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The first thing one can reproach him with is that he succumbed to the temptation documentary on Heiner Mueller and his staging of catastrophism[[Hamlet]] in 1989, of perceiving "Zeit aus den Fugen," deploys the situation (in 1989) as one entire scope of utter despair (recall his statements from those years that he just wants reticence to drown himself in alcohol embrace [[German]] unification and drugs). A lot the simple direct transposition of today's claims the BRD [[model]] on the DDR. What distinguishes Mueller is that he went much further than those who just complained how the XXth century unique [[chance]] of developing a [[third]] way beyond [[state]] [[socialism]] and [[global]] [[capitalism]] was missed: Mueller questioned the most catastrophic in the entire human history, the lowest point a priori legitimacy of nihilismfree elections themselves, proposing a risked comparison with 1933 ("free elections also brought [[Hitler]] to [[power]]"). What this just the situation display of extreme danger, etc., forgets the elementary lesson arrogance of dialectics: a fake dissident whose [[narcissism]] was hurt when the XXth century appears as such because masses rejected the criteria themselves changed - today, we simply have much higher standards alternative of what constitutes the violation democratic socialism? Was Mueller himself thrown out of human rights, etcjoint? Or can his stance be defended? these [[terms]]. The fact Now that the situation appears catastrophic 10^th anniversary of Mueller's [[death]] is thus in itself a positive signapproaching, a sign of (some kind of) progress: we are today much more sensitive it is perhaps the [[time]] to the things which were going on also in the previous epochsrevisit this question. Recall feminism: only in the last 200 years was the situation of women progressively perceived My aim here is to take Mueller's stance seriously as unjusta THEORETICO-POLITICAL [[position]], although it was "objectively" getting better. Or recall not just as a pseudo-radical chic allowed and excused in advance to the treatment of disabled individuals: even a couple of decades agoeccentric [[artist]], the special entrances which enable them the access and to restaurants, theatres, etc., would have been unthinkablesee if it can be justified on The [[case]] against Mueller seems clear.<br><br>

More specificallyThe first [[thing]] one can reproach him with is that he succumbed to the temptation of catastrophism, is Muellerof perceiving the [[situation]] (in 1989) as one of utter despair ([[recall]] his statements from those years that he just wants to drown himself in alcohol and drugs). A lot of today's stance not emblematic of claims on how the XXth century was the privileged "official dissidents" with free visas to travel to most catastrophic in the Westentire [[human]] [[history]], angry at the stupid crowd for betraying their dreams? One can make even a more general lowest point hereof [[nihilism]], the situation of extreme [[danger]], etc., forgets the elementary lesson of dialectics: what about prothe XXth century appears as such because the criteria themselves changed -Castro Western Leftists who despise today, we simply have much higher standards of what Cubans themselves call "<i>gusanos</i>/worms/constitutes the violation of [[human rights]]," those who emigrated? But, will all sympathy for etc. The fact that the Cuban revolutionsituation appears catastrophic is thus in itself a positive [[sign]], what right does a typical middle class Western Leftist have to despise a Cuban who decided to leave Cuba not only because sign of political disenchantment, but also because (some kind of poverty (so severe as ) [[progress]]: we are today much more sensitive to involve genuine hunger)? In the same vein, I myself remember from things which were going on also in the early 1990s dozens of Western Leftists who proudly threw previous epochs. Recall [[feminism]]: only in my face how, for them, Yugoslavia still exists, and reproached me for betraying the unique chance last 200 years was the situation of maintaining Yugoslavia — to which I always answered that I am not yet ready to lead my life so that [[women]] progressively perceived as unjust, although it will not disappoint was "objectively" getting better. Or recall the dreams [[treatment]] of Western Leftists. There are few things more worthy disabled individuals: even a couple of contemptdecades ago, few attitudes more <i>ideological</i> (if this word has any meaning todaythe special entrances which enable [[them]] the access to restaurants, it should be applied here) than a tenured Western academic Leftist arrogantly dismissing (ortheatres, even worseetc., "understanding" in a patronizing way) an Eastern European from a Communist country who longs for Western liberal democracy and some consumer goodswould have been unthinkable.<br><br>

It More specifically, is here that the Frankfurt School miserably failed: what cannot but strike the eye is the almost total absence Mueller's stance not emblematic of the theoretical confrontation privileged "[[official]] [[dissidents]]" with Stalinism in the tradition of free visas to travel to the Frankfurt SchoolWest, in clear contrast to its permanent obsession with angry at the Fascist antistupid crowd for betraying their [[dreams]]? One can make even a more general point here: what [[about]] pro-Semitism. The very exceptions to this rule are tell-tale: Franz Neumann's Castro Western Leftists who despise what Cubans themselves call "<i>Behemothgusanos</i>/worms/," those who emigrated? But, will all sympathy for the Cuban [[revolution]], what [[right]] does a study typical middle [[class]] Western [[Leftist]] have to despise a Cuban who decided to leave Cuba not only because of National Socialism which[[political]] disenchantment, in the typical fashionable style but also because of poverty (so severe as to involve genuine hunger)? In the late 30s and 40ssame vein, suggests that I myself [[remember]] from the three great world systems - the emerging New Deal capitalismearly 1990s dozens of Western Leftists who proudly threw in my face how, for them, Fascism[[Yugoslavia]] still [[exists]], and Stalinism - tend towards reproached me for betraying the unique chance of maintaining Yugoslavia — to which I always answered that I am not yet ready to lead my [[life]] so that it will not disappoint the same bureaucratic, globally organizeddreams of Western Leftists. There are few things more worthy of contempt, "administered" society; Herbert Marcuse's few attitudes more <i>Soviet Marxism[[ideological]]</i>(if this [[word]] has any [[meaning]] today, his least passionate and arguably worst book, it should be applied here) than a strangely neutral analysis of the Soviet ideology with no clear commitments; andtenured Western academic Leftist arrogantly dismissing (or, finallyeven worse, attempts by some Habermasians who, reflecting upon the emerging dissident phenomena, endeavored to elaborate the notion of civil society as the site of resistance to the Communist regime - interesting politically, but far "[[understanding]]" in a patronizing way) an Eastern European from offering a satisfactory global theory of the specificity of the Stalinist "totalitarianism[[Communist]] country who longs for Western [[liberal]] [[democracy]] and some consumer goods."<br><br>

The standard excuse (It is here that the Frankfurt [[School classical authors did not want to oppose Communism too openly, since, by doing this, they would play into ]] miserably failed: what cannot but strike the hands of their domestic Cold War warriors) eye is obviously insufficient - the point is not that this fear almost [[total]] [[absence]] of being put the [[theoretical]] confrontation with [[Stalinism]] in the service [[tradition]] of the official [[Frankfurt School]], in clear contrast to its permanent [[obsession]] with the Fascist [[anti-Communism proves how they were secretly proSemitism]]. The very exceptions to this rule are tell-Communisttale: Franz Neumann's <i>Behemoth</i>, a study of National Socialism which, but rather the opposite: if they were to be really cornered as to where they stand in the Cold War, they would have chosen Western liberal democracy (as Max Horkheimer explicitly did in some typical fashionable style of his the late writings). 30s and 40s, suggests that the [[three]] great [[world]] systems - the emerging New Deal capitalism, [[Fascism]], and Stalinism - tend towards the same bureaucratic, globally organized, "Stalinismadministered" (really existing socialism) was thus for the Frankfurt School [[society]]; Herbert [[Marcuse]]'s <i>Soviet [[Marxism]]</i>, his least passionate and arguably worst book, a traumatic topic apropos strangely neutral [[analysis]] of which it HAD to remain silent - this silence was the only way for them to retain their inconsistent position of the underlying solidarity Soviet [[ideology]] with no clear commitments; and, finally, attempts by some Habermasians who, reflecting upon the Western liberal democracyemerging dissident phenomena, without losing their official mask endeavored to elaborate the [[notion]] of its "radical" Leftist critique. Openly acknowledging this solidarity would deprive them [[civil society]] as the site of their "radical" aura[[resistance]] to the Communist [[regime]] - interesting politically, changing them into another version but far from offering a satisfactory global [[theory]] of the Cold War anti-Communist Leftist liberals, while showing too much sympathy for specificity of the Stalinist "really existing Socialism[[totalitarianism]]." would force them to betray their unacknowledged basic commitment.<br><br>

This ultimate solidarity with The standard excuse (the Western system when the latter was really threatened displays a clear symmetry Frankfurt School classical authors did not [[want]] to the stance of the "democratic socialist opposition" in the German Democratic Republic. While its members criticized the Communist Party ruleoppose [[Communism]] too openly, since, by doing this, they endorsed would play into the basic premise hands of the GDR regime, the thesis that the Federal Republic of Germany their domestic [[Cold War]] warriors) is a neoobviously insufficient -Nazi state, the direct inheritor point is not that this [[fear]] of [[being]] put in the Nazi regime, and that, therefore, the existence service of the GDR as the official [[anti-Fascist bulwark must be protected at any cost. For that reason, the moment the situation got really serious and the Socialist system was effectively threatened, Communism]] proves how they publicly supported the system (Brecht apropos of East Berlin workers' demonstrations in 53were secretly pro-Communist, Christa Wolf apropos of the Prague Spring in 68). They sustained the belief in the inherent reformability of the system - but for this true democratic reform to take place, time and patience are needed, i.e. a too fast disintegration of Socialism would return Germany to the capitalist-fascist regime and thus strangle rather the Utopia of Other Germany for which, in spite of all its horrors and failures, the GDR continued to stand for… Herefrom the deep distrust of these intellectuals for "people" as opposed to Poweropposite: in 1989, if they openly opposed free elections, well aware that, if free elections were to be held, the majority would have chosen the despised capitalist consumerism. Heiner Mueller was quite consequent when, in 1989, he claimed that free elections also brought Hitler to power... (Some Western Social Democrats played the same game, feeling much closer to the "reform-minded" Communists than to dissidents - the latter somehow embarrassed them, appearing really cornered as an obstacle to the process of <i>detente</i>.) Along the same lines, it was also clear to perceptive dissidents like Havel that the Soviet intervention where they stand in a way saved the myth of the Prague Spring of '68, i.e. the utopian notion that, if the Czechs were to be left aloneCold War, they would effectively give birth to a "socialism with a human face," to an authentic alternative to both Real Socialism and Real Capitalism. That is to say, what would have happened if the Warsaw pact forces were NOT to intervene chosen [[Western liberal democracy]] (as Max [[Horkheimer]] explicitly did in August some of '68? Either the Czech Communist leadership would have to impose restraint, and Czechoslovakia would remain a (more liberal, truehis late writings) Communist regime, or it would turn into a . "normalStalinism" Western capitalist society (maybe with a stronger Scandinavian social-democratic flavorreally existing socialism).<br><br>One should was thus fully admit for the falsity Frankfurt School a [[traumatic]] topic apropos of what one is tempted which it HAD to call the "interpassive Socialism" of the Western academic Left: what these Leftists displace onto the Other is not their activity, but their passive authentic experience. They allow themselves to pursue their wellremain silent -paid academic careers in the West, while using this [[silence]] was the idealized Other (Cuba, Nicaragua, Tito's Yugoslavia) as the stuff of their ideological dreams: they dream through the Other, and explode against it if it disturbs their complacent dream (by only way of abandoning Socialism and opting for liberal capitalism). What is of special interest here is the basic misunderstanding, the lack of communication, between the Western Left and the dissidents in late socialism - it is as if it was forever impossible for them to find a common language. Although they felt that they should somehow be on retain their inconsistent position of the same side, an elusive gap seemed forever to separate them: for underlying [[solidarity]] with the Western Leftistsliberal democracy, Eastern dissidents were all too naive in without losing their belief in democracy - in their rejection official mask of Socialism, they unknowingly threw out the baby with the dirty water; in the eyes its "radical" Leftist critique. Openly acknowledging this solidarity would deprive them of the dissidentstheir "radical" aura, the Western Left played patronizing games with changing them, disavowing the true harshness into [[another]] version of the totalitarian regime Cold War anti- the accusation that dissidents were somehow guilty Communist Leftist [[liberals]], while showing too much sympathy for not seizing the unique opportunity of the disintegrating socialism and inventing an authentic alternative "really existing Socialism" would force them to capitalism was hypocrisy at its purestbetray their unacknowledged basic commitment. However, what if this lack of communication was effectively an example of successful communication in the Lacanian sense of the term? What if each of the two positions received from its other its own repressed message in its inverted and true form?<br><br>

HoweverThis ultimate solidarity with the Western [[system]] when the latter was really threatened displays a clear symmetry to the stance of the "democratic socialist opposition" in the German Democratic Republic. While its members criticized the Communist Party rule, they endorsed the basic premise of the GDR regime, the constellation [[thesis]] that the Federal Republic of [[Germany]] is not a neo-[[Nazi]] state, the direct inheritor of the Nazi regime, and that, therefore, the [[existence]] of the GDR as simple as it may appearthe anti-Fascist bulwark must be protected at any cost. For that [[reason]], the [[moment]] the situation got really serious and the Socialist system was effectively threatened, they publicly supported the system ([[Brecht]] apropos of East Berlin [[workers]]' demonstrations in 53, Christa Wolf apropos of the Prague Spring in 68). They sustained the [[belief]] in the inherent reformability of the system - but for this [[true]] democratic reform to take [[place]], time and patience are needed, i.e. As Alain Badiou pointed outa too fast disintegration of Socialism would [[return]] Germany to the [[capitalist]]-fascist regime and thus strangle the Utopia of [[Other]] Germany for which, in spite of all its horrors and failures, the GDR continued to stand for… Herefrom the deep distrust of these intellectuals for "really existing Socialism[[people]]" as opposed to Power: in 1989, they openly opposed free elections, well aware that, if free elections were to be held, the majority would have chosen the despised capitalist consumerism. Heiner Mueller was quite consequent when, in 1989, he claimed that free elections also brought Hitler to power... (Some Western [[Social]] [[Democrats]] played the only political force that - for some decadessame [[game]], at least [[feeling]] much closer to the "reform- seemed minded" Communists than to pose dissidents - the latter somehow embarrassed them, appearing as an effective threat obstacle to the global rule [[process]] of capitalism<i>detente</i>.) Along the same lines, really scaring its representativesit was also clear to perceptive dissidents like [[Havel]] that the Soviet [[intervention]] in a way saved the [[myth]] of the Prague Spring of '68, driving them into paranoiac reactioni.e. Sincethe [[utopian]] notion that, todayif the Czechs were to be [[left]] alone, capitalism defines and structures the totality of the they would effectively give [[birth]] to a "socialism with a human civilizationface, every "Communist" territory was to an authentic alternative to both [[Real]] Socialism and Real Capitalism. That is - againto say, what would have happened if the Warsaw pact forces were NOT to intervene in spite August of its horrors '68? Either the Czech Communist leadership would have to impose restraint, and failures - Czechoslovakia would remain a (more liberal, true) Communist regime, or it would turn into a kind of "liberated territory,normal" as Fred Jameson put it apropos Western capitalist society (maybe with a stronger Scandinavian social-democratic flavor).<br><br>One should thus fully admit the [[falsity]] of Cuba. What we are dealing with here what one is tempted to call the old structural notion "interpassive Socialism" of the gap between Western academic Left: what these Leftists displace onto the Space and the positive content that fills it in: althoughOther is not their [[activity]], as but their [[passive]] authentic [[experience]]. They allow themselves to pursue their positive contentwell-paid academic careers in the West, while using the Communist regimes were mostly a dismal failureidealized Other (Cuba, generating terror and miseryNicaragua, Tito's Yugoslavia) as the stuff of their ideological dreams: they at [[dream]] through the same time opened up a certain spaceOther, and explode against it if it disturbs their complacent dream (by way of abandoning Socialism and opting for liberal capitalism). What is of special interest here is the space of utopian expectations whichbasic misunderstanding, among other things, enabled us to measure the failure [[lack]] of [[communication]], between the really existing Socialism itself. What Western Left and the antidissidents in late socialism -Communist dissidents it is as if it was forever [[impossible]] for them to find a rule tend to overlook is common [[language]]. Although they felt that the very space from which they themselves criticized and denounced should somehow be on the everyday terror and misery was opened and sustained by the Communist breakthroughsame side, by its attempt an elusive gap seemed forever to escape the logic of [[separate]] them: for the Capital. In shortWestern Leftists, when Eastern dissidents like Havel denounced the existing Communist regime on behalf were all too naive in their belief in democracy - in their [[rejection]] of authentic human solidaritySocialism, they (unknowinglythrew out the [[baby]] with the dirty water; in the eyes of the dissidents, for the most part Western Left played patronizing [[games]] with them, disavowing the true harshness of it) spoke from the place opened up by Communist itself totalitarian regime - which is why they tend to be so disappointed when the "really existing capitalism" does accusation that dissidents were somehow [[guilty]] for not meet seizing the high expectations unique opportunity of their anti-Communist strugglethe disintegrating socialism and inventing an authentic alternative to capitalism was [[hypocrisy]] at its purest. Perhaps, Vaclav Klaus, Havel's pragmatic doubleHowever, what if this lack of communication was right when he dismissed Havel as a "socialist"...effectively an example of successful communication in the [[Lacanian]] [[sense]] of the term? What if each of the two positions received from its other its own [[repressed]] [[message]] in its inverted and true [[form]]?<br><br>

This externality to capitalism also compelled dissidents to question However, the incessant drive to productivity shared by capitalism and state socialismconstellation is not as simple as it may appear. The obverse As [[Alain]] [[Badiou]] pointed out, in spite of this drive are its horrors and failures, the "really existing Socialism" was the growing piles of useless wasteonly political force that - for some decades, piled mountains at least - seemed to pose an effective [[threat]] to the global rule of used carscapitalism, computersreally scaring its representatives, etcdriving them into [[paranoiac]] reaction.Since, like today, capitalism defines and [[structures]] the [[totality]] of the famous airplane human [[civilization]], every "resting placeCommunist" territory was and is - again, in the Mojave desert… in these everspite of its horrors and failures -growing piles a kind of inert, dysfunctional "stuffliberated territory," which cannot but strike us as Fred [[Jameson]] put it apropos of Cuba. What we are dealing with here is the old [[structural]] notion of the gap between the [[Space]] and the positive [[content]] that fills it in: although, as to their uselesspositive content, inert presencethe Communist regimes were mostly a dismal failure, one cangenerating [[terror]] and misery, as it werethey at the same time opened up a certain space, perceive the capitalist drive at rest. Therein resides the interest space of Andrei Tarkovsky's masterpiece <i>Stalker</i>utopian expectations which, among other things, enabled us to measure the failure of its postthe really existing Socialism itself. What the anti-industrial wasteland with wild vegetation growing over abandoned factories, concrete tunnels Communist dissidents as a rule tend to overlook is that the very space from which they themselves criticized and railroads full of stale water denounced the everyday terror and wild overgrowth in which stray cats misery was opened and dogs wandersustained by the Communist breakthrough, by its attempt to escape the [[logic]] of the [[Capital]]. Nature and industrial civilization are here again overlappingIn short, but through a common decay - civilization in decay is in when dissidents like Havel denounced the process existing Communist regime on behalf of again being reclaimed authentic human solidarity, they (not by idealized harmonious Natureunknowingly, butfor the most part of it) spoke from the place opened up by nature in decomposition. The ultimate irony of history Communist itself - which is that an author from why they tend to be so disappointed when the Communist East displayed "really existing capitalism" does not meet the greatest sensitivity for this obverse high expectations of the drive to produce and consumetheir anti-Communist [[struggle]]. Perhaps, howeverVaclav Klaus, Havel's pragmatic [[double]], this irony displays was right when he dismissed Havel as a deeper necessity which hinges on what Heiner Mueller called the "waiting-room mentalitysocialist" of the Communist Eastern Europe:...<br><br>

"There would be an announcement: The train will arrive at 18.15 This [[externality]] to capitalism also compelled dissidents to question the incessant [[drive]] to productivity shared by capitalism and depart at 18state socialism.20 -- and it never did arrive at 18The obverse of this drive are the growing piles of useless waste, piled mountains of used cars, computers, etc.15. Then came , like the next announcement: The train will arrive at 20.10. And so on. You went on sitting there famous airplane "resting place" in the waiting roomMojave desert… in these ever-growing piles of inert, dysfunctional "stuff," which cannot but strike us with their useless, inert [[presence]], one can, thinkingas it were, It's bound to come perceive the capitalist drive at 20rest.15. That was Therein resides the situationinterest of Andrei [[Tarkovsky]]'s masterpiece <i>Stalker</i>, of its post-industrial wasteland with wild vegetation growing over abandoned factories, [[concrete]] tunnels and railroads [[full]] of stale water and wild overgrowth in which stray cats and dogs wander. Basically[[Nature]] and industrial civilization are here again overlapping, but through a state common decay - civilization in decay is in the process of Messianic anticipationagain being reclaimed (not by idealized [[harmonious]] Nature, but) by nature in decomposition. There are constant announcements The ultimate irony of history is that an [[author]] from the Communist East displayed the greatest sensitivity for this obverse of the Messiah's impending arrival, drive to produce and you know perfectly well that he won't be comingconsume. And yet somehowPerhaps, it's good to hear him announced all over again."<however, this irony displays a name=deeper [[necessity]] which hinges on what Heiner Mueller called the "1xwaiting-room mentality"></a><a href="#1"><font color="#e42033">¹</font></a> of the Communist Eastern [[Europe]]:<br><br>

"There would be an announcement: The point of this Messianic attitude was not that hope was maintained, but that, since train will arrive at 18.15 and depart at 18.20 -- and it never did arrive at 18.15. Then came the Messiah did NOT next announcement: The train will arriveat 20.10. And so on. You went on sitting there in the waiting room, people started to look around and take note of the inert materiality of their surroundings[[thinking]], in contrast It's bound to come at 20.15. That was the West where peoplesituation. Basically, engaged in permanent frantic activity, do not even properly notice what goes on around them: because a state of the lack Messianic [[anticipation]]. There are constant announcements of acceleration, people enjoyed more contact with the earth on which the waiting room was built; caught in this delayMessiah's impending arrival, they deeply experienced the idiosyncrasies of their worldand you [[know]] perfectly well that he won't be coming. And yet somehow, it's [[good]] to hear him announced all its topographical and historical details…over again."<a [[name]]="1x"></a><a href="#1"><font color="#e42033">¹</font></a> <br><br>

Our first result is thus The point of this Messianic attitude was not that hope was maintained, but that there are good reasons to take Mueller's reticence seriously. There are three motifs, three topicssince the Messiah did NOT arrive, people started to look around which his political stance is crystallized: and take note of the rejection inert materiality of their surroundings, in contrast to the unconditional drive to productivityWest where people, engaged in permanent frantic activity, the distrust do not even properly notice what goes on around them: because of democracy, the theatralization lack of politicsacceleration, people enjoyed more contact with the inevitability of violence — three features earth on which directly contradict the three dogmas waiting room was built; caught in this delay, they deeply experienced the idiosyncrasies of today's postpolitics: the focus on economic growth, liberal democracy, non-theatrical pragmatismtheir world, nonviolent tolerance.all its [[topographical]] and historical details…<br><br>

Let us begin with the key role of theatralization. Recall the staged performance of "Storming the Winter Palace" in Petrograd, on the third anniversary of the October Revolution (November 7^th, 1920). This event (directed by Nikolai Evreinov who, in 1925, emigrated Our first result is thus that there are good reasons to France) involved 8000 direct participants and an audience of 100,000 (a quarter of the citytake Mueller's population, in spite of heavy rain)reticence seriously. The underlying idea was formulated by Anatoli LunatcharskyThere are three motifs, People's Commisar for Enlightenmentthree topics, in the spring of 1920around which his political stance is crystallized: "In order to acquire a sense of self the masses must outwardly manifest themselves, and this is possible only when, in Robespierre's words, they become a spectacle unto themselves."<a name="2x"></a><a href="#2"><font color="#e42033">²</font></a> Thousands rejection of workers, soldiers, students, and artists worked round the clock, living on <i>kasha</i> (tasteless wheat porridge), tea, and frozen apples, preparing the performance at the very place where the event "really took place" three years earlier. Their work was coordinated by Army officers, as well as by avant-garde artists, musicians, and directors, from Malevich unconditional drive to Meyerhold. Although this was acting and not "realityproductivity," the soldiers and sailors were playing themselves - many distrust of them not only actually participated in democracy, the event theatralization of 1917[[politics]], but were also simultaneously involved in the real battles inevitability of [[violence]] — three features which directly contradict the Civil War that were raging in the nearby vicinity three dogmas of Petrograd, a city under siege and suffering from severe shortages of food. A contemporary commented on the performancetoday's postpolitics: "The future historian will record how, throughout one of the bloodiest and most brutal revolutions, all of Russia was acting."<a name="3x"></a><a href="#3"><font color="#e42033">³</font></a> Andfocus on [[economic]] growth, the formalist theoretician Viktor Shklovski noted thatliberal democracy, "some kind of elemental process is taking place where the living fabric of life is being transformed into the non-theatrical[[pragmatism]], nonviolent [[tolerance]]."<a name="4x"></a><a href="#4"><font color="#e42033">⁴</font></a> <br><br>

We all remember Let us begin with the infamous, self-celebratory First of May parades that were one key [[role]] of theatralization. Recall the supreme signs of recognition staged performance of "Storming the Stalinist regimes. If one needs proof of how Leninism functioned Winter Palace" in an entirely different wayPetrograd, are such performances not on the supreme proof that third anniversary of the October Revolution was definitely NOT a simple (November 7<isup>coup d'étatth</isup> , 1920). This [[event]] (directed by the small group Nikolai Evreinov who, in 1925, emigrated to [[France]]) involved 8000 direct participants and an audience of Bolsheviks100, but an event which unleashed 000 (a tremendous emancipatory potential? Does the "Storming quarter of the Winter Palace" staging not display the force city's population, in spite of a sacred (pagan?heavy rain) pageant. The underlying [[idea]] was formulated by Anatoli Lunatcharsky, of People's Commisar for [[Enlightenment]], in the magic act spring of founding 1920: "In [[order]] to acquire a new community? It sense of [[self]] the masses must outwardly [[manifest]] themselves, and this is here thatpossible only when, perhaps, one should look for the realization of Wagnerin Robespierre's [[words]], they become a [[spectacle]] unto themselves."<a name="2x"><i/a><a href="#2"><font color="#e42033"><sup>Gesamtkunstwerk2</isup>, of what he aimed at with the designation of his <i/font>Parsifal</ia> as Thousands of workers, soldiers, students, and artists worked round the clock, [[living]] on <i>Buehnenweihfestspielkasha</i> ("sacred festival drama"tasteless wheat porridge): if ever, thentea, it was in Petrograd of 1919and frozen apples, much more than in preparing the Ancient Greece, that, "in intimate connection with its history, performance at the people itself that stood facing itself in very place where the event "really took place" three years earlier. Their [[work of art]] was coordinated by [[Army]] officers, as well as by avant-garde artists, becoming conscious of itselfmusicians, anddirectors, from Malevich to Meyerhold. Although this was acting and not "[[reality]]," the soldiers and sailors were playing themselves - many of them not only actually participated in the space event of a few hours1917, rapturously devouring, as it but were, its own essence." This aestheticization, also simultaneously involved in which the people quite literally "plays itself," certainly does not fall under Benjamin's indictment real battles of the Fascist "aestheticization of Civil War that were raging in the political" — instead nearby vicinity of abandoning this aestheticization to the political RightPetrograd, instead of a blanket dismissal city under siege and [[suffering]] from severe shortages of every mass political spectacle as food. A contemporary commented on the performance: "proto-FascistThe [[future]] historian will record how," throughout one should perceive, in this minimal, purely formal, difference of the people from itselfbloodiest and most brutal revolutions, the unique case all of [[Russia]] was acting."real life<a name="3x"></a><a href="#3"><font color="#e42033" differentiated from art by nothing more than an invisible, formal gap. The very fact that, in historical documentaries, movie shots from this reconstruction (as well as from Eisenstein's 1927 >³<i/font>October</ia>) And, the formalist theoretician Viktor Shklovski noted that, "some kind of elemental process is taking place where the storming living fabric of life is being transformed into the Winter Palace are often presented as documentary shots is to be taken as an indication of this deeper identity of people playing themselvestheatrical."<a name="4x"></a><a href="#4"><font color="#e42033">⁴</font></a> <br><br>

The archetypal Eisensteinian cinematic scene rendering We all remember the infamous, self-celebratory First of May parades that were one of the exuberant orgy supreme [[signs]] of revolutionary destructive violence (what Eisenstein himself called "a veritable bacchanalia [[recognition]] of destruction") belongs to the same series: whenStalinist regimes. If one [[needs]] proof of how [[Leninism]] functioned in an entirely different way, in are such performances not the supreme proof that the October Revolution was definitely NOT a simple <i>Octobercoup d'état</i>by the small group of Bolsheviks, but an event which unleashed a tremendous emancipatory potential? Does the victorious revolutionaries penetrate the wine cellars "Storming of the Winter Palace" staging not display the force of a sacred (pagan?) pageant, of the [[magic]] act of founding a new [[community]]? It is here that, perhaps, they indulge there in one should look for the ecstatic orgy realization of smashing thousands [[Wagner]]'s <i>Gesamtkunstwerk</i>, of what he aimed at with the expensive wine bottles. In designation of his <i>Parsifal</i> as <i>Behzin MeadowBuehnenweihfestspiel</i>("sacred festival drama"): if ever, then, it was in Petrograd of 1919, much more than in the Ancient [[Greece]], that, "in intimate connection with its history, the village Pioneers force their way into people itself that stood facing itself in the local church work of art, becoming [[conscious]] of itself, and desecrate it, robbing it in the space of its relicsa few hours, rapturously devouring, squabbling over an iconas it were, sacrilegiously trying on vestmentsits own [[essence]]." This aestheticization, heretically laughing at in which the statuary... In this suspension of goal-oriented instrumental activitypeople quite literally "plays itself, we effectively get a kind " certainly does not fall under [[Benjamin]]'s indictment of Bataillean the Fascist "unrestrained expenditure.aestheticization of the political" Recall the classic reproach — instead of Robespierre abandoning this aestheticization to the Dantonist opportunists: "What you want is political Right, instead of a revolution without revolution!blanket dismissal of every mass political spectacle as " [[proto- Fascist]]," one should perceive, in this minimal, purely [[formal]], [[difference]] of the pious desire to deprive people from itself, the revolution unique case of "real life" differentiated from art by [[nothing]] more than an invisible, formal gap. The very fact that, in historical documentaries, movie shots from this excess reconstruction (as well as from Eisenstein's 1927 <i>October</i>) of the storming of the Winter Palace are often presented as documentary shots is simply the desire to have a revolution without revolutionbe taken as an indication of this deeper [[identity]] of people playing themselves.<br><br>

The archetypal Eisensteinian cinematic [[scene]] rendering the exuberant orgy of revolutionary destructive violence (what Eisenstein himself called "a veritable bacchanalia of [[destruction]]") belongs to the same series: when, in <i>October</i>, the victorious revolutionaries penetrate the wine cellars of the Winter Palace, they indulge there in the ecstatic orgy of smashing thousands of the expensive wine bottles. In <i>Behzin Meadow</i>, the village Pioneers force their way into the local [[church]] and desecrate it, robbing it of its relics, squabbling over an [[icon]], sacrilegiously trying on vestments, heretically laughing at the statuary... In this suspension of [[goal]]-oriented instrumental activity, we effectively get a kind of Bataillean "unrestrained expenditure." Recall the classic reproach of Robespierre to the Dantonist opportunists: "What you want is a [[revolution without revolution]]!" - the pious [[desire]] to deprive the revolution of this [[excess]] is simply the desire to have a revolution without revolution.<br><br> However, this "unrestrained expenditure" is not enough: in a revolution proper, such a display of what [[Hegel ]] would have called "abstract negativity" merely, as it were, wipes the slate clean for the second act, the imposition of a New Order. The tautology "revolution WITH revolution" has thus also another aspect, it also signals the urge to [[repeat ]] the [[negation]], to relate it to itself — in its course, a true revolution revolutionizes its own starting presuppositions. Hegel had a presentiment of this necessity when he wrote, "It is a modern folly to alter a corrupt [[ethical ]] system, its [[constitution ]] and legislation, without changing the [[religion]], to have a revolution without a reformation."<a name="5x"></a><a href="#5"><font color="#e42033">⁵</font></a> He thereby announced the necessity of what Mao Ze Dong called the "[[Cultural ]] Revolution" as the condition of the successful social revolution. What, exactly, does this mean? The problem with hitherto revolutionary attempts was thus not that they were "too extreme," but that they were <i>not radical enough</i>, that they did not question their own presuppositions. In a wonderful essay on <i>Chevengur</i>, Platonov's great peasant Utopia written in 1927 and 1928 (just prior to [[forced ]] collectivization), [[Fredric Jameson ]] describes the two moments of the revolutionary process. It begins with the gesture of radical negativity:<br><br>

<font face="courier" size="-0"><tt>this first moment of world-reduction, of the destruction of the idols and the sweeping away of an old world in violence and [[pain]], is itself the precondition for the reconstruction of something else. A first moment of absolute immanence is necessary, the blank slate of absolute peasant immanence or [[ignorance]], before new and undreamed-of-sensations and [[feelings ]] can come into being.<a name="6x"></a><a href="#6"><font color="#e42033">⁶</font></a><br><br>

<font face="courier" size="-0"><tt>Then follows the second [[stage]], the invention of a new life — not only the [[construction ]] of the new [[social reality ]] in which our utopian dreams would be realized, but the (re)construction of these dreams themselves:<br><br>

<font face="courier" size="-0"><tt>a process that it would be too simple and misleading to call reconstruction or Utopian construction, since in effect it involves the very effort to find a way to begin imagining Utopia to begin with. Perhaps in a more Western kind of [[psychoanalytic ]] language /…/ we might [[think ]] of the new onset of the Utopian process as a kind of [[desiring ]] to [[desire, ]] a learning to desire, the invention of the desire called Utopia in the first place, along with new rules for the fantasizing or daydreaming of such a thing — a set of [[narrative ]] protocols with no precedent in our previous [[literary ]] institutions.<a name="7x"></a><a href="#7"><font color="#e42033">⁷</font></a> <br><br>

<font face="courier" size="-0"><tt>The reference to [[psychoanalysis ]] is here crucial and very precise: in a radical revolution, people not only "realize their old (emancipatory, etc.) dreams"; rather, they have to reinvent their very modes of dreaming. Is this not the exact [[formula ]] of the link between [[death drive ]] and [[sublimation]]? It is ONLY this reference to what happens AFTER the revolution, to the "morning after," that allows us to distinguish between libertarian pathetic outbursts and true revolutionary upheavals: these upheavals lose their [[energy ]] when one has to approach the prosaic work of social reconstruction — at this point, lethargy sets in. In contrast to it, recall the immense [[creativity ]] of the Jacobins just prior to their fall, the numerous proposals about new civic religion, about how to sustain the dignity of old people, and so on. Therein also resides the interest of [[reading ]] the reports about daily life in the [[Soviet Union ]] in the early 1920s, with the enthusiastic urge to invent new rules for quotidian existence: how does one get [[married]]? What are the new rules of courting? How does one celebrate a birthday? How does one get buried? It is precisely with [[regard ]] to this [[dimension ]] that revolution proper is to be opposed to the carnivalesque [[reversal ]] as a temporary respite, the exception stabilizing the hold of power.<br><br>

And this brings us to the key question: how are we to [[construct ]] a social space in which revolution can stay, can stabilize itself? Perhaps, one of the options is to pursue the trend of self-organized collectives in areas [[outside ]] the law. Arguably the greatest literary monument to such a utopia comes from an unexpected source — Mario Vargas Llosa's <i>The War of the End of the World</i> (1981), the novel about Canudos, an outlaw community deep in the Brazilian backlands which was a home to prostitutes, freaks, beggars, bandits, and the most wretched of the poor. Canudos, led by an apocalyptic prophet, was a utopian space without [[money]], property, taxes, and [[marriage]]. In 1987, it was destroyed by the military forces of the Brazilian [[government]].<br><br>The echoes of Canudos are clearly discernible in today's <i>favelas</i> in [[Latin ]] American megalopolises: are they, in some sense, not the first "liberated territories," the cells of futural self-organized societies? Are institutions like community kitchens not a model of "socialized" communal local life? The Canudos liberated territory in Bahia will remain forever the model of a liberated space, of an alternative community which thoroughly negates the existing state space. Everything is to be endorsed here, up to the [[religious ]] "fanaticism." It is as if, in such communities, <i>the Benjaminian other side of the [[historical Progress]], the defeated ones, acquires a space of their own</i>. Utopia EXISTED here for a brief period of time — this is the only way to account for the "[[irrational]]," excessive, violence of the destruction of these communities (in Brasil of 1897, ALL inhabitants of Canudos, [[children ]] and women included, were slaughtered, as if the very [[memory ]] of the possibility of [[freedom ]] had to be erased — and this by a government which presented itself as "progressive" liberal-democratic-republican…) Till now, such communities exploded from time to time as passing phenomena, a sites of [[eternity ]] that interrupted the flow of [[temporal ]] progress — one should have the courage to recognize them in the wide span from the Jesuit <i>reduciones</i> in the 18^th century Paraguay (brutally destroyed by the joint [[action ]] of Spanish and Portuguese armies) up to the settlements controlled by Sendero Luminoso in Peru of the 1990s. Can one imagine a utopian point at which this subterranean level of the utopian Other Space would unite with the positive space of "normal" social life?<br><br>

The key political question is here: is there in our "[[postmodern]]" time still a space for such communities? Are they limited to the undeveloped outskirts (favelas, ghettos), or is a space for them emerging in the very heart of the "postindustrial" landscape? Can one make a wild wager that the dynamics of "postmodern" capitalism with its rise of new eccentric geek communities provides a new chance here? That, perhaps for the [[first time ]] in history, the logic of alternative communities can be grafted onto the latest state of [[technology]]?<br><br>

The main form of such alternative communities in the XXth century were so-called councils ("soviets") - (almost) everybody in the West loved them, up to liberals like Hannah [[Arendt ]] who perceived in them the echo of the old Greek life of <i>polis</i>. Throughout the age of the Really Existing Socialism (RES), the [[secret ]] hope of "democratic socialists" was the direct democracy of the "soviets," the local councils as the form of self-organization of the people; and it is deeply symptomatic how, with the decline of RES, this emancipatory shadow which haunted it all the time also disappeared - is this not the ultimate confirmation of the fact that the council-version of "democratic socialism" was just a [[spectral ]] double of the "bureaucratic" RES, its inherent [[transgression ]] with no substantial positive content of its own, i.e., unable to serve as the permanent basic organizing [[principle ]] of a society? What both RES and council-democracy shared is the belief in the possibility of a self-[[transparent ]] organization of society which would preclude political "[[alienation]]" (state apparatuses, institutionalized rules of political life, [[legal ]] order, police, etc. — and is the basic experience of the end of RES not precisely the rejection of this SHARED feature, the resigned "postmodern" acceptance of the fact that society is a [[complex ]] network of "sub-systems," which is why a certain level of "alienation" is constitutive of social life, so that a totally self-transparent society is a utopia with totalitarian potentials.<a name="8x"></a><a href="#8"><font color="#e42033">⁸</font></a> (In this sense, it is [[Habermas ]] who is "postmodern," in contrast to [[Adorno ]] who, in spite of all his political compromises, to the end remained attached to a radically utopian [[vision ]] of revolutionary redemption.)<br><br>

Are, however, things really so simple? First, direct democracy is not only still alive in many places like favelas, it is even being "reinvented" and given a new boost by the rise of the "postindustrial" digital [[culture ]] (do the descriptions of the new "tribal" communities of computer-hackers not often evoke the logic of councils-democracy?). Secondly, the [[awareness ]] that politics is a complex game in which a certain level of institutional alienation is irreducible, should not lead us to ignore the fact that there is still a line of [[separation ]] which [[divides ]] those who are "in" from those who are "out," excluded from the space of the <i>polis</i> — there are citizens, and there is the [[spectre ]] of <i>[[homo sacer]]</i> haunting them all. In other words, even the "complex" contemporary societies still rely on the basic [[divide ]] between included and excluded. The fashionable notion of "[[multitude]]" is insufficient precisely insofar as it cuts across this divide: there is a multitude WITHIN the system and the multitude of those EXCLUDED, and to simply encompass them within the scope of the same notion amounts to the same [[obscenity ]] as equating starvation with dieting to loose weight. And those excluded do not simply dwell in a [[psychotic ]] non-[[structured ]] Outside — they have (and are forced into) their own self-organization one of the names (and practices) of which was precisely the "council-democracy."<br><br>

But should we still call it "democracy"? It seems politically much more productive and theoretically much more adequate to [[limit ]] "democracy" to the [[translation ]] of [[antagonism ]] into [[agonism]]: while democracy acknowledges the irreducible [[plurality ]] of interests, [[ideologies]], narratives, etc., it excludes those who, as we put it, reject the democratic rules of the game — liberal democrat are quite right in claiming that [[populism ]] is inherently "antidemocratic." "Democracy" is not merely the "power of, by, and for the people," it is not enough just to [[claim ]] that, in democracy, the will and interests (the two in no way automatically coincide) of the large majority determine the state decisions. Democracy — in the way this term is used today — concerns, above all, formal legalism: its minimal definition is the unconditional adherence to a certain set of formal rules which [[guarantee ]] that [[antagonisms ]] are fully absorbed into the agonistic game. "Democracy" means that, whatever electoral manipulation took place, every political [[agent ]] will unconditionally respect the results. In this sense, the US presidential elections of 2000 were effectively "democratic": in spite of obvious electoral manipulations, and of the patent meaninglessness of the fact that a couple hundred of Florida voices will decide who will be the president, the Democratic candidate accepted his defeat. In the weeks of uncertainty after the elections, Bill [[Clinton ]] made an appropriate acerbic comment: "The American people have spoken; we just don't know what they said." This comment should be taken more seriously than it was meant: even now, we don't know it — and, maybe, because there was no substantial "message" behind the result at all.<br><br>At this point, it is crucial to avoid the "democratic" trap. Many "radical" Leftists accept the legalistic logic of "[[transcendental ]] guarantee": they refer to "democracy" as the ultimate guarantee of those who are aware that there is no guarantee. That is to say, since no [[political act ]] can claim a direct foundation in some transcendent [[figure ]] of the [[big Other ]] (of the "we are just instruments of a higher Necessity or Will" type), since every such act involves the risk of a [[contingent ]] decision, nobody has the right to impose his [[choice ]] on [[others ]] — which means that every collective choice has to be democratically legitimized. From this perspective, democracy is not so much the guarantee of the right choice as a kind of opportunistic insurance against possible failure: if things turn out wrong, I can always say we are all responsible… Consequently, this last refuge must be dropped; one should fully assume the risk. The only adequate position is the one advocated already by [[Lukacs ]] in his <i>History and Class [[Consciousness]]</i>: democratic struggle should not be fetishized; it is one of the forms of struggle, and its choice should be determined by a global strategic assessment of circumstances, not by its ostensibly superior intrinsic [[value]]. Like the Lacanian [[analyst]], a [[political agent ]] has to commit [[acts ]] which can only be authorized by themselves, for which there is no [[external ]] guarantee. An authentic political act can be, as to its form, a democratic one as well as a non-democratic one. There are some elections or referendums in which "the impossible happens" — recall, decades ago in Italy, a referendum on [[divorce ]] where, to the great surprise also of the Left which distrusted the people, the pro-divorce side convincingly won, so that even the Left, privately sceptical, was ashamed of its distrust. (There were elements of the event even in the unexpected first electoral victory of [[Mitterand]].) It is only in SUCH cases that one is justified in saying that, beyond and above the mere numeral majority, people effectively have spoken in a substantial sense of the term. On the other hand, an authentic act of popular will can also occur in the form of a violent revolution, of a progressive military dictatorship, etc.<br><br>

Interestingly enough, there is at least one case in which formal democrats themselves (or, at least, a substantial part of them) would tolerate the suspension of democracy: what if the formally free elections are won by an anti-democratic party whose platform promises the abolition of formal democracy? (This did happen, among other places, in [[Algeria ]] a couple of years ago.) In such a case, many a democrat would concede that the people was not yet "mature" enough to be allowed democracy, and that some kind of enlightened despotism whose aim will be to educate the majority into proper democrats is preferable. Every old Leftist remembers [[Marx]]'s reply, in <i>[[The Communist Manifesto]]</i>, to the critics who reproached the Communists that they aim at undermining [[family]], property, etc.: it is the capitalist order itself whose economic dynamics is destroying the traditional family order (incidentally, a fact more true today than in Marx's time), as well as expropriating the large majority of the population. In the same vein, is it not that precisely those who pose today as global defenders of democracy are effectively undermining it? This gradual limitation of democracy is clearly perceptible in the attempts to "rethink" the [[present ]] situation — one is, of course, for democracy and human rights, but one should "rethink" them, and a series of [[recent ]] interventions in the [[public ]] debate give a clear sense of the direction of this "rethinking." More than a year ago, Jonathan Alter and Alan Derschowitz proposed to "rethink" human rights so that they include [[torture ]] (of suspected terrorists). In <i>The Future of Freedom</i>,<a name="9x"></a><a href="#9"><font color="#e42033">⁹</font></a> [[Fareed Zakaria]], [[Bush]]'s favored columnist, already draws a more general conclusion: he locates the threat to freedom in "overdoing democracy," i.e., in the rise of "illiberal democracy at home and abroad" (the books subtitle).<br><br>

In a recent TV interview, Ralf Dahrendorf linked the growing distrust in democracy to the fact that, after every revolutionary [[change]], the road to new prosperity leads through a "valley of tears": after the breakdown of socialism, one cannot directly [[pass ]] to the abundancy of a successful [[market ]] [[economy ]] — the limited, but real, socialist [[welfare ]] and security had to be dismantled, and these first steps are necessarily painful; and the same goes for [[Western Europe]], where the passage from the post-WWII Welfare State to new [[global economy ]] involves painful renunciations, less security, less guaranteed social care. For Dahrendorf, the problem is best encapsulated by the simple fact that this painful passage through the "valley of tears" lasts longer than the average period between (democratic) elections, so that the temptation is great to postpone the difficult changes for the short-term electoral gains. For him, the paradigmatic constellation is here the disappointment of the large strata of [[post-Communist ]] nations with the economic results of the new democratic order: in the glorious days of 1989, they equated democracy with the abundance of the Western consummerist societies, and now, ten years later, when the abundance is still [[missing]], they blame democracy itself… Unfortunately, he focuses much less on the opposite temptation: if the majority resists the necessary structural changes in economy, would [[NATO ]] (one of) the [[logical ]] conclusion(s) be that, for a decade or so, an enlightened [[elite ]] should take power, even by non-democratic means, to enforce the necessary measures and thus to lay the foundations for the truly [[stable ]] democracy? Along these lines, Zakaria points out how democracy can only "catch on" in economically developed countries: if the developing countries are "prematurely democratized," the result is a populism which ends in economic catastrophe and political despotism — no wonder that today's economically most successful Third World countries (Taiwan, South Korea, Chile) embraced full democracy only after a period of authoritarian rule. And does the predicament of today's Germany not point in the same direction? In Federal Republic of Germany, the welfare state survived more or less intact, rendering its economy less competitive and flexible; the necessary "restructuring" of the economy (the [[dismantling ]] of the welfare state) meets with strong opposition from the majority of voters (workers, old retired people…), so it can only be enacted by <i>non-democratic</i> means.<br><br>The exemplary economic strategy of today's capitalism is [[outsourcing ]] — giving over the "dirty" process of [[material ]] production (but also publicity, [[design]], accountancy…) to another company via a subcontract. In this way, one can easily avoid ecological and health rules: the production is done in, say, Indonesia where the ecological and health regulations are much lower than in the West, and the Western global company which owns the logo can claim that it is not [[responsible ]] for the violations of another company. Are we not getting something homologous with regard to torture? Is torture also not being "outsourced," left to the Third World allies of the US which can do it without worrying about legal problems or public protest? Was such outsourcing not explicitly advocated by Jonathan Alter in <i>Newsweek </i>immediately after 9/11? After [[stating ]] that "we can't legalize torture; it's contrary to American values," he nonetheless concludes that "we'll have to think about transferring some suspects to our less squeamish allies, even if that's hypocritical. Nobody said this was going to be pretty."<a name="10x"></a><a href="#10"><font color="#e42033">¹⁰</font></a> This is how, today, the First World democracy more and more functions: by way of "outsourcing" its dirty underside to other countries…<br><br>

This inherent crisis of democracy is also the reason of the renewed popularity of Leo [[Strauss]]: the key feature which makes his political [[thought ]] relevant today is the elitist notion of democracy, i.e., the idea of a "necessary lie," of how elites should rules, aware of the actual state of things (brutal [[materialist ]] logic of power, etc.), and feeding people with fables which keep them [[satisfied ]] in their blessed ignorance. For Strauss, the lesson of the trial and execution of [[Socrates ]] is that Socrates was guilty as charged: [[philosophy ]] <i>is</i> a threat to society. By questioning the gods and the <i>ethos</i> of the city, philosophy undermines the citizens' loyalty, and thus the basis of normal social life. Yet philosophy is also the highest, the worthiest, of all human endeavors. The [[resolution ]] of this [[conflict ]] is that the [[philosophers ]] should, and in fact did, keep their [[teachings ]] secret, passing them on by the esoteric art of [[writing ]] "between the lines." The true, hidden message contained in the "Great Tradition" of philosophy from [[Plato ]] to [[Hobbes ]] and Locke is that there are no gods, that [[morality ]] is ungrounded prejudice, and that society is not grounded in nature…<a name="11x"></a><a href="#11"><font color="#e42033">¹¹</font></a> <br><br>

This is the sense in which one should render problematic democracy: why should the Left always and unconditionally respect the formal democratic "rules of the game"? Why should it not, in some circumstances, at least, put in question the legitimacy of the outcome of a formal democratic procedure? All democratic Leftists venerate Rosa Luxembourg's famous "Freedom is freedom for those who think differently." Perhaps, the time has come to shift the accent from "differently" to "think": "Freedom is freedom for those who <i>think</i> differently" - ONLY for those who REALLY THINK, even if differently, not for those who just blindly (unthinkingly) act out their opinions… What this means is that one should gather the courage to radically question today's predominant attitude of anti-authoritarian tolerance. It was, surprisingly, [[Bernard Williams ]] who, in his perspicuous reading of David Mamet's <i>Oleanna</i>, outlined the limits of this attitude:<br><br>

<font face="courier" size="-0"><tt>A complaint constantly made by the [[female ]] [[character ]] is that she has made sacrifices to come to college, in order to learn something, to be told things that she did not know, but that she has been offered only a feeble [[permissiveness]]. She complains that her teacher /…/ does not [[control ]] or direct her enough: he does not tell her what to believe, or even, perhaps, what to ask. He does not exercise [[authority]]. At the same time, she complains that he exercises power over her. This might seem to be a muddle on her part, or the playwright's, but it is not. The [[male ]] character has power over her (he can decide what grade she gets), but just because he [[lacks ]] authority, this power is mere power, in part [[gender ]] power.<a name="12x"></a><a href="#12"><font color="#e42033">¹²</font></a> <br><br>

<font face="courier" size="-0"><tt>Power appears (is experienced) "as such" at the very point where it is no longer covered by "authority." There are, however, further complications to Williams' view. First, "authority" is not simply a direct property of the [[master]]-figure, but an effect of the social [[relationship ]] between the master and his [[subjects]]: even if the master remains the same, it may happen, because of the change in the socio-[[symbolic ]] field, that his position is no longer perceived as legitimate authority, but as mere illegitimate power (is such a shift not the most elementary gesture of feminism: male authority is all of a sudden unmasked as mere power?). The lesson of all revolutions from 1789 to 1989 is that such a disintegration of authority, its transformation into [[arbitrary ]] power, always precedes the revolutionary outbreak. Where Williams is right is in his emphasis on how the very permissiveness of the power-figure, its restraining from exercising authority by directing, controlling, his [[subject]], makes it that authority appears as illegitimate power. Therein resides the [[vicious cycle ]] of today's academia: the more professors [[renounce ]] "authoritarian" [[active ]] teaching, imposing [[knowledge ]] and values, the more they are experienced as [[figures ]] of power. And, as every parent [[knows]], the same goes for parental education: a [[father ]] who exerts true transferential authority will never be experienced as "oppressive" — it is, on the contrary, a father who tries to be permissive, who does not want to impose on his children his views and values, but allows them to discover their own way, that is denounced as exerting power, as being "oppressive"… <br><br>

The [[paradox ]] to be fully endorsed is here that the only way to effectively abolish power relations leads through freely accepted relations of authority: the model of free collective is not a group of libertines indulging in their pleasures, but the extremely disciplined revolutionary collective. The [[injunction ]] which holds together such a collective is best encapsulated by the logical form of double negation ([[prohibition]]) which, precisely, is NOT the same as the direct positive assertion. Towards the end of Brecht's <i>Die Massnahme</i>, the Four Agitators declare:<br><br>

</i>But not only others would we kill, but ourselves too if [[need ]] be<br>

The [[text ]] does NOT say "we are allowed to kill," but "it is still not permitted (an adequate paraphrase of <i>vergoennen</i>) to us not to kill" — or, simply, it is still <i>prohibited</i> to us not to kill. Brecht's precision is here admirable: the double negation is crucial. "It is allowed to kill" would amount to simple immoral permissivity; "it is ordered to kill" would transform killing into an [[obscene]]-[[perverse ]] [[superego ]] injunction that is the [[truth ]] of the first version (as [[Lacan ]] put it, the permitted <i>[[jouissance]]</i> inexorably turned into a prescribed one). The only correct way is thus the reversal of the [[biblical ]] prohibition, the prohibition NOT to kill, which goes to the end, to the anti-Antigonean prohibition to provide for the proper funeral [[ritual]]: the young comrade has to "vanish, and vanish entirely," i.e., his [[disappearance ]] (death) itself should [[disappear]], should not leave any (symbolic) traces.<br><br>

Bernard Williams can again be of some [[help ]] here, when he elaborates that forever separates MUST from OUGHT: "<i>Ought</i> is related to <i>must</i> as <i>best</i> is related to <i>only</i>."<a name="14x"></a><a href="#14"><font color="#e42033">¹⁴</font></a> We arrive at what we must do after a long and anxious consideration of alternatives, and "can have that belief while remaining uncertain about it, and still very clearly [[seeing ]] the powerful merits of alternative courses."<a name="15x"></a><a href="#15"><font color="#e42033">¹⁵</font></a> This difference between must and ought also relies on [[temporality]]: we can reproach somebody for not having done what he "ought to have done," while we cannot say to someone "you must have done it" if he did not do it — we use the expression "you must have done it" for consoling somebody who DID a thing which he found distasteful (like "Do not blame yourself, even if you loved him, you must have punished him!"), while the standard use of the expression "you ought to have done it" implies, on the contrary, that you did NOT do it.<br><br>

"Must" and "Ought" thus relate as [[the Real ]] and [[the Symbolic]]: the Real of a drive whose injunction cannot be avoided (which is why Lacan says that the status of a drive is ethical); the Ought as a symbolic [[ideal ]] caught in the [[dialectic ]] of desire (if you ought not do something, this very prohibition generates the desire to do it). When you "must" do something, it means you have no choice but to do it, even if is terrible: in Wagner's <i>Die Walkuere</i>, Wotan is cornered by Fricka and he "must" ("cannot but") allow the [[murder ]] of Siegmund, although his heart bleeds for him; he "must" ("cannot but") punish Brunhilde, his dearest [[child]], the embodiment of his own innermost striving. And, incidentally, the same goes for Wagner's <i>Tristan und Isolde</i>, the Bayreuth staging of which was Mueller's last great theatrical [[achievement]]: they MUST, they CANNOT BUT, indulge in their [[passion]], even if this goes against their <i>Sollen</i>, their social obligations.<br><br>

In Wotan's forced exercise of [[punishment]], Wagner encounters here the paradox of the "killing with <i>pieta</i>" at work from the Talmud (which calls us to dispense Justice with [[Love]]) to Brecht's two key <i>Lehrstuecke</i>, <i>Der Jasager</i> and <i>Die Massnahme</i>, in which the young comrade is killed by his companions with loving tenderness. And although Mueller disagreed with <i>Die Massnahme</i>, proposing, in his <i>Mauser</i>, a critique of its political logic, his critique is strictly [[internal]]: his reproach to Brecht is precisely that he did not draw all the consequences from the stance of "killing with <i>pieta</i>," of killing without dehumanizing the [[enemy]]. And this is what today, in our time in which the abstract humanitarian rejection of violence is accompanied by its obscene double, the anonymous killing WITHOUT <i>pieta</i>, we need more than ever. <br><br>

<a name="2"></a><a href="#2x"><font color="#e42033">2. </font></a>Quoted in Richard Taylor, <i>October</i>, [[London]]: BFI 2002. <br><br>

<a name="3"></a><a href="#3x"><font color="#e42033">3. </font></a>Quoted from Susan Buck-Morss, <i>Dreamworld and Catastrophe</i>, Cambridge: Harvard [[University ]] Press 2001, p. 144. <br><br>

<a name="5"></a><a href="#5x"><font color="#e42033">5. </font></a>[[G.W.F. Hegel]], <i>Enzyklopaedie der philosophischen Wissenschaften</i>, Hamburg 1959, p. 436.<br><br>

<a name="11"></a><a href="#11x"><font color="#e42033">11. </font></a>Furthermore, does Strauss' notion of esoteric knowledge not confuse two different phenomena: the [[cynicism ]] of power, its unreadiness to admit publicly its own true foundations, and the subversive insights of those who aim at undermining the power system? Say, in Real Socialism, there is a difference between a critical [[intellectual ]] who, in order to get through his message, has to cide it in the terms of official ideology, and the cynical top member of [[nomenklatura ]] who is aware of the falsity of the basic claims of the ruling ideology — equating the two is like equating hunger and dieting.<br><br>

<a name="13"></a><a href="#13x"><font color="#e42033">13. </font></a>[[Bertolt Brecht]], <i>Collected Plays: Three</i>, London: Methuen 1997, p. 87. <br><br>