[lbo-talk] "Barbarous" Critique of Hardt & Negri's Empire

[Dwayne Monroe]

I've been meaning to read “Empire” for a little while.
 Since I can't compare the work in question to the
critique, I can't speak to the accuracy of the
criticisms made.

Even so, what a sprawling, often messy yet still
terribly compelling piece.

As I said, I don't know (yet) whether or not the
analysis is a fair criticism of Hardt and Negri – a
reading will hopefully fill in the gap.  “Empire”
aside, there are intriguing passages in the essay that
reflect my own view of many of the 'liberal'
criticisms of such overtly imperial projects as the
invasion of Iraq.

'If only we can turn a bloody and inept occupation
into a reconstruction project' the critics say, 'then
we'll be living up to our obligations.'  To which the
essay, inadvertently (though perhaps not since its
scope is wide) offers this:

“Biting observations with regard to the Empire always
fascinate the quarrelsome subjects who are drawn into
a fictitious complicity by these emissaries and
therefore don’t realize that the critique of
imperfection is functional to the achievement of
perfection, transforming the Empire from something we
need to get rid of into something we need to correct
but that we cannot do without.”

Which sums up the problem nicely, if not succinctly.

And then there's the following gem, which echoes the
words of Baudrillard (who himself has been criticized
and dismissed as little more than a word smith fancy
pants) in his essay “The Spirit of Terrorism”. 
Baudrillard insists that, geopolitical cause and
effect notwithstanding, the international terrorism
we're seeing is the result, in part, of the fact that
global capital insists upon holding “all the cards”
forcing “the other” into violent resistance.

Crisso and Odoteo present a similar idea this way:

“In order to take root the Empire has imposed the
religion of money everywhere. But how could anyone
think that the transcendence of the rites and
traditions of thousands of years, which have saturated
every sphere of social life and given meaning to the
existence of millions of devotees, could abandon its
place to the immanence of the commodity without
rousing rebellions? The sacred book of Christianity
itself, the Bible, records the fury of Christ before
the presence of merchants in the temple and their
violent removal: “It is written: My house will be
called a house of prayer, but you have made it a den
of thieves” (Matthew 21:13). Thus, in the moment of
its triumph, the Empire rouses religious
fundamentalism. “

Yes, there's a lot of material there.

Spot-on critique of Hardt and Negri?  I don't know but
a fascinating read in any event.


DRM

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