It Is Time To Toss The Dice
How Nietzsche’s Philosophy Inspires Anarchist Practice
Catherine Hooijer
Master Thesis of Philosophy University of Amsterdam
Dr. Robin Celikates / prof. dr. Yolande Jansen
Abstract
In a precarious world where almost everyone is affected by discrimination, oppression and insecurity in some way or another, more and more people want to change their situation. However, many of those people are turning to right-wing, conservative ideas or conspiracy theories. Anarchism has until now not been able to come up with an alternative to the current way of living together that attracts people in the same way. In my thesis, I argue that this is partly due to anarchist practices based on what the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche calls ressentiment, and that anarchists should drastically change the fundamentals of those practices if anarchists are to change the world for the better. For the purpose of this thesis I will focus my discussion on two prevalent practices within anarchism, namely identity politics (or more aptly named, privilege politics) and accountability processes. However, this is not to say that only these practices are to blame, nor that they should be completely abandoned. I will argue that anarchists need to radically transform these practices. To go beyond my critique, I will explore a Nietzschean “affirmation of life” as this new ground on which to build. In the process I will also show that this new basis of anarchism will be distinctly feminist in character.
Foreword – Acknowledgements
‘It is time to toss the dice’. This statement is made by one of the characters in the book-series The Wheel of Time written by Robert Jordan. The character in question uses it as a mantra whenever he makes risky gambles or goes into battle. This thesis was a gamble for me from the start, and often it was a battle. Having never extensively read Nietzsche’s works, I took the opportunity of this thesis to explore this fascinating philosophy and using it to develop thoughts on my political interest in anarchist practice. It has been six months of laughter and joy, but also of frustration and suffering. Quite early after starting on this path, I realised it was more dangerous than I could have anticipated: it is so easy to become lost in Nietzsche’s writing, to be sucked into it, even more so because it is sometimes nice to get lost in Nietzsche’s writing.
I want to thank Robin Celikates for giving me the chance to start on this project and pushing me beyond my limits. I also want to thank Yolande Jansen for agreeing to serve as the second reader of my thesis despite having a busy schedule. However, I could not have seen the project through to the end without my friends being around, being both my harshest critics and best resting place. Above all Eleni Kouvelas, my reading partner for Nietzsche’s philosophy. We have cried from laughter and danced through the frustration of reading Nietzsche’s books. I hope that by the end of this she will also have finished her thesis with the same feeling of joy as I do. And I want to dearly thank Sigmund Schilpzand who, from all the way over in Southampton has been able to evoke reflection with a few words, while at the same time providing the music to see it all through.
Now, at the end I feel like I know what it is to affirm life in the Nietzschean sense. At least, I have learned that tossing the dice makes winning or losing not just a random chance; it all depends on the game one is playing – which is something you can decide for yourself. For me, this was a winning toss.
Contents
Contents ... 3
Introduction ... 4
The will to power ... 8
Anarchism ... 10
Chapter One: ‘People Not Profit’ ... 14
1.1 Creating the Subject ... 14
1.2 The Neoliberal Subject ... 16
Chapter Two: ‘Bigger Cages! Longer Chains!’ ... 21
2.1 When Identity Politics Become Privilege Politics ... 21
2.1.1 Essentialising Identity... 22
2.1.2 Claiming Rights Instead of Freedom ... 23
2.1.3 Identity for Ascribing Blame ... 25
2.1.4 Using Safe Spaces for Escape ... 27
2.2. When Accountability Becomes the Justice System ... 29
2.2.1 Restorative Justice ... 29
2.2.2 Punishing the Guilty ... 30
2.2.3 The Evil One ... 31
2.2.4 The Victim ... 32
Chapter Three: ‘No One Is Free Until All Are Free’ ... 34
3.1 Ressentiment and Bad Conscience ... 35
3.1.1 Internalising Suffering ... 36
3.1.2 Punishing and Bad Conscience... 37
3.2 Ressentiment in the Justice System ... 40
3.3 Ressentiment as the ‘peacefulness’ of the State ... 43
Chapter Four: ‘Love Is Its Own Protection’ ... 47
4.1 Affirmation: Life as Becoming ... 47
4.1.1 The Eternal Recurrence ... 49
4.2 The Revaluation of Suffering ... 54
4.3 The Revaluation of Mitleid ... 58
4.4 The Psychology of the Tragic, Dionysus ... 59
4.5 Communities of Friends ... 61
4.6 To Empower ... 62
Conclusion ... 65
Introduction
People all over Europe live in precarious situations; poverty, insecurity, and feelings of non-belonging are apparent almost everywhere. People are discriminated against because of social-economic status, gender, ethnicity, sexuality, ability or some other aspect of one’s life. A growing number of people, however, want this situation to change. At the same time, more and more people seem to be turning towards conservative, right-wing ideas or conspiracy theories in order to try to change this precarity. Blaming refugees for lack of jobs and housing, blaming feminism for not having the romantic relationships one sees on TV, blaming diversity policies for not receiving a promotion at work, all are examples of attempts to reclaim some mythical past in which everything is supposed to have been good. The alternative offered on the other side of the political spectrum, “left” as it is often called, seems unable to attract as many people to their vision of living together. The question that started out this thesis is why this is the case.
At the end of the 20th and beginning of the 21st century, lots of people joined in an effort to change the way society was organised. This is often called the anti-globalisation movement and it had distinct anarchist tendencies, as such organising in an anti-authoritarian, horizontal fashion intermixed with plenty of direct action.1 Anti-globalisation activists aimed at structurally changing society and everything seemed possible. Now, years later, politicians on the far-right of the political spectrum are gaining influence, neo-nazis are openly marching on the streets in several European countries, borders are being closed to migrants, and people’s lives are becoming ever more precarious, whilst thousands are displaced and dispossessed. The anarchist practices that seemed so promising during the anti-globalisation movement are no longer viewed as viable alternatives to organising society. In this thesis, I will explore the idea that these practices are no longer deemed viable because they are possibly based on what the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche calls ressentiment. Whilst reading Nietzsche, it seemed to me that his diagnosis of ressentiment in morality is also accurate for the anarchist practices in Europe today. In this, I follow Saul Newman, Lewis Call and Thomas Conte who have suggested that anarchism is indeed based on ressentiment.2 By investigating this, I hope to not only come up with an answer to the question why
1 Corradi, L. (2013). Black, Red, Pink, and Green: Breaking Boundaries, Building Bridges. In: The Anarchist Turn [J. Blumenfeld, C. Bottici, & S. Critchley, eds.], pp. 125-142. London: Pluto Press.; Newman, S.
(2010). Introduction. In: The Politics of Postanarchism, pp.1-14. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
2 Newman, S. (2000). Anarchism and the Politics of Ressentiment. Theory and Event, 4, 2.; Call,
L.(2001). Towards an Anarchy of Becoming: Postmodern Anarchism in Nietzschean Philosophy. Journal of
Nietzsche Studies, 21, 48.; Conte, T. (1999). Nietzschean Anarchism and the Possibility of Political Culture. New Political Science, 21, 378.
anarchism does not seem to be a viable alternative anymore, but also if and how it can become such an alternative.
To do so, my approach will differ from Newman, Call and Conte. Newman and Call focus mostly on the theoretical problems of anarchism, looking at those problems from a Nietzschean perspective. For instance, Newman argues that anarchism often creates ‘an essential, moral opposition between society and the State’ which is a sign of ressentiment according to Newman.3 Call focuses on the way in which Nietzsche criticises subjectivity and the creation of a Subject. Conte, on the other hand, focuses mainly on to what extend Nietzsche endorses anti-authoritarian and anti-statist ideas. However interesting these topics are, – and I will certainly draw on some of their ideas – I want to approach anarchism and Nietzschean philosophy from a more practical perspective to arrive at a politics that can serve as an alternative way of living together. I will therefore focus on two prevalent practices (or practices based on) identity politics and accountability. I will discuss how identity politics and accountability are now practiced within anarchism, and if or how Nietzschean philosophy can help anarchists to arrive at a better practice.
To answer the question how Nietzschean philosophy can inspire this new anarchist practice, I will first address several other questions. In chapter one I will first explore why anarchists would want to change society as it is now. To answer this question I will draw on the works of Michel Foucault, Wendy Brown, and David Graeber. In the second and third chapter I will consider why the current practices of identity politics and accountability that anarchists engage in in order to change the status quo are not suited to create an alternative way of living together. Coming up with an answer to this question will require a reading of anarchist texts on the topic and Wendy Brown’s States of Injury4, and a diagnosis of what exactly is wrong for which I will use a Nietzschean perspective. The last question I will try to answer, in chapter four, is how Nietzschean philosophy can offer a solution to the problems that I have discerned in the earlier chapters, namely what an anarchist practice should be based on if it wants to change the current way of living together. In the remainder of this introduction, I will explain some of the philosophical choices I have made to answer these questions and what, in my view, anarchism is.
To address the problems sketched above, I have chosen to draw heavily on the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche. His work is a critique and revaluation of Judeo-Christian moral values
3
Newman, Politics of Ressentiment, 6.
4
that still percolate in modern (mainly Western-European) society. Struck by his diagnosis of our situation, I saw a resemblance to the anarchist movement I know in the Netherlands. Nietzsche shows that morality has a history and is not given, natural or teleological, that there is neither an inherently “good” morality, nor a given individual that is separate from its actions.5 Decades later, the philosopher Michel Foucault takes up the genealogical ‘stick’ from Nietzsche in his project of showing how a Subject is created.6 I have chosen to incorporate his work because of his analysis of power and society and the way power develops in contemporary history that is still recognisable today. However, I turn back to Nietzsche for a thorough diagnosis of what is wrong with anarchist practice and how to arrive at an alternative. I do this because Foucault’s concepts of “speaking truth to power” and “care of the self” feel to me as distinctly individualist and I want to formulate an alternative that accounts for living together.
Nietzsche’s Genealogy of Morality elaborates on the ressentiment that Nietzsche has diagnosed the modern Western-European culture with. The ressentiment he shows to be prevalent in many aspects of thinking and acting – in science, philosophy, morality, religion – might still be prevalent today within anarchist practice (and elsewhere). I will therefore, in chapter three, investigate what ressentiment is and if and how it is apparent in identity politics and accountability in anarchist practice. The concept of ressentiment is tied up with Nietzsche’s ideas on the creation of a Subject, Truth, a valuation of life, suffering, pain, compassion, strength and weakness, happiness and friendship. While the Genealogy is quite structured, many of Nietzsche’s other works are (purposefully) elusive. Especially when it concerns the topic of chapter four, the affirmation of life, which draws on the book Thus Spoke Zarathustra, having multiple perspectives on what Nietzsche writes is important. Besides, Nietzsche’s oeuvre is extensive, the different books connected and sometimes (seemingly) contradictory, which would require an extensive reading of all his works (multiple times). 7 Since this is hardly a reasonable requirement for this thesis, I have drawn on multiple interpretations of Nietzsche’s philosophy – also to prevent tunnel-vision. For this
5 I will elaborate on this throughout my thesis, this section is only to situate my choices for certain
philosophies.
6 I will differentiate between the “Subject” that Foucault describes and that Nietzsche criticises, and the
“individual” or person that I will describe in chapter four. This latter idea is another form of subjectivity that is not – as we will see the Subject to be – a unified “I” and a universalized Being. Therefore, I will capitalise the Subject. Since this description of universalised being also applies to some forms of “Truth”, I will also capitalise this term.
7 For this I have used the English translations by the Cambridge Texts in the History of Philosophy
series, with the exception of the Genealogy of Morality for which I have used the translation by Maudemarie Clark and Alan J. Swensen. Please note that in the footnotes, the numbers that are referred to in Nietzsche’s work are not page numbers, but the numbers of the statements he makes.
I have made us of the works of Gilles Deleuze,8 Bernard Reginster,9 Robert Pippin,10 and Henry Staten.11 Below I will give a short outline of these philosphers’ interpretations of Nietzsche so as to give a basis on which to start my own project.
I will use Deleuze and Reginster’s interpretations most extensively, since both cover the topic of ressentiment and the affirmation of life. While Staten and Pippin help to put these two interpretations into perspective. I have chosen to use both the interpretation by Deleuze and Reginster to complement them; as we will see, Deleuze’s interpretation is a more metaphysical interpretation, while Reginster’s interpretation explains Nietzsche in a more practical way which can be more easily translated it to everyday life. On the other hand, both create a theory based on the will to power as the driving force of life.12 This is why I will elaborate on this concept as interpreted by both philosophers below. First, I will explain more about the interpretations by Staten and Pippin.
Staten approaches Nietzsche’s philosophy in a psycho-dialectical way, which means that he focuses primarily on the tone of Nietzsche’s writings to highlight important concepts. Staten also pays considerable attention to points on which Nietzsche (seemingly) contradicts himself, which he places within the ‘economy’ of Nietzsche’s work. An economy, according to Staten, is a relative unity, a whole that needs to be read as such. Nietzsche’s Voice is therefore of great help in interpreting concepts like Mitleid, affirmation and love.13 Pippin, like Staten, focuses on love as a driving power in our lives. In Nietzsche, Psychology, and First Philosophy he focuses on the way in which our conception of morality is based on the Subject as a causa sui. His work is useful for formulating a critique of the Subject and for constructing an alternative to this individualised Subject without stripping them of agency and responsibility for their actions. Pippin avoids a theory on the Will to Power, as does
8 Deleuze, G. (2006). Nietsche & Philosophy. [trans. Hugh Tomlinson]. New York: Columbia University
Press.
9 Reginster, B. (2006). The affirmation of life: Nietzsche on overcoming nihilism. Cambridge: Harvard
University Press.
10
Pippin, R. B. (2010). Nietzsche, Psychology and First Philosophy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
11 Staten, H. (1990). Nietzsche’s Voice. New York: Cornell University Press.
12 Pippin criticises this, especially since it is in both cases based for a large part on the ‘book’ The Will to Power by Walter Kaufmann which is highly controversial according to Pippin and for instance, Souladié.
Souladié (2015), even calls it ‘the fake book’, since it is actually a collection of notes that were never published. It is controversial to base an interpretation on this, because Nietzsche’s style of writing is important for the interpretation of what is important (Pippin, 2008 in his book review of Reginster’s The Affirmation of Life). Besides, the Will to Power places importance on this concept of the will to power as if the book is actually some kind of realisation of ‘what they believe Nietzsche planned as his magum opus, Der Wille zur Macht’ (Pippin, Review The Affirmation of Life, 87), while he never finished it, whether he gave up the project as Pippin argues, or did not have the chance as Reginster says (Reginster, The Affirmation of Life, 103).
13
I will use the German word for ‘pity’ or ‘compassion’ since it expresses best the ressentiment form of empathising when someone is hurt, while reserving the term compassion for the new way of doing so.
Staten. Moreover, neither Staten nor Pippin proposes a systematic theory of the whole of Nietzsche’s work as do Deleuze and Reginster. However, I will elaborate on the systematic theories Deleuze and Reginster for reference. This helps to introduce several important concepts in a coherent manner.
The will to power ‘The will to power
‘What is good? – everything that enhances people’s feeling of power, will to power, power itself.
What is bad? – Everything stemming from weakness.
What is happiness? – The feeling that power is growing, that some resistance has been overcome.’14
Reginster interprets Nietzsche’s philosophy by placing it in the context of Schopenhauer’s work. According to Reginster, Nietzsche’s concept of the will to power is a response to Schopenhauer’s will to live and the latter’s pessimism. According to Nietzsche, Schopenhauer’s philosophy is a philosophy of ressentiment, since the definition of happiness in Schopenhauer is one of the satisfaction of one’s desires: happiness is ‘a final satisfaction of the will, after which no fresh willing would occur, […] an imperishable satisfaction of the will’ or ‘a contentment that cannot again be disturbed.’15
To be happy, to strive for happiness, is therefore to strive for not-being according to Nietzsche because this permanent contentment is only possible in a world-beyond, a world that does not exist. Schopenhauer’s idea of happiness is life-denying since it denies the value of this life in favour of a life of permanent peace. It also denies the value of suffering because suffering is defined as ‘the displeasure caused by the sole frustration of a desire’.16
It is therefore directly opposed to happiness and should somehow be eliminated. Pessimism is then the realisation that permanent contentment is impossible because the character of life is a will to will17: ‘the basis of all willing, however, is need [Bedürftigkeit], lack [Mangel], and hence pain [Schmerz], and by its very nature and origin, it is therefore destined to pain.’18 This is why Schopenhauer creates a morality of compassion, to which Nietzsche is opposed.19 Such a morality makes it impossible according to Nietzsche to experience actual happiness or joy (I
14 Nietzsche, Anti-Christ, 2.
15 Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Representation, I 65 as cited in Reginster, Affirmation of Life,
108.
16 Reginster, Affirmation of Life, 113. 17 Reginster, Affirmation of Life, 122. 18
Reginster, Affirmation of Life, 120.
19
will elaborate on this point in chapter four). Nietzsche’s will to power, according to Reginster, however, assumes that there is no will to ‘live’, since only that which already has life also has will.20 In Reginster’s interpretation of Nietzsche, the will to power is the will to overcome resistance. Therefore, life is one of permanent striving for ‘expansion, incorporation, growth’ which is driven by displeasure.21
In its fundamental form, the will to power is therefore already one of affirmation; it is to will willing, to will resistance be overcome.22 On this basis Reginster gives a very interesting theory on the revaluation of the values of suffering and Mitleid to which I will return in chapter four, where it will be supplemented with Staten and Pippin’s interpretations on suffering and love. Via this path, Reginster comes to an understanding of the affirmation of life.
Deleuze’s book on Nietzsche’s philosophy, albeit a use of Nietzsche to create Deleuze’s own philosophy, helps to understand why it is important to view life as becoming when considering affirmation. His work, though more ontologically disposed than Nietzsche, sees life as ever-changing relations of forces.23 It is based on Nietzsche’s critique on searching for fixed, permanent states and beings. If, for instance, a person is always in a state of becoming, they are always changeable.24 The way these relations are intersecting depends on an ‘open field of encounters in which new relations are formed, new connections are made and new life-experiments can take shape.’25 According to Deleuze, forces can be “active” or “reactive”. Active forces are those that make a person create, go beyond their limits26
, whilst reactive forces focus a person to conserve what is, prevent change, create stability and strive for eternal peace.27 The way these forces are related to each other is determined by the will to power. Determining here means that because of the quality prevailing in the will to power, forces that have an affinity with that quality become constitutive for the relation.28 The will to power can be affirming or negating depending on function, time and place. For Deleuze, there is an affinity between active forces and the affirming quality of the will to power, and
20
Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, II On Self-Overcoming: ‘Only where life is, is there also will; but not will to life, instead – thus I teach you – will to power!’.
21 Reginster, Affirmation of Life, 126.
22 Pippin criticises this ‘almost intentional’ outlook on the will to power, as if one is ‘trying to create
suffering for yourself’ (Pippin, Nietzsche, Psychology, First Philosophy, 117 footnote 11). I agree with Pippin on this, but I do think that this conception of the will to power as overcoming resistance is helpful in the notion of an affirmation of life, without this intentionality.
23 Deleuze, Nietzsche and Philosophy, 6. 24 Deleuze, Nietzsche and Philosophy, 188. 25
Pisters, P. (2009). Micropolitiek. In: Deleuze Compendium [E. Romein, M. Schuilenburg, & S. van Tuien, eds.], pp.224-236. Amsterdam: Boom., 235.
26 Deleuze, Nietzsche and Philosophy, 59. 27
Deleuze, Nietzsche and Philosophy, 100.
28
there is an affinity between reactive forces and the negating quality of the will to power. A relation of forces can be a becoming-active or becoming-reactive depending on which forces are in play and which quality the will to power has.29 The relationships which forces form are at the same time ‘random’ and necessary; it is all in the toss of the dice.30
The number of possibilities for forming these relations are in principle endless and not determined by a causa sui that has intentions and tries to produce a certain outcome. If one wants to affirm life, one needs to be able to play. This means to affirm all possibilities for acting before the act because your intention only becomes visible in your action.31 It is thus via another route than Reginster that Deleuze comes to the affirmation of life: by an emphasis on the creation of a Subject on the one hand and a sovereign individual on the other, be instead of a revaluation of compassion and suffering. As such, Pippin’s interpretation shares this with Deleuze. As Pippin says: ‘it is “in” the deed. […] Once we “launch” a deed, it takes on a life of its own in the world […] taken up by others in ways we could not have anticipated, perhaps manifesting aspects of our own character that we would not have anticipated. The image further deflates any notion of a strict individual ownership of the deed’32
Anarchism
The remainder of this introduction concerns a definition of anarchism and its subsidiary concepts. The definition of anarchism I will use can be called applied anarchism33: ‘anarchism is a socio-political theory [and practice] which opposes all systems of domination and oppression.’34
This means a fundamental change in the way people currently live together and exist in the world. It is also necessary to have an intersectional practice to oppose all systems of domination and oppression. Intersectionality is to take into account the ways in which systems of domination are connected and can intersect in the lived experience of people.35 It is as such that anarchist practice requires feminist, black, queer- and trans-, and other liberating movements.36 This definition of anarchism shifts the focus away from
29
Deleuze, Nietzsche and Philosophy, 63.
30 Deleuze, Nietzsche and Philosophy, 25-27.
31 Pippin, Nietzsche, Psychology, First Philosophy, 75. 32
Pippin, Nietzsche, Psychology, First Philosophy,75-76.
33Fiala, A. (spring 2018). Anarchism, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. [E. N. Zalta ed.]. 34Nocella et al., 2015, p.7 as cited by Fiala, Anarchism..
35 Crenshaw, K. (1989). Demarginalizing the Intersections of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of
Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics. The University of Chicago Legal Forum,
140,pp. 139-167. Crenshaw, K. (1990). Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence
Against Women of Color. Stanford Law Review,43, 1241-1299.
36 Arruzza shows how within anarchism, the feminist movement was not always accepted as necessary
because it was supposed to be inherent to the definition of anarchism struggling against all forms of domination. However, this is a way in which identity politics is actually important as we will see below. Arruzza, C. (2013).
primarily a politics aimed at overthrowing state-power, as is the aim of what Newman calls ‘classical anarchism’37
, to addressing domination and power-relations as a more decentralised phenomenon. Michel Foucault described how this decentralised power functions. I will elaborate on this in chapter one.
The aim of anarchists is to be free of domination and oppression. Foucault would only speak of “domination” when there is no possibility to act or change, when there is no dynamic in the power relations.38 In Nietzsche’s philosophy domination can be defined in multiple ways, but both Deleuze and Reginster agree that domination is seen as being natural to life. 39 In Deleuze’s interpretation we can speak of dominance when one force prevails over another to direct the relation they are in.40 In Reginster’s interpretation, domination is the consequence of overcoming resistance.41 Thus, in Nietzsche, dominance is not seen as something that hinders development, whilst in Foucault’s definition it does. However, Nietzsche opposes the lack of dynamic in a similar way to Foucault: to be un-free is to be limited in one’s possibilities for acting.42 It is this lack of dynamic, lack of change and becoming that is what it means to be un-free. I will call this domination and oppression. As will be argued in chapter one, I think the neoliberal governmentality that is prevalent in current Western-European countries is oppressive and dominant. To be able to continue on this line of argument, I will now first consider what it means to be free.
To be free, according to the above line of argument, is to be able to decide for yourself who and what you want to be, it is a form of self-realisation or autonomy.43 Freedom can be defined as follows: ‘a subject, or agent, is free from certain constraints, or preventing conditions, to do or become certain things.’44
In this definition, one could also be considered free within a neoliberal governmentality which stimulates one to pursue one’s goals. However, these goals can only be set within the boundaries of “normality”, which are, as we will see, quite limiting. What is necessary then, is another sense of freedom. As Pippin argues, Nietzsche uses a concept of ‘erreichte Freiheit’, achieved freedom, which is a ‘complete and hierarchical unity among states of one’s soul, memories, desires, aversions,
Of What is Anarcha-Feminism the Name? In: The Anarchist Turn [J. Blumenfeld, C. Bottici & S. Chritchley, eds.], pp.111-124. London: Pluto Press.
37 Newman, S. (2010). Postanarchism and power. Journal of Power, 3, 259-274.
38Foucault, Ethics: subjectivity and truth, p. 283 as quoted in Newman, Postanarchism and Power, 267. 39 Reginster gives multiple interpretations in chapter three of The Affirmation of Life.
40 Deleuze, Nietzsche and Philosophy, 86. 41
Reginster, Affirmation of Life, 138-139.
42 Deleuze, Nietzsche and Philosophy, 66.
43 Carter, I. (2016). Positive and Negative Liberty. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer
edition 2018). [E. N. Zalta, ed.].
44
and so forth.’45
I think an important addition is, however, that freedom is a practice.46 It is never fully achieved as a finished state.47 Freedom is therefore also tied up with agency, with what it means to be an individual or a subject. I will extensively consider this topic in chapter one and four, since what it means to be a ‘Subject’ differs quite significantly from what it means to be an ‘individual’. In doing so, I hope to show that ‘it requires that we surrender the conservative pleasures of familiarity, insularity, and routine for investment in a more open horizon of possibility and sustained willingness to risk identity, both collective and individual.’48
In other words, that freedom is a dynamic process as opposed to immobile domination. As I will argue, achieving this freedom cannot be brought about in isolation. As Bakunin wrote: ‘For the individual to be free means to be recognized, considered, and treated as such by another individual, and by all individuals that surround him.’49
So the way of organising in anarchism should reflect this. As Bottici writes, anarchists cannot isolate themselves from the rest of the world, neither individually nor collectively.50 In this lies the basis for a practice that is distinctly feminist in character, since it draws on conceptions of care for each other instead of individualised strength, on mutual aid instead of destroying state-power.51 All this brings me to my first question: why is the current way of living in need of change? I will answer this question in chapter one.
For the purpose of this thesis, I have chosen to single out two anarchist practices to consider with this Nietzschean perspective: identity politics and accountability. Both are prevalent in anarchist practice and as topics of discussion. Both practices aim to change the way people currently live together in Western-Europe, whilst embodying in themselves an alternative mode of living. Identity politics is foremost a process that empowers people to work towards their freedom, do demand their place in society.52 Spivak defined identity politics as strategic essentialism. That is to say: to organise within a group on the basis of shared experiences, politically or culturally, sexually or ethnically.53 This can, and often does, happen by organising around ‘safe spaces’, where people can formulate their ideas and
45 Pippin, Nietzsche, Psychology, First Philosophy,109. 46 Brown, States of Injury, 63.
47
Brown, States of Injury 23-27.
48 Brown, States of Injury 25.
49Bakunin quoted in Bottici, C. (2013). Black and Red: The Freedom of Equals. In: The Anarchist Turn,
pp.9-34 [ J. Blumenfeld, C. Bottici & S. Chritchley, eds.]. London: Pluto Press, 15.
50Bottici Black and Red, 18-19. 51
Verter, M. C. (2013). Undoing patriarchy, subverting politics: anarchism as a practice of care. The
Anarchist Turn, pp.101-110. [J. Blumenfeld, C. Bottici, & S. Critchley, eds.]. London: Pluto Press. 52 Crenshaw Mapping the Margins.
53
Spivak, G. C. (1990). The Post-Colonial Critic: Interviews, Strategies, Dialogues. [S. Harasym, ed.]. New York: Routledge, 45.
discuss those ideas with people who share their experiences on the subject.54 As Crenshaw states: ‘for all those groups, identity-based politics has been a source of strength, community, and intellectual development.’55
Organising within a safe space makes discussions about strategy, ideology and tactics easier because they are not obfuscated by racist or sexist comments, the role of people of colour, or of people with a disability in militant actions, nor by the repeated use of wrong pronouns.56 However, in current-day anarchist practice, identity politics can, inadvertently or otherwise, turn out to become ‘privilege politics’, thereby becoming counterproductive in the struggle for freedom, as I will show in chapter two and three. Important to note is that my critique of identity politics will be aimed mostly at the privilege politics identity politics can (and has) become because I do value the way identity politics can contribute to the struggle for freedom by pointing out the dominating and oppressive practices in daily life.
Accountability processes are processes that take place when someone within a community has been harmed. Most often, these processes are put into practice in case of sexual assault, abuse or rape. But in principle they are there to ‘address the harm done directly without relying on the state’57 and as such can be extended to other areas of harm. I think accountability processes are an important tool, a promising alternative to state-justice, but a process has to be created that is able to deals with the complexities of social relations. I will argue in chapter two and three that, as of yet, this is not the case within anarchism.
54 Gelderloos, P. (2010), ‘Lines in the Sand’. 55 Crenshaw, Mapping the Margins, 1242.
56It takes up a lot of energy to continuously having to point people to the fact that they are mis-gendering
you because not everyone identifies as “he” or “she” but prefer to be referred to as “they”, that not all people of colour are criminals, not all muslims are terrorists, and that both people of colour and women can decide for themselves what they can and cannot do. Because I do value the way in which identity politics helps to become more aware of the oppressions in daily life, I want to connect it to a practical implication for my thesis: the use of pronouns. I will refer to individuals and persons as “they” as to not assume that everyone identifies within one of the two binary gender-categories. I will also use this pronoun to refer to Subjects, as they are still people not only objects.
57
CrimethInc. (w.y.). Accounting for Ourselves: Breaking the Impasse Around Assault and Abuse in Anarchist Scenes.
Chapter One: ‘People Not Profit’
As we have seen in the introduction, anarchism aims to change the way people now live together in Europe, but it is still unclear why one should want to change this. In other words, why is the current way of living together in need of change? This question is the one I take up in this chapter, while also touching on the question who or what the person is that wants to be free. Since anarchism wants to change all systems of oppression and domination, the focus of anarchist practice is, as we have seen, on power as a decentralised phenomenon. Michel Foucault analysed this power and the way it influences humans’ living together. That is why I will first turn to Foucault’s analysis of power and the development of neoliberal governmentality. To situate Foucault’s analysis in the current debate, I will draw on the works of David Graeber58 and Wendy Brown59.
1.1 Creating the Subject
The first important point to note is that Foucault is influenced by Nietzsche’s philosophy and incorporated elements of it into his own work. Like Nietzsche, Foucault is concerned to show that certain aspects of life are assumed to be quite stable, are in fact created by history. Nietzsche shows that morality – what is deemed to be “right” or “wrong” – is ‘a complex social institution that frames and shapes human subjects and human agency.’60
Foucault continues a genealogy of the subject, which he takes up from Nietzsche.61 The point both Nietzsche and Foucault make here is that there is no ‘unbiased subject’62
and no ‘universal form of the subject to be found everywhere’.63
Subjectivity is produced by power and morality. For Nietzsche the creation of this “Subject” is done in a process of “active” ressentiment because it is ultimately created by a distinction (co-)created by philosophy between the experienced world, which is illusionary and a ‘true world’ that is the cause of what is done and experienced.64 Philosophers have been devoted to investigate and discover
58
Graeber, D. (2015). The Utopia of Rules: On Technology, Stupidity, and the Secret Joys of
Bureaucracy. New York: Melville House.
59 Brown, W. (2015). Undoing the Demos. Brooklyn: Zone Books.
60 Saar, M. (2008). Understanding Genealogy: History, Power, and the Self. Journal of the Philosophy of History, 2, 295-314, 301.
61 Ansell-Pearson, K. (2015). Questions of the Subject in Nietzsche and Foucault: A Reading of Dawn.
In: Nietzsche Today, vol. 5 Nietzsche and the Problem of Subjectivity. [J. Constâncio, M. João Mayer Branco, & B. Ryan, eds.], pp.411-435. Berlin: De Gruyter.
62 Pippin, Nietzsche, Psychology, First Philosophy, 71. 63
Rosenberg, A. & Milchman, A. (2018). Nietzsche and Foucault: Modalities of Appropriating the World for an Art of Living. In: Foucault and Nietzsche: A Critical Encounter. [A. Rosenberg & J. Westfall, eds.], pp. 147 – 192]. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 168.
64
See for instance Nietzsche, Human, All too Human; Nietzsche, Genealogy of Morality; Nietzsche,
this “true world” – to approach Truth.65
Philosophers search for the Subject in the true world since it is thought that consciousness, intentions and free will – ‘what lies “behind” our basic commitments’66
– can be found there. The Subject is thereby posited as a causa sui, the origin of what is done in the world that can be separated from the acts.67 This distinction is made by creating a conscience as the cause for acting: their intentions, which are the cause of action; intentions, qua cause, can be located in consciousness.68
Foucault’s analysis helps us understand how this process of creating a Subject works by giving a ‘history of the microphysics of power’.69
Power, according to Foucault, is productive, meaning that it both uses and creates knowledge to produce a Subject that can be then disciplined and controlled.70 The subject is both created as an object of knowledge and a knowing Subject that gathers knowledge on itself and others. This is done on two levels: the individual level and the collective, population level. At the level of the individual, knowledge is gathered by Subjects on themselves for the purpose of disciplinary techniques to make Subjects more useful.71 At the level of the population, knowledge is gathered by Subjects on the whole population (for instance statistic data), to regulate and control the population and to protect it from internal dangers.72 The power that is exerted on Subjects on this second level is what Foucault calls biopolitical power.73 Power and knowledge are here inseparable because ‘power cannot be exercised unless a certain economy of discourses of truth functions in it, on the basis of, and thanks to that power.’74
The Subject created through these knowledge-gathering and power-exerting techniques, learns to tell the “truth” about themselves.75 This is what also happens in identity politics according to Brown: people tell the truth about themselves and posit this as a universal truth about people with that identity, laying claim to both the truth and to morality.76
65 Pippin, Nietzsche, Psychology, First Philosophy,14 in this search, truth and morality are knit together,
since these same philosophers who look for Truth also search to ground morality in an objective truth: only those that are true can be good, and only what is true is worth pursuing in life.
66 Pippin, Nietzsche, Psychology, First Philosophy,43, 72. 67 Pippin, Nietzsche, Psychology, First Philosophy,68-70. 68
Nietzsche, TI, Four Great Errors, 3.
69 Ansell-Pearson, Questions of the Subject, 414.
70 Foucault, M., (1978). The History of Sexuality, Volume I: An Introduction [translation: Robert Hurley,
1978]. New York: Pantheon Books, 135-150.
71 Foucault, M. (1995). Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. [translation: Alan Sheridan,
1977]. New York: Vintage Books, 170.
72 Foucault, M., (2003). Society Must be Defended: Lectures at the Collège de France 1975-1976. [M.
Bertani and A. Fontana, eds.]. New York: Picador, 249.
73 Foucault, History of Sexuality, 144. 74 Foucault, Society Must be Defended, 24. 75
Brown, States of Injury, 42
76
Both disciplinary and biopolitical power create the Subject. Disciplinary power is exerted by techniques of surveying, creating a dossier, educating and training and regulating behaviour at the individual level.77 Biopolitical power adds to this by calculating population averages, deviations, predicting events and creating dividing lines between “normal” and “abnormal”.78
Together, these techniques shape a governmentality that aims to normalise the Subject, to make them conform to certain norms that are set by society: ‘the individual, with his identity and characteristics, is the product of a relation of power exercised over bodies, multiplicities, movements, desires, forces.’79
Nietzsche shows us that this creation of the Subject is not a necessary development but rather inspired by ressentiment, Foucault, on the other hand, shows how this Subject functions within our current society.
1.2 The Neoliberal Subject
The various techniques of power together form an “art of governing”, a governmentality.80 Characteristically, governmentality is independent from the ideology that makes use of it: ‘the exercises of power consist in guiding the possibility of conduct and putting in order the possible outcome.’81
According to Foucault the governmentality that shapes one’s life is a neoliberal governmentality, and according to Wendy Brown and the analysis of Graeber this is still accurate. These analyses by Brown and Graeber are necessary since Foucault ‘did not anticipate the ways that the sciences of economics, business, and politics would be merged through rational choice, formal modelling, and above all, the language of administrative government.’82
The power techniques in this neoliberal governmentality not only aim at more obedience, but at making people and the population as a whole behave more “rational” – i.e. more economical – choice.83 Because the social aspect of society in neoliberalism is completely regulated by “market” principles, even when enforced by state-actors, the principle of ‘equality in inequality’ is created.84
This equality in inequality means that people are equal in the risk that they can fall on harder times: there is inequality for everyone. The market is based on the principle of competition, in which the creation of social equality is
77
Foucault, Discipline and Punish, 136-137.
78 Foucault, History of Sexuality, 144; Foucault, Society Must be Defended, 249.
79 Foucault, M. (1988). Power/Knowledge. [C. Gordon, ed.]. New York: Penguin Random House, 74. 80 Foucault, M. (2007). Security, Territory, Population – Lectures at the Collège de France 1977-1978
[M. Senellart, F. Ewald, & A. Fontana; translation Graham Burchell, eds.]. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 97, 104.
81
Foucault, M., (1982). The Subject and Power. In: Critical Inquiry, 8, 777-795, 788-789.
82 Brown Undoing the Demos, 77. 83 Foucault, Subject and Power, 788. 84
Foucault, M. (2008). The Birth of Biopolitics: Lectures at the Collège de France 1978-1979. [M. Sennelart, ed.]. New York: Palgrave Macillan, 167.
deemed “anti-economic”. Freedom is then seen as not having obstacles to prevent one from reaching one’s goal. Risks are privatised as much as possible and one becomes the entrepreneur of one’s own life, the Subject becomes a homo oeconomicus.85 A rational choice is thus one that generates as much profit as possible.86 Brown adds: ‘Today, homo oeconomicus maintains aspect of that entrepreneurialism, but has been significantly reshaped as financialized human capital: its project is to self-invest in ways that enhance its value or to attract investors through constant attention to its actual or figurative credit rating, and to do this across every sphere of its existence.’87
The Subject is made completely responsible for their own situation and actions.88 While it is not bad that people are valued as having agency, the sense of freedom in neoliberal governmentality is lacking and the idea of equality in inequality is, as we will see, only theoretically interesting because of the way in which Subjects are created.
As Graeber argues this equality in inequality principle will not hold in our society. In the bureaucratic world some people are more adept at ‘navigating the world of paperwork’ than others, for instance because their parents are richer and because of having had a better education to learn to understand this bureaucratic world.89 This system helps to keep those who are already faring better to keep doing so while not opening up the opportunity for those who are doing less well: one needs money to get an education, but this money first has to come from somewhere which can not only be done by just working harder.
However, since this dynamic is not taken into account when determining whether one makes rational choices, this system can become increasingly oppressive. As soon as one does not follow the norm of making oneself into an entrepreneurial self, one does not ‘assess the world in a non-delusional fashion’90, in other words: one is crazy and needs treatment – normalised – because if everyone were to do this, it would threaten the neoliberal governmentality. The disciplinary and biopolitical techniques used on the neoliberal Subject are often forms of “soft power”, like legal rights, bureaucratic rules, privileges etc.91
But the techniques used can become increasingly oppressive when one seems resistant to change – this is often deemed a personal failing, since one is responsible for oneself, not taking into account the above described dynamic of equality in inequality. The normalising practices are
85 Foucault Birth of Biopolitics, 147, 226, 249. 86Graeber, Utopia of Rules, 135.
87
Bown Undoing the Demos, 32-33.
88 Foucault, Birth of Biopolitics, 120. 89Graeber, Utopia of Rules, 23. 90
Graeber, Utopia of Rules, 38.
91
‘felt most cruelly by the poor, who are constantly monitored by an intrusive army of moralistic box-tickers assessing their child-rearing skills, inspecting their food cabinets to see if they are really cohabiting with their partners, determining whether they have been trying hard enough to find a job, or whether their medical conditions are really sufficiently severe to disqualify them from physical labor.’92
These bureaucratic systems and normalising practices are always, according to Graeber, ‘backed up by the threat of force.’93 This does not necessarily mean an increase in physical violence, but can include taking away rights and privileges, forced treatment, or, ultimately, imprisonment. These practices of normalisation, which Foucault describes, fit in with Nietzsche’s diagnosis of ressentiment: it is an attempt at ‘a collectivity-building project that aims at disciplining bodies and selves and integrating them into a uniform whole’.94
This might seem counter-intuitive, since it would fit in nicely with Nietzschean ideas of ‘strength’ and ‘weakness’ and the naturalness of the strong coming out on top. However, as Ansell-Pearson argues, it is precisely the homogenising consequence towards which biopolitical and disciplinary techniques aim that is ressentiment. We will see in chapter three exactly how this works, but it is for now enough to state that part of why the current way of living together is in need of change, is that it is based on ressentiment.
The question is whether identity politics can change this way of living together based on a neoliberal governmentality. This question is pressing for two reasons. First, certain political identities, such as working-class, woman, black, queer, are depoliticised within this neoliberal framework, and identity politics is , broadly speaking, an attempt to (re-)politicise them. Second, the structural oppressions surrounding these identities are not taken into account when deciding if it was the natural working of the world that someone has fallen onto hardship. However, as we will see in chapter two, identity politics often focus on gaining rights, which is a way of gaining recognition within the neoliberal framework. As such, as Brown writes: political identity is ‘essentialized into private interest’.95
This is because freedom within neoliberalism is seen as the existence of individual rights and the lack of obstacles to pursue goals, in combination with a Subject that is completely self-reliant and a causa sui. People’s hardship is individualised because the structural oppression is not taken into account.96 As such, the neoliberal Subject is ‘vulnerable to ressentiment’ according to
92
Graeber, Utopia of Rules, 41.
93Graeber, Utopia of Rules, 32.
94Ure 2006, as cited by Ansell-Pearson, Questions of the Subject, 424. 95
Brown, States of Injury, 59.
96
Brown.97 This goes for all neoliberal Subjects, since they fall back on the initial distinction between a “true world” and a “illusionary world”, but identity politics run an especially high risk because often a ‘sovereign and unified “I” that is disenfranchised by an exclusive “we”’ is created'.98 In doing so, people both tell the ‘hidden truth’ about their group identity and thereby lay claim on what is good: that which is opposite to oppression. But ‘the irony [is] that rights sought by a politically defined group are conferred upon depoliticized individuals; at the moment a particular “we” succeeds in obtaining rights, it loses its we-ness and dissolves into individuals’.99
I will elaborate on this depoliticised character of the neoliberal Subject more in chapter two where I will consider the way in which anarchist identity politics takes shape and whether it can escape this characteristic.
This chapter started with the question why anarchists would want to change the current way of living together. I can answer to this question it is because living a neoliberal governmentality – which creates Subjects as entrepreneurs who are utterly responsible for their own well-being – is ultimately based on a morality of ressentiment. It puts profit over people. Everyone who does not conform to this ideal can be normalised under the threat of force to maintain the well-being of society as a whole. This neoliberal governmentality and its power techniques function on the assumption that the Subject is a causa sui with a free will, intentionality and responsibility. This, thereby, depoliticises their hardship as something that is their own responsibility. In turn, this limits the Subject’s freedom: their possibilities for acting are decided by the neoliberal governmentality along the lines of economical rationality. However, procuring rights might not be enough to liberate this Subject – i.e. to open up more possibilities for action – since rights define what it is to be a Subject, with which comes a set of norms and normalising practices. As such, Foucault’s analysis that is focused on the productive aspects of power falls short. According to Foucault one is still free within this neoliberal governmentality because there is opportunity for resistance. However, he underestimates, I think, how thoroughly the morality of ressentiment influences and limits the possibilities for acting. When the foundation of the resistance is still based on this ressentiment, on the same ideas of the Subject, rights and “Truth”, those attempts can easily be neutralised and incorporated within the neoliberal governmentality without providing actual freedom. It is thus necessary to evaluate whether anarchist practices are also based on
97 Brown, States of Injury, 67. 98
Brown, States of Injury, 61.
99
these ideas as to consider the question why anarchism does not seem to be a viable alternative for living together.
Chapter Two: ‘Bigger Cages! Longer Chains!’
The situation that anarchism tries to change, the neoliberal governmentality described in chapter one, is based on what Nietzsche calls ressentiment, since it functions on the basis of a distinction between a “true world” and an “illusionary world”. Besides, neoliberal governmentality tries to fully conform people to a universalised morality of the economic. Brown suggests that people who organise their politics based on identity are even more susceptible to ressentiment. So in this chapter I will discuss identity politics and accountability as it is practiced in anarchist politics. As such it will form the basis for an answer to the question why these practices exemplify (following Nietzsche) ressentiment. 2.1 When Identity Politics Become Privilege Politics
Identity politics is, as Spivak states, strategic essentialism. As such, it creates the, sometime very necessary, position of the “Other” as opposed to the Self to clarify what is going on in an oppressive power-relation. In many cases the self is then constructed as Other because they are on the receiving end of the relation. This is called ‘alterity’.100
An example of how this operates can be found in the work of Frantz Fanon, where he shows black people as radically other than white people in the context of colonialism.101 Alterity helps to show what is going on in these oppressive power relations: people are deemed as less valuable, as having fewer rights as humans based on their identity as “black”, “woman”, “queer” or all of the above. It can help to show that sometimes, people are not seen as people or even Subjects – however problematic that notion may be in itself – but as objects. Silvia Federici gives an example of this in her book Caliban and the Witch102, where she responds to Foucault’s claim that power is productive. She argues that power-relations only create Subjects who are acknowledged as such within governmentality.103 For those who do not fall within this category, for instance women (as Federici argues) or black people (as K. Aaron argues), power-relations are more repressive than productive.104 This means that the power-relations are not dynamic, resulting in an absence of freedom. Aarons argues that this is still the case for black people in the United States; the slave-relation is still in place: ‘the slave-relation, Patterson argued, is rather defined by a threefold condition: a) general dishonourment (or
100 Appiah, K. A. (1991). Is the Post- in Postmodernism the Post- in Postcolonial? Critical Inquiry, 17,
336-357, 354.
101 See The Wretched of the Earth and Black Skin, White Masks. 102
Federici, S. (2004). Caliban and the Witch. Brooklyn, NY, USA: Autonomedia.
103 Federici, Caliban and the Witch, 15-16.
104 Aarons, K., (2016). No Selves to Abolish: Afropessimism, Anti-Politics and the End of the World.
Retrieved from: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/k-aarons-no-selves-to-abolish-afropessimism-anti-politics-and-the-end-of-the-world.
social death), b) natural alienation (i.e. the systematic rupture of familial and genealogical continuities), c) gratuitous or limitless violence.’105 Therefore, it can be really important to organise politically on the basis of identity.
2.1.1 Essentialising Identity
However, there are several problems with organising politically around identity in such a way. Crenshaw briefly highlights one: ‘it frequently conflates or ignores intragroup differences. […] ignoring differences within groups contributes to tension among groups’106
thereby making it harder to organise intersectionally, which is, as I argued in the introduction, important. This is part of seeing the self as a ‘unified “I”’, as something with an essential identity. Essentialism means there are certain characteristic that are a precondition of some identity.107 For instance, before one is a woman one must have a womb, ovaries, breasts. When one organises politically around identity, it is often the assumption that this identity can be generalised to groups of people, thereby smoothing over the differences between people who have one or several characteristics in common108: ‘the idea that there exists some detectible and objective core-quality of particular groups of people that is inherent, eternal, and unalterable.'109 In this way essentialism can become normalising: it pushes someone into a role that is associated with that identity and dressing, talking, and acting accordingly.110 The consequence of not conforming to these expectations can lead to being laughed at, stigmatised, or even excluded and denied a part of your identity. As such, creating an essential idea of what it is to be “gay”, “queer”, “woman”, and even “disabled” or “black” runs the risk of reproducing the same normalising power-practices that anarchist practice would oppose. Not only do these practices normalise certain individuals, however, it also reinforces the idea that structurally oppressed groups of people are different, “Other”, or victims. However necessary it may initially be to define yourself as the Other to gain recognition for your situation, to be seen as a person in the first place, one has to be careful to not completely identify with this identity as “victim”. Below I will argue that such an identity can become passivating. Examples of this happening are provided by multiple anarchist texts,
105 Aarons, No Selves to Abolish, 4. 106 Crenshaw, Mapping the Margins, 1242. 107 Gelderloos, Lines in the Sand, 8.
108 Crenshaw, Mapping the Margins; Spivak, The Post-Colonial Critic. 109
Jarach, L. (2004), Essentialism and the Problem of Identity Politics, 3.
like Who is Oakland111, Ain’t no PC gonna fix it baby112, Against Innocence113, A Critique of Ally Politics114, and No Selves to Abolish115. Those show that agency is taken away because people are seen as victims. If one completely identifies as the victim of oppression, they would lose their ‘political significance of difference’ as soon as one stops being oppressed. One would lose an important part of their identity. The queer collective BASH BACK! even claims that identity politics is accordingly ‘rooted in an ideology of victimisation’116 I would argue that it is not a feature of identity politics per se but of what I will call ‘privilege politics’.
2.1.2 Claiming Rights Instead of Freedom
Within the neoliberal framework where freedom is seen as having rights, political struggle around identity becomes what Aaron labels ‘privilege’ politics.117
I will refer to privilege politics for the rest of this discussion because it makes possible the important distinction between the sometimes necessary identity politics and its counterproductive expression in privilege politics. Within privilege politics, identity becomes “property” or “capital” which can be employed– within the boundaries of the neoliberal governmentality – to lobby for or demand rights.118 While this might initially help to gain the status of a Subject, it makes one dependent on the ‘benevolence’ of those in power.119 Besides, it will not structurally change the radical exclusion of people deemed unworthy; ‘Rights that empower those in one social location or strata may disempower those in another.’120
An example of this is given by Arruzzi, when discussing the way in which second-wave feminism influenced anarchism.121 Due to the focus on the Subject, the Subject of the “woman” is created as opposed to the “man”, but at the same time excluding trans- and non-binary people from having the same rights.122 This is what Foucault calls Racism123: dividing up groups of people
111 Croatoan. (2012). Who is Oakland: Anti-Oppression Activism, the Politics of Safety, and State
Co-Optation. Escalating Identity.
112 CrimethInc. (2014). Ain’t no PC gonna fix it baby.
113 Wang, J. (2012). Against Innocence – Race, Gender, and the Politics of Safety. LIES: A Journal of Material Feminism, 1.
114
M. (2015). A Critique of Ally Politics. Exerpt from: Taking Sides: Revolutionary Solidarity and the
Poverty of Liberalism. Chico: AK Press. 115 Aarons, No Selves to Abolish. 116
Eanelli, T. (2007-2011). Bash Back! Is Dead; Bash Back Forever!, 12.
117 Aaron, No Selves to Abolish, 3.
118 Heckert, J. (2002). Maintaining the Borders: identity & politics, 5. 119
Aaron, No Selves to Abolish, 3.
120 Brown, States of Injury, 98. 121 Arruzzi, Anarcha-Feminism, 119. 122
An extreme example of this that Arruzzi does not mention, is the case of trans-exclusionary radical feminists, who argue that transwomen cannot participate in feminist struggle, since they do not have the
on the basis of the evaluation whether they are worth the investment.124 Concretely, it concerns dilemmas such as: is it worth giving an alcoholic a new liver to keep them alive or are they not worth the investment?
Another consequence of what the granting of rights can be is that some persons can ‘become “junior partners” of White civil society.’125
This means they can be incorporated or allied with the society that oppresses them as a group.126 The problem is that this acceptance by society happens on the basis of “innocence”: only when one is innocent can one be accepted; their oppression recognised as unfair. By the acceptance of some individuals their oppression is acknowledged as unfair due to their “innocence”, but the structural oppression of the group is not (necessarily) addressed. An example: the friendly leader of the group advocating non-violent protests or that neighbour next door that one knows well can be accepted, since one knows they are good people and their treatment is unfair. However, this is not mean that those rioting people who destroyed the car of the president are also treated unfairly, after all, they destroyed property so they are not innocent. This (unconscious) focus on innocence and rights takes the political out of the identity because ‘it may be that the withdrawal that rights offer, the unmarking or de-stigmatisation they promise, has as its cost the loss of a language to describe the character of domination, violation, or exploitation that configures such needs.’127
Heckert writes that identity, political identity, tries to provide an answer to the question who one is, but that the labels that are now used are only to relay ‘someone’s position in various hierarchies’.128
It is because of this that identity politics ‘fits in nicely with the dominant neoliberal ideology. Groups created around oppressed identities can lobby the state for civil rights’,129
but these rights function on the basis of neutrality and universality in which the identity is depoliticised.130 A Subject can have rights because they belong to a certain group that is granted those rights. However, as shown in chapter one, the neoliberal governmentality does not account for systematic oppression and the “Racism” inherent in this governmentality is thus still in place. What the granting of rights creates, then, is a Subject based on a political identity, setting norms and normalising the individual
biological characteristics of women and therefore do not “really” experience womanhood and cannot know the oppression that comes with it.
123 It should be noted here that this form of Racism is not what we would call racism in our daily lives.
Foucault generalises this phenomenon to all instances where a distinction is made between groups of people.
124 Foucault, Society Must be Defended, 254. 125 Aaron, No Selves to Abolish, 6.
126
Wang, Against Innocence, 4.
127 Brown, States of Injury, 126. 128 Heckert, Maintaining the Border, 5. 129
Heckert, Maintaining the Border, 5.
130
