[p2p-research] [-empyre-] seeing yourself a prototype - the limits of open source (innovation as manipulation)

[Michel Bauwens]

Thanks Andy,

makes a lot of sense, also to understand the thai tacticians of the red
shirt,

yet, I don't one should discount the effects on getting broader sympathies,
which are an important part of any struggle,

Michel

On Sun, May 2, 2010 at 5:58 PM, Andy Robinson <ldxar1 at gmail.com> wrote:

> This would be a big debate to get into, which I don't really have the time
> for at the moment.  You're right that I'm thinking of more than simply
> European insurrectionism, though I think many of the movements have similar
> characteristics.
>
> To summarise a few things briefly.
>
> 1) The question is not so much whether violence "justifies repressive
> measures" or "fails to get majority support".  The question is whether
> "majorities" (conformists) are *right* in their rather irrational aversion
> to the use of force by protesters, and where they get this aversion from.
> If it is the case that the majority are incurable bigots, or that they
> believe whatever they are told in the tabloids/Fox News/Berlusconi's
> channels, this actually *strengthens* the insurrectionist case to ignore
> what they think.
>
> 2) Insurrectionism does not try to be effective by influencing the
> 'majority'.  It tries to be effective by directly disrupting
> control-infrastructures or by imposing costs on state repression.
>
> 3) The point is that insurrectionism emerges partly because effective
> nonviolent direct action is successfully repressed in certain societies and
> is no longer a viable strategy for effective transformation.
>
> I'm rather worried about the 'fetishist' position (in a Freudian sense) of
> 'we know very well the majority are wrong, but still we keep observing their
> limits (because of the other supposed to believe)' - it is absolutely
> corrosive of autonomy in agency.
>
> There are certainly other reasons for nonviolent activism, which are not
> affected by any of this.  I think it's quite possible to be autonomous and
> also nonviolent (as in Ruta Pacifica).  There is a certain relation,
> however, between autonomy and antagonism, or 'violence' in Benjamin's sense,
> which is clearest in Clastres' argument about the conditions for indigenous
> autonomy.
>
> On your other point:
>
> I don't take the view that repressive closure is the *only* cause of
> movement demobilisation.  Of course there are many societies which are very
> repressive but never achieve such closure.  It all has to do with the
> relative balance of political and social principles in society.  In some
> societies, the social principle is very resilient.  State repression has the
> effect of decomposing horizontal relations (p2p you might say) and creating
> authoritarian dyads.  However, counter-agency can recompose horizontal
> relations.  There are a lot of factors affecting whether this happens: the
> extent of cooptation of movements, the size and degree of organisation of
> autonomous spheres, the tradition or lack of it of 'everyday resistance' and
> 'weapons of the weak', whether there's a mainly hierarchical commodified
> economy and a mainly formal economy or whether people are economically
> composed in other fields (subsistence, petty commodity production, gift
> economy, moral economy, etc).
>
> I think the basic point however, is that state repression decomposes
> horizontal relations - the state is an 'antiproduction assemblage' as
> Deleuze and Guattari put it.  Hence there is a need to ward off such
> actions, otherwise horizontal relations are doomed from the start.  Hence
> the need for some kind of response which imposes costs on the state, makes
> it difficult for it to decompose movements at will.  We are unfortunately
> long past the point where 'it will look bad in the Guardian' is cost enough.
>
> bw
> Andy
>
>
>
>
> On Sun, May 2, 2010 at 9:17 AM, Michel Bauwens <michelsub2004 at gmail.com>wrote:
>
>> Hi Andy,
>>
>> when you refer to insurrectional anarchists, I was more thinking of small
>> groups in France, or the black block in the G8-G20 demonstrations, or the
>> Greek youth revolts, and I don't find these tactics particularly fruitful on
>> the contrary, they justify repressive measures which get majority support
>> because of the perceived violence.
>>
>> This is not an argument against violence of insurrection as such, though I
>> would tend to think that nonviolence is better not just as a matter of
>> principle, but also in terms of efficience, and of course, with non-violence
>> I do not mean coopted ngoi's, but mass movements on the ground.
>>
>> Since you refer not necessarily to what Im mentioning above, but to
>> massive social movements, like the examples you cite, I have of course to
>> acquiesce, but I didn't see them neither as anarchists nor as
>> insurrenctionists, though they may apply certain tactics. You have to see
>> their aims, which are often very moderate (non-privatisation of water in
>> bolivia, free elections in thailand), and their tactics which are mostly
>> event driven, often by the repression and non-reaction to nonviolent
>> tactics. But insurrection and violence are always dangerous and can
>> backfire, the thai movement for example, does not seem to attract middle
>> class democrats, nor much youth. I don't think most of these movements, and
>> their leaders, are familiar neither with Agamben, nor Italian autonomists; I
>> find Zapatista manifesto's eminently readable by the way: i have no
>> objection against specialist language as such, if it is instrumental, but I
>> do have objections against building whole theories on questionable premisis.
>>
>> For example you explain the lack of social movements in western europe by
>> repressive closure, but I would question that, I don't think those regimes
>> are more repressive than the southern european ones where more actions are
>> occuring; I think the lack of activism has other causes. How could could
>> prove that there is such a direct link between presumed repression and lack
>> of activism. For example, both thailand and the US are quite repressive, but
>> have very activie social movements,
>>
>> I'm just against easy equations, that's all,
>>
>> Michel
>>
>>   On Sat, May 1, 2010 at 3:52 PM, Andy Robinson <ldxar1 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> "the way I see the method is: take something which has a grain of truth,
>>> say measures of exception, take it as the absolute truth, then build a whole
>>> system of thought on that doubtful premise," - this is probably true, a lot
>>> of the continental theorists work that way.  It's an effect of trying to do
>>> empirical social science by means of philosophy.  The thing is though, that
>>> people who use these theories (whether activists or academics) will
>>> generally use them selectively, use them in a kind of bricolage of several
>>> of the theories.
>>>
>>> The rest of your construction here...  well, there's quite a few
>>> assumptions need unpacking.  One of these is, which movements/people you are
>>> taking to be 'real social movements' or 'activists on the ground'.  If
>>> you're thinking of the Thai context, then it is rather unusual
>>> internationally (though you will notice standard insurrectionist tactics -
>>> blockading airports, occupying and shutting down key nodes, storming summits
>>> - used by both sides).  In Britain and America, activism is at an all-time
>>> low, old reformist and civil disobedience orientations are proving to be
>>> really very ineffectual in the current conjuncture, and movements are
>>> decomposing drastically.  The people who are still active are gravitating
>>> towards autonomous/insurrectional modalities of action (the biggest events
>>> in Britain over the last few years have been the G20 and G8, the Climate
>>> Camps, and then a raft of smaller campaigns such as against DSEi, Smash EDO,
>>> SHAC, etc).  If you look at continental European countries - France, Greece,
>>> Denmark - the repressive closure is less far-gone and is only now being
>>> imposed, and the response has been a wave of insurrectional politics - the
>>> Ungdomshuset revolt, the constant preparedness to physically defend
>>> Christiania, the banlieue revolts, the rise of the 'anarcho-autonome' scene
>>> in France, the Greek revolt of December 2008.  In the South the pattern is
>>> slightly different but basically similar.  In South Africa for instance the
>>> old 'civil society' has been demobilised by the ANC in power; what is left
>>> is an insurgent outside, groups like APF, SECC, LPM, Abahlali, who mobilise
>>> mainly throuhg popular revolt in the townships.  Chile is similar, the
>>> Philippines is similar.  Argentina has had constant revolts which are at an
>>> ebb now, but the movements which came out of the revolts are intractably
>>> autonomous.  Bolivia the movements got to such a point that neoliberalism
>>> became unsustainable.  China, the only real resistance to the current
>>> trajectory comes from the periodic, and rather frequent, uprisings in the
>>> peripheral zones.  Then there's the very peripheral areas where things get
>>> even more messy: Chiapas, the Niger Delta, West Papua, etc.  In these cases
>>> opposition most often emerges as armed opposition.
>>>
>>> Some of these have been very effectual.  Governments overthrown in
>>> Bolivia, Argentina, Ecuador.  Mining shut down in Bougainville.  The Peru
>>> Amazon law defeated multiple times.  Huge concessions in the Niger Delta.
>>> Autonomous zones for over a decade in Chiapas.  Christiania still going,
>>> much to the chagrin of the Danish elite.
>>>
>>> On the other hand, there are a great many 'civil society' organisations
>>> with memberships dwarfing those of the autonomous social movements,
>>> ostensibly with the ear of government, which have achieved absolutely
>>> nothing (think Drop the Debt for example).
>>>
>>> Can you come up with any examples of social movements which have
>>> anti-neoliberal and anti-repressive demands, which have succeeded through
>>> reformist or ameliorative means in the current period?
>>>
>>> Off the top of my head, I can only think of a handful of examples.  They
>>> either happened in a context of militant autonomous mobilisation mixed with
>>> insider strategies, in rather unusual contexts where global pressure was
>>> working for the protest, and where a government is terrified of losing
>>> legitimacy (TAC in South Africa); or they happened in cases where a
>>> social-movement-based party had taken political power and either had been
>>> intermittent in its attempts to, or had failed to, recuperate social
>>> movements (as in Venezuela).  Most of the time it is the same old story:
>>> adverse incorporation.  Either social movements are 'listened to' and
>>> ignored, or their leaders are coopted, or they are drawn into the realm of
>>> service provision funding bids and lose their oppositional purpose.  None of
>>> which stops the onward march of neoliberalism or the growth of state
>>> repression, or even slows it down significantly.  There are a few countries
>>> where the pattern is a bit different because they remain either broadly
>>> social-democratic, or broadly within the field of patronage-based
>>> insertions.
>>>
>>> The question of 'language used', or styles of theorising, is another one
>>> which needs to be unpacked.  It's not clear if you're saying the language is
>>> too difficult for activists or too Manichean.  If the former, this varies a
>>> lot across contexts, and you would find for instance activist writings in
>>> Italy are often as difficult as Agamben's - it happens to be a society with
>>> a high level of theoretical discussion.  I'd also suggest comparing the
>>> Zapatistas' style of writing, which is developed specifically for the Mayan
>>> indigenous context, and yet reads very much like 'postmodern' expression.
>>> Of course there is a difficulty in that radical theory is not speaking
>>> directly to the banlieue youth for instance, but it's by no means clear that
>>> a 'simplified' version would be either; marginal groups often have their own
>>> subcultures and linguistic styles (slang, dialects and suchlike).  There's
>>> little point seeking to imitate since these differences are partly
>>> expressive, they are designed to be specific not general.  On the other
>>> hand, I have heard from someone who grew up in this kind of background, that
>>> very marginal groups are more responsive to action than words.  On the
>>> second point, this would be rather ironic to claim, since activists of all
>>> kinds (even the liberal-reformist ones) are nearly always accused of being
>>> too Manichean and cut-and-dried about things.
>>>
>>> bw
>>> Andy
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Sat, May 1, 2010 at 7:01 AM, Michel Bauwens <michelsub2004 at gmail.com>wrote:
>>>
>>>> I think we had this discussion about 18 months ago, when you talked
>>>> about the contempary situation as a new type of fascism.
>>>>
>>>> What is demobilizing about it, in my view, is that it overemphizes the
>>>> enemy, it presumes a total defeat of civil society, which is not the case,
>>>> yes, there are new state powers, yes democracy is in crisis, but do we live
>>>> in a totalitarian state, or totalitarian capitalism, no, absolutely not.
>>>>
>>>> I think that the fact the you mention insurrectionist anarchism, surely
>>>> the most ineffectual strategy at present, as using Agamben, is indicative,
>>>> it leads to nihilism.
>>>>
>>>> Otherwise of course, I do find your thoughts and contributions very
>>>> informative, since I probably won't have the time to read it all, but I
>>>> truly feel that the language the post-modern left is using, is bringing it
>>>> further and further away from any contact with real social movements, and
>>>> totally away from the construction of a new p2p world, I feel it is the
>>>> scholastics of our time,
>>>>
>>>> the way I see the method is: take something which has a grain of truth,
>>>> say measures of exception, take it as the absolute truth, then build a whole
>>>> system of thought on that doubtful premise,
>>>>
>>>> of course, I wouldn't be able to engage in a convincing discussion about
>>>> this, but I noted how activists on the ground, often felt the same way as me
>>>> during this type of academic conferences ...
>>>>
>>>> Michel
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On Fri, Apr 30, 2010 at 10:02 PM, Andy Robinson <ldxar1 at gmail.com>wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Hiya,
>>>>>
>>>>> Why do they see state of exception theories as demobilising?
>>>>>
>>>>> I've seen Agamben namedropped or concept-dropped in insurrectionist
>>>>> anarchism, so he seems to be attracting attention from people who are
>>>>> certainly not 'demobilised'.  On the other hand his view is strongly against
>>>>> any kind of reformism or gradualism, since the problem is inherent to the
>>>>> state as a social form.  I wonder if this is where Hardt and Negri feel
>>>>> threatened - it demobilises *their* kind of politics.
>>>>>
>>>>> I also think Agamben and Virilio are too simplistic sometimes (a
>>>>> strange accusation when they're difficult to read, but I'm thinking of their
>>>>> conceptual frame rather than their language).  They have quite correctly
>>>>> deduced the social logic of the state - what Kropotkin calls the 'political
>>>>> principle' - but they wrongly use it as a general meta-theory of reality,
>>>>> ignoring the roles of other social logics which either syncretise with or
>>>>> oppose this logic (to be sure, neither of them deny that there is at least
>>>>> one other social logic - 'popular defence' in Virilio,
>>>>> 'whatever-singularities' in Agamben - but there seem only to be these two
>>>>> logics).  In Kropotkin there is a similar construct but the 'social
>>>>> principle', the other pole, is given a lot more prominence, and this leads
>>>>> in people like Martin Buber, Gustav Landauer and Colin Ward (and maybe Hakim
>>>>> Bey?) to a great deal of openness to the strategic construction of autonomy,
>>>>> even in quite 'reformist' ways (provided their tendency is to re-empower the
>>>>> social principle - e.g. squatting, mutual aid, etc).
>>>>>
>>>>> Obviously, I theorise this alternative logic in terms of
>>>>> affinity-networks.  The theory of the alternative pole to state power is
>>>>> already tending this way in Kropotkin, and I've already explained the extent
>>>>> (and limits) to which Hardt and Negri conceive it in this sense, but in
>>>>> Agamben it tends to be rather amorphous, almost a kind of minimum life-force
>>>>> which is irreducible.  I have a sense that Agamben and Virilio actually
>>>>> *mean* affinity-networks - Agamben's model is derived from Deleuze's,
>>>>> which is explicitly network-based; Virilio's draws on the density of
>>>>> ecological and social connections in peasant/artisan/indigenous communities,
>>>>> similar to Kropotkin's social principle - but it isn't very developed.  (If
>>>>> there was no 'second pole', state of exception theories *would* be
>>>>> thoroughly disempowering - as in their Lacanian incarnation for instance.
>>>>> In Agamben's case, 'The Coming Community' is very clear in terms of the
>>>>> articulation of a second pole - this is the text used by Richard Day when he
>>>>> discusses Agamben.  My first reaction to Agamben - based on Homo Sacer - is
>>>>> that he was pessimistic and disempowering.  We need to remember that Agamben
>>>>> has over a dozen books in English alone - his theory is not limited to Homo
>>>>> Sacer).
>>>>>
>>>>> However, it's not only their under-theorisation of the affinity-network
>>>>> pole which bothers me a bit - it is also their failure to conceive of other
>>>>> social logics which are not either the state (at its most fascistic) or
>>>>> affinity-networks (at their most anarchic).  While this might ultimately be
>>>>> how the social field splits, there are also other logics operative which
>>>>> don't quite fit - in particular, the capitalist logic, the logic of the
>>>>> 'included' (addition of axioms), the 'mass' (in Baudrillard's sense), and
>>>>> reactive networks.  (Looking at the current field, one might specify for
>>>>> instance the people at the World Economic Forum who opposed the Iraq war as
>>>>> bad for business; movements such as Drop the Debt; or something like the RSS
>>>>> or al-Qaeda - none of these are either pure statist sovereignty movements or
>>>>> affinity-networks).  If the social field is not 'bipolar' (in the IR sense),
>>>>> if there are three or more logics (I count at least six, maybe seven if
>>>>> tributary modalities are included, and possibly others I haven't identified
>>>>> yet), things get a lot more complicated.
>>>>>
>>>>> I want to emphasise here that I think Agamben and Virilio are
>>>>> ultimately *right* - they have identified the social logic of the
>>>>> state very clearly.  But they have failed to identify adequately the field
>>>>> in which this logic operates.  They can't really explain why the state
>>>>> doesn't *always* behave in this way, why it has taken so long to
>>>>> actualise its social logic, why it does so more in some places than others.
>>>>> Their account is too much a matter of inner unfolding, almost a Hegelian
>>>>> process - the state becomes what it has always been.  Yet in fact, the state
>>>>> only unfolds its basic logic to the extent to which it is able to do so in a
>>>>> field where this logic is contested by other social forces.  The pure state
>>>>> of exception does not emerge, for instance, in syncretic Southern states
>>>>> connected to social networks; they are capable of brutal violence, but of a
>>>>> different order, that of the reactive network and the energised mobilisation
>>>>> of reactive forces (fear, hatred, etc).  And it does not emerge in the
>>>>> social-democratic state, because the power of the state as a social logic is
>>>>> mediated by the included and by a particular configuration with capital (the
>>>>> tripartite alliance of the state, capital and the included through
>>>>> negotiated social pacts).
>>>>>
>>>>> I think what is peculiar about the current conjuncture is that
>>>>> previously the state was very much constrained by capital - except in
>>>>> Bonapartist situations (necessarily temporary) or Stalinist situations
>>>>> (excluding capital from their frame - but not their actual functioning), the
>>>>> state was not allowed to actualise the 'state of exception' because doing so
>>>>> is 'bad for business' (the frame of bourgeois constitutionalism).  So if
>>>>> states are realising this logic today, it is because their relationship to
>>>>> the capitalist logic has changed: in neoliberal capitalism, the logic of the
>>>>> state of exception is re-enabled because it becomes compatible with the
>>>>> unconstrained realisation of the capitalist logic of accumulation, whereas
>>>>> previously the two had been antagonistic and 'mediated'.  Also important is
>>>>> the way the role of the included stratum or the logic of the addition of
>>>>> axioms mediates between the capital-state axis and the excluded or
>>>>> exploited.  The included stratum *hate* the state of exception (look
>>>>> at the Guardian for proof of this), but they've been pushed out of political
>>>>> power in the places where the state of exception has been actualised most
>>>>> drastically (and crucially, have *not* been pushed out of power in the
>>>>> places where it has not been actualised so much).  This supports the
>>>>> Deleuzian hypothesis of the contestation between addition and subtraction of
>>>>> axioms as different strategies within the alienated/capitalist field.  The
>>>>> current situation of the included stratum is a situation of 'adverse
>>>>> incorporation' - being kept on board through ever-decreasing concessions
>>>>> tending towards zero, or by the absent promise of influence which never
>>>>> emerges.
>>>>>
>>>>> Of course, this also alters the strategic position of autonomous social
>>>>> movements and the affinity-network social logic, though I don't think it
>>>>> alters it very much.  Hardt and Negri put a lot of faith in alliances with
>>>>> the included as a means to tilt the world towards the unfolding of
>>>>> affinity-networks.  I don't think this is likely to work, because the
>>>>> included have been quite thoroughly disempowered.  Today it is not so much a
>>>>> matter of settling for social-democracy as the complete self-disempowerment
>>>>> of would-be reform movements through the 'Third Way', which is neoliberalism
>>>>> repeated.  The danger in this approach is that autonomous social movements
>>>>> disempower themselves by tying themselves to the sinking ship of the
>>>>> excluded, when in fact, the power of the included was always conditional on
>>>>> the threat posed by autonomous social movements in fact or in potential (the
>>>>> included were given power because of their role as a pole of mediation, as
>>>>> placeholders for the absent excluded).  I think it also fundamentally
>>>>> misunderstands what autonomous social movements are.  There is a fundamental
>>>>> structural antagonism between autonomous social movements and the
>>>>> affinity/horizontal/p2p logic and the logica of the included, because the
>>>>> logic of the included is firmly within the logic of alienation,
>>>>> representation and transcendental signification, whereas the
>>>>> affinity-network logic is firmly outside.  So a strategy of working through
>>>>> the included cannot lead to a world in which the affinity-network form has
>>>>> primacy.  In this sense, Agamben and Virilio are right that the hope of
>>>>> opposing the neoliberal conjuncture lies with autonomous social movements
>>>>> and not with some kind of neo-reformism.  To go back to the IR analogy, on a
>>>>> global scale and in most of the key sites in the current global
>>>>> configuration, what we have in terms of social logics is a multipolar field
>>>>> which nevertheless resolves itself in the current conjuncture in a largely
>>>>> bipolar way because of the operation of alliances:  on one side the state
>>>>> logic + capital + included stratum as very subordinate element + some
>>>>> incorporated reactive networks; on the other, the affinity-network logic,
>>>>> sometimes composing into a 'black hole' space with non-incorporated reactive
>>>>> networks, informal economies, and the tributary logic owing to its emergence
>>>>> from forcible delinking rather than active assertion of the affinity-network
>>>>> logic itself.  Since the state operates as the enforcement wing of the first
>>>>> coalition, the 'fourth world war' tends to pan out as a social war between
>>>>> the state logic (with state of exception) and the affinity-network logic
>>>>> (autonomous social movements)  However, it's fairly easy to find local sites
>>>>> where this is not how the different logics line up.
>>>>>
>>>>> bw
>>>>> Andy
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>  On Fri, Apr 30, 2010 at 2:36 PM, Michel Bauwens <
>>>>> michelsub2004 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> thanks for the interesting comments,
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I'm reading commonwealth, which has an interesting critique of state
>>>>>> of exception theories as demobilizing, I tend to agree,
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Michel
>>>>>>
>>>>>>   On Sun, Mar 21, 2010 at 3:24 AM, Andy Robinson <ldxar1 at gmail.com>wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Hiya,
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Reminds me a lot of Virilio actually.  The idea that crises are only
>>>>>>> crises for civilians, and that unfriendly environments operate in favour of
>>>>>>> the state by reducing the capability for popular defence and creating
>>>>>>> dependence on those who can work in such environments.  Also Negri on the
>>>>>>> 'crisis-state', which seems to suggest that this model operates in
>>>>>>> contemporary capitalism in terms of imminent catastrophe as a pretext for
>>>>>>> states of exception.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> It can be traced in corporate and statist discourse, that the people
>>>>>>> in charge view terrain complexity as something frightening and threatening,
>>>>>>> and unregulated ecosystems as dangerously chaotic - they fantasise about
>>>>>>> concreting over everything.  I am thinking here of Sherene Razack on Somalia
>>>>>>> (discourses trying to mitigate human rights atrocities by 'peacekeepers'
>>>>>>> tended to fuse the hostile environment with local hostility and miltiary
>>>>>>> difficulties in the account of Somalia as a hellish place), and Spivak's
>>>>>>> essay 'Responsibility' (treating water in Bangladesh as the enemy and
>>>>>>> seeking to regulate it to 'protect' people who will actually end up
>>>>>>> dispossessed as a result).  In a sense, most of us (in urban settings) are
>>>>>>> already living in 'created' environments in this sense: urban environments
>>>>>>> are physically harsh, do not have food sovereignty and are highly dependent
>>>>>>> on artificial institutions (states, markets, welfare regimes) for
>>>>>>> material/ecological and social provisions which might be a lot easier to
>>>>>>> obtain in other settings (water needs to be stored up and piped in, energy
>>>>>>> concentrated and provided from outside, security provided artificially
>>>>>>> because of the lack of face-to-face interaction, mass transit becomes a need
>>>>>>> because of the zoning of cities, space becomes scarce and has to be set
>>>>>>> aside for purposes which less concentrated space would allow automatically
>>>>>>> e.g. leisure, health problems need to be treated rather than simply warded
>>>>>>> off - for most of history cities were population sinks for health
>>>>>>> reasons...)
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> There is thus an extent to which the contestation of urban spaces
>>>>>>> (squatting, guerrilla gardening, urban foraging, autoreduction, social
>>>>>>> centres, etc) can be viewed as 'ruralisation' or 'ecologisation', somewhat
>>>>>>> akin to weeds peeping through the cracks and eventually eating away concrete
>>>>>>> - the city becomes a dense ecosystem in its own right to the extent that
>>>>>>> contestation of urban spaces restores an ecosystemic (rather than a
>>>>>>> dependent-dominant) dynamic, remembering that ecosystems are peer-networks
>>>>>>> rather than hierarchies, whereas the urban-rural division is hierarchical.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> bw
>>>>>>> Andy
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>  On Sat, Mar 20, 2010 at 9:47 AM, Michel Bauwens <
>>>>>>> michelsub2004 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
>>>>>>>> From: Dante-Gabryell Monson <dante.monson at gmail.com>
>>>>>>>> Date: Sat, Mar 20, 2010 at 2:25 PM
>>>>>>>> Subject: Fwd: [-empyre-] seeing yourself a prototype - the limits of
>>>>>>>> open source
>>>>>>>> To: Michel Bauwens <michelsub2004 at gmail.com>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> interesting reply revolving around
>>>>>>>> *
>>>>>>>> *
>>>>>>>> *" **an interest in introducing an innovation with the intention of
>>>>>>>> forcing adaptation
>>>>>>>> in the population. "*
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
>>>>>>>> From: davin heckman <davinheckman at gmail.com>
>>>>>>>> Date: Thu, Mar 18, 2010 at 10:35 PM
>>>>>>>> Subject: Re: [-empyre-] seeing yourself a prototype - the limits of
>>>>>>>> open source
>>>>>>>> To: soft_skinned_space <empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Julian,
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> I'm sorry for being unclear.  What I had meant to say is that,
>>>>>>>> typically, a prototype is a discrete thing which is created with the
>>>>>>>> intention of being tested.  Certainly the way the prototype is
>>>>>>>> tested
>>>>>>>> is a) the object itself is put through various challenges that are
>>>>>>>> anticipated uses and stresses, and b) the general integration of the
>>>>>>>> thing into the system is also tested at that point (how the thing
>>>>>>>> might fare in light of unanticipated uses and stresses).  The
>>>>>>>> distinction I was trying to draw was the coercive potential of
>>>>>>>> innovations.  Where there is less an interest in testing an
>>>>>>>> individual
>>>>>>>> thing with the intention of improving it....  and more of an
>>>>>>>> interest
>>>>>>>> in introducing an innovation with the intention of forcing
>>>>>>>> adaptation
>>>>>>>> in the population.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> I was less concerned with individuals modifying themselves through,
>>>>>>>> say, education or societies changing populations through educational
>>>>>>>> institutions.  These things, on their face, have the intention of
>>>>>>>> shaping the person and society.  They are, at least in principle,
>>>>>>>> geared towards the preservation of individual and social existence.
>>>>>>>> Or, at least, they do insofar as they are generated by a public in
>>>>>>>> service of the ideal public which they represent.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> On the other hand, there are technologies that seem to be introduced
>>>>>>>> with the stated purpose of achieving one objective, yet have the
>>>>>>>> larger objective of changing human populations.  Take, for instance,
>>>>>>>> the infamous case of Nestle's infant formula strategy in Africa.
>>>>>>>> Company reps masquerading as health workers introduce infant formula
>>>>>>>> to a population that had not used it previously.  The suggested
>>>>>>>> purpose is to provide nutrition and humanitarian aid.  But when
>>>>>>>> women
>>>>>>>> stopped lactating and suddenly found themselves forced to pay for
>>>>>>>> the
>>>>>>>> product or watch their children starve, a much more radical
>>>>>>>> technical
>>>>>>>> innovation becomes apparent--the forced creation of a new social web
>>>>>>>> in service of corporate interests.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> More current (and relevant) examples might be the sort of biological
>>>>>>>> innovations that have been spurred by petrochemical industries as
>>>>>>>> ubiquitous products (plastics, agricultural products, drugs, etc)
>>>>>>>> saturate ecosystems with chemicals that interfere with hormone
>>>>>>>> production across the food chain, resulting in an explosion of
>>>>>>>> diseases requiring treatment.  I don't know that I know enough to
>>>>>>>> say
>>>>>>>> that there is anything resembling a conspiracy here....  other than
>>>>>>>> the sort of conspiracy of opportunistically imposed apathy and
>>>>>>>> ignorance.  But the general recklessness of big business seems to
>>>>>>>> suggest that there is something intentional about turning quick
>>>>>>>> profits, letting major catastrophic accidents happen, and then
>>>>>>>> profiting further.  Habituating people to live in a precarious state
>>>>>>>> of withered consciousness seems to have been the real "value"
>>>>>>>> uncovered by the pervasive barrage of technical innovations....
>>>>>>>>  human
>>>>>>>> beings can be turned into quivering beasts who will tolerate any
>>>>>>>> injustice simply to hope for another day, and in many cases, who
>>>>>>>> will
>>>>>>>> tear at each other's throats in defense of the paymasters
>>>>>>>> responsible
>>>>>>>> for this exploitation.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> I suppose I should hang it up, here.  I might be drawing a false
>>>>>>>> distinction.  And I certainly am off the rails for this month's
>>>>>>>> discussion.  There is something moralistic in my argument,
>>>>>>>> resembling
>>>>>>>> the months old discussion of "good" and "bad" that we had here.
>>>>>>>>  Yet,
>>>>>>>> I wonder that there might be some value in drawing distinctions
>>>>>>>> between orders of technological existence.   That the fast-forward
>>>>>>>> orientation of prototyping is fascinating and productive....  but it
>>>>>>>> is a loaded term...  and it is one that I have a hard time
>>>>>>>> unpacking.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Davin
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> On Thu, Mar 18, 2010 at 11:50 AM, Julian Oliver <
>>>>>>>> julian at julianoliver.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>> > ..on Thu, Mar 18, 2010 at 03:10:01PM -0000, Johannes Birringer
>>>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>>> >> >> Davin wrote:>> At one point in time, discrete objects were
>>>>>>>> things that were considered prototypes that could be thrown into an existing
>>>>>>>> system and tested. Increasingly, it seems like the prototypes are geared to
>>>>>>>> test individual and collective consciousness.  In other words, maybe we are
>>>>>>>> the  prototypes?  Being tested so that we can be effectively processed,
>>>>>>>> shrink-wrapped, labeled, bought and sold>>
>>>>>>>> >
>>>>>>>> > Hmm, This statement from Davin confused me also. I thought it was
>>>>>>>> fairly clear
>>>>>>>> > that any act of learning - or any 'attempt', which all action is
>>>>>>>> at it's root -
>>>>>>>> > simultaneously produces the self as a prototype, even if only for
>>>>>>>> the duration
>>>>>>>> > of that act. The very notion of a prototype assumes a platonic and
>>>>>>>> eventuating
>>>>>>>> > objecthood, a finished thing. When are people ever so singularly
>>>>>>>> resolved?
>>>>>>>> >
>>>>>>>> > Second order prototyping is the work of other people, especially
>>>>>>>> aquaintances,
>>>>>>>> > marketeers and those that resource people.
>>>>>>>> >
>>>>>>>> > Beast,
>>>>>>>> >
>>>>>>>> > --
>>>>>>>> > Julian Oliver
>>>>>>>> > home: New Zealand
>>>>>>>> > based: Berlin, Germany
>>>>>>>> > currently: Berlin, Germany
>>>>>>>> > about: http://julianoliver.com
>>>>>>>> > _______________________________________________
>>>>>>>> > empyre forum
>>>>>>>> > empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
>>>>>>>> > http://www.subtle.net/empyre
>>>>>>>> >
>>>>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>>>>> empyre forum
>>>>>>>> empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
>>>>>>>> http://www.subtle.net/empyre
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> --
>>>>>>>> Work: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dhurakij_Pundit_University -
>>>>>>>> Think thank:
>>>>>>>> http://www.asianforesightinstitute.org/index.php/eng/The-AFI
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net  -
>>>>>>>> http://blog.p2pfoundation.net
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Connect: http://p2pfoundation.ning.com; Discuss:
>>>>>>>> http://listcultures.org/mailman/listinfo/p2presearch_listcultures.org
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Updates: http://del.icio.us/mbauwens;
>>>>>>>> http://friendfeed.com/mbauwens; http://twitter.com/mbauwens;
>>>>>>>> http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> --
>>>>>> Work: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dhurakij_Pundit_University - Think
>>>>>> thank: http://www.asianforesightinstitute.org/index.php/eng/The-AFI
>>>>>>
>>>>>> P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net  -
>>>>>> http://blog.p2pfoundation.net
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Connect: http://p2pfoundation.ning.com; Discuss:
>>>>>> http://listcultures.org/mailman/listinfo/p2presearch_listcultures.org
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Updates: http://del.icio.us/mbauwens; http://friendfeed.com/mbauwens;
>>>>>> http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> Work: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dhurakij_Pundit_University - Think
>>>> thank: http://www.asianforesightinstitute.org/index.php/eng/The-AFI
>>>>
>>>> P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net  -
>>>> http://blog.p2pfoundation.net
>>>>
>>>> Connect: http://p2pfoundation.ning.com; Discuss:
>>>> http://listcultures.org/mailman/listinfo/p2presearch_listcultures.org
>>>>
>>>> Updates: http://del.icio.us/mbauwens; http://friendfeed.com/mbauwens;
>>>> http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Work: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dhurakij_Pundit_University - Think
>> thank: http://www.asianforesightinstitute.org/index.php/eng/The-AFI
>>
>> P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net  - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net
>>
>> Connect: http://p2pfoundation.ning.com; Discuss:
>> http://listcultures.org/mailman/listinfo/p2presearch_listcultures.org
>>
>> Updates: http://del.icio.us/mbauwens; http://friendfeed.com/mbauwens;
>> http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>


-- 
Work: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dhurakij_Pundit_University - Think thank:
http://www.asianforesightinstitute.org/index.php/eng/The-AFI

P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net  - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net

Connect: http://p2pfoundation.ning.com; Discuss:
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