Territory and Ritornello: Deleuze and Guattari on Thinking Living Beings

2015 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 208-230 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arjen Kleinherenbrink
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Divine Revelation ◽  
Deleuze And Guattari ◽  
Metaphysical Commitment ◽  
Economic Ideology

The concepts of territory and ritornello cannot be separated from one another, despite the fact that scholarship tends to restrict the former to discussions of politics and the latter to discussions of art. Deleuze and Guattari deploy the combination of territory and ritornello, along with associated notions such as rhythm, milieu, counterpoint and force, as a method to describe and understand the formation, existence and relations of living beings. They understand ‘life’ to also include a variety of nonorganic entities, such as social formations. Territory and ritornello provide a philosophical alternative to understanding the existence of beings in terms of an immutable, unchanging transcendent structure, such as divine revelation, politico-economic ideology or cultural identity. As such, this conceptual pair is a necessary element in translating Deleuze and Guattari's metaphysical commitment to immanence and univocity into ethical and political theory and practice.

Domestic Colonies

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barbara Arneil
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Mentally Ill ◽  
Abraham Lincoln ◽  
The State ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Civil Society Organizations ◽  
Alexis De Tocqueville ◽  
Modern History ◽  
Peter Kropotkin

Colonization is generally defined as a process by which states settle and dominate foreign lands or peoples. Thus, modern colonies are assumed to be outside Europe and the colonized non-European. This volume contends such definitions of the colony, the colonized, and colonization need to be fundamentally rethought in light of hundreds of ‘domestic colonies’ proposed and/or created by governments and civil society organizations initially within Europe in the nineteenth and first half of the twentieth centuries and then beyond. The three categories of domestic colonies in this book are labour colonies for the idle poor, farm colonies for the mentally ill, and disabled and utopian colonies for racial, religious, and political minorities. All of these domestic colonies were justified by an ideology of domestic colonialism characterized by three principles: segregation, agrarian labour, improvement, through which, in the case of labour and farm colonies, the ‘idle’, ‘irrational’, and/or custom-bound would be transformed into ‘industrious and rational’ citizens while creating revenues for the state to maintain such populations. Utopian colonies needed segregation from society so their members could find freedom, work the land, and challenge the prevailing norms of the society around them. Defended by some of the leading progressive thinkers of the period, including Alexis de Tocqueville, Abraham Lincoln, Peter Kropotkin, Robert Owen, Tommy Douglas, and Booker T. Washington, the turn inward to colony not only provides a new lens with which to understand the scope of colonization and colonialism in modern history but a critically important way to distinguish ‘the colonial’ from ‘the imperial’ in Western political theory and practice.

scholarly journals The Rhizomatic Trajectory of Ecocriticism

2010 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Serpil Oppermann
Keyword(s):  
Key Words ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Hierarchical System ◽  
Third Wave ◽  
Deleuze And Guattari ◽  
Palabras Clave ◽  
Interpretive Methods ◽  
System Operating

Key words: rhizomatic trajectory, third wave, postmodern ecocriticism, Deleuze and Guattari, interconnected approaches, ecocritical heterogeneity, multiplicity of theories  In its third wave, ecocriticism has become multicultural and transnational, and expanded rapidly in terms of epistemological positions and interpretive methods. Its very multiple directions and methodological and theoretical plurality may appear problematic. However, ecocritical theory and practice are not arbitrary or ‘ambivalently open’, but rather pursue a trajectory summed up by Deleuze and Guattari in the image of the rhizome. The quintessentially postmodern concept of the rhizome as an acentred, non-hierarchical system operating by variation and alliance permits us to recognise a cultivated kind of growth where others have seen only disciplinary crisis.  Palabras clave: trayectoria rizomática, tercera oleada, ecocrítica posmoderna, Deleuze y Guattari, enfoques interconectados, heterogeneidad ecocrítica, multiplicidad de teorías  En esta tercera oleada, la ecocrítica se ha vuelto multicultural y transnacional, y se ha expandido rápidamente en lo que respecta a posiciones epistemológicas y a métodos interpretativos. Sus múltiples direcciones y su pluralidad metodológica y teórica pueden parecer problemáticas. Sin embargo, la teoría y prácticas ecocríticas no son arbitrarias o “abiertas de forma ambivalente”, sino que más bien continúan una trayectoria que Deleuze y Guattari han resumido en la imagen del rizoma. El concepto postmodernista por excelencia del rizoma es un sistema no-jerárquico y sin centro que se rige por la variedad y la alianza y que nos permite reconocer un tipo de crecimiento cultivado donde otros sólo han visto una crisis disciplinaria.  

The Philadelphian system: sovereignty, arms control, and balance of power in the American states-union, circa 1787–1861

1995 ◽  
Vol 49 (2) ◽  
pp. 191-228 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel H. Deudney
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Balance Of Power ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
The European Union ◽  
American States ◽  
Close Analysis ◽  
Legitimate Violence ◽  
American Union ◽  
Real State

A rediscovery of the long-forgotten republican version of liberal political theory has arresting implications for the theory and practice of international relations. Republican liberalism has a theory of security that is superior to realism, because it addresses not only threats of war from other states but also the threat of despotism at home. In this view, a Hobson's choice between anarchy and hierarchy is not necessary because an intermediary structure, here dubbed “negarchy,” is also available. The American Union from 1787 until 1861 is a historical example. This Philadelphian system was not a real state since, for example, the union did not enjoy a monopoly of legitimate violence. Yet neither was it a state system, since the American states lacked sufficient autonomy. While it shared some features with the Westphalian system such as balance of power, it differed fundamentally. Its origins owed something to particular conditions of time and place, and the American Civil War ended this system. Yet close analysis indicates that it may have surprising relevance for the future of contemporary issues such as the European Union and nuclear governance.

Two regimes of the symbolic: radical democracy between Romanticism and structuralism

2019 ◽  
pp. 77-88
Author(s):  
Warren Breckman
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Democratic Theory ◽  
Radical Democracy ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
German Romanticism ◽  
Linguistic Turn ◽  
Ernesto Laclau ◽  
Constructed Dialogue ◽  
History Of

The ‘symbolic’ has found its way into the heart of contemporary radical democratic theory. When one encounters this term in major theorists such as Ernesto Laclau and Slavoj Žižek, our first impulse is to trace its genealogy to the offspring of the linguistic turn, structuralism and poststructuralism. This paper seeks to expose the deeper history of the symbolic in the legacy of Romanticism. It argues that crucial to the concept of the symbolic is a polyvalence that was first theorized in German Romanticism. The linguistic turn that so marked the twentieth century tended to suppress this polyvalence, but it has returned as a crucial dimension of contemporary radical political theory and practice. At stake is more than a recovery of historical depth. Through a constructed dialogue between Romanticism and the thought of both Žižek and Laclau, the paper seeks to provide a sharper appreciation of the resources of the concept of the symbolic.

Plucking Off the Mask of Mystery

2019 ◽  
pp. 257-294
Author(s):  
Gerald J. Postema
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
Special Interest ◽  
Common Law ◽  
Social Needs ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Radical Critique

This chapter discusses Bentham's critique of Common Law theory and practice. Bentham's critique is of special interest because that criticism reflects the considerations and arguments that moved him to his positivist conception of law. This radical critique of both the practice and the theory of Common Law rests on the same set of principles and arguments, drawn from his social and political theory, in particular his conception of the primary tasks and functions of law, and the best or most efficient means of serving them. Thus, Bentham's defence of his conception of the nature of law rests not on normatively neutral, analytical, or conceptual considerations, but on his analysis of fundamental human and social needs, and the ways in which law can be used to meet them. Jurisprudence draws directly on political theory. His is a distinctively utilitarian positivism.

“We care about others”: discursive constructions of corruption vis-à-vis national/cultural identity in Indonesia’s business-government relations

2020 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Kanti Pertiwi
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Government Function ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Government Relations ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Political Dimensions ◽  
Local Discourses ◽  
Global And Local ◽  
Discursive Constructions

Purpose This paper aims to problematize existing conceptualization of corruption by presenting alternative perspectives on corruption in Indonesia through the lens of national/cultural identity, amidst claims of the pervasiveness of corruption in the country. In so doing, the paper also sheds light on the micro-processes of interactions between global and local discourses in postcolonial settings. Design/methodology/approach The study applies discourse analysis, involving in-depth interviews with 40 informants from the business sector, government institutions and anti-corruption agencies. Findings The findings suggest that corruption helps government function, preserves livelihoods of the marginalized segments of societies and maintains social obligations/relations. These alternative meanings of corruption persist despite often seen as less legitimate due to effects of colonial powers. Research limitations/implications The snowballing method of recruiting informants is one of the limitations of this paper, which may decrease the potential diversity and lead to the silencing of different stories (Schwartz-Shea and Yanow, 2013). Researchers need to contextualize corruption and study its varied meanings to reveal its social, historical and political dimensions. Practical implications This paper strongly suggests that we need to move beyond rationalist accounts to capture the varied meanings of corruption which may be useful to explain the limited results of existing anti-corruption efforts. Social implications This study calls for a greater use of qualitative methods to study broad social change programs such as anti-corruption from the perspective of the insiders. Originality/value This paper contributes to the discussion of agency at the interplay between the dominant and alternative discourses in postcolonial settings. Moreover, the alternative meanings of corruption embedded in constructions of national identity and care ethics discussed in this paper offer as a starting point for decolonizing (Westwood, 2006) anti-corruption theory and practice.

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