Hatred of Democracy

I read Ranciere's Hatred of Democracy yesterday. There is something appealing in his discussion of the scandal of democracy, although, ultimately, I'm not convinced of his underlying thesis.

What's appealing? Ranciere's emphasis on chance (he gets here via a reading of Plato). The drawing of lots attests to a form of government that allows a role for chance, that is, for those with no claim to rule actually to rule. Ranciere argues, then, that democracy is well understood as a law of chance.

I find this idea quite provocative, and, yes, a scandal. It reminds me that insofar as there is no entitlement to govern--complete idiots have as much right to rule as anyone--democracy has this wonderfully irreverent core (I'm tempted to call it democracy's 'being there' in an effort to cite the Peter Sellers film somewhat against the grain in which it is typically invoked). This scandal thumbs its nose at theorists, intellectuals, and ideologists who focus on principles and premises. It moons the consistent and snickers at the ethical--for democracy rests on neither consistency nor ethics but on an absence, an absence of foundations and guarantees, in other words, on chance.

But, Ranciere links this chance to equality in a way I don't quite get. He points out thatt the heart of democracy there is a fundamental contingency that cannot be effaced by aristocracy or expertise. Even the rich and old, in order to rule, require a supplement to their power:

Their power must become a political power. And a political power signifies in the last instance the power of those who have no natural reason to govern over those who have no natural reason to be governed. The power of the best cannot ultimately be legitimated except via the power of equals.

Politics, it seems, requires that power be justified. And this requirement, seems for Ranciere, to involve not something like free consent (as in the liberal tradition) but rather equality:

[there is] no force that is imposed without having to justify itself, and hence without having to recognize the irreducibility of equality needed for inequality to function. From the moment obedience has to refer to a principle of legitimacy, from the moment it is necessary for there to be laws that are enforced qua laws and institutions embodying the common of the community, commanding must presuppose the equality of the one who commands and the one who is commanded. ... Inegalitarian society can only function thanks to a multitude of egalitarian relations.

I'm not sure I follow this. If equality refers to the element of chance (it could me or you, him or her), then there is an equalizing force here. You could be the one commanded; I could be the one commanding. But, is this the same as a principle of legitimacy? It could be-- a friend of mine, Rainer Forst, argues for a right to justification. So, perhaps Ranciere has something like that in mind--as soon as a legitimation must be offered, as soon as grounds for obedience are required, then equality slips in--if men have to tell women why they are incapable of reason, then women must be capable of reason. But, does this apply to command: the general tells the private to shoot--does this rely on an underlying supposition of equality between the commanded and the commander? In other words, is Ranciere's last sentence above sensical? I'm inclined not to think so--yet, I confess that the more I try to think of examples to counter, the more promising the idea becomes: justification and legitimacy presuppose an underlying equality.

Yet, isn't it the case that most inequalities persevere unjustified and illegitimate? Without anyone even bothering to explain them? And, couldn't it be that the very explanations/justifications rely on inequality: oh, my wealth is fully justified--I work hard and you are a lazy drug addict. So, here, the equality to which Ranciere appeals is trivial and damning, a means of cementing the more fundamental inequality.

Ultimately, I'm not persuaded of Ranciere's argument overall because, for all it hope, its makes democracy into a given. Democracy is not a form of government or a form of society (he argues):

Democracy can never be identified with a juridico-political form. This does not mean it is indifferent to such forms. It means that the power of the people is always beneath and beyond these forms. Beneath, because these forms cannot function without referring in the last instance to that power of incompetents who form the basis of and negate the power of the competent, to this equality which is necessary for the functioning of the egalitarian machine [I love that]. Beyond, because the very forms that inscribe this power are constantly reabsorbed, through the play itself of the governmental machine...

Democracy is a constitutive force, one that state power tries to organize, control, contain, direct, and diminish. So, it is primarily resistance and response, perhaps a kind of excess and overflow. This is likely satisfying to some activist mentalities, forever critical; but it avoids responsibility for power and for instantiating particular kinds of organization, control, containment, direction, and diminishment.

Comments

[Nate]

hi Jodi,

My copy of the new book's not arrived yet, but I don't think R would say "complete idiots have as much right to rule as anyone" so much as "geniuses have as little right to rule as anyone," I think the argument on equality is against any type of rule. He says in the Ignorant Schoolmaster that the equality Jacotot encounters/posits is completely incompatible with institutions at all.

On that note, I think your remark about R's arguments potentially falling into a forever critical (essentially sidelined) gadfly position is fair. That would I think be the police version of his arguments, rather than the political, in his terms. I'm pretty sure he holds that there's a police variant possible for any political assertion (at least that's how I read some of Disagreement).

I also think your argument about commands is fair. Presumably a state of exception doesn't presuppose the equality of those rendered bare life in any meaningful way: pulling the trigger when the commander shouts "fire!" doesn't seem to presuppose equality (at least not in any non-trivial way) between executed prisoners and soldiers or soldiers and commander. One could argue that that event does require egalitarian relationships elsewhere, but this too might be trivially true. I think the argument on equality works best as an argument against inequality, rather than one for equality.

take care,
Nate

[pomegrenade]

Hi Jodi,

I'm a transfer from sometimes' blog to yours..

Thank you for the resonance.

I think when R says inequality has to pass by way of the equal to justify itself he means there's no power that's natural, and that mere fact makes power prone to being challenged. This of course doesn't bring any immediate consequence that it "will" be challenged. But it creates the leverage.

I find his examples significant in this text. It's scary that a former Althuserian, and current Lacanian (Milner, as well as Zizek) can revert to the language of the "natural" to complain about the political process in France. We're not even talking about outright right-wingers here.

That seems to me the kind of context he's writing from, a concrete frustration with things happening around him in France. Somebody calling Bourdieu an anti-semite, etc. And how can you explain and deal with these, R. seems to ask, except as naming it the "discontent with equality"--because equality is what inserts arbitrariness and chance, and that way, goes against the natural. how else can you oppose it if you don't want to revert to yet other "natural" belongings (identity/property) yourself? How does one break out from pitting one "natural" (Balibar would say anthropological) difference to another? Those at least are his questions, in my reading.

Angela says it's a convoluted way to go. I'll have to reread her comment now.

cheers,
pom

[pomegrenade]

by the way, reading Nate, i think in the command and shoot situation we are dealing with natural power. As when there's a physical asymmetry between weapons--it's again natural power. His whole attempt to hold onto the remnants of the text of law or equality in the strategic way he suggets is to avoid confronting the power as natural.

[Amish Lovelock]

Peter Hallward's piece on Ranciere that compared him with Chomsky on the equality thing in the New Left Review was quite good, I thought. When I first saw the title of this book I thought it would be a critique of democracy rather than a critique of its abuse - which kind of put me off it. Inegalitarian societies function because of the veneer of egalitarian relations.

[Amish Lovelock]

Or perhaps the vested assumption.

[highlowbetween]

Jodi - great as usual! I'd like to point out - since we're talking "greek" here, that the wealthy elite of Athens spoke of "democracy" in derogatory terms. Even the word democracy is rooted in the concept of a mob - eluding to a militarized
one.

[highlowbetween]

correction - alluding ;)

[Amish Lovelock]

These were interesting'

http://www.lacan.com/blog/files/archive-1.html

[Amish Lovelock]

Taking responsibility for power - when Zizek talks about the need for the State does he mean the need for a monopoly of legitimate violence?

[jeremy hunsinger]

Hmm, doesn't this statement on equality have to be read in light of his other works on equality and its origination? as this seems to be at least the third book with inequality as a central theme.

[chakira]

Doesnt Kojin Karatani have a suggestion to reinstall the dictatorship of the proletariat via lottey based elections.
also borges, the babylon lottery, is a classic example in a similar vein.

i think zizek attacks karatani in the first or second chapter of parrallax view.

Josh

[pancime]

For an understanding of where
Ranciere is coming from read the spine chilling pages from around p304 to 322 of The Lives of Michel Foucault by David Macey. There you will find Ranciere a member of the Maoist party, the GP, while they call for the 'liquidation of the bourgeoisie', and the specific lynching (their term) of a murder suspect, because he was a member of the bourgeoisie, all in the name of 'direct democracy'.
Search the web for 'Papin sisters' to also gain an insight into the respect for life and equality common among the Ranciere, Foucault, Satre set.
Makes David Irving look like a saint.