tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14532613885189452472012-01-08T12:04:27.061+02:00...seeking the red thread... so that we can weave a red threathydrarchynoreply@blogger.comBlogger841100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-3728989956544611762012-01-08T12:04:00.000+02:002012-01-08T12:04:27.092+02:00

by Achille Mbembe, Johannesburg Workshop in Theory and Criticism What might be the conditions of a radical, future-oriented politics in contemporary South Africa? Interrogating the salience of wealth and property, race and difference as central idioms in the framing and naming of ongoing social struggles, Achille Mbembe investigates the possibility of reimagining democracy not only as a form of

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-47722672110900957432011-10-26T13:00:00.000+02:002011-10-26T13:00:22.780+02:00

by Mike Davis, Los Angeles Review of Books Who could have envisioned Occupy Wall Street and its sudden wildflower-like profusion in cities large and small? John Carpenter could have, and did. Almost a quarter of a century ago (1988), the master of date-night terror (Halloween, The Thing), wrote and directed They Live, depicting the Age of Reagan as a catastrophic alien invasion. In one of

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-49651329219059527222011-10-26T12:59:00.000+02:002011-10-26T12:59:53.718+02:00

by Richard Pithouse, SACSIS In The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck's novel about the Great Depression, Tom Joad, the novel's central character, a man who has been made poor and who is on the run from the law, tells his mother in the climactic scene that: “I been thinking about us, too, about our people living like pigs and good rich land layin' fallow. Or maybe one guy with a million acres and a

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-60429777950293679122011-09-23T15:11:00.000+02:002011-09-23T15:11:15.086+02:00

The professor Glenn Beck loves to hate speaks with Cornel West about waitressing, black nationalism, how the radical right helped her define her politics, and why she’s gloomy about America’s future. The conservative media stalwart Glenn Beck may be partially responsible for reinstating Frances Fox Piven into mainstream sociopolitical discourse. Nary a mention of Piven goes by without referring

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-71264331739666148142011-08-22T21:53:00.000+02:002011-08-22T21:53:17.383+02:00

by Jacqueline Rose, The London Review of Books The Letters of Rosa Luxemburg edited by Georg Adler, Peter Hudis and Annelies Laschitza, translated by George Shriver Verso, 609 pp, £25.00, February 2011, ISBN 978 1 84467 453 4 We live in revolutionary times. I cannot imagine now what it would have been like to be thinking about Rosa Luxemburg if the revolutions in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya had

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-77924408262659529692011-08-13T11:23:00.000+02:002011-08-13T11:23:48.225+02:00

by Peter Linebaugh, CounterPunch I thought Napoleon said it. But no, it's in Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations (1776), book IV, section vii, part 3 (about half way through). Here's what he says, "To found a great empire for the sole purpose of raising up a people of customers may at first sight appear a project fit only for a nation of shopkeepers. It is, however, a project altogether unfit for a

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-64932348205399362322011-07-24T16:32:00.000+02:002011-07-24T16:32:59.662+02:00

by John Berger, Guernica The wonderful American poet Adrienne Rich pointed out in a recent lecture about poetry that “this year, a report from the Bureau of Justice Statistics finds that one out of every 136 residents of the United States is behind bars—many in jails, unconvicted.” In the same lecture she quoted the Greek poet Yannis Ritsos: In the field the last swallow had lingered late

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-4860839142434671692011-05-25T11:25:00.001+02:002011-05-25T11:25:48.768+02:00

Nigel Gibson, Seminar Presentation at the Centre for Sociological Research, University of Johannesburg, 25 May 2011 The Problem of Humanism What is Fanon’s humanism, or better to say his new humanism? Simply put it is about putting invention into existence, or life into being. His is a living humanism. In Black Skin, Fanon speaks of this abstractly, he says, “yes to freedom no to exploitation”;

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-65629963372558173852011-05-07T15:55:00.001+02:002011-05-07T15:55:55.955+02:00

by Slavoj Žižek, Guernica The Left today faces the difficult task of emphasizing that we are dealing with political economy—that there is nothing “natural” in the present crisis, that the existing global economic system relies on a series of political decisions—while simultaneously acknowledging that, insofar as we remain within the capitalist system, violating its rules will indeed cause

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-8563008132870467792011-03-07T20:55:00.000+02:002011-03-07T20:56:26.787+02:00

by Alain Badiou, El KilomboUntil when will the idle and crepuscular West, the “international community” of those who still believe themselves to be the rulers of the world, continue to give lessons in good management and good behavior to the rest of the world? Is it not laughable to see well-paid and well-fed intellectuals, retreating soldiers of the capital-parliamentarism that serves us as a

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-17667792856410604472011-02-24T08:31:00.000+02:002011-02-24T08:32:48.594+02:00

by Peter Hallward, The GuardianIn the late 1940s, Simone de Beauvoir was already bemoaning our tendency to "think that we are not the master of our destiny; we no longer hope to help make history, we are resigned to submitting to it". By the late 70s such regret, repackaged as celebration, had become the stuff of a growing consensus. By the late 80s, we were told that history itself had come to

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-91229739970582514992011-02-19T11:03:00.001+02:002011-02-19T11:03:25.023+02:00

by Nigel Gibson, Radical Africa‘What makes the lid blow off?’ Fanon asks in ‘The Wretched of the Earth’, reflecting on the revolution against French colonialism in Algeria 50 years ago and thinking about the future ‘African revolution.’ In Egypt, a country where 50 per cent of the population is under 30 years old and which has known no other regime than Mubarak’s state of emergency, with its

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-4840966462386061982011-02-19T10:59:00.000+02:002011-02-19T10:59:46.179+02:00

by Richard Pithouse, SACSISLife, ordinary life, is meant to follow certain rhythms. We grow, seasons change and we assume new positions in the world. When you have finished being a child you put away childish things and move on to the next stage of life. But there is a multitude of people in this world who cannot build a home, marry and care for their children and aging parents. There is a

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-38020458844475947392011-02-01T15:22:00.000+02:002011-02-01T15:22:54.250+02:00

by Peter Hallward, The GuardianFrom revolutionary France and America to modern north Africa, this is a concept that can topple governmentsThe day after popular pressure forced Tunisia's autocratic president Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali from power on 14 January, Egypt's government declared that it "respects the will of the Tunisian people". So did the governments of Yemen and Iran, and so did the Arab

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-23466326643233354642011-02-01T15:18:00.000+02:002011-02-01T15:19:59.452+02:00

by Silvia Federici, The CommonerAt least since the Zapatistas took over the zócalo in San Cristobal de las Casas on December 31, 1993 to protest legislation dissolving the ejidal lands of Mexico, the concept of ‘the commons’ has been gaining popularity among the radical left, internationally and in the U.S., appearing as a basis for convergence among anarchists, Marxists, socialists, ecologists,

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-74358026544962667442011-01-12T14:52:00.000+02:002011-01-12T14:54:30.178+02:00

by Peter Linebaugh, The CommonerThe story begins at Blue Mountain Lake in the Adirondacks when, at a gathering of cultural workers for the commons and through no wish of their own, Peter and George Caffentzis were asked to speak about violence and the commons. Accordingly following dinner after what had been a chilly October day, they settled into armchairs by the fire and explained to the

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-13021007870049806192010-11-24T13:09:00.000+02:002010-11-24T13:10:30.651+02:00

by John HollowayThis is the text and notes for a talk given in Nottingham.How far is Latin America from Nottingham? It depends on how you measure it. You can measure it in terms of a politics of poverty or you can measure it in terms of a politics of dignity.If we speak of a Pink Tide in the area, we must remember that Pink is not a primary colour, that what seems to be pink is in fact a blend of

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-4206153099056304342010-11-23T13:13:00.000+02:002010-11-23T13:16:24.057+02:00

by Raúl Zibechi, Envisioning a Post-Capitalist OrderThe end of 2008 marked the ten-year anniversary of Hugo Chávez's first electoral victory (December 6, 1998), which initiated a new period marked by the emergence of progressive and left governments in South America. His clinching of the presidency was the result of a long process of struggles from below, beginning in February 1989 with the

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-41863360885152821302010-08-19T12:18:00.000+02:002010-08-19T12:20:56.598+02:00

by Zodwa Nsibande & S'bu Zikode, El KilomboPeople all over South Africa have been asking the leaders of Abahlali baseMjondolo as to why the government continues to ignore the demands of the shack dwellers. They have been asking why after all the marches, statements, reports and meetings the Kennedy Road settlement continues to get burnt down through the endless shack fires.They have been

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-61847633153740784332010-05-24T21:04:00.000+02:002010-05-27T08:02:11.504+02:00

Aimé CésaireDéputé for MartiniqueTo: Maurice ThorezGeneral Secretary of the French Communist PartyIt would be easy for me to articulate, as much with respect to the French Communist Party as with respect to the Communist International as sponsored by the Soviet Union, a long list of grievances or disagreements.Lately, the harvest has been particularly bountiful: Khrushchev’s revelations

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-23088314006999646952010-04-10T12:39:00.000+02:002010-04-10T12:43:16.095+02:00

Tuesday 06 April 2010by: Lewis R. Gordon, Truth OutIn many forums over the past decade, public intellectuals seem unable to talk about pressing social issues without performing the equivalent of an academic literature review. Although reasons range from trying to inform their audiences of relevant debates to efforts to demonstrate erudition, that many public intellectuals present their work as

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-15677453848893981652010-04-05T20:10:00.000+02:002010-04-05T20:12:05.615+02:00

Éric Alliez, Claire Colebrook, Peter Hallward, Nicholas Thoburn, Jeremy Gilbert (chair)Nick and Jeremy circulated some general questions to think about before the discussion, which particularly focused on the surprising fact that many casual commentators, and indeed, some self-styled ‘Deleuzians’, seemed to regard Deleuzian philosophy as wholly compatible with an embrace of market capitalism and

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-41013459853034441482010-03-29T10:14:00.000+02:002010-03-29T10:23:12.230+02:00

A Memorandum of Demands to President Jacob ZumaMonday, 22 March 2010 14, 2005We, members and supporters of Abahlali baseMjondolo and the Rural Network in the province of KwaZulu-Natal, are democrats committed to the flourishing of this country. We speak for ourselves and direct our own struggles. We have no hidden agendas. We have been mobilised by our suffering and our hopes for a better life.

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-41848361126160141272010-03-29T09:55:00.000+02:002010-03-29T10:08:09.068+02:00

Gandhians with a Gun? Arundhati Roy plunges into the sea of Gondi people to find some answers...Outlook IndiaThe terse, typewritten note slipped under my door in a sealed envelope confirmed my appointment with India’s Gravest Internal Security Threat. I’d been waiting for months to hear from them. I had to be at the Ma Danteshwari mandir in Dantewada, Chhattisgarh, at any of four given times on

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-28702184189541608982010-03-17T12:07:00.000+02:002010-03-17T12:07:03.740+02:00

by Alain Badiou[Originally published in Le Monde, 13 February 2010. Translated by Alberto Toscano and republished at Infinite Thought]For almost thirty years, the present, in our country, has been a disoriented time. I mean a time that does not offer its youth, especially the youth of the popular classes, any principle to orient existence. What is the precise character of this disorientation? One

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-69469454487135327972010-01-26T11:38:00.000+02:002010-03-05T07:32:45.723+02:00

by Peter Hallward, Americas Program, 22 January 2010Nine days after the devastating earthquake that struck Haiti on January 12, 2010, it's now clear that the initial phase of the U.S.-led relief operation has conformed to the three fundamental tendencies that have shaped the more general course of the island's recent history. It has adopted military priorities and strategies. It has sidelined

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-47104112187475471792010-01-26T10:56:00.000+02:002010-01-26T11:10:28.191+02:00

by Lawrence Liang, Lodi Gardens, Delhi, 5th February 2009, KafilaJacques Rancière (born Algiers, 1940) is Emeritus Professor, Philosophy, at the University of Paris (St. Denis). He came to prominence when he co-authored Reading Capital (1968), with Louis Althusser, the Marxist philosopher. He subsequently broke away from Althusser and wrote The Nights of Labour, a work that examined the

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-13624171644001708872010-01-09T16:00:00.000+02:002010-01-09T16:00:11.381+02:00

by Willie Baptist, Organizing UpgradeWillie Baptist was interviewed by John Wessel-McCoy for Organizing Upgrade in June 2009Present SituationAny approach to social change, organizing and leadership development has to be based on your assessment of the situation and of the problem. If you have one assessment or one diagnosis, you’re going to have a particular prescription and a particular

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-14646410937116991902009-12-12T15:06:00.000+02:002009-12-12T15:32:11.430+02:00

Michael Neocosmos, InteractivistThe background and consequences of the recent violent destruction of the Kennedy Road organisation of the Abahlali baseMjondolo (AbM) movement of shack dwellers by a combination of gangs recruited for the purpose, police action and local and regional ANC structures needs to be analysed at some depth. The reason is that this event and the actions surrounding it by

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-59482103710165476052009-11-16T18:28:00.000+02:002009-11-16T18:29:18.080+02:00

by Alex Knight, InteractivistThis Halloween season, there is no book I could recommend more highly than Silvia Federici’s brilliant Caliban and the Witch: Women, the Body, and Primitive Accumulation (Autonomedia 2004), which tells the dark saga of the Witch Hunt that consumed Europe for more than 200 years.In uncovering this forgotten history, Federici exposes the origins of capitalism in the

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-2804972661487190152009-11-12T17:56:00.000+02:002009-11-12T18:04:41.886+02:00

by Arundhati Roy, InteractivistTo justify enforcing a corporate land grab, the state needs an enemy — and it has chosen the MaoistsThe low, flat-topped hills of south Orissa have been home to the Dongria Kondh long before there was a country called India or a state called Orissa. The hills watched over the Kondh. The Kondh watched over the hills and worshipped them as living deities. Now these

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-12895058016688843042009-11-12T17:43:00.000+02:002009-11-12T18:05:54.007+02:00

by S'bu Zikode, LibcomUniversity of KwaZulu-Natal Forum LectureThursday 22 October 2009The Kennedy Road settlement, like all other Abahlali baseMjondolo settlements, has been embarking on a living politic.This politic is a living politic because it talks about the realities of our democracy – a democracy that serves the interests of a minority while the majority our people continue to live and to

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-6331982366414048022009-09-25T10:21:00.001+02:002009-09-25T10:39:08.441+02:00

by Peter Linebaugh“Where liberty is, there is my country,” declared Benjamin Franklin, to which Thomas Paine replied, “Where is not liberty, there is mine.” Tom Paine was a worker and commoner. He spoke and wrote from a particular experience, that of an English artisan at the onset of industrialization. He was, too, a planetary revolutionary—indeed, he helped give meaning to the term—and as such

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-75242537388816496062009-08-15T15:19:00.000+02:002009-08-15T15:24:16.619+02:00

Bu makaleyi Türkçe okumak için buraya tiklayin.by Nigel Gibson, Frantz Fanon Colloque, Algiers July 7, 2009The nation does not exist in the program which has been worked out by revolutionary leaders … [but] in the muscles and intelligences of men and women.Fanon, Les damnésTo speak about Fanonian practices in postapartheid South Africa one first needs to think about the question of method in two

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-25270445065445380052009-08-15T09:05:00.000+02:002009-08-15T09:07:52.471+02:00

by Peter Linebaugh, CounterpunchOne day at Crottorf we eat mouthwatering strawberries and yogurt for our lunch-time sweet.Crottorf is the name of a castle, or schloss, in Westphalia, Germany. Twenty-one of us are assembled from around the world to discuss the commons. We come from India and Australia, Thailand and South Africa, Brazil, Italy, Germany, Austria, France, England, Greece, California

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-38973096624945985462009-07-17T16:10:00.000+02:002009-07-17T16:10:38.794+02:00

by Slavoj Žižek, London Review of BooksWhen an authoritarian regime approaches its final crisis, but before its actual collapse, a mysterious rupture often takes place. All of a sudden, people know the game is up: they simply cease to be afraid. It isn’t just that the regime loses its legitimacy: its exercise of power is now perceived as a panic reaction, a gesture of impotence. Ryszard

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-66454721190351781132009-07-08T21:57:00.000+02:002009-07-08T22:28:40.338+02:00

Is democracy a hit with humans because it mirrors our myopia?by Arundhati Roy, Outlook IndiaWhile we're still arguing about whether there's life after death, can we add another question to the cart? Is there life after democracy? What sort of life will it be? By democracy I don't mean democracy as an ideal or an aspiration. I mean the working model: Western liberal democracy, and its variants,

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-18914646203697715612009-07-06T18:50:00.000+02:002009-07-06T18:55:00.132+02:00

by Lawrence Liang, Prashant Iyengar and Jiti Nichani of the Alternative Law Forum in BangaloreA walk through the lexical jungle of intellectual property reveals a range of strange creatures lurking in various nooks and corners. A patent here, a trademark there and copyrights springing threats at trespassers warning them not to stray into the domain of protected property. On the other side of the

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-1435079872395509062009-07-06T18:44:00.000+02:002009-07-06T18:48:44.171+02:00

by the Midnight Notes Collective (and friends)After five hundred years of existence, capitalists are once again announcing to us that their system is in crisis. They are urging everyone to make sacrifices to save its life. We are told that if we do not make these sacrifices, we together face the prospect of a mutual shipwreck. Such threats should be taken seriously. Alreadyin every part of the

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-10056239887916791182009-06-19T09:26:00.000+02:002009-06-19T14:45:06.867+02:00

Nine Power, The Philosopher's Magazine, 15 June(The full and unedited text of this interview with Badiou is available at Infinite Thought.)Alain Badiou is having a busy day. Having just been interviewed by the BBC for both the radio and the screen, he arrives at his hotel with just enough time to grant us an audience before dashing off to the Institute for Contemporary Arts. Why all this

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-39896622652939221442009-06-19T09:15:00.000+02:002009-06-19T09:20:35.917+02:00

by Peter Hallward, Radical Philosophy, May/June 2009By ‘will of the people’ I mean a deliberate, emancipatory and inclusive process of collective self-determination. Like any kind of will, its exercise is voluntary and autonomous, a matter of practical freedom; like any form of collective action, it involves assembly and organization. Recent examples of the sort of popular will that I have in

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-13120743167270517302009-05-30T17:22:00.000+02:002009-06-19T14:48:08.989+02:00

Click here to read an annotated version of this interview in pdf and here to read a summary.To Resist All Degradations & DivisionsS’bu Zikode interviewed by Richard PithouseTell me something about where you were born and who your family were.I was born in a village called Loskop which is near the town called Estcourt. It is in the Natal Midlands. I was born in 1975. I have a twin sister, her name

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-81196923441907253642009-01-05T15:16:00.009+02:002009-01-05T18:38:24.605+02:00

SaraiPREFACEThe Indian reader who opens this book in 2009 will no doubt think it is a strange thing. How can these stories of nineteenth-century French lockmakers, tailors, cobblers and typesetters be relevant to the information revolution, the reign of immaterial production or the global market?This question, it should be said, was already present for the French reader who opened this book

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-25723940698614572182009-01-05T15:11:00.003+02:002009-01-05T15:16:02.499+02:00

paysanxxiWhat is first at stake is the configuration of the possible. This also means what is first at stake is the distribution of the capacities. The struggle is between opposing ways of understanding the relation between the particular and the universal, the relation between the present and the future. The same goes, you know, for instance when networks of mostly anonymous social actors oppose

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-79068129821308420012009-01-05T08:52:00.001+02:002009-01-05T08:54:38.189+02:00

Under Siege Here on the slopes of hills, facing the dusk and the cannon of timeClose to the gardens of broken shadows,We do what prisoners do,And what the jobless do:We cultivate hope.***A country preparing for dawn. We grow less intelligentFor we closely watch the hour of victory:No night in our night lit up by the shellingOur enemies are watchful and light the light for usIn the darkness

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-56932980878320417392009-01-05T08:42:00.002+02:002009-01-05T08:48:59.969+02:00

Struggle News, December 16 2008An open letter to students by workers in Athens, against the background of the social upheaval following the police shooting of a young boy.A letter to studentsOur age difference and the general estrangement make it difficult for us to discuss with you in the streets; this is why we send you this letter.Most of us have not (yet) been bald or big-bellied. We are part

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-11421590041687011522009-01-03T10:13:00.003+02:002009-01-03T10:20:21.180+02:00

Eurozine, September 2008An interview with Achille MbembeThe faults in Europe's universalism, especially when confronting its colonial history, have nurtured a variety of critical perspectives in the West. Talking to French magazine Esprit, theorist Achille Mbembe says that postcolonial thinking looks so original because it developed in a transnational, eclectic vein from the very start. This

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-48034123068837730992008-11-02T18:57:00.002+02:002008-11-02T19:00:11.920+02:00

Mute Magazine, October 2008By supporting NGOs instead of popular movements, is the left suppressing a radical politics in Haiti and elsewhere? And is it possible to defend a popular movement without deifying its leader? Richard Pithouse reviews Peter Hallward's new book on the containment of popular politics in Haiti.The inequality of class, first universalised into a global Manicheanism in The

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-24216951527492879592008-10-14T09:56:00.001+02:002008-10-14T09:59:51.000+02:00

Text of a speech by S'bu Zikode at the Diakonia Council of Churches Economic Justice Forum - an audio recording of the speech, including the discussion afterwards, is available from Diakonia. Click here to read the report on the speech in the Sowetan.Land and HousingThursday 28 August, 2008I have been asked to speak on the burning issues of land and housing. I only get these invitations because

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-64112688251723538132008-07-25T14:36:00.003+02:002008-07-25T15:57:40.425+02:00

by Mark Butler and David Ntseng, Abahlali baseMjondolo, July 2008People in government, business, and political and civil society organisations routinely talk about 'stakeholders'. They do exercises in stakeholder analysis to inform their 'strategic planning'. Invariably they use the stakeholder language to advertise claims about the inclusivity of their thinking, their processes, and their

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-33269644302848729112008-06-23T15:32:00.009+02:002008-07-25T15:56:40.134+02:00

All through the 1980s and early 90s [U.S. army intelligence officers] recognized that 'the most serious threat to U.S. interests was not secular Marxist-Leninism or organized labour but liberation theology'. - Peter Hallward, Damming the Flood.Politics Beyond the Stateby Brother Filippo Mondini, Abahlali baseMjondoloMichael Neocosmos argues that there is a politics beyond the state and that,

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-77624920070199156442008-06-22T15:53:00.005+02:002008-06-22T16:05:31.584+02:00

Jacques Rancière interviewed by Sudeep Dasgupta in the Dutch journal Krisis. Translated by Dirk Haen and republished on the Jacques Rancière blog. The reflections of the French philosopher Jacques Rancière shift in between literature, film, pedagogy, historiography, proletarian history and philosophy. He came to prominence when he contributed to Althusser’s Lire le capital (1965) and, shortly

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-68342093536383348962008-06-21T15:55:00.008+02:002009-01-05T08:51:32.921+02:00

by Richard Pithouse, The Struggle for the City, 16 June 2008The industrial and mining towns on the Eastern outskirts of Johannesburg are unlovely places. They’re set on flat windswept plains amidst the dumps of sterile sand left over from old mines. In winter the wind bites, the sky is a very pale blue and it seems to be all coal braziers, starved dogs, faded strip malls, gun shops and rusting

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-81370103318859080702008-06-14T11:15:00.005+02:002008-06-14T11:37:56.165+02:00

by Partha Chatterjee, first published in Economic & Political Weekly 19 April 2008, republished in Kafila, 13 June 2008With the changes in India over the past 25 years, there is now a new dynamic logic that ties the operations of “political society” (comprising the peasantry, artisans and petty producers in the informal sector) with the hegemonic role of the bourgeoisie in “civil society”. This

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-80761438724658204562008-06-14T09:15:00.002+02:002008-06-14T09:19:56.262+02:00

by Andile Mngxitama, The Struggle for the City, 12 June 2008The sms’s came fast and furious. As furious as the fiery images we were subjected to by our television and our daily newspapers. The front pages are a festival of beastly pictures of the victims of the negrophobic bloodletting which has gripped South Africa in the past weeks. I dreaded opening a newspaper for days - afraid of being

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-46590554892394288572008-06-08T11:39:00.002+02:002008-06-08T11:43:56.607+02:00

by Silvia Frederici, lecture delivered October 2006, placed online June 2008Precarious work is a central concept in movement discussions of the capitalist reorganization of work and class relations in today’s global economy. Silvia Federici analyzes the potential and limits of this concept as an analytic and organizational tool. She claims reproductive labor is a hidden continent of work and

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-39921405935016769752008-06-05T16:16:00.006+02:002008-06-14T09:14:32.813+02:00

by Michael Neocosmos, Abahlali baseMjondolo, 5 June 2008Reflecting on the causes of the recent xenophobic pogroms in the country, it is striking how most commentators have stressed poverty and deprivation as the underlying causes of the events. Yet it requires little effort to see that economic factors, however real, cannot possibly account for why it was those deemed to be non-South Africans

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-73422761961513985452008-05-31T11:09:00.005+02:002008-06-14T09:12:38.025+02:00

by Sumanta Banerjee. An EPW article republished in SanhatiThe official bibliography on causes of popular discontent in India and ways to tackle it has been expanding at as impressive a rate as discontent itself. Our government can boast of a staggering collection of statistical data, reports of investigations, research papers, recommendations, among other things, that by its sheer size can

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-33007215407737856992008-05-27T10:38:00.003+02:002008-06-05T16:14:59.490+02:00

Wednesday, 21 May 2008Abahlali baseMjondolo Press StatementUnyawo AlunampumuloAbahlali baseMjondolo Statement on the Xenophobic Attacks in JohannesburgThere is only one human race.Our struggle and every real struggle is to put the human being at the centre of society, starting with the worst off.An action can be illegal. A person cannot be illegal. A person is a person where ever they may find

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by Giorgio Agamben, translated by Michael Rocke.European Graduate School1. In 1943, in a small jewish periodical, The Menorah Journal, Hannah Arendt published an article titled "We Refugees." In this brief but important essay, after sketching a polemical portrait of Mr. Cohn, the assimilated Jew who had been 150 percent German, 150 percent Viennese, and 150 percent French but finally realizes

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-43280192382333086812008-05-18T12:25:00.007+02:002008-05-18T12:49:33.320+02:00

by the Sramik Sangram Committee, published in Sanhati 18 May 2008A fugitive criminal is ruling roost in Nandigram, directing a huge armed force of party cadres. A police officer waves and gives a beaming smile to the criminal while passing by in his jeep — a picture familiar in today’s ‘peaceful’ Nandigram. A group of socially established intellectuals were prohibited from proceeding towards

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by Mabogo Percy More We the living shoulder the historical responsibility of ensuring that the deeds and words of the dead should not fade into oblivion unnoticed. Since the dead (ancestors) will always be there, confronting us directly or far off on the horizons of our being, our duty requires that we accept this responsibility with a clear consciousness. The death of Aimé Césaire - the

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by Luka Arsenjuk, Eurozine, 1 March 2007Jacques Rancière opposes a type of politics that makes decisions on the people, for the people, instead of the people; a politics that holds that in the political order, all sections of the community have been assigned their proper place. "Politics [...] is that activity which turns on equality as its principle", and begins when inequality is challenged.

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by Begüm Özden FıratPaper presented at Encuentro II Migratory Politics, Universiteit van Amsterdam, September 2007. A section of A Seventh Man, the book by John Berger to which this paper makes sustained reference, is online at the Abahlali baseMjondolo website.Istanbul in the 1960s. Hundreds of people line up in front of the liaison offices of the German Federal Employment office in Istanbul

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A fragment from Alain Badiou's Les leçons de Jacques Rancière: Savoir et pouvoir après la tempête (2006) translated by Richard Stamp and published on the Jacques Rancière blog on 29 April 2007"I believe that Rancière’s principal transformation of the question of education is to demolish [destituer] the question “Who educates whom?” It is precisely this question that is poorly posed. Since it

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by Meena Kandasamy in Ultra Violet, 14 April 2008ON MARCH 28, Lalpari Devi, a 45-year-old Dalit woman was accused of being a witch by caste-Hindu, feudal villagers in Bihar who mercilessly beat her up, paraded her through the streets, tied her to a palm tree, cut her hair and smeared her face with limestone paste. She was saved from certain death by the timely arrival of the police. Lalpari

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by Grace Kwinjeh in Pambazuka, 17 April 2008I was just sent a copy of this statement by the Feminist Political Education Project [pasted in below] and must admit to being more than a little bewildered and shocked by what is suggested in light of recent events in Zimbabwe, by sisters whom I know very well – who are part of the Feminist Political Education Project. Sisters dare I say, I have worked

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-17402794877224034142008-04-22T18:43:00.006+02:002008-04-22T18:57:16.481+02:00

by Jacques Rancière, translated by Rachel Bowlby & Davide Panagia, Theory & Event, 2001, placed in common, 2008Thesis 1: Politics is not the exercise of power. Politics ought to be defined on its own terms, as a mode of acting put into practice by a specific kind of subject and deriving from a particular form of reason. It is the political relationship that allows one to think the possibility

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by John Berger in Race & Class, 2006How is it I am still alive? I’ll tell you I’m alive because there’s a temporary shortage of death. This is said with a grin, which is on the far side of a longing for normalcy, for an ordinary life.Everywhere one goes in Palestine – even in rural areas – one finds oneself amongst rubble, picking a way through, round and over it. At a checkpoint, around some

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-50268396736290148972008-04-17T11:12:00.005+02:002008-04-17T11:25:05.991+02:00

by Peter Hallward, first published in South Atlantic Quarterly, (104:4) 2005The assassinations of Salvador Allende and Amílcar Cabral in 1973 mark the end of the last truly transformative sequence in world politics, the sequence of national liberation associated with the victories of Mao Tse-tung, Mohandas Gandhi, and Fidel Castro. It may be that this end is itself now coming to an end, through

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-82421098949580041182008-04-07T17:26:00.005+02:002008-04-20T18:51:47.320+02:00

by Hilary Klein in Left Turn, February 2008On December 29 - 31 women from all five Zapatista Caracoles (centers of resistance) gathered in the community of La Garrucha, Chiapas to meet with women who had come from all around the world to hear their stories of struggling, organizing, and participating in the Zapatista litical leaders and members of the autonomous government, health and education

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-29461408167270996492008-04-03T13:37:00.020+02:002008-05-12T21:31:33.505+02:00

by Michael Neocosmos, Interactivist, 30 March 2008Critical approaches to neo-liberalism in Africa have overwhelmingly concentrated on analysing the problems, both theoretical and empirical, of its economic arguments and policies. There are numerous texts and scholarly works criticising SAPs, the ideology of the IFIs, the disastrous effects of neo-liberal economic policies on Africa, and the

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-55752590639360694352008-03-31T12:41:00.038+02:002008-04-07T23:22:50.727+02:00

by Collective Reinventions, first published at the Collective Reinventions site and republished, with a more attractive layout, at LibCom, March 2008The following text is the result of a collaborative effort, and is the fruit of a considerable number of meetings and discussions. It reflects the give and take, even the hesitations, of an ongoing conversation. It should also be noted at the outset

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-73994640552253363992008-03-31T10:36:00.016+02:002008-04-07T18:21:17.264+02:00

by Justine Illiria, Mute Magazine, February 2008This short article was first published in the Harm Reduction Communication newsletter, Summer 2001, but Mute Magazine recently republished it due to "the increasing presence of EU/NATO military forces and NGOs in the area given Kosovo's imminent declaration of independence. It also offers a more candid perspective on immigrant sex work than the

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by Alain Badiou, New Left Review, January 2008 What is the communist hypothesis? In its generic sense, given in its canonic Manifesto, 'communist' means, first, that the logic of class—the fundamental subordination of labour to a dominant class, the arrangement that has persisted since Antiquity—is not inevitable; it can be overcome. The communist hypothesis is that a different collective

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by Saroj Giri, Sanhati, December 2007 Is the war in Iraq essentially an ideological subterfuge to keep the capitalist machinery going or is it the capitalist machinery itself? Does limiting one’s struggle to opposing the US invasion of Iraq, and now maybe Iran, amount to the fight to bring down capitalism in the US or can it sometimes mean concentrating only on the symptom of war and letting the

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For an excellent collection of links to news and analysis on the struggle in Nandigram see http://bengalresistance.blogspot.com.November 2007We read with growing dismay the statement signed by Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn and others advising those opposing the CPI(M)'s pro-capitalist policies in West Bengal not to "split the Left" in the face of American imperialism. We believe that for some of the

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-36110362810152707952008-03-29T16:53:00.007+02:002008-06-08T11:56:26.758+02:00

by Richard Pithouse, Voices of Resistance from Occupied London, October, 2007Since 2004 South African cities have been convulsed by a series of municipal revolts organised from shack settlements. They have most often taken the form of blockading roads with burning barricades and have generally targeted municipal party councillors. Across the country many of the more militant settlements have

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-40223096823965307502008-03-29T16:38:00.016+02:002008-03-31T13:57:49.569+02:00

by Claudio Albertani, Collective Interventions, June 2007Translation of “El Espejo de Mexico,” June 13, 2007: http://www.rebelion.org/noticia.php?id=52119 One year after the outbreak of the teachers’ conflict, Oaxaca is the mirror of Mexico. The right wing transformation of the country has advanced by large leaps, but the rebellion has also progressed and sometimes has found new ways forward.

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-8256293238454831762008-03-29T15:53:00.006+02:002008-03-31T13:57:49.571+02:00

by Emilio Quadrelli, Mute Magazine, May 2007French cities burst back into flames after President Sarkozy’s election on a ‘clean the scum off the streets with a high-pressure hose’ ticket. It won't be the last time, as long as the factors necessitating the mass revolt of November 2005 remain in place, in France and elsewhere. This text, based on Emilio Quadrelli's interviews in the Paris banlieues

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-29911748471769372252008-03-29T15:29:00.004+02:002008-03-31T13:27:21.320+02:00

by Eyal Weizman, Radical Philosophy, March 2006 The Israeli Defence Forces have been heavily influenced by contemporary philosophy, highlighting the fact that there is considerable overlap among theoretical texts deemed essential by military academies and architectural schools.The attack conducted by units of the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) on the city of Nablus in April 2002 was described by

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-8685295602527892932008-03-29T15:05:00.002+02:002008-03-31T13:57:49.572+02:00

by Peter Hallward, London Review of Books, February 2007In the mid-1980s, Jean-Bertrand Aristide was a parish priest working in an impoverished and embattled district of Port-au-Prince. He became the spokesman of a growing popular movement against the series of military regimes that ruled Haiti after the collapse in 1986 of the Duvalier dictatorship. In 1990 he won the country’s first democratic

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-41337279132922447692008-03-29T15:03:00.006+02:002008-04-01T13:20:12.698+02:00

by Alain Badiou An excerpt from The Paris Commune: A Political Declaration on Politics in Polemics, Verso, 2006. To start with, let's note that before the Commune there had been a number of more or less armed popular and workers' movements in France in a dialectic with the question of state power. We can pass over the terrible days of June 1848 when the question of power is thought not to have

hydrarchynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1453261388518945247.post-67309180664610998452008-03-29T14:04:00.009+02:002008-03-31T13:57:49.576+02:00

by Peter Hallward, in Radical Philosophy, February 2004Two hundred years ago this month (January 2004), the French colony of Saint-Domingue on the island of Hispaniola became the independent nation of Haiti. Few transformations in world history have been more momentous, few required more sacrifice or promised more hope. And few have been more thoroughly forgotten by those who would have us

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