
war machine possible, in other words constant capital
476
(resources and equipment) and human variable capital,
constantly recreate unexpected possibilities for
counterattack, unforeseen initiatives determining
revolutionary, minority, mutant machines.[29]
These marginal and free-floating bodies of resistance cannot,
however,
assume the poli tical meaning the pos ts truc turalis ts
would wish to ascribe to them, since a resistance, if it is to
be defined as revolutionary, must be capable of developing into
a critique of the totality. The codification necessary to all
discourse which this would imply is precisely
this sort of
systemising agains t which Deleuze argues. The whole point of
nomadology is that it challenges the codes:
At the centre, the rural communities are absorbed by
the despot's bureaucratic machine, which indicates
its scribes, its priests, its functionaries. But on
the periphery, these communities commence a sort of
adventure ••• a nomadic war machine, and they begin
to decodify instead of allowing themselves to be
overcodified.[30]
It is
therefore important always
to remain embarked on
the
adventure of a discontinuous and unsystematised thought which
resists the codifications of theory and structures of power,
even though this entails a forfeiture of the possibility of a
revolutionary critique.
The
impossibility
of
a
definitive
recuperation
theorised by the Si tua tionis ts in poli tical terms.
affirmed
that: 'If
destructiveness:
it is
to last,
was
Vaneigem
Power had to shackle
its
the good general oppresses his men, he does
not execute them.' [31] Because the ground of resistance is not
destroyed, but only put in abeyance and rendered impotent, the
possibility of its resurgence remains. 'Power lives off stolen
goods. It creates nothing, it recuperates.' This is a sentiment
common
to
both Situationist and poststructuralist,
although
477
they differ widely on their conceptions of
'power'
and
'the
goods'. For Deleuze and Gua t tari, too, power was placed in a
relation of dependency on resistance, where power is defined as
codification and resistance is that which defies it.
Power is
therefore constantly engaged in preventing the
development of
liomadology,
this
Deleuze
resistance into any sort of
threat.
In
and
dynamic
of
Guattari
defined
this
resistance as a war machine, observing that the
'State has no
war machine of its own; it can only appropriate one in the form
of
a
military
institution,
one
that
will
always
cause
it
problems.' [32] They continued:
Could it be that it is at the moment the war machine
ceases to exist, conquered by the State, that it
displays to the u tmos t i t s irreducibili ty, tha t i t
sca t ters into thinking, loving, dying, or crea ting
machines which have at their disposal vital or
revolutionary powers capable of challenging the
conquering state? [33]
This
suggests
that
the moment at which the recuperation of
critique into the totality seems definitive is also that in
which the potential of its dissolution arises.
This position is merely a reworking of the Marxist adage,
'the
capitalist
sells
the
rope
that
hangs
him'.
In
The
££mmunist Manifesto, Marx and Engels wrote:
The weapons with which the bourgeoisie felled
feudalism to the ground are now being turned against
the bourgeoisie itself. But not only has the
bourgeoisie forged the weapon tha t brings death to
itself;it has also called into existence the men who
are to wield those weapons - the modern working-class
- the proletarians. [34]
The
same
point
was
made
by
Jean
Barrot,
in
What
.§.!.tuationism?:
The
mis take
in
descriptions
of
comple tely
totalitarian societies is that they do not see that
all societies, even the most oppressive, presuppose
is
478
the intervention and action of human beings in their
unfolding. Every society, including and especially
capitalist society, lives on these tensions, even
though it risks being destroyed by them. [35]
These observations suggest that Foucault's call for theory to
be constructed as
the satisfaction of
conceptual needs
is
answered and indeed anticipated in the critical tradition.
This suggests that discourse, like all the products of a
system of power relations,
can be appropriated by those whose
interests are opposed to the context in which it arises. The
Situationist notion of detournement is most useful here, since
it implies the possibility of a reclamation of meaning. In Pure
hust,
for
example,
Mary
Daly
wrote
of
the
'double-edged
dimensions' of words, and set about reclaiming, discovering and
inventing
discourse
as
part
of
her
project
to
expose
the
patriarchal nature of discourse and simultaneously establish
the possibility of a women's speech. [36] Similarly,
Madeleine
Gagnon declared: 'I snatch this language that is foreign to me
and turn it about in my fashion ••• I am a foreigner to myself in
my own
language and
others.' [37]
I
translate myself by quoting all
the
In Sorties, Helene Cixous wrote that the woman
cannot return to any origin. 'A boy's journey is the return to
the native land ••• A girl's journey is farther - to the unknown,
to
invent.'
[38]
Feminist
original, authentic,
critique .cannot
depend
or prediscursive meanings,
need them in order to proceed.
upon
any
and does not
479
Arming the chairs
The analyses of pos ts truc turalism are meaningful, valid, and
consistent
only when they are made to reenter the tradition of
historical critique in which they were anticipated. Armed with
an imperative to criticise and intended not as a description of
power
relations
but
their
critique,
Kristeva's
to
feminist
discourse makes a useful contribution~critical analysis. This
use of poststructuralism has been observed in relation to the
events in Italy in the 1970s, and is
poststructuralism's
place
in
the
explained in terms of
development
of
twentieth
century thought and society. Developing out of the theoretical
and practical critiques of capitalism effected by Marxism and
the
avant-garde,
Situationists,
and
brought
together
in
the
work
of
the
poststructuralism bears
all
the hallmarks
of
these traditions but uses this heritage to deny its validity.
This returns us to the fundamental weakness in Foucault's
argument identified by Lemert and Gillan:
abou t
conceptual needs,
Foucault
but it is only in the mos t
can talk
general
terms of the will to power or the will to truth that he can
identify the reason for our need to conceptualise. Wi th his
conception
denied
the
knowledge.
take
of
knowledge
as
intrinsically coercive,
possibility
of
the
appropriation
of
Dews argued tha t i t is perfectly possible to
'to
account
of
social
and
critical
Foucault
institutional
preconditions
of
knowledge without denying that knowledge also possesses its own
immanent, rational historicity.' [39]
And it would seem that
some such conjunction of an awareness of the preconditions of
480
knowledge and the possibilities of their criticism is essential
if we are to escape the impasse into which poststructuralism
leads us.
All critical discourse should be aware of the historical
Context in which it speaks.
The poststructuralists recognise
this imperative, but fail to develop it, with the result that
they
employ
tactics,
techniques,
and
methodologies
without
regard for their historical significance. This means that they
often
use
meanings
conceptualisations
which contradict
and
their
theoretisations
own
Vaneigem's conception of subversion
premises.
which
For
bear
example,
as 'the act whereby play
grasps and reunites beings and things which were frozen solid
in a hierarchy of fragments' [40], is fundamentally opposed to
the sense in which it is used in poststructuralism.
Baudrillard's work epitomises the poststructuralist use of
Situationist
Spectacle,
theory.
he
Taking
defined
it
the
as
Situationist
a
version,
notion
rather
of
the
than
the
inversion of reality. The ecstaey of communication which the
Situationists identified as the imposition of ahistoricism was
offered by Baudrillard as the complete closure or delineation
of reality. In Intellectuals and the Left in France Since 1968,
Keith Reader considered
analyses was
that the recuperation of Situationist
perfected by Jean Baudrillard, whose work,
wrote:
may seem to have points in common wi th
the
decentring,
punctualising polymorphousness
of
a
Lyotard or a Deleuze; but Baudrillard's pre-text can
as profitably be sought in the situationist movement
so active in May 1968. [41]
he
481
Reader
quoted
an
article
in
Le
Nouvel
Observateur,
which
asserted:
The overall champion of shameful c0Prying and "hushedup" use, of "burglary operations', is surely, in
France, Guy Debord. Nothing is funnier than the care
taken everywhere to use him without naming him, to
tone and water him down or when one can no longer
pretend he does not exist, to rid oneself of him with
a furtive acknowledgement. [42]
Debord's
assertion tha t
the spectacle circumscribes and so
produces the nature of that which resis ts it led him to the
opposite conclusion to that drawn by Baudrillard. Whereas the
latter derived some form of nihilism from this position,
Situationists
developed
the
notion
of
the
spectacle
as
the
a
Contradiction to the reality of historical consciousness. Both
Debord and Baudrillard identified the same meaninglessness and
self-referential play of existing society,
but Baudrillard' s
thesis contained no means by which it might be superseded.
Baudrillard's
work
critical and radical
still
bears
the
appearance
of
a
movement. But, as Reader observed:
one undoubted difference between the situationists
and Baudrillard, however, is that the former actively
set out to disrupt, or even overthrow, the "society
of the spectacle', and to involve in the process new
forms
of social relationships.
Baudrillard,
by
contrast, is ( ••• ) an armchair nihilist, who contents
himself wi th a tranquil recording of the demise of
the social (if it ever existed) and the inescapable
entropy of Western societies. [43]
Nevertheless,
Baudrillard
it is clear tha t
isolates
is
the inescapable stas is which
still
subject
to
a
strategy
of
resistance which rides with some incongruity on the back of the
meaningless ecstasy of his analysis.
Both
Situationists
and
poststructuralist
philosophers
identified the interconnection of all aspects of life and all
482
relations of society and discourse, and both
considered these
relations
coercion.
to
be
those
of
domination
and
These
positions necessitated the development of a tactical awareness
of
the
conditions
on
which
wished
to
expose and resist
sense
of
liberation
in
discourse
since
both
this domination and carry
some
their
proceeds,
analyses.
In
spite
of
the
similarity of the tactics employed by the two movements,
is
a
striking,
and
fundamental
difference
between
there
the
two
tendencies. For the Situationists, the exertion of domination,
even where this occurs through in relations of discourse and
language, is specific to capi talism.
The tactics wi th which
they resisted power were therefore developed with the intention
of effecting the negation of a set of power relations defined
as a totality subject
For
the
to the mutability of history.
poststructuralists,
however,
any
thesis
which
attempts to identify such a structure is guilty of the renewed
exercise
of
power
over
the
immediacy
and
dynamism
of
experience. Their tactics of deconstruction are used as ends in
themselves,
as
specific
resistances
to
particular
powers,
whose struggle can have no victory and is wi thou tend.
The
techniques
in
of
demystification
POststructuralism as
reality
theories
and
appear
appears
from
dynamism of the discursive webs in
within
universalisations
deconstruction,
unlike
Precursors
poststructuralism,
of
deconstruction
essentially descriptive: they embark on a
perpetual uncovering of the
which
and
the use
the
conceptualisations,
of
knowledge.
to which it was
is
critical, and has no imperative to be so.
not
This
put by
intended
to
the
be
483
THE IMPASSE OF POSTSTRUCTURALISM
Poststructuralism
offers
discursive relations
an
account
in which
the
of
existing
social
identification
of
and
such a
structure of power is seen as outdated and inappropriate. This
is implied by Foucault's rejection of historical materialism on
the grounds that it ties history to a single economic base and
so denies the validity of other determining factors in what is
really a genealogy, rather than a history, of power relations.
This genealogy develops according to discontinuous circulations
of power, in which resistances are produced at every turn,
but
cannot develop into a cri tique of the whole wi thout assuming
the guise of the discursive network they resist.
This is certainly the appearance assumed by the historical
period to which poststructuralism addresses itself. The end of
history, the end of politics, and the end of criticism which it
POstulates are substantiated by a great deal of prima faci .e
eVidence:
the
decline
of
the
revolutionary
left,
fragmenta tion of social and cuI tural ins ti tutions,
the
loss of
meaning and direction in artistic practice, and the reiteration
of the 1960s claim that the working class no longer assumes an
economic or political centrality. The fin de siecle mood of the
late
1980s
fluidity
in
is
allegedly
which
the
dominated by
foundations
a
and
sense
of
loss
and
presuppositions
of
Previous discourse have been undermined.
With no reason to criticise this situation, and no reality
to which it may be opposed as an appearance,
is ostensibly engaged in its
poststructuralism
description. Its account of the
484
meaninglessness
and
fluidity
of contemporary
life
is
often
informative and accurate. Nevertheless, it differs little from
that offered by the Situationist critique of the passivity of
the spectacle, which accounts for the emergence of
features
of
social
and
discursive
poststructuralism while at
relations
the same
all the
identified
by
time facilitating
their
the postmodern genre,
whose
critique.
This
is also
the case for
cultural practice accompanies poststructuralism's philosophical
analysis.
There is a great deal of confusion over the meaning
of postmodernism, to the extent that a number of texts on the
Subject abandon the attempt to define it in favour of renewed
discussions
on
the difficulty
of defining
modernism.
[44]
Although postmodernism is something of a catch-all term for
Contemporary
tradi tion,
art,
its
main
divergence
from
the
modernism
in which bo th Dada and Surrealism can be placed,
rests in its lack of purpose. Postmodern culture is diffuse and
meandering in a world without meaning and solidity; its art is
characterised by the juxtaposition of a plethora of earlier
styles, media, and disciplines placed together without reason
Or intention.
Postmodernism
has,
in
effect,
taken
Dada's
apparent
nihilism literally. Having seen the extent to which the Dadaist
destruction of meaning was intended as a critical tool, it is
clear
that
although
postmodern
art
shares
many
of
the
characteristics of modernist expression, its lack of intention
and purpose merely affirms the experience of this absence in
485
contemporary
life
and
provides
no
criticism,
analysis,
or
challenge to it.
In the late 1980s, the
Communist Party of Great Britain
has been inspired by the postmodern atmosphere which permeates
the intellectual milieu.
This has led to its rejection of the
values and forms of cri ticism of the 'tradi tional'
left, and
discussions of the reconstruction this entails have dominated a
number of issues of Marxism Today.
Stuart Hall's 'Brave New
World'
Lyotard
introduced
Baudrillard
and
as
the
leading
intellectuals of what the journal refers to as the 'new times'.
A rather facile characterisation of these 'new times' declared
Foucault, poststructuralism, the arbitrary, and the free market
to have replaced the themes of the 'modern times':
hUmanism,
determinism,
and free
love.
Sartre,
In 1988, an editorial
declared:
New Times are about much more than economic change.
Our world is being remade. Mass production, the mass
consumer, the big city, big-brother state,
the
sprawling housing-estate, and the nation-state are in
decline:
flexibility,
diversity,
differentiation,
mobility,
communication,
decentralisation
and
internationalisation are in the ascendent. In the
process our own identi ties, our sense of self, our
own subjectivities are being transformed. We are in
transition to a new era.[45]
In economic terms, the 'Fordism' of mass-production is opposed
to
a
'post-Fordist
order
technology and robotics.'
based
on
computers,
information
A policy review published in 1989
argued that such changes mean that 'The fact and language of
the working class as the main agent of political change is a
thing of the past.'[46]
Nevertheless, it would seem that this
conclusion
an
is
developments.
based
on
uncritical
acceptance
of
these
In The Communist Manifesto, such changes in the
486
characteristics of capitalism were described without any loss
of a cri tical framework;
life
which
the shifting uncertainty of modern
poststructuralism
has
taken
to
indicate
the
impossibility of defining a totality which might be criticised
was seen by Marx and Engels as
the inevitable attribute of
capitalist development.
The bourgeoisie cannot exist without constantly
revolutionising the instruments of production, and
thereby the relations of production, and with them
the relations of society ••• Constant revolutionising
of production, uninterrupted disturbance of all
social
conditions,
everlasting
uncertainly
and
agitation distin.suish the bourgeois epoch from all
earlier ones.[47J
It would appear that the fragmentation and dissolution defined
by poststructuralism as innovations to a postmodern world were
already intrinsic to the cri tical tradi tion wi th which they
claim to have broken.
However, there is a marked absence of any serious critical
analysis of the phenomena theorised by poststructuralism, with
the
result
criticism is
that
the
latter's
challenge
rarely questioned.
The
to
the validity
of
social and discursive
relations which pertain in the late 1980s are clearly different
from those theorised by the Situationists in the 1960s, but
there is little evidence of any equivalent level of debate on
the nature of these changes. In order to preserve the integrity
of
its
Contents
theoretisations,
itself
with
much
the
of
denial
the
of
political
the
left
either
significance
of
Philosophical, artistic, and cultural critique, or moves, like
the British Labour Party, and the Communist Party, towards the
POststructuralist
change.
denial
of
the
possibility
of
wholesale
487
It seems however, that the Situationist analysis continues
to present an appropria te characterisa tion and cri ticism of
social
and
discursive
relations,
a
position
which
its
own
recupera tion by pos ts truc turalism would seem to support.
In
Debord' s Preface to the Fourth Italian Edi tion of 'the
1979,
~ociety
of the Spectacle'recognised that in the decade since
the last edition of Internationale Situationniste, capitalism
had developed a more cynical and open facade. Failing to fulfil
its earlier
longer
promises of material abundance,
declares
itself
perfect,
but
merely
capi talism no
asserts
its
immutability.
The society of the spectacle had begun everywhere in
coercion, deceit and blood, but it promised a happy
path.lt believed itself to be loved. Now it no longer
promises anything. I t no longer says: "Wha t appears
is good, what is good appears." it simply says: "It
is so. " It admi ts frankly tha t i t is no longer
essentially reformable, though change be its very
na ture in order to transmute for the wors t every
particular thing. It has lost all its general
illusions about itself. [48]
Another decade later, this renewed
developed
into
a
critique
of
critique of capitalism was
poststructuralism
in
Debord's
&ommentaires sur la Societe du Spectacle (Commentaries on the
Society of
the Spectacle).
For one
reviewer,
'reading
this
after bouncing between the trance-like paralysis of Baudrillard
and the interminable vacuity of Stuart Hall is like suddenly
finding some of the terms with which to think.' [49]
Described
as a 'discourse upon Secrecy', the text developed the idea that
capi talist
Presents
society
itself
pos ts truc turalism
continually
as
a
appears
conceals
its
origins
given.
From
this
perspective,
as
thes is
which
' takes
a
and
the
Spectacle entirely in its own terms', constructed by 'those who
488
have
the
stupidity
to
believe
that
they
using
what
is
hidden
from
them,
[50]
Baudrillard's
something,
not
by
believing
what
is
revealed
to
them.'
characterisation
of
1968
a
'secret'
as
consequence' is completely inverted in
can
understand
even t
but
in
'wi thou t
Debord's account of its
obscurity:
The first priority in the spectacle's domination is
to obliterate all knowledge of history, starting with
just about all reasonable information and commentary
on the most recent past. The evidence for this is so
glaring
it hardly needs further explanation. Wi th
consummate skill the spectacle organises ignorance of
what is about to happen and, immediately afterwards,
the forgetting of whatever has nonetheless been
understood. The more important something is, the more
it is hidden. Nothing, in the last twenty years, has
been so thoroughly coated in obedient lies than the
history of May 1968. Some useful lessons have indeed
been learned from certain demystifying studies of
those days; these, however, remain state secrets.
[51]
In
contrast,
Baudrillard
and
the
poststructuralists
have
abandoned the imperative to seek the causes and reasons of the
lack of purpose and meaning in contemporary life in favour of
its description and acceptance as a given.
The deliberations
of poststructuralism have
led to
the
assertion that criticism and analysis must transfer themselves
to
unprecedented
new
realm
of
attributes
which
preclude
a
the
breadth
and
identification
complexity,
of
central
Contradictions and negating perspectives. As we have seen, this
POsition still allows for the maintenance of resistance,
and
COntains an implicit tendency towards the collaboration of the
multiple
sites
possibility of
of
its
operation.
But
its
denial
identification and criticism of
the
of
the
totality
robs any critical project of its validity, since the nihilism
489
of poststructuralism removes the mechanisms of evaluation and
founda tion from all discourse and praises resis tance for its
own sake.
This posi tion
forms
resistance
of
removes both the grounds on which
can
be
evaluated,
and
the
critical
fUnction to which poststructuralism, in spite of its claims to
the contrary, clearly aspires.
Having
however,
no
grounds
on
which
to
and having undermined all
effect
the means
this
criticism,
by which
they
could be developed, poststructuralism asserted its nihilism, a
nihilism made active by its practice of deconstruction. But its
advocation of
this practice necessitates
some notion of
the
intention, end, purpose, direction, or meaning. Deconstruction
cannot be made for its own sake, since there would be no reason
to effect it at all. Neither can it claim to be disinterested
or impartial, since such terms would reestablish some notion of
obj ectivi ty or foundation
which pos ts truc turalism completely
undermines.
Poststructuralism
is
neither
disinterested
nor
nihilistic,
since it does make evaluative claims about both
Social and discursive relations. It asserts, for example, that
Contemporary society is constituted not by an economic system
but a discontinuous history of fragmented power relations, the
specificity of which should be preserved and revealed wherever
they arise. The fact that it makes such claims about the nature
and determination of social relations shows that it does indeed
assume the critical function which it claims to eschew.
This means that it is inconsistent in its nihilism, and
collapses
into a
form of positivism.
means by which it might
In
the absence of any
dis tinguish between appearance and
490
reality, alienation and authenticity, or ideology and truth, it
collapses
each
of
these
distinctions
and
has
no
reason
to
choose, evaluate or even deconstruct one phenomenon or relation
ra ther
than
another.
By
its
claims
about
social
and
own
thesis,
discursive
pos tstructuralism' s
relations
are
without
legitimation.
Lacking any critical distance from the relations
it observes,
poststructuralism engages
that which exists.
and
inevi tably
in
the affirmation of
It sees marginalisation and fragmentation,
assumes
that
these
are
not
merely
the
contingent characteristics of a particular historical moment,
but the principles on which contemporary social and discursive
relations are based. Whilst it is true that poststructuralism,
unlike Marxism, has no reason to think otherwise, neither has
it any reason to suggest this to be the case.
The achievement of poststructuralism lies in its emphasis
on the necessity for all discourse to reach an understanding of
the conditions on which it proceeds: critical theories must be
aWare of
their dependence on
~hich place
presupposi tions and
intentions
them in an internal and complicit relation to the
discourses they criticise. Although it remains
true that this
imperative
and
critics
was
recognised
considered
sUcceeded
in
by
the
avant-garde
political
in
this
text,
poststructuralism
has
bringing
these
problems
to
of
the
forefront
philosophical debate. The impunity with which poststructuralist
~ri ters
have
challenge
presented
some
of
the
their
cri ticisms
has
enabled
most
sacrosanct
values
and
them
to
concepts,
among them history, the subject, society, meaning, and truth.
491
This challenge has led them to an impasse which cannot be
Overcome
within
the
confines
of
their
discourse.
It
is
an
impasse which has been faced time and again by those engaged in
cri tical inquiry.
Marxis t cri tique has continually faced the
problems of criticising a system in which the ruling ideas are
those of the ruling class;
likewise, Surrealism was engaged in
a battle to supersede 'bourgeois reason' and exceed the bounds
of
meaning
discourse.
while
finding
Throughout
itself
dependent
the history of critical
on
exis ting
thought,
the
need to anticipate the reception criticism is likely to receive
within
the
discourse
it
addresses
has
been paramount.
Dada
understood this issue so well that it ended its project, but it
did not consider that its own failure precluded that of all
cri ticism.
Dadaist
Wi th the Si tua tionis ts,
impasse
possibility
of
of
suicide
or
revolution.
In
the
silence
supersession of
the
was
the
contrast,
posed
with
poststructuralist
elucidations of the dilemmas of criticism lead it to pronounce
the illegitimacy of all critical thought;
the problems reemerge
without any hope of solution.
It is an interesting intellectual exercise to criticise
the
world
exercise
without
to
seek
reason,
the
and
reasons
an
to
interesting
do
so.
But
philosophical
reasons
become
necessary with the desire to place these exercises at work in
the world.
If they are to be put to any cri tical use in the
understanding and transformation of experience, all discourses
require
meanings,
purposes,
and
a
grasp
POststructuralism is unable to provide.
of
reality
which
492
Conclusion.
'The brilliant past has made brilliant promises to the future.
It will keep them.' (Lautreamont)
The
use
of
the
epithet
'revolutionary'
to
sell
washing
machines, cars, or hair treatments epitomises the displacement
of vocabulary from critical to affirmative intention. A serious
consideration of this displacement shows that the recuperation
of cri tical ideas and practices wi thin a dominant discourse
does
not
throws
bear
the
arguments
relief.
inevitability
about
the
often
nature
of
ascribed
to
it,
criticism
into
and
sharp
These arguments have been brought to the conclusion
that an awareness of the conditions on which criticism proceeds
is essential to any critical project and allows it to
develop
the sophistication necessary to its success.
A number of other themes have emerged in the course of
this
discussion.
conventional
It
has
been
demarcations
shown
between
that
the
cultural,
challenge
to
social,
and
philosophical criticisms forms a central concern of twentieth
century
discourse;
discussed
with
the
interplay
reference
to
the
of
these
areas
avant-garde,
has
been
Marxism,
and
poststructuralist theories. The silence with which the theories
of the Situationist International are received has also been
broken with
recuperation
the assertion
and
that
detournement
the
Situationist notions
have
provided
of
valuable
493
contributions to debates about the nature of criticism.
It has
also been argued that partial criticism always develops
into
criticism of a totality of social and discursive relations, so
that
the
confinement
of
analysis
to
specific
areas
is
detrimental to the critical project. The problem of identifying
this
totality
and distinguishing
those social and discursive
relations which are mutable from those which may be impossible
to
criticise
or
change
has
been
raised
throughout
the
discussion.
Criticism must be aware of the extent to which its tools
are predetermined and defined by the structures they address.
This does not mean that the identification of a totality and
its
critical
negation
is
impossible
to
achieve.
On
the
contrary, it suggests that the recognition of the difficulties
which
have
faced
such
critical project and
attempts
in
the
past
can
facili tate the development of
renew
the
rigorous
and effective procedures in all areas of critical thought.
494
Illustrations.
'The fact is that above art and poetry also, whether one likes
it or not, there beats a flag - in turn red and black. (Andre
Breton)
'The answer to the question, whether my work can be called art
or not, depends on whether one believes that the future belongs
to the working class.' (George Grosz)
495
.'
.
.;' :~)'/:t~~t:!.~~\wt~r'. ,.' ':. .'~'" ~." . : -.
PlUM
.. ..
.:",'
Des jeunes gens s'etaient
essayes a /'ulner le terrible suo
UII trlJle h'nemenl qlll J.It. ~llU la dhollllon d.ax !amllles des pllU honorablemenl eoacaes d. Is
.0elHi nanlauo •• ·osl prodall h!ndl loll. Deul Jeunea ,.na d·un. "lnrlal:u d·ann6 ... aeln.llemlol moblluh •• onl mort. d'une 1nl01leatlon provoqu!o par un. absorption Irop (Tand. d·oplum.
...
!IOta n·avlon. p&l ea encore -
heauu.semenl! i diplor.r dan. notr. vUlt du .lIels auul ,raves
d. Cltte !unesl. pUslOIl d. cu •• lnp60anu I. d.
COl drocaes au charm. mortel. qui ,',,1 aecllmslh
dlpnlJ qaelques ann6., p&rml nos Jenou hommes.
A I'Hatel
de France
LUll,!! lolr. an p.a aVAnl 18 hlurel. un Jeunl
IQldll da urvlct d. 1·lnl.odlno. Am6rlelln ••
A.-K. Woyno ..... It pr6e1pl~1I oomm. un Cou. d'uot
cbamb~ da 2' 6Ia,. dt I'HOtel d. Tranot el domlndill 1 pullr 4·ur,lno. aa dirtelear. C.lol-el. ararl!.
It prhentall el appronall d. Ion In~rloculeur qat
dtax I.an .. ,ens. amb dt I·Am6ncaln. italenl
moar&nta dins la cbambre. Un m6decln !ul aussl161
uoblreh' .1 I. Doelelll 4t la Roeh.(ordUre !ul
trour' .1 ameni.
P6nUrlnl danlla fUe •• I. pntlelln UOUVl '1lndus
lut nn Ill. coaoh6, 'an 1111 It 00\4 droll el I·autr.
'Ol I. 0414 ,Iaoh •• 1 14IU 1001111 ,U.m.ol! d.ax
Jtan .. CtU qlll p.r....al.nl dormlr proCoodlm.nt.
Lea
'Wtnl eaJmN. mals re06talll an complll
h6bH.m.nt.
.
){. . d .... Ro.heCord16u ooo.tal& qa. I'WI des
eoTpt 61&11 d6ll !rold. alon que I'aalu 'tall cbaud;
n lit tul pIJ Ion, • prononctr .on db.{ooltlo : IN
dtax Ineonnus 'talenl ,leUm .. d'uu Inlorlelllon
du.ll·ab.orptlon' Corta dost d·oplam.
.
~ Ct~.nhlll qat I. m6d,e-I.D· pro.U,ull '" 1~1.:11
4'aboN l oelal des deu hUlltl ,Ins qlll p~ralu<
poavoll .neor •• lri ·uar{ .1 .0.IllII l l ' Am6rlealn
qlll 1'6"" !.toa,' mal. H. I. commwalll d. polle<!.
prh.n, arrlv. pour !llle 161 oonl"tallona.
ma,,,
. ..
:.~.
'.
.
'
'..
Les Victimes
"
::' . ,..
~ Du' paplers reeaerub .1 'd61 lDdlcadonl reltvl"
'Ol I. forlstre d, l'hOItI, D rhllllt q1ll " mon 'tall
UII nomm6 lacqaos v.... 23 ana. adladllll la ... m.
.,c.dreD do lra1lI dll 'qlllpa,u .1 lib 4·D.II hononhl, o~det lap4rhc:r hAbltant I. /i' anondIJ •.-;
m~~
t>~·
.
,· ,
' .\
~:~:'.~~ >(.' ,".'
,
.
Le commlsull. enqulteur Iroun dans la thlmbr.
WI petll pol coollnaol d. I'oplnm; IQr une tabl. UII
coateaa ~uqo.1 adb/allnt des parcell., 4. la terrlbl. drogo.; eonn. prh du Ill •• a mllleu d'lnnomb~bl" « m6.ol•• d, cl,aurles iupllenoH. lUle
volrall. pIp. en bots dOOI I. fonrntla 6\,11 eoeore
lImpU d·oplum.
.
'.
D. l'tnquH. ourerle. U rhullt qa' Jaeqa .. V...
et Paul B.... pparlenalenl i une baode d. I.UllH
c noclurs • !ran~3ls et amerlc3111s .-requentanl
... ldOm,ct lu lIeul o~ I'on I·amuse.
.
L'ldh Ilur ,lnt d•• ·usayer 1 fu:ncr d. I'oplum
probAbl.menl dlnl I'upoll d'l !rouur d..
.. "oluplh 1 QUI I. lerrlbl. sue 40an •..• eomm. 11
proeut' lLussI la mort.
Comm.nt SI procu :e r.nl·lls line forI. dolt
d'oplum t C'ul r. qU'on Ignore encore. Jlcqau V ...
tn &\'01:·11 lleuI" daol une .. cbelle qu'null pa
noll 100 plr •• qui a lorvl .UI coloales t L. lac d.
plvol aar31HI tl6 fOl:rnl par l'Amf:lcltn Wornow
oa PH quolqu. Cblnob IrH3U1lnl lur I.. qulJ t
Ful·U "ndu pu quelqu.·commoreanl marron?
La famUI. de J3CqUes V ... a 61' prhooa. "'ee
loal let mina •• menll n6eosulle!. Quanl .01
pu,nh d. Paul B... U. lonl absenls d. )lanln.
L'aulorI\4 mlI III Ire , ubi. plr la pelle •• a !all
enlnH I.. doux udarros.
(Lt TiJi,rammr des Prorin:a dr rOuesl. mCTdi 7-1-19)
p.r.a.
Les rlclfmes da drama d'bler 'talenl 4t b~&V ..
loldals quI anlenl 1&11 leut dHoll dHanl l·enn.m1
.1 aralenl .~ bles.h; U. n. d.valenl p&l
de.
!amours Inv6tArh. IfS C!tconslAn e., m.m .. d. 1.111
. mort d6mootrenl I.ur Innp6rlenc,.
"[L'EIPTaJ dt rOuul. jtudi 9 janviu 1919).
. '--
..
'~
'
.... ",'
:"
.') '"
'/.
,. "
;
...
. .,
~~_
L~~._.~~====c~~_~~
'.,
____________________
The death of Jacques Vache, 1919
: : ,,1
.
"
.'
.:r.
.
"
.
Autour
. , d'un fait-divers
Koa. avon. sI,nal6 hIer. comme U eooveo&lI. I.
1&l:lenllhl. !.II-~IHn qlll a ooOti la ,I. , deax·
'.nnu ,eu d. trh honorables Clm.llI.. .mpelsonnl. p3r I·oplum. n 1 aurall blen d6J c~·mmeo~l: ..
• t~lle '111 c. dr.m~lIqae "'n.menl qal compoN
d·aOlean. ell IIll-mfm •• u le~oll. Plllau-\-tU. Itr~
. oompru. 4. eel leanu fe.rv.lh qui, daus 1& r.ebereb, d. eertalnu lOoutlon. mal.utnu. loaon\
alul IVe. la dr0tll. qlll ahrulll quod tU. 1I' la •
', , ' <. -
~ "
"
~.
499
We komen om te Idjven op
den dwang van het kapltaal
we voelen aan den Itjve
't ver!<noelt ons allemaal
en ons geduld duurt veel te lang
v."C z:!jn doodzlek van stoC en stank
kabouterll aan de slag
ons wer!< Is nog wet gedaan
't krapuul moet naar de maan la ja ja
we kappen met ons bljlen
t
kabouters voor het leste
de korrupte koek In gTUls
al zljn we nog zo kleln
het Is voor ons het beste
we maken grote plelnen
vol homen rond ' t stadhuls
om danJg vrank te zljn
we restaureren wllmarsdonck
't krapuul dat steekt naar ooze s maak
dat In het kapitaal verdronk
al veel te lang met ons den dr aak
kabouters un de slag
kaboute:'s un de slag
ons wer!< III nog nl e t g edaa.,
ons wer!< Is nog wet gedaan
't krapuul moet naar de maan ja la la 't krapuuI -moet naar de ms.an js ja la
Above: Kabouter song.
The chorus is:
'To the battle
Kabouters, Our work
is not yet done,
Let's bury all
the shit, yes yes yes.'
(Trans.Reinier HoIst)
Right: Kabouter
cartoon, in which
Kolonel Kabouter
practises the
movement's guerrilla
tactics.
501
Examples of detournement.
Above, Situationist intervention
in the San Fransisco cable car
strike, 1971.
Below, cartoon from
The Return of the Durritti Column,
Andre Bertand, 1966.
Avssl -S"E Ii ATE ~{;JT' I~D';;;CC:OHPL iR
L~S HeWVES SE.50l;.Nts
C£SsiTEe5 PAR L~ ~Ff:/V~E OE'S INTt~Ers EsnJoi,a,lI/TiIJS .. •
Ne
503
TI
The t 936 Aldez I'Espagne anti.lascist
pamphlel design by Miro.
~
The Italian T-shIrt. A reconstructed
hammer and sickle design in green, red and
black.
~
The Gramscl T-shirt. A tripte·bloc image in
pastel pink, blue and green.
~
The Nicaraguan T-shIrt. Part proceeds to
Ricardo Morales Aviles in Nicaragua.
~
The Gorbachev T-shIrt. The ultimate
democralic lashion accessory . . . In blacl<
and redlor Ihe revolulionary and pink and
grey lor the realigned.
@
The Forward March of the Proletariat in
lull·colour.
Shins from Ihe mere large, via the XL to the incredibl y
roomy XXXL.
CENTRAL COMI.tITTEE OUTFITTERS
~~ CLOTHING FOR AUTONOMY
68'~
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~ -------------------------------~ ------------------~~--------
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Good, To4a/
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'Clothing for Autonomy', T. Shirt advertisement, 1987
504
FOR CONSPIRACY
~.-
II
~>:
~'.::.
i
!
ROBERT CARR
or
This rNn i.s ,uiJl),
conspidn, 10 kill .nd m~im (he public at brie by perpelu.lin,
ul\y(e conditions in workplaccs;
con~pi.rinl 10 Icrronze and intimidate workers by thrnlenin, Ihem with kpJ
puni$hmenis if Ihey ,0 on slrike;
eonspirin& 10 derraud Ihe ~opl. oul or Ihe f",ill of Iheir ,",bour 10 Ihe profil of I
sm.1I "oup of c.>pillllstJ who"o~' n" Ilmosl .,.rylhinl;
conspi.rin,lo extort monej (rom the poor and live it 10 the rich;
corupirin& 10 bribe Ir.<! bllckm.iI tude union omdlls >0 Ih.1 Ihey no lon&er ..en
'repres<nl' lh. workers, bUI become policemen for lhe bosses;
conspirin,lo dislorllh. lroth by spoulin, d.plrlp Iboul'producll'ity', 'induslri.1
rtution,s·. 'In~rchy' .nd the ·natioN1 inltres~':
conspirln, wilh Henry Ford Ind olher forei,n l,ilAlon 10 impricon millions of
~ople in Ih. Ure of boredom, froSCralion, isot.lion Ind humil"tion which lhe
apiutisc system condemns them to:
CARR conspired 10 commillheS< crimes 1,Iinsl lhe ('<'ople wilh lhe members of I
lerroNl poup callinl ils<lf lhe 'CABINIT,
ThC"S<t men He dln&erous, It you SC'e Iny or .hcm, dui wilh them IS you think Or.
all power to the
people
I.~N fURDIE AND J.~ K£ rRESCOTT DEFENCE CROUP
C.~. RE OF I. T. IIA OER k7CK STREET, I.ONDON k~ l.
Angry Brigade poster, 1971
505
Footnotes.
'The turds of "anti-art" have been solemnly hung alongside
The School of Athens •• Dada has undergone castration by card
index.' (Situationist slogan, reproduced on postcards for sale
at the reA exhibition, 1989)
506
Footnotes to Chapter 1.
1.
Richard H. Popkin and Avrum Stroll, Philosophy Made Simple
(Heinemann, London, 1982), p. 89
2.
Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Manifesto of the Communist
Party (Foreign Language Press, Peking, 1972), p. 35
3.
Richard Gombin, The Origins of Modern Leftism, trans.
Michael K. Perl (Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1975), p. 62
4.
Ibid., p. 63
5.
Ibid., p. 64
6.
Henri Lefebvre, Everyday Life in the Modern World, trans.
Sacha Rabinovitch (AlIen Lane, The Penguin Press, London,
1971), p. 204
7.
Karl
h
Karl Marx
Pengul.n,
8.
Ibid., pp. 177-8
9.
George Lukacs, History and Class Consciousness, trans.
Rodney Livingstone (Merlin Press, London, 1983), p. 87
10. Ibid., p. 83
11. Karl Marx, Selected Writings in Sociology and Social
Philosophy, Ope cit., p. 177
12. Ibid., p. 183
13. Karl Marx, in David McLellan, The Thought of Karl Marx
(MacMillan, London, 1987) p. 123
14. Karl Marx, Selected Writings in Sociology and Social
Philosophy, Ope cit., p. 178
15. Ibid., p. 177
16. Guy Debord, The Society of the Spectacle, (Black and Red,
Detroit, no date), 33. Since this text is arranged in a series
of short numbered theses, this and subsequent references are to
these rather than page numbers.
17. Ibid., 42
18. See Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, Studies in the
Ideology of Advanced Industrial Society (Beacon Press, Boston,
1966)
19. See Paul Cardan, Modern Capitalism and Revolution
(Solidarity, London, 1974)
Paul Cardan is a pseudonym for
Cornelius Castoriadis, who has written under a number of names
including Pierre Chalieu. Cardan was involved in the
Socialisme ou Barbarie movement, which Debord joined briefly in
1960. The British group 'Solidarity' developed ideas in the
same genre as the Situationists and were greatly influenced by
Cardan. See, for example, As We See It (Solidarity, 1961)
20. See The Society of the Spectacle, Ope cit.
21. This point is reinforced by Debord's Preface to the
Fourth Italian Edition of 'The Society of the Spectacle'
507
(Chronos, London, 1979), in which he observes that the end of
the period of affluence and apparent boundless economic growth
in the 1970s has reinforced, rather than contradicted, the
Situationist analyses. This is developed in Chapter 6 below.
22. One-Dimensional Man, op. cit., p. 9
23. Everyday Life in the Modern World, op. cit., p. 3
24. Modern Capitalism and Revolution, op. cit., p. 11
25. Alex Callinicos, Is There A Future For Marxism?
(MacMillan, London, 1983), p. 32
26. Richard Kearney, Modern Movements in Euro}ean Philosophy
(Manchester University Press, Manchester, 1986 , p. 142
27. One-Dimensional Man, op. cit., p. xvii
28. See, for example, Is There A Future For Marxism?, op cit.
29. Modern Capitalism and Revolution, op. cit., p. 4
30. The Society of the Spectacle, op. cit., 114
31. Raoul Vaneigem, The Revolution of Everyda Life, trans.
Donald Nicholson-Smith (Left Bank Books and Re el Press, no
~lace, 1983) ~p. 48-9.
Mark Shipway develops this point in
Situationism , (Maximilen Rubel and John Crump, eds., NonMarket Socialism in the Nienteenth and Twentieth Centurres(Macmillan, London, 1987) pp. 151-172
32. The Society of the Spectacle, op. cit., 114
33. Guy Debord, 'Perspectives for Conscious Alterations in
Everyday Life', Situationist International Anthology, ed. and
trans. Ken Knabb (Bureau of Public Secrets, Berkeley, 1981),
p. 69
34. Raoul Vaneigem, 'Basic Banalities', in Situationist
International Anthology, op. cit., p. 90
35. 'Perspectives for Conscious Alterations in Everyday Life',
op. cit., p. 71
36. The Society of the Spectacle, op. cit., 62
37. 'Basic Banalities', op. cit., p. 129
38. Guy Debord, 'Critique of Separation', in Situationist
International Anthology, op. cit., p. 37
39. The Society of the Spectacle, op. cit., 30
40. Ibid., 1
41. Ibid., 32
42. Ibid., 37
43. Ibid., 42
44. Ibid., 40
45. Ibid., 43
46. Raoul Vaneigem, 'Basic Banalities', op. cit., p. 92
47. Ibid.
t
508
48. 'Perspectives for Conscious Alterations in Everyday Life',
Ope cit., p. 70
49. Fredy Perlman, The Rerroduction of Daily Life (Black and
Red, Detroit, no date) p.
50. Ibid., p. 4
51. Ibid., p. 3
52. Perhaps the best example of this is the Benetton
chainstore, whose multicolour displays of knitwear are often
made up of items of single colours: a single product has none
of the excitement of the display.
53. The Society of the Spectacle, Ope cit., 28.
54. Ibid., 69
55. Ibid., 69
56. Ibid., 65
57. Ibid., 12
58. 'Basic Banalities', Ope cit., p. 98
59. The Revolution of Everyday Life, Ope cit., p. 50
60. The Society of the Spectacle, Ope cit., 70
61. Ibid., 67
62. 'Perspectives for the Conscious Alteration of Everyday
Life', Ope cit., p. 70
63. The Society of the Spectacle, Ope cit., 21
64. Ibid., 59
65. The edition which preceded Ken Knabb's anthology was
Leavin the Twentieth Centur : The Incom lete Work of the
S1tuat10n1st Internat10na e 1te
y C r1stop er Gray an
pUblished in London by Free Fall Press, 1974. The twelve
issues of the journals are collected in Internationale
Situationniste 1958-1969 (Champ Libre, Paris, 1975). A full
index, bibliography, list of members, and chronology of the
movement is published by Jean-Jacques Raspaud and Jean-Pierre
Voyer, L'Internationale Situationniste: rota onistes
chronolo 1es
1 10 ra
es noms 1nsultes)
Camp L1 re, Par1s,
,an a t oroug
1story 0 t e
movement from 1952 to 1972 is presented in Jean-Fran~ois
Martos, Histoire de L'Internationale Situationniste (Editions
Gerard Lebovici, Paris, 1989).
66. Ken Knabb, Situationist International Anthology, Ope cit.,
p. 372
67. The Society of the Spectacle, Ope cit., 8
68. Ibid., 6
69. 'All the King's Men', in Situationist International
Anthology, Ope cit., p. 115
70. Canjuers and Debord, 'Preliminaries to Defining a Unitary
Revolutionary Programme', in Situationist International
Anthology, Ope cit., p. 308
509
71. The Societ}:: of the SEectacle, Ope cit., 5
72. Ibid. , 17
73. Ibid. , 68
74. Ibid. , 11
75. Ibid. , 73
76. Ibid. , 70
77. Ibid.
78. Ibid., 143; this notion is also present Lukacs, where it
appears as 'there has been history, but there is no longer
any' (Histor}:: and Class Consciousness, Ope cit., p. 48)
79. Ibid., 72
80. Modern Movements in EuroEean Philosoph}::, Ope cit., p. 142
Footnotes to Chapter 2.
1.
History and Class
2.
On The Povert
economl.c
48
3.
Histor}:: and Class Consciousness, Ope cit., p. 27
4.
Ibid., p. 77
5.
George Lukacs, in Modern Movements in EuroEean PhilosoEh}::,
Ope cit., p. 140
6.
Ibid., pp. 140-1
7.
Histor}:: and Class Consciousness, Ope cit., p.28
8.
Ibid., p. 27
9.
Modern Movements in European PhilosoEh}::, OPe cit., p. 141
10. Histor}:: and Class Consciousness, Ope cit., p. 39
11.
Bernard Susser, The Grammar of Modern Ideolog}::
(Routledge, London, 1988) p. 78
12. Ibid., p. 79
13. George Lukacs, in ibid., p. 77
14. Modern Movements in European PhilosoEh}::, Ope cit., p. 139
15. Histor}:: and Class Consciousness, Ope cit., p. 205
16. Ibid., p. xxiv
17. Ibid.
18. The Grammar of Modern Ideolog}::, OPe cit., p. 99
19. Ibid., p. 100
20. Ibid.
510
21. Ibid., p. 99
22. Modern Movements in European Philosophy, Ope cit., p. 142
23. History and Class Consciousness, Ope cit., p. 40
24. The Society of the Spectacle, Ope cit., 11
25. Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, The German Ideolog~,
edited and introduction by C.J. Arthur, (Lawrence and W1shart,
London, 1970), p. 65
26. Ibid., p. 66 .
27. Ibid., pp. 65-6
28. Ibid., p. 66
29. Ibid., p. 64
30. Karl Marx, in Alex Callinicos, Marxism and Philosophy
(Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1983), p. 37
31. The German Ideology, Ope cit., p. 57
32. Ibid., p. 47
33. Karl Marx, in Selsam and Martel, Reader in Marxist
Philosophy (International Publishers, New York, 1963), p. 186
34. Ibid., p. 187
35. Karl Marx, in Joe McCarney, The Real World of Ideology
(Harvester Press, Sussex, 1980), p. 22
36. Ibid.
37. Marxism and Philosophy, Ope cit., p. 135
38. Ibid., p. 136
39. Ibid., p. 127
40. Tom Bottomore, in Conrad Lodziak, 'Dull Compulsion of the
Economic: The Dominant Ideology and Social Reproduction',
Radical Philosophy, 49, Summer 1988, p. 10
41. Ibid.
42. Ibid., p. 115
43. Modern Movements in European Philosophy, Ope cit., p. 174
44. Carl Boggs, Gramsci's Marxism (Pluto Press, London, 1976),
p. 37
45. Antonio Gramsci, 'State and Civil Society', Selections
from the Prison Notebooks, edited and translated by Hoare and
Nowell Smith (Lawrence and Wishart, London, 1986), p. 235
46. Gramsci's Marxism, Ope cit., p. 39
47. Antonio Gramsci, 'The Modern Prince', Selections from the
Prison Notebooks, Ope cit., p. 184
48. David McLellan, Marxism After Marx (MacMillan, London,
1979), p. 186
49. Gramsci's Marxism, Ope cit., p. 40
50. Marxism and Philosophy, Ope cit., p. 153
511
51. Antonio Gramsci, footnote to 'The Modern Prince',
Selections from the Prison Notebooks, Ope cit., p. 80
52. Ibid., p. 187
53. Gramsci's Marxism, Ope cit., p. 48
54. Antonio Gramsci, 'The Study of Philosophy', Selections
from the Prison Notebooks, Ope cit., p. 333
55. Gramsci's Marxism, Ope cit., p. 16
56. Ibid., p. 26
57. Antonio Gramsci, 'State and Civil Society', Selections
from the Prison Notebooks, Ope cit., p. 233
58. Gramsci's Marxism, Ope cit., p. 64
59. Antonio Gramsci, 'Syndicalism and the Councils',
Selections from Political Writin s 1910-1920, selected and
e 1te
y QU1nton Hoare Lawrence an W1S art, London, 1977),
pp. 110-1
60. Gramsci's Marxism, Ope cit., p. 93
61. Ibid., p. 70
62. Ibid., p. 69
63. Antonio Gramsci, 'Problems of Marxism', Selections from
the Prison Notebooks, Ope cit., p. 424
64. Ibid., p. 192-3
65. Marxism After Marx, Ope cit., p. 87
66. Ibid., pp. 87-8
67. Antonio Gramsci, 'The Communist Party', Selections from
Political Writings 1910-1920, Ope cit., p. 333
68. See, for example, Alastair Davidson, Antonio Gramsci
Towards an Intellectual Biography (Merlin Press, London, 1977),
pp. 78-9
69. Antonio Gramsci, 'Questions of Culture', Selections from
Cultural Writings, edited by Forgacs and Nowell Smith,
translated by Boelhower (Lawrence and Wishart, London, 1985),
p. 41
70. Gramsci's Marxism, Ope cit., p. 72
71. Antonio Gramsci, 'Marinetti the Revolutionary?',
Selections from Cultural Writings, Ope cit., p. 51
72. Ibid.
73. Ibid., p. 50
74. Is There A Future for Marxism?, Ope cit., p. 78
75. The German Ideology, Ope cit., p. 65
76. Ibid., p. 66
77. Herbert Marcuse, 'Liberation from the Affluent Society',
The Dialectics of Liberation, ed. David Cooper (Penguin,
Harmondsworth, 1968) p. 176
78. Ibid.
512
79. Herbert Marcuse, An Essay on Liberation (Penguin,
Harmondsworth, 1973) p. 27
80. Herbert Marcuse, Counterrevolution and Revolt (AlIen Lane
The Penguin Press, London, 1972), p. 14
81. Ibid., pp. 15-6
82. Herbert Marcuse, Five
and Utopia (AlIen Lane~T~e~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
83. Counterrevolution and
pp. 16-7
84. One-Dimensional Man, Ope cit.,
85. An Essay on Liberation, Ope cit., p. 25
86. One-Dimensional Man, Ope cit., p. 9
87. Ibid., p. 12
88. Ibid., p. xv
89. An Essay on Liberation, Ope cit., p. 25
90. Ibid., p. 24
91. Herbert Marcuse, Negations (Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1968),
p. xviii
92. One-Dimensional Man, Ope cit., p. 37
93. Herbert Marcuse, 'Karl Popper and the Problem of
Historical Laws', From Luther to Popper (Verso, London, 1983)
p. 203
94. Barry Katz, Herbert Marcuse and the Art of Liberation
(Verso, London, 1982), p. 144
95. Robert B. Pippin, A. Feenberg and C.P. Webel, Marcuse:
Critical Theor~ and the Promise of Utopia (Macmillan,
Basingstoke, 1 88), p. 16
96. An Essay on Liberation, Ope cit., p. 25
97. John Fry, Marcuse - Dilemma and Liberation, a Critical
Analysis (Humanities Press, Atlantic Highlands, 1978), p. 32
98. Five Lectures, Ope cit., p. 5
99. Philip Rieff, in Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination
(Heinemann, London, 1974) p. 87
100. Five Lectures, Ope cit., pp. 33-4
101. Ibid., p. 19
102. One-Dimensional Man, Ope cit., pp. 10-1
103. Ibid., p. 11
104. An Essay on Liberation, Ope cit., p. 92
105. Five Lectures, Ope cit., p. 8
106. Herbert Marcuse, Eros and Civilisation a Philosophical
Inquiry into Freud (Beacon Press, Boston, 19 a4), p. 19
107. Five Lectures, Ope cit., p. 8
108. Ibid., p. 9
513
109. Ibid., p. 12
110. An Essay on Liberation, Ope cit., p. 21
111. Ibid., p. 20
112. Ibid., p. 15
113. One-Dimensional Man, Ope cit., p. 18
114. An Essay on Liberation, Ope cit., pp. 29-30
115. Counterrevolution and Revolt, Ope cit., 29
116. One-Dimensional Man, Ope cit., p. 7
117. Eros and Civilisation, Ope cit., p. 18
118. Five Lectures, Ope cit., p. 4
119. Eros and Civilisation, Ope cit., 130
120. An Essay on Liberation, Ope cit., p. 40
121. Herbert Marcuse, 'Philosophy and Critical Theory',
Negations, Ope cit., p. 155
122. Herbert Marcuse and the Art of Liberation, Ope cit.,
p. 154
123. One-Dimensional Man, Ope cit., p. 74-5
124. Ibid., p. 77
125. Ibid., p. 78
126. Eros and Civilisation, Ope cit., p. 108
127. One-Dimensional Man Ope cit., p. 1
' 128. Ibid., p. 7
129. Ibid., pp. 1-2
130. Ibid., p. 7
131. Herbert Marcuse, 'Repressive Tolerance', in A Critigue of
Pure Tolerance, R.P. Wolf, Barrington Moore, Jnr, and H.
Marcuse (eds) (Beacon Press, Boston, 1965) p. 124
132. Ibid., p. 111
133. Ibid. , p. 98
134. Ibid. , p. 108
135. Ibid. , pp. 123-4
136. Ibid. , p. 110
137. Ibid. , p. 111
138. Ibid. , p. 106
139. Ibid. , pp. 106-7
140. Ibid. , p. 109
141. Ibid. , pp. 112-3
142. Ibid. , pp. 114-5
143. Ibid. , p. 101
144. An Essay on Liberation, Ope cit., p. 62
514
145.
146.
147.
148.
149.
150.
151.
152.
153.
154.
155.
'Repressive Tolerance', Ope ci t. , p. 103
Ibid. , p. 119
Ibid. , p. 102
Ibid. , p. 95
Ibid. , p. 101
Ibid. , p. 126
Ibid. , p. 125
Ibid. , p. 126
Ibid. , p. 123
Ibid. , p. 120
Ibid. , p. 137
Ibid. , p. 115
Ibid.
Ibid. , p. 97
Ibid. , p. 131
One-Dimensional
516
210.
211.
212.
213.
214.
215.
Counterrevolution and Revolt, Ope cit., p. 109
Ibid., p. 121
Counterrevolution and Revolt, Ope cit., p. 91
'Art as Form of Reality', Ope cit., 57
One-Dimensional Man, Ope cit., p. 184
The Aesthetic Dimension, Ope cit., p. 8
Footnotes to Chapter 3.
1.
John Richardson, 'The Dada Movement', Times Literary
Supplement, 23rd October, 1953, p. 669
2.
Quotations, respectively, in Tristan Tzara, 'Lecture on
Dada', Seven Dada Manifestos and Lam isteries trans. Barbara
Wright Jo n Ca er Lon on,
p.;
Michel Sanouillet,
'Dada: A Definition J , Stephen C. Foster and Rudolf E. Kuenzli,
eds., Dada s~ectrum: The Dialectics of Revolt (Coda Press,
Madison, 197 ), p. 23; Tristan Tzara, 'Dada Manifesto on
Feeble and Bitter Love', Seven Dada Manifestos and
Lampisteries, Ope cit., p. 43; ibid., p. 45; 'Lecture on
Dada', Ope cit., p. 112; and Ribemont-Dessaignes, in Dada
Spectrum, Ope cit., p. 22
3. Dada Spectrum, Ope cit., p. 23
4.
Hans Richter, Dada: Art and Anti-Art (Thames and Hudson,
.
London, 1965), p. 9
5.
Richard Huelsenbeck, in ibid., p. 32
6.
Hans Arp, in J.H. Matthews, An Introduction to
Surrealism(The Pennsylvania State University Press,
Pennsylvania, 1965), p. 16
7.
Tristan Tzara, in Marc Dachy, 'Dada, a Transparent
Transformation: An Essay on Tristan Tzara , DadaConstructivism, The Janus Face of the Twenties (Annely Juda
Fine Art, London, 1984) pp. 76-78
8.
Tristan Tzara, 'Dada Manifesto on Feeble and Bitter Love',
in Seven Dada Manifestos and Lampisteries, Ope cit., p. 43
9.
Tristan Tzara, in Andre Breton, 'For Dada', Franklin
Rosemont, ed., Andre Breton, What Is Surrealism? Selected
Writings (Pluto Press, London, 1978), p. 6
10. Roger Cardinal and Robert Short, Surrealism: Permanent
Revelation (Studio Vista, London, 1970), p. 16
11. 'Dada, a Transparent Transformation', Ope cit., p. 81
12. Dada: Art and Anti-Art, Ope cit., p. 14
. 13. Ibid., p. 16
14. Rudolf E. Kuenzli, 'The Semiotics of Dada Poetry', Dada
Spectrum, Ope cit., p. 52.
517
15. Dada: Art and Anti-Art, Ope cit., p. 16
16. Tristan Tzara, 'Dada Manifesto 1918', Dada 3, coll~cted in
Cabaret Vo1taire Der Ze1twe
Dada Le Coeur A Barbe (Editions
Jean M1c e Pace, Par1s,
,p.
• T e Man1 esto appears
in translation in Seven Dada Manifestos and Lampisteries, Ope
cit., but all references are to the former.
17. 'Dada, a Transparent Transformation', Ope cit., p. 74
18. 'Dada Manifesto on Feeble and Bitter Love', Ope cit.,
p. 39.
19. Hanne Bergius, 'The Ambiguous Aesthetic of Dada: Towards a
Definition of its Categories', Richard Sheppard, Dada: Studies
of a Movement, ed. Richard Sheppard (Alpha Academic, Chalfornt
St. Giles, 1979), p. 29.
20. The Lettrist movement is discussed Chapter 4.
21. Dada: Art and Anti-Art, Ope cit., p. 118
22. 'The Semiotics of Dada Poetry', Ope cit., p. 67
23. Ibid., p. 69
24. Hans Arp, 'Notes from a Dada Diary', Robert Motherwell,
ed., The Dada Painters and Poets, An Anthology (Wittenborn,
Schultz Inc., New York, 1951), p. 222
25. Hans Arp, in Charles Russel1, Poets, Prophets and
Revolutionaries The Literar Avant-Garde from Rimbaud throu h
Postmo ern1sm,
Un1vers1ty Press,
, p.
26. Hans Arp, in Herbert Read, Arp (Thames and Hudson, London,
1968), p. 142
27. Ibid., pp. 38-9
28. Ibid., p. 142
29. Dada: Art and Anti-Art, Ope cit., p. 61
30. Tristan Tzara, in Henri Behar and Michel Carassou, Le
surrealisme, Textes et Debats, (Librairie Generale Franyaise,
Paris, 1984 , p. 15-6
31. 'The Semiotics of Dada Poetry', Ope cit., p. 56.
32. 'Dada Manifesto 1918', Ope cit., p. 144
33. Ibid., p. 142
34. Ibid., p. 144
35. Ibid., p. 143
36. Ibid., p. 143
37. Ibid., p. 142
38. Ibid., p. 142
39. Tristan Tzara, 'Unpretentious Proclamation', Seven Dada
Manifestos and Lampisteries, Ope cit., p. 15
40. 'The Ambiguous Aesthetic of Dada', Ope cit., p. 27
41. 'Lecture on Dada', Ope cit., p. 112
518
42. Gabrielle Buffet-Picabia, 'Some Memories of Pre-Dada:
Picabia and Duchamp', The Dada Painters and Poets, Ope cit.,
p. 255
43. Tristan Tzara, 'Note on Poetry', Seven Dada Manifestos and
Lampisteries, Ope cit., p. 77
44. Tristan Tzara, 'Monsieur AA the Antiphilosopher sends us
this Manifesto', Seven Dada Manifestos and Lampisteries, Ope
cit., p. 28
45. Ibid., p. 27
46. Marcel Duchamp, Dada: Art and Anti-Art, Ope cit., p. 89
47. Ibid., p. 88
48. Marcel Duchamp, in Robert Short, Dada and Surrealism
(Chartwell Books Inc., New Jersey, 1980), p. 25
49. Ibid.
50. Marcel Duchamp, in Dada: Art and Anti-Art, Ope cit., p. 90
51. Hans Arp, in Poets, Prophets and Revolutionaries, Ope
cit., p. 102
52. Ibid.
53. H.D. Heilman, 'Noteworthy forerunner of the
Antiauthoritarian Movement: Dada', Schwarze Protokolle, No 6,
October 1973, p. 66. (Trans. Andi Chapple)
54. 'The Semiotics of Dada Poetry', Ope cit., p. 59
55. Ibid.
56. Dada: Art and Anti-Art, Ope cit., p. 31
57. Dada and Surrealism, Ope cit., p. 57
58. 'Lecture on Dada', Ope cit., p. 107
59. Ibid., p. 112
60. Dada: Art and Anti-Art, Ope cit., p. 101
61. Ibid., p. 102
62. Hans J. Kleinschmidt, 'Berlin Dada', Dada Spectrum, Ope
cit., p. 148
63. Dada: Art and Anti-Art, Ope cit., pp. 110-1
64. Ibid., pp. 111-2
65. Tristan Tzara, in Dada: Art and Anti-Art, Ope cit., p. 163
66. Ibid., p. 160
67. Dada and Surrealism, Ope cit., p. 42
68. 'Berlin Dada', Ope cit., pp. 151-2
69. Mustapha Khayati, 'Captive Words: Preface to a
Situationist Dictionary', Situationist International Anthology,
OPe cit., p. 172.
70. George Grosz and John Heartfield, 'Art is in Danger', in
Stephen Foster, 'Dada Criticism, Anti-Criticism and ACriticism', Dada Spectrum, Ope cit., p. 40
519
71. 'Lecture on Dada', Ope cit., p. 111
72. Tristan Tzara, 'Monsieur Antipyrines's Manifesto', Seven
Dada Manifestos and Lampisteries, Ope cit., p. 1
73. 'Dada Manifesto on Feeble and Bitter Love', Ope cit.,
p. 45
74. 'Dada Manifesto 1918', Ope cit., p. 144
75. See Surrealism: Permanent Revelation, Ope cit., and A.
Alvarez, The sava~e God, A Study of Suicide (Penguin,
Harmondsworth, 19 1)
76. Louis Aragon, in Robert Short, 'Paris Dada and
Surrealism', Dada: Studies of a Movement, Ope cit., p. 83
77. 'Some Memories of Pre-Dada', Ope cit., p. 253
78. Ribemont-Dessaignes, in Dada: Art and Anti-Art, p. 183
79. Ibid.
80. Dada and Surrealism, Ope cit., p. 65
81. Ben Vautier, 'The Duchamp Heritage', Dada Spectrum, Ope
cit., p. 251
82. An Introduction to Surrealism, Ope cit., p. 30
83. Richard Sheppard, 'Dada and Politics', Dada: Studies of a
Movement, Ope cit., p. 67
84. The Savage God, Ope cit., p. 253
85. Albert Gleizes, 'The Dada Case', Dada: Studies of a
Movement, Ope cit., p. 299
86. 'The Ambiguous Aesthetic of Dada', Ope cit., p. 27
87. 'Dada and Politics', Ope cit., p. 67
88. Dada: Art and Anti-Art, Ope cit., p. 209
89. Ibid., p. 211
90. Ibid., p. 208
91. Ibid., p. 205
92. Maurice Nadeau, The History of Surrealism,
(Harmondsworth, Penguin, 1973), p. 47
93. Benjamin Peret, 'A Word from Peret', (excerpts), in Rachel
Stella, ed., Death to the Pi s Selected Writin s of Ben'amin
Peret, Atlas Ant 0 ogy
At as
94. The History of Surrealism, Ope
95. Ibid., p. 72
96. Andre Breton, Second Manifesto of Surrealism, Andre
Breton, Manifestos of Surrealism (University of Michigan
Press, Ann Arbor, 1974) trans. R. Seaver and H.R. Lane, p. 125
97. Ibid., pp. 125-6
98. Andre Breton, 'Introduction to the Discourse on the
Paucity of Reality', in What Is Surrealism?, Ope cit.,
pp. 18-9
520
99. Louis Aragon, Paris Peasant (Pan, London, 1987), pp. 127-8
100. Ibid., p. 130
101. The History of Surrealism, Ope cit., p. 160
102. Surrealism, Permanent Revelation, Ope cit., p. 12
103. Quoted in Anna Balaikan, surrealism~ The Road to the
Absolute (The Noonday Press, New York, 1 59), p. 53
104. Surrealism, Permanent Revelation, Ope cit., p. 13
105. The History of Surrealism, Ope cit., p. 58
106. The Savage God, A Study of Suicide Ope cit., p. 249
107. Ibid., p. 248
108. Clifford Bowder, Andre Breton, Arbiter of Surrealism
(Librairie Droz, Geneva, 1967), p. 7
109. The Savage God, Ope cit., p. 248
110. Ferdinand Alquie, The PhilosOiht of Surrealism (Ann Arbor,
The University of Michigan press, 9 5), p. 47
111. Andre Breton, 'Pour Dada', What Is Surrealism?, Ope cit.,
p. 4
112. Victor Castre, in The Philosophy of Surrealism, Ope cit.,
p. 47
113. 'Pour Dada', Ope cit., p. 4
114. Andre Breton, Arbiter of Surrealism, p. 9
115. Andre Breton, Anthology of Black Humour (excerpts), in
What Is Surrealism?, Ope cit., p. 194
116. Arthur Rimbaud, in Charles Russell, Poets, prophets; and
Revolutionaries, (Oxford University Press, New York, 198 ),
p. 52
117. Andre Breton, in The Philosophy of Surrealism, Ope cit.,
p. 106
118. Louis Aragon, in Surrealism, Permanent Revelation, Ope
ci t., p. 54
119. Pierre Mabille, in Towards the Poetics of Surrealism, Ope
cit., p. 151
120. Andre Breton, The communicatin~ Vessels (excerpts), in
What Is Surrealism?, Ope cit., p. 6
121. Ibid., p. 69
122. Surrealism, Permanent Revelation, Ope cit., pp. 21-2
123. Ibid., p. 57
124. Andre Breton, Mad Love (University of Nebraska Press,
Lincoln and London, 1987) trans. Mary Ann Caws, p. 25
125. Andre Breton, in The History of Surrealism, Ope cit.,
p. 87
126. Andre Breton and Philippe Soupault, The Magnetic Fields
(Atlas Press, London, 1985), trans. David Gascoyne, p. 25
521
127. Roger Cardinal, Figures of Reality (Croom Helm, London,
1981), p. 46 ff. The logological extreme is developed to
perfection in Fiona T. Wardle, Belligerent ESSay: 'Reflex
Actions in a Confined Space' (Manchester, 1988
128. Ibid., p. 51
129. Dawn Ades, Dada and Surrealism Reviewed (Arts Council of
Great Britain, London, 1978), p. 162
130. Poets, Prophets, and Revolutionaries, Ope cit., p. 127
131. Dada and Surrealism, Ope cit., p. 69
132. The Philosophy of Surrealism, Ope cit., p. 131
133. Mad Love, Ope cit., p. 39
134. Andre Breton, Surrealism and Painting, trans. Simon Watson
Taylor, (Macdonald, London,1972), p. 288
135. Ibid., p. 290
136. Philippe Audoin, in J.H. Matthews, Lan~Uages of Surrealism
(University of Missouri Press, Columbia, 19 6), p. 128
137. The Philosophy of Surrealism, Ope cit., p. 128
138. Mad Love, Ope cit., pp. 13-5
139. 'Experimental Researches', What Is Surrealism?, Ope cit.,
pp. 95-6
140. Mad Love, Ope cit., p. 47
141. WaIter Benjamin, 'Surrealism', One-Way Street (New Left
Books, London, 1979), p. 230
142. Roger Cardinal, Breton: Nadja (Grant and Cutler, London,
1986), p. 11
143. Andre Breton, in Roger Cardinal, 'Soluble City, The
Surrealist Perception of Paris', Architectural Design (Vols 23, 1978), p. 143
144. The History of Surrealism, Ope cit., pp. 106-7
145. Breton, ~i1jh (Gallimard, Paris, 1964), p. 22. Trans. Andi
Chapple, unpu 1S ed, 1988
146. Ibid., p. 38
147. See Breton: Nadja, Ope cit., p. 57
148. 'Soluble Fish', in Manifestos of Surrealism, Ope cit.,
p. 60
149. Roger Cardinal, 'The Raven and the Writing Desk', in
Surrealism, supplement to Freedom (Freedom Press, London, 1978)
150. Paris Peasant, Ope cit., p. 35
151. Ibid., p. 147
152. Ibid., p. 151
153. Ibid.
154. Ibid., p. 190
155. Ibid., p. 64
522
156. Louis Aragon, in Surrealism, Permanent Revelation, Ope
cit., p. 60
157. WaIter Benjamin, in Andre Breton, Arbiter of Surrealism
Ope cit., , p. 104
158. This is the last phrase of Breton's Nadja.
159. Haim M. Finkelstein, Surrealism and the Crisis of the
Object (UMI Research Press, Ann Arbor, 1979), p. 68
160. Whitney Chadwick, Women Artists and the Surrealist
Movement (Thames and Hudson, London, 1985), p. 31
161. Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex (Penguin,
Harmondsworth, 1972), pp. 267-8
162. Women Artists and the Surrealist Movement, Ope cit., p. 31
163. Ibid., p. 105
164. Surrealism, Permanent Revelation, Ope cit., p. 17
165. J. H. Matthews, An Introduction to Surrealism
(Pennsylvania State University Press, Pennsylvania, 1965),
p. 160
166. Mad Love, Ope cit., p. 25
167. The History of Surrealism, Ope cit., pp. 106-7
168. Andre Breton, in ibid., p. 143
169. Jean-Paul Sartre, What Is Literature? (Methuen, London,
1981), p. 138
170. 'Introduction to the Discourse on the Paucity of Reality',
Ope cit., p. 25
171. Unpublished declaration, in The History of Surrealism, Ope
cit., p. 113
172. Second Manifesto of Surrealism, Ope cit., p. 139
173. Pierre Naville, in The History of Surrealism, Ope cit.,
p. 140
174. 'Legitimate Defence', in What Is Surrealism?, Ope cit.,
p. 32
175. Ibid. , p. 34
176. Ibid. , p. 37
177. Ibid. , p. 34
178. Ibid. , p. 37
179. Ibid. , p. 39
180. Ibid. , p. 42
181. Andre Breton, in The Histor~ of Surrealism, Ope ci t. ,
p. 176
182. Ibid., pp. 176-7
183. 'Manifesto for an Independent Revolutionary Art', in What
Is Surrealism?, Ope cit., p. 185
523
184. Franklin Rosemont, quoted in J.H. Matthews, Towards the
Poetics of Surrealism, (Syracuse University Press, New York,
1976), p. 150
185. Tristan Tzara, in Le Surrealisme, Textes et Debats, OPe
cit., p. 82
186. The History of Surrealism, Ope cit., p. 131
187. Ibid., p. 134
188. Louis Aragon, in Herbert S. Gershman, The Surrealist
Revolution in France (Ann Arbor, University of Michigan Press,
1969), p. 120
189. Louis Aragon, in The History of Surrealism, Ope cit.,
p. 110
190. Red Front is reprinted in The History of Surrealism, Ope
cit., pp. 311-322
191. What Is Literature?, Ope cit., p. 224
192. Ibid., p. 137
193. Ibid., p. 134
194. Andre Breton, The Communicating Vessels, excerpts in What
Is Surrealism?, p. 75
195. 'For Dada', Ope cit., p. 3
196. Andre Breton, in Surrealism, Permanent Revelation,
Ope cit., p. 123
197. Robert Desnos, in Towards the Poetics of Surrealism,
Ope cit., p. 154
198. Andre Breton, in The History of Surrealism, Ope cit.,
p. 175
199. H. Viesel, 'Wieso Eigentlich Surrealismus?', Schwarze
Protokolle, No. 6, October 1973, (Trans. Andi Chapple). The
Surrealist attitude to institutionalised politics is
encapsulated in Benjamin P€ret and George Munis~ Les Syndicats
Contre La R€volution (Eric Losfeld, Paris, 1968)
200. George Melly, 'The Revolutionary Dilemma of Surrealism in
its Time', Surrealism, supplement to Freedom (Freedom Press,
London, 1978)
201. Breton: Nadja, Ope cit., p. 61
202. See The Raven (Freedom Press, London, Vol 1, No. 2, August
1987, and Vol 1, No. 3, November 1987)
203. Now 7, Feb-Mar 1946, pp. 33-4
204. Andre Breton, 'What Is Surrealism?', in What Is
Surrealism?, Ope cit., p. 118
205. Ibid. This point has a resonance with the attitude of many
American Indians. Smohalla, a Nez Perce Indian, founded a
dreamer religion which declares: 'My young men shall never
work. Men who work cannot dream; and wisdom comes to us in
dreams.' Touch the Earth, compiled by T.C. McLuhan (Abacus,
London, 1982), p. 56. This text is also a valuable source for
524
other points of contact, such as the notion of 'dream places',
between American Indian and Surrealist thought. See 'Soluble
City', Ope cit., for a discussion of this point.
206. Surrealism, Permanent Revelation, Ope cit., p. 122
207. Pierre Naville, in The History of Surrealism, Ope cit.,
p. 139
208. Surrealism, Permanent Revelation, Ope cit., p. 147
209. Alchemists of the Surreal, Arts Council Film and Video
Umbrella tour document.
210. Henry Miller, 'Open Letter to Surrealists Everywhere', The
Cosmological Eye (New Directions, Conneticut, 1939), p. 159-~
211. Ibid., pp. 151-2
212. Ibid., p. 163
213. Ga~tan Picon, Surrealists and Surrealism (Rizzoli
International, New York, 1983), p. 127
214. Surrealism, Permanent Revelation, Ope cit., p. 115
215. Ibid., p. 122
216. 'Tranchons-en', in J.H. Matthews, Towards the Poetics of
Surrealism, Ope cit., p. 146
217. 'Specialists in Revolt', Jean Schuster, in discussion
with Paul Hammond, the New Statesman, Vol 114, No. 2958, 4 Dec
1987, pp. 22-3
218. J.-F. Dupois, in Le Surrealisme, Textes et Debats, Ope
cit., p. 69
Footnotes to Chapter 4.
1.
The History of Surrealism, Ope cit., p. 37
2.
Stewart Home, The Assault on Culture Uto ian Currents
from Lettrisme to C ass War, Apor1a Press & Unpopu ar Boo s,
London, 1988) p. 8
3.
Cobra's name was taken from the cities Copenhagen,
Brussels, and Amsterdam from which its members came. For a full
Guy Atkins, Asger Jorn, The Crucial Years 1954-1964 (Lund
Humphries, London, 1977
4.
Nuclear art was founded in Italy in 1951 and included exFuturists, and Dadaists: see The Assault on Culture, Ope cit.
5.
Richard Gombin, The Origins of Modern Leftism, Ope cit.,
p. 60. The plethora of Lettrist,texts includes ', Isidore Isou,
Reflexions sur M. Andr~ Breton (Editions Lettristes, Paris,
1948), and Maurice Lemaitre, Toujours a l'avant-garde de
l'avant-garde jusgu'au Paradis et au-dela (Centre de
Creativite, Paris, 1972)
6.
Leaving the Twentieth Century, Ope cit., p. 3
525
7.
The Assault on Culture, Ope cit., p. 17
8.
Ivan Chtcheglov, 'Formulary for a New Urbanism', in
Situationist International Anthology, Ope cit., p. 1
9.
Ibid., p. 2
10. Ibid., pp. 2-3
11. Ibid. p. 3
12. The existence of the London Psychogeographers is doubtful;
see Asger Jorn, Ope cit.
13. 'Instructions for Taking Up Arms', in Situationist
International Anthology, Ope cit., p. 64
14. Guy Debord, 'Introduction to a Critique of Urban
Geography', in Situationist International Anthology, Ope cit.,
p. 6
15. 'Ideologies, Classes, and the Domination of Nature',
Situationist International Anthology, Ope cit., p. 106
16. 'Preliminaries Toward Defining a Unitary Revolutionary
Programme', Ope cit., p. 309
17. 'All the King's Men', in Si tua tionis t International
Anthology, Ope cit., p. 116
18. Guy Debord, 'Report on the Construction of Situations and
on the International Situationist Tendency's Conditions of
Organisation and Action', in Situationist International
Anthology, Ope cit., p. 24
19. Debord and Wolman, 'Methods of Detournement' in
Situationist International Anthology, Ope cit., p. 11
20. Van Doesburg and Van Eesteren, 'Towards Collective
Building', in Ulrich Conrads, Programmes and Manifestos on
Twentieth Century Architecture (Lund Humphries, London, 1970),
p. 67. The 1950s and 1960s saw a plethora of avant-garde
critiques of architecture, see especially the work of the
group Archigram. Hundertwasser's 1958 Manifesto points out
that although one is able to ?aint or sculpt without overt
control, the practice of archi t ecture is specialised and
inaccessible.
21. Ibid., p. 155
22. Guy Debord, 'Introduction to a Critique of Urban
Geography', in Situationist International Anthology, Ope cit.,
p. 5
23. Jacques Fillon, 'New Games', in Pro 9rammes and Manifestos
on Twentieth Century Architecture, Ope C1t.,
p. 155
24. See Chapter 5.
25. Ivan Chtcheglov, 'Formulary for a New Urbanism', Ope cit.,
p. 3
26. Ibid., p. 4
27. 'Report on the Construction of Situations ••• ', Ope cit.,
p. 24
28. Ibid.
526
29. 'All the King's Men', Ope cit., p. 116
30. Mustapha Khayati, 'Captive Words: Preface to a
Situationist Dictionary', in Situationist International
Anthology, Ope cit., pp. 171-2
31. 'All the King's Men', Ope cit., p. 115
32. Ibid., p. 117
33. 'Response to a Questionnaire from the Centre for SocioExperimental Art', in Situationist International Anthology, Ope
cit., p. 143
34. 'All the King's Men', Ope cit., p. 116
35. Ibid., p. 114
36. Ibid., 72
37. 'Report on the Construction of Situations ••• ', Ope cit.,
p. 20
38. 'Response to a Questionnaire from the Centre for SocioExperimental Art', Ope cit., p. 144
39. Ibid.
40. 'Basic Banalities', Ope cit., • 124
41. Ibid., pp. 97-8
42. 'Report on the Construction of Situations ••• ', Ope cit.,
pp. 17-8
43. 'Captive Words', Ope cit., 173
44. Ibid.
45. 'Preliminaries Towards Defining a Unitary Revolutionary
Programme', Ope cit., p. 308
46. 'The Fifth SI Conference in Goteburg', in Situationist
International Anthology, Ope cit., p. 88
47. 'Ideologies, Classes, and the Domination of Nature', Ope
cit., p. 107
48. lAll the King's Men', Ope cit., p. 116
49. The Revolution of Everyday Life, Ope cit., p. 137
50. Ibid.
51. J.H. Matthews, Langua~es of Surrealism (University of
Missouri Press, Colombia, 986) pp. 156-7
52. 'Report on the Construction of Situations ••• ', Ope cit.,
p. 18.
53. Ibid., pp. 18-9
54. 'Captive Words', Ope cit., p. 170
55. Ibid.
56. 'Methods of Detournement', Ope cit., p. 11
57. Ibid., p. 9
58. 'Report on the Construction of Situations ••• ', Ope cit.,
p. 19
527
59. Ken Knabb, Double Reflection l Preface to a Phenomenology
of the Subjective Aspect of Pract1cal Critical Activity (Bureau
of Public Secrets, Berkeley, 1974), p. 15
60. Ibid., p. 12
61. The Society of the Spectacle, 203
62. Ibid., 204
63. Ibid., 122
64. 'Minimum Definition of Revolutionary Organisations', in
Situationist International Anthology, Ope cit., p. 223
65. For a full account of the tradition of council communism,
see Richard Gombin, The Radical Tradition (Methuen, London,
1978), and Mark Shipway, 'Council communism', Non-Market
Socialism in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Ope cit.,
pp. 104-126. For the role of councils in the events in France
in 1968, see F. Perlman and R. Gregoire, Worker-Student Action
Committees, France May 1968 (Black & Red, Michigan, 1970)
66. The Society of the Spectacle, 81
67. Ibid., 87
68. Ibid., 84
69. 'Perspectives for Conscious Alterations in Everyday Life',
Ope cit., p. 74
70. The Revolution of Everyday Life, Ope cit., p. 74
71. 'Instructions for Taking up Arms', Ope cit., p. 63
72. Ibid.
73. The Revolution of Everyday Life, Ope cit., p. 127
74. Ibid.
75. 'Perspectives for Conscious Alterations in Everyday Life',
Ope cit., p. 74
76. 'Captive Words', Ope cit., p. 171
7 7 • ' All the Kin g's Men " 0 p • c it., P • 115
78. Ibid.
79. The Revolution of Everyday Life, Ope cit., p. 75
80. 'Basic Banalities', Ope cit., p. 125
81. 'Basic Banalities', Ope cit., p. 124
82. The Revolution of Everyday Life, Ope cit., p. 75
83. 'Manifesto', Internationale Situationniste, No 4., p. 38,
Internationale Situationniste 1957-1969, Ope cit.
84. Ibid.
85. Ken Knabb, Double Reflection, Ope cit., p. 8
86. Ibid., p. 7
87. 'The Countersituationist Campaign in Various Countries',
in Situationist International Anthology, Ope cit., p. 113
88. 'Instructions for Taking up Arms', Ope cit., pp. 64-5
528
89. 'Basic Banalities', Ope cit., p. 93
90. Ibid., pp. 122-3
91. 'The Countersituationist Campaign in Various Countries',
Ope cit., p. 113
92. Ibid.
93. The Society of the Spectacle, 193
94. Preface to the Fourth Italian Edition of 'The Society of
the Spectacle', Ope cit., p. 6
95. Ibid., pp. 7-8
96. Peter Wollen, 'The Situationist International', in New
Left Review, 174, March/April 1989, pp. 67-95. The exhiDItion,
'The Situationist International 1957-1972', is co-produced by
the Musee National d'Art Moderne Centre Georges Pompidou,
Paris, and the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston. It is
accompanied by a 'Situationist scrapbook', Iwona Blazwick, ed.,
An Endless Adventure ••• An Endless Passion ••• An Endless
Banquet (ICA and Verso, London, 1989) which, like Debord's
Memoires, is bound in sandpaper.
97. Kotanyi and Vaneigem, 'Elementary Programme of the Bureau
of Unitary Urbanism' , in Situationist International Anthology,
Ope cit., p. 65
98. A thorough account of the events of 1968 and other
revolutionary crises is to be found in Chris Harman's The Fire
Last Time: 1968 and After (Bookmarks, London, 1988). The
Situationists receive some recognition for their role in 1968
in David Miller, Anarchism (J.M. Dent, London, 1984),
pp. 141-151, and The Origins of Modern Leftism, Ope cit. The
collapse of the Situationist International in the aftermath of
1968 is documented in Guy Debord and Gianfranco Sanguinetti, La
Veritable Scission dans L'Internationale (Champ Libre, Paris,-1972) and Histoire de L'Internationa1e Situationniste, Ope
cit., which also gives an account of the Situationist
involvement in the Council for the Continuation of the
Occupations (CMDO), and the wider movements of 1968.
99. Dernieres Nouvelles (4.12.66), quoted in 'Our Goals and
Methods in the Strasbourg Scandal' Situationist International
Anthology, Ope cit., p. 205
100. On the Poverty of Student Life ••• , Ope cit., p. 4
101. Ibid., p. 7
102. Ibid., p. 11
103. Ibid., p. 4
104. Ibid., p. 11
105. Ibid., p. 10
106. Ibid.
107. 'Our Goals and Methods in the Strasbourg Scandal', Ope
cit., p. 205
108. Ibid., p. 206
529
109. Reprinted on the back cover of the Black & Red edition On
the Poverty of Student Life ••• , Ope cit. This text appears inthe majority of reprints of the pamphlet.
110. 'Our Goals and Methods in the Strasbourg Scandal',
Ope cit., p. 207
111. Ibid.
112. 'The Beginning of an Era', Situationist International
Anthology, Ope cit., p. 228
113. On the Poverty of Student Life ••• , Ope cit., p. 24
114. 'The Beginning of an Era', Ope cit., p. 228
115. Ibid. Jeff Nuttall had to revise his views on the
Situationists: in Bomb Culture (Paladin, London, 1970), p. 175,
he descibed the movement's highest achievements as 'a number of
witty and pointed public events', a view amended in a footnote:
'This is no longer true. Situationists were very active during
the Paris student riots.'
116. Socialist Worker, 7.5.88
117. 'Basic Banalities', Situationist International Anthology,
Ope cit., p. 93
118. Le Nouvelle Observateur, 8.2.71
119. Ibid., 8.11.71
120. 'The Beginning of an Era', Ope cit., p. 227
121. Ibid.
122. Ibid., p. 229
123.The Fire Last Time, Ope cit., p. 91
124. Ibid., p. 92
125. See Rene Vienet, The Enra
Situationists in the
Occupation Movement, M~a7.y~-'J~u~n~e~~~~~~~P~a~p~e~r~s~P~u~r1~c~a~t~1~o-n~s,
York, no date)
126. Paris: May 1968 1 an eyewitness account (Dark Star Press
and Rebel Press, 198b)
127. The Observer, 26.5.68
128. The Times, 1.6.88
129. Socialist Worker, 7.5.88
130. The Times, 1.6.88
131. The Observer, 25.6.68
132. Paris: May 68, Ope cit., p. 33
133. Ibid.
134. The Enrages and the Situationists ••• , Ope cit., p. 14
135. Paris: May 68, Ope cit., p. 26
136. Ibid., pp. 24-5
137. Ibid., p. 19
138. Paris: May 68, Ope cit., p. 5
530
139. The Observer, 2.6.68
140. The Enrages and the Situationists ••• , op. cit., p. 15
141. Ibid.
142. The Observer, 26.5.68
143. The Enrages and the Situationists ••• , op. cit., p. 15
144. See Harold Rosenberg, The De-definition of Art: Action Art
to Pop to Earthworks (Seeker and Warburg, London, 1972). A wide
appraisal of the 1960s conjunctions of art and politics is to
be found in Robert Hewison, Too Much, Art and Society in the
Sixties (Methuen, London, 1988)
145. Jean Cassou et. al., Art and Confrontation, France and the
Arts in an Age of Change, (Studio Vista, London, 1970), p. 199
146. The Enrages and the Situationists ••• , p. 15
147. Hannah Arendt, in the Observer, 19.5.68
148. Ibid., 2.6.68
149. Ibid., 19. 5. 68
150. The News of the World, 16.2.69
151. The Observer, 26.5.68
152. The Enrages and the Situationists ••• , op. cit., p. 7
153. The Observer 19.5.68
154. The Enrages and the Situationists ••• , op. cit., p. 17
155. 'Specialists in Revolt', The New Statesman, op. cit.
156. Quoted in Situationist International Antholo~y, op. cit.,
p. 384. Patrick Seale and Maureen McConville's Re Flag Black
Flag, French Revolution 1968 (Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1~68),
was one of a number of books to be commissioned in the
immediate aftermath of the 1968 events. Others include Charles
Posner, ed., Reflections on the Revolution in France: 1968
(Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1970); Herve Bourges, ed.~ The Student
Revolt. The Activists Speak (Panther, London, 1968) and, most
famously, Gabriel Cohn-Bendit and Daniel Cohn-Bendit, Obsolete
Communism, The left-Wing Alternative (Penguin, Harmondsworth,
1969)
157. L'Archibras, edited by Jean Schuster, Paris. Five issues
of the journal appeared between April 1967 and March 1969.
158. For a comprehensive guide to the graffito of 1968, see
WaIter Lewino, L'imagination au Pouvoir (Le Terrain Vague,
Paris, 1968). Manifestos, flysheets and other documents from
1968 are collected in Vladimir Fisera, Writint on the Wall
France, Ma, 1968: A Documentary Anthology (AI ison and Busty,
London, 19 8)
159. The Enrages and the Situationists ••• , op. cit., p. 4
160. Paris: May 68, op. cit., p. 27
161. Art and Confrontation, op. cit., p. 27
162. The Observer, 26.5.68
531
163. Art and Confrontation, op. cit., p. 27
164. Ibid., p. 34
165. The Enrages and the Situationists ••• , op. cit., p. 5
166. Ibid., p. 3
167. 'Specialists in Revolt', op. cit.
168. Keith Reader, Intellectuals and the Left in France Since
1968, (Macmillan, London, 1987), p. 163
169. Malcolm Imrie, preface to the New Statesman's pull-out
colour supplement, January 1988
170. The Enrages and the Situationists ••• , op. cit., p. 14
171. Roel Van Duyn, Message of a Wise Kabouter (Duckworth,
London, 1972)
172. Rudolf de Jong, Provos and Kabouters (Friends of Maltesta,
Buffalo, no date), pp. 11-2. This pamphlet was reproduced in
Apter and Joll, Anarchism Today (Macmillan, London, 1971)
173. Ibid., p. 11
174. Ibid., pp. 10-1
175. Ibid., p. 14
176. The statue had been donated to the City of Amsterdam by
Imperial Tobaccos.
177. Provos and Kabouters, op. cit., p. 6
178. Ibid., p. 14
179. On the Poverty of Student Life ••• , op. cit., pp. 12-3
180. George Branchflower, 'Oranges and Lemons', Here and Now No
7/8, 1989, pp. vii-ix
1~1. L'Eurogeo, in Situationist International Anthology, op.
c1t., p. 39
.
182. Mario Tronti, 'The Strategy of Refusal', Semiotext(e),
Vol. Ill, No. 3, 1980, p. 29
183. Ibid.
184. Ibid., p. 34
185. Bifo, 'Anatomy of Autonomy', Semiotext(e), op. cit.,
p. 155
186. See The Fire Last Time: 1968 and After, op. cit., p. 218
187. 'Anatomy of Autonomy', op. cit., p. 156
188. Toni Negri, 'Interrogation', Semiotext(e), op. cit.,
p. 190
189. Maurizio Torealta, 'Painted Politics', Semiotext(e), op.
cit., p. 102
190. 'Anatomy of Autonomy', op. cit., p. 156
191. 'Painted Politics', op. cit., pp 102-3
192. Ibid., p. 103
532
193. Ibid., p. 105
194. Ibid.
195. 'Anatomy of Autonomy', op. cit., p. 156
196. Collective A/Traverso, 'Radio Alice - Free Radio',
Semiotext(e), op. cit., p. 131
197. Like a Summer With a Thousand Julys (Blob, London, no
date), p. 43
198. 'Radio Alice - Free Alice', op. cit., p. 131
199. Ibid.
200. Ibid., p. 133
201. Ibid.
202. Ibid., p. 134
203.
,
ant
p.
207. Ibid., p. 49
208. Stoke Newington Eight Defence Campaign, If You Want Peace
Prepare for War (London, no date) p. 13
209. The Angry Brigade, op. cit., p. 32
210. Ibid., p. 37
211. Ibid., p. 29
212. The Assault on Culture, op. cit., p. 74
213. Ibid., p. 77
214. Smile (No. 10), p. 3
215. Desire In Ruins (text accompanying an installation at
Transmission, Glasgow, 1987)
216. Smile, op. cit., p. 1
217. Andi Chapple, On the Spur of the Moment (Manchester,
1986). Various King Mob documents are reproduced in An Endless
Adventure ••• , op. cit., in which the influence of the
Situationists on British culture is also traced. See also
George Robertson, 'The Situationist International: Its
penetration into British Culture', in Block No. 14. Autumn 1988
218. Jamie Reid, Up They Rise - The Incomplete Works of Jamie
Reid (Faber & Faber, London, 1987), p. 15
219. Ibid., p. 35
220. Ibid., p. 38
221. Ibid., p. 38
222. Ibid., p. 43
533
223. Ibid.
224. The End of Music (Calderwood 15, Glasgow, 1978) pp. 32-3
225. Ibid., pp. 12-3
226. Ibid., p. 9
227. Ibid.
228. Ibid., p. 9
229. City Fun, May 1982. Tony Wilson's Factory Records stands
alongside Beck's Bier as sponsors of the 1989 ICA Situationist
exhibition; among the exhibits, a T. shirt with the logo: 'Well
you've blown it now. You'll never see The Ha~ienda. It doesn't
exist. Anywhere. THE HA~IENDA MUST BE BUILT'.
Footnotes to Chapter 5.
1.
Toni Negri and Mario Tronti, The Social Factory
(Semiotext(e), New York, 1985)
2.
'Anatomy of Autonomy', Ope cit., p. 166
3.
Jean-Franyois Lyotard, Driftworks (Semiotext(e), New York,
1984), back cover
4.
The Revolution of Everyday Life, pp. 185-6
5.
Ibid., pp. 137-8
6.
Charles C. Lemert and Garth Gillan, Michel Foucault,
Social Theory and Transgression (Columbia University Press, New
York, 1982), p. 95
7.
Ibid., p. 108
8.
Ibid., p. 109
9.
Ibid.
10. Colin Gordon, 'Afterword' to Michel Foucault,
Power/Knowledge, trans. Colin Gordon, Leo Marshall, John
Mepham, Kate Soper (Harvester, Brighton, 1986), p. 231
11. Intellectuals and the Left in France Since 1968, Ope cit.,
p. 13
12. Jean-Franyois Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition, A Report
on Knowledge (Manchester University Press, 1984)
13. Gilles Deleuze, 'Nomad Thought', The New Nietzsche,
Contem orar St les of Inter retation, edited by David B.
A T e MIT Press, Massac usetts, 1985), p. 149
14. Ibid.
15. Ibid.
534
17. 'Truth and Power', Power/Knowledge, Ope cit., p. 115
18. Michel Foucault and Gilles Deleuze, 'Intellectuals and
Power', Language, Counter-Memory, Practice, Ope cit., p. 207
19. Michel Foucault, 'Revolutionary Action: "Until NOw"',
Language, Counter-Memory, Practice, Ope cit., p. 233
20. Psychoanalytic Politics, Ope cit., p. 230
21. Ibid., p. 65
22. Ibid., p. 58
23. Ibid., p. 59
24. Julia Kristeva, in ibid., p. 81
25. Driftworks, Ope cit., p. 31
26. Ibid.
27. Ibid., p. 26
28. Ibid., p. 29
29. Ibid., p. 80
30. Michel Foucault, 'Polemics, Politics, and Problemizations:
An Interview', The Foucault Reader, edited by Paul Rabinow
(Penguin, Harmondswortfi, 1986), pp. 383-4
31. Jean Baudrillard, 'Forget Baudrillard', Forget Foucault
(Semiotext(e), New York, 1987), pp. 114-5
32. Ibid., p. 115
33. Michel Foucault, 'The Eye of Power', Power/Knowledge, Ope
cit., p. 159
34. Ibid.
35. Ibid.
36. Michel Foucault, Social Theory and Transgression, Ope
cit., p. 60
37. Michel Foucault, 'Two Lectures', Power/Knowledge, Ope
cit., p. 102
38. 'The Eye of Power', Ope cit., p. 158
39. Jeff Minson, 'Strategies for Socialists? Foucault's
Conception of Power', Towards a Critique of Foucault (Routledge
& Kegan Paul, London, 1986), p. 114
r
40. 'Intellectuals and Power', Language, Counter-Memory,
Practice, Ope cit., p. 213
41. 'Strategies for Socialists? Foucault's Conception of
Power', p. 114
42. Ibid.
43. Foucault, 'The Politics of Health in the Eighteenth
Century', Power/Knowledge, Ope cit., p. 171
44. 'Intellectuals and Power', Ope cit., p. 210
45. 'The Eye of Power', Ope cit., p. 149
46. Ibid., p. 151
535
47. Ibid., p. 155
48. Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish The Birth of the
Prison, trans. Alan Sheridan (AlIen Lane, T6e Penguin Press,
London, 1977), p. 82
49. 'The Eye of Power', Ope cit., p. 156
50. Jeremy Bentham, in ibid., p. 154
51. Mark Poster, Foucault, Marxism and History (Polity Press,
Cambridge, 1984), p. 78
52. Michel Foucault, 'Truth and Power', Power/Knowledge, Ope
cit., p. 119
53. Peter Dews, Lo~ics of Disintegration, Post-structuralist
Thou,ht and the Cla1ms of Critical Theory (Verso, London,
1987 , p. 167
54. Michel Foucault, in John Rajchman, Michel Foucault, The
Freedom of PhiloSOihy (Columbia University Press, New York,
1985), p. 52. Cha lenges to the notion of the self appear
throughout poststructuralist thought and are developed
particularly well in Deleuze and Guattari's notion of the 'body
without organs', in which the 'self' is constituted by series
of discontinuous 'desiring machines'. See Anti-Oeditus,
trans. Robert Hurley, Mark Seem, and Helen R. Lane, Viking,
New York, 1983)
55. 'Two Lectures', Ope cit., p. 98
56. Logics of Disintegration, Ope cit., p. 162
57. Michel Foucault, Social Theory and Transgression, Ope
cit., p. 106
58. 'Strategies for Socialists? Foucault's Conception of
Power', Ope cit., p. 113
59. Logics of Disintegration, Ope cit., p. 54
60. Michel Foucault, The Freedom of Philosophy, Ope cit.,
p. 52
61. Michel Foucault, in Alan Sheridan, Michel Foucault, the
Will to Truth (Tavistock, London, 1984), p. 169
62. Foucault, Marxism and History, Ope cit., p. 127
63. Ibid., p. 82
64. Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality, Volume 1: An
Introduction, trans. Robert Hurley (AlIen Lane, The Penguin
Press, London, 1979), p. 26
65. Ibid., p. 7
66. Michel Foucault, 'Body/Power', Power/Knowledge, Ope cit.,
p. 58
67. 'Truth and Power', Ope cit., p. 118
68. Logics of Disintegration, Ope cit., p. 177
69. Ibid., p. 180
70. Michel Foucault, Social Theory and Transgression, Ope
cit., p. 45
71. Michel Foucault, 'The Subject and Power', Afterword to
Hubert L. Dreyfus and Paul Rabinow, Michel Foucault: Beyond
536
71. Michel Foucault, 'The Subject and Power', Afterword to
Hubert L. Dreyfus and Paul Rabinow, Michel Foucault: Beyond
Structuralism and Hermeneutics (Harvester Wheatsheaf, Hemel
Hempstead, 1982), pp. 210-1
72. The History of Sexuality, Ope cit., p. 33
73. Forget Foucault, Ope cit., p. 37
74. Ibid., pp. 42-3
75. Ibid., pp. 10-1
76. Jean Baudrillard, The Ecstasy of Communication
(Semiotext(e), New York, 1988), p. 63
77. Ibid., p. 64
78. Ibid., p. 68
79. 'Forget Baudrillard', Ope cit., p. 127
80. Ibid.
81. Ibid. , p. 70
82. Ibid. , pp. 74-5
83. Ibid. , p. 73
84. Ibid. , p. 135
85. Ibid. , p. 128
86. The Ecstaoy of Communication, Ope cit., p. 66
87. Ibid., p. 73
88. 'Revolutionary Action: "Until Now"', Ope cit., pp. 220-1
89. 'Nomad Thought', Ope cit., p. 146
90. Mark Poster, 'Introduction' to Jean Baudrillard, Selected
Writings, edited by Mark Poster (Stanford University Press,
California, 1988) , p. 6
91. Alex Callinicos, 'Marxism and Philosophy: a reply to Peter
Binns', International Socialism (2:19, 1983), p. 116
92. Logics of Disintegration, Ope cit., p. 177
93. Michel Foucault, 'Power and Strategies', Power/Knowledge,
Ope cit., p. 142
94. 'The Eye of Power', Ope cit., p. 164
95. 'Power and Strategies', Ope cit., p. 142
96. 'Two Lectures', Ope cit., p. 86
97. Ibid., p. 81
98. Ibid., p. 81
99. 'Two Lectures', Ope cit., p. 83
100. Luce Irigaray, 'This Sex Which Is Not One', Elaine Marks
and Isabelle de Courtivon, eds., New French Feminisms (The
University of Massachusetts Press, 1981), p. 99
101. Ibid., p. 103
102. Ibid., p. 100
537
103. Ibid., p. 103
104. Luce Irigaray, in Toril Moi, Sexual/Textual Politics,
Feminist Literary Theory (Methuen, London, 1985)
105. 'This Sex Which Is Not One', Ope cit., p. 103
106. Sexual/Textual Politics, Feminist Literary Theory, Ope
cit., p. 140
107. Ibid., p. 139
108. Ibid., p. 108
109. 'Two Lectures', Ope cit., p. 86
110. Ibid.
111. Michel Foucault, Social Theory and Transgression, Ope
cit., p. 95
112. 'The Subject and Power', Ope cit., p. 209
113. 'Theatrum Philosophicum', Ope cit., p. 185
114. Michel Foucault, 'Prison Talk', Power/Knowledge, Ope cit.,
p. 53
115. 'Two Lectures', Ope cit., p. 81
116. 'The Eye of Power', OPe cit., p. 165
117. 'Revolutionary Action: "Until Now"', Ope cit., p. 219
118. Noam Chomsky and Michel Foucault, 'Human Nature: Justice
versus Power', in Fons Elders, ed., Reflexive Water, The Basic
Concerns of Mankind (Souvenir Press, London, 1974), p. 170
119. Ibid., pp. 173-4
120. Ibid., p. 171
121. Ibid., p. 180
122. Ibid., p. 182
123. Chris Wheedon, Feminist Practice and Poststructuralist
Theory (Basil Blackwell, Oxford, 1987), p. 52
124. Ibid., p. 54
125. Sexual/Textual Politics, Feminist Literary Theory, Ope
cit., p. 163
126. Feminist Practice and Poststructuralist Theory, Ope cit.,
p. 70
127. Sexual/Textual Politics, Feminist Literary Theory, Ope
cit., p. 163
128. Ibid., p. 164
129. Julia Kristeva, 'Woman can Never be Defined', New French
Feminisms, Ope cit., p. 137
130. Feminist Practice and Poststructuralist Theory, Ope cit.,
p. 69
131. Psychoanalytic Politics, Ope cit., p. 82
132. Sexual/Textual Politics, Feminist Literary Theory, Ope
cit., p. 164
538
133. Julia Kristeva, 'Oscillation between Power and Denial',
New French Feminisms, Ope cit., p. 166
134. Ibid., p. 165
135. Julia Kristeva, Revolution in Poetic Language (Columbia
University Press, New York, 1984), pp. 224-5
136. Ibid., p. 225
137. Sexual/Textual Politics, Feminist Literary Theory, Ope
cit., p. 171
138. Ibid., p. 170
139. Psychoanalytic Politics, Ope cit., p. 82
Footnotes to Chapter 6.
1.
Jean Baudrillard, The Ecstaey of Communication, Ope cit.,
pp. 21-2
2.
Mark Poster, 'Introduction' to Jean Baudrillard, Selected
Writings, Ope cit.,p. 2
3.
Ibid., p. 6
4.
Intellectuals and the Left in France Since 1968, Ope cit.,
p. 133
5.
'Introduction' to Jean Baudrillard, Selected Writings, Ope
cit., p. 1
6.
Ibid., pp. 4-5
7.
Jean Baudrillard, In the Shadow of the Silent Majorities
(Semiotext(e), New York, 1983), p. 51
8.
Ibid., p. 134
9.
Forget Foucault, Ope cit., p. 89
10. The Ecstasy of Communication , Ope cit., p. 74
11. Ibid., p. 75
12. Driftworks, Ope cit., p. 13
13. Ibid., p. 12
14. Ibid., p. 13
15. Francis Picabia, in The Dada Painters and Poets, Ope cit.,
p. 206
16. 'Forget Baudrillard', Ope cit., p. 108
17. 'Oranges and Lemons', Ope cit., p. viii
18. Driftworks, Ope cit., p. 19
19. Ibid., pp. 21-2
20. 'Two Lectures', Ope cit., p. 83
21. Driftworks, Ope cit., p. 32
539
22. 'Body/Power', Ope cit., p. 57
23. 'Forget Baudrillard, Ope cit., pp. 119-20
24. Sylvere Lotringer and Christian Marazzi, 'The Return of
Politics', Semiotext(e), Ope cit., p. 12
25. Michel Foucault, in Pamela Major-Poetzl, Michel Foucault's
Archeology of Western Culture, Towards a New Science of History
(Harvester, Brighton, 1983), pp. 47-8
26. Felix Guattari, 'The Proliferation of Margins',
Semiotext(e), Ope cit., p. 109
27. Feminist Practice and Poststructuralist Theory, p. 135
28. Sexual/Textual Politics, Feminist Literary Theory, Ope
cit., p. 160
29. Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, Nomadolo~~: The War
Machine (Semiotext(e), New York, 1986), pp. 11930. 'The New Nietzsche', Ope cit., p. 147
31. The Revolution of Everyday Life, Ope cit., p. 91
32. Nomadology: The War Machine, Ope cit., p. 7
33. Ibid., p. 10
34. Manifesto of the Communist Party, Ope cit., p. 39
35. What is Situationism?, Ope cit., p. 15
36. Mary Daly, Pure Lust (The Women's Press, London, 1984)
37. Madeleine Gagnon, 'Body I', New French Feminisms, Ope
cit., p. 180
38. H~lene Cixous and Catherine Clement, The Newly Born Woman
(Manchester University Press, 1987), p. 93
39. Logics of Disintegration, Ope cit., p. 176
40. The Revolution of Everyday Life, Ope cit., p. 205
41. Intellectuals and the Left in France Since 1968, Ope cit.,
p. 131
42. Ibid., pp. 131-2
43. Ibid., p. 132
44. See, for example, Hall ' Foster, ed., Postmodern Culture
(Pluto Press, London, 1985), p. ix
45. 'Guide to New Times, A user-friendly guide to the new
world of the 1990s', Marxism Today, October 1988, p. 5. See
also Marxism Today, January 1989, special issue on
postmodernism which includes an interview with Jean
Baudrillard.
46. The Observer, 26.5.89
47. Manifesto of the Communist Party, Ope cit., p. 47
48. Preface to the Fourth Italian Edition of'The Society of
the Spectacle, Ope cit., p. 22
540
49. Mike Peters, 'The "Secret Articles" of Guy Debord', Here
and Now, Ope cit., p. 32. See Guy Debord, Commentaires sur-Ia
Soci~te du Spectacle (Gerard Lebovici, Paris, 1988)
50. Ibid.
51. Guy Debord, in An Endless Adventure ••• , Ope cit., p. 95
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