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Friday, August 14, 2009

Politics / Science / Books The Strategy

Posted by Charles Mudede on Fri, Aug 14, 2009 at 9:51 AM

In the second lecture Foucault delivered at the Collège de France in 1979, I find the solution to a very old problem and a way to make some sense out of the current situation (or crisis) of the GOP:

"Dialectic logic puts to work contradictory terms within the homogeneous. I suggests replacing this dialectic logic with what I would call strategic logic. A logic of strategy does not stress contradictory terms within a homogeneity that promises their resolution in a unity."

There it it is—a way out of my one big problem with Hegel, dialectics. The logic of dialectics is weak because it fails to explain how or why contradictions persist. Meaning, a dialectical lens always sees a resolution to a contradiction—it is picked up and canceled out (aufhebun). But a hegemonic bloc like the GOP, for example, persisted without canceling out the differences within its process. And with the current crises of the GOP, its dissipation, we see those differences detach from its process and persist on their own. They were never dissolved by the process. What then was the logic of the GOP hegemonic bloc (the business elite, the basically racist base, the Christian fundamentalist)? A strategic logic (the same is true for the opposing party). There was no canceling of differences, only an assemblage of those differences. (I'm of course referencing DeLanda's theory of assemblages—each component in a process, or emergent property, only makes an external rather than internal connection.)

Speaking of contradictions, is there one more extreme (or unsettling) than a carnivorous plant?

Image by mshades.

Comments (16) RSS

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Please, please, please don't let him write about Hegel anymore...

Posted by Engels on August 14, 2009 at 9:53 AM

lolwut?

Posted by jns on August 14, 2009 at 9:55 AM

You crack me up, Charles. Drive yourself nuts masturbating about this stuff if that's what turns your crank, but the simple fact is that you have about as much chance of understanding it all as your dog does understanding orbital trajectories.

Posted by Fifty-Two-Eighty

on August 14, 2009 at 10:01 AM

Those fractured blocks of the GOP though, don’t necessarily represent the GOP. They only support it because it’s what they see as the lesser of two evils (i.e., they’ll support the republicans over the democrats). If all political groups could actually compete equally for a shot at president or major control of government, all those fractured groups, in both the GOP and the DFL, would vote for many different people.

So yes, contradictions exist, but only if you see it as a whole, rather than what it really is - many small, loosely related groups.

And yes, carnivorous plants are strange (but cool).

Posted by Urgutha Forka on August 14, 2009 at 10:08 AM

This seems to dovetail with Shaviro's recent discussion of Marxism vs. Actor Network Theory. As with the antinomy between a totalizing force (i.e. Marxism) vs. the decentralized rhizome of the network, perhaps the lack of a dialectical synthesis between the contradictions erupting from the GOP's hegemonic block represents the same impasse between Marxism and Network Theory?

Posted by retinariddims on August 14, 2009 at 11:05 AM

What crisis?

I feel fine!

Posted by GOP on August 14, 2009 at 11:08 AM

@5, you nailed me. i have been following shaviro's ideas on this area of thought.

Posted by Charles Mudede on August 14, 2009 at 11:15 AM

Funny in retrospect that Foucault didn't figure in his discussion. So an important addition!

Posted by retinariddims on August 14, 2009 at 11:29 AM

Strategic logic has kept the right together for all of these years, but their leadership, the orchestrators of the logical threads that tied their component pieces together, has fractured leaving the clinically insane bigots and the wealthy elite crooks exposed for what they are. If the democrats can retain cohesiveness and avoid splitting into various disparate factions, we will dominate the century. Obama understands this and is now employing strategic logic to tie us together and advance his policy agenda, let's hope he knows his knots.

Posted by Morgan on August 14, 2009 at 11:29 AM

APPARENTLY WHILE CATTY IZ AWAY MICEYS WILL MAKE MISATTRIBUTIONS, LIE ABOUT THEMSELVES, AND GENERALLY FUCK UP IN AN IRRITIRATING AND NOISOME WAY. MY UFFICIAL RETURN IZ NUTT UNTIL THIS WEEKEND, BUT KARLY, YOU DESERVE THIS:

1. DE LANDA INVENTED NOTHING. DELEUZE FUCKED YOUR MOTHER AND YOU AND U NEED TO STOP BITCHING

2.THERE IS NO IMPASSE BETWEEN MARXISM AND THE RHIZOME. IT IZ VEWY SIMPLE: MARXISM CAN NEVER BE RHIZOMATIC. THE RHIZOME CAN LOOK LIKE MARX'S BEARD SOMETIMES, BUT SMART PEEPS DUNT GET KONFUSED BY THAT. U R NOT 1 OF DEM.

3. KARLES, SILLY GIRL, U LUVVV DIALECTICS!!! DIALECTIC DICK TO THA DOME!!!

Posted by LaRiiiiM0RrrHAwtiiii696969

on August 14, 2009 at 11:45 AM

Charles,
I'm not sure I understand the connection with Foucault dialectics and the Republican party but I do believe there are contradictory folks/ideas in the GOP and in the Democratic party as well.

Speaking of contradictions try this on for size:

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,5394…

A black man posing as a white supremacist and threatening Pres. Obama? Huh?

Posted by lark on August 14, 2009 at 12:01 PM

The fewer political parties, the more divergent views need to come together to succeed. And mushrooms are more like animals than plants. They get their nutrients from organic matter, not the sun.

Posted by Vince on August 14, 2009 at 12:01 PM

A carnivorous plant spouting Hegel, perhaps?

Posted by NapoleonXIV on August 14, 2009 at 12:26 PM