Author: Richard Barbrook
THE HOLY FOOLS (LONG MIX) by Richard Barbrook
THE HOLY FOOLS
a critique of the avant-garde
in the age of the Net
1: The Lost Utopia
The Net is haunted by the disappointed hopes of the Sixties. Because this new technology symbolises another period of rapid change, many contemporary commentators look back to the stalled revolution of thirty years ago to explain what is happening now. For instance, the editors of Wired continually pay homage to the New Left values of individual freedom and cultural dissent in their coverage of the Net. Yet, these old hippies no longer believe in political rebellion and collective provision. Instead, in their Californian ideology, they now claim that their youthful ideals will be realised through technological determinism and free markets. The politics of ecstasy have been replaced by the economics of greed. [1]
Within Europe, it is much more difficult to pull off the Californian scam of camouflaging New Right policies for the Net underneath New Left rhetoric. A long history of class-based politics and compulsive theorising makes such ideological chicanery seem much more implausible. Even post-modernists are much more attracted to pessimism and nihilism than to the reactionary modernism underpinning the Californian ideology. [2] However, this does not mean that Europeans are immune from embracing digital elitism in the name of Sixties libertarianism. Ironically, this bizarre union of opposites is most evident in the writings on the Net by avant-garde intellectuals inspired by Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari.
Although these two philosophers were overt leftists during their lifetimes, many of their contemporary followers support a form of aristocratic anarchism which is eerily similar to that promoted by Californian neo-liberals. The European avant-garde is rediscovering its elitist traditions through the cult of Deleuze and Guattari. By doing so, the Deleuzoguattarians haven’t just unwittingly exposed the fatal weaknesses within what appears to be an impeccably emancipatory analysis of the Net. Trapped within the precepts of their sacred creed, the disciples of Deleuze and Guattari can’t even grasp why the spread of the Net really is such a subversive phenomenon.
Inside the universities, alternative culture and the art world, the popularity of Deleuze and Guattari is the philosophical equivalent of current nostalgia for Sixties pop music. At the end of the century, the superficiality and detachment of post-modernism are no longer fashionable among radical intellectuals. However, because the Soviet Union has collapsed, the European avant-garde cannot return to its traditional obsession with the 1917 Bolshevik revolution. Instead, contemporary activists, academics and artists look back to the libertarian spontaneity of the revolutionary Sixties. Just like pop musicians, TJs use samples from this heroic decade to prove their radical credentials. [3] At the peak of the Sixties revolutionary wave, it appeared that old structures were disintegrating and collective subjectivity was about to be realised. During a brief moment, the continent seemed to be on the verge of fundamental social transformation.
‘The movement [of May ‘68] was a rediscovery of collective and individual history, an awareness of the possibility of intervening in history, an awareness of participating in an irreversible event…It was a generalised critique of all alienations, all ideologies and of the entire organisation of real life…’ [4]
The great change never happened. Despite marches, strikes, riots, occupations and terrorism, the system was able to defeat the challenge from the New Left. During the Eighties and Nineties, even the social gains of the post-war settlement were being rolled back by triumphant capitalism. Yet, after decades of reactionary rule, the folk memory of May ‘68 still remains an inspiration for the present. While ‘really existing socialism’ has imploded, the democratic ways of working, cultural experimentation and emancipatory lifestyles initiated in the Sixties have survived - and even flourished - into the harder times of the Nineties. From raves to environmental protests, the spirit of May ‘68 lives on within the DIY culture. [5] Deprived of Leninism, contemporary European intellectuals wishing to revive the revolutionary traditions of the avant-garde are drawn to this legacy of the New Left. However, unlike their hippie mentors, these academics, artists and activists realise that the overthrow of capitalism is not imminent. Apparently unrealisable in practice, social transformation must be turned into theoretical poetry: a revolutionary dreamtime for the imagination.
The cult of Deleuze and Guattari is a prime example of this aesthetisation of Sixties radicalism. Their most famous book - A Thousand Plateaus - is a weird pot-pourri of anarchism, therapy, mysticism, art theory, musicology, bizarre science, imaginary history and drug references. Rejecting reasoned sociological arguments, Deleuze and Guattari created free association meditations written in their own inimitable language. As they explained in its opening pages: ‘a book…is a multiplicity - but we don’t know yet what the multiple entails when it is no longer attributed, that is, after it has been elevated to the status of a substantive.’ [6]
Despite this warning from its authors, A Thousand Plateaus has become a sacred text: the Kabbala of the techno-generation. This book provides the buzzwords and concepts for a specifically European understanding of the Net. It is the default setting for discussions on nettime and other on-line political-artistic forums. [7] Precisely because it comes from Europe, Deleuzoguattarian theory is now fashionable from New York to Tokyo. On the West Coast, Kevin Kelly and other Wired writers also use an eclectic mix of hippie rhetoric, weird science and pop culture to create the Californian ideology. [8] However, their hard-line neo-liberalism is irrelevant to most European intellectuals - and their imitators overseas. Instead of seeing the Net primarily as a business opportunity, avant-garde academics, artists and activists are much more excited by the cultural possibilities of new technologies. This is not just a reflection of the relative weakness of the European computer industry. For over two decades, a vibrant techno-culture has been developing across the continent. Pioneered by computer-generated dance music, this digital aesthetic now embraces fashion, art, graphic design, publishing and video games. When it emerged in Europe, the Net was not surprisingly pioneered by this already flourishing techno-culture. [9]
The conservative politics and culture of Wired could never provide a credible explanation of what was happening within this alternative scene. Looking for another approach, TJs have rediscovered the writings of Deleuze and Guattari. [10] Apparently free from the taint of both Leninism and neo-liberalism, these two philosophers seem to provide a theoretical framework for understanding the subversive potential of the Net. While all that remains of hippie ideals in Wired is its psychedelic layout, European cyber-enthusiasts - and their imitators - can still champion the lost utopia of May ‘68 by using the theoretical poetry of Deleuze and Guattari. The revolution will be digitalised. [11]
2: Techno-Nomads@Rhizome.Net
A Thousand Plateaus has achieved such a cult status within the on-line community because Sixties radicalism did fundamentally shape the Net. Despite being funded by the US military, many of its most important aspects came from the hippie counter-culture. Above all, most Net users expect neither to pay for items downloaded nor to be paid for others accessing their sites. This DIY ethic was partially inspired by the New Left. Campaigning against the American invasion of Vietnam, the Yippie movement advocated not paying for any goods or services provided by corporations profiting from the war. Among activists involved in developing the early computer networks, this subversive attitude was expressed in the famous hacker slogan: ‘information wants to be free.’ [12] Although now threatened by state censorship and colonised by commercial interests, the content of the Net is still mainly produced through spontaneous collaboration between autonomous individuals within a hi-tech gift economy. People freely swap articles, music, software, pictures and any other form of intellectual labour which can be digitally recorded. On websites, on-line conferences, listservers, newsgroups and other virtual spaces, they can play, learn and work together outside the control of both state and market. [13]
Unable to comprehend any form of human sociability except money-commodity relations, the Californian ideology is completely useless for explaining why the hi-tech gift economy is such a fundamental aspect of cyberspace. In contrast, A Thousand Plateaus does seem to provide a credible alternative analysis of the Net. This book contains theoretical metaphors which illustrate how much of the Net’s content is produced without monetary incentives. It even has concepts which can be used to describe some of the more bizarre aspects of on-line culture, such as cybersex. Above all, this sacred text allows the European avant-garde of the late-Nineties to live within a revolutionary dreamtime inspired by the rebellious Sixties.
For the disciples of Deleuze and Guattari, the rhizome is the key concept found within A Thousand Plateaus. As a metaphor derived from plant roots, this phrase captures how cyberspace is organised as an open-ended, non-hierarchical, spontaneous and horizontal network. Not surprisingly, rhizome has been adopted a shorthand term for websites, listservers, IRC channels, bulletin boards, MOOs and other on-line conferences where people can come together inside the Net without needing the direct mediation of money. [14] One hip New York list server and web site has even adopted Rhizome as its name. [15] According to the Deleuzoguattarians, these non-commodified Net spaces are digital versions of other ‘Temporary Autonomous Zones’ liberated by DIY activists, such as squats, pirate radios, illegal raves and environmental protest camps. [16] Far from being the apotheosis of market competition, the Net is seen as heralding a new stage of human civilisation founded on rhizomic collaboration. [17]
The adepts of A Thousand Plateaus believe that the most utopian demands of May ‘68 are about to be realised within cyberspace. Social movements will be able to organise themselves freely using the Net’s decentralised structure. [18] Cyber-feminists will use digital technologies to transcend patriarchal oppression. [19] Community media will be able to distribute their output without fear of censorship or other restrictions. [20] The limitations of representative democracy will be overcome through the creation of the ‘virtual agora’ - a real-time direct democracy made possible through mass participation in social decision-making using the Net. [21] As nations disappear and hierarchies collapse, Sixties radicalism will finally realised within cyberspace.
The appeal of A Thousand Plateaus lies in more than its poetic recapitulation of New Left communal utopias. In their holy book, Deleuze and Guattari also propagated the myth of the nomad to celebrate hippie tribalism. During the Sixties, many revolutionaries thought that rejecting the dull routines of everyday life was the most effective method of undermining corporate capitalism. Rather than becoming docile workers and contented consumers, ‘…the children of the ants are all going to be tribal people…’ [22] From crusties to cyberpunks, contemporary youth subcultures still retain this hippie belief in the redemptive power of bohemian lifestyles. European avant-garde intellectuals are particularly attracted by the nomadic version of this tradition. Being relatively privileged, they already enjoy greater mobility as employees and as tourists than most of the population of the continent. These academics, artists and activists are making business and forming friendships at conferences, openings, festivals, exhibitions and parties held across the continent and beyond. Now, in their imaginations, the disciples of Deleuze and Guattari can even be in motion when sitting in front of their computer screens. They are the ‘hunter-gatherers of CommTech’ - a cyber-tribe who follow the ‘flows’ across the open spaces of the virtual world. [23] Within the rhizomes of the Net, the Deleuzoguattarians are forming their own youth subculture: the techno-nomads. [24]
There is an eccentric flakiness in Deleuze and Guattari’s writings which fits well with the mood of the times. As in the Sixties, alternative culture has a simultaneous - and contradictory - fascination with mystical beliefs, such as New Age and UFO cults, and with scientific advances, such as quantum physics and genetic manipulation. Among the Californian ideologues, this strange combination of spiritual irrationalism and technical rationalism has been used to justify their neo-liberal analysis of the Net. Using A Thousand Plateaus, TJs have mixed a European version of mystical positivism as wacky as anything found on the West Coast. [25]
For instance, on-line dating isn’t simply a fun way of meeting new partners and trying to find romance. Someone who talks about sex on an IRC channel or in a MOO is supposedly transformed into a Body-without-Organs - an erotic mind freed by digital technologies from the restrictions of the flesh. [26] According to Pierre Lévy, the Net is forming a ‘collective intelligence’ out of our individual minds - a notion derived by combining neo-Platonist Islamic theology with chaos theory and quantum mechanics. [27] For both Manuel De Landa and Sadie Plant, the self-organising tendencies of the Net are derived from a process of chaotic ‘emergence’ which determines everything from hurricanes through living organisms to computer systems. [28] However, even these forms of mystical positivism are not irrational enough for Hakim Bey. Promoting his own incoherent mix of Sufism, acid, anarchism and cyberpunk, this guru openly denounces: ‘…all born-again knee jerk atheists & their frowsy late-Victorian luggage of scientistic vulgar materialism…’ [29]
The disciples of A Thousand Plateaus are the contemporary version of the European avant-garde. D&G now symbolises more than just Dolce & Gabbana. United by certain ’signifying practices’, they form an intellectual version of the youth subcultures studied by many of them on Cultural Studies courses. [30] The techno-nomads love computer technologies, they’re fans of techno music, they’re excited by bizarre science, they’re sympathetic to esoteric beliefs, they’re part of the chemical generation and they adore cyberpunk novels. There even is a distinctive Deleuzoguattarian language which is almost incomprehensible to the uninitiated. [31] Above all, the techno-nomads possess a radical optimism about the future of the Net. Intoxicated by reading too much Deleuze and Guattari, these TJs are confident of being able to intervene within cyberspace to maximise its emancipatory social and cultural potential. The development of the Net won’t just undermine the power of the state, but also create a whole new libertarian way of living. The wired future is there for the taking…
‘What we want to do is what we can do: cut new channels, create new temporary autonomous zones, defuse cathecting power. More than any other writers, [Deleuze and Guattari] …have developed a coherent set of conceptual tools that help us understand our situation and act upon it.’ [32]
3: The Politics of May ‘68
As the European universities and art world have long been dominated by French formalist philosophy, it is not entirely surprising that avant-garde intellectuals interested in the Net have elevated A Thousand Plateaus into a cult text. Since Barthes, Foucault, Derrida, Baudrillard and Virilio are no longer the latest thing, they have proclaimed Deleuze and Guattari as the philosophers of the moment. Although sometimes included within the inner circle of French post-structuralism, these two thinkers were until recently considered far too radical to receive official artistic or academic recognition. [33] However, in this current period of rapid social change symbolised by the Net, the subversive ideas contained within their writings now add to their fashionable appeal. The cynicism and detachment of the post-modernists was Eighties style. The techno-nomads need a more passionate approach for the end of the Nineties. Although they’re both dead, Deleuze and Guattari have become the philosophers of the cyber-millennium.
Far from deterring an audience educated in structuralism, the hermetic language and tortured syntax used within A Thousand Plateaus are seen as proofs of its analytical brilliance. Yet this idiosyncratic Deleuzoguattarian discourse has caused as much confusion as elucidation among their followers. Although the sacred texts are obviously inspired by Sixties radicalism, most of the techno-nomads seem blissfully unaware of what exactly are the theoretical and practical implications of its New Left politics. For instance, the Rhizome website blandly announces that: ‘rhizome is…a figurative term…to describe non-hierarchical networks of all kinds.’ [34] However, at no point does this web site explain either the political meaning of this peculiar concept or how its principles might be applied within the Net. On the contrary, rhizome is simply a hip European phrase borrowed to celebrate the disorganised nature of the New York cyber-arts scene. Some disciples have become even more befuddled by the strange rhetoric of A Thousand Plateaus. For example, Hari Kunzru claims that Deleuze and Guattari are on the same side as the Californian ideologues in the ‘libertarian-communitarian opposition’ within debates about the Net. Just like Wired, these two philosophers are supposedly champions of the ‘emergent properties’ of individual initiative against the evils of state domination. [35]
Such confusion is partially the consequence of political naiveté among many followers of Deleuze and Guattari. Because the two philosophers didn’t use stilted left-wing jargon, most of their followers have avoided understanding the specific political position which informs A Thousand Plateaus and the other sacred texts. Yet, Deleuze and Guattari weren’t just advocates of avant-garde art - and were certainly never apologists for neo-liberalism. Above all, these two gurus were ’soixante-huitards’: supporters of the May ‘68 revolution. [36] During their lifetimes, they were both participated with high-profile New Left initiatives. Deleuze was actively involved in the Groupe d’Information sur les Prisons - the anti-prisons movement led by Michel Foucault. Guattari was the leader of most influential community radio organisation in France. [37] Although it has confused their disciples, Deleuze and Guattari’s idiosyncratic discourse was inspired by their participation in these New Left campaigns. According to the two philosophers, the problem with the ‘wooden language’ of Leninism was that its lack of radicalism not its revolutionary aspirations. [38] In its place, they composed theoretical poetry to express the new subversive practices which developed following the May ‘68 uprising against capitalism. Far from supporting Californian neo-liberalism, Deleuze and Guattari actually championed the most revolutionary form of New Left politics: anarcho-communism.
Like other members of their generation, Deleuze and Guattari wanted to escape from the rigid orthodoxies of Stalinism which had dominated the French Left since the rise of fascism. [39] Trying to find a radical alternative, they took their inspiration from an eclectic range of sources. Along with other young militants, the two philosophers participated in the rediscovery of revolutionary ideologies which had been discarded by their elders, such as anarchism, Trotskyism, Surrealism, council communism and Freudo-Marxism. [40] At the same time, these philosophers also drew on the new ideas and practices which were emerging from the ferment of the New Left, such as Maoism, structuralism, Situationism, urban terrorism, feminism, pacifism, gay rights, community media, psychedelic culture and the anti-psychiatry movement. Despite the profound contradictions between them, all these different currents were united in their disillusionment with the parliamentary parties and trade unions of the mainstream European Left. [41]
For Deleuze and Guattari, anarcho-communism was the most radical expression of New Left politics. As its name suggests, anarcho-communism stood for the destruction of both state power and market capitalism. After bureaucracy and money were abolished, society would be reorganised as a direct democracy and as a gift economy. Initially, anarcho-communists had believed that their utopia would be formed by workers’ councils based in the factories. But, after May ‘68, they increasingly identified direct democracy and the gift economy with the social movements and community media created by New Left activists. [42]
The appeal of anarcho-communism did not only derive from its abstract theory, but also from its concrete practice. During the Sixties, anarcho-communists led the search for radical solutions to the historically novel problems facing young people. Because of the struggle against fascism and the development of Fordism, the babyboomer generation grew up in a period when the Left in Western Europe was dominated by Stalinist and Social Democratic parties. Although divided by the Cold War, both movements prioritised representative politics and economic growth over more radical concepts of human liberation. However, with the arrival of consumer society, the policy of unrestricted modernisation appeared to have reached its limits. Once almost everyone had annual rises in income and mass unemployment had disappeared, the problems of everyday life took on increasing importance, such as restraints on sexual and cultural freedom.
Above all, many people now wanted a say in the decisions which effected them. They were no longer willing to accept leadership from above without some form of dialogue. Responding to these historically specific circumstances, young militants rediscovered and updated anarcho-communism not just as a theory, but also as a practice. Unlike their parents’ parliamentary parties and trade unions, the New Left could articulate their contemporaries’ demands for more participation. Within the universities, factories, offices and cultural life, young people were no longer content to have others deciding their lives for them in return for the commodities of consumer society. Instead, they wanted to do things for themselves.
‘[Anarcho-]communism is not a new mode of production; it the affirmation of a new community. It is a question of being, of life…men and women…will not gain mastery over production, but will create new relations among themselves which will determine an entirely different activity.’ [43]
4: The Romance of ‘Schizo-Politics’
In their writings, the disciples of Deleuze and Guattari are invoking this revolutionary spirit of May ‘68 to celebrate the libertarian aspects of the Net. Opposed to censorship or commercialisation within cyberspace, they instinctively seize on rhizomes, nomads and Body-without-Organs to attack their statist and capitalist enemies. Bored by the political apathy of post-modernism, the techno-nomads are excited by the subversive attitudes of their two gurus. However, the current aestheticisation of Sixties radicalism makes it difficult to understand the particular political position underpinning Deleuze and Guattari’s philosophy. Because of their idiosyncratic language, the origins of their politics in the historically specific circumstances facing the New Left thirty years ago have been obscured. Yet, when read with knowledge of this past, the free association theoretical poetry of A Thousand Plateaus does reveal its rigid political line: anarcho-communism.
Like the traditional Left, Deleuze and Guattari also believed that modern society was the culmination of thousands of years of social conflict. However, the two philosophers rejected the policies for economic modernisation championed by both the Stalinist and Social Democratic parties. Growing up during the post-war boom, they thought that poverty and unemployment were no longer urgent social problems. Along with other anarcho-communists, Deleuze and Guattari didn’t just think that this strategy was a betrayal of the revolutionary heritage of the Left. Above all, they claimed that the reformism of the parliamentary parties had become ‘a historical absurdity’ after May ‘68. [44]
While the mainstream Left still sought political power, the Deleuze and Guattari denounced the state itself as the source of all oppression. According to their foundation myth, the state and its allies had been using top-down tree-like structures to subjugate people ever since the dawn of agrarian civilisation. [45] Described as a process of ‘territorialisation’, they claimed that the media, psychoanalysis and language were the primary ‘machinic assemblages’ used by the state to control everyday life in the modern world. [46] For Deleuze and Guattari, economics was only one manifestation of the state’s primordial will to dominate all human activity. [47]
Facing the transhistorical enemy of the state was a new opponent: the social movements. Both Stalinists and Social Democrats believed that the organised working class was the principle enemy of capitalism. In contrast, Deleuze and Guattari thought that this traditional style of left-wing politics was now obsolete. As part of the ‘guaranteed’ sector of the economy, private and public sector workers not only had been bought off by the system, but also had their desires manipulated by the family, the media, the dominant language and psychoanalysis. [48] Like much of the post-’68 New Left, the two philosophers instead looked to the new social movements of youth, feminists, ecologists, homosexuals and immigrants to ‘deterritorialise’ the power of the state. Forming the ‘non-guaranteed’ sector, people in these movements were excluded from the system and were therefore supposedly eager to fight for the revolution. [49]
While the parliamentary Left wanted to unite all workers around common concerns which could be satisfied through reforms, Deleuze and Guattari advocated a ‘micro-politics of desire’ which resisted such homogenisation of individual needs by the state and its left-wing allies. [50] In A Thousand Plateaus, the nomads poetically symbolised the ‘molecular’ groups who were making this anarcho-communist revolution against the ‘molar’ tyranny of political power. Echoing the hippie fascination with American Indians, the two philosophers claimed that nomadic tribes had prefigured the small-scale and non-hierarchical organisations of the social movements. Far from trying to seize political power, nomads used their mobility to avoid the ‘territorialised’ control of the authoritarian state. [51] Inspired this example, the social movements should therefore reject all attempts to unify them behind the programmes for legislative reforms proposed by the Stalinist and Social Democratic parties. Instead, they should form a multiplicity of tribes which were autonomous from all centralising and hierarchical tendencies, especially those supported by the mainstream Left. [52]
Like other members of the New Left, Deleuze and Guattari advocated the replacement of the state by direct democracy. However, because they distrusted the organised working class, the abolition of political power was no longer to be achieved through the rule of the factory councils. Instead, the two philosophers believed that the bottom-up organisations of the social movements should supersede the top-down authority of the state. In A Thousand Plateaus, the rhizome therefore acted as a poetic metaphor for this updated vision of direct democracy. Along the ‘lines of flight’ mapped out by the New Left, the oppressed would escape from the control of the authoritarian state into autonomous rhizomes formed by the social movements. While the parliamentary Left was still committed to its arboreal, top-down organisations, the New Left was creating rhizomic, bottom-up movements which prefigured the anarcho-communist future. [53]
‘To…centred systems, the authors contrast acentred systems, finite networks of automata in which communication runs from any neighbourhood to any other, the stems and channels do not pre-exist, and all individuals are interchangeable, defined only by their situation at a given moment - such that the local operations are co-ordinated and the final global result synchronised without a central agency.’ [54]
According to Deleuze and Guattari, the overthrow of political power was only the beginning of the anarcho-communist revolution. As ultra-leftists, they didn’t just want to replace one type of social organisation with another more sophisticated form. Above all, they sought to create a fully libertarian way of living. Consequently, these two philosophers advocated the destruction of not only the state and the market, but also the family, the media, the dominant language and the asylum. The only truly free individuals were those who had freed themselves from the ‘common sense’ rationality of bourgeois society. In their critique of official psychiatry, the ‘delirium’ of schizophrenics was something to be celebrated rather than cured. Escaping from their oppressive lives under capitalism, the insane expressed their desires at an intensity which went beyond the social limitations imposed by conventional language. [55] Crucially, this meant that anarcho-communism could no longer be expressed through rational arguments used by the mainstream Left. Because language itself was a form of social domination, ’schizo-politics’ had to be proclaimed through the ‘delirium’ of theoretical poetry. [56]
According to Deleuze and Guattari, political domination was only made possible through personal repression. The anarcho-communist revolution therefore had to liberate the libidinal energies of people from all forms of social control. The individual ‘delirium’ of schizophrenics prefigured the chaotic spirit of collective revolution. [57] This meant that radicals not only had to detonate a social uprising, but also personally live out the cultural revolution. The New Left revolutionary was symbolised as the Body-without-Organs: a person whose spontaneous desires were no longer ‘organised, signified, subjected’ by the rationality of the state. [58] Such individuals were forerunners of the new type of human being who would emerge after the anarcho-communist revolution. Liberated from the repressive culture of the old order, this post-revolutionary person would be the New Left equivalent of Nietzsche’s Superman: a sovereign individual who could constantly ‘… create new values which are those of life, which make life light and active.’ [59] For Deleuze and Guattari, anarcho-communism was therefore not just the realisation of direct democracy and the gift economy. In their ’schizo-politics’, the revolution had to include the destruction of bourgeois rationality so each individual could become a holy fool.
‘[The Fool]…is the vagabond who exists on the fringe of organised society, going his own way, ignoring the rules and taboos with which men seek to contain him. He is the madman who carries within him the seeds of genius, the one who is despised by society yet who is the catalyst who will transform that society.’ [60]
5: The Moment of Radio Alice
After two decades of domination by neo-liberalism, it is not surprising that the followers of Deleuze and Guattari don’t wish to ‘come out’ as anarcho-communists. It is much easier to transform the two philosophers’ theoretical poetry into a revolutionary dreamtime about the Net. However, this fear of being overtly anarcho-communist has led to a curious - and revealing - omission among the exuberant writings of Deleuze and Guattari’s disciples. Although they eagerly adapt the poetical metaphors of A Thousand Plateaus to praise the Net, the techno-nomads almost never mention the enthusiasm of one of their holy prophets’ for the emancipatory potential of computer-mediated communications.
For, as well as being a philosopher and a psychoanalyst, Guattari was also a prominent community media activist. From the mid-Eighties onwards, he became one of the main proponents of the use of computer networks by the new social movements. Over a decade before the Net became popular in the USA, the French government had set up the world’s first public access computer network: Minitel. [61] Guattari thought that this proto-Net was a harbinger of a new ‘post-media’ civilisation. In his philosophical writings with Deleuze, the media had always been condemned for imposing capitalist subjectivity on people. In particular, Guattari detested television as a ‘hypnotic drug’ which stupefied its audience and cut them off from their fellow humans. [62] However, he believed that the domination of the mass media was almost over. Using a Minitel bulletin board, group Eros - an anti-psychiatry organisation - was already pioneering new interactive forms of communications among its members. [63] Following this example, other social movements would soon be forming their own ‘collective assemblages of enunciation’ over the public computer network. [64] Instead of being brainwashed by a few television channels, people would then be able to participate within a multiplicity of information spaces. According to Guattari, the New Left was imminently going to replace top-down, homogenising media with bottom-up, rhizomic ‘post-media’. [65]
Given the similarity of Guattari’s utopian vision of computer networks with their own, the absence of almost any mention of his enthusiasm for ‘post-media’ by the techno-nomads is indeed very strange. The reason must be found in their - conscious or unconscious - realisation that an examination of Guattari’s involvement within community media would reveal why their favourite philosophical duo do not really provide ‘a coherent set of conceptual tools’ for understanding the Net. This is because Guattari’s enthusiasm for media experiments by social movements was nothing new. In the late-Seventies and early-Eighties, he was a prominent guru of the community radio movement in both Italy and France. However, when the abstractions of the holy prophets were put into practice, they had disastrous consequences. This is why the techno-nomads have so far studiously avoided mentioning Guattari’s own writings about the impact of computer networks. Once these became known, it would be inevitable that people would then look for their origins in the embarrassing history of the application of Guattari’s theory as practice within the community radio movement. Crucially, it is this anarcho-communist adventure within community radio which - paradoxically - provides the answer to why the disciples of Deleuze and Guattari have developed such a curious affinity with the neo-liberal ideology of Wired.
Like many other innovations of the New Left, the community radio movement began on the West Coast of the USA. The protests against the American invasion of Vietnam didn’t just politically radicalise a generation, but also popularised the hippie counter-culture. Alongside conventional political activism such as marches, election campaigns and sit-ins, young militants showed their opposition to the murderous policies of the US government in South-East Asia by rejecting the puritanical lifestyle of their parents. This fusion of political and cultural radicalism found its clearest expression in the alternative media. Utilising the latest technologies, hippies created many different forms of counter-cultural expression from underground newspapers to rock bands. [66]
The development of community radio broadcasting was an integral part of this cultural revolution against the American military-industrial complex. As with many other New Left initiatives of the time, community radio stations were organised in ways which supposedly prefigured the anarcho-communist future. For example, stations democratically elected their managements and all important tasks were rotated among their workers. At the same time, the community radio stations were committed to breaking down the separation between programme-makers and their audience. For instance, stations refused to accept advertising and instead relied on donations from the listeners. In place of money-commodity relations, community stations were run as gift economies. Above all, New Left media activists wanted members of the audience to make radio programmes about their own concerns. By encouraging two-way communications over the airwaves, these hippie radicals believed that community radio stations were creating a truly democratic form of media within the USA. [67]
Across in Europe, young militants were quick to learn from their American contemporaries. The May ‘68 French revolution had catalysed a wave of New Left activism across the continent. In particular, Italy was convulsed by increasingly violent protests against the corrupt rule of the conservative Christian Democrats and their clerical allies. However the mainstream Left could not benefit from this popular desire for change. Because of the Cold War, the Italian Communist Party was blocked from coming to power at a national level and was therefore forced into an implicit acceptance of the status quo. [68] With electoral politics frozen, many young people embraced New Left positions. Rejecting existing party and union structures, they not only organised wildcat strikes and sabotage within the universities and the factories, but also created new social movements of feminists, youth, ecologists, lesbian & gays and other minorities. These hippie radicals sparked off a cultural revolution against the oppressive and patriarchal morality of the Catholic church. By the late-Seventies, the Italian New Left had successfully pioneered a exciting and innovative counter-culture which ranged from national newspapers to community theatres. [69]
Félix Guattari was closely associated with this political and cultural ferment in Italy. Being a prominent New Left psychotherapist, he worked with the Italian anti-psychiatry movement. More importantly, he was proclaimed as the theoretical guru of the Italy’s most celebrated community station: Radio Alice. [70] For decades, the nationalised broadcasting company had been used to disseminate propaganda from the ruling Christian Democrats. Although they complained about political bias, the Left parties didn’t oppose the state’s monopoly over the airwaves. Instead, they campaigned for more ideological pluralism within the existing nationalised system. Just at the point where the opposing parties were edging towards a compromise, some New Left activists decided to undermine this emerging consensus by setting up their own unlicensed radio stations. When the police tried to close them down, these pirates challenged the legality of the state’s monopoly over the airwaves.
Much to their delight, the Italian supreme court decided in 1975 that this situation was indeed a violation of the right of free speech guaranteed in the constitution. Following the collapse of the regulations against unlicensed broadcasting, thousands of ‘free radios’ were set up all across Italy. While most of these were commercial, about a fifth of these stations were run by New Left activists. Like their American counterparts, the radical ‘free radios’ not only elected their own administrators, but also encouraged listener participation in their broadcasts. From phone-ins to community programme-making, these stations allowed their audience to describe their own experiences in strikes or other social struggles. Refusing corporate advertising, they survived through gifts of time and money from their listeners. No longer hindered by the state, the Italian New Left had discovered how to propagate the cultural revolution over the airwaves. [71]
Radio Alice was set up as a political ‘free radio’ in 1976. The station was based in Bologna whose reforming local authority was run by the Communist Party. Its name was an ironic reference to how the city was portrayed as a ‘wonderland’ in the party’s propaganda. [72] Like other radical stations, Radio Alice broadcast news about the social struggles led by the New Left and encouraged community groups to make their own programmes. [73] However, the provision of ‘counter-information’ was not the sole purpose of this station. According to Guattari, Radio Alice was replacing the corrupt system of representative democracy with an electronic form of direct democracy. Instead of having their views represented by politicians or other elected officials, people could now directly express their own opinions on the programmes of the community radio stations. Once the ‘immense permanent meeting’ over the airwaves was formed, Guattari claimed that the social movements would then successfully be able to ‘deterritorialise’ the hierarchical power of the state. Although initially limited to community radio stations, this electronic agora supposedly prefigured the imminent reorganisation of the whole of society around direct democracy after the anarcho-communist revolution. [74]
‘The social entity is enabled to speak for itself without being obliged to look to representatives or spokesmen to speak for it.’ [75]
Even this ultra-left utopia didn’t go far enough for Guattari. The ultimate aim of Radio Alice was the subversion of bourgeois rationality and repressive sexuality within everyday life. When people were able to express their own views over the airwaves, Guattari hoped that the ‘delirium’ of libidinal desire would be released within the population. By encouraging ‘poetical-frenzied’ speech, the ‘free radio’ rhizomes would be laying the foundations for a truly libertarian way of living. [76] Not surprisingly, Radio Alice’s commitment to converting the inhabitants of Bologna to ’schizo-politics’ was not appreciated by the reformists at the city hall. When the station helped to organise a student rebellion in the centre of Bologna in 1977, the local Communist council finally had a legal excuse to shut down Radio Alice. The first experiment in Deleuzoguattarian community media was over. [77]
‘The police have destroyed Radio Alice - its activists have been hunted down, condemned, imprisoned, its premises have been ransacked - but its revolutionary work of deterritorialisation tirelessly carries on right into the nervous systems of its persecutors.’ [78]
6: Guattari Goes Bankrupt
Back at home, Radio Alice’s dramatic martyrdom had turned Guattari into the putative leader of the ‘free radio’ movement in France. [79] As in Italy, the French electronic media was controlled by a state-owned broadcasting monopoly which shamelessly promoted the interests of the ruling conservative parties. However, like the Italian Communist party, the parliamentary Left in France initially didn’t support opening up the airwaves. On the contrary, they wanted the nationalised broadcasting corporation to be reformed along public service lines. [80] This impasse created an opportunity for direct action by New Left activists. In 1977, some Greens in Paris set up the first pirate radio station in France. Inspired by this example, many other groups started to experiment with unlicensed radio broadcasting. Despite state repression, soon almost every political movement in France had its own pirate station. Even François Mitterrand, the leader of the Socialist party, was busted for illegal radio broadcasting! [81]
Although some pirates were commercial, most of the ‘free radios’ were run by New Left activists. Before the May ‘68 revolution, the Situationists had advocated the replacement of ‘the society of the spectacle’ by the electronic agora. This ultra-left organisation believed that creating direct democracy within the media was the precondition for the victory of anarcho-communism across France. [82] For many members of the New Left, pirate radio broadcasting was the most effective and fun way of putting this revolutionary theory into practice. Instead of being represented by others, people could now express their own views over the airwaves and organise collectively to realise common goals. According to this analysis, ‘free radios’ were prefiguring the electronic agoras which would run society after the coming revolution.
‘Free radio has the effect of allowing people to be aware of the upheavals which are about to happen. But it is above all the proof that our fate is not determined and that citizens are able to be actors of these transformations rather than forever being (TV) spectators…’ [83]
As in Italy, Félix Guattari was associated with one of the leading stations of the ‘free radio’ movement. Along with Gilles Deleuze and other New Left philosophers, he set up Radio 93 in Paris. Like Radio Alice, this radical pirate didn’t just broadcast news about revolutionary struggles and programmes made by community groups. Radio 93 was also committed to the ‘deterritorialisation’ of state power and the subversion of sexual-linguistic oppression. Although repeatedly raided, the fame of Guattari and his colleagues ensured that this radio project received considerable attention from the mainstream media. With all this coverage, Guattari soon became accepted as the ‘voice’ of the radical pirates. Crucially, his celebrity status allowed him to win support for his own particular theories about the media within the French ‘free radio’ movement. [84]
When pirate radio broadcasting started, the lobbying campaign to open up the airwaves was led by pragmatic members of the Socialist party. Although involved with community radio stations, they were willing to form a tactical alliance with the advocates of commercial broadcasting to obtain licences from a conservative government. But, when this compromise was turned down by the ruling parties, their consensual strategy appeared to have failed. Radicalised by police repression, the surviving pirate radio stations moved towards the policies advocated by Guattari and his colleagues at Radio 93. Rejecting any collaboration with the commercial pirates, these ’soixante-huitards’ argued that ‘free radios’ should concentrate on prefiguring anarcho-communism within their organisations. Above all, this meant that these stations had to refuse any funding from advertising. In order to consolidate this militant position, the radical pirates came together to form a new lobbying organisation: the Fédération Nationale des Radios Libres (FNRL). [85]
According to Guattari, the principle task of the FNRL was to make clear the community radio movement’s opposition to ‘advertising pollution’. As the state’s monopoly crumbled, the philosopher feared that control would be reimposed over radio broadcasting by commercial organisations. Instead of electronic agoras flourishing within a gift economy, private corporations and their political allies would dominate the airwaves with ‘disco radios’ promoting the values of consumer society. The ‘free radios’ therefore had to maintain their anarcho-communist principles. In place of advertising, community radio stations had to be funded by donations of time and money from their audience. They could then exist within a gift economy rather than become dependent on the ‘territorialising’ forces of capitalism. For the FNRL, the refusal to take radio advertising became the main symbol of a pirate station’s radical credentials. A rhizomic ‘free radio’ could never compromise with arboreal powers from the commercial sector. [86]
Yet, despite its New Left politics, the FNRL still welcomed the Socialist victory in the 1981 elections. Because Mitterrand himself had been arrested for radio piracy, the Fédération knew that the new government would rapidly open up the airwaves. When legislation was being prepared, the anarcho-communist FNRL ironically emerged as the principle advocate of tight state regulation over this new sector. Determined to prevent the commercialisation of radio broadcasting, the Fédération argued that only voluntary organisations should be granted licences and all on-air advertising should be banned. Despite warnings from more pragmatic ‘free radio’ activists, the FNRL managed to persuade the Socialist government to include these measures in its 1981 broadcasting law. According to this statute, the new stations could only be run by social movements and organised as gift economies. [87] As well as winning this victory, Guattari and his comrades were also granted one of the much coveted radio licences for Paris once they agreed to fuse their project with other New Left pirate stations. After years of struggle, they now controlled their own legal ‘free radio’: Fréquence Libre. [88]
While many philosophers have theorised in a vacuum, Guattari now had an unrivalled opportunity to turn his and Deleuze’s abstractions into practice. Fréquence Libre had been granted a licence to broadcast to the millions of inhabitants of Paris. It had its own studios, support from leading members of the New Left and even a small subsidy from the government. This ‘free radio’ was a potential rhizome where social movements could make their own programmes, where the gift economy could be developed and where the ‘delirium’ of libidinal desire could be released. Yet it soon became obvious that turning theory into practice was much more difficult than Deleuze and Guattari had ever imagined. In February 1982, the first major survey was made into the popularity of the new local radio stations in Paris. According to its results, the most successful service was a pop music station with a weekly audience of over 500,000. In complete contrast, Fréquence Libre only had 30,000 listeners tuning in each week. [89] During the next three years, Guattari and his comrades were never able to reverse these disastrous results. By 1985, Fréquence Libre was still only 21st out of a total of 23 independent radio stations in Paris. The two stations below Guattari’s station in the ratings both broadcast in languages other than French! [90]
According to Guattari, the electronic agora would be built through the participation of increasing numbers of people within community radio broadcasting. However, soon after Fréquence Libre was launched, it was obvious that only a minority of activists from the New Left were interested in making programmes for the station. Crucially, the sectarian politics of these militants actually discouraged other people - including many on the Left - from getting involved in this community radio station. For instance, leading Fréquence Libre presenters insisted on ‘talking the same way as in political meetings’ when they were on-air. [91] Despite the promise of community involvement, Guattari and his colleagues were more interested in lecturing the audience rather than engaging in discussions with them. Instead of encouraging the ‘delirium’ of desire, Fréquence Libre was often broadcasting in its own ultra-left version of Stalinist ‘wooden language’.
This revolutionary elitism could even be found in the musical policies of the station. Although they were from the baby boomer generation, many New Left activists were hostile towards what they perceived as a mindless and consumerist pop culture. The FNRL habitually used ‘disco radio’ as a dismissive term for commercial broadcasting. So when some rappers approached Fréquence Libre about the possibility of making some programmes, the station’s leadership completely failed to realise why the emergence of this multi-racial style of music in the suburban ghettos of Paris was a major cultural event in France. Unable to appreciate the music, they refused to let any hip-hop crews on-air until their lyrics had been politically vetted! Although much of the station’s airtime was filled with the sounds of punk, reggae and other alternative rhythms, the New Left militants who ran Fréquence Libre never really understood the cultural importance of promoting innovative styles of popular music on their community radio station. [92]
Although ‘free radios’ were theoretically committed to two-way communications among people, Fréquence Libre had in practice become the megaphone for the viewpoints of Guattari and his disciples. However, the station could not survive in the long-run depending on such a limited number of people. Committed to refusing all advertising, Fréquence Libre had to raise most of its income as gifts from its listeners. As well as help in kind, it needed a constant flow of money to pay for its premises, studios, transmitters and other running costs. The station also had to employ a few people to provide essential engineering, broadcasting and administrative support for its volunteer programme-makers. Out of political commitment, people did work for the station for nothing or for very low wages. However, as they acquired family responsibilities or discovered other interests, the first generation of activists slowly started to drift away. Because they’d alienated most of their potential audience, Guattari and his comrades soon discovered that they could neither raise sufficient cash nor recruit enough volunteers to operate the gift economy successfully within their ‘free radio’ station.
Fréquence Libre now entered into a vicious circle of decline. Without more resources, the station couldn’t produce better programming. Without an interesting service, more listeners wouldn’t tune into the station. Without more listeners, the station didn’t receive enough donations of time and money to survive. Despite Guattari’s earlier optimism, the gift economy was no longer working at Fréquence Libre. Reluctantly, the station’s management eventually agreed to start raising money from advertising. But this compromise with economic reality had come far too late. Hardly anyone was interested in buying commercials on an anarcho-communist station with a tiny audience. In 1985, Fréquence Libre finally went bankrupt. To complete the humiliation, the station’s frequency had to be sold to a commercial radio network to pay off some of its debts. Guattari’s attempts to turn theory into practice within the ‘free radio’ movement had ended in tragedy. [93]
‘…the movement [was confined] within the old methods of militancy which came from ‘68, while the radio phenomenon proved on the contrary that these were finished.’ [94]
7: From Stalin to Pol Pot
As Fréquence Libre headed towards bankruptcy, Guattari never admitted any responsibility for the disaster. Amazingly, he instead blamed the Mitterrand government for the collapse of the community radio movement in France. Despite being given a statute written to FNRL specifications, a Paris-wide licence and limited subsidies, the philosopher still claimed that the Socialists had deliberately destroyed the ‘free radios’ through the process of legalisation. Being outside the law, the pirate stations had never been forced to compromise with political and commercial interests. But, once the 1981 broadcasting law was passed, the revolutionary purity of the ‘free radios’ had been inevitably corrupted by the state and the market. Whatever the circumstances, DIY initiatives had to preserve their complete autonomy from the rest of society. At the moment of defeat, Guattari portrayed himself as the tragic romantic hero. His ambitious plans had been thwarted, but his revolutionary principles remained intact. By reasserting anarcho-communism in theory, the holy prophet avoided explaining why its application hadn’t worked in practice. [95]
Yet, elsewhere in Europe and in the USA, community radio stations have managed to avoid going bankrupt. When not dominated by a small group of militants, DIY media projects can be much more tolerant and inclusive. As a consequence, community radio stations are able to recruit enough volunteers, produce popular programming and raise sufficient funding, including even from commercial sources. For instance, Radio Populare in Milan is not just financially viable, but also has been the most popular station in the city on several occasions. [96] However, the techno-nomads are not excited by these more successful - and less utopian - examples of community radio broadcasting. On the contrary, as avant-garde intellectuals, they are precisely attracted by the uncompromising theoretical radicalism expressed by Guattari. What they are looking for is a revolutionary dreamtime to project onto cyberspace rather than a practical method of extending access to the media.
Above all, the techno-nomads are unable to realise the failure of Guattari’s ‘free radio’ experiment exposes the severe flaws within the theoretical positions championed by the two philosophers. Far from succumbing to an outside conspiracy, Fréquence Libre imploded because of the particular New Left politics which inspired A Thousand Plateaus and the other sacred texts. Unwilling to connect abstract theory with its practical application, the techno-nomads cannot see how the revolutionary rhetoric of Deleuze and Guattari hid some very reactionary concepts. Crucially, the tragic history of Fréquence Libre demonstrated that the two philosophers’ celebration of direct democracy was simultaneously a justification for intellectual elitism. Although formally committed to opening up the airwaves to the oppressed, Fréquence Libre collapsed because only a small minority of committed activists were actually allowed to become involved in the project.
This elitism was no accident. It came directly from the existential situation faced by much of the baby boomer generation. Because of their very different life experiences, many young people experienced a pronounced ‘generation gap’ between themselves and their parents. As political rebels, New Left activists particularly felt that they had little in common with the rest of the population. This disillusionment extended to left-wing parties and unions which were nominally dedicated to overthrowing capitalism. Feeling so isolated, the ’soixante-huitards’ not surprisingly valued intense commitment over popular support in their politics. Above all, they believed that society could be changed by a revolutionary vanguard composed of themselves and their comrades. [97] This is why many young radicals simultaneously believed in two contradictory concepts. First, the revolution would create mass participation in running society. Second, the revolution could only be organised by a committed minority.
The New Left militants were reliving an old problem in a new form. For over two hundred years, radical politics had been caught inside the contradiction between popular freedom and intellectual authority. Back in the 1790s, Robespierre had argued that the democratic republic could only be created by a revolutionary dictatorship. [98] In the late-nineteenth century, Bakunin had called for a spontaneous uprising of the people directed by a secret conspiracy led by himself. [99] During the 1917 Russian revolution, Lenin had advocated direct democracy by workers’ councils while simultaneously instituting the totalitarian rule of the Bolshevik party. [100] As the experience of Fréquence Libre showed, Deleuze and Guattari never escaped from this fundamental contradiction of revolutionary politics. While community groups were supposedly free to express themselves through the rhizomic ‘free radio’, the New Left vanguard really controlled who could - and could not - broadcast over the airwaves. As in other social movements, the lack of formal structures meant that Fréquence Libre was dominated by a few charismatic individuals: the holy prophets of the anarcho-communist revolution. The absence of the Leninist party did not prevent the continuation of vanguard politics. On the contrary, anarchy and spontaneity were the preconditions for unchecked domination by the intellectual elite. [101]
‘If the movement continues deliberately not to select who shall exercise power, it does not thereby abolish power. All it does is abdicate the right to demand that those who do exercise power and influence be [democratically] responsible for it.’ [102]
In Deleuze and Guattari’s writings, this deep authoritarianism found its theoretical expression in their methodology: semiotic structuralism. Despite rejecting its ‘wooden language’, the two philosophers never really abandoned Stalinism in theory. Above all, they retained its most fundamental premise: ordinary people were incapable of determining their own destiny. According to Lenin, the mass of the population were trapped within a ‘false consciousness’ imposed by the media and other ideological institutions. [103] During the early-Sixties, this elitist theory was updated through the addition of Lacanian structuralism by Louis Althusser, the chief philosopher of the French Communist party. According to his analysis, ideological domination was an inevitable feature of all societies because of its psychological origins in the unconsciousness. [104] For Deleuze and Guattari, Althusser had explained why only a revolutionary minority supported the New Left. Brainwashed by the family, media, language and psychoanalysis, the majority of the population supposedly desired fascism rather than anarcho-communism. [105]
Deleuze and Guattari’s theoretical poetry was therefore impregnated with Leninist assumptions. [106] Like other structuralists, they never accepted that ordinary people could make their own history without leadership from the intellectual vanguard. All theories celebrating individual and collective subjectivity were suspect because they assumed that the mass of the population could possess some form of ‘free will’. Instead, these philosophers claimed that semiotic ‘machinic assemblages’ controlled the development of society, including the production of human subjectivity. [107] By adopting this analysis, Deleuze and Guattari were tacitly privileging their own role as intellectuals: the producers of semiotic systems. Just like their Stalinist elders, the two philosophers believed that only a minority of revolutionaries were capable of freeing themselves from ideological domination. Illuminated by the ‘holy idea’, the vanguard of intellectuals had the right to lead the masses - without any formal consent from them - in the fight against capitalism. [108]
‘…the speculative notion of the domination of the speculative ideal in history [turns] into the notion of the domination of the speculative philosophers themselves.’ [109]
This authoritarian methodology clearly contradicted the libertarian rhetoric within Deleuze and Guattari’s writings. Yet, as demonstrated by the experience of Fréquence Libre, the philosophical duo did turn the elitist side of their theory into practice. The implosion of this ‘free radio’ was caused by the inability of Guattari and his comrades to expand its support beyond the New Left vanguard. As the rappers who wanted to make a show for their radio station discovered, the Deleuzoguattarian interpretation of anarcho-communism could even involve censoring musicians from the ghettos before allowing them on-air. Although it supposedly prefiguring direct democracy in its internal organisation, the principle role of Fréquence Libre was to propagate the beliefs of the intellectual elite among the unenlightened population of Paris. [110]
For the mainstream Left, the only way out of this contradiction between participation and elitism was to abandon the concept of violent revolution altogether in favour of electoral reformism. [111] However, the New Left had emerged precisely to combat such parliamentary compromises. For young militants, the problem was how a committed minority could make a revolution without ending up with totalitarianism. Some of the New Left thought that the solution to this dilemma could be found in the heroic leftism of the early Bolsheviks. [112] In France, this Leninist revival often acquired an ‘orientalist’ flavour through the influence of Maoism. [113] For others, only anarcho-communism could express their desire to overthrow both political and economic oppression. [114] However, even this revolutionary form of politics still appeared to many as tainted by the bloody failure of the Russian revolution. Had not the experience of Stalinism proved that any compromise with the process of modernity would inevitably lead to the reimposition of tyranny? In the name of a better future, millions had been slaughtered for resisting the programme of forced industrialisation organised by the totalitarian state.
Consequently, anarcho-communist thinkers increasingly decided that just opposing the oppressive features of economic development was not radical enough. Desiring a complete transformation of society, they rejected the transcendent ‘grand narrative’ of modernity altogether, especially those left-wing versions inspired by Hegel and Marx. According to these ultra-leftists, the whole concept of progress was a fraud designed to win acquiescence for the intensification of capitalist domination. While the mainstream Left still wanted to complete the process of modernisation, the New Left should instead be leading a revolution against modernity. [115]
Deleuze and Guattari enthusiastically joined this attack against the concept of historical progress. For instance, although the chapters of A Thousand Plateaus are named after significant historical dates, these are deliberately not put in sequential order. [116] The philosophical duo instead emphasised moments of ‘delirium’ found in intense political, sexual, chemical, psychotic and mystical experiences. [117] For them, the achievement of these ‘becomings’ wasn’t the result of a Hegelian transcendence across time. On the contrary, the immanence of liberation from social controls was Nietzschean: something which always existed potentially within the here and now. [118] For Deleuze and Guattari, there was a hermetic history of ‘delirium’ which could be found within dissident politics and art. However, these intensities had been experienced as particular moments rather than as steps towards the good society. [119] Anarcho-communism was therefore not the ‘end of history’: the material result of a long epoch of social development. Instead, the liberation of desire was a perpetual promise: an ethical stance which could be equally lived by nomads in ancient times or social movements in the present. [120] With enough libidinal intensity, anyone could overcome hierarchical repression to become a fully-liberated individual: the nomad warrior, the Body-without-Organs, the holy fool, the Nietzschean Superman and the New Left militant.
‘Men’s only hope lies in a revolutionary becoming: the only way of casting off their shame or responding to what is intolerable.’ [121]
Once anarcho-communism was transformed into an ahistorical ideology, the New Left’s opposition to economic development soon developed into a desire to abandon modernity altogether. This dream of returning to a pre-industrial past had deep roots within the baby boomer generation in France. At the beginning of the post-war era, nearly half of the French population still lived in the countryside working in small businesses or as peasants. During their childhoods, the ’soixante-huitards’ had lived through the rapid completion of the urbanisation and industrialisation of France. [122] While most of their parents had welcomed the increase in their material well-being, many of the younger generation reacted against the superficiality of the new consumer society. Believing that economic crisis would never return, they created the New Left movement to seek more autonomy within their daily lives and combat the undesirable results of industrialism, such as inequality and pollution.
As in the USA, this radicalisation of French youth coincided with fierce anti-imperialist struggles in the Third World. During the Fifties and early-Sixties, many French intellectuals had courageously supported national liberation movements in their country’s colonies, such as Vietnam and Algeria. Inspired by Mao, Fanon and Castro, some of them had created ‘Third-Worldism’: a belief that the imperialist sins of metropolitan society would be punished by a revolution of the poor peasants in the periphery. When the USA invaded Vietnam, these ‘Third-Worldists’ were at the forefront of the campaigns against this act of brutal aggression. [123] Following the May ‘68 revolution, support for rural guerrillas resisting American imperialism soon became mixed up with hippie dreams of tribalism, green concerns about environmental degradation and nostalgia for a lost peasant past. Disillusioned with the economic progress championed by the parliamentary Left, many on the New Left synthesised these different ideas into hatred of the mass urban society created by modernity. For them, a truly libertarian revolution could only have one goal: the destruction of the city. [124]
Along with many of their contemporaries, Deleuze and Guattari eagerly supported this anti-modernist interpretation of anarcho-communism. For them, the ‘deterritorialisation’ of urban society became the solution to the contradiction between participatory democracy and revolutionary elitism haunting the New Left. If the centralised city could be broken down into ‘molecular rhizomes’, direct democracy and the gift economy would reappear as people formed themselves into small nomadic bands. [125] Like other hippies, the two philosophers dreamed of reviving pre-modern tribalism in a new form. Believing that urban democracy was most advanced form of oppression, they championed the untamed nomads who would eliminate the corruption of the city. [126]
‘Make the desert, the steppe grow; do not depopulate it, quite the contrary. If war necessarily results, it is because the [nomadic] war machine collides with States and cities…from then on the [nomadic] war machine has as its enemy the State, the city, the state and urban phenomenon, and adopts as its objective their annihilation.’ [127]
For Deleuze and Guattari, the destruction of modern urban society was necessary to free humanity not just from the state and the market, but also from the family, media, language and psychoanalysis. What was only immanent in moments of ‘delirium’ within contemporary society would become a fully libertarian way of living once everyone became a member of the nomadic tribes of holy fools. However, as the experience of Fréquence Libre proved, this rhetoric of unlimited freedom ironically contained a deep desire for ideological control by the New Left vanguard. Nowhere was this contradiction more intense than in the two philosophers’ opposition to the process of modernity. Far from expressing the most radical concept of freedom, anti-modernism implied authoritarianism in its most regressive form.
While the nomadic fantasies of A Thousand Plateaus were being composed, one revolutionary movement actually did carry out Deleuze and Guattari’s dream of destroying the city. Led by a vanguard of Paris-educated intellectuals, the Khmer Rouge organised a successful peasant revolution in Cambodia against an oppressive regime installed by the Americans. Rejecting the ‘grand narrative’ of economic progress, Pol Pot and his organisation instead tried to construct a rural utopia. Determined to eliminate the supposedly corrupting influences of urban living, the Khmer Rouge expelled everyone from the cities and turned them into forced labourers within the countryside. When the economy subsequently imploded, the regime embarked on ever more ferocious purges against real and imaginary enemies until the country was rescued by an invasion by neighbouring Vietnam. As a first step in rebuilding Cambodia, the new government encouraged the surviving city-dwellers to return to their homes. Deleuze and Guattari had claimed that the destruction of the city would create direct democracy and libidinal ecstasy. Instead, the application of such anti-modernism in practice had resulted in tyranny and genocide. [128]
8: The Antinomies of the Avant-Garde
The exposure of the Khmer Rouge’s crimes precipitated a profound crisis within the French New Left. The end of the long post-war boom had already weakened the credibility of a political movement which assumed that poverty and unemployment were no longer major social problems. Now it was revealed that the anti-modernist revolution had unleashed the barbarism of the ‘killing fields’ rather than liberating humanity. The ‘line of flight’ from Stalin had led to Pol Pot. Disillusioned with ultra-left politics, most activists gravitated towards either parliamentary reformism or post-modern nihilism as the Seventies came to a close. The New Left revolution had failed. [129]
Ironically, the current popularity of Deleuze and Guattari comes from their stubborn refusal to recognise this defeat. In A Thousand Plateaus and the other sacred texts, Deleuze and Guattari completely ignored the harsher socio-economic climate following the 1974 oil crisis and the disastrous consequences of the anti-modernist revolution in Cambodia. Even when Fréquence Libre went bankrupt, the two philosophers never questioned their strategy of ’schizo-politics’. Instead, they transformed the historically specific politics of the New Left into theoretical poetry which existed outside history. As opponents of the ‘grand narrative’ of modernity, these holy prophets much preferred the libidinal intensity of revolutionary failure to the limited achievements of parliamentary reformism.
‘The victory of the revolution is immanent and consists of the new bonds which it installs between people, even if these bonds last no longer than the revolution’s fused material and quickly give way to division and betrayal.’ [130]
Because of their ultra-leftism, Deleuze and Guattari remained marginal figures within the pantheon of post-structuralist philosophers throughout the Eighties. Despite supporting social movements and denouncing historical ‘grand narratives’, these gurus were far too closely associated with the defeat of the New Left to be promoted by the fashionable advocates of post-modernism. During the decade of ascendant neo-liberalism, avant-garde intellectuals emphasised formal experimentation over social engagement. [131] However, at the end of the Nineties, post-modernist detachment now seems very dated. Looking for an alternative to Eighties apathy, contemporary intellectuals are rediscovering the revolutionary passion of the New Left. For ‘cutting edge’ TJs, it is now almost compulsory to sample from the writings of Situationists, Autonomists and other ultra-leftists of the period. Above all, they have to embrace the theoretical poetry of Deleuze and Guattari.
Yet, this revival of New Left theories is taking place in very different circumstances from those which produced the politics of May ‘68. For instance, only a few ‘deep greens’ still believe in the anti-modernist revolution. [132] However, the contemporary irrelevance of Deleuze Guattari’s politics does not discredit their theoretical poetry among radical intellectuals. On the contrary, the defeat of the New Left has enabled their disciples to complete the transformation of anarcho-communism from the hope of social revolution into the symbol of personal authenticity: an ethical-aesthetic rejection of bourgeois society. Divorced from its historical context, the New Left is now admired more for its emotional intensity than for its practical achievements. Although defeated in reality, the ideals of May ‘68 can be used to imagine a revolutionary dreamtime for the Net. The political vanguard of the Sixties is reborn as the cultural avant-garde for the Nineties.
The aestheticisation of revolutionary politics is a revered tradition of the European avant-garde. Back in the Twenties, the Surrealists perfected the fusion of artistic creativity with social rebellion. Inspired by Lenin, this avant-garde movement claimed that the consciousness of the majority of the population was controlled by cultural mediocrity and puritan morality. Therefore radical intellectuals had the heroic task of freeing the people from ideological domination. Their innovative art would undermine the repressive cultural norms of bourgeois society. Their bohemian way of living would challenge the dull conformity of everyday life under capitalism. The Surrealists believed that this assault against aesthetic and personal repression would soon culminate in the people rallying to the revolutionary cause. [133] In culture as in politics, the majority of the population would be liberated by following the leadership of an enlightened minority.
‘The essential is always to look ahead…toilingly to go onward towards the discovery, one by one, of fresh landscapes, and to continue to do so indefinitely…that others may afterwards travel the same spiritual road, unhindered and in all security.’ [134]
In this interpretation of Leninism, cultural experimentation became the privileged expression of revolutionary politics. The Surrealists are still praised for their artistic innovations, such as ready-mades, montages, dream imagery and automatism. They are also remembered for their pioneering use of new technologies, such as film-making and photography. [135] Yet, the Surrealists didn’t make their famous artworks just to transgress the formal limitations of Western aesthetics. Above all, they believed that their experimental art would radicalise the consciousness of the people. For instance, this avant-garde movement borrowed techniques from so-called ‘outsider art’ made by tribal societies, the insane, the intoxicated and the uneducated. Although these groups had little else in common, the Surrealists thought that their members lived more passionately and emotionally than those trapped within the rules and regulations of bourgeois society. [136]
The Surrealists believed that their use of techniques borrowed from ‘outsider art’ would inspire rebellion against the alienation of life under capitalism. Whether from the tribal past or the science-fiction future, any vision of a more authentic life should be used to subvert the cultural philistinism of the bourgeois present. For the Surrealists, breaking the conventions of high art was directly equated with fighting against the ideological domination of capitalism. Their aesthetic eclecticism was always underpinned by a rigid Leninism. According to the Surrealists, innovative paintings, sculptures, photography, films and literature could only be made ‘…in the service of the revolution.’ [137]
Although its language is idiosyncratic, the cult of Deleuze and Guattari is the latest manifestation of this European avant-garde tradition. After years of post-modern apathy, Nineties intellectuals are rediscovering the joy of aestheticising the revolution. [138] Because Leninism is discredited, they’ve instead seized on Deleuzoguattarian discourse to signify their political, moral and aesthetic dissidence. Ironically, this change in language is necessary to maintain a continuity in practice. For, just like its Surrealist predecessors, the contemporary avant-garde models itself on the political vanguard. Experimental art and bohemian lifestyles are equated with the fermenting of social rebellion. The primitive and the future are still counterposed against the present. [139] Once again, radical intellectuals are leading the cultural revolution against bourgeois society.
‘For artistic practice, the adaptation of the model of the [nomadic] war machine can mean that, in order to enhance the transversal tendencies, insecurities have to be triggered, anti-production has to be initiated and parasitic behaviour has to be developed as a series of inversive strategies: infoldings at the boundaries.’ [140]
Despite their involvement with radio broadcasting and computer-mediated communications, Deleuze and Guattari had still hoped that the ‘line of flight’ from modernity would lead back to the tribal past. In the sacred texts, the holy prophets perpetuated the primitivist traditions of Surrealism by composing myths about nomadic warriors and Bodies-without-Organs. [141] In contrast, their contemporary followers are much more excited by the digital future than by tribal societies. They have no ambiguity about their relationship with modern technologies. Far from desiring the destruction of the city, radical intellectuals now hope that the Deleuzoguattarian utopia will emerge from the process of ‘deterritorialisation’ unleashed by the Net. [142]
Using intellectual alchemy, the techno-nomads transmute their gurus’ anti-modernist scriptures into a philosophy of hyper-modernism. The rhizome becomes a metaphor for community networks. The nomad warrior is turned into a hi-tech employee who can easily move between jobs and countries. Semiotic structuralism reflects the digital codes of Net software. The Body-without-Organs is used to mythologise cybersex. For their contemporary followers, Deleuze and Guattari’s ultra-leftism is primarily an ethical-aesthetic stance opposing the conformity of bourgeois society. By separating Sixties anarcho-communism from its specific historical moment, New Left vanguard politics can re-emerge as the hip avant-garde style for the Nineties: ‘What is Fashion? A form of utopia.’ [143]
This aestheticisation of May ‘68 is made much easier by the poetical style of Deleuze and Guattari. In A Thousand Plateaus, the ’schiz-flow’ of the text continually jumps between radical psychoanalysis, art criticism, historical myths, popular science and several other genres. As in modernist painting, the ‘realism’ of the text has been superseded by a fascination with the formal techniques of theoretical production. For Deleuze and Guattari, theory was no longer a tool for understanding social reality. On the contrary, theory became poetry: a piece of literature expressing authentic emotion. Having failed in practice, New Left politics could live on as theory-art.
‘The aesthetic power of feeling, although equal in principle with the other powers of thinking philosophically, knowing science, acting politically, seems on the verge of occupying a privileged position within the collective Assemblages of enunciation of our era.’ [144]
At the beginning of this century, the founders of the European avant-garde pioneered the combination of revolutionary politics and cultural rebellion into the new aesthetic form of theory-art. [145] Faithful to this hallowed custom, techno-nomad TJs now sample Deleuze and Guattari to produce leftfield philosophical writings. Yet, like Britpop bands imitating their heroes from the Sixties, something is lost in these respectful homages to the past. The faithful coping of the holy prophets’ literary style is obscuring their ultra-left beliefs. For Deleuze and Guattari’s theoretical positions are being reproduced for their emotional intensity not for their particular politics. In the sacred texts, the rational analysis of society had already been replaced by the literary celebration of irrational desires. The European avant-garde is now discarding the few remaining connections with the social sciences. Deleuzoguattarian discourse can then become cool multi-media theory-art for the age of the Net. [146]
The techno-nomads are a cultural movement who constitute themselves through Deleuzoguattarian theory-art. Being an avant-garde, they combine revolutionary politics, bohemian lifestyles and experimental aesthetics. Being a sub-culture, they have a distinct set of ’signifying practices’. Above all, this new generation continues the most hallowed folk custom of the European avant-garde: the cultural revolution. Despite the disappearance of the utopia of total social transformation, academics, artists and activists can still champion the rebellion of holy fools against the oppressive rationality of bourgeois society. Within the revolutionary dreamtime of cyberspace, the avant-garde uses Deleuzoguattarian discourse to recreate May ‘68 as a theory-art project.
‘…network-generated operations conclusively undermine political discourses centred on notions such as agency, action, territory, progress and development. Usership, operation, non-linearity, recursivity and chaos appear as traits of computer technology and of cyberspacetime. These are the characteristics of the breakdown of modernity itself.’ [147]
At the end of the twentieth century, the potential influence of the European avant-garde has never been greater. The small number of individuals involved in subversive artistic movements have already had a disproportionate impact on popular culture. Since the Twenties, radical intellectuals have not only created modernist aesthetics, but also pioneered libertarian politics and hedonistic lifestyles. In the late-Nineties, the avant-garde now has a much larger pool of recruits and a much bigger potential audience. The rapid growth of the Net is the most dramatic manifestation of the increasing importance of cultural innovation. Many more people are going through further and higher education. [148] The creative industries have emerged as major employers. [149] Some commentators believe that the ‘virtual class’ is the most significant sector of the workforce. [150] Even the fine arts are recognised as a catalyst for local and national regeneration. [151] The appeal of the European avant-garde is therefore no longer confined within artistic and academic circles. For an increasing proportion of the population, continual aesthetic innovation is the basis for their livelihoods: ‘the creative industries are where the growth is, where the jobs are.’ [152]
The avant-garde tradition of cultural experimentation is now at the centre of socio-economic development in the advanced countries. A minority of dedicated and talented artists can benefit the majority of the population by inventing new aesthetic forms, especially using digital technologies. Within an information society, ‘all power to the imagination’ becomes more than just a utopian slogan from May ‘68. A profane economic rationale therefore underpins the recent revival of European avant-garde traditions. Although excluded from serious power, academics, artists and activists do acquire increased social status through recognition of their theoretical erudition and creative innovation. [153] Far from marginalising its proponents, European intellectuals long ago discovered that membership of an avant-garde movement can be the precondition of social success. As the creative industries keep expanding, more and more people are choosing this exciting career path. The rejection of post-modern nihilism is not just morally preferable, but also can often be financially more rewarding too. [154]
The techno-nomads are not surprisingly happy to benefit from the social recognition given to membership of the avant-garde. Although expertise in a particular hardware or software dates quickly, knowledge of an ahistorical ideology can survive across time. After studying the holy prophets, adepts can find employment propagating the sacred creed through teaching, publishing and the media. Sampling from Deleuze and Guattari’s theory-art, they can produce journalism, academic texts, websites and fiction celebrating the Net and other aspects of techno-culture. [155] While others fail to adapt to the new technologies, the Deleuzoguattarians are at the ‘cutting edge’ of theoretical and cultural innovation. ‘Temporary Autonomous Zones’, collective intelligence, Body-without-Organs and other phrases from their mystificatory jargon are even entering fashionable speech. Once again, the aestheticisation of revolutionary politics is a successful way of breaking into the highly-competitive art, education and media sectors. [156]
Yet, like the political vanguard, the European avant-garde is haunted by the fatal contradiction between popular participation and intellectual elitism. In their theory-art, the techno-nomads use Deleuzoguattarian discourse to celebrate DIY culture. However, just by adopting its obscurantist style, they are asserting their intellectual authority over this popular movement. According to the sacred creed, most people - including members of the DIY culture - are brainwashed by semiotic ‘machinic assemblages’. But, when illuminated by the teachings of Deleuze and Guattari, radical intellectuals can amazingly cast off the mental shackles of bourgeois rationality and experience the redemption of ecstatic immanence.
The members of the avant-garde are supposedly the privileged few who can produce the ‘holy idea’ which liberates the people from ideological bondage. However, as shown by the sad history of Fréquence Libre, this theorisation of anarcho-communism justifies the practice of vanguard politics. The continual sampling of Deleuze and Guattari’s theory-art therefore reflects elitist tendencies within the contemporary avant-garde. The techno-nomads adopt its post-structuralist method and peculiar jargon to intimidate the uninitiated. The success of their philosophical ‘will to power’ is shown by the increasing incorporation of Deleuzoguattarian phrases within the slang of the techno-culture. Although many are called, only few can become true disciples of the esoteric doctrine.
‘Beautiful language, artistic style and aestheticism are merely the end-products of…the alienation of the logos, and the artist has become the high priest of the logos, its magus, or simply its mandarin.’ [157]
Above all, the European avant-garde embraces the Deleuzoguattarian discourse to emphasise its chosen ‘marks of distinction’: revolutionary politics, experimental art and bohemian lifestyles. [158] For decades, radical intellectuals have adopted dissident politics, aesthetics and morals to separate themselves from the rest of society. According to the European avant-garde, the majority of the population were ‘herd animals’ whose minds were controlled by repressive ideologies. Therefore the ethical-aesthetic rebellion against bourgeois conformity could only be led by the privileged few who were free from all forms of cultural conditioning.
Despite their revolutionary rhetoric, avant-garde intellectuals constituted themselves as an artistic aristocracy separated from the philistine masses. [159] Continuing this elitist tradition, Deleuze and Guattari championed nomadic minorities from the ‘non-guaranteed’ social movements against the stupefied majority from the ‘guaranteed’ sector. As the activists of Fréquence Libre discovered, even having family responsibilities was considered incompatible with personal commitment to the revolutionary cause. [160] In the late-Nineties, Deleuzoguattarian discourse allows the contemporary avant-garde to perpetuate its venerated custom of cultural elitism. Once again, the revolution is the ethical-aesthetic illumination of a minority rather than the social liberation of all people. As Deleuze emphasised: ‘…art realises…the genius of the superhuman.’ [161]
This form of aesthetic elitism has rapidly lead to overtly reactionary positions. For instance, the Italian Futurists looked to militant nationalism for deliverance from the cultural sterility of bourgeois society. In their theory-art, the holy fool was transformed into the blackshirt. [162] At the end of the century, the techno-nomads remain trapped within the avant-garde contradiction between popular participation and intellectual elitism. Some TJs are even repeating their predecessors’ flirtation with fascist positions. For instance, Hakim Bey still preaches the Nietzschean creed of ‘radical aristocratism’. [163] In his NYC remix of the European avant-garde, this blessed guru urges Net activists to form a holy order of warrior-monks modelled on the medieval Assassin sect! [164] The cultural revolution remains simultaneously primitivist and futurist. [165] Although he praises DIY culture, Bey primarily uses Deleuzoguattarian discourse to uphold the most reactionary legacy of the avant-garde: the artistic aristocracy. Within the revolutionary dreamtime of cyberspace, the Nietzschean elite of holy fools are leaders of the pack.
‘These nomads practice the razzia, they are corsairs, they are viruses… These nomads chart their courses by strange stars, which might be luminous clusters of data in cyberspace, or perhaps hallucinations.’ [166]
As the Net develops, the antinomies of the European avant-garde are reaching crisis point. It is now increasingly difficult to be simultaneously participatory and elitist. Nowhere is this clearer than within the writings of the techno-nomads. On the one hand, Deleuzoguattarian theory-art is revolutionary: the sanctification of the hi-tech gift economy. Its poetic phrases and bizarre metaphors exalt every communal and libertarian possibility of the Net. Yet, on the other hand, the aestheticisation of May ‘68 is also reactionary: the negation of anarcho-communism as a practice within cyberspace. By definition, the existence of the European avant-garde presupposes that the majority of the population can’t participate within Do-It-Yourself culture. If the minds of the people are controlled by ‘machinic assemblages’, only radical intellectuals can supposedly create the future. When they celebrate DIY culture in their theory-art, the Deleuzoguattarians are simultaneously proclaiming their own superior status as Nietzschean Supermen.
‘Artists…are..physically…strong, full of surplus energy, powerful animals, sensual; without a certain overheating of the sexual system a Raphael is unthinkable…their lives must contain a kind of youth and spring, a kind of habitual intoxication.’ [167]
This dream of an artistic aristocracy sometimes evolves into fascism. More often, the avant-garde has supported totalitarian tendencies within the Left. [168] Nowadays, cultural elitism can easily turn into implicit sympathy with neo-liberalism. Despite its ultra-left origins, Deleuzoguattarian theory-art is becoming conservative: the European version of the Californian ideology. In the USA, Wired already uses New Left anti-statism to sell New Right neo-liberalism. [169] The rhetoric of individual freedom justifies the removal of welfare benefits and health care. The European avant-garde - and its imitators - could never openly support the free market fundamentalism of the Californian ideology. As self-proclaimed cultural revolutionaries, the techno-nomads must remain faithful to the spirit of May ‘68.
Yet, as the techno-nomad TJs cut ‘n’ mix, the distinctions between right-wing and left-wing versions of libertarianism are blurring. Crucially, both sides share a fashionable fascination with mystical positivism, such as memes, hive minds, cyborgs, chaos mathematics and artificial life. The convergence of technologies around digital protocols is being paralleled by the adoption of scientific rhetoric for social and artistic debates. [170] The European avant-garde has been performing the trick of combining spiritual primitivism with scientific futurism for decades. As Deleuze and Guattari faithfully followed this hallowed tradition, their disciples can easily confuse Bergsonian vitalism sampled from the holy prophets with the Lamarckian fantasies of the West Coast gurus. [171] The semiotic ‘machinic assemblages’ of Deleuzoguattarian discourse already echo the denial of human subjectivity found within the theory of memetics. An enthusiastic TJ can rapidly make the two concepts seem indistinguishable.
‘From the “bio-adaptor” of language as the proto-meme to the “infosphere” of global networks as the ultimate habitat of the human mind… The possibility of the emergence of a post-biological, cyberorganic line of evolution out of universal binary code, of which the first protozoans have names like Internet, Cyberspace and I-way… Memes…the identification and integration of virtual communities that gather only at the interface.’ [172]
The collapse of Deleuzoguattarian discourse into the Californian ideology through mystical positivism is no accident. These pseudo-scientific concepts supposedly prove that the majority of the population are controlled by outside forces. Just as in the avant-garde tradition, these theories claim that only the enlightened few can determine the future. The two forms of aristocratic libertarianism now appear to be the same. On the one hand, the Californian ideologues claim that this heroic minority is composed of cyber-entrepreneurs emerging from the fierce competition of the electronic marketplace. The covers of Wired have portrayed corporate bosses as Conan the Barbarian and Mad Max. [173] On the other hand, the Deleuzoguattarians believe that the new elite is formed by cool TJs and hip artists who release subversive ‘assemblages of enunciation’ into the Net. In their writings, avant-garde intellectuals dream of becoming nomad warriors and cyberpunk hackers. In both the Californian ideology and Deleuzoguattarian discourse, primitivism and futurism are combined to produce the apotheosis of individualism: the cyborg Nietzschean Superman. [174]
‘…the possibility…to rear a master race, the future “masters of the earth”; - a new tremendous aristocracy…in which… philosophical men of power and artist-tyrants will…work as artists on “man” himself.’ [175]
Amazingly, neo-liberalism and anarcho-communism can now appear to be on the same side of the ‘libertarian-communitarian opposition’ within cyberspace. [176] The re-emergence of the European avant-garde doesn’t just signify the rediscovery of the revolutionary legacy of May ‘68. Ironically, the aestheticisation of the New Left is simultaneously a reaction against mass participation within cyberspace. By turning DIY culture into theory-art, radical intellectuals are asserting their superior status over the majority of Net users. Despite the rhetoric of immanence and non-linearity, the social revolution has once again disappeared from the here and now. Instead, the hope of redemption is projected into the revolutionary dreamtime of cyberspace. [177]
Within this imaginary future, May ‘68 flourishes as a theory-art project. Yet, in this process, the New Left dream of collective liberation is virtualised into ethical-aesthetic salvation for a select band of artistic aristocrats. Deleuzoguattarian theory-art is impaled on the fatal contradiction between popular participation and intellectual elitism. As was demonstrated by the tragic story of Fréquence Libre, the delirious celebration of DIY culture cannot be reconciled with the simultaneous assumption that most people are unable do things for themselves. The writings of Deleuze and Guattari can therefore never provide ‘a coherent set of conceptual tools’ to comprehend the libertarian potential of the Net. As the millennium approaches, the techno-nomads remain trapped within the antinomies of the avant-garde.
‘Aetheticisation is an alibi. It pretends to fill the chasm between unsatisfied subjectivities and increasing unattainable accumulation.’ [178]
9: The Hi-Tech Gift Economy
Back in the Twenties, the European avant-garde had no doubt about its heroic mission. The enlightened minority could free the people from ideological domination through experimental art and libertarian lifestyles. The cultural avant-garde was an essential element of the political vanguard. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, this Leninist myth has lost all credibility. The ‘grand narrative’ of history can no longer be used to justify the leadership of the few. In the late-Nineties, revolutionary elitism must now be expressed in the words of May ‘68. The techno-nomads therefore remix Leninism into Deleuzoguattarian discourse: subversive theory-art ‘deterritorialises’ the semiotic ‘machinic assemblages’ controlling the minds of the majority. Crucially, the contemporary avant-garde must substitute itself for the missing political vanguard. Although supposedly possible for everyone, the immanence of ethical-aesthetic ‘delirium’ can only be experienced by radical intellectuals. Cultural rebellion, bohemian lifestyles and ultra-leftism are now the ‘marks of distinction’ for the artistic aristocracy. Lenin is morphed into Nietzsche.
The current revival of the European avant-garde depends upon the aestheticisation of May ‘68. Yet, important pioneers of the New Left were highly critical of this tradition of cultural elitism. Above all, the Situationists attacked aesthetic innovations of the Surrealists for failing to remove the ideological domination of the bourgeoisie. These avant-garde experiments had been too easily incorporated into the fashionable styles of consumer society. The Surrealist experience proved that innovative art could never remain subversive for long. [179] In place of aesthetic experimentation, the Situationists instead advocated transforming the social context of cultural production. Rather than following the avant-garde elite, everyone should have the opportunity to express themselves. [180]
‘The situation is…made to be lived by its constructors. The role played by a passive…”public” must constantly diminish, while that played by those who cannot be called actors but rather…”livers” must steadily increase.’ [181]
The Situationists proclaimed the end of the cultural avant-garde. The New Left didn’t just have to radicalise the content of art. More importantly, young militants had to create opportunities for everyone to express their own hopes, dreams and desires. The Hegelian ‘grand narrative’ could then culminate in the supersession of all mediations separating people from each other. Yet, at the same time, the Situationists never completely escaped from the avant-garde legacy left by their Surrealist predecessors. The movement was predominantly composed of radical intellectuals. [182] This revolutionary minority supposedly prefigured the bohemian lifestyles and ultra-left politics of the future. As with the Surrealists, the ‘holy idea’ of participation for everyone justified unaccountable leadership of the intellectual elite. Once again, the practical transcendence of social oppression had elided into the spiritual immanence of theoretical enlightenment. Despite their invocation of Hegel and Marx, the Situationists remained haunted by Nietzsche and Lenin. [183]
Unable to break with avant-garde tradition, the Situationists inevitably aestheticised the social revolution. Fearful of repeating the fate of the Surrealists, the movement celebrated cultural activities which couldn’t easily be turned into fashionable commodities. Above all, the Situationists looked for ways of living which were free from the corruptions of consumer capitalism. Like earlier avant-garde intellectuals, they thought that the path into the future was also the return to the past. Despite their Hegelian modernism, the Situationists claimed that anarcho-communism had been prefigured by the potlatch: the gift economy of Polynesian tribes. [184]
Within these primitive societies, the circulation of gifts bound people together into tribes and encouraged co-operation between different tribes. In contrast with the atomisation and alienation of bourgeois society, these potlatches required intimate contacts and emotional authenticity. According to the Situationists, the tribal gift economy demonstrated that individuals could successfully live together without needing either the state or the market. Anarcho-communism was therefore a practical possibility. However, the Situationists remained trapped within the antinomies of the avant-garde. Once again, the utopia of mass participation simultaneously justified the leadership of the artistic elite. Unlike the rest of the population, radical intellectuals could supposedly prefigure the libertarian future by producing esoteric theory-art. Anarcho-communism had been transformed into a ‘mark of distinction’ for the New Left vanguard. The giving of gifts therefore became the absolute antithesis of market competition. There could be no compromise between tribal authenticity and bourgeois alienation. After the social revolution, the potlatch would completely supplant the commodity. [185]
‘The crumbling away of human values under the influence of exchange mechanisms leads to the crumbling of [commodity] exchange itself…new human relationships must be built on the principle of pure giving. We must rediscover the pleasure of giving: giving because you have so much. What beautiful and priceless potlatches the affluent society will see - whether it likes it or not! - when the exuberance of the younger generation discovers the pure gift.’ [186]
After May ‘68, this purist vision of anarcho-communism inspired a generation of community media activists. For instance, the radical ‘free radio’ stations refused all funding from state and commercial sources. Instead, these projects tried to survive through donations of time and money from their supporters. Emancipatory media supposedly could only be produced within the gift economy. During the late-Seventies, pro-situ attitudes were further popularised by the punk movement. [187] Although rapidly commercialised, this sub-culture did encourage its members to form their own bands, make their own fashions and publish their own fanzines. [188] From punk through rave to the present-day, the ‘cutting edge’ of youth culture has remained participatory. The permanent innovation in styles on the dance floor is driven by people doing things for themselves. [189]
Crucially, every user of the Net participates within a gift economy. Without even thinking about it, people continually circulate information between each other for free. They co-operate together without the direct mediation of either politics or money. During the Eighties, post-modern pessimists claimed that the gift economy would always be defeated by market capitalism. [190] Yet, at the end of the Nineties, DIY culture is thriving within the most technologically advanced sector of the economy. Everyday, Net users circulate gifts of information amongst each other. What was once revolutionary has become banal. Far from being the ‘holy idea’ of avant-garde intellectuals, anarcho-communism is now the mundane activity of ordinary people within cyberspace.
‘Millions of people have been interacting and participating in what they clearly value… There is no question that there are differences between the economic logic - the application of basic economic principles - on and off the Net. To begin with, most of the economic activity on the Net involves value but no money.’ [191]
The invention of the Net was one of the greatest ironies of the Cold War. At the height of the struggle of American capitalism against Russian Communism, the US military funded the creation of anarcho-communism within computer-mediated communications! From the beginning, the gift economy has determined the technical and social structure of the Net. Being a military bureaucracy, the Pentagon initially did try to restrict the unofficial uses of its computer network. However, it soon became obvious that the Net could only be successfully developed by letting its users build the system for themselves. [192] Within the scientific community, the gift economy has long been the primary method of socialising labour. Funded by the state or by donations, scientists don’t have to turn their intellectual work directly into marketable commodities. Instead, research results are publicised by ‘giving a paper’ at specialist conferences and by ‘contributing an article’ to academic journals. The collaboration of many different academics is made possible through the free distribution of information. [193]
Within small tribal societies, the circulation of gifts established close personal bonds between people. In contrast, the academic gift economy is used by intellectuals who are spread across the world. Within their peer group, scientists can receive recognition from colleagues who might never meet them in person. Despite the anonymity of the modern version of the gift economy, academics acquire intellectual respect from each other through citations in articles and other forms of public acknowledgement. If someone is often quoted, their career prospects within the university system are usually much enhanced. Scientists therefore can only acquire personal recognition for their individual efforts by openly collaborating with each other through the academic gift economy. Although research is being increasingly commercialised, the giving away of findings remains the most efficient method of solving common problems within a particular scientific discipline. [194]
When the Yippies proclaimed that ‘information wants to be free’ back in the Sixties, they were preaching to computer scientists who were already living within the academic gift economy. What seemed revolutionary in the rest of the USA was the usual method of working within the university. From its earliest days, the free exchange of information has therefore been firmly embedded within the technologies and social mores of cyberspace. Above all, the founders of the Net never bothered to protect intellectual property within computer-mediated communications. On the contrary, they were developing these new technologies to advance their careers inside the academic gift economy. [195]
Scattered across the world, scientists from the same speciality needed the Net to disseminate their research results to each other and to work together on collaborative projects. Far from wanting to enforce copyright, the pioneers of the Net tried to eliminate all barriers to the distribution of information. Technically, every act within cyberspace involves copying material from one computer to another. Once the first copy of a piece of information is placed on the Net, the cost of making each extra copy is almost zero. The architecture of the system presupposes that multiple copies of documents can easily be cached around the network. As Tim Berners-Lee - the inventor of the Web - points out:
‘Concepts of intellectual property, central to our culture, are not expressed in a way which maps onto the abstract information space. In an information space, we can consider the authorship of materials, and their perception; but…there is a need for the underlying infrastructure to be able to make copies simply for reasons of [technical] efficiency and reliability. The concept of “copyright” as expressed in terms of copies made makes little sense.’ [196]
Within the commercial creative industries, advances in digital reproduction are feared for making the ‘piracy’ of copyright material ever easier. Almost everyone already copies music, articles, television programmes and other information products for personal use without payment. The sampling and remixing of other people’s tunes is widespread within dance music. [197] For the owners of intellectual property, the Net can only make the situation worse. In contrast, the academic gift economy welcomes technologies which improve the availability of data. Users should always be able to obtain and manipulate information with the minimum of impediments. The design of the Net therefore assumes that intellectual property is technically and socially obsolete. [198]
In France, the nationalised telephone monopoly has accustomed people to paying for the on-line services provided by Minitel. [199] Yet, the Net remains predominantly a gift economy even though the system has expanded far beyond the university. The attempt to construct computer-mediated communications around copyright payments ended in failure. [200] The commercial providers of information services have never been able to supplant the free exchange of information amongst the on-line community. [201] Even the porn industry is encountering difficulties in making money on the Net. [202] From scientists through hobbyists to the general public, the charmed circle of users was slowly built up through the adhesion of many localised networks to an agreed set of protocols.
Crucially, the common standards of the Net include social conventions as well as technical rules. The giving and receiving of information without payment is almost never questioned. Although the circulation of gifts doesn’t necessarily create emotional obligations between individuals, people are still willing to donate their information to everyone else on the Net. Even selfish reasons encourage people to become anarcho-communists within cyberspace. By adding their own presence, every user contributes to the collective knowledge accessible to those already on-line. In return, each individual has potential access to all the information made available by others within the Net. Everyone takes far more out of the Net than they can ever give away as an individual.
‘…the Net is far from altruistic, or it wouldn’t work… Because it takes as much effort to distribute one copy of an original creation as a million…you never lose from letting your product free…as long as you are compensated in return… What a miracle, then, that you receive not one thing in value in exchange - indeed there is no explicit act of exchange at all - but millions of unique goods made by others!’ [203]
Despite the commercialisation of cyberspace, the self-interest of Net users ensures that the hi-tech gift economy continues to flourish. For instance, musicians are using the Net for the digital distribution of their recordings to each other. By giving away their own work to this network community, individuals get free access to a far larger amount of music in return. Not surprisingly, the music business is worried about the increased opportunities for the ‘piracy’ of copyrighted recordings over the Net. [204] Sampling, DJ-ing and mixing are already blurring property rights within dance music. [205] However, the greatest threat to the commercial music corporations comes from the flexibility and spontaneity of the hi-tech gift economy. After it is completed, a new track can quickly be made freely available to a global audience. If someone likes the tune, they can download it for personal listening, use it as a sample or make their own remix. Out of the free circulation of information, musicians can form friendships, work together and inspire each other. [206] ‘It’s all about doing it for yourself. Better than punk.’ [207]
Within the developed world, most politicians and corporate leaders believe that the future of capitalism lies in the commodification of information. Over the last few decades, intellectual property rights have been steadily tightened through new national laws and international agreements. Even human genetic material can now be patented. [208] Yet, at the ‘cutting edge’ of the emerging information society, money-commodity relations play a secondary role to those created by a really existing form of anarcho-communism. For most of its users, the Net is somewhere to work, play, love, learn and discuss with other people. Unrestricted by physical distance, they collaborate with each other without the direct mediation of money or politics. Unconcerned about copyright, they give and receive information without thought of payment. In the absence of states or markets to mediate social bonds, network communities are instead formed through the mutual obligations created by gifts of time and ideas.
‘This informal, unwritten social contract is supported by a blend of strong-tie and weak-tie relationships among people who have a mixture of motives and ephemeral affiliations. It requires one to give something, and enables one to receive something. I have to keep my friends in mind and send them pointers instead of throwing my informational discards into the virtual scrap heap… And with scores of people who have an eye out for my interests while they explore sectors of the information space that I normally wouldn’t frequent, I find that the help I receive far outweighs the energy I expend helping others; a marriage of altruism and self-interest.’ [209]
On the Net, enforcing copyright payments represents the imposition of scarcity on a technical system designed to maximise the dissemination of information. The protection of intellectual property stops all users having access to every source of knowledge. Commercial secrecy prevents people from helping each other to solve common problems. The inflexibility of information commodities inhibits the efficient manipulation of digital data. In contrast, the technical and social structure of the Net has been developed to encourage open co-operation among its participants. As an everyday activity, users are building the system together. Engaged in ‘interactive creativity’, they send emails, take part in listservers, contribute to newsgroups, participate within on-line conferences and produce websites. [210] Lacking copyright protection, information can be freely adapted to suit the users’ needs. Within the hi-tech gift economy, people successfully work together through ‘…an open social process involving evaluation, comparison and collaboration.’ [211]
The hi-tech gift economy is even at the forefront of software development. For instance, Bill Gates admits that Microsoft’s biggest competitor in the provision of web servers comes from the Apache program. [212] Instead of being marketed by a commercial company, this program is open source software. [213] Like similar projects, this virtual machine is being continually developed by its techie users. Because its source code is not protected by copyright, the program can be modified, amended and improved by anyone with the appropriate programming skills. When someone does make a contribution to a shareware project, the gift of their labour is rewarded by recognition within the community of user-developers. [214]
The inflexibility of commodified software programs is compounded by their greater unreliability. Even Microsoft can’t mobilise the amount of labour given to successful shareware programs by their devotees. Without enough techies looking at a program, all its bugs can never be found. [215] The greater social and technical efficiency of anarcho-communism is therefore inhibiting the commercial take-over of the Net. Open source software programs are now beginning to threaten the core product of the Microsoft empire: the Windows operating system. Starting from the original program by Linus Torvalds, a community of user-developers are together building their own non-proprietary operating system: Linux. For the first time, Windows has a serious competitor. Anarcho-communism is becoming the only alternative to monopoly capitalism. [216]
‘Linux is subversive. Who could have thought even five years ago that a world-class operating system could coalesce as if by magic out of part-time hacking by several thousand developers scattered all over the planet, connected only by the tenuous strands of the Internet?’ [217]
10: Beyond the Avant-Garde
The New Left anticipated the emergence of the hi-tech gift economy. People could collaborate with each other without needing either markets or states. Anarcho-communism really did work in practice. However, the New Left had a purist vision of DIY culture. According to the ’soixante-huitards’, the gift was the absolute antithesis of the commodity. There could be no compromise between the authenticity of the potlatch and the alienation of the market. For instance, Fréquence Libre refused to raise money from advertising to prove its ethical-aesthetic integrity. Rather than compromising with the arboreal powers of commercialism, the rhizomic ‘free radio’ station preserved its principles to the point of bankruptcy. The current popularity of Deleuze and Guattari comes from their romanticisation of this uncompromising form of anarcho-communism. What had failed in practice can live on as theory-art.
Bored with the emotional emptiness of post-modernism, the techno-nomads are entranced by the moral fervour of the holy prophets. In their remixes, the purist interpretation of anarcho-communism is virtualised into the revolutionary dreamtime of cyberspace. However, as shown by Fréquence Libre, the rhetoric of mass participation often hides the rule of the enlightened few. Instead of providing media freedom for all, the hi-tech gift economy becomes the ‘mark of distinction’ for the cultural avant-garde. The ethical-aesthetic commitment of anarcho-communism can only be lived by the artistic aristocracy. In place of the majority doing things for themselves on the Net, the minority of radical intellectuals make cool theory-art about the ‘holy idea’ of digital DIY culture.
Yet, the antinomies of the avant-garde can no longer be avoided. The rapid growth of the Net is undermining the particular ‘marks of distinction’ adopted by the Deleuzoguattarians. The ideological passion of anarcho-communism is dulled by the banality of giving gifts within cyberspace. The theory of the artistic aristocracy cannot be based on the