Antonio Negri and Michael Hardt have identified two very important aspects that block the communication of struggles: 1. Clarifying the nature of the common enemy and 2. To construct a new common language that facilitates communication (57). What kind of communication is at the heart of this matter? The type of ‘communication’ and ‘language’ that Hardt and Negri speak of is not meant to be interpreted as a specific vernacular. This communication is not even necessarily verbal. The power of revolutionary communication is based in the plurality of the struggle, i.e. the common enemy being translated within all political struggles in a universal manner in which a global multitude can react in solidarity. The Middle East and its vast protest movements of the past few months have accomplished this enormous task in both areas. The protestors have identified a common enemy and they have communicated their solidarity against that enemy.
The Middle East protestors have communicated their struggle to each other (and the world) without even sharing a single word of the fact amongst one another. Yes, the protestors have used the internet as a tool to arouse global support but that support has not physically crossed national borders (Egyptians were not joined by Bahrainis and Bahrainis were not aided by Libyans, etc). That support has been ignited within national borders and against a national enemy (dictatorship, autocracy, etc). Of course, the economy transcends borders and this is where the real power of the protests has found strength – the critique of political economy transcends the nation and the state and it is able to travel amongst global ctizens. The point to be made is that this revolutionary communication has become global. There are millions of people that feel akin to what is happening in the Middle East even if they will never meet with those that are directly participating in the protest. This type of communication is on a non-verbal surface. It is felt and not spoken. The communication is a dialectical understanding and it is one that is spreading the world over.
The communication has spread like fire and is encompassing many different revolutionary movements in the Middle East. Tunisia was first, then Egypt, and now it is Bahrain, Libya, Jordan, Gaza, Iran, and growing. Communication is at core of this solidarity. The protestors in Egypt never met with those in Bahrain, or Tunisia, etc, but the unspoken dialectic of revolution (i.e. political and social freedoms) is the universal ideal that is catching the attention of the multuitude. The dialectic is spreading. The dialectic is an ongoing discourse.
The communication of the Middle East protest movements have existed in a very interesting political reality. The protestors have united in their idealism with no references or basis in: a political party, religion, ethnicity, gender, or within any state institution and/or organization. The protestors of the Middle East appear to have transcended basic sectarian representations and have organized under the basic pretext of ‘freedom’ (maybe this is just an ‘appearance’ but for the time being it seems more than that). The struggle for freedom has, at this moment, trumped all sectarian and socialized biases among these multitudes. The multiplicity of the multitude has resulted in a powerful singularity of struggle. There are many backgrounds that are united for one cause.
The critique of political economy is a strong under-current in the communication of these protest movements. Young workers are angry and the time has come for their voices to be heard. I will explore this point further in the future
Reference:
Hardt, Michael and Negri, Antonio. 2000. Empire. Cambridge: Harvard University Press
Sorry about that last comment: it was supposed to be here:
The nature of the common enemy of all of us everywhere is faith-based beliefs.
In this sense, I think these upheavals have failed to achieve any kind of meaningful freedom. They are a push-back against authority. The price of food, however, will not go down and the absurd demographics (half the population under the age of 25) guarantees high unemployment and low wages no matter how large the demonstrations are. These facts – brutal as they are – will circumscribe what changes can take place. Lasting changes will only come if women are fully empowered under law; undermining the law in the name of freedom will not yield the kind of necessary changes that must happen for these populations to join the modern world.
Who is to say that this cannot happen. To say that it can never happen is deterministic and essentialist; those types of arguments are always proven false in time. The various women’s movements in the West were only meant for white middle class women in their beginnings but then they expanded to other peoples, as time passed.
Who is to say that the Middle East is not at a similar crux point in there political existence. No revolution immediately wins all of its goals in one step.
I didn’t say they cannot happen; in fact, I have great hope that they will because they are inevitable. These changes are inevitable because they are based on respecting what’s true and revealed as valuable because they work.
As for women’s movements in the West, the basis was enlightenment values of respecting what’s true, respecting the foundation of reason that showed law makers the wisdom of granting full political voting rights to all eligible adults. The same argument of respecting a white woman applies equally to a black, to a gay, to singel and married, and so on. The reasons for this respect are the same: it benefits all of us to hold equal rights under the law. Note this isn’t any kind fo blanket freedom to do what we want when we want without any kind of constraints: constraints are essential. What is vital is the equality we have under the law. But this principle is under attack even here in Canada with the acidic attack against this equality in favour of special status… particularly for group rights, rights based on blood, on gender, on culture, on language, on tribal affiliation, on political allegiance, and so on. Always the principles of the enlightenment are under attack because people move away from the principle of equality and respect for reason of what’s true and begin substituting what they believe are legitimate cases of special pleading to be guaranteed as exemptions and favouritism under the law. Always and everywhere, faith-based beliefs continue to try to undermine and weaken the very values upon which we have built our political and legal foundation to grant us our maximum freedom protected by the state under which we then give our consent to be governed.
Is the Middle East at this point? I don’t think so because I don’t think they embrace this push for equality and reason and respect for what’s true yet. Perhaps they are closer than they were but that remains to be seen. Certainly the internet and mass communication will begin to reveal these arguments and help propel people to think for themselves and stop granting their allegiance to beliefs that harm their rights.
“grant us our maximum freedom protected by the state under which we then give our consent to be governed” Tildeb
The political state governs with or without our consent. To claim that our liberal democratic state in Canada is somehow superior to the Islamic state in Iran is a flat tautology. No matter what rights and freedoms are supposedly given here in glorious Canada. Why? Because the state is all-powerful and has the right to act on its own behalf in any way it sees fit; even in Canada. The state represents itself and this is why it fights extremely hard to protect itself against the citizenry; the Middle East is once again prioving this to be true. Therein lies the abuse of power; not in the kind of state rather in the form.
I personally adhere to the stance of Marx on this point. The state is the state of capital, in that it protects and works for capital. If this were not true then the hegemonic power in the world today would not be the liberal free-market. But it is.
It is interesting how Muslim, Jewish, Christian, Hindu, and secular societies and political states alike all agree on the liberal freedom of the market and on the necessity of fluid capital. Yet when it comes to a citizenry, and its rights, they must grovel and give up all power in order to be granted and “given” these freedoms in return; a bit of a slanted relationship. Yet the free-market gets absolute free reign without hindrance and or democraric responsibility to any citizenry across the globe.
The state forcefully takes its liberty and it only ‘gives’ back what it deems fit. It is obviuous why the Middle East is in uproar. They have had enough of the heavy-handed state. The West sits in judgement of their motives all the while we march to the beat of the state and its Leviathan drum-beat.
This is a rather bizarre reading of the Constitutional and Charter differences enforced by the state between Iran and Canada. That you fail (or refuse) to see the substantial difference isn’t a reflection of what’s true in fact but what you believe is true. This is a fatal flaw you are making, and I presume you do so on purpose to substantiate your claim that states are all powerful and only give back what ‘they’ see fit.
But JB, your rights don’t come from any parliament but are recognized as coming from you by the decision of our courts; neither are these rights and freedoms protected by parliament but by our armed forces upholding the courts. That’s why law itself is so important and either we submit to its applications or we do not, in which case we are by choice outside the law and can no longer ask the armed forces to act on our behalf. When the spirit of the law is subverted by those in public office, in the name of making law in the name of democracy (or some kind of partisanship or local issue or whatever) rather than equality, they risk all of our rights and freedoms. It is a form of sedition and politicians forget too easily that the armed forces has every right to take up arms against these people who abuse the public trust.
Your notions of the state are antiquated and are metaphysical constructs that do not exist in fact. There is no such thing, for example, as a ‘free’ market, and capital is one of those nebulous terms that can be used to represent just about anything. That you attach the term ‘liberal’ to today’s markets (presumably anything that involves government and ‘capital’) is another indication how much you rely on maintaining the metaphysical notions and not the realities present in the particulars.
Of course the West sits in judgment… just like you do and you are part of the West. But you fail to mention the diversity of those judgments and how that diversity plays out in local, regional, and federal policies and positions. That’s a rather salient feature that differentiates us from, say, Iran don’t you think?
wow a greater rant about nothing I have never read. I was critiquing the form of state and not the actual interpretation of its representation.
You fundamentally misread the critique of capital and have no basis in it at all, none. Go and read some critical politcal economy philospophy and then come back and make comments. Start with Marx, then Lenin, then Luxemburg, then Lukacs, then Deleuze, then Zizekm then Badiou, then Negri, then Hardt, then etc, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc.
The state of Iran is a Hobbesian-Rousseau ‘Leviathan’ and so is the state of Canada. This is the point to be made. We are not Iran in culture and they are not us but still the state is the state. Do you even know what the political state embodies? I wonder. Go and read Foucault. Or should I explain that too
“What is vital is the equality we have under the law. But this principle is under attack even here in Canada with the acidic attack against this equality in favour of special status… particularly for group rights, rights based on blood, on gender, on culture, on language, on tribal affiliation, on political allegiance, and so on” (tildeb)
No we get to some of the ‘crux’ of viewpoint and interpretation of what the constitution really constitutes.
You viewpoint on equality is not equality to me at all, and with bland viewpoints like that – we can expect a whole group of minorities in Canada to never make true progress – First Nations people groups.
You may not be aware of the Indian Act but I can fill you on some of it’s basicness: it governs most, if not all, First Nations relationships with law and within society. This piece of legislation applies to only one group in society – First Nation people. I think we can all agree, thats not ‘fair’ or ‘equal’.
It gets much worse than that.
Did you know that under that Indian Act the removal from treaty rights is occuring via blood definitions. This means I can have kids and they can have Indian status, their kids might not…meaning I can have a split family because the only land we were promised (in exchange for the land where treaties were signed) is ‘reserve land’ – again in the Indian Act as far as governance and law for Indian peoples. Half my family could be there, including extended family, and some of that family may not have a single right to live by their cousins…fair and equal?
The truth is, within Canada, First Nations (Indians) signed treaties so they could be treated ‘equally’ – in a time of much discrimination. They bartered and won – in some senses – and lost in other senses. However, equality under the law must take into account the facts Indian peoples have treaties and an extra piece of legislation – and this means there will be equality that has to be account for this stuff. It’s not a black and white Canada – there is quite some shades in the political arena here.
However, when I read your comment it sounds very ‘ethnocentric’…like there is a right way of viewing these rights, and equality is everyone having the ‘same’ status. Thats plain bogus in Canada – and that’s reality.
Oh, I understand the principle of fairness is different than the principle of equality and how it trumps rights in Canada… although it is almost amusing to see how easily the words are used interchangeably. I also understand how poorly served all of us by the Indian Act and how we are doing the best we can saddled by such ridiculous treaties made in the name of the sovereign for whom the ‘negotiators’ represented. You do realize it would cheaper to pay every member of the first nations 10 million dollars a piece to buy their status than it would to continue paying all the costs for Indian Affairs for the next five?
I also understand the importance of tribal hierarchy having lived for many years in BC on the Island. The princess gets the job with the most authority because of blood and not merit and to circumvent this is to invite all kinds of problems. The Cdn taxpayer pays for this ongoing local discrimination, too, and calls it just another element of the fairness policy. I wish a majority of central Canadians would spend a few months in their lives coming to a better understanding of what their blanket support for fairness actually looks like in action. I suspect the white guilt would quickly be replaced with legitimate anger at the scope of the problems we are helping to make worse.
And yes, I think every citizen should have equal status under the law as a citizen, to better describe what that actually means in both responsibilities as well as rights and freedoms. This basis need not replace or conflict with ethnic and cultural and linguistic and religious values except where these values are in direct and fundamental conflict with what it means to be a citizen. (Let’s remember that the claims among just first nations cover upwards of 120% of Canada.) If these contrary values have been enshrined in legislation, then the legislation needs changing. The Constitution, too, needs to updated to address the problems of division within the national boundaries. Holding fast to the past by refusing to deal with the present realities is not a sign of ancestral respect nor tribal allegiance but of mistrust in one’s self to handle full citizenship. There is no reason why anyone who rejects full citizenship should have full access to the rights and freedoms and protections that fall under its purview. Treaty settlements are important and need to get done. But these settlements must be under and not exempted from the base of legal equality achieved by our common citizenship.
“You do realize it would cheaper to pay every member of the first nations 10 million dollars a piece to buy their status than it would to continue paying all the costs for Indian Affairs for the next five?” (tildeb)
Where did you hear this statistic? Its interesting that’s for sure.
Regardless of the stat – First Nations people enjoy their communities and if there is ever to be a good repeal of the Indian Act – and maybe even the treaties – it needs to involve the development of systems that allow for First Nations people to own the land they are currently on, develop inner-city communities that can provide support, and deal with the real problems of under employment and poverty in First Nations communities.
I don’t like the Indian Act more than the next person to be perfectly honest. However, I love the treaties.
“The Cdn taxpayer pays for this ongoing local discrimination, too, and calls it just another element of the fairness policy” (tildeb)
(a) Let’s be clear here – this is only a handful of BC tribes and across Canada this is actually not the case at all. In SK, for example, every reserve holds elections every 2 to 4 years concerning their leadership. So this is a small issue.
(b) Why is this a problem exactly? What if the people of those disctricts (ie: bands) prefer this over and above Canadian forms of election?
(c) Many forms of First Nations gov’t (historically) also involve a process called ‘concensus’ – where nothing passes unless all have heard in the community administration and can agree this is best action to take. This is actually a much better form of decision making and can wonder ‘why isn’t this the way out Federal Gov’t functions?’….and then cry discrimination since the Feds or Provinces are using a system that is most votes wins and not via concensus. Point being, were using a system of gov’t (IMO) that is actually worse than one with concensus.
We disagree on very little here. Power needs to be federated to allow local bands to maintain ways of life typical to those areas. But my major concern is that these powers fall under a single and equal law of basic rights and freedoms for all citizens (regardless of any other consideration or group membership) that cannot be discriminated against by local bands, nor can members of local bands be discriminated against by the tyranny of the local majority (which occurs now).
I understand the difference between legal equality and what is called equality-of-opportunity. In other words, sometime discrimination is justified in law to equal the playing field regarding access to opportunities, and this fairness policy is important and necessary. But it has to stop when it crosses that determined boundary that awards basic rights and freedoms to all citizens, which are spelled out in detail in the Charter. Right now, this boundary is crossed and I’m thinking of particular cases in (I think) Gananoque regarding married people where one spouse is forcibly removed from the reserve for not being status. There has to be legal limits in a federal state where local laws cannot take precedence without full political independence.
I have no problem with local laws different than others: this a municipality equivalent that I think successfully crosses into minor criminal and civil matters as long as it doesn’t cross that federal boundary under which all must live. Consensus sentencing is one great example that does a much better job than the current one.
Treaty settlements are vital and every government needs to make this a high priority to find workable solutions. Paying in excess of 12 billion a year for Indian Affairs to maintain a broken system is foolishness. The cost in resource development alone is worth the kind of settlements BC has made with the Nisga and a few other tribes. Full participation by First Nations people in all aspects of Canadian life is still impaired by archaic and unfair practices and this needs to change. Indian Affairs is simply a pipeline into which public money is poured without much significant return on investment. Put this money into better use by treaty settlements and a status buy-back plan will help solve these never-ending problems.
As for the buy-back, I am having trouble finding specific numbers of status holders to divide into a 60 billion dollar expense for five years of funding Indian Affairs. When I lived in BC during the Nisga treaty settlement, the number was equivalent to a million dollars per status Indian would be cheaper than maintaining the (then) current total levels of funding. But that was a long time ago so my numbers are off. But I suspect the payoff would be greater today and would finally put a cap on this ever-growing, rarely yielding public expense that disenfranchises rather than empowers people.