> The idea of a performative unity is somewhat sensible, but I still
> would want to know what that unity was. It sounds like a fairly
> atomistic one from the way he describes it--almost like the reverse of
> Feuerbach. Still, your point about the coalitions it can create is
> echoed in his discussion of a community organizing against police
> repression. But here, it basically requires some fundamental
> antagonism which is constituted only by the oppressive force for it to
> remain sutured. I see the lure of the positive unity he tries to
> imagine--and I respect your attraction to it for the reasons you
> give--but other than our common humanity, it is objectively untrue
> that everyone lives in the same world.
But can our common humanity ever be good enough to reignite the 'Communist Hypothesis'? I guess the wager here is that it can. And if not, then our task is to find something else that will. Badiou writes that we are in a period where the path forward is unclear and experimentation is necessary. I think Badiou's taken a decent shot at the problem; it's pretty clear from the essay that that's all he's aspiring to do.
To a large degree, I share your skepticism about trying to build a political movement around an axiom that appeals to our common humanity. You are right to call for us to identify divisions and take sides. That goes without saying. But I think it's important for movement building to be able to identify the principles that positively unite those who share opposition to war, poverty, bosses, environmental degradation, and so forth. Can we afford to settle for an emancipatory movement that is only defined negatively?
I imagine a movement united by the axiom that we are all laboring animals with immediate needs would address itself to the ruling class as follows:
"We insist that we are all part of one world. As laboring animals, we have immediate concrete needs that _must_ be satisfied. And because these needs must be satisfied, it is irrelevant whether their satisfaction occurs with your approval or not. Furthermore, because your institutions pose a permanent threat to the satisfaction of our animal needs (and for what? the freedom to purchase cheap IPods and choose between Coke and Pepsi?), we will have to abolish them, because our long-term survival depends on it."
Does this follow necessarily from the proposition that we are all laboring animals who eat, fuck, shit and die? No. Lots of different things can follow from any simple proposition. But this proposition would explain (retroactively in the beginning) why we're in this fight together and why we're going to stay in it.
-WD