Just wanted to let you know I’d read your last comment. I won’t respond in detail, other than to say that I think we pretty much think in the same direction, with the possibility that I might be slightly more optomistic about the potential for something like theory to have certain, restricted transformative and empowering effects outside the classroom (though, I agree, that’s no reason to valorise academic work in the “hurray for me doing my job!” kind of way).

Cheers

Permission of course granted. Use whatever you like, please. Thanks for the kind words, though.

This group I used to hang around in Chicago used to say “the left” or “the movement needs philosophy!” and seemed to say it such that the “need” indicated a necessary condition for success. I always used to respond that the movement doesn’t need philosophy in that sense of need. I think the left can use the support of people who work doctors, lawyers, graphic designers, martial arts instructors, etc, that the capacities they use in (and to some extent cultivated by) their jobs can be productively deployed in movement stuff. Ditto for philosophers. But the movement stands or falls with none of this. So yeah, no special use in the sense of ‘more important’. Over all, I mean. There might be contexts where this use is more important (just as a lawyer may be more useful than anyone else dealing with illegal arrests, a doctor when people have been injured at a demonstration, etc). I like your distinction between helpful and imperative.

I also like your use of my definition against me. Touche! But… you write of theory changing an institutional setting. Fair enough. I think there’s value to that just as I think there’s value to not reading only white male authors, and there’s value to discussions instead of only lectures, etc. And I have definitely had my life changed by theory I encountered in a formal educational setting. But if one wants to say that theory changes the institution which is its context, sure the reverse must also be true - the institutional context shapes the theory. I take it as axiomatic that the very big worlds-changing I’d like to see happen, and many of the smaller instantiations (the accumulation of) which I think can contribute to that over time, is not something someone will make a career at. I think the introduction of a wage will generally introduce shaping effects away from changing worlds - in part because the wage relation is part of the structure of most every world. I hold this for theory, NGO staff, etc. That’s not to say those things are useless. In some cases ethical change may be all that’s locally practicable and even if it’s not then that doesn’t mean ethical change is useless. And like I said, I do think things can pass from ethical to political. The issue is one of starting points though, if one is saying “I want to do something about X that is the most effecting thing I can do” that’s different than “I want to do something about X in Y way because I feel strongly about it.” So, say there’s a public space where there’s a lot of aggressive public sexual harrassment of young women. One effective way to deal with this, to end the behavior in that area, might be a march through the area, or a system of counter-harrassment whereby groups confront the sexual harrassers, accompanied by leafleting etc. One might also say, though, “I want to be part of this, it’s really important, but I want to work with the young women who are being or have been harrassed to help them process that experience.” That’s totally valuable, but is less likely to end the particular case of ongoing sexual harrassment. (That the “work on X in Y way” type.) I’m much more comfortable with paid staff in the latter type of cases than I am in the former, and I’m still okay with paid staff in many of the former type cases but I think the wage does limit the scope of the worlds-changing (limits the size or type of worlds which can be changed, if you will).

On this, getting back to theory in classrooms - I think some of the time theory in the university might be no more than job training, just like a lot of what else goes on in classrooms. (I don’t think job training is necessarily a bad thing, particularly if it helps correct divisions in the labor market, but again the scope of worlds-change with that is limited.) I’m not at all convinced that theory is in some way more resistant to being just job training than at least some other types of things one can do in a classroom (visual art stuff, literature, history, etc) and I’m not convinced that theory empowers students outside the classroom more than many other type of pursuits (this is the special vs more thing again). This connects with the waged labor bit above in that part of what I want to avoid is a “hurray for me doing my job!” kind of thing, a valorization which can mask the role of universities - and help inure those of us who work in universities to that role - in valorization in the marxist sense.

take care,
Nate

The question to my mind is whether theory is useful at or is a way of doing politics, in breaking up a count. I want to say that of course it is - some of the time. But it’s not clear to me that this is unique to theory or that theory is more (more intensely or more frequently) a way to do politics than any other. Or that there’s some specialness to what theory might contribute to politics. Particularly insofar as it’s one’s job to do theory….

The theory spreading you mention IS changing worlds, but it’s the question of for whom! The spread of theory changes worlds for theorists and theory oriented people.

Now we arrive at the guts of it. Is there something “special” to what theory potentially contributes to politics? I wouldn’t say “special” but I would say “different”, in the non-hierarchical and non-oppositional sense that “theory” amounts to a kind of practice different from “nursing” which is a kind of practice different again from construction, etc. There’s nothing in that view, of course, that would lend support to arguments that what theory contributes to politics is so worthwhile that “spreading theory” — in the sense of developing within “subjects” or “populations” capacities to theorise, to work with ideas, to subject institutions and values to critique, etc. — would be a politically “progressive” thing to do. In defence of the argument that disseminating theory might be a helpful (as distinct from imperative) thing to do, all I could do at this time is appeal to certain historical “facts” about the extent to which action, practice, function, value, etc are believed to be based (at least, ideally) on an ahistorical, impartial logic, rather than on (say) the force of convention or the arbitrariness and caprice of interest. But that wouldn’t for a second entail denying that disseminating nursing skills might also be a politically progressive thing.

As for whose worlds are changed by the spread of theory, I would say that it’s not just the world(s) of theorists and “theory-oriented people” — at least, to the extent that “spreading theory” isn’t identical with “doing theory” (although the latter may play a part in enabling the former, perhaps). The moment theory — understood as a practice that confronts, challenges and aims to transform institutions (i.e. conflicts with), including structures of authority and distributions of capacities to act, speak, etc. — takes hold within an educational apparatus and is taught as a practice or technique (as distinct from a content or system) it plays a part in the potential transformation (e.g. as cultivation) of a student’s capacity to speak, act, etc., in certain kinds of situation and perhaps beyond those situations, too. Given, moreover, that an education apparatus’s purview is fairly wide (in the sense that huge numbers of students pass through it) and its effects are somewhat unpredictable or at least fallible (in the sense that it’s not equivalent to an industrial system of mass production), then the spreading of theory via an education system is indeed political, and here I’ll sneakily use your own definition of political change “against” you:

political change involves more than one person (it’s collective), it involves conflict with some other persons (so there’s at least 4 people involved), and it’s not fore-ordained to succeed (because the outcomes of the conflict depend on power built up and to some degree on luck, maybe we can say it’s probalistic? it’s also contextual).

So, again, the question(s) come down not to whether theory is political, but (1) to whether the difference of theory-as-practice from other forms of “non-intellectual” practice is significant or relevant enough give it any strategic force; and, if so, (2) to whether theory-as-practice cultivates capacities of analysis, communication, critique, etc. that other forms of “intellectual” practice (e.g. literary appreciationism) either can’t or don’t do so in a sufficiently strategic or effective way; and (3) to whether the cultivation of a capacity to theorise empowers students in contexts outside of academic practice (understood in the narrow sense).

And if all that doesn’t count as useless obscurantism, I don’t know what does…

Cheers

Thanks for these. I really need to get to bed so I can get up in the morning and work on stuff much less enjoyable than this. I’ll try to be brief but will likely go on very long out of sheer fun and a desire to procrastinate.

I got a lot from the distinction that Jacques Ranciere draws between politics and what he calls police. Both fit under a sort of everyday speech (at least, everyday activist and/or academic speech) use of politics, corresponding roughly to good and bad politics (though he insists, rightly, that there are better and worse police orders). One could say, for instance, that sexual assault is political, or racial profiling, or defense spending. I have no objections to terming any of that political, particularly as part of trying to end them or alleviate their effects or to understand them better (hopefully in order to accomplish one of the prior two). Ranciere would say those are of police or policing, we could use the clumsy neologism of policeal. Politics would be the interruption of these systems/logics/flows (Ranciere calls them counts, like with numbers). Work that is about this subjects would be a sort of refinement of our understanding of the count, like Marx’s critique - understanding how it works better. That can be useful for politics but I would say isn’t exactly political (I’m not actually invested in drawing too firm a lines here) so much as something which we could draw from for the sake of politics.

Like with workplace organizing, one of the first things one does is map the physical space to see where one can talk frankly in a safe way without being seen or overheard. If one does that alone, it’s police-al but a useful preliminary for politics. If one does it with a co-worker, it can be the beginnings of politics as the relationship is built, confidence increased, etc. (Also, on workplace organizing, that’s most of what I meant by political, yeah, the other meaning is along the lines of what I call police-al here - the distribution of healthcare and housing is at least as political and pressing a matter as the distribution of education.)

Where was I? Oh yes, necessarily political. Theory is necessarily political due to its institutional settings. It’s a count - and every count is the result of the (political) disruption of a prior count - or is based in a count, an institution and so in that sense is political in the sense of policing.

The question to my mind is whether theory is useful at or is a way of doing politics, in breaking up a count. I want to say that of course it is - some of the time. But it’s not clear to me that this is unique to theory or that theory is more (more intensely or more frequently) a way to do politics than any other. Or that there’s some specialness to what theory might contribute to politics. Particularly insofar as it’s one’s job to do theory.

I think I’m just spinning my wheels here so I should stop. Last thing - “changing worlds” might be better than “changing the world”, makes for a more relative and less absolute phrasing. “Changing worlds” in the sense of disrupting/redistributing power relations in some world (or situation). That’s what I mean by political change. How about this. Think about an intensive care unit for infants, or an after school program. We want the children there to get better treatment. Let’s say that they get it because the people working there sacrifice a lot of their time and energy to provide good work for the kids (don’t take their breaks, coming home aching and tired, etc). That’s great and is commendable, good for those kids and changes the world - in the sense of improving things for someone - but in the sense that I called ethical. Now let’s say the people who work there get together and say “you know, we could give the same level of quality to these kids or maybe even better if we had more staff and more control over the workplace.” So they organize themselves, confront the employer, and win more control and therefore more staff. That’s the political change, changing balances of power. I think the dissemination of theory you mention could certainly be the former, ethical improvement type of changing worlds. I’m not as sure about it being the latter.

I take it back. The theory spreading you mention IS changing worlds, but it’s the question of for whom! The spread of theory changes worlds for theorists and theory oriented people. Just as better workplace control is good for the nurses and after school program workers in my last example. But - is it good for anyone else? The nurses and after school program workers will say “it’s good for others too” and I think they’re right. Is that an ethical or a political good, for the recipients of the better care? I want to say ethical. (My turn to have a narrow definition of political I guess, wherein political means organizing.) Does the spread of theory do good for others? And is that an ethical or political good? I think I’ve rigged the game because I think it’s very hard for doing for others to be political in what I’m said here.

Okay, no better, but I found it interesting to blather. Sorry if it’s less interesting to read. I’m off to sleep.

take care,
Nate

Needless to say, I traveled to this post and to my question from the Long Sunday discussion on the future of theory (etc.) and what was said there about the politics of intellectual work. Consequently, my questions and thoughts relate as much to to what you said in that discussion as to anything you’ve written above (which seems to me, in any case, to be pretty consistent with what you wrote at LS). And the key to those questions/thoughts is not so much an apparent distinction between the political and the ethical — I merely picked up on those terms in order to find a point of reference for working out what you mean by “politics” — than your suggestion that you “guess” that theory is political “in the same (always uniquely instantiated) way that health care and construction is political”. At first, I had no idea of what “political” meant in that sentence; in light of your most recent comments, though, I think you mean “political” in the sense of workplace politics, the politics of labour and capitalism, etc. — is that right?

I’m with you on seeing that kind of event or context or activity as a matter of politics. While I occupy a slightly more ambivalent stance in relation to capitalism than you appear to do, I’m more than happy with the kinds of scenarios, and especially with the implied outcomes in those situations, that you use to exemplify politics. But for me there are other dimensions to or forms of politics that that view doesn’t encapsulate (at least, not explicitly or directly). For me, the sphere of “politics” also includes matters of citizenship and choice — what I will call a politics of democracy, not because I think the first form is opposed to democracy or can’t encompass this second form, but simply because conventionally (conservatively) the two forms get opposed in that way. But I think there are other forms of politics (e.g. politics of representation, identity politics), only one more of which I’ll go on to elaborate right now. And I should stress, too, that I don’t see these different forms as being radically distinct or as necessarily opposed, etc.; I’m sketching out nothing more than an occasional typology, to be abandoned the minute I’ve finished laying it out (if not earlier).

I also think of politics, that is, as institutional politics — as questions of sanction and authority within a given institutional purview; of the differentially available capacities to act or to judge or speak (etc.) in a given situation; of the arbitrary (in the sense of non-necessary) preservation or transformation of institutional forms of action, response, speech, etc.; as well as, if not most importantly, the provisional, iterable marking and re-marking of the limits between the “inside” and “outside” of a given institution, hence population (or, in other words, processes of inclusion and exclusion).

A person of theory will probably recognise that last sense of politics as emerging from an engagement with the work of Foucault and Derrida. For certain people of theory (and for many people not of theory), that fact is enough to disqualify that formulation as a politics. I don’t know where you stand on that question, but let me repeat that I don’t see this last form of politics as the ultimate in politics (in the sense that all that other forms are “at bottom” forms of institutional politics) or as necessarily (though, perhaps occasionally) inconsistent with the other senses of politics we’ve covered.

In any case, it’s this last sense of politics that I have in mind when I say that intellectual work or theory — even when understood in its “purest” (therefore, impossible) form, i.e. as a form of scholarship that is (somehow) completely detached from workplace politics, from the transformative potential of pedagogy, etc. — can be political. One might even say that, to the extent that scholarship, theory, etc., must draw upon particular academic conventions, techniques, priorities, etc., then it is necessarily political (albeit perhaps only insofar as one may after the fact, as you say, contextualise such work with an analysis of “its” politics). Of course, in that sense theory is also no more political, as you’ve already said, than health care or construction, and so if it turns out that you meant this kind of politics all along, then I’ve wasted your time with a needlessly elaborate response.

Still, I don’t believe that the political effects of theoretical work (no more than the political effects of nursing or construction) are necessarily limited to the particular context of its instantiation. And this is because I see the marking of the limit to such a context as itself open to political intervention/transformation. That’s why, while I’m with you on the rather ludicrous, or at least embarrassing, stance of those who go about declaring their work as “political”, I don’t doubt that it is, in a much more restricted sense, political nevertheless. Of course, the ways in which it is political (especially after one factors in the fact that one continues to benefit from the “political” nature of one’s publications, etc.) is very complex.

And, of course, none of what I’ve said so far has much to suggest exactly what I would count as “good” or “just” politics….

Cheers

Thanks for the kind words and the good question. First off, I’m happy to say that there can be cross-overs. A song might inspire someone, say, to learn about things they didn’t know about which leads them to new activities. (I got into Take Back The Night activity a lot in college in part from a book I read that I heard of from a song I heard.) Crossover from ostensible non-political to political stuff is possible and great when it happens. Crossover the other way is less so. That is, let’s say you and I work together and are really concerned about sexual harrassment of a co-worker at our workplace and we decide we must try to do something. Starting a punk band or writing short fiction is probably a less immediately useful and obvious option than starting to talk to our co-workers one on one and building a plan to confront our supervisor. On the other hand, we might create some art and it might have some effect - other coworkers get angry enough to confront the superviser, etc. That’s great. If we confronted the boss, though, lost our jobs and didn’t end the sexual harrassment it would be cold comfort to hear “well, you’ve got great material to write music or fiction about now.” Nonpolitical to political, awesome. Political to nonpolitical, less likely to be awesome.

Following that, I’m fine with saying that things are not political, I think it’s best to be modest and say “we tried but we’re not sure if we’ll prove successful” - if one’s wrong then one is overly modest but pleasantly surprised to have made a useful difference. Whereas if one says “I make a huge difference!” and is wrong one is not only immodest but unpleasantly surprised to find oneself useless. None of that answers your question, though, it all just presumes a notion of (successful) political change. Umm…

Political change depends on one’s political perspective. I’m an anarchist and a communist, personally, so I’d like to see capitalism done away with. That’s not happening any time soon I imagine, so I need a less absolute standard for meaningful political change. Also, others might not agree with my perspective, others who I might still want to discuss with. For both reasons, your question is productive, trying to come up with workable metrics for activity to judge whether it’s useful (politically) or not - and attempting to avoid uses like feeding one’s ego etc.

How does this sound?

Meaningful political change alters a balance of power in some important way, relative to some frame of reference. So, meaningful change in a neighborhood might mean creating a tenant organization which gets better conditions in homes and more fair rent. In a workplace it might mean getting a group of co-workers to confront a boss about abusive behavior, altering that treatment (and hopefully using that to build up an organizing committee to take action on issues like wages, conditions, etc). Relative political change is stuff that one wagers will contribute to something like that - or wagering like I do that the above type of activity can in the long run contribute to bigger changes in society.

So, political change involves more than one person (it’s collective), it involves conflict with some other persons (so there’s at least 4 people involved), and it’s not fore-ordained to succeed (because the outcomes of the conflict depend on power built up and to some degree on luck, maybe we can say it’s probalistic? it’s also contextual).

I feel like maybe I’m coming off like I’m trying to dodge the question, that’s not what I’m doing. It’s a good question (and I’m a bit blurryminded, more than usual even, from a long day). One thing for sure: subject matter alone does not make something political - criticism and politics aren’t the same thing. Writing about or teaching Marx or labor law or feminism etc are laudable things but do not make one someone who is contributing to systemic change.

I should also say that in general I think that the political-ness of something is easiest to identify after the fact. Claims to be doing (or being) something very political right here and now often strike me as a bit suspect - particularly when made by academics (”I consider my work an intervention…”). This is simplistic, but, let’s say for the sake of argument that politics takes place in the present and is often identified as political after the fact. Following that, one who in the present says “I’m doing (or being) something political” projects imaginatively projects themself into the future and looks back at the present, saying in effect “this will have been political.” Fine and good if people need to do that for some reason, but it seems to me that one is more likely to make that imaginative projection - and to do so with certainty - at moments when on is not putting one’s time and energy into a political project. That’s not much use either.

One thing I’m convinced of is that sometimes people use claims to do/be something political as a way to feed their ego and/or to advance their career in some industry (certain academic departments, NGOs). This cheapens important things and makes them into chips in games of one-upsmanship or into economic factors. Neither is acceptable.

Another thing I’m convinced of is that things don’t have to be political to be worthwhile. There are things which are compatible with nearly any type of social arrangement (nursing, raising kids). These can still be - are, barring perhaps some circumstantial variations/exceptions - worthwhile even in cases of really terrible social arrangements. People can say those activities “change the world” or “make the world a better place” as a type of honorific, which is fine. But one would be stretching to say that those activities pose a challenge to those social arrangements (again barring circumstances/exceptions like for instance raising a child who grows up to be Rosa Luxemburg etc).

Confusedly yours,
Nate

ps- right back at you, Rob: what would count, in your view, as a “political difference”, as “changing the world” in a political rather than honorific sense? Or do you not think there is such a difference?

What would count, in your view, as a “political difference”, as “changing the world” in a political rather than honorific sense? (I’m not talking about intellectual work specifically, but in any context.) And what is it, exactly, that qualifies it as an example of “political” change as distinct from “ethical” change?

I don’t want to pre-empt your response, but one of the (many) reasons why I ask this question has to do with the way that a certain order of quasi-academic writing is deemed “political” or “activist” on account of the fact (over and above the point about “style”) that it’s about political issues, and that it adopts a determined (and determinate) position in relation to those issues, yet it remains, in terms of its status as a practice, nothing more than “writing”, even (quasi)academic writing.

i will comment over on voyou as well, but just a note on foucault: yep, the particular/specific intellectual is a response to sartre, and he defines it as an intellectual closer to her own context (political, geograpical, etc).

But what’s interesting for me is firstly, that Foucault can be interpreted as abandoning this formulation later on (Mark Poster makes this point well). Secondly, though, I think it also gets Sartre wrong: Sartre’s point was that given our situations, we need to make claims that transcend the local. It’s inevitable, and if we refuse, we’re really just tacitly doing the work of the powerful.

Perhaps in this context, the lines would be the following: Foucault would recognize the power structure of the university, but nevertheless restrict his work to that same structure. Sartre would be more ambitious, critiquing the structure and its relation to the economy, etc., perhaps running the risk of error, but with full knowledge of this risk.

kisses
g