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May 13, 2004
I've been busy down in the cellar churning out political material whilst everyone has been sleeping soundly.
sigh.
What I keep noticing is the unphilosophical nature of politics and the exclusion from politics of philosophical questions concerning politics. There is the substantive exclusion from political debate and decision-making the key issues concerning our ways of life. As Alasdair MacIintyre comments this is the case even though "the activities of government are such that they are not in their effects neutral between ways of life, but undermine some and promote others. "
Oh well, let us come back to the Hardt and Negri text. Here is someone else looking at the text.
In the Universal Values section we find Hardt and Negri exploring the connection between the police actions and universal values. They ask:
"Should we assume that since this new right of intervention functions primarily toward the goal of resolving urgent human problems, its legitimacy is therefore founded on universal values? Should we read this movement as a process that, on the basis of the fluctuating elements of the historical framework, sets in motion a constitutive machine driven by universal forces of justice and peace? Are we thus in a situation very close to the traditional definition of Empire, the one promulgated in the ancient Roman-Christian imaginary?"
They add that imperialism is no longer possible today since no nation state, not even the United States, is capable of acting as a sovereign power to rule over the global order.
We could say yes to these questions and quickly move on. However, Hardt nad Negri say:
"It would be going too far to respond affirmatively to these questions at this early stage in our investigation. The definition of the developing imperial power as a science of the police that is founded on a practice of just war to address continually arising emergencies is probably correct but still completely insufficient. As we have seen, the phenomenological determinations of the new global order exist in a profoundly fluctuating situation that could also be characterized correctly in terms of crisis and war. How can we reconcile the legitimation of this order through prevention and policing with the fact that crisis and war themselves demonstrate the very questionable genesis and legitimacy of this concept of justice? As we have already noted, these techniques and others like them indicate that what we are witnessing is a process of the material constitution of the new planetary order, the consolidation of its administrative machine, and the production of new hierarchies of command over global space."
That is a good signpost. A new juridical apparatus is in formation with the new global order. That is why we need to keep an open mind here and adopt the stance of exploring what is going on. As Hardt and Negri say we are are participants in this development and so our citizenship, just like our ethical responsibility, is situated within these newly global order.
In this article in Global Agenda (courtesy of H.U.H.) we find that Hardt and Negri reject the view that we should think of the new global order in terms of the hegemony of the US. They say:
"It is becoming increasingly clear that a unilateral or “monarchical” arrangement of the global order – centred on the military, political and economic dictation of the United States – is undesirable and unsustainable. "
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Politics, by 1 definition in business philosophies, is the Use of Power, legitimate or illegitimate by the rules set within organizations.
The exclusion you mentioned, is largely due to the inability or unwillingness of most people to perceive their surroundings in terms of "organizational dynamics/behavior". Instead most rely on the traditional method of "individual dynamics/behavior".
Power, in its basic definition, is Influence, of individuals and organizations upon each other.
Much of our definition of Power is dependent upon archaic forms of "authority".
Hence, many people believe that REAL power can only exist in "positions"/offices, when actually those are merely symbolic representations of Power.
Humans are unfortunately, highly ritualized in Power. But this is necessary.
Rituals "formalize" Power, but do not MAKE the Power.
"Informal" powers do exist quite extensively in human society, ie. underground influences of leaders, the power of rebels and exiles, the power of blackmarket power/economies.
To study Politics in philosophy, one must understand the organizational dynamics of many forms of Power and Influence in various different kinds of organizations.
The proofs are all there, we have just ignored them too long.