{"id":13955,"date":"2020-04-10T22:51:03","date_gmt":"2020-04-11T02:51:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/?p=13955"},"modified":"2020-04-11T19:26:03","modified_gmt":"2020-04-11T23:26:03","slug":"badiou-covid-19-pandemic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/2020\/04\/10\/badiou-covid-19-pandemic\/","title":{"rendered":"Badiou COVID-19 Pandemic"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Alain Badiou on the COVID-19 pandemic<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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We\u2019ve known for a long time that in the event of a war between countries, the state must impose, not only on the popular masses, as is to be expected, but on the bourgeoisie itself, considerable constraints, all in order to save local capitalism. Some industries are almost nationalised for the sake of an unbridled production of armaments that does not immediately generate any monetizable surplus value. Many bourgeois are mobilised as officers and exposed to death. Scientists work night and day to invent new weapons. Numerous intellectuals and artists are compelled to supply national propaganda, etc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the side of this state, the situation is of the kind in which the bourgeois state must explicitly, publicly, make prevail interests that are in some sense more general than those of the bourgeoisie alone, while strategically preserving, in the future, the primacy of the class interests of which this state represents the general form<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In other words, the conjuncture compels the state to manage the situation by integrating the interest of the class whose authorised representative it is with more general interests, on account of the internal existence of an \u2018enemy\u2019 that is itself general \u2013 in times of war this may be a foreign invader, while in the present situation it is the virus SARS 2.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The lesson to be drawn from this is clear: the ongoing epidemic will not have,\u00a0qua<\/em>\u00a0epidemic, any noteworthy political consequences in a country like France.<\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even supposing that our bourgeoisie \u2013 in light of the inchoate grumbling and flimsy if widespread slogans \u2013 believes that the moment has come to get rid of Macron, that will in no way represent any change worthy of note. The \u2018politically correct\u2019 candidates are already waiting in the wings, as are the advocates of the most mildewed form of a \u2018nationalism\u2019 as obsolete as it is repugnant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As for those of us who desire a real change in the political conditions of this country, we must take advantage of this epidemic interlude, and even of the \u2013 entirely necessary \u2013 isolation, to work on new figures of politics, on the project of new political sites, and on the trans-national progress of a third stage of communism <\/strong>after the brilliant one of its invention and the \u2013 interesting but ultimately defeated \u2013 stage of its statist experimentation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We will also need to pass through a stringent critique of every perspective according to which phenomena like epidemics can work by themselves <\/em>in the direction of something that is politically innovative.<\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over and above the general transmission of scientific data about the epidemic, a political charge will only be carried by new affirmations and convictions concerning hospitals and public health, schools and egalitarian education, the care of the elderly, and other questions of this kind. Only these might possibly be articulated with a balance-sheet of the dangerous weaknesses on which the current situation has shed light.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In passing, one will need to show publicly and dauntlessly that so-called \u2018social media\u2019 have once again demonstrated that they are above all \u2013 besides their role in fattening the pockets of billionaires \u2013 a place for the propagation of the mental paralysis of braggarts, uncontrolled rumours, the discovery of antediluvian \u2018novelties\u2019, or even  fascistic obscurantism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let us not give credence, even and especially in our isolation, except to truths that are controllable by science and to the grounded perspectives of a new politics<\/strong>, of its localised experiences as well as its strategic aims.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Translated by Alberto Toscano<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Alain Badiou on the COVID-19 pandemic We\u2019ve known for a long time that in the event of a war between countries, the state must impose, not only on the popular masses, as is to be expected, but on the bourgeoisie itself, considerable constraints, all in order to save local capitalism. Some industries are almost nationalised … Continue reading “Badiou COVID-19 Pandemic”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13955","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-badiou"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13955","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13955"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13955\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13958,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13955\/revisions\/13958"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13955"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13955"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13955"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}