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<i>Slavoj [[Zizek ]] </i></b></tt></font></a> <font class="f" color="#000000" face="Courier,Helvetica,Arial,[[Times ]] Roman"><tt>interviewed by </tt></font><a href="http://lacan.com/bios.htm#ayerza" target="_top"><font class="f" color="#000000" face="Courier,Helvetica,Arial,Times Roman"><tt><b><i>Josefina Ayerza </i></b></tt></font></a> <font class="f" color="#000000" face="Courier,Helvetica,Arial,Times Roman"><tt> (Lusitania, Vol I, no 4, 1994)</tt></font></td></tr>

JOSEFINA AYERZA: <i>The contemporary [[political ]] [[discourse]], changed by events such as the altering of [[communist ]] regular patterns, should be giving new [[meaning ]] to the actual [[signifiers]]. What [[speech ]] act is involved in this context? </i><br><br>

SLAVOJ ZIZEK: "[[Work ]] hard": a [[return ]] to [[capitalist ]] values. "Everybody might get rich, including you." Let's take Thatcherism in Great [[Britain]]: what is the Thatcherist [[dream]]? It is that by hard work you win; luck is around the corner. Now of course the [[leftist ]] Labor Party counteroffensive said that this is an [[illusion]], only a few of us might get rich; the majority of us won't get rich. But they missed the point, because the [[identification ]] that Thatcher's discourse gave you was not that you would actually become rich, but, rather, the discourse gave you the opportunity to [[identify ]] yourself as the one who might get rich next. Wealth was [[right ]] around the corner...maybe. <br><br>

SZ: Yes, that was enough; it was even proven by [[sociology ]] polls. [[People ]] actually answered that it was enough for [[them ]] to live with the [[consciousness ]] that maybe if- the sheer possibility that maybe if-"okay, this year my small business went bankrupt, but maybe next year if I work hard...maybe next year if I try again and again, I will succeed." To identify with this possibility is enough to succeed. For the possibility itself to bring its own [[gratification]], you have already to be in the Spinozist [[universal ]] field of the [[signifier]]. <br><br>

JA: <i>May we call it the possibility of a kind of [[jouissance]], in the [[Lacanian ]] [[sense ]] of the term? </i><br><br>

SZ: It is only against a Spinozean background that you can have this kind of [[paradox]], where the possibility of [[satisfaction ]] already functions in itself as actual satisfaction, so that you don't [[need ]] to [[pass ]] into [[action]]. Let's say that the [[conditions ]] of possibility are related to the field. <br><br>

JA: <i>If possibility stands for the field, what may stand for the [[impossible]], or for the interfering element? </i><br><br>

SZ: What we might call the Kantian revenge appears precisely in [[figures ]] like [[Saddam ]] Hussein. To put it naively, these figures of radical [[evil ]] are for me the [[symptom]]. They are the return of the [[repressed]]. How is the [[enemy ]] painted in the late capitalist [[fantasy]]? In today's ruling [[ideology]]-in [[other ]] [[words]], in the big [[media]]-constructing the enemy has two objectives. The first is fanatic, [[irrational ]] [[fundamentalism]], which is of course why the West always was and still is obsessed with Islamic fundamentalism. This fundamentalism is precisely the Kantian revenge of radical evil. By the way, I'm not saying this has really something to do with [[true ]] [[Islam]]. <br><br>

JA: <i>What kind of evil is Saddam, releasing petroleum in the water and killing wildlife, killing [[nature]]? </i> <br><br>

SZ: It is a shock for the West. It was not [[rational ]] what Saddam did during the Persian Gulf War. This was radical, almost [[ethical ]] evil. In this fluid fantasy-[[universe ]] of the West, the Japanese are also sometimes painted as a kind of fanatic demonic evil. But what bothers me is how quickly the layer of fanatic fundamentalism is deployed. I [[remember ]] a few years ago when some ecologists in California started to prevent the cutting down of big sequoia trees. They discovered that putting long nails into the trees made them impossible to cut. Electric saws couldn't get through the nail and the trees were saved. The ecologists were labeled as eco-terrorists." This makes me very suspicious. <br><br>

JA: <i>And the second [[objective]]? </i><br><br>

SZ: Now I come to my next [[thesis]]. It is no wonder that in [[philosophy]], thinkers like Louis [[Althusser ]] and Michel [[Foucault]], as well as Gilles [[Deleuze]], were so obsessed with [[Spinoza]]! I don't see anything very revolutionary in this return to Spinoza. Contemporary philosophy is [[conscious ]] of what we were just discussing, that is, of the Spinozist features of contemporary [[society]]. I'm very suspicious of the kind of [[ethics ]] proposed by this universal field of the signifier. What kind of ethics does it imply? It is an ethics basically of non-identification. It says, let's stay free, don't identify too much, there are multiple [[subject ]] positions and you must renew your [[personality]], don't make any lasting commitments, don't overidentify, invent yourself anew," etc. This would be this late Spinozist ethics. <br><br>

There is [[nothing ]] subversive in this kind of ethics developed in the last two books of Foucault, proposed as a [[model ]] (The Care of the [[Self]], The Uses of [[Pleasure]]]. I [[think ]] Foucault's ethics fit perfectly the late capitalist universal Spinozist signifier. Even in our everyday political experiences when we [[construct ]] the enemy, we depict [[danger ]] as the one who overidentifies. This is the usual way; even deconstructionists usually formulate it like that: "The enemy does not see how every identification is constructed." <br><br>

SZ: It is a [[false ]] enemy. Basically, fundamentalists are not the danger. The crucial question is, do we accept this narrow Spinozist universal signifying field? Is this the ultimate [[reality ]] that we have to accept, or not? Yes, for me this is the ultimate question, the only true problem. I think the [[whole ]] [[conflict ]] of fundamentalism versus nonfundatnentalism is basically a false problem. Those whom we perceive as fundamentalists are not really it. For example, let's take the [[Moral ]] Majority preachers, usually regarded here as fundamentalists. Did you notice how the same rule applies to them as to ([[Joan Copjec ]] developedthis very nicely in October # 68) the problematic of the so-called "Teflon president," Ronald [[Reagan]]? You [[know ]] how Reagan made a series of mistakes in his [[public ]] appearances and speeches; each [[time]], the journals mocked him, they made the whole [[list ]] of-them. The [[real ]] mystery is that not only it did not [[affect ]] his popularity adversely, iteven helped it. In a way, the poor [[liberals ]] [[thought ]] that by proving how wrong Reagan was, by enumerating all the mistakes, all the gaffes, they would somehow hurt him. They did not hurt him; they helped him. <br><br>

My point is that the same goes, at least up to a point, for the Moral Majority preachers. It is wrong to label them as fundamentalists. Those who follow them know that this is fake. For examples Jimmy Swaggart: again and again it is proven that he is involved in [[sexual ]] scandals; yet he still functions. That is the so-called mystery. I would even say the same [[thing ]] [[about ]] David Duke. The problem is not one of, is he really a racist or, does he really believe in [[anti-Semitism]]? These are false questions; his [[position ]] is a kind of imposture, but the point is he is even more dangerous because of it. <br><br>

JA: <i>Because of its [[being ]] his ethics ? </i><br><br>

SZ: Yes, he is not a serious anti-Semite. I'm not saying he's simply joking, but there is a much more refined [[dialectic ]] at [[world ]] there. Let's put it this way: it's his ethics. Fredric [[Jameson]], in one of his articles on [[film]], speaks of this. Fifteen years ago we had this wave of [[horror ]] movies, like The Exorcists, Jaws, etc. The Exorcist did not rely on the simple [[belief ]] in supernatural forces. Jameson's [[idea ]] was that these movies expressed a kind of [[nostalgia ]] for the lost world, where it was still naively possible to believe in devils. This is a more refined dialectic. This is the same [[game ]] David Duke is playing. Of course, we cannot be really anti-Semitic today. Duke is a kind of nostalgic [[figure]]. His thing is, "Wasn't it nice when it was still possible, like in [[Hitler]]'s [[good ]] old days?" I'm not saying it is not dangerous; it is even more disgusting, even more dangerous. Do you know why? <br><br>

JA: <i>Is it the same, but with no [[sublime ]] [[object]]? </i> <br><br>

SZ: There still is the [[symbolic ]] in play, but again, the basic feature of today's ideology, in correspondence with this Spinozist [[universality ]] of the signifier, is not a kind of fundamentalism, but a mixture of nostalgia and [[cynicism]]: cynical distance, nostalgia, etc. We, as theoreticians from a long-term political perspective, cannot accept this as the ultimate [[stage ]] and say to it "Okay, now humanity will just float in the bliss of the universal signifier to the end." This is not the ultimate horizon; I cannot accept this. <br><br>

JA: <i>About the Russians emigrating to the [[United States ]] and Occidental [[Europe]], let's say that in their own country they have been actually [[living ]] something else: masses of people [[working ]] together in factories, in industries, are accustomed to have an enormous strength as a group. Yet the Spinozist world instead keeps people at home, dissolves the groups. What will happen when all these people have to deal with this being at home? Are they going to like it? Since you say this is not the ultimate stage, are we wanting to go back to the massive getting together, to the strength of the group? </i><br><br>

SZ: No, no, no, of course you cannot go back. There is a crucial thing that is going around now on [[another ]] level in Eastern Europe. In [[Russia ]] they are also approaching it; it is already on the way in [[Poland ]] and Czechoslovakia and Hungary. The democratic enthusiasm is over now and we have a [[total ]] depoliticization, a cynical retreat into private [[life]]. This is the last stage of Eastern Europe now, as we saw in the latest elections. <br><br>

SZ: Yes, but at another, far more dangerous level. The problem with Eastern Europe is that people there expected something else. This is why this depoliticized reaction now is dangerous. The basic background is that what people wanted of [[capitalism ]] was strictly a contradictory [[desire]]. They wanted things. But what did the [[dissolution ]] of [[communism ]] and return to capitalism mean to the everyday Eastern European person? Eastern Europeans experienced communism as something that disintegrated their [[organic ]] [[unity]]. They experienced communism as a strange cancerous entity that disrupted, disunited, degenerated their original [[family ]] ties, [[community ]] ties, etc. Therefore, what they expect now from post-communist society is capitalist individualism, consumer society, and so on, and at the same time-and this is crucial-a new kind of community and [[solidarity]]. <br><br>

JA: <i>A [[postmodern ]] kind of capitalism ? </i><br><br>

SZ: This is strictly contradictory because capitalism is not this, it is emphatically not this. And this is what I find most dangerous, this contradictory desire. Do we have a [[name ]] for the [[system]], for a [[social ]] system that tries to accomplish precisely this? Capitalism and organic unity at the same time: this is the most elementary definition of [[fascism]]. Fascism means precisely this. For examples in [[Argentina]], what was Peron's promise? That you would have capitalism, but at the same time solidarity I think this contradictory desire was a protofascist desire. It may sound very harsh, but what most people spontaneously craved in Eastern Europe was not [[socialism ]] with a [[human ]] face, but rather fascism with a human face. This is very dangerous. Anti-Semitism arises at such moments. Now they are extremely disappointed. Why didn't we get what we wanted, capitalism and organic unity at the same time? <br><br>

JA: <i>The [[Jews ]] or.... </i><br><br>

SZ: It doesn't have to be a Jew. It can be somebody who is constructed according to the same [[logic ]] that is at work in anti-Semitism. It is very interesting to see how, even when the enemy is not the Jew, it is still constructed in the same way, as some kind of foreigner. <br><br>

SZ: Yes, and precisely, the attraction of anti-Semitism is that it gives a face to the enemy-at least the modern [[form ]] of anti-Semitism. <br><br>

JA: <i>So the Russians [[want ]] a figure of the enemy, and they may not find the actual one clear enough? </i><br><br>

SZ: Usually it is the national enemy, it is another [[nation]]. <br><br>

SZ: Any other, but usually connected to Jews. In [[Yugoslavia ]] it's usually a combination of enemies. The standard idea is that when two big nations confront eachother-this is the typical [[formula ]] of Eastern European conflict-you simply do not put the blame directly on the other nation. You say instead that the other nation is so bad and attacking us because behind it there is the Jew pulling the strings. You always [[split ]] the enemy. For example in Yugoslavia it works with Serbians, with Croations, etc. You say they" were corrupted, spoiled by the Jews, who really pulled the strings from behind. This is a nice paradox. Even in the [[Soviet Union ]] now, the hard-level Russian-nationalist anticommunists try to explain communism itself in [[terms ]] of anti-Semitism, communism as a [[Jewish ]] invention. For example, the modern Russian anti-Semites will quickly tell you how almost all members of [[Lenin]]'s Politburo were Jews. In other words, there is a stage of spontaneous ideology in the East: putting the blame for everything on communism is no longer the national sport. Now it is to put the blame on the Jew, or on another nation behind communism itself. I don't like this revival of small ethnic nations in Eastern Europe. I see a dangerous proto-fascist potential here, a very serious possibility; I don't think it is an [[illusory ]] abstract possibility. This first democratic enthusiasm is now over, and people are radically disappointed and returning to private life. It is the Spinozist [[machine ]] at work. In spontaneous American ideology, the Japanese are constructed as an enemy that functions in an almost anti-Semitic way, because in anti-Semitism, the Jew is everywhere and nowhere; you can never localize him. They can be hidden everywhere. They are perceived as being all around, the ones who penetrated everything. <br><br>

JA: <i>This kind of enemy is nevertheless [[identified]]. </i><br><br>

SZ: But not clearly identified. This is a crucial point of anti-Semitism in [[Nazi ]] propaganda. It is more complicated than it may appear, because in anti-Semitism fantasy [[space]], the Jew is not simply somebody with such-and-such a corrupted or whatever nature. In anti-Semitism, the Jew represents a nation that has no proper nature, has no proper [[character]], which can mix. There is nothing horrible about having Chinese neighborhoods, Little Italy, etc. As long as you have these distinct entities, it's all right. The problem is that [[surplus ]] element that is everywhere and nowhere. The standard [[role ]] attributed to the Jew in Europe is here, up to a point, taken by Japanese. The second point is about the [[obsession ]] even in American media, that Japanese don't know how to [[enjoy ]] properly, that they work too much, the idea that the Japanese [[relationship ]] to [[enjoyment ]] is somehow strange other thanours, not normal, disturbed. I am always struck how in the American media they report this with regularity. Even the Japanese [[government ]] tries to teach the Japanese how to enjoy more. For example, they are now ordered to take regular holidays. <br><br>

SZ: This is the idea, this is the ultimate racist fantasy. And here Lacanian [[psychoanalysis ]] can teach us a lot, because the basic Lacanian idea is that the ultimate point of [[racism ]] is not this kind of (as it is usually explained) clash of [[symbolic identification]], [[cultural ]] values, or whatever. As it was developed by Jacques-[[Alain ]] [[Miller ]] in Extimite, racism ultimately concerns the Other's relationship to enjoyment. Ultimately what bothers you in the Other is the way he or she [[enjoys]]. And not only the obvious ways-like, for example, the [[primitive]], white sexual [[fantasies ]] of black [[sexuality]]. <br><br>

JA: <i>What would be the [[threat ]] in the Japanese working too much? </i><br><br>

SZ: The idea is that they work too much because they don't know how to [[separate ]] properly work and enjoyment, they perversely enjoy working too much, they have this [[deprivation ]] that is threatening to us. In Europe, this is usually attributed to Jews. I remember once even talking to my [[mother]]. Officially she is not anti-Semitic, but once we had some financial dealings with a [[neighbor ]] of ours who is a Jew, an older [[woman]], and when she returned some [[money ]] to us, my mother said, "She is a very nice old lady, but did you notice the strange way she counted the money?" I mean this, a strange idea, some kind of special relationship to jouissance, precisely as a [[lack ]] of pleasure, a kind of deprivation, the different jouissance in what is displeasurable, in what for us is not pleasure. <br><br>

JA: <i>The problem seems to entail on the one hand investigation-how is the Other enjoying?-and on the other, [[control ]] over the ways of enjoyment of the Other. </i><br><br>

SZ: Yes, because these are two basic fantasies, which are of course the reverse of each other. The one we all know, Jacques [[Lacan ]] talked about in the late 1960s, when he predicted racism. For Lacan, racism is a kind of revenge of the [[particularity ]] in the universal field of the signifier. Lacan's idea is that racism is a kind of reaction to this universal field of the signifier, the only way to not be dissolved and lost in this universality. The only way to stick out, the only support you can find, is to stick to your [[particular ]] way of enjoyment, which then involves you in this racial [[paranoia]], of course. <br><br>

You formulate your [[identity ]] on the fantasy that the Other is the one who automatically wants to steal from you. These are the two basic fantasies: one is that the Other wants to steal from us our precious enjoyment, usually the fantasy behind the racist idea of David Duke-blacks, [[others]], they want to ruin the American way of life. The other idea, like with the Jew, is that the Other possesses some kind of excessive and strange enjoyment, which is in itself a threat to us. By the way, another amusing point that I developed is this idea of how enjoyment can be stolen. In the United States, I was struck by the series of [[films ]] like Rambo, [[Missing ]] in Action, etc., which are based on the American obsession that there are still some prisoners, some Americans alive down there in Vietnam. The hero, Rambo, saves them, brings them back. I think the fantasy behind it is that the most precious part of America was stolen and the hero brings it back to where it belongs. Because this "treasure" was missing under Jimmy Carter, America was weak. If the hero brings it back, America will be strong again. <br><br>

And this is again where Lacan was in a way, to put it naively, ahead of his time, because he did already predict this new upsurge of racism in the middle-to-late 1960s, in [[Television]]. Lacan predicted precisely in [[1968]], that when the student enthusiasm ended, there would be a new age of racism. This again indicates that the Spinozist universal field cannot be our ultimate answer. The usual illusion is that racism is a kind of fundamentalist [[remainder ]] of the [[past]]. No it is not a remainder from the past; it is not some remainder of old traditions to be dissolved by [[progress ]] toward an even more computerized Spinozist universe. Instead, it is produced by [[modernity]]. What we call fundamentalisms are precisely desperate attempts to cling to some forms of jouissance.