[iDC] Reposting - A Reflection on the Activist Strategies in the Web 2.0 Era

Wed Jan 28 17:48:26 UTC 2009

Hi Michel,

Sorry, I realize I never introduced myself, so by way of quick intro: I'm
not an academic, I work with Critical Art Ensemble, and I have several
non-academic "day jobs" to pay the bills...

> This is of course true, but both the 'establishment' and minoritarian's do
have agency, and can react creatively to
> challenges. So the whole point is not to say that it is 'easy' or that any
result is guaranteed, but that there is always
> potential and possibility,

Agreed!

> The status quo is not really static either, and continuously incorporates
cultural and political innovation.

True...

> Let's assume I'm in favor of wholistic medicine. Would I just say: well
the medical establishment is all powerful and
> in any case there is nothing we can do.

Certainly not -- I advocated permanent resistance. Meaning that, even if
Hardt and Negri are right and this is finally the moment for a viable global
revolution, there will never be a time we can kick back and just chill in
some kind of leftist utopia. There will always be a need to critique, create
alternatives, and struggle...

> Or would be be active in various ways, creating counter or alternative
networks of medical practitioners and 'patients'?
> That in the end the reality is a mix between the desired change and the
level of acceptance that has been shown by the
> existing system, that is a given, but my bet would be a new range of
medical freedom will have been created.

Agreed -- I'd only emphasize that when institutions like the medical
establishment "incorporate innovation", it is invariably the result of
political and cultural struggle as well as innovation. Take the AIDS
movement, one of the most successful social justice movements in modern
history that saved millions of lives. The changes that were made to the
medical establishment came through both "innovation" (amateurs insisting
that they were the experts in living with AIDS and should inform policy, and
creating a system of alternative health care knowledges and practices) --
and also crucially taking up the tools of political and cultural activism --
and putting their bodies on the line, organizing, shutting down Wall Street,
taking over the National Institutes of Health, going to jail,  etc...

> Meta-transitions are exceedingly rare, and I frankly don't think they are
a result of human volition, though the latter
> plays a role. I think that the model of political and social revolutions
that inspired the left were the result of a long
> series of prior changes in the economic and social landscape, the result
of the actions of many. Similarly, we can
> through our multitude of actions and changes create a reality on the
ground, that may or may not result in a
>  meta-transition, but whose effect in changing lives and balances of power
may nevertheless be substantial.

It's not an either-or, but a both-and: political change comes about as a
result of both large scale forces and individual and collective human
agency, as you point to at the beginning. Collective actions are the result
of human volition as much as individual actions...

> I guess this discussion is not resolvable, and that temperament has a lot
to do with it, and perhaps academia self-selects
> for the critical part of the equation?

The main point I'm trying to make is that we can't meaningfully separate the
positive creation of alternatives from the need to struggle and resist. We
need both, because the second you get in the way of authority's ability to
make profit at any cost -- including something as seemingly small as simply
ceasing to parrot dominant discourses -- it considers you contestational and
it will react with greater or lessor force. People who are doing nothing but
creating positive alternatives, or who simply happen to get in the way of
capital's "right to profit", are routinely displaced and brutalized. Organic
and traditional farmers who are doing nothing more than trying to make a
living are regularly terrorised and impoverished into signing the contracts
of multinationals like Monsanto for "depriving it of its right to profit"
(see for example the case of Percy Schmeiser). In developing nations the
situation is of course much worse. I spent the last 4 years struggling to
keep Steve Kurtz from going to jail (http://caedefensefund.org). Why was he
prosectued with the full force of the federal government and threatened with
20 years in jail? He wasn't engaged in traditional political activism -- he
simply dared to create spaces of alternative discourse, education and
knowledge sharing. Happily, in the end, through a long collective struggle,
we won. But so many others who are equally innocent but who do not have
Steve's resources or collective support, are in jail.

So we need more of everything -- more creation of alternative knowledges,
practices, and spaces, more critique, more cultural resistance, and more
political struggle.

Thanks for the interesting discussion,

Lucia
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
> *From:* Lucia Sommer <sommerlucia at gmail.com>
> *To:* Michael Bauwens <michelsub2003 at yahoo.com>
> *Sent:* Wednesday, January 28, 2009 12:20:31 AM
> *Subject:* Re: [iDC] Reposting - Re: A Reflection on the Activist
> Strategies in the Web 2.0 Era
>
> Hi Michael,
>
> Any action within the cultural landscape performed from a minoritarian
> political position -- whether reactive or positive, new or old -- will be
> perceived by authority as a "contestational" act. And often as not, any or
> all of a variety of disciplinary agents will be sent to re-stabilize the
> discourses of the status-quo.
>
>
> cheers,
>
> Lucia
>
>
>
> On Tue, Jan 27, 2009 at 4:45 AM, Michael Bauwens <michelsub2003 at yahoo.com>wrote:
>
>> Lucia,
>>
>>
>>
>> you write:
>>
>>
>>
>> Meanwhile, all we have is permanent resistance, by definition tactical.
>>
>>
>>
>> But why is resistance, by definition a reactive and negative endeavour,
>> the only alternative to  the strategy of taking power??
>>
>>
>>
>> Why not construct and interconnect the new, using all the interstices and
>> new possibilities of interconnection at your disposal?
>>
>>
>>
>> Why not turn it around, the construction of alternatives first, resistance
>> second.
>>
>>
>>
>> Michel
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>  ------------------------------
>>  *From:* Lucia Sommer <sommerlucia at gmail.com>
>> *To:* idc at mailman.thing.net
>> *Sent:* Saturday, January 24, 2009 1:29:21 PM
>> *Subject:* [iDC] Reposting - Re: A Reflection on the Activist Strategies
>> in the Web 2.0 Era
>>
>>
>> Sorry, I meant to post the below reply to the whole list. Curt, perhaps
>> you want to re-post your last reply as well? Good discussion. -- Best, Lucia
>>
>> For de Certeau, individuals and resistant constellations can't produce
>> strategy, and I think he's pretty convincing on that point. It's not an
>> ethical distinction I'm making (and I don't think it was for de Certeau
>> either, rather his was among other things a challenge to certainties of the
>> orthodox left that had led to impasse and to totalizing notions concerning
>> the location of resistance). I certainly WISH  we, the "multitudes", had
>> strategic power. Indeed, the utopian left has long proposed that we do, and
>> even some recent attempts to re-think Marxism, like Hardt and Negri's, argue
>> that a "movement of movements" could have strategic power. I myself am
>> sceptical and tend toward the pessimistic on this point, or at least
>> "pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will". While I would in
>> principle support a genuinely left revolution (strategic action), I don't
>> see it happening any time soon. Meanwhile, all we have is permanent
>> resistance, by definition tactical.
>>
>> But to return to the kind of discussion that I think you're proposing with
>> its emphasis on the questions of efficacy of practices -- which is  also
>> what interests me: I really appreciate your attempt to problematize the
>> binary use/production and to open up discussion about the kinds of
>> negotiations that cultural producers make vis a vis institutions. I agree we
>> need a better language to describe and think about these negotiations.
>>
>> In this sense de Certeau's strategy/tactics distinction can be an ally to
>> problematizing unproductive binaries like the "pure" activists vs. "bad"
>> institution. I think we need to acknowledge the degree to which our work has
>> the potential to be used by institutional power in ways that can compromise
>> the public good, for instance by creating a signifier that houses a false
>> set of associations that in turn mask the narrow interests and desire for
>> profit of a few. But that realization can also lead to a paralysis, where
>> one is afraid to do anything at all. One tactic suggested by Certeau's work
>> on monumentality and used by many cultural producers in the process of
>> institutional negotiations is that of ephemerality (as counter to strategic
>> monumentality): the tactician gets in and out fast, deterritorializing, so
>> as to avoid leaving material monuments or ideological imperatives.
>>
>> That's only one example, but perhaps a fruitful area of discussion would
>> be that of failure. CAE sometimes does a talk called "Crash and Burn," where
>> it discusses times that projects have failed dramatically and even helped
>> reinforce authoritarian power.  There's also the related question of how art
>> fails every day, if we measure cultural activism (or any other resistant
>> action) by the individual achievement of a single action. But fortunately
>> collective power, the aggregate of cultural activism, can create the
>> possibility to shift the status quo.
>>
>>
>> Thanks again, and best,
>>
>> Lucia
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
>
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