thanks for this Roman. Interesting see some translation in action. I'd like to just clarify/correct a couple of things:
1. re. welfare state as evolving; I think what I probably said was the nation-state is transforming, not disappearing and that a logic of welfarism continues in as much as we now see forms of corporate welfare all over the place (tax incentives, R&D, cheap/zero cost land leases, etc).
2. re. post-representational democracy - I wouldn't go so far as to advocate a transposition of the traditional (read liberal democratic) forms of democracy into online fora, but rather an invention of entirely new logics of post-representative politics. Pasted below is a brief sketch of some of those ideas, culled from discussions associated with the recent incommunicado conference in amsterdam:
http://incommunicado.info/conference.
The idea of a post- or non-represenational democracy springs from various theoretical and practical lineages. Two key theoretical points of reference for me in recent years have been the work of Mouffe and Virno (neither of whom I'd call "post-modern", but I'd rather put that term to the side). In The Democratic Paradox, Mouffe presents a compelling (if somewhat repetitive) critique of Third Way politics and liberal democracy (Habermas, Rawls) in terms of the fundamental contradictions with those political idioms: namely, a rhetoric of tolerance and pluralism underpinned by numerous forms and techniques of exclusion inherent within rational consensus models of democracy. Mouffe argues that rational consensus, deliberative models of democracy ultimately fail due to their disengagement with "the political", or field of antagonisms that underpin sociality. With Laclau, her call has been for a radical democracy - one that takes antagonism as a condition of emergence for democracy. She argues for an agonistic process whereby a plurality of interests, discourses, practices and forces procure a space of legitimacy whereby antagonisms are able to be addressed - not for the purpose of transcendence or consensus, but for the purpose of acknowledging that incommensurabilities are inherent to the politics of sociality.
My critique of Mouffe is based on the limits of her argument when it comes to thinking politics within the field of icts. Her model of radical democracy is premised on political institutions of the state as the primary institutional framework for addressing "the political". While I wouldn't adopt the nonsense in some quarters that claim the end of the nation-state, borderless economies, etc etc, I do think that the network models of sociality made possible by icts presents new forms of social-technical systems - or what I call the emergent institutional forms of organised networks. While I think these networks can be called institutional forms insofar as they have a capacity to organise social relations, they are radically dissimilar to the technics of modern institutional forms such a
seems like some of that last posting got cut off:
here's the post-rep bit again:
The idea of a post- or non-represenational democracy springs from various theoretical and practical lineages. Two key theoretical points of reference for me in recent years have been the work of Mouffe and Virno (neither of whom I'd call "post-modern", but I'd rather put that term to the side). In The Democratic Paradox, Mouffe presents a compelling (if somewhat repetitive) critique of Third Way politics and liberal democracy (Habermas, Rawls) in terms of the fundamental contradictions with those political idioms: namely, a rhetoric of tolerance and pluralism underpinned by numerous forms and techniques of exclusion inherent within rational consensus models of democracy. Mouffe argues that rational consensus, deliberative models of democracy ultimately fail due to their disengagement with "the political", or field of antagonisms that underpin sociality. With Laclau, her call has been for a radical democracy - one that takes antagonism as a condition of emergence for democracy. She argues for an agonistic process whereby a plurality of interests, discourses, practices and forces procure a space of legitimacy whereby antagonisms are able to be addressed - not for the purpose of transcendence or consensus, but for the purpose of acknowledging that incommensurabilities are inherent to the politics of sociality.
My critique of Mouffe is based on the limits of her argument when it comes to thinking politics within the field of icts. Her model of radical democracy is premised on political institutions of the state as the primary institutional framework for addressing "the political". While I wouldn't adopt the nonsense in some quarters that claim the end of the nation-state, borderless economies, etc etc, I do think that the network models of sociality made possible by icts presents new forms of social-technical systems - or what I call the emergent institutional forms of organised networks. While I think these networks can be called institutional forms insofar as they have a capacity to organise social relations, they are radically dissimilar to the technics of modern institutional forms such as parliament and auxiliary institutions and departments. In other words, I do not think it is possible to speak of democracy as a representative, consensus based politics in the environment of icts based networks. That is why I think advocates of "e-democracy" at both a practical and theoretical level are investing in a phantasm -- they have, in my view, a very dumb idea that the central tenets (citizenship, participation, transparency, etc) of representative democracy can be transposed into the realm of networks. For a start, citizenship is a concept and practice co-emergent with the state form. Networks are not states. Therefore in order to think democracy within networks, it is necessary to develop in conceptual and practical ways idioms for non- or p
Ned
this is fascinating, many thanks.
apologies for the truncated messages - Haloscan allows only 1,000 characters or so per comment, so basically you have to split your message/comment into smaller ones...- annoying.
Anyway, i think your summary of Mouffe's thesis is great, i recently read the book and found it both powerful and somewhat repetitive.
In addition to your criticism re transplanting nation-state concepts onto the web, i think there is an inherent paradox (he he) in Mouffe's thesis, which has very much to do with the nature of space / community / public sphere.
*Every* community and/or space (whether that's our galaxy, a liberal democracy or my neighbourhood) is finite - it is defined not only by what it is (positively), but also negatively - by what it's not.
As i'm sure you're aware, the key feature of any social construction or collective identity is exclusion (me/us v. 'the other'). In the context of the nation state that distinction is very easy to conceptualise. Mouffe may have a case that some members of that community are being excluded e.g. through the discursive practices of 'The Third Way'. Yet, ANY social organisation is bound to exclude someone - infinity cannot exist in politics/the context of power.
That becomes even more complicated in the context of the globalised interdependent / network society, where the case for excluding people (because they're not 'citizens' or whatever) is very very weak (e.g. i inhale your carbon dioxide emissions).
Having said that, and while i take your point about the futility of trying to transplant democracy as we know it into the 'e' world, representation is still relevant (and will always be) both in terms of geographical/demographic proportionality (i.e. physical space and communities) and also in terms of ensuring diversity of voices.
Thus, representation is still the keyword for legitimation - but how you GET that representation is another story.
Also, given that the globalised networked etc public sphere is only one layer in (rich) people's lifeworld, I claim that established institutions that are tied to local or national geographies are still not irrelevant.
Thus, (and i'm playing devil's advocate here), i challenge your notion of post-representational democracy in two senses:
- the conceptual sense that the term (PRD) contains an oxymoron: representation is embedded within (indeed inseparable from) the concept of democracy. BUT, the institutions and means of that representation are obviously fluid.
- post-representational democracy in the context of ICTs pressuposes universal access, which will never be the case.
omg what the heck is that colored ball thingy? it's pretty :P
If possible please can I get the audio version of the original discussion including the Q&A?
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