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Psychoanalysis and the Post-Political

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An Interview with Slavoj Zizek

For many, Jacques [[Lacan ]] represents [[postmodern ]] [[theory ]] at its height--that

is, at its worst. Lacan, so say his detractors, made a career out

of obscurantism, and may not even have believed very much of what he

said. Noam [[Chomsky ]] once indicated such a hypothesis when he explainedthat "my frank opinion is that [Lacan] was a [[conscious ]] charlatan, andhe was simply playing [[games ]] with the [[Paris ]] [[intellectual ]] [[community ]] to

see how much absurdity he could produce and still be taken seriously."

Even Lacanians might find it in their hearts to forgive Chomsky

The best counterpoint to suspicions such as Chomsky's may well be found in

the [[work ]] of Slavoj [[Zizek]], whose frenetic endorsements of [[Lacanian ]] theory

achieve a dense complexity even as they provide moments of startling

(and typically humorous) clarity. Take Zizek's way of explaining why

even one of the most banal features of late twentieth-century [[culture]],the laugh-track of [[situation ]] [[comedy]], is itself an illustration of theLacanian [[thesis ]] that "[[desire ]] is desire of the [[Other]]":

. . . let us remind ourselves of a phenomenon quite usual in popular

[[television ]] shows or serials: "canned [[laughter]]." After some supposedly

funny or witty remark, you can hear the laughter and applause included in

the soundtrack of the show itself--here we have the exact opposite of the

Chorus in classical [[tragedy]]; it is here that we have to look for "[[living]]

Antiquity." That is to say, why the laughter? The first possible

answer--that it serves to remind us when to laugh--is interesting enough,

since it implies the [[paradox ]] that laughter is a

[End Page 1]

matter of [[duty ]] and not of some spontaneous [[feeling]]; but this answer

is not sufficient because we do not usually laugh. The only

correct answer would be that the Other--embodied in the television set--is

relieving us even of our duty to laugh--is laughing instead of us. So

even if, tired from a hard day's stupid work, all evening we did [[nothing]]but [[gaze ]] drowsily into the television set, we can say afterwards thatobjectively, through the medium of the Other, we had a really [[good ]] [[time]].

such as this can have the effect of seducing even Zizek's most skeptical

readers, but this is not to say that Zizek's work hasn't earned him

opponents. For many, Zizek's Lacanian [[analyses ]] of contemporary culturecannot quite shed the burdens of classical [[psychoanalysis ]] itself:in an academy happily enamored of [[historicism ]] and often disinclined

toward universalisms of any kind, Zizek's mostly ahistorical,

[[psychoanalytic ]] [[defense ]] of the [[Enlightenment ]] draws criticism fromvarious [[epistemological ]] camps. One of the most persistent reproaches,for [[instance]], has been voiced by [[Judith ]] [[Butler]], who asks rhetorically,

"Can Zizekian psychoanalysis respond to the pressure to theorize

the historical specificity of [[trauma]], to provide [[texture ]] for the

specific exclusions, annihilations, and unthinkable losses that

[[structure ]] . . . [[social ]] phenomena . . . ?"

Others have raised suspicions about the political implications of the

I recently met with Zizek in [[order ]] to discuss such complaints, as wellas to elicit his opinions on the ongoing crises in the ex-[[Yugoslavia]],Zizek's country of [[birth]]. The latter topic has become a heated[[subject ]] for Zizek, who ran a close campaign for the presidency of[[Slovenia ]] in 1990, and who views the resurgence of [[nationalism ]] in the[[Balkan ]] states as a phenomenon that has gone completely misunderstood bythe West. Since the Bosnian [[conflict ]] began near the outset of thelast decade, ex-Yugoslav [[politics ]] have taken up more [[space ]] in Zizek's[[thinking]], but still, there is probably no dominant feature within the

contemporary landscape he analyzes. For Zizek, one quickly realizes,

[[life ]] is essentially an excuse to theorize; hence, his Lacanian commentaryon the [[psychopathology ]] of everyday [[existence ]] rarely ceases. As we packed

into a crowded elevator in New York's St. Moritz hotel, for instance, the

panel of [[control ]] buttons caught Zizek's eye, provoking an excursus onthe faulty [[logic ]] behind the hotel's [[symbolic ]] [[exclusion ]] of the thirteenth

floor. "You

cannot cheat God!" he proclaimed, drawing bewildered glances from the

[[people ]] around us. "They shouldn't call it the fourteenth floor--they

should just make the thirteenth floor an empty mezzanine, an

ominous [[lack ]] in the midst of the [[others]]." Somehow, the commentary slideffortlessly, [[naturally]], into the subject of [[voyeurism]], and from there,to the Lacanian [[distinction ]] between the gaze and the look. Our later

conversation partook of a similar, free-associative pattern even as it

returned to a few fundamental concerns: the [[position ]] of Lacanian theoryin today's academy, Zizek's friendly [[antagonism ]] with [[Judith Butler]],Zizek's own polemic against multicultural [[identity ]] politics. And talking

with Zizek, one realizes that these issues are all of a piece with a

larger problem: What kinds of [[political ]] [[ontology]]--what manner of social[[perception]], for that matter--does today's [[theoretical ]] constellationallow or, more particularly, [[foreclose]]?

Christopher Hanlon: Your home city, [[Ljubljana]], is home to a[[number ]] of prominent Lacanians today. Was there something [[particular ]] [[about]]the Slovene--then the Yugoslav--[[scene ]] that made Lacan particularly crucialduring the 1980s, when you were first formulating your [[project]]?

[[Slavoj Zizek]]: I believe it was simply someincredible [[contingency]]. The first [[thing ]] here is that, in the

ex-Yugoslavia, the phenomenon is strictly limited to Slovenia--there are

practically no Lacanians in the other Yugoslav republics. But I'm often

asked this question: "Why there?" The only thing I can say is that there

were some marginal, not-sufficient, [[negative ]] [[conditions]]. One was thatthe intellectual climate was very open; or rather, the [[regime ]] was open if

you didn't directly pursue political opposition. There was intellectual

[[freedom]], borders were open, and so on . . . . And the other thing was thatSlovenia was, far from [[being ]] isolated from [[Europe]], a kind of microcosm,in the [[sense ]] that all of what went on in the [[philosophical ]] scene aroundthe [[world]], all main orientations, were fairly represented. This is tosay, there was a clear Frankfurt [[School ]] or Critical Theory orientation,there was a [[Heideggerian ]] orientation, there were analytical [[philosophers]],

and so on and so on . . . . But within this constellation, I don't have

a precise theory, though it's something I'm often asked. Why there? One

thing is that in other areas--around Zagreb and Belgrade, in Croatia and

Serbia--they have much more substantial [[psychoanalytical ]] traditions,and maybe this is what prevented [[them ]] from appropriating Lacan. InSlovenia, there was no psychoanalytic [[tradition]], so we were starting

from a zero-point.

For me, the original spark came out of the confluence of

two traditions: [[Frankfurt School ]] [[marxism ]] and, of course, Lacanian

psychoanalysis. When I was a young student in Slovenia, the intellectual

scene

[End Page 3]

was [[divided ]] between Heideggerians and the Frankfurt School. UnderYugoslav [[Communism]], that is, [[dialectical ]] [[materialism ]] was [[dead]]; it was nolonger the [[State ]] [[philosophy]]. It was some kind of vague [[humanist ]] marxism,

linked to the Frankfurt School. At least in Slovenia, the main opposition

was Heideggerrian: this is why my first book was on [[Heidegger ]] and[[language]]. But what made me suspicious was this phenomenon, as it seemed

to me, by which both Heideggerians and the followers of the Frankfurt

School began to [[speak ]] the same language. This precisely aroused me.

CH: Though Slovene culture and politics play a pronounced

[[role ]] in your later work--say, from The Metastases of [[Enjoyment ]] onward--American [[popular culture ]] remains the central touchstone. Do yousee America as more pathological, more ripe for [[analysis]]?

SZ: This is perhaps the result of my personal trauma,

which was that my [[relationship ]] with Slovene art, especially with Slovene[[literature ]] and [[cinema]], was extremely negative. In Slovenia we have acult of literature, especially [[poetry]], as "the fundamental cornerstoneof our [[society]]"; the [[idea ]] is that the Slovene poets effectively createdthe Slovene [[nation]], so there's a [[false ]] veneration of poetry. On top ofit, most Slovene writers now are, in no uncertain [[terms]], [[right]]-wingnationalists, so I'm happily not on [[speaking ]] terms with them--it's

a kind of negative gesture of pride for me to turn to American pop

culture. Although, in the last few years, I have been turning toward

so-called "[[literary]]" or high culture; my new book will deal with

Shklovsky, Tchaikovsky, and so on.

CH: [[Another ]] new book? Does Verso at all worry that you mightflood the [[market]]?

There have been some surprises here. For example, they

were worried about The [[Ticklish Subject]]. "After so many books,who will buy such a thick book, 400 pages . . . ." But OK--I [[know ]] that I

am very close to flooding the market; the next thing will be that

next month a short book on [[David Lynch]]'s Lost Highway will comeout by the [[University ]] of Washington Press, Seattle. Then it will be this

other book, this big triple-orgy, this dialogue, between Judith Butler,

Ernesto [[Laclau]], and me. The idea was that each of us should write anopening [[statement]], maybe fifty pages, defining his or her

position toward the other two. Then two rounds of questions and answers;

it grew into a big book, about [[three ]] hundred printed pages. And it's

very interesting to me, because it isn't a polite debate; it's nasty,

nasty--it almost but I hope didn't ruin our personal relationships. We're

[End Page 4]

nasty, with all these rude expressions, you know: "He's totally [[missing]]

the point," "He didn't do his homework," "Sounds like she's decided to

tone it down a little bit," and so on and so on.

CH: I [[want ]] to ask about one common critique of your work, mostrecently voiced by [[James ]] Hurley, that centers on what we might call your

"intrapsychic" focus.

SZ: No, because I [[think ]] that such criticism misses thepoint of [[Freudian ]] [[subjectivity]]. I think that the very term "intrapsychic"

is misleading; I think that, at least for Lacan, who emphasizes this

again and again, the proper [[dimension ]] of the [[unconscious ]] is not "deep[[inside]]." The proper dimension is [[outside]], materialized in the stateapparatuses. The [[model ]] of [[split ]] subjectivity, as later echoed by Louis[[Althusser]], is not that there is something deep in me which is [[repressed]];it's not this [[internal ]] [[psychic ]] conflict. What subverts my consciousattitudes are the implicit [[ideological ]] beliefs externalized, embodiedin my [[activity]]. For instance, I'm interested in this new fashion ofHollywood [[Holocaust ]] comedy. Have you noticed how, starting with Life Is

Beautiful, we have a new genre, repeated in Jakob the Liar, and

so on? Apropos of this, I ask, "Why do Holocaust tragedies fail?" For me,

Speilberg is at his lowest during a scene from Schindler's [[List]],when the concentration-camp commander faces the [[Jewish ]] [[girl ]] and we

have this internal monologue, where he is split between his attraction

to the girl and his racist tract: you know, "Are you a rat? Are you a

[[human ]] being?" and so on. I think this split is false. I take here quiteliterally Lacan's dictum that psychoanalysis is not [[psychology]], that the

ultimate lesson of psychoanalysis is that when you analyze phenomena

like [[Nazis ]] or [[Stalinism]], it is totally wrong to think that you will

arrive at any pertinent result through so-called in-depth profiles

of [[figures ]] like [[Stalin ]] or [[Hitler]]. Here there is a lesson to belearned from Hannah [[Arendt]]--though at a different level I disagree withher--about the banality of [[evil]]. The banality of evil means for me thatthe key is not, for example, the [[personality ]] of Eichmann; there is a gapseparating the [[acts ]] of Eichmann from Eichmann's [[self]]-[[experience]]. But what

I would add is that this doesn't mean that Eichmann was simply innocent

in the sense that he was possessed by some kind of brutally [[objective]]

logic. My idea is more and more that we are dealing with--to reference

my eternal idea about canned laughter--what I am tempted to call a kind

of canned [[hatred]]. In the same way that the TV set laughs

for you, relieves you of the obligation to really laugh, Eichmann himself

didn't really have to [[hate ]] the [[Jews]]; he was able to be just an ordinary

person. It's the objective ideological machinery that did the hating;

the hatred was imported, it was "out there."

the point in the sense that the fundamental lesson of psychoanalysis

is that the unconscious is outside, crystallized in institutional

practices. This is why, for me, [[commodity ]] [[fetishism ]] is a nice example of

this--not collective, I'm not speaking of course about some Jungian

[[collective unconscious]]--unconscious in the sense of the set of

presuppositions, beliefs. The subject is not aware of these beliefs,

but the beliefs are materialized in the social practices, [[rituals]],institutions in which the subject participates. So in this sense, I [[claim]]

that this idea that when you analyze in psychoanalytic terms what are

ideological phenomena, you translate them into intrapsychic phenomena,

definitely does not hold for Lacan. If anything, Lacan can be accused

of the opposite mistake, of externalizing these issues. For example,

in a friendly [[discussion ]] with him years ago, this is what Fred [[Jameson]]reproached me with: that the inner self-experience [[disappears ]] with me,

that I externalize everything into social rituals.

Let me put it this way: Lacan is an [[author ]] with which it's incredible

how "anything goes." It's incredible how whatever comes to our head,

you can attribute to Lacan--people are very insensitive to the things

some of the things he says are formulated very clearly. Just to give you

an example: though I appreciate her very much--especially her late work,

The Psychic Life of [[Power]]--Judith Butler repeatedly makes this

strange claim, this strange thesis, that for us Lacanians (not for her),

"unconscious" is [[Imaginary ]] [[resistance ]] to [[the Symbolic ]] Law. Where did she

find this? I'm almost tempted to say, "Wait a minute! If there is

one phrase that is the first commonplace about Lacan, the first

[[association]], it is 'The unconscious is [[structured ]] like a language'!" Theunconscious is the [[Symbolic order]]. Where did she find this

idea that the unconscious is Imaginary resistance? I know what she

means--her idea is that we are caught in the web of social relations

which are the Symbolic order, and that [[unconsciously]], our resistance isto [[identify ]] with the set of [[social norms]], and so on and so on. OK! An

interesting thesis, but unfortunately, it has absolutely nothing

to do with Lacan.

I notice the same split within your audience. On the one hand, there's a

kind of weird delight you can elicit, an experience of almost fanatical

excitement, but on the other, one also observes a deep [[displeasure]]. Ofcourse, many [[public ]] intellectuals gain both followers and opponents,

but with you, there's almost no middle ground between these two extremes

. . .

SZ: . . . I know. My friends tell me that if you

check the amazon.com reviews of my books, I get either five

stars or no stars. You know, either, "It's [[total ]] crap!" or "It's a

revelation!" Never, "It's a moderately good book, not very good, but some

solid achievements." This is an interesting point in the sense that--this

is [[true ]] especially in England, with Radical Philosophy; they don'tlike me there--there are these [[fantasies ]] circulating around me, that Ishouldn't be trusted; beneath this apparently [[marxist]], [[left-wing ]] surface,

there is this strange, decadent, even nationalistic attachment . . .

Slovenia, and for a lot of Western left-wingers, we Slovenes committed

the original sin. The idea is that we were the first ones to leave

Yugoslavia, that we started the [[process ]] and then hypocritically escaped

the consequences. We stepped out when the house of cards was starting

to collapse, and started it all, and we didn't even suffer for it. It's

incredible how strong this accusation is. So Dews's big reproach is

"Why didn't you oppose the disintegration of Yugoslavia?" First, I was

pretty much indifferent to this at the time. But [[the thing ]] that surprises

me about this is that--typically in England--the very same people who

are opposed to the disintegration of Yugoslavia, if you ask them about,

for instance, Ireland: all these principles are suddenly reversed. So

that is not nationalist [[madness]]?

I guess I would say that at least one level of this political suspicion

against me is conditioned by what I call this politically-correct

Western-[[leftist ]] [[racism]]. In the aftermath of the disintegration of

Yugoslavia, a new entity was produced with which I don't want to have

anything to do: the

SZ: Yeah, yeah, that kind of stuff. And I've never wanted

to play that [[game]], to [[present ]] myself as this kind of [[victim]]. This is one

aspect. The other aspect is a general resistance to Lacan. Let's put it

this way: vaguely, we have three orientations today. For phenomenologists

articles, I saw Nancy Fraser make a line of distinction between Kristeva

and Lacan, claiming that Kristeva may be of some use, but that Lacan

can be of absolutely no use. . . . With [[deconstruction]], it's thesame--you know, this incredible tension between Lacan and [[Derrida]]. Then,

of course, for cognitivists, Lacan is simply deconstruction. So all main

orientations definitely reject the Lacanian approach.

CH: Well, apropos of this [[Habermas]]/Lacan [[division ]] you mention

. . .

debate is usually either Habermas versus communitarians, who consider

Habermas too much of a universalist, or on the other hand Habermas

versus deconstructionists, who again question whether we [[need ]] [[universal]]

norms. The point is . . . don't you think that for Habermasians we

rarely even enter the picture? The big debate is, for example in the

[[feminist ]] circle, Nancy Fraser or Seyla Benhabib against Judith Butler,against [[Wendy Brown]]--you have that opposition. Or deconstruction versus

neopragmatism--we simply do not enter the picture.

CH: Well, here in the States, the opposition seems to me, more

and more, to be between neopragmatists--I'm not thinking of Habermasians

so much as I am about people like [[Richard Rorty]], Walter Benn Michaels--and

"the theorists," in a totalizing, reductive sense. For instance, a

couple of years ago, I saw Cornel West intone a kind of neopragmatist

complaint against you during a roundtable discussion: how do you justify

your highly abstract work, when there are [[concrete ]] political battles tobe waged, and then call it [[liberal]]?

CH: Yes. In any [[case]], I point out the instance as an indication

that perhaps it's theory itself that is discounted, or discountable,

right now, rather than Lacanian theory in particular.

reproach that can be addressed specifically to Lacan. My idea

is the old marxist idea that this immediate reference to experience,

[[practice]], [[struggle]], etcetera, usually relies on the most abstract andpure theory, and as an old [[philosopher ]] I would say, as you said before,

that we simply cannot escape theory. I fanatically oppose this turn which

has taken [[place ]] in [[social theory]], this idea that there is no longer time

for great theoretical projects, that all we can do is narrativize the

experience of our [[suffering]], that all various ethnic or [[sexual ]] groupscan ultimately do is to narrate their painful, [[traumatic ]] experience. I

think this is a catastrophe. I think that this fits perfectly the

existing [[capitalist ]] order, that there is nothing subversive in it. Ithink that this fits perfectly today's [[ideology ]] of [[victimization]],

where in order to legitimize, to gain power politically, you must present

yourself, somehow, as the victim.

political divisions between Habermas and Derrida, although they cannot

stand each other? There are none! The same general left-of-center,

not-too-liberal but basically democratic [[vision ]] . . . practically, their

positions are indistinguishable. Now, Rorty draws from this the conclusion

that philosophy doesn't matter. I am tempted to draw a more [[aggressive]],

opposite conclusion: that philosophy does matter, but that

this political indifference signals the fact that although they appear

their respective philosophies. Besides, not all philosophers would

adopt the same position; someone like Heidegger definitely would not,

and a left-winger like [[[Alain] ]] [[Badiou ]] definitely would not.

The big question for me today concerns this new consensus--in England

it's the "[[third ]] way," in [[Germany ]] it's the "new middle"--this idea that[[capitalism ]] is here to stay, we can maybe just smooth it out a little with[[multiculturalism]], and so on . . . . Is this a new horizon or not? What

I appreciate in someone like Rorty is that at least he openly makes this

point. What annoys me about some deconstructionists is that they adopt

identity politics, and especially the subversive hope some intellectuals

attach to them. But with your newest book, this critique acquires a more

honed feel. Now, you [[suggest ]] that partisans of the identity-politics

struggle have had a "depoliticizing" effect in some way. Could you hone

your comments even further? Do you mean that identity politics have come

to supersede what for you are more important [[antagonisms ]] (such as thatbetween [[capital ]] and [[democracy]], for instance), or do you mean something

more fundamental, that politics itself has been altered for the worse?

it this way: if one were to make this reproach directly, they would

explode. They would say, "My God, isn't it the exact opposite? Isn't

it that identity politics politicized, opened up, a new [[domain]],

spheres of life that were previously not perceived as the province

of politics?" But first, this [[form ]] of [[politicization ]] nonethelessinvolves a transformation of "politics" into "[[cultural ]] politics," where

certain questions are simply no longer asked. Now, I'm not saying that

we should simply [[return ]] to some marxist-fundamentalist [[essentialism]],

or whatever. I'm just saying that . . . my God, let's at least just

take note of this, that certain questions--like those concerning the

[[nature ]] of relationships of production, whether political democracy is

really the ultimate horizon, and so on--these questions are simply no

longer asked. And what I claim is that this is the necessary consequence

that "No, we don't abandon those other aspects, we just add to politics

proper." No, the abandonment is always implicit. Why? Take a concrete

example, like the [[multitude ]] of studies on the exploitation of either

African Americans or more usually illegal Mexican immigrants who work

as harvesters here in the U.S. I appreciate such studies very much,

but in most of them--to a point at least--silently, implicitly, [[economic]]exploitation is read as the result of [[intolerance]], racism. In Germany,they don't even speak of the [[working ]] [[class]]; they speak of immigrants . . .

CH: "Visiting [[workers]]."

we are dealing with a false psychologization. The problem is not that

of intrapsychic [[tolerance]], and so I'm opposed to this way in which all

problems are translated into problems of racism, intolerance, etcetera. In

this sense, I claim that with so-called postmodern identity politics,

the [[whole ]] [[concept ]] of politics has changed, because it's not onlythat certain questions aren't any longer asked. The [[moment ]] you begin totalk about . . . what's the usual [[triad]]? "[[Gender ]] . . ."

SZ: No, no. I'm well aware, for example, that the

whole problematic of political [[economy ]] also had its own symbolic

dimension. . . . I'm not playing "merely cultural" problems against

"[[real]]" problems. What I'm saying is that with this new proliferation ofpolitical [[subjects]], certain questions are no longer asked. Is the state

our ultimate horizon? Is capitalism our ultimate horizon? I just take

note that certain concerns have disappeared.

SZ: [...] You've got me here, in that sense. But I'm

not mystifying the [[notion ]] of act into some big [[event ]] . . . . What I'm

saying is that the way the political space is structured today more

and more prevents the emergence of the act. But I'm not thinking of

some metaphysical event--once I was even accused of conceiving of some

protofascist, out-of-nowhere [[intervention]]. For me, an act is simply

something that changes the very horizon in which it takes place, and I

claim that the present situation closes the space for such acts.

[End Page 11]

say so publicly, I know privately that [[Alain Badiou ]] tends to this

conclusion--that maybe politics, for some foreseeable time, is no longer

a domain where acts are possible. That is, there were [[times ]] during whichacts did happen--the [[French ]] [[Revolution]], the October Revolution, maybe the

'68 uprisings.

CH: Let's move on to another topic. I have to ask you about your

reaction to what may be Derrida's last [[word ]] on his whole conflictwith Lacan, published in [[Resistances ]] to Psychoanalysis. Withoutretracting any of his original theses concerning Lacan's [[seminar ]] on "ThePurloined [[Letter]]," Derrida now insists that "I loved him and admired

him a lot," and also that "Not only was I not criticizing Lacan, but I

was not even [[writing ]] a sort of overseeing or objectifying metadiscourse on Lacan," <a name="REF8" href="#FOOT8">8</a>

that it was all part of a mutual dialogue . . . . What is your

SZ: I would just like to make two points. First, I still

think, as I first developed in [[Enjoy ]] Your [[Symptom]]!, that

"resistance" is the appropriate term here. In deconstructionist circles,

you can almost feel it, this strong embarrassment about Lacan. So

they can buy Lacan only, as it were, conditionally, only insofar as

they can say he didn't go far enough. I claim that the [[truth ]] is the

exact opposite; the only way they can appropriate Lacan is to submit

him to a radical misreading. You know, all the time we hear about the

"[[phallic ]] [[signifier]]," and so on, and so on, but the [[figure ]] ofLacan they [[construct ]] is precisely what Lacan was trying to undermine. For

example, one of the standard criticisms of some deconstructionists here

in the States is that Lacan elevates the "[[Big Other]]" into some kind

of non-historical, a priori symbolic order . . . . My only, perhaps

naïve answer to this is that the big Lacanian thesis from the

mid-fifties is that "The Big Other doesn't [[exist]]." He repeats

this again and again, and the point of this is precisely that there is

no symbolic order that would serve as a kind of prototranscendental

[[guarantor]]. My second point would be a very [[materialist]], Althusserian

one. Without reducing the theoretical aspects of this conflict,

let's not forget that academia is itself an "Ideological State [[Apparatus]],"

and that all these orientations are not simply theoretical orientations,

but what's in question is thousands of posts, departmental politics,

and so on. Lacanians are excluded from this. That is to say, we are not

a field. You know, Derrida has his own [[empire]], Habermasians have

their own

not that "I really hated him," but "there is a tension; we are

irreducible to each other." This statement you point out is the kiss

of [[death]]. What's the [[message ]] in this apparently nice statement fromDerrida? The message is that "the [[difference ]] is really not so strong,

so that our field, deconstruction, can swallow all of this; it's

really an internal discussion." I think it is not. I'm not even saying

than ever to emphasize--the tension between Derrida and Lacan and their

followers is not an interfamilial struggle. It's a struggle between two

radically different [[global ]] perceptions. Even when they appear to useapproximately the same terms, refer to the same [[orders]], they do it in a

totally different way, and this is why all attempts to mediate between

them ultimately fall short. Once, I was at a conference at Cardozo Law

School where Drucilla Cornell maintained that the Lacanian Real was a good

"first attempt" at penetrating beyond this ahistorical Symbolic

order, but that it also retains this dimension of [[otherness ]] that is

still defined through the Symbolic order, and that the Derridean

notion of writing incorporates this otherness into the Symbolic order

typical of what I'm talking about. We should simply accept that there

is no common language here, that Lacan is no closer to Derrida than to

[[Hegel]], than to Heidegger, than to whomever you want.

CH: Judith Butler--with whom you have engaged in ongoing if

cordial debate--maintains that the Lacanian [[topology ]] is itself dubious

for its nonhistorical, transcultural presuppositions. You yourself have

written that "[[jouissance ]] is non-historical" <a name="REF9" href="#FOOT9">9</a>

--How do you respond to complaints such as Butler's?

maybe hundreds of pages, in this book. My answer is to say that she

is non-historical. That is to say, she presents a certain [[narrative]],

the same as Ernesto [Laclau]. With Ernesto, it's that we have an older

type of essentialist class politics, then slowly, slowly, essentialism

starts to disintegrate, and now we have this [[contingent ]] struggle for[[hegemony ]] where everything is open to negotiation . . . . With Judith

Butler, there is the same implicit narrative: in the old times, there

was sex essentialism, [[biologically]]-[[identified]]; then slowly, slowly,this started disintegrating into a sex/gender distinction, the [[awareness]]

that gender is not biologically--

what I mean? There is a certain, almost teleological narrative here,

in which from the "bad" zero-point of essentialism, slowly we come to

the "good" realization that everything is a [[performative ]] effect, that

nothing is exempted from the contingent struggle for hegemony. But don't

you need a metanarrative if you want to avoid the conclusion that people

historical trajectory, but an acceptance of a loosely Foucauldian premise,

that one hundred and fifty years ago there were in place certain

institutional mechanisms, power-[[discourses]], which coerced [[belief ]] from

their subjects, engendered them . . .

SZ: Ah! But if you accept this Foucauldian metanarrative,

then things get a little complicated. Because [[Foucault ]] is not speakingabout truth-[[value]]; for him, it is simply the [[change ]] from one episteme to

another. Then . . . OK, I ask you another question--let's engage in this

discussion, with you as Butler. So: is there a truth-value distinction

epistemic presupposition of her work is implicitly--even explicitly,

at least in her early work--that, to put it bluntly, sex always already

was a performative [[construction]]. They just didn't know it then. But

you cannot unite this with Foucauldian narrative, because Foucauldian

narrative is epistemologically neutral, in which we [[pass ]] from one

paradigm to the other. You know, sex was confessionary then; sex is

now post-confessionary, pleasurable bodies, whatever . . . . But OK:

metanarrative. Marxism would provide the other one, in the sense that

"the [[development ]] of capitalism itself provoked a shift in subjectivity,"

whatever. But again, what I claim is that there is some unresolved

tension concerning [[historicity ]] and truth-value.

I ask you a different question. Both in Laclau and in Butler, there

is a certain theory: Butler--and I'm speaking of early Butler; later,

things get much more [[complex]], much more interesting, a more intense

dialogue becomes possible . . .

coalition," although Ernesto rejects the term . . . . Now, what are these

theories? Are they universal theories--of gender or of social/political

[[processes]]--or are they specific theories about political practice,

sex practice, within a certain historical/political moment? I claim that

the ambiguity is still irreducible. At the same time that it's clear that

these theories are rooted in a certain historical moment, it's also clear

that they touch upon a universal dimension. Now my ironic conclusion

is that, with all this anti-[[Hegelianism]], what both Ernesto and Judithdo here is the worst kind of pseudo-[[Hegelian ]] historicism. At a certain

point, it's as if the access to truth or what always already was true

is possible only in a certain historical situation. So in other [[words]],

philosophically, I claim that beneath these theories of contingency,

there is another narrative that is deeply teleological.

CH: But either Butler or Laclau might rebut this reproach by

pointing out that even such an embedded [[teleology ]] is no worse than a[[matrix ]] of non-historical Lacanian presuppositions.

symbolic norm. It's interesting how, in order to qualify the Lacanian

notion of [[sexual difference ]] as a nonhistorical Real, she silently slips

in this nonhistorical gender norm, to then claim that "we homosexuals

are excluded from this," and so on. So her whole criticism inveighs

point is that the Lacanian Real, in a way, is historical,

in the sense that each historical epoch, if you will, has its own

Real. Each horizon of historicity presupposes some [[foreclosure ]] of

some Real. Now, Judith Butler would say "OK, I agree with this, but

doesn't this mean that we should re-historicize [[the Real]], include it,

re-negotiate it?" No, the problem is more radical . . . . Maybe the

ultimate misunderstanding between us--from my perspective--is that for

has to be sustained on the basis of some fundamental exclusion. Why is

there historicity? Historicity doesn't simply means that "things change,"

and so on. That's just stupid evolutionism; not in the [[biological ]] sense,

but common sense. Historicity means that there must be some unresolved

traumatic exclusion which pushes the process forward. My paradox would

be that if you take away the nonhistorical kernel, you lose [[history]]

itself. And I claim that Judith Butler herself, in her last book, is

silently approaching this position. Because in Gender Trouble,

the idea that your psychic identity is based on some primordial [[loss]]

or exclusion is anathema; it's the Big Bad Wolf. But have you noticed

that, if you read it closely, in The Psychic Life of Power she

through renouncing the fundamental passionate attachment, and that there's

no return, no re-assumption of the fundamental attachment. It's a very

Freudian notion. If you lose the distance, the [[disavowal ]] . . . it's[[psychosis]], foreclosure.

terms--that these are the good guys. You know: we have Power, which wants

to render everything controllable, and then the problem is how to give

[[voice ]] to those who are marginalized, excluded . . .

[End Page 16]

Bakhtinian carnival? That's to say that what interests me is not so

much the progressive other whom the power is controlling, but the way

in which power has to [[disavow ]] its own operation, has to rely on itsown [[obscenity]]. The split is in the power itself. So that . . . when

Butler argues very convincingly against--at least she points to the

problematic aspects of--[[legal ]] initiatives that would legalize gaymarriages, claiming that in this way, you accept state [[authority]],you become part of the "[[visible]]," you lose [[solidarity ]] with all those

whose identity is not publicly acknowledged . . . I would say, "Wait a

minute! Is there a subject in America today who defines himself

as marginalized, repressed, trampled by state authority?" Yes! They

are called survivalists! The extreme right! In the [[United States]],

this opposition between public state authority and local, marginalized

resistances is more and more an opposition between [[civil society ]] andradical [[right-wing ]] groups.

I'm not saying we should simply accept the state. I'm just

saying that I am suspicious of the political pertinence of this

opposition between the "public" [[system ]] of power which wants to control,

proscribe everything, and forms of resistance to subvert it. What I'm

more interested in are the [[obscene ]] supplements that are inherent to

power itself.

SZ: No, no . . . that was a more specific phenomenon,

a very naïve one. What happened was that, ten years ago, the [[danger]]in Slovenia was the same as in all the post-[[Communist ]] countries. Would

there emerge one big, hegemonic, nationalist movement that would then

colonize practically the entire political space, or not? That was the

[[choice]]. And by making some compromises, we succeeded. In Slovenia,the scene is totally different than in other [[post-Communist ]] countries,in the sense that we don't have--as in [[Poland]], as in Hungary--the big

opposition is not between radical, right-wing, nationalist movements

and ex-Communists. The strongest political party in Slovenia is neither

CH: Could we talk about Kosovo? In The Metastases of

Enjoyment, when the Bosnian conflict was still raging, you

insisted that the West's inability to act was rooted in its [[fixation]]with the "Balkan victim"---that is, with its [[secret ]] desire to maintain theBalkan subject as victim. More recently, when the [[NATO ]] bombings

were under way, you claimed that the act came much too late. Now, the

West seems to have descended into a period of waiting for a "democratic

on and so on. This abstract moralism bothers me, in which you deplore

everything on account of . . . what? I claim that we are dealing here with

the worst kind of Nietzschean [[ressentiment]]. And again, we [[encounter ]] here

the logic of victimization at its worst, exemplified by a New

York Times piece by Steven Erlanger.

SZ: No stake, just this abstract suffering . . . and this

is the fundamental logic, that the [Kosovar] Albanians were good so

long as they were suffering. [[Remember ]] the [[images ]] during the war, of

the Albanians coming across the mountains, fleeing Kosovo? The moment

they started to strike back--and of course there are Albanian excesses;

nationalist, and an Albanian nationalist. Now, the Serb and the Albanian

talked--of course within the horizon of their political projects--in

pretty [[rational ]] terms: you know, the Serb making the claim that Kosovo

was, for many centuries, the seat of the Serbian nation, blah, blah,

blah; the Albanian was also pretty rational, pointing out that since

but it doesn't matter what you think politically--just promise me

that when you leave here, you will not shoot at each other, that you

will tolerate each other, that you will [[love]] each other." Andthen for a brief moment--that was the [[magic ]] moment--I noticed how,

although they were officially enemies, the Albanian and the Serb

exchanged glances, as if to ask, "What's this idiot saying? Doesn't he

Another aspect I want to emphasize apropos of Serbia: here, my

friend/enemy, a Serb journalist called Alexander Tijanic, wrote

a wonderful essay examining the appeal of [[Milosevic ]] for the Serb

people. It was practically--I wondered if I could have paid him to make my

point better. He said that the West which perceives Milosevic as a kind

of tyrant doesn't see the [[perverse]], liberating aspect of Milosevic. What

Milosevic did was to open up what even Tijanic calls a "permanent

carnival": nothing functions in Serbia! Everyone can steal! Everyone can

smuggle! Again, we are back at Bakhtin. All Serbia is an eternal carnival

now. This is the crucial thing people do not get here; it's not simply

some kind of "dark [[terror]]," but a kind of false, explosive liberation.

possibility is that Milosevic's regime will survive, but the country

will be isolated, ignored, [[floating ]] in its own shit, a pariah. That'sone option. Another option that we [[dream ]] about is that, through mass

demonstrations or whatever, there will be "a new beginning," a new

opening in the sense of a Western-style democratic upheaval. . . .

SZ: Of course! What you don't get often through the Western

[[media ]] is this hypocritical . . . for instance, when there was a clash

between the police and anti-Milosevic demonstrators, you know what the

demonstrators were shouting? "Why are you beating us? Go to Kosovo and

beat the Albanians!" So much for the "Serb Democratic Opposition"! Their

accusation against Milosevic is not that he is un-democratic, though

it's also that: it's "You lost Bosnia! You lost Kosovo!" So I [[fear ]] the

advent of a regime that would present itself to the West as open and

democratic, but will play this covert game. When pressed by the West to

<a name="authbio" href="#top">Christopher Hanlon</a> recently received his Ph.D. from the University of

Massachusetts, Amherst. His current work concerns the intersections of

psychoanalysis, [[pragmatism]], and American narratives of self-invention. His

interview with Slavoj Zizek took place in New York City on 15 October

1999.

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