> In short, if you accept Hardt & Negri's analysis,
> why resist the
> expansion of Empire? Is it not reactionary to
> resist it tout court?
> Why not welcome the civilizing influence of capital
> and then struggle
> from within Empire? Even if expanding Empire
> necessarily takes
> deaths and injuries of thousands of Afghans and
> other peoples here
> and there, not expanding it has and will take an
> even higher human
> toll in any case, so why not argue for peace-keeping
> and
> nation-building missions under the U.N. aegis
> (rather than under the
> Anglo-American flags), which should guarantee equal
> rights to women
> in the public and private spheres, reconstruction of
> economic
> infrastructure, food, medical, & other aids to the
> truly desperate,
> international crime tribunals, and so forth, while
> minimizing
> civilian casualties? Shouldn't universal human
> rights of individuals
> trump dubious rights of national sovereignty?
But the implicit interpretation here sounds unfair to Hardt & Negri, if not downright wrong. Aren't they critical of NGOs as the "mendicant orders" supporting the neoliberal global order under the ruse of universal human rights, as you posted about recently? Granted, they don't see a return to the nation-state as a viable path.
Empire isn't something Hardt & Negri endorse tout court, either:
". . . Empire itself is not a positive reality. In the very moment it rises up, it falls. Each imperial action is a rebound of the resistance of the multitude that poses a new obstacle for the multitude to overcome.
. . . Imperial power is the negative residue, the fallback of the operation of the multitude; it is a parasite that draws its vitality from the multitude's capacity to create ever new sources of energy and value. A parasite that saps the strength of its host, however, can endanger its own existence" (p. 361)
Alec
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