Re: AUT: they remember nothing and understand nothing

[Nate Holdren <nateholdren@xxxxxxxxx>]

Lowe and everyone -

The posts are flying fast and furious here, I'm sure
deterritorializing capital trembles in the acentric halls of its
nonplace.

Lowe, I think we just disagree on Negri's relationship to Lenin(ism).
I don't have the time and resources right now to marshall significant
textual support, that's a long term project. Part of this is just my
own preoccupation with vanguardism in Operaismo and Marxism in
generally (this is one of the heartbreaking continuities that comes
out in Steve Wright's book, which I recommend as highly as possible if
you haven't read it).

The vanguard party was the organizational form par excellence of the
early operaisti, and the aim was conquest of state power. There's also
a very good article by Mony Neill and Midnight Notes on the Zapatistas
and class composition analysis that notes that the operaisti also held
to a different sort of vanguardism - vanguardism of a given class
sector (this comes out crudely in factoryist politics - subordination
of other struggles to the 'leading' sector of factory workers - but is
also bound up in theory, the identification of a hegemonic class
figure - professional worker, mass worker, etc).

Negri has explicitly rejected the party as an organizational form, and
the conquest of state power (both of which he did earlier hold to).
Still, I think your reading of Negri - while admirably charitable - is
not the only plausible one on this. Like I said though, I can't make a
more textually grounded argument at the moment. It may well be simple
desire for angelic purity on my part, of the sort Thiago has objected
to onlist in relation to other discussion, a simple distaste for
anything that smacks of vanguardism etc. My hunch is there more to it
than that, that this is somehow linked to what I don't like about some
of Negri's political positions, but again, I can't even clearly make
the point right now, let alone defend it.

My concern over Negri's remarks on communism are tied in with the
above and I'd rather say nothing on this than articulate myself badly.
Another time, eventually.



As for 'the commons', the use you identify for the term is simply not
the one given to it in the use by Midnight Notes and others (some of
the articles in The Commoner on the concept of primitive accumulation
are good on this, Harry Cleaver's notes on the primitive accumulation
section of Capital v1 are great as well. Also Jason Read has
interesting remarks on the concept of primitive accumulation and
production of subejectivity, Read moves in a different direction but I
think his work could be read as a bridge between the different
vocabularies at play here).

un abrazo,
Nate


On Tue, 2 Nov 2004 06:25:18 +0100, Lowe Laclau <lowe.laclau@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Nate,
>
> > progressivism. I think this is part of what's going on when Negri and
> > Hardt say in the same breath that the struggle today is networks, it
> > does not aim to take state power, and then say that Lenin would agree
> > if he were here. Thus implying Lenin was right back in the day. So
> > it's a supercession of vanguardism, not a rejection as such.
>
> In Il potere constituente you see in what senses Negri agreed with
> Lenin's approach and just where he sees his failures. Negri no where
> to my memory condones his vanguardism. In fact that was the starting
> point of his critique (contrasting I believe with Luxembourg). I'm not
> exactly sure though what HN want to say about "if Lenin were here". My
> sense from reading his reading of Lenin is not so much that he thinks
> "Lenin was right back in the day" but rather he approaches him as one
> would approach an old man or ones father who one appreciates but one
> has as well learned from his mistakes. Its the type of appreciation
> that is produced by learning and not a desire for repetition.
>
> > I'm not sure what comes of this, aside from the
> > uglyness of siding with those who said earlier "wait till after the
> > revolution, darling".
>
> What revolution? [see irony here]
>
> > I do wonder, though, as it seems to imply a certain species of
> > necessity in their thought, as if there's one political composition
> > that corresponds adequately to the technical composition (the vanguard
> > party in 1917 russia, networks in Europe today), rather than seeing
> > the technical as a basis from which many political forms (lines of
> > flight?) are possible and potentially effective.
>
> I think that would be a misreading. There is an excellent little essay
> by N in the May 2000 edition of Multitudes (I have it here someplace
> but am feeling a bit too lazy at the moment to find it) called
> Necesity and Liberty chez Spinoza: quelques alternatives. Gives you a
> good way of understanding his perspective of what is necessary and
> what not. In no case however do I think he would say that only on
> poltiical form was adeuate to technical conditions.
>
>
>
> > My hunch is that this is tied in with the more state/institution
> > directed moment of Negri - new New Deal demands, the need for a new
> > Magna Charta, etc - though substantiating this hunch is beyond me just
> > now.
> >
> > As part of backing away from all of the above that I'm concerned over
> > w/ Negri, I definitely share Harald's view that 'the commons' is a
> > preferable term (maybe this kind of terminological quibbling is silly,
> > but it something that sticks in my throat a bit). It points out a
> > contiguity of struggles and emphasizes the need for more detailed
> > investigation into the composition of the commons.
> >
> > all the best,
> > Nate
>
> Well no, we;re not quibbling over terminology. The terms refer to two
> different things entirely. The commons is a completely separate idea
> from the common as H&N have used it. They are too drastically
> different IMO to be collapsed into one.
>
> The commons refers to a significationally preconcieved enclosure. The
> common to a type of political field based upon living labor.
>
> Question though... what is your concern exactly with respect to their
> writing on the possibility of communism?
>
>
>
> Lowe
>
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>


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