Minor Politics: Deleuze, Marx, and the Refusal of Work

Nicholas J. Thoburn

Phl). in Sociology

Goldsmiths College, University of London

Vft79-
_--_q 1
Abstract

This thesis is concerned with political composition. It uses Deleuze and Guattari's
materialism, and specifically their concept of 'minor' processes, both to develop an
understanding of a politics of difference against identity, and to interpret political
composition in communist movements. Both the theoretical and empirical concerns are
framed around the problematic of 'the refusal of work'. 'Work' is argued to be a
pervasive mechanism of identity which a materialist politics of difference would seek to
unsettle, and it is the specific site of political practice for the communist movements
considered.
Though driven methodologicallyby Deleuze'swork, the theoreticalcore of the
thesisdrawsrelationsbetweenDeleuzeand Marx around the categoriesof capitalismand
communism. Thus, at a theoreticallevel, as well as exploring Deleuze'sempiricism and
6minor politics', the thesis also considers the concepts of the proletariat, the
lumpenproletariat,the 'social factory', and the 'socialisedworker'.
The empirical focus is on communistmovementsof 'cramped' minority groups.
It is from the very cramped position of these minorities, lacking the subjective and
materialresourcesto be describedas 'a people', that politics as a mode of complication
andcreationof life is arguedto be situated. The communismand minor politics of these
movementsis thusexploredasa situatedprocessof differenceand creationratherthan the
product of 'identity'. The specific empirical focus is on the practices, political
techniques,languages,conceptualconstructions, and cultures of the North American
Industrial Workersof the World in the early yearsof the twentiethcentury, and the Italian
operaisinoandautonondamovementsin the 1960s and 1970s.

2
Acknowledgments

The processesof life and work are such that the importanceof one's milieu transcends
that of the hours spent in front of a word processor. I would thus like to acknowledge
the greatdebt I haveto thosewho havesupportedand helpedme in the processof writing
this thesis.
First of all, the thesis is dedicatedto June, John, and Alan. Thankyou for
everything. To Leah Hargreaves and everyone in the folds of the cafe on the common:
sustenance,coffee, disco, and friendship have never been so well composed. Martha
Michailidou has continually enrichedmy life at Goldsmiths and beyond. Thankyou to
everyonewho hasreadand commentedon parts of the thesis, especiallyRuna Khalique,
Margot Butler, and Andrew Barry. The work and archives of Red Notes have been
invaluable. Many thanks also to the Kate Sharpley Library for archival material, Joe
Kenyon for claimants'action material,andto Steveat AntagonismPress for conversation
about left-communism. Indeed, the work of marginal publishers has fuelled me
throughout. Finally, I owe a debt of gratitudeto my supervisor,the thesis would have
beenvery different if Nikolas Rose had not been such a supportive, encouraging, and
critical reader.

3
Table of Contents

Abbreviations 7

ChapterI Introduction:Politics againstldentitX 8

Minor politics 8
Deleuze and Marx 10
Work and its refusal 12
Against the identity principle 17
Chapter plan 18

Chapter 2 Literature Review: Materialism and Diffierence 22

Anti-dualism 23
Identity, equivalence,andthe revengeof the liberal subject 25
Subalterninsurgency 27
Infidel heteroglossia:in and againstcapital 29
Conu-nunityagainstequivalence 33
Conclusion 37

Chapter 3 Empiricism: A Materialist Methodology for the Untimely 39

Genealogy and 'counter-memory' 40
Matter 42
Relationsand resonance 44
The empiriciststandpoint:the untimely minoritarian 48
Conclusion 51

Chapter 4 The Minoritarian: a Politics of Cramped Creation 53

Cramped space and the centrality of creation 54
Deterritorialisation as first principle 57
The particular and the social in minor composition 61

The collective, the singular, and the minor author-function 68

Creation against resistance (Deleuze and Foucault) 70

Conclusion 72

Chapter 5 The Lumpenproletariat and the Proletarian Unnamable 74

Marx's lumpenproletariat 76
Bakunin on the lumpenproletariat as radical identitY, and
Marx's critique 86
The unnamedproletariat 90
Work and manifold relations 93

4
 The proletariatandthe minor 95
The empiricallumpen/proletariat 97
Conclusion 99

Chapter6 The Wobblies:Abstract Labour,Minorities, and Industrial

Sabotage 101
Abstract labour and the working class 104
Reductions and complications 109
The repetition and difference of wobbly culture 116
The hobo anomalous 121
Sabotage 131
Conclusion 137

Chapter 7 The Social Factoa and the Socialised Worker 140

Introduction to autonomia for chapters 7 and 8 140
Introduction to chapter 7 143
Panzieri and Marx on machines and the social 144
The social factory: social capital, the collective capitalist,
and
the general interest of labour 149
The Fragment on Machines 152
Socialised workers 158
The capitalist BwO 166
The little work-machines of the social factory 175
Conclusion 178

Chapter 9 The Reversal of Pers2ecliveand the Enzafginati 180

Class composition and the reversal of perspective 183
The refusal of work (against self-management) 185
Needs and autovalorisation 188
Margins at the centre: emarginati and untorelli 192
Inclusive disjunctive identities and 'autonomy' 195
The wacreand money 200
Factory and city 202
Language and counterculture: the Metropolitan Indians and
Radio Alice 205
Conclusion 211

5
Chapter 9 Conclusion 214
46 in our two different ways, perhaps" 215
...
Capital, the line of flight, and the impossibilities of politics 216

Bibliography 221
Abbreviations

Works by DeleuzeandGuattari:
ME (1983)Anti-Oedipus:Capitalismand SchizophreniaVolumeI
ATP (1988)A ThousandPlateaus:Capitalismand SchizophreniaVolumeII
K (1986)Kay'ka:Towarda Minor Literature

Works by Deleuze:
N (1995) Negotiations

Other works:
RV Kornbluh, J. L. (ed.) (1988) Rebel Voices: An IWWAnthology

7
Chapter 1
Introduction: Politics aqainst Identity

For the race summoned forth by art or philosophy is not the one that claims to be
pure but rather an oppressed,bastard, lower, anarchical, nomadic, and irremediably
minor race... (Deleuze and Guattari 1994: 109)

Minor Politics
This thesis is concerned with political composition. I argue that politics is a mode of life
in which forms of community, techniques of practice, ethical demeanours, styles,
knowledges, and cultural forms are composed. it is a site of innovation, of
experimentation, and of the complication of life. In this sense, politics is not the terrain
of the representation of a people (and hence does not circulate primarily around questions
of 'justice' and 'truth'), but of their creation. But the conditions of this creative
composition are not the subjective and material resources (legally sanctioned and
autonomous subjectivities, recognised histories, cultural consistencies) that one would
conventionally associatewith self-creation. Rather, the creativity I am concerned with is
a condition of those who lack these resources, or who experience them as oppressive or
inadequate. It is a creativity of 'n-tinorities', who find their movements and expressions
'cramped' on all sides such that they can not in any conventional sense be said to have
carved out a delineated social space of their 'own' such that they could be called 'a
People'. It is from their very cramped and complex situations that politics emerges, but
not as a process of facilitating and bolstering identity, or 'becoming-conscious'. If "the
people are missing", as Deleuze (1989: 216) puts it, then there is possibility for a new
configuration to emerge, unconstrained by fixed identity; a political configuration of
engagementwith the complex social forces which traverse minorities, a 'minor politics'.
Such a minor politics is the concern of this thesis. My specific focus (as I elaborate
below) is on the minor processes in the theory and practice of communist movements
which have developed a certain 'refusal of work'.
This concept of minor politics is developedin the work of Gilles Deleuzeand
F61ixGuattari, and its explorationin this thesis is essentiallyan elaborationof Deleuze
and Guattari's politics.1 One of my main arguments is that Deleuze and Guattari present
an innovative and useful politics for our 2
times. This is by no means an unusual

1 The term 'minor politics' is derived from Deleuze and Guattari's concept of the 'minor' and 'minor
literature'. Though they have used the expressions "minorliterature and politics" and "Kafka politice' (K-.
86,7), 'minor politics' is not a term they employ.
2 Whilstthere is difference and variation in themes and styles between Deleuze's and Guattari's works,
and between each and their collective work, this thesis draws on their individual and collective works as
part of a single oeuvre, which, for convenience, I sometimessignify with the name 'Deleuze' (as in the
thesis title). Guattari(1998: 192-3)discussesthe problemswith, and motives for the sometimes elision of
his name from what he elsewherecalls the 'deleuzoguattarian'project (Guattari 1980: 234), but suggests
that 'Deleuze' has becomean acceptablecommonnoun for it.

8
statement.DeleuzeandGuattariare self-proclaimed'political' thinkers. Indeedpolitics is
central enough to their understandingof the formation of life that they can write that
"politics precedesbeing" (ATP: 203). In Deleuzeand Guattari's monist thought, 'life'
has no primary forms or identities but is a perpetual process of configuration and
variation, where politics is an art of composition, an art that affirms the variation and
creation of life 'minor' processes, against striation and identity - 'major' or 'molar'
-
processes (though I
as will show, there is no simple minor/major dichotomy). 3
The ramifications of this generalisationof politics across the plane of life are
great,and this manoeuvreplays a not insignificant part in the positive receptionand use
of Deleuze and Guattari's works, where a frequent theme is an explication of this
politicised being, or becoming. For the developmentof a politics, however, this
manoeuvrecan raise problems. If 'everything is political', one can be left wondering
whether there is any specificity to politics. This argument figures in Alain Badiou's
(1998: 16-7) critique of Deleuze. He makes the case that in generalising politics
everywhere, Deleuze's system lacks a specifically 'political register of thought' (and
hencehe suggeststhat Deleuze'spolitics reflect 'ideological' rather than 'political'
a more
vein of the politics of '68). But though Badiou is right to draw our attention to the
possibleproblems of generalisingpolitics across the terrain of life, his critique at this
level is not adequateto the depthandcomplexity of Deleuze'spolitics, becauseit does not
end with this generalisingmanoeuvre.In Deleuzeand Guattari's works there is at once a
rich conceptionof what a politics of life might be (and indeedone that is not 'ideological',
but rather concretely, or 'materially' situated), and considerable discussion of more
conventionalpolitical questions;questions that have been posed by what we can call
revolutionary,radical,or proletarianpolitics (thesebeing signifiers of the form of politics
that Badiou, with his Maoist affiliations, seeksto foreground). The interrelationof these
two aspectsis particularly evidentin Deleuzeand Guattari's conceptof the minor. It is
explicitly emphasisedwhen, employing Marx's political categoryof the proletariat, they
write that "[t]he power of minority, of particularity, finds its figure or its universal
consciousnessin the proletariat." (ATP: 472) Yet, though the fornier question of the
politics of life is receiving attention in Deleuzescholarship,the latter questionof Deleuze
and Guattari's relation to radical politics is less frequently addressed. In this thesis I am
seeking to use the conceptof the minor to discuss both these aspectsof their work
together.
There are three core areasor debateswhich this elaboration of minor politics
passesthrough, and to which the thesis seeks to contribute: relations between Deleuze

3 It is crucial to understandthat there is no primary elementto Deleuzeand Guattari's monism other than
an infinite process,where "[m]atterequals energy"(ATP. 153):'The plane of consistency of Nature is like
an immenseAbstract Machine, abstract yet real and individual; its pieces are the various assemblages
and individuals,each of which groups together an infinity of particles entering into an infinity of more or
less interconnectedrelations. There is therefore a unity to the plane of nature, which applies equally to
the inanimateand the animate,the artificialand the natural....What we are talking about is not the unity of
substance but the infinity of the modificationsthat are part of one another on this unique plane of life."
(ATP.254)

9
and Marx, the politics of 'the refusal of work', and, more generally, a situatedpolitics of
differenceandcompositionagainstidentity.

Deleuze and Marx

First, in using the conceptof minor politics to write aboutMarx andthe refusal of work, I
am seeking to situate the thesis in relation to the small amount of current work on
relationsbetweenDeleuzeand Marx. Though such relations have been noted certainly
sinceAnti-Oedipus (cf. Lyotard 1977;Donzelot 1977), and Deleuzehimself more than
once proposedthat he and Guattariwere Marxists (N: 171; 1995a:5 1), this remains a
relatively unexamineddynamic in their work. 4 It is a dynamic, however, that has been
brought forward a little by Deleuze's (1995a: 51) comment that his last book
(uncompletedbeforehis death)was to be called Grandeurde Marx. The questionof how
Deleuze, for whom 'resonance' rather than explication was the basis of philosophical
interpretation,would composethe 'greatness'of Marx has left a fitting opennessto his
oeuvre. Yet, as even a cursory reading of Capitalismand Schizophrenia(A(E, ATP)
shows,such a resonancewould not have beenwholly new.5 Addressingthis question of
Deleuze's relation to Marx, tric Alliez (1997: 81)
suggests that "all of Deleuze's
philosophy ... comes under the heading 'Capitalism and Schizophrenia...... Since the
proper nameof such a concernis of course 'Marx', who more than anyone sought to
developa politics from an analysisof the 'monstrous' configuration
of capitalism,Alliez
thuscontinues:"It can be realisedthereforejust how regrettableit is that Deleuzewas not
able to write the work he planned as his last, which he wanted to entitle Grandeur de
Marx." But this is not an unproductiveregret. For, asAlliez proposes,the possibility of
this book mobilisesus to think something of a Marx-Deleuzeresonance:"we can take
comfort from the possibility of thinking that this virtual Marx, this philosophically clean-
shavenMarx that Deleuzealludes to in the opening pagesof Difference and Repetition,
can be mobilised in the form of an empty square allowing us to move around the
Deleuziancorpuson freshlegs." (Alliez 1997:81)6
The focus of interestin a Marx-Deleuzeresonancehas been on the centrality of
in
capitalism their works (cf. Holland 1998,1999; Massumi 1992,1998; Surin 1994,
1997). Indeed, Surin (1997) suggeststhat Deleuze'sMarxian concern with capitalism
marks the very 'epochality' of his thought that could ground Foucault's enigmatic
suggestionthat one day the twentieth century may be known as 7
'Deleuzian'. The

4A recent essay on the 'many' materialisms in Deleuze, for example, only mentions Marx once, and then
disparagingly to suggest that Anti-Oedipus' use of the term 'production' is "no doubt a lingering
...
influence of orthodox Marxian thought. " (Mullarkey 1997: 451)
5 Deleuze (1 995a: 51) himself writes that Capitalism and Schizophrenia is completely traversed by Marx
and Marxism.
6 See Deleuze (1998) for discussion of the function of the 'empty square' in structuralism, as the forever
vacated space of fixed meaning in any system.
7 The form of capitalism that Surin suggests Deleuze analyses is a contemporary
particular
'hype rcapital ism' that followed the demise of the post-war world system with its three focal points of
Fordism in the West, Sovietism in the Eastern block, and developmentalism in the 'Third World'.

10
analysisof capitalismmust indeedbe the basis of a Marx-Deleuzeresonance,for it is a
concernwith the ways that the capitalist social machineengineersthe flows of life that is
the declaredbasisof Deleuze'sMarxism.8 But one gets the sensethat the foregrounding
of Marxian concernsthrough the categoryof capitalismhas, at times, led to a feeling of
impasse,since capitalismappearsto be increasingly overtaking the kind of differences
and mutationsaffirmed aspolitics in Anti-Oedipus(A(E). That is, the political injunction
of Anti-Oedipus to continuous 'deterritorialisation'(essentially, the process of breaking
open and escapingmolar identity)9 appearsto have becomeproblematicsince even the
extremesof deterritorialisationare increasinglyisomorphic to capitalistrelations (Holland
(1998) specifically makesthis point).
If thereis a feeling of impassethis hasparticularramificationsfor reading Deleuze
and Guattari, since, unlike the aporia-overdriveof some poststructuralism,their project
has been particularly important for its 'affirmative' force.10 This is not to say that
impasseis an alien condition for Deleuzeand Guattari, and one should not assumethat
their 'joyful' project, like the worst forms of leftism, should circulatearound a continual
optimism. Indeed,one can think of Beckett's (1979: 382) proposition that it is the very
'impossibility' of life that compelslife ("I
can't go on, I'll go on") as expressinga more
appropriatetenor for the Deleuzianpolitical than the popular image of unlicenseddesire.
Nevertheless,it would be a pity if Alliez' suggestionof 'fresh legs'
a movementaround
Deleuze'scorpusthrough a 'virtual Marx' focusedexclusively on aspectswhich show a
closing-down of political possibility (as if Marx returned to sober-up Deleuze and
Guattari). This thesis thus contributes to debate on a Deleuze-Marx resonanceby
considering how this relation opens political potential, how it helps us understand
processesof political composition.
With this in mind, I want to suggestthat it is in our possible impassethat Marx
becomeseven more importantin exploring Deleuzeand Guattari's politics. This is not
becauseof the centrality of an analysisof capitalismper se,but becauseMarx remainsthe
pre-eminentthinker of the impossibility of any easy or given political escapefrom the
infernal capitalistmachine,whilst simultaneouslypositing such possibility and potential
on relations formed within capitalism itself. This condition is what Marx calls
6communism'. To foreground communismin Marx is not to turn to a different set of
Marx's texts (for example,the early works rather than Capitao. For Marx, communism
is the immanentpotentialthat haunts,andemergesin and through capitalism. It is thus a
perspective for interpreting capitalism and developing politics (and is hence found

8 T61ix Guattari and I have remained Marxists, in our two different ways, perhaps, but both of
us. You
see, we think any political philosophy must turn on the analysis of capitalism and the ways it has
developed. " (N. 171)
9 For example: "... one can never go far enough in the direction of deterritorialisation: you haven't
seen
anything yet... " (ACE. 321)
10 As Deleuze (1995: 6) wrote of his concentration on Lucretius, Hume, Spinoza, Nietzsche
against the
conventional 'history of philosophy', what appealed to him was "their critique of negativity, their cultivation
of joy... "

11
throughoutMarx's works).II DeleuzeandGuattarihaveresonancewith Marx here. For
DeleuzeandGuattari,capitalismis a mode of social relation that is premisedon 'lines of
flight'; socially engineeredflows that continually break-open, or deterritorialise fixed
ways of being. Marx and Engels (1973: 36-7) similarly emphasisethe revolutionary
creativity of the capitalistmodeof productionasa processof the continual transformation
of social relations (where "[a]ll that is solid melts into air"). 12 Deleuze and Guattari's
politics and Marx's communismaresimultaneously interpretations of theselines of flight,
and critical engagementswith them to configure them in different ways, open new
possibilities of life, and open out to what Deleuze calls the 'virtuality' or 'potential' of
life. Sucha communistperspective,to use Nietzscheanterms, is not a reactivedenial of
current life, or an elaborationof a different 'communist society', but is a process of
in is
continual overcoming all of our social relations, as evident in Marx and Engels'
(1974: 56-7) deliberatelyambiguousdefinition:

Communism is for us not a state of affairs which is to be established,an ideal to

which reality [will] have to adjust. We call communism the real movement which
abolishesthe present state of things. The conditions of this movement result from
the premisesnow in existence.

Such 'communism' is explored in the thesis in two ways. First, in a more theoretical
vein, the minor is used to interpret Marx's 'proletariat' as a category of difference in and
against capitalism, and second, in a more empirical fashion, minor processes are
considered in actual communist movements. The question of the refusal of work runs
throughboth theseconcems.

Work and its refusal

If one of the concerns of thesis is to consider forms of political composition through
relations between Deleuze and Marx, I am also seeking to explore the question of a
'refusal of work'. Few of the social, political, and economic forecasts of the twentieth
century can have been more off-beam than those which foresaw the immanent demise of
work, where either 'mass unemployment' or 'leisure society' was to be caused by the

substitution of machines for humans. 13 We perform work which has over-spilled the old
boundaries of work-place, home, leisure, the 'working day', with the assorted regulatory
flexible contracts, part-time job
and productive techniques of employment, zero-hours
portfolios, Jobseeking' imperatives (rather than 'unemployment), key-tap monitoring

11 This is how I would interpret Bordiga's argument, as Dauv6 reports, that the whole of Marx's work is an
elaboration of communism (cf. Dauv6 and Martin 1997: 83).
12 The question of the primacy of 'lines of flight' as against 'contradictions' (the latter being the prime-
mover for more conventional Marxism) is discussed in Chapters 4 and 5, where this reading of Marx is put
on a firmer setting.
13 Such predictions actually go as far back as Antiquity. In response to Cicero's and Aristotle's
propositions that machines could overcome work, Marx (1976: 532) writes: "Oh those heathens! They
understood nothing of political economy and Christianity... "

12
keyboards, work drug-tests, off-shore island-factories, micro-electronic sweat shop
production, and so on, that show not a demise, but an intensification of work. 14 Yet,
whilst this intensificationhas not gone
t. ) without opposition, there has beenrelatively little
critique, or work-placepolitics that hasseriouslyproblematisedthe social arrangementof
'work' itself. In Britain, for example,the central drive of Blairite social policy of 'social
inclusion' through work (cf. Gray 1998)hasbeen surprisingly easily naturalised.15 This
is in part due to our lack of critical traditions to draw upon. Though the early workers'
movementsaw the critique of work as a central aspect of its politics (as visible, for
example, in the persistenceof 'Saint Monday' - absenteeismon Mondays - and the
campaign for the eight hour day (cf. Thompson 1967; Linebaugh 1991; Hunnicutt
1988)),it would seemthat, as modem political culture developed,work becamea rather
unproblematiccategory. Bordiga (cited in Nigation 1975: 5 1) marks this point when he
writes:

The classical socialist goal is the abolition of wage labour. Only the abolition of
wage labour can bring about the abolition of capitalism. But not having been able
to abolish wage labour the socialist movement has, since it began, aimed at the
...
abolition of the market economy.

Thus, even Marxist politics, for which work is a central category, has so often served
less to problematise than to glorify work, in, as Benjamin (1992: 250-1) puts it, a certain
resurrection of the old Protestant work ethic. This is amply evident in the demands for
the 'right to work', 'full employment', or Lenin's 'war communism' and advocacy of
Taylorism. (cf. Bell 1956: 41), Trotsky's 'ryfilitarisation of labour', Stalin's
'Stakhanovite' workers and so on. 16 Negri (1979: 124) thus writes:

14 This intensification of work is considered in detail in Chapter 7, but two

anecdotes can make the point
for now. A London Underground advertisement for Lemsip Extra in the winter of 1997/8 displayed a little of
the imperatives and pernicious mechanisms of work when it asked: "What sort of person goes to work with
the flu? " The response was: "The one after your job". Elsewhere, the intensification of work which
accompanied the growth of flexible production techniques was such that the Japanese were induced to
coin a new word - 'karoshi' - to describe a condition of sudden death through over-work (cf. Kamunist
Krant! 1997). For an excellent and exhaustive account of the contemporary intensification of work from an
anti-work perspective see Kamunist Kranti (1997).
15 The way that this naturalisation appears to have been eased by the Labour Party's historical relations
to a socialist tradition (with the return of 'old Labour' talk of full employment, the right to work, and a
community of workers) exemplifies a little of the mainstream left's uncritical relation with the category
'work'.
16 In a 1987 conversation with Pope John Paul 11, the Polish leader General Jaruzelski proposed that the
common ground between East and West was not the Eastern block's movement toward capitalism, but the
affirmation of what he called "the Theology of Work" (cited in Hunnicutt 1988: 314-5). But such a
perspective on work was not limited to Stalinism. Trotsky's 'militarisation of labour' is a useful example
since he has retained a popular image of being on the left of Marxism. As is clearly evident in this
passage, in Trotsky's socialism there is to be no reduction in work: "Under capitalism, the system of
piece-work and of grading, the application of the Taylor system, etc., have as their object to increase the
exploitation of the workers by the squeezing-out of surplus value. Under Socialist production, piece-work,
bonuses, etc., have as their problem to increase the volume of socialist product, and consequently to
raise the general well-being. Those workers who do more for the general interest than others receive the
right to a greater quantity of the social product than the lazy, the careless, and the disorganisers. " (1961:
149)

13
 More than any other single watchword of the communist movement, the refusal of
work has been continually and violently outlawed, suppressedand mystified by the
traditions and the ideology of socialism. If you want to provoke a socialist to rage,
or deflate his flights of demagogy, provoke him on the question of the refusal of
work!

Yet Marx himself took a very different attitudeto work. Though his position was not
unambiguous, his difference from the dominant traditions of Marxism are amply evident
in this passagecarried on the back cover of the US journal Zerowork (1975,1977):

It is one of the greatestmisunderstandingsto talk of free, human, social work, or

work without private property. 'Work' is essentially the unfree, inhuman, unsocial
activity, determined by private property and creating private property. The

abolition of private property becomes a reality only when it is understood as the

abolition of 'work'. (Marx, from 'Ueber Friedrich Lists Buch Das Nationale Systein
der Politischen Oekononzies')

A critique of work has, however, not been wholly absent from modem radical
movements. In 1883 Paul Lafargue, Cuban-born Marxist and Marx's son-in-law, wrote
a communist polemic, The Right to be Lazy, which can be seen as the start of the critique
of work within the modem communist movement. 17 Lafargue's argument had a simple
premise:

A strange delusion possesses the working classes of the nations where capitalist

civilisation holds sway. This delusion drags in its train the individual and social
woes which for two centuries have tortured sad humanity. This delusion is the love
of work, the furious passion for work, pushed even to the exhaustion of the
individual and his progeny. Instead of opposing this mental aberration, the priests,
the economists and the moralists have cast a sacred halo over work. (Lafargue 1989:
21)

Lafargue was careful not to situate the cause of this furious passion solely in the hands of
the bourgeoisie and its 'anaemic Rights of Man'. For the tragic irony is that those most
to 'the most terrible scourge' have sought to make it the basis of their
subject

17 Lafargue's essay is the first to explicitly emphasise the critique of work as the basis of a communist
politics within a Marx-informed communist milieu. In a broader sense, the critique of work of course
to this. As Illich (1981) has argued, work itself is a modern capitalist invention (cf. also
emerges earlier
ATP. 400-1,490-1). The problems with generalising sweeps through history aside, Illich argues that for
the classical Greeks and Romans, work done with the hands was a more lowly practice than begging (not,
that this prevented slaves and women doing it), and through the Middle Ages, wage labour (as
of course,
household subsistence, certain trades such as shoe making, and begging) was a sign of misery
against
lack of community. In the emergence of modern capitalism it took considerable effort to turn
and
peasants and vagabonds into the proletariat (cf. Linebaugh 1991; Marx 1976: 899; and Thompson 1967).
In the politics of modern capitalism itself, Lafargue was by no means the first to raise the issue; anti-work
perspectives and practices were a persistent feature of slave resistance (cf. Rawick 1972), and were
prevalent amongst other elements of the transatlantic working class (cf. Linebaugh and Rediker 1990).

14
&revolutionaryprinciple' - the 'Right to Work': "... if the miseries of compulsory work
and the torturesof hunger have descendedupon the proletariatmore in number than the
locustsof the Bible, it is becausethe proletariatitself invited them." (28) Though this is
not the place to assessLafargue's argument,against the 'right to work', he presents
communismas a movementwhich, through the pressurefor shorter hours and higher
wages,can force technologicaldevelopmenttoward a societywith a minimum possible of
work-time, such that "[t]he end of revolution is not the triumph of justice, morality and
liberty but to work the least possible and to enjoy oneself intellectuallyand physically
...
the most possible." (cited in Cohn 1972: 160)18
At the same time as Lafargue was writing his Marxist polemic, Nietzsche was
sayingsomethingnot wholly different:

The impossible class. Poor, happy and independent! these things can go together;
- -
poor, happy and a slave! - thesethings can also go together - and I can think of no
better news I could give to our factory slaves:provided, that is, they do not feel it to
be in general a disgrace to be thus used, and
used tip, as a part of a machine and as
it were a stopgap to fill a hole in human inventiveness!...If have always in
... you
your ears the flutings of the Socialist pied-pipers whose design is to enflame you
with wild hopes? which bid you to be prepared and nothing further, prepared day
upon day, so that you wait and wait for something to happenfrom outside and in all
respectsgo on living as you have always lived... This would be the right attitude of
mind: the workers of Europe ought henceforth to declare themselvesas a class a
human impossibility... (1982: 206)

The sense that these positions manifest is reflected, in diverse ways, in an anti-
work tangent that develops through a number of modem communist and countercultural
movements. The most prominent of these include the Industrial Workers of the World
(cf. Chapter 6), Dada and Surrealism (cf. Huelsenbeck 1966; Thirion 1929), the
Situationist International (cf. Knabb 1981), the Yippies (cf. Hoffman 1996; Rubin 1970;
Neville 1971), the Black Panther Party (cf. Cleaver 1970), operaisnio and autono"lia (cf.
Chapters 7 and 8), the British punk movement, and movements such as Rastafari and
other elements of black expressive culture and politics (cf. Gilroy 1987: 199-203; Hall et
al. 1978; Howe 1973; 'After Marx, April' Collective 1981), as well as, in Britain,
elements of the Claimants' Union movement and, more recently, claimants' movements

181say that this is a'Marxist'text, but the degree to which Marx himselfwas in accordwith The Right to be
Lazy is unclear. As Cohn (1972)has documented,though Marx was happy with the work of Guescleand
Lafarguein LEgalit6 at the time when The Rightto be Lazy was serialised, he later fell out with Lafargue,
famously suggesting, as a direct reference to Lafargue, that "if that's Marxism, I am not a Marxist" (as
Engels reported Marx's words to Lafargue, in Cohn 1972: 167). It appears that for Marx, Guescle and
Lafarguewere fast and lose with the word 'revolution', and displayed an "impatience without bounds"
(1972: 167). Lafarguein particularwas admonishedfor his "infantileboastingon the revolutionary horrors
of the future" (Marxcited in Cohn 1972: 168-9). But, whilst Marx wrote (November1882) that Lafargue's
writings were in fact "reminiscencefrom Bakunin", it is unclear if this refers to The Right to be Lazy,
becauseone month later (betweenits serialisation and its publication in pamphletform) Marx wrote that
"Lately Paul has written his best things with humourand fun." (cited in Cohn 1972: 169)

15
againstthe Jobseekers,
Allowance andNew Deal (cf. Aufheben 1998; Bad Attitude 1995;
Carr 1975: 54-5; Job Shirkers Alliance n.d; Kenyon 1972; Unwaged Fightback 1987).
The refusalof work hasalsoemergedin a myriad of smallergroups and journals, where
the senseof the 1953St. GermaindesPr6sZ:graffiti
' "Ne TravaillezJainais" has developed
in many different ways (cf., for example, Fatuous Times n.d.; Midnight Notes and
ProcessedWorld generally).19This is far from saying, however, that there is a coherent
politics or trajectoryof the refusal of work. The perspectiveswithin which a refusal of
work emerges in these groups are often radically different, even fundamentally opposed,
suchthat at most it is a point of disjunctionand innovation in political culture, rather than
a 'school'. 20
My interest in the refusal of work, at a general level, is to bring the rather
forgotten perspectiveof a critique of work into political debate. But I am not writing a
'history of the refusal of work' or setting out a body of programmatictenets. The way
this thesisconsidersthe refusalof work is as a perspectivefor bringing Marx and Delcuze
into relation. More empirically, I use it as a means of understanding communist
movementswhich have sought to overcome 'work' and the subject of 'worker'. The
refusal of work should thus be seen in this thesis as immanentto the anti-identitarian
processesof the minor and the proletariat, and hence I sometimesuse the expression
'refusal of work/er' to emphasisethis.
The groupsI considerin no senseexhaustthe potential of a politics of the refusal
of work. My concernis with movementswhich havevery concretelyengagedwith work
itself and havetakenwork asthe starting point of politics. That is, I am concernedwith
groups which have engagedwith a quite conventional political territory (though their
politics are far from conventional). I should stressthat by exploring the refusal of work
within movementswhich fit, to degrees,with conventionaldefinitions of politics, rather
than in more obviously popularcultural, countercultural,or avant gardist forms, I am not
seekingto describethe 'autonomouspolitical register' that Badiou points out is absentin
Deleuze. I would arguethat the 'specifically political' aspectsof Deleuze'swork that his
relations with Marx help elucidateare still to be situatedacross the social whole (rather
than in an autonomousregister).21 The reason for my focus is to consider explicitly
communist work-based movements, concerns, and problematisationswithin a framework
that emphasisessociocultural composition and creation. This is at once to draw
communist politics away from the anaemic territory of 'real politics' and orthodox

19 A photograph of this graffiti ('Never Work') appeared in Intemationale Situationniste no. 8 1963 (cf. IS
1970), with the heading 'Preliminary program to the situationist movement', and it reappeared in the
Sorbonne in May '68 (Pag6s 1998: 36). Much of the elaboration of the refusal of work in these smaller
groups and journals has developed from the politics of the SI, but the best of it is part of a movement of
overcoming the SI's very real problems. See for example Blissett (1995).
20 One example is the critique of Bob Black (whose 'The Abolition of Work' (1987) is one of the more
popular anti-work essays) and John Zerzan by some of those who write under the Luther Blissett 'multiple
name' (cf. Blissett 1987).
21 it is for similar reasons that Marx is a thinker of social rather than political revolution (cf. Marx and
Engels 1973: 12), and why those related to left-communist milieu often pose their politics as 'anti-political'
(cf. Bordiga n.d.; Dauvd and Martin 1997).

16
Marxism, and to bring some poststructuralist and cultural studies concerns with
countercultureanddifferenceaway from the territory of the 'post-political'. By drawing
out the refusal of work within workers movementsI hope to show how innovative
political practicecan occur in direct engagementwith work. This is not to asserta return
to a politics of work against an interest in countercultureand the cultural artistic avant
garde(far from it - thesehavebeencrucial sites and processesof political and conceptual
innovation),rather,it is to try andreaddressthe balance,andproblematisethe distinctions
betweenthe more countercultural,artistic, and poetic aspectsof politics (which retain a
continued, if marginal, popularity in cultural studies, as evident, for example, in the
recentacademicinterestin the SituationistInternational),and work-basedpolitics (which
are decidedlyunfashionable).

Against the identity principle

To situate the thesis more widely, a third concern is with exploring a politics of difference
and becoming against identity. This politics is signalled in the opening of this chapter as
a 'minor politics'. In bringing together Deleuze's minor, Marx's proletariat, and the
refusal of work I am considering how politics can operate as a creative, composing, and
concretely situated process without being premised upon, or falling back on identity. I
will leave further development of this for the following chapters. Here I want to suggest
how this minor politics relates to a broader political debate.
Through the influence of neo-Gramscian theories
of 'hegemony' and the
6autonomy of the political' (most famously developed in Laclau. and Mouffe (1985)), a
persistent concern of 1980s and 1990s sociology and cultural studies has been with
developing a politics of minorities, difference, particularity, and new social movements,
in a break from orthodox Marxian ideas of class, unity, teleology, and the centrality of
'the economy'. These development have sometimes been called 'post-Marxism',
4cultural politics', and 'post-politics' to signify this break. The politics I explore here is
equally attuned to the problems of orthodox Marxian thought, and with an affirmation of
difference, but it takes a different path to neo-Gramscian conceptionS.22 Rather than
following an overcoming of Marx, the arguments of this thesis have a closer relation to
Marxian problematics, hence I seek to show how a politics of difference relates to the
categories of the proletariat, class, surplus value, and work, and the processes, flows,
and captures that these categories describe. At a time of the intensification of work and
the increasing capitalisation of life at the most micro levels, analysis at the level of the

22 It is noteworthy that the Italian operaismo and autonomia movements that I consider in Chapters 7 and
8 explicitly challenge the neo-Gramscian politics of the Italian Communist Party (PCI), and offer a
trajectory in Marxist politics that has been overshadowed by the concept of 'hegemony' and its popularity
in European theory and politics (even though it had a particularly repressive function in Italy).

17
capitalist 'mode of production', or ISOCiUS123
would seem to be more, rather than less
necessary.
This problematicof a politics against identity has been highlighted by Jean-Luc
Nancy (1991) in his conceptof 'unworking community' (as discussedin Chapter 2).
Against philosophiesof being, essence,and presence,'community' for Nancy is not
found in the coherenceof a completed'work' or 'identity', but in a continuousprocessof
connection,disjunction, and singularity - or 'unworking'. I mention Nancy here because
he relatesthis unworking to communism. Indeed he suggests that unworking is the
political imperativeof communism,insofarasit is a politics which radically problematises
work (both in termsof 'identity' and the more conventionalsenseof the word) (1991: 7).
Nancy's pursuit, at least in its broad sense,is one that this thesis has affinities with. 24
Minor politics is a processof engagementwhich enters"in the middle" (Deleuze1988a:
123) of any set of relations,practices,or movements. It describestechniques,modesof
engagement,points of concern, and a political 'style', rather than proposes a political
model or a 'school'. Hence, I am not using minor politics and the refusal of work to
describean autonomoustheoretical
or empirical community or identity, a 'work', but to
see how it opens, or 'deterritorialises' fixed identities, and indeed conventional
understandingsof the communistmovementand political practice. However, if this kind
of perspectiveis to havecontemporarypertinence,it needsto be applied. Hence, where I
differ from Nancy is in seekingto explore how this 'unworking' has
operatedin rather
concreteforrns of engagementwith work and its identities. That said, the empiricalcase-
studiesare not examplesof 'correct practice'. The thesis contributesto contemporary
political thought through developing the conceptsand techniquesof the minor and the
refusalof work. The casestudiesshow how the minor can be used to 'interpret' political
movements,and to offer accountsof a politics of the refusal of work. The potential use
of the Industrial Workers of the World and autonorniatoday can only be in points of
resonancethat they may offer, sites of problematisationand forms of composition that
may havecontemporarypertinence,but not in any direct senseas exemplaryfon-ris.

Chapter plan
To summarise,the thesis develops an understandingof 'minor politics' as a form of
creativity of 'cramped' minorities. This categorybrings togetherDeleuzeand Guattari's
politics of life, and a more conventionalplane of radical politics. In this I am seekingto
contributeto discussionaroundthe relationsbetweenDeleuzeand Marx in a fashion that

23 Deleuze and Guattari's word 'socius' is used throughout the thesis. Essentially it means "social
machine" (A(E-. 33) - the set of flows, relations, and identities of a social system - and is not wholly
different to Marx's 'mode of production' (though see Chapter 7, note 54).
24 1 say this advisedly because, though Nancy and Deleuze share certain concerns, they
work in very
different philosophical frameworks. Whilst Deleuze suggests that he was never Heideggerian, reportedly
referring to Heidegger as "the Nazi Druid" (Faye 1995), and is somewhat disparaging of Bataille's
understanding of 'transgression' (cf. Deleuze and Parnet 1987: 47), these two form the basis of Nancy's
discussion of community. See Nancy (1996) for his interpretation of their relation, and (1991 a: 4)
where
he uses Deleuze's concept of 'becoming-imperceptible'in an explanation of his 'being-in-common'.

18
talks about communism as much as capitalism, and that brings in a politics of the refusal
of work/er. In a broader sense, the thesis is an intervention in current political theory in
the development of a situated anti-identitarian or 'creative' perspective. The rest of the
chapters are organised as follows.
Chapter 2 is a literature review of poststructuralist work that has, at a largely
theoretical level, sought to pose the possibility of a politics against identity and liberal
humanist forms of equivalence through a relation with Marx and/or communism. Here I
consider Judith Butler's (1998) essay 'Merely Cultural', Wendy Brown's (1995) critique
of the principle of identity in 'new social movement' theory, Spivak's (1996) 'subaltern
insurgency', Haraway's (1991) 'cyborg' and 'situated knowledges', Nancy's (1991)
6unworking' of community, and Lyotard's (1988) differend. This chapter presents a
terrain of relations between poststructuralism and Marx that is different to neo-Gramscian
and post-Marxist readings, and a set of problematics to act as a background for the
discussion of Deleuze and Guattari's politics. I have chosen not to review the relevant
secondary literature on Deleuze, the literature on the refusal of work, or more overtly
4communist' literature, for these bodies of work are used selectively in the substantive
chapters.
Chapter 3 is more methodological, and the start of my argument proper. It is an
elaboration of Foucault's and Deleuze's readings of Nietzsche's 'genealogy'. After
explaining the general framework of genealogy as a process of 'unmaking' ourselves, I
explore Deleuze's 'empiricism' as a methodology of 'matter', 'relations', and 'resonance'
that seeks to accentuatevariation and difference against identity. The chapter develops
into an elaboration of the 'standpoint' of empiricism, the minor. As well as mapping
Deleuze's understanding of 'life' and empiricism, the chapter is concerned to show how
one can approach the writing of histories of radical movements without turning them into
historical objects.
Chapter 4 takes up the minor standpoint and considers the specific techniques

and processes of the minor, from 'creation' and 'cramped space' to 'deterritorialisation',
4particular intrigues', and the minor relationship to the social, the 'line of flight', and
tauthorship'. This chapter is based around Delcuze and Guattari's concept of 'minor

literature', but it develops a more general economy of minor politics. Though I discuss
the techniques and concerns of the minor in detail, I stress that the minor is not a set of

programmatic rules of a correct 'Deleuzian politics', but a mode of engagement that

always begins 'in the middle' of any situation or movement.

Chapter 5 explores Marx's figures of the proletariat and lumpenproletariat to see
how a minoritarian concept of difference relates to Marx's standpoint. After a detailed
of the lumpenproletariat that emphasises the political basis for the
consideration
the category (in Marx's disputes with the anarchists), I argue that despite its
emergence of
frisson of excess (and its occasional foregrounding by some groups as a 'class' of the
refusal of work), the lumpenproletariat is a problematic category for a Deleuzian reading

19
of Marx to adopt. This is becauseit is a categorythat seeksto describeidentity removed
from social relations, even as it looks like difference. That said, I also show how the
lumpenproletariatis a useful meansof drawing out the question of the refusal of work
and the complexity of class formation, againstMarxian orthodoxy (and aspectsof Marx
himself). The prime concern of this chapter is to develop an understandingof the
proletariatas a situatedprocess,a minor figure or 'unnamable', rather than an identity,
that is both of the manifolds of the capitalist socius and seeks to deterritorialisethem.
The refusalof work is presentedas an extensionof Marx's argumentthat the proletariatis
ZD
both in and againstcapitalistforms of life.
Chapter 6 is an interpretationof the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW)
using the frameworksof the minor andthe proletariatdevelopedin the previous chapters.
I show the various techniques by which, through the plane of 'class', the IWW
composed a minor people against the identities of worker, minority, American,
immigrant, citizen, and 'People'. I show how a crampedspaceof work, and a paucity of
cultural themesdevelopedinto a vibrant andcomplex movement. In particularI focus on
the IWW migrant worker or hobo, not as a romanticisedwanderer, but as a site of
political creationfrom the situationof being in an anomalousposition to work, migrancy,
and the IWW. I also look at sabotageas a tactic immanentto a group formed not around
identity but processesof the deterritorialisationof work.
Chapters 7 and 8 are concernedwith the Italian operaismo and autonomia
movements,and henceI start with a generalintroduction to the movements. The chapters
are split around two concerns:the 'social factory', and the processesand techniquesof
the operaistand autonomistformulation of the refusalof work. This division should not,
however, be seen as following a narrative where the 'theory' is followed by a
presentationof the 'practice'. As I show in Chapter 4, theory and practice are not
distinct, but part of a generalminor creativity. The chaptersare so structured to enable
discussionof two aspectsof the political productionof operaismoand autonomia.
Chapter 7, on the 'social factory', moves from discussionof Panzieriand Marx
on machinesand 'real subsumption', through Tronti's idea of 'social capital' and the
social factory, to Marx's 'Fragmenton Machines' and Negri's 'socialisedworker'. In a
critique of Negri's socialisedworker thesis I also include a quite lengthy discussion of
Deleuzeand Guattari's conceptionof capitalism, 'axiomatics', 'control', and 'machinic
surplusvalue', as a thesis that is more in keeping with the conceptof the social factory.
Whilst being an explorationof an aspectof the conceptualproduction of operaismoand
autonomia, this chapteralso addsto the understandingof capitalismthat is first presented
in Chapter5. Thus the chapterendsby discussingcontemporaryforms of 'work'.
Chapter 8 explores the theoreticaltechniquesand practices of the refusal of
in
work autonomiaand the eniarginati('marginals'). I start by showing how operaismo
and autonomia developed the concepts of 'class composition', the 'reversal of
perspective',the 'refusal of work', and 4autovalorisation'to understandan antagonistic

20
political compositionthat brokewith the identity of worker (and with the neo-Gramscian
eurocommunismof the PCI). I then consider the way autonomia developed into a
politicisation of 'marginality'. What I stress in the discussion of the practices of the
emarginatiis the way difference and particularity operated in the composition of the
movement,and how problematisationsand practicesof counterculturewere brought into
the terrain of a politics of work. I discuss this through the questions of 'inclusive
disjunctive identitiesand autonomy', 'the socialwageand money', 'factory and city', and
'counterculture and language'. Whilst I developedthe social factory thesis into an
understanding of contemporary capitalist sociality, in this chapter I stay with the
elaborationof one movement.
Chapter 9 concludesthe thesis with a return to the questionof a Deleuze-Marx
resonance. I discussthe basis of Deleuzeand Guattari's 'Marxism', and consider how
minor politics and the 'line of flight' can addressthe problemof the closureof politics.

21
Chapter 2
Literature Review: Materialism and Difference

one does not belong to communism, and communism does not let itself be
...
designatedby what it names.(Blanchot 1997: 295)

The thesis is structuredaround a relation betweenDeleuzeand Guattari's 'minoritarian'

and Marx's 'proletariat'. But rather than attempt to cover the literature on Deleuze or on
the communist movement (which will be selectively used in the argument of the thesis),
by way of a literature review I want to illustrate a wider milieu of related poststructuralist
thought. I focus here on recent influential poststructuralist conceptions of politics that
have sought to analyse 'difference' in relation to the Marxian problematic of an immanent
critique of capitalism and its identities. My purpose here is to present a general territory
and set of concerns and problematics to contextualise my argument, and from which to
develop the specific and detailed
explanation of minor politics.
This linking of poststructuralism and Marxism
may sound like a return to an older
debate from which a certain 'post-Marxism'
emerged through conceptions of hegemony
and civil society against theories founded on class; most prominently in Laclau and
Mouffe's (1985) Hegeniony and Socialist Strategy. It is, however,
a very different
relation between Marx and poststructuralism that I want to explore. Throughout the
thesis I am seeking to relate poststructuralist concerns back to more 'orthodox' Marxian
problematics (even as they are so often politically unproductive in orthodox Marxism). I
am concerned with how Marx's understanding of a milieu and its forces (life or labour-
power in the capitalist mode of production) and an antagonistic politics that emerges in
and against this milieu and its identities (communism), could form mutually productive
relations with a poststructuralist politics of difference and critique of the liberal humanist
subject.
There are five parts to this review, each of which considers an aspect of one
theorist's work: a problematisation of a resurgent material/cultural dualism (Butler), a
critique of the implicit liberal subject of identity politics (Wendy Brown), a conception of
agency as a materialist process of difference (Spivak), a continuation of this through an
understanding of the relations between contemporary capitalism and political practice
(Haraway), and a presentation of 'community' against identity and equivalence (Nancy
and Lyotard). One of the more important concerns here is the question of difference

against equivalence. A critique of the place of equivalence in Laclau and Mouffe's

hegemony thesis and some post-Marxism is evident in the reading of Brown. In the
sections on Spivak and Haraway, and the last section on the figure of communism and
community in Nancy and Lyotard, politics is presented as a process of difference against
equivalence. It is perhaps no accident that most of the theorists considered here are

22
poststructuralist influenced feminists. Feminist questions of structural inequality, the
possibilities of a community that is nonetheless complex, an ambivalent relation with
Marx and Marxism, and the project of the exploration and negation of dominant subject
positions, with which contemporary feminism has been engaged, are not dissimilar to the
wider concerns of this project.

Anti-dualism
That Judith Butler's (1998)recentessayon the stateof US Left critique, and its apparent
return to a dualistic base/superstructure
model, was necessaryat all might seem rather
tragic. Yet the essay itself is a useful opportunity to consider an example of the
interrelation of contemporary poststructuralist politics (Butler's (1990) politics of
'performativity' having had considerable influence) with a more conventionally
4materialist'tradition. Against unnamedMarxist critics who have consigned'new social
movements'to the realmsof a 'merely', at best derivative, 'cultural', where activism is
seen as simply the affin-nation of particularistic identity, Butler contends that the
material/culturaldichotomy is, to say the least, unstable. This is not a new position;
indeedit is not even a critique that is unique to poststructuralistinterventions. Butler
rightly points to Marxist influencedtheoristsincluding Williams, Hall, Spivak, and most
notably Althusser, who have all problematisedthe dualism.' And we can go back to
Marx himself to makethe case. If for Marx the first premiseof human history is the self-
making of the human through an intricate interrelationwith Nature (as a complex life
activity, or processof labour, where the whole ndlieu is the plane of composition), then
one can not easily delineate division in his work (cf. Marx
a coherentbase/superstructure
and Engels 1974: 42). 2
Butler suggests not only that 'cultural politics' are far from unrelated to a
4material'realm, but also that in invoking the distinction, the new vulgar materialismis
seekingto reinscribe(or simply negate)that which, following 1970s feminism, actively
broke with the subordinationof 'unity' enactedby the old Left's notion of 'real politiCS1.3
Butler writes that "there is no reasonto assumethat such social movementsare reducible
to their identitarianforms." (37) Indeed, through a readingof Engels' (1948) critique of

1 As the prime example, in his concept of multiple 'overcletermination' Althusser (1969: 113) reads Marx
and Engels to argue that "... in History, these instances, the superstructures, etc. - are never seen to step
respectfully aside when their work is done or, when the Time comes, as his pure phenomena, to scatter
before His Majesty the Economy as he strides along the royal road of the Dialectic. From the first moment
to the last, the lonely hour of the 'last instance' never comes. "
2 One can of course selectively find Marx in 'economic determinist' mode, but we should remember the
direction of his argument is against a pervasive idealism such that in polemical vein he perhaps over-plays
an 'economic'case at times. However, a strict delineation of the economic and the superstructural is not
to the theorist who thought such subdivisions of the unity of human life and Nature (or
a useful way read
'labour-power') were functional to capitalist social forms (and hence were bourgeois, not Marxist
abstractions).
3 For example, Butler ponders whether the 'merely cultural' accusation against queer politics might be a
deliberate performative exclusion. She suggests that this exclusion may be an 'unthinking response' to a
perceived sexual degradation of cultural life such that these critics (unable to cope with the kinds of
critique of all social relations that homosexuality may raise, including their own) deliberately reopen the
dualism so as to consign queer politics to the subordinate realm in the dichotomy (1998: 44).

23
the centrality of the normativefamily structureto the modeof production, and Althusser's
(1971) conceptionof the materialapparatusof ideology, she suggeststhat even queer
politics (the archetypeof the 'merely cultural'), despitenot necessarilybeing a question of
'work', could be consideredin terms of that most materialistof categories,'class'. But
Butler's argumentis not to tortuouslydraw cultural strugglesinto a bed of economism(or
indeedto affirm an all encompassing'cultural monism' (cf. Butler 1997)). Rather, by
marking the complexity andmutualdeterminationof economicand cultural forces, she is
enabledto talk of the importanceof difference (in these 'new political formations') to
politics generally. She suggeststhat normativeand oppressiveforms of identity can be
challengedthrough the proliferation of difference, and that, as these movementsenter
'convergent fields of politicisation' and 'conflictual encounters', difference becomes a
process of movement across and between political groups rather than a marker of
delimited identity. She thus turns Left critique on its headin arguing that 'Unity' stifles
politics, and proposes "... that difference remain constitutive of any struggle", even
"...the cipher of democraticpromiseon the Left." (1998: 44)
But if Butler problematisesa material/culturaldichotomy and affirms processesof
differentiation, she does not offer much critique of the new social movements she
considers. One gets the impression of an emerging dichotomy between an old style
economismand a new political.4 Only once does she say that "... a narrowly identitarian
construalof suchmovementsleadsto a narrowing of the political field... " (37), and only
then to suggestthat we shouldnot assumethat they are so reducibleto identity. Perhaps
this essay is not the place for her to take up a critique of these movements (it is, after all
simultaneously a 'reply' and an attempt to open debate). But her assertion that "New
political formations do not stand in an analogical relation with one another, as if they were
discreteand differentiatedentities..." but "... are overlapping, mutually determining, and
convergentfields of politicisation" (37) is basedon a little bit of an assumptionthat all
groups have similar ability to, and investmentin 'mutual determination'. Thus, though
she professessome sympathy with theseMarxist critics, she does not raise the question
of how movementsbasedaroundidentity and rights may enactrather than escapea rather
bourgeoisnotion of identity, with all the exclusionsthis entails. Whilst Butler suggests
that the differencesof thesemovementsare a certainbecoming(37) againstidentity, the
ways this might occur, or indeed the reasons why this would occur at all are left
untouched. 5 If a certain form of Marxism is rightly challengedfor its desire for identity
and unity (which affirms a hierarchyof identities and reinforces exclusion), one is left
wondering why new social movementsshould be assumed to have left such desires

4 Butler's relation with the unnamed Marxists that she sets up, in the rather Derridean beginning of the
essay, by situating herself in and against the critique that she is critiquing, is thus largely negated by the
rest of the essay.
5 It does not really help the case that the only example offered of the escape from identity is in the
academy, where efforts to delineate autonomous articulations of gender and race studies are said to
'invariably' expose the limits of autonomy (37).

24
behind such that their demand for rights and recognition should not be considered as a
liberal politics?

Identity, equivalence, and the revenge of the liberal subject

It is preciselyon thesetermsof a desirefor identitythatWendyBrown (1995)presentsa
cogentcritiqueof 'newsocialmovements'.Througha readingof Nietzsche'sconceptof
ressentiment,Brown suggeststhat identitypolitics are not so much an affirmationof
differenceandcomplexity(againsttheteleologies andunitiesof orthodoxMarxism),but,
rather,a reactionaryturning in (in Nietzsche'ssenseof a fear and hatredof life and
difference)againstsuchcomplexity. The assertionof particularidentity, far from the
beginningof contextualisedprocesses of difference,
tends more towardthe fetishismof a
decontextualisedfragmentof life that offers somereactivesecurityagainstthe world,
ratherthanactivepoliticsassuch.Brownwrites:

Drawing upon the historically eclipsed meaning of disrupted and fragmented

narratives of ethnicity, race, gender, sexuality, region, continent, or nation, identity
politics permits a senseof situation - and often a senseof filiation or community -
without requiring profound comprehension of the world in which one is situated.
Identity politics permits positioning without temporal or spatial mapping, a feature
that sharply distinguishes it from (Marxian) class analysis and reveals its proximity
to (liberal) interest group politics. In this respect, identity politics, with its fierce
assertion and production of subjects, appears less a radical political response to
postmodernity than a symptom of its ruptures and disorienting effects... Identity
politics emerges partly as a reaction, in other words, to an ensemble of distinctly
postmodern assaults upon the integrity of modernist communities producing
collective identity. (1995: 35)

For Brown, in almost a reversal of Butter's position, a politics of particularity and

identity is less attuned to the complexities of material/cultural forces than Marxian class
analysis (though Brown is not referring to the vulgar materialists Butler critiques, and she
is well aware of Marxism's totalising tendencies).6 Indeed, identity politics rather
replicates, at the level of the particular, the very form of identity that Marxism and
poststructuralism critique. Where Butler seemed to will creative relations of difference
between and across new political forms, Brown shows how they tend toward precisely
the reverse.
Brown also critiques the notion of community in theories of new social
movements. I want to briefly consider this under a critique of 'equivalence'. In talking
of the mutual constitution of movements, Butler professes some relation with Laclau and

6 Brown clearly sees close similarities between her work and Butler's, and it would be
misleading to
present too much of a dichotomy between the two. Brown's work nevertheless quite explicitly challenges
identity politics where Butler is more tangential to them.

25
Mouffe's concept of a 'chain of equivalence' as an 'equality' between identities as they
emerge and change in mutual relation. 7 In so far as Butler aligns herself with this figure I
think she is still subject to a certain separation of the political and the economic. But here
I want to focus on the problem in Laclau and Mouffe. In conversation with Butler,
Laclau writes that liberalism seeks to fix certain parameters to the community of these
equivalent identities, and 'radical democratic politics' attempts to "... partially extend
to
equivalences and partially limit their indefinite "
expansion. (Butler and Laclau 1997: 8)
There seems to be an expansion of the content of the category of liberal identity
('extending equivalences') and a certain limitation, without a critique of the category per
se. Such assertion of the possibility of an equivalence of identities seems, despite itself,
to return to a base/superstructuredualism. Inasmuch as Laclau and Mouffe's argument is
founded on an 'autonomy of the political', identity can be rather unproblematically
nurtured into equality in civil society. Laclau seemsto suggest as much in his reading of
what he calls 'the Sorelian-Gramscian tradition', where ...Collective will', 'ororanic
t: )

ideology', 'hegemonicgroup', and so forth becomeempty forms that can be filled by any
imaginable political and social content." (1995: 95; emphasis added)g This kind of
formulation, Brown argues, is necessarilymyopic toward the operationsof a globally
structured economy, and the intricate, differentiated, and multiple processesof the
production of identity that Foucault, amongstothers, has taught us (where, at the very
least, identity is always simultaneouslyan economic, cultural, and political form - not
simply something formed on the social democratic plane of social rights and
responsibilities).9 Perhaps such democratic equalities are possible, but, as Brown
suggests,the degree to which some content is more imaginablethan others is such that,
without an awarenessof the differential in
positioning of subjects relation to, even in

exclusion from hegemonic space, it is difficult to in

see what sense Laclau's statement fits

with a radical 'politics' at all. At best it is an attempt to bring all into a milieu that is not
particularly disturbed by 'rights': capitalism, as Marx informs us, "is in fact a very Eden
of the innate rights of "
man. (1974: 172)

7 Butler (1988: 37) writes: "This is not quite the chain of equivalence proposed by Laclau and Mouffe,
it does sustain important relations to it. " In conversation with Laclau (Butler and Laclau 1997)
although
she is more certain: "I very much agree with your formulation of the logic of equivalence, namely, as a
'process by which the differential nature of all identity is at the same time asserted and subverted. '" (9) It
is interesting in this context that at a recent discussion between Butler and Laclau (London's ICA
18.5.1997), the only point of stark disagreement concerned the relevance of the category of class, that
is, structured inequality across liberal categories (a category which Laclau was keen to deny).
8 As if to mark off consideration of the economic, Laclau asserts "... that for me it is only as an extension
and radicalisation of this ['Sorelian-Gramscian') tendency that cleconstruction can present itself both as a
moment of its inscription in the Marxist tradition as well as a point of turning/cleepening/supersession of
the later. " (1995: 95; emphasis added)
9 Despite Laclau and Mouffe's fondness for Althusser, such multiplicity of determinants is clearly
Althusser's (1969,1971) concern also. It is difficult to read in Althusser a definition like this: "The concept
of overdetermi nation is constituted in the field of the symbolic, and has no meaning whatsoever outside
it. " (Laclau and Mouffe 1985: 97)

26
Subaltern insurgency
Spivakalso indicatesan uneaseat the liberal humanisttone of Laclau and Mouffe's
project(whenshesuggeststhatFoucault'sethicscannot be understoodon the planeof
autonomous individualism(Spivak1996:142,167)).Here,however,I want to consider
herconceptionof 'subalterninsurgency'as a politicalprocessattentiveto the problems
with identitypoliticsandthedifferentialpositioningof subjectivities.Spivak'sconceptof
subalterninsurgency from
emerges a relation with the SubalternStudies Group's reading
of Gramsci's(1971)noteson the 'History of the SubalternClasses:Methodological
Criteria'. HereGramscimakesan interestingdistinctionbetweenthe "...historicalunity
of theruling classes[as] realisedin the State"(52), andthe disunityandimpurityin the
10 The attentionto an intertwined
historyof the subaltern,existentas it is, within states.
andnon-unitaryform is useful (as is his assertionthat subalternhistoriescan only be
writtenmonographically, andthenwith difficulty),but Gramsciis nevertheless concerned
with comprehending the "fragmentedandepisodic"(54-5)natureof the subalternwithin
theanalyticregimeof continuityand 'permanent'victory (howevermuchthis potentialis
subvertedby dominantgroups). Thushe statesof the Risorgimentothatoneshouldbe
attentiveto "how theseinnovatoryforcesdeveloped, from subalterngroupsto hegemonic
anddominantgroups"(53). Spivakis concerned with somethingdifferent;not with the
comingto hegemony of thesubaltern, but with theveryactof insurgency.
If Gramscimarksthedifficulty of ascertaining anhistoricalcontinuityin subaltern
struggles,Spivakstartsfrom the assertionthat the subalternis by definition without
continuityor coherence.Thereis no transparentsubjectof the subaltern. Spivak's
subalternmaybeableto talk,but it cannot 'speak'- it hasno self-identicalcoherence as
the 'oppressed' or the 'subaltern'as a passwordto politicaldiscourse.Wheninsurgent,
thesubalternis not reflectingits identityas'theoppressed' or uncomplicatedly expressing
its consciousness,but problematising theregimesof powerandpossibilitythatproduceit
asan excluded,almostnon-identity:

Now, if I understand the work of the Subalternists right, every moment of

insurgency that they have fastened onto has been a moment when subalternity has
been brought to a point of crisis: the cultural constructions that are allowed to exist
within subalternity, removed as it is from other lines of mobility, are changed into
militancy. In other words, every moment that is noticed as a case of subalter-nity is
undermined. We are never looking at the pure subaltern. (Spivak 1996: 289)

The insurgency of the subaltern, then, is an engagementwith the conditions of a

particular exclusion. What is important here is not the question of the emergenceof a
new subjectconfigurationfrom this unseenand excludedsubalterncondition, so much as

10 "The subaltern classes, by definition, are not unified and cannot unite until they are able to become
a
'State': their history, therefore, is intertwined with that of civil society, and thereby with the history of
States and groups of States. " (Gramsci 1971: 52)

27
the very processof 'insurgency'. To consider subalterninsurgency is to focus on the
militancy of the oppressedbut not as an expression of their known, determinable
interests. Rather,it is looking at insurgencyas a spaceof the production of 'difference'
:D
that is both of the position of oppressionand exclusion, and againstit, and any achieved
identity." To mark the difficulty of writing about such difference Spivak employs the
word 'catachresis'- "abuseor perversionof a trope or metaphor"(OED cited in Spivak
1993: 298) - to namethe insurgent manoeuvre. If, as she writes, "no historically [or
philosophically]adequateclaims can be producedin any spacefor the guiding words of
political, military, economic,ideologicalemancipationand oppression", then the process
of politics ascatachresisis to "take positionsin termsnot of the discovery of historical or
philosophical grounds,but in termsof reversing,displacing,and seizing the apparatusof
value-coding" (1993: 63). Spivak posits catachresison the terrain of 'value-coding'
because of the intimate relation between identity and capitalist accumulation.12
Catachreticinsurgency is a manoeuvre of conflict against an identitarian chain of
equivalence. Thus, in a rather bold statementshe writes: "... if we position ourselvesas
identitiesin termsof links in the chain of value-coding", or identities in equivalence,"as
if they were personsand things, and go on to ground our practice on that positioning, we
becomepart of the problem..." (1993: 62-3).
In this we can see the imperative and antagonismof Spivak's Marxism. For
Spivak, whilst Marx's conceptsdescribedefinite relations and effects, they nevertheless
producean inessential,openand discontinuoussystem. Furthermore,Spivak arguesthat
Marx's concepts are part of a method that is politically motivated toward the
transformation of the situation it conceives, without ever fixing the subject of
transformation. Thus the apparentdistinction between 'interpretation' and 'change' in
Marx's elevenththesison Feuerbach("The philosophershave only interpretedthe world,
in various ways; the point is to changeit. " (Marx and Engels, 1974: 123)) is not so
simple. Whilst 'interpret' (haben interpretiert)is a completed meaning commensurate
with a phenomena,the word usedfor 'change' (zu verlindern)is an open 'making-other'
(of, by inference,the self-identical)ratherthan a completedtransformation(Spivak 1996:
217-8). Not, then, a simple appealto proletarianpractice, it is the job of critique to
continually 'make-other'the self-identical. The point of Spivak's 'interpretation' is never
simply identifying the subaltern(aspresencein capitalismis the problem),bringing it into
democraticpluralist space,but magnifying its processesof insurgency.

11 Spivak (1996: 293) puts it thus: 'The possibility of subalternity for me acts as a reminder. If it is true
that when you seem to have solved a problem, that victory, that solution, is a warning, then I begin to look
- it's not a substantive formula - but I always look at that moment for what would upset the apple cart. And
that's quite often the moment when one begins to track the newly created subaltern, out of reach. It's
more than just strategic exclusion; it's really something that would destroy my general isations. It's not
something like'going in search of the primitive'. I don't know that it is an 'ever-receding horizon'. It is just
a space of difference, if you like. "
12 Spivak and Deleuze and Guattari
are very similar on this insistence that the question of identity is
intimately linked with what Marx calls Value. To translate into Deleuzian terms, as explored later, "value-
coding' is the solidification of abstract force into specific determined forms such as 'worker' or indeed
'marginal' - what Deleuze and Guattari call the territorialisation and coding of desiring-production.

28
Infidel heteroglossia: in and against capital
We nowhavea figureof a politicsthatoperates in a complexmaterialmilieuwithoutever
achievingpresenceas such, or settlingin a chain of equivalenceof strugglesand
identities.Indeedequivalence (at a formallevel)hasbeenidentifiedas the very problem
of liberalhumanistpoliticsin thatit is essentialto the formationof capitalistidentities(in
processesof value-coding).We can now considerDonnaHaraway's(1991) political
figurationsof the 'cyborg' and 'situatedknowledges'. 13 ThoughHarawaydescribesthe
cyborgasa hybridof machineandorganism,it is far from a 'cyber-celebration' of a new
timeof technologically infusedhumanbeings.14 It is betterunderstoodas the point of
intersectionof a multiplicityof relationsof organicand inorganicforms; as a complex
materialfigureat themeetingpointof thehuman,theeconomic,thecultural,the technical
and much more besides, in a time 15
of post-warcapitalism. But if the cyborg is the
currentconditionof capitalistlife, it is alsoa possiblemovementof politics:"The cyborg
is our ontology;it givesus our politics." (150)16Suchpoliticsis at onceradical,situated,
and,aswith Spivak,concerned with theaffirmationof differenceagainstequivalence.
Thereis muchto besaidaboutHaraway,but I want to focuson two aspects:the
centralplacecapitalismhasin hercyborgfigure,andthe politicaltechniques immanentto
it.

C31 There is a certain ambivalence in Haraway's critique of capitalism that is not

unrelated to that in Marx, and Deleuze and Guattari. She does not present a dualism
between liberating and dominating aspects of modem technology (1991: 181), but rather
affirms something of the complexity and boundary disruption that, she argues, it induces.
Thus, though in one sense she suggests a certain pragmatism where cyborgs are simply
our reality, not something we choose (176), at the same time she argues that the
multiplicity and complexity of high-tech life forces feminism, and politics generally, to
break from an "... unreflexive participation in the logics, languages, and practices of white

13 In her later work Haraway usefully complicates the cyborg with other figures, but it is heuristically
useful here as a figure that clearly links her politics to a conception of capitalism. It is also still timely to
affirm the critique in Haraway's cyborg against its (and perhaps also Deleuze and Guattari's) appropriation
by what Ansell Pearson (1997: 2) calls "cyber-celebrations of the transhuman" under which, he suggests,
"a new theology of capital emerges to cavalierly justify and legitimise the inanities of the commodified
postmodern present. "
14 Haraway identifies three late twentieth century 'boundary breakdowns' that make her analysis possible:
between the human and the animal, the organism and the machine, and the physical and the non-physical
(in terms of the invisibility of microelectronics).
15 "Cyborg figures such as the end-of-the-millennium seed, chip, gene, data-base, bomb, foetus, race,
-
brain, and ecosystem - are the offspring of implosions of subjects and objects and of the natural and
artificial. " (Haraway 1997: 12)
16 Haraway suggests that "Modern production seems like a dream of cyborg colonisation work, a dream
that makes the nightmare of Taylorism seem idyllic. " But the cyborg is also "... an imaginative resource
suggesting some very fruitful couplings. " (1991: 150)

29
humanism... " (160) with its foundational myths, teleologies, unities, and privileged
perspectives.17
Haraway characterisesthe social plane of the cyborg variously as 'advanced
capitalism', the 'informatics of domination', and the 'homework economy'. Though she
is clearly aware of the dangers of talking in totalising terms, she characterisesthe
contemporaryterrainof life, particularly since the SecondWorld War (163) as a virulent
disruption of boundariesrelatedto a speeded-upglobal capitalismwhere info- and bio-
technologyenablethe permeationof elementsfar smallerthan any essentialcategory of
organism, machine, animal, woman, man, and the simultaneous recoding and
reconfiguring of these elements in an equivalenceof 'universal translation' (she uses the
4
military acronym C31 - command-control-communication-intelligence - to describe this
process). That is, ratherthan a questionof essentialidentities,capitalismnow operates in
terms of the control, coding, and reconfiguration of flows and energies across
boundaries, where 'rates' and 'degrees', 'probabilities' and 'statistics' delineate
temporary and varying interfaces between ever-changing elements in an integrated
system,suchthat identity is alwaysoverlappedand multiple) 8 Harawaywrites:

Any objects or persons can be reasonably thought in terms of disassembly and

reassembly, no 'natural' architectures constrain system design.... 'Integrity' or
'sincerity' of the Western self gives way to decision procedures and expert
systems....No objects, spaces,or bodies are sacred in themselves;any component
can be interfaced with any other if the proper standard, the proper code, can be
constructed for processing signals in a common language. (162,163)

More than once Haraway compares this condition to Foucault's biopolitics. She
suggests that we have moved from biopolitical 'bodies and works' to cyborg 'texts and
surfaces', such that it is now time to write 'The Death of the Clinic' (245). But this is not
because clinics, or any other spatio-temporal technique of biopower have vanished as
such. Rather, these have become fluid, overlapping, and polymorphously interfaced:
"Home, Market, Paid Work Place, State, School, Clinic-Hospital, and Church. Each of
these idealised spaces is logically and practically implied in every other locus, perhaps
analogous to a holographic photograph. " (170) There is no subjective depth, only
reconfiguring coded units: "Our dominations don't work by medicalisation and

17This argumentis evident in these two passages. "It is no accident that the symbolic system of the
family of man - and so the essenceof woman- breaksup at the same momentthat networks of connection
among people on the planet are unprecedentedlymultiple, pregnant, and complex." (1991: 160) "High-
tech culture challenges dualisms in intriguing ways.... In so far as we know ourselves in both formal
...
discourse (for example, biology) and in daily practice (for example, the homework economy in the
integratedcircuit), we find ourselvesto be cyborgs, hybrids, mosaics,chimeras." (177)
18Guattari and Alliez, 'in an essay that importantly considers capitalism as composed of very different
'types', of which Haraway'sC31would be only one, talk here of capital workingon arrangementsof "optimal
fluidity' (Guattari 1984: 286).

30
normalisation any more; they work by networking, communications redesign, stress
management." (245)19
Despite the emphasis here on Haraway's conceptual configuration, she does offer
concrete analysis of the forms of life in this coded system, particularly around her notion
of the homework economy and in her later work (OncoMOUSeTm and so on, in Haraway
(1997)). But the important point in this review is how Haraway sees this analysis of
capital as integral to her mapping of a possible politics.

Situated politics Haraway's politics seekto challengeboth the Unities of humanism

(in its 'White CapitalistPatriarchal'as well as its feminist versions) and the equivalences
of capitalism. The materiallife of the cyborg is such that Haraway's politics moves well
beyond theoriesattachedto coherentunities and fixed identities (such that the unnamed
Marxists that Butler rallied againstseemquite archaicin comparison).20 As I have said,
shedoesnot simply privilege technologicalchangein the formation of her politics. It is
more that the speed and ever-more intricate boundary breakdowns of high technology
capitalism give fen-tinismless of an 'excuse' (160) not to see the divergent subject
positions that Eurocentricfeminism had subsumedin the subject 'Woman'. Thus the
namedincarnationsof a cyborg condition are more likely to be SoutheastAsian peasants
in JapaneseandUS electronicsfirms, than a Silicon Valley elite workforce.21
Haraway seeksto valorise the loss of a privileged political subjectin favour of a
proliferation of partial, situatedpositions:

With no available original dream of a common language or original symbiosis

promising protection from hostile 'masculine' separation, but written into the play
of a text that has no finally privileged reading or salvation history, to recognise
'oneself' as fully implicated in the world, frees us of the need to root politics in

19 Haraway and Deleuze are very similar here, though as far as I know they never cite each other. In a
general sense, they both develop a kind of poststructuralist Marxism, and base politics in a certain
machinism, but their points of overlap are never clearer than in their notions of control and coding that
characterise the post-1945 era. Deleuze's later essay (first published in 1990) suggests that control may
make us see harsh confinement as a "wonderful happy past" (1995: 175), as Haraway considers it will be
seen as "idyllic" (1991: 150). Deleuze proposes that coherent analogical individuals are giving way to
digital, continuously modulating 'dividuals', where Haraway talks of inessential cyborgs in continual
mechanisms of 'coding'. Both offer an analysis of the ways specific sites of confinement now operate in
an intensive and continuous interrelation, providing similar examples. And both argue that this new form
of relation takes over from Foucault's configuration of disciplinary confinement, suggesting that Foucault
named a system of power at the time of its overcoming (whilst using rather than negating Foucault's
analysis).
20 Haraway writes that "Fhe boundary-maintaining images of base and superstructure, public and private,
or material and ideal never seemed more feeble. " (1991: 165). It is interesting that writing at the same
time, Spivak, also highly attuned to the intricate interrelation of the material and the cultural, takes a
different perspective to Haraway here (perhaps reflecting the difference in their training, in bioscience and
cleconstruction), suggesting that the dualism is so 'deeply entrenched' that "[t]he best one can envisage
is the persistent undoing of the opposition, taking into account the fact that the complicity between
...
cultural and economic value systems is acted out in almost every decision we make... " (1996: 122).
21 Ross et al. (1997) make a similar point that in the age of multinational sub-contracting
and outsourcing,
the extremes of 'post-industrial' infotech employment and the nineteenth century sweatshop are fully
interfaced.

31
 identification, vanguard parties, purity, and mothering. Stripped of identity, the
bastard race teaches about the power of the margins... (176)

But suchpartial perspectivesarenot an affirmation of different identities(as a sub-divided

Subject). Rather, as with Spivak, Haraway privileges the processesof difference and
connectionthat are involved in the continualboundarybreakdownsof the cyborg (against
their coding into equivalentmicro identities). This argument
zn is made explicit in her
epistemologicalfigure of 'situatedknowledges'.
Whilst Haraway is conscious of the importance of a standpoint of the subjugated,
she is adamant that the perspectives of marginal identity do not have privileged access to
truth, and neither are they uncomplicated positions from which to produce critical
knowledge. She writes that "in principle" the standpoints of the subjugated "are least
likely to allow denial of the critical and interpretative core of knowledge. They are savvy
to modes of denial through repression, forgetting, and disappearing acts - ways of being
nowhere while claiming to see comprehensively. " (191). But, precisely because of this
initial critically aware position, such locations are induced to consider that they are never
'innocent' identities. Particular location is itself enmeshed in a myriad of relations such
that the production of knowledge (or indeed the practice of politics) does not arise from
'being' a particular identity: "One cannot 'be' either a cell or molecule or a woman,
-
colonised person, labourer, and so on - if one intends to see and see from these positions
critically. 'Being' is much more problematic and contingent. " (192) Instead, if there is
no total or complete position from which critical knowledge can emerge, knowledge
production must be about exploring, tD engaging with, and problematising the
'heterogeneousmultiplicities' that cross any partial perspective.22 Haraway would thus
be misreadif 'partiality' was affirmed in its own right. Partial knowledge is intricately
bound togetherwith 'connection' andchange.
Though it is a little underdeveloped,Harawayoffers an exampleof the inessential
categoryof 'women of color'. Without an appealto a coherentidentitarianlineage, she
argues that this category Operatesnot in terms of natural identification, but in a 'political
kinship' (156) of a community of excludedidentities (174). But within this 'community'
Haraway presentsthe complex discontinuitiesof migrant labourers (offshore workers
who would conventionallybe seen as undercutting wages and preventing solidarity),
sciencefiction and Chicanaliterary traditions, and also high tech forms of work in a
'homework economy'. Suchcommunity is not, then,composedof a unitary or common
language (as in Eurocentric feminism, money, or information code) but rather in a
chargedatmosphereof contestation,deconstruction,translation,webbedconnectionsand
so on

22 Haraway is explicitly concerned

with producing what she calls 'usable accounts of the world' so this is
far from a relativist position. It is just that in the production of 'real' knowledge the multiplicity of
perspectives and possibilities in any 'one' situation must communicate with each other: "Here is the

32
 So, if Spivak affirmed the movement of catachretic subaltern insurgency (not a
subaltern subject) against value-coding, Haraway privileges the 'particular' and the 'local'
not as reified positions, but as meeting points of complex relations that creatively
'communicate' with each other, such that any particularity is always complex and in
motion, in a community not of identities but complex parts. Politics becomes something
concerned with survival and creation within and across these communities such that the
boundary transgressionsof advancedcapitalism are not challengedwith identity, 'real'
base-levelstruggles, an equivalenceof struggles,appealsfor choice, or autonomy, but
with practicesthat attemptto resistthe impositionof coding and control through what she
calls a material-semiotic'infidel heteroglossia'.

Community against equivalence

Jean-LucNancy's (1991,1991a) figure of an 'inoperativecommunity'has achieved
considerable attention,not only in poststructuralist (it
theory was indeed the for
catalyst a
bookby Blanchot(1988))but alsoin moreappliedattemptsto rethinkpoliticsfrom some
communistand/or anti-identitarianpositions (for example,Agamben1998; Garcfa
Diittmann1996;Illuminati 1997). At risk of over-simplifying,Nancy presentsus with
two perspectiveson community:the Westerntradition of humanistcommunitarian
equivalencewhere communityis a commonbeing ('essence')createdas a fulfilled
identity or 'work' by the individual subjectswho enter into it; and that which is
coextensive with such identity,but which is its 'unworking' toward a communityof
disjunctionand mutation(basedon a perpetualand changingprocessof 'singular'
relation).23 That the latter is a political imperativeis markedby Nancy's founding
statement: "I startout from the ideathat the thinkingof communityasessence - is in
...
effecttheclosureof thepolitical." (1991:xxxviii) HereI want to considerhow Nancy's
'unworking'communityoperates asbotha conditionof being,anda politicalimperative.

Being-in-cornmon Nancy's proposition is that there is no being of community

(completed essence) but rather there is only a being -in -connnon (existence): "... being is
not common in the sense of a common property, but that it is in common. " (1991 a: 1)
That is, the defining element in community is not the essence of what it produces (the
community united) but the relations that are formed and unformed in the process of
common existence. Common existence is what we all share, not as an addition to our
selves (following humanist individual/collective dichotomies), but as our very being:
"Community is simply the real position of existence." (1991a: 2) This positing of the
primacy of community is not to extract community from political debate. Rather it is to

promise of objectivity: a scientific knower seeks the subject position not of identity, but of objectivity; that
is, partial connection. " (193)
23 "Community necessarily takes
place in what Blanchot has called 'unworking', referring to that which,
before or beyond the work, withdraws from the work, and which, no longer having to do either with
production or with completion, encounters interruption, fragmentation, suspension. Community is made of
the interruption of singularities, or of the suspension that singular beings are. " (Nancy 1991: 31)

33
reassert the fundamental importance of thinking about ourselves as irreducibly collective
entities if we are to keep the sphere of the political (rather than the technocratic) open.
Nancy must therefore think community and difference through each other (1991:
xl). Community becomes what happens to 'singularities'. Or rather, our singularity is
only in and through our community. Singularity is found at the moment of relation
signified by the in of 'in common', the 'together' "that divides and joins at the same
time... " (1991a: 8) By definition this is a process that is in no way concerned with
creating a new identity, rather it is the sharing of a 'lack of identity' in a perpetual
momentary 'just once, this time' where relations are based as much on their cutting as on
their formation (1993: 66). Thus, in singularity-community Nancy is speaking "... of a
bond that forms ties without attachments, or even less fusion, of a bond that unbinds by
binding, that reunites through the infinite exposition of an irreducible finitude. "

Politics The necessity of thinking of community in these terms is to bring this relation
of being-in-common into the political as the political. The imperative Nancy identifies is

to contest liberal humanist culture of identity and equivalence by invoking the

inadmissible and the incommensurable. Here Nancy uses the word 'communism'.
Communism can not be a thing or an identity (indeed the very fact that it has so often
come to be such makes Nancy wary of its use). Nancy's communism is not that of
Lenin, Stalin, and Trotsky (Nancy 1991: 7). Instead he suggests it is a figure of Marx's
politics of excess, and admiringly cites Blanchot from 1968: "Communism: that which
excludes (and excludes itself from) every community already constituted. " (in Nancy
1991: 7) This said, Nancy's relation to Marx is not too clear, and his examples do not
help. He rightly argues that it was the very basis of communism that became its
really
most problematic feature namely the definition of humans as producers of their own
-
essence in 'work' (1991: 2). But, because of this, he is reluctant to use Marx's category
of 'labour-power', and is hence left without a means of describing the force of excess.
Thus, in elaborating the 'being-ecstatic' of communism, Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy
bring in Marx through a rather unenlightening section of the Critique of the Gotha
Progranune that deals with the question of "the future public affairs of communist
society. " (Marx, cited in Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy 1997: 115,179). But, leaving

aside a critique of Nancy's use of Marx, his importance for this chapter is in naming
communism as an 'emblem' against, not only that which turned it against itself (orthodox
Marxism), but also against theories of democracy that would consider politics as
exclusively a process of bolstering and facilitating identity.
Whilst Nancy is wary of critiquing democracy, he is equally attentive to "the risk
of what we always call 'democracy"' namely, "settling for violent and flat appropriation
of the in of being-in-common" (1991a: 11). Democracy does not open to the
incommensurable because it is founded on similarity and commensurability, and the
delineation of an 'inside' through the category of the citizen, rather than the excess of

34
singularity-community. But democracy is not only an abstraction, a 'work' from the
multiplicity of life. It also hides a more conventional oppression in so far as it considers
identity in terms of an autonomous plane of social-juridical rights, rather than seeing it as
composed through differential positioning across the different territories and spheres of
life (such that 'citizenship', and then, only for those who are recognised as citizens, can
only be a formal equality). For Nancy, the political can not be separated from any
sphere, least of all the economic. Thus he writes of a

broadly pervasive democratic consensus [which] seems to make us forget that

...
'democracy', more and more frequently, servesonly to assurea play of economic
and technical forces that no politics today to
subjects any end other than its own
expansion. (1991: xxxvii)

Against communicability and consensus,Nancy invites us to think a certain

'revolution' that perpetuallyforms relationsof singularity across any apparentplane of
individuals, institutions, and social, juridical, economicspheres:"This moment - when
the 'in-common' erupts, resists, and disrupts the relations of need and force - annuls
collective and communalhypostases..." (1991: xl) But if Nancy proposes an abstract
singularity-communityrelation againstidentity, he does not really offer much elaboration
asto how actualcommunitiesmight exist beyondthe ideal of momentarysingularity. We
know that community operates against the liberal democratic sphere of equivalent
identities:"In society, in every society and at every moment, 'community' is in fact
...
nothing other than a consumption of the social bond or fabric..." (1991: 37). This
generalisedunworking acrossthe social meansalso that there can be no 'two societies'.
But the ways that processesof unworking community may emergeand develop is not
clear. Lyotard helps us expandwith his notion of the Differend.

Differends In opening his book, Lyotard defines the differend thus:

a differend would be a case of conflict, between (at least) two parties, that cannot
...
be equitably resolved for lack of a rule of judgement applicable to both arguments
A wrong results from the fact that the rules of the genre of discourse by which
...
one judges are not those of the judged genre or genres of discourse. (1988: xi;
subsequent references are to text numbers)

Basically, the differend points to the impossibility of consensus (or uncomplicated

'identity' in a single generally acceptedrealm of the social-juridical) since different groups
are always composed of diverse, heterogeneous elements such that even the same word
will have radically different meanings depending on the regimes within it is used (92).
The problem, and this is the 'wrong' identified by his concept, is that one party is judged
by the regime of another, such that the concerns of the former will not register in the

35
judgment of the latter.24 Lyotard offers a classic Marxian example of the work-contract
which, though ostensibly a free agreement, presupposesthat the worker values her labour
as a commodity to be sold and valued in terms of economic exchange. The idiom of
social and economic law is that by which agreement is made, but it covers the differend
between labour-power and capital. In this agreement, "If the labourer evokes his or her
essence (labour-power), he or she cannot be heard by this tribunal... " (13). The word
6work' thus inserts into the different meaning regimes of worker and employer in very
different ways, but it operates through social, juridical, and economic law on the basis of
one regime, that of the exchange of commodities.
The pervasiveness, beyond such a conventional example, of the apparent
exchangeof equivalents (which necessarily hide differends) is central to Lyotard's
critique. He writes of the 'hegemonyof the economicgenre' (250,252) to suggestthat
there is a pervasive valuation in terms of exchange("Capitalism does not constitute a
universal history, it is trying to constitute a world market..." (255)), but such
exchangeabilityis not confined to the econon-ticsphereof production and consumption.
In an earlier essay(1978) on capitalism as a reactivereturn of the same, Lyotard thus
includeseconomic,social,political processesin a 'Kapital' which managesthis repetition
through "the equality of the parties involved in any metamorphosis" (47). Thus
Freudianism,for example,is equally caught up in the 'law of value': "Eros-logos is the
Kapital as the agentmaintainingconstantunities, stableinstitutions, investmentsalways
" (48)
recoverable.
Against equivalenceas that which papers-overdifferends, Lyotard (1991) thus
refersto and concurswith Nancy:

what is forgotten by political treatment in its constitution of a 'commonality' of

...
humans by dint of their belonging to the same polis, is the very thing that is not
shareableamong them, what is not communicable or communal or common at all.
Call it birth and/or death, even singularity. (43)

The differend is also the possibility of being-in-common in so far as it marks, at least in

potential, a different way of doing things against this commonality of equivalence. But
unlike Nancy, Lyotard refers to Marx's 'pure creative power' of excessive labour-power
as a force that marks a certain 'fidelity to the non-enchained' (in any form of identity and
equivalence):

I say 'pure'creative power, because Marx endows it with an attribute that no

mechanismof exchangepossesses(be it chemical, physical, or human), namely, the
property of expending or consuming less energy (less value) than it produces as it

24 "A case of differend between two parties takes place

when the 'regulation' of the conflict that opposes
them is done in the idiom of one of the parties while the wrong suffered by the other is not signified in that
idiom." (1988: 12)

36
 goes into action (into productive action, that is, as it goes to work). Thus, this power
must be unleashedfrom the chains that bind it in the intrigue of the contract and on
the stage of the market. It must be unbound from the pseudon (contract, work,
averagesocial time required) in which it is proffered, imagined, exposed, betrayed.
Revolution, according to Marx, clearly means this fidelity to the non-enchained.
(45)

With Nancy and Lyotard together we have a politics that affirms an excessive
singularity-communityagainstidentity and equivalence. But whereasNancy leaves his
being-in-commona little vacant,Lyotard brings in a more materialistbasis for singularity;
an excessivelabour-power. Lyotard also helps us to envisagewhere community may
emergefrom: the sites of antagonisticdifferends that compose meaning and relation
acrossand againstany delineatedindependentsphere and set of regulations. Thus he
uses the exampleof May '68, precisely becauseit refusedthe regimesof work and the
civil sphere,asa fidelity to the differend andthe non-enchained:"May '68 was faithful to
the thing that would suffer from its being representedand directedtoward the civil sector,
the thing that would be ill-treated,not only in the factory or the office, but also at school,
and throughoutthe 'cultural' institution." (45)

Conclusion
I have sketched a body of poststructuralist literature that brings together difference and the
Marxian critique of capitalist relations. Butler argued that we need to overcome
base/superstructuredichotomies, and argued that difference, as against 'unity', should be
the basis of a cultural-material politics, but she appeared to have downgraded a sense of
the pervasiveness of differential structuring that orthodox Marxism is based upon, such
that the implications of an 'equivalence' of struggles were not fully considered. Brown
made this point, and I explored it a little against Laclau and Mouffe's 'chain of
equivalence'. The rest of the theorists operated on an assumption that there is no parity of
terrns between the 'human' and 'identity', and argued that social democratic identity and
equivalence served to exclude difference and community from the human. In their
critique, a number of different inessential political figures were seen to emerge; the
insurgent subaltern, the cyborg, being-in-common or unworking, and the non-enchained.
All of these figures are not subjects, but processes of interrelation, that are premised on
an understanding of difference and excess, the boundary breakdowns of capitalist forms
of life, and on the need to challenge the imposition of coded and 'equivalent' identities on
life. Lyotard argued that the processes of excess and difference (against identity and

equivalence) were the essenceof Marx's 'practical materialism', and for this reason I am
suggesting that there is a milieu of poststructuralist materialism that is not yet ready to
embrace a 'post-political', or leave politics in the social democratic sphere, but rather has
affinity with Marx's communism, even as it needs to be continually rethought.

37
 When Nancy writes that community "is the unworking of work that is social,
economic, technical, and institutional (1991: 31), he excludes the political so as to
suggest that this unworking is the practice of politics (158). He then asks,

how can the community without essence (the community that is neither 'people'
...
nor 'nation', neither 'destiny' nor 'generic humanity', etc.) be presented as such?
That is, what might a politics be that does not stem from the will to realise an

essence? (1991: xxxix-xl)

The following chapterstake up Nancy's questionin an explorationof the conjunction of

Deleuzeand Guattari's 'minor', and aspectsof Marx's 'proletariat' and the communist
movement. That the community of this politics can not simply be representedor, as
Spivak (1988) reminds us, 'spoken for' is the topic of the next chapteron Deleuze's
6empiricism'.

38
Chapter 3
Empiricism: A Materialist Methodology for the Untimely

A chronicler who recites events without distinguishing between major and minor
ones acts in accordance with the following truth: nothing that has ever happened
should be regarded as lost for history. (Benjamin 1992: 246)

It is not a matter of identifying with various historical personages, but rather

identifying the names of history with zones of intensity on the body without

organs... No one has ever been as deeply involved in history as the schizo... (A(E:
21)

This thesis considers political creation as a process of juxtaposition, complication, and a

certain indeterminacy without and against coherent identity (autonomous self-identical
subjectivities, classes, or minorities). This chapter develops a research methodology
appropriate to such a non-identitarian 'object'. it explores Deleuze's 'empiricism' as a
methodology specifically attentive to difference, that not only critiques historicism as the
production of historical objects, but afhrms a 'creative' relation with history. The
specific problem that the chapter addressesis how to write 'political' histories of 'counter
movements' without replicating the subject/object relation of representation.
At a general level this empiricism is part of the tradition of 'genealogy',
6perspectivism', and 'interpretation' developed in different ways by Nietzsche, Foucault,
and Deleuze. In as much as it is explicitly concerned with change, genealogy is an
overtly political form of interpretation that seeks to move beyond a knowledge / practice
dualism. As Deleuze (n. d.: n.p. ) puts it: "It is possible that in the current idea of
interpretation, there is something that might go beyond the dialectical opposition between
'knowing' [connaitre] and 'transforming' the world. " In genealogy, the practice of
interpretation is itself seen as a process of intervention and transformation. Genealogy
follows two interrelated concerns. First, it problematises our contemporary forms of
knowing and being through tracing the myriad disruptions and discontinuities in our
composition, as Foucault (1980: 160) suggests, in order to sever the continuities of
historical memory, to oppose history as a project of creating a 'memory' of our current
reality, identity, and truth, and so to 'unrealise' ourselves. But genealogy is not simply
an unmasking of our divergent historical trajectories. The genealogical imperative is to
form a wholly different relation with history. It seeks to enact "a transfon-nation of
history into a totally different form of time", a time of "counter-memory" (160) as an
affirmation of the multiplicity and potential of historical past. History is a practice of
engagement with the myriad of material relations across time and space that have been,
and can be further put into play in ever-new relations, rather than an historicisation of a

39
demarcated moment. The question becomes one of the conditions by which difference
has emerged, in a process of the further actualisation of difference such that, as Deleuze
defines empiricism: "... the aim is not to rediscover the eternal or the universal, but to find
the conditions under which something new is produced (creativeness)." (Deleuze and
Parnet 1987: vii). This needs to be explored in detail.
The chapter starts with a consideration of Foucault's reading of Nietzsche's
genealogy, and then considers Deleuze's empiricism as presenting a different focus to
Foucault. I consider three elements of Deleuze's empiricism: matter, relations and
resonance, and the 'standpoint' of the minor.

Genealogy and 'counter-memory'

Foucault's genealogiesare primarily problematisationsof the contemporary self (in
relation to discursive formations of sanity, health, confinement, sexuality, governance
and so on). His work deploys history as a resourceto disrupt our anthropologicaland
metaphysicalunities, discovering not a different set of narratives, but difference itself-'
Counter-memory,as Foucault (1977) elaboratesin 'Nietzsche, Genealogy, History', is
not, then, a different 'alternative' memory. If the purpose of writing histories of our
presentis to problematisehistorical objectsthrough which Man, as the subject of linear
history, is composed,counter memory can not delineatea different historical object and
subject through a 'bottom-up' kind of history, or assert a continuity that has been
somehowforgotten, ignored, or excludedby traditional history. Such a project would
perhapsbe an interesting counter to dominant histories, but ultimately would fail to
manifestthe historical senseof genealogyasit would remain on the terrain of identity (as
a seriesof 'different' historical objectsand subjects). Nevertheless,genealogydoes have
somerelation to conventionalhistory. In a passagethat Foucaultgives some prominence,
Nietzsche suggests that the European is a 'hybrid' entity that treats history as a
'storeroom' of different andchangingcostumesthat it in vain tries to solidify as identity:
"... we paradeourselvesas romantic or classicalor Christian or Florentineor baroqueor
4national', in moribus et artibus: the 'cap doesn't fit'! " (1973: 223) Nietzsche and
Foucault suggestthat the genealogistcan take some comfort in this process. Indeed
Nietzscheproposesthat "Perhapsit is precisely here that we are discovering the realm of
our invention..." (1973: 223). But such masqueradebecomescounter-memory and
invention only when it ceasesto try and producea set of narrativesto bolster our present
identity, and instead directly challenges memory-as-identityitself by affirming and
parodying the complexity of thesecostumes. At this moment, according to Foucault's
readingof 'the greatcarnival of time' we reacha point of: "No longer the identification of
our faint individuality with the solid identitiesof the past, but our 'unrealisation' through

1 "What [genealogy] really does is to entertain the claims to attention of local, discontinuous, disqualified,
illegitimate knowledges against the claims of a unitary body of theory which would filter, hierarchise and
order them in the name of some true knowledge and some arbitrary idea of what constitutes a science and
its objects. " (Foucault 1980a: 83)

40
the excessive choice of identities... " (Foucault 1980: 161). History, then, is something
with which we should entertain diverse relations; a multiplication of relations, not a
production of coherent memory:

The study of history makes one 'happy, unlike the metaphysicians, to possessin
oneself not an immortal soul but many mortal ones.' And in each of these souls,
history will not discover a forgotten identity, eager to be reborn, but a complex
system of distinct and multiple elements,unable to be mastered by the powers of
synthesis... (Foucault 1980: 161)

This said, despite the concern with affirming the genealogical 'carnival' of
historical difference, Foucault tends to focus more on problematising our present through
tracing specific configurations of power/knowledge that have composed our dominant
('most natural') forms. Foucault somewhat enigmatically suggests that "We have to
promote new forms of subjectivity through the refusal of this kind of individuality which
has been imposed on us for several centuries." (1982: 216). And, most famously, and
perhaps more 'positively', he suggests we could "... counter the grips of power with the
claims of bodies, pleasures, and knowledges, in their multiplicity and their possibility of
resistance." (1980: 157) Indeed, in the last two volumes of The History of Sexuality,
Foucault (1990,1992) begins to elaborate alternate models of composition or 'techniques
of the self'. But beyond this, and a reference to how archaeological method could be
applicable to the study of revolutionary movements (1972: 194-5), Foucault does not
explore the question of political composition too much (though as Deleuze (1988: 115)

suggests, Foucault's interviews, which often discuss the relation of his historical work to
contemporary political questions, are an integral part of his work). When Foucault does

explicitly raise the question of politics, or 'resistance', he tends to focus on the capacity
to
of resistance shed light on power/knowledge formations. 2 The relation of Foucault's

resistance to Deleuze's politics is discussed in the next chapter, but here I should say that
though I think that there is little doubt that Foucault's method presents ample opportunity
and material for politics, to this end the analysis of resistance would need to be more than
a question of 'bringing to light power relations'.
Deleuze and Guattari take a different path. It is misleading to suggest that the
difference with Foucault is based on a hard distinction over the relative 'primacy' of
power or desire. Despite Deleuze and Guattari's assertion that power is the stratified
form of desire (cf. ATP: 53 1) and is hence secondary, and Foucault's distaste at Deleuze
and Guattari's use of the word desire (with its psychoanalytic connotations) (cf. Deleuze
1997: 189), the Nietzschean conception of the primacy of 'force' in both presents more

2 As Foucault writes, in a text famous for its explicit discussion of 'freedom' and 'resistance': "... another
way to go further towards a new economy of power relations ... consists of using this resistance as a
chemical catalysts so as to bring to light power relations, locate their position, find out their point of
application and the methods used. " (1982: 210-11)

41
similarities than differences. At the same time it is clear that, as Deleuze (1997: 189)
writes, the distinctions are "more than a question of words". I would suggest that these
differences lead not to a fundamentally different understanding of life, but to a different
focits in their works. Where Foucault uses genealogy to problematise our stratifications
(such that resistance is considered to bring power relations to light), Deleuze and Guattad
focus on the processes of deterritorialisation that escape stratifications. If this is only a
difference in emphasis, it still leads to a different relation with history; where Foucault
asks 'what could the emergence and descent of our apparently most natural forms beT,
Deleuze and Guattari ask 'what unactualised potential lies in history for a different
configuration of ourselves?13
Deleuze and Guattari quite explicitly frame their works of 'schizoanalysis' as an
affirmation of hybrid relations and processesof difference. Moreover, though one would
not find quite the elaboration of methodology as presented in The Archaeology of
Knowledge, Deleuze and Guattari provide considerable, if dispersed, insight into their
techniques. To develop the specific methodological deployment of 'perspective' in this
project, as this different relation with history, I want to now move from the general
framework of genealogy to what one could call Deleuze's form of counter-memory:
empiriciSM.4 The rest of this chapter is a consideration of three interrelated aspects of
Deleuze's empiricism: matter, relations of resonance, and the minoritarian standpoint

Matter
Deleuze's empiricism, as indeed all his and Guattari's concepts and categories, is
intricately related to his Spinozist and Nietzschean materialism with its conception of the
world as an ever-changing and intricately related 'monstrous' collection of forces that is
always constituting modes of existence at the same time as it destroys them. Such a
materialism conceives the world as not only without finitude, but also without delineated
subjects or objects: let us call them 'things'. 5 Of course this is not a refutation of the
existence of things, but it is a refusal to present them in any ontological or epistemological

3A comparison of Foucault's and Deleuze's book titles conveys a sense of their different emphasis (for
example, the 'birth' and 'history'of the clinic, the prison, and sexuality, as against A Thousand Plateaus
and Difference and Repetition).
4 'Empiricism' is used here, not because it offers a different framework to schizoanalysis, pragmatics,
nomadology, stratoanalysis, micropolitics, rhizomatics and so on (though of course each of these
concepts is at the same time interchangeable and different), but to emphasise the practical nature of
Deleuze and Guattari's 'perspectivism' as a methodology. It is beyond the scope of this chapter to
explore Deleuze's reading of the empiricist tradition through Hume and Whitehead.
5 Nietzsche (1969: 1067) puts it like this: "This world: a monster of energy, without beginning,
without
end-,a firm, iron magnitude of force that does not grow bigger or smaller, that does not expand itself but
only transforms itself... ". Nietzsche's argument that there are no things, only perspectives, is applicable
to even the smallest of 'units': "It is only after the model of the subject that we have invented the reality of
things and projected them into the medley of sensations. If we no longer believe in the effective subject,
then belief also disappears in effective things, in reciprocation, cause and effect between those
phenomena that we call things.
There also disappears, of course, the world of effective atoms... " (1968: 552)

42
primacy. There are things, but only as they are constituted in particular, varied, and
mutable relations of force.6
If the world is at base a primary flux of matter without form or constant, then
things are always a temporaryproduct of a channellingof this flux in what Deleuzeand
Guattari call 'assemblages'or 'arrangements'(cf. AM 503-5).7 Nietzsche calls this
channellinga processof 'interpretation': the processwherebymatter is cut and assembled
by a particular series of forces that, as Foucault's work has emphasised,respect no
'ideal' / 'material' dichotomy. Henceany interpretationof a thing or an event does not
come after the fact, but is part of the composition of the thing as one of many forces
immanentto it. As Deleuze(n.d: n.p.) puts it: "Nietzsche'sidea is that things and actions
are already interpretations. So, to interpretis to interpret interpretations in
and, this way,
already to changethings, 'to changelife'. " The coherenceof things is not, then, a
function of their position in the centreof a seriesof concentriccircles of interpretation.
Things are far more unstablethan this. Without a primary form before interpretation,the
thing is situated at a meeting point of a perpetually changing series of
interpretations/forcesand is thus never 'finished'. 8 Without a 'model' and structured
interpretation,the thing embodiesdifference within itself as a 'virtuality' or 'potential' to
be actualisedin different interpretations(for Deleuze,every 'thing' has two aspects,the
'actual' andthe 'virtual', wherethe former is a 'selection' of the manifold potential of the
latter (cf. Deleuze 1994,1996)).
This 'potential' is not in oppositionto the 'real', ratherit is the reality of a creative
matteras it exists in ever-newconfigurationsas the baseof the real (it is in opposition
only to the fixed determinationof relations) (cf. ATP: 99). Nancy (1996: 110) puts this
well: Deleuze's "thought doesnot have 'the real' for an 'object' it has no 'object'. It is
-
anothereffectuationof the real, admitting that the real 'in itself' is chaos, a sort of
"9
effectivity without effectuation. Thus, as Nietzsche(1968: 481) puts it, it is not only
that "facts is precisely what there is not, only interpretations" (derived from our
historically formed values), but that we are called to an active creation of new and
different interpretations,or 'lives'. If all is contestedinterpretationas the production of
being, then "politics precedesbeing": "Practicedoes not come after the emplacementof
the termsandtheir relations,but actively participatesin the drawing of the lines..." (ATP:

6 Deleuze writes that: "The history of a thing, in general, is the succession of forces which take
possession of it and the co-existence of the forces which struggle for possession. " (1983: 3) There is,
however, still something of a 'thing' in this expression. Foucault (1972: 47) perhaps expresses the
Nietzschean conception of matter better when he writes: "What, in short, we wish to do is to dispense with
'things'... To substitute for the enigmatic treasure of 'things' anterior to discourse, the regular formation of
objects that emerge only in discourse. "
7 Essentially, the term 'assemblage' describes a process of relations of proximity where the multiplicity of
connection and flux across forces in relation is such that what defines the assemblage is its singular
functioning (with forms of content and expression), and its mutation.
8 "A thing has as many senses as there are forces capable of taking possession of it. But the thing itself
is not neutral and will have more or less affinity with the force in current possession. " (Deleuze 1983: 4)
9 Deleuze offers a useful example here of the polymorphous nature of May '68: "Ant!
-Oedipus was about
the univocity of the real, a sort of Spinozism of the unconscious. And I think '68 was this discovery itself.

43
203,208). Interpretation is both a process of intricate attention to what makes a thing
cohere, what makes an assemblagework, and, as far as possible (it is not a product of a
simple will to change, but is a complex and difficult engagement) an affirmation of new
senses. Deletize (1994) presents 'empiricism' as a methodology appropriate to this
materialism that seeksto expand difference through interpretation. 10

Relations and resonance

Empiricism is a perspectivism.toward an overturning of all thought of identity and
representation(populatedas it is with the dualismsof subjects,objects, universals, and
particulars), with an affirmation of relations of connectivity and resonanceacross,
against,and within 'things':

Representationhas only a single centre, a unique and receding perspective, and in

consequence a false depth. It mediates everything, but mobilises and moves
nothing. Movement, for its part, implies a plurality of centres, a superposition of
perspectives,a tangle of points of view, a coexistence of moments which essentially
distort representation...(Deleuze 1994: 55-6).

That Deleuze's'perspective'does not, then, coherearound a particular subject position

should not surprise us, but that neither does it suggest a series of positions needs
elaboration. Just as Deleuzerefusesa specific perspectivalidentity he also insists that a
or perspectiveswould not transcendthe basic premiseof
multiplication of representations
identity, as this would continue to compose a structured dualistic relation between a
seeing subject and its delineated object (however many subjects and objects are
II
collated). But if the principle that "[ilt is not enoughto multiply in
perspectives order to
establish perspectivism" (1994: 69) challengesa simple appealto ever more particular
is
perspectives,empiricism not a rejectionof the empirical particular in a meta-theoryof
universals.
Perspectivism is concerned with "[n]either empirical particularities nor abstract
universals... " (1994: xxi) because these categories remain on the terrain of identity. The

empirical particular is nevertheless crucial, but it is a particularity that is not a thing

(subject or object). The empiricist concern is with relations. Even the smallest
particularity as a unit of representation is still an identity. For Deleuze's empiricism, as

The people who hate '68, or say that it was a mistake, see it as something symbolic or imaginary. But
that's precisely what it wasn't, it was pure reality breaking through. " (N. 144-5)
10 "The intense world of differences, in which we find the reason behind qualities and the being of the
sensible, is precisely the object of a superior empiricism. This empiricism teaches us a strange 'reason',
that of the multiple, chaos and difference (nomadic distributions, crowned anarchies). " (Deleuze 1994: 57)
11 "Infinite representation includes precisely an infinity of representations either by ensuring the
-
convergence of all points of view on the same object or the same world, or by making all moments
properties of the same Self.... The fact is that infinite representation is indissociable from a law which
renders it possible: the form of the concept as a form of identity which constitutes on the one hand the in-
itself of the represented (A is A) and on the other the for-itself of the representant (Self = Self). The prefix

44
should be clear from the discussion of materialism, relations are not derived from things,
but vice versa: "Relations are not internal to a Whole; rather, the Whole is derived from
the external relations of a given moment, and varies with them." (Deleuze 1997a: 59) The
core premise of Deleuze's empiricism is hence that "relations ... are external to their
terms." (Deleuze 1991: X)12 The particular as a unit of enipiricism is thus not a unit at all,
but a multiplicity of relations. Faced with these multiplicities, empiricism seeks to create
new differences through new relations. It is thus a methodology of 'and' rather than 'is'
(cf. Deleuze and Parnet 1987: 54-9).
The question arises as to the means of composing productive relations of the
and'-type. This process is not an arbitrary smash-and-grab treatment of history where
things are forced into alignment. 13 Empiricism seeks to find a more subtle relation
between entities, what Deleuze and Guattari call a 'resonance'. A comparison with
Benjamin's (1992) concept of 'constellation' in his Theses on the Philosophy of History

will help elaborate.

Against the teleologies of historicism (and indeed, implicitly a vulgar historical
materialism), Benjamin suggests that the historical materialist should treat history as a
series of "monads", and seek to open a specific "life" out of the "homogenous course of
history" (254). The materialist should form a "... unique experience with the past... " by
"... seiz[ing] hold of a memory as it flashes up at a moment of danger." (1992: 254,247;
emphasis added). Benjamin writes:

Historicism contents itself with establishing a causal connection between various

moments in history. But no fact that is a cause is for that reason historical. It
became historical posthumously, as it were, through events that may be separated
from it by thousands of Years. A historian who takes this as his point of departure

stops telling the sequence of events like the beads of a rosary. Instead, he gasps the
constellation which his own era has formed with a definite earlier one. (255)

This senseof 'experience'and 'constellation' is a potent imageof a non-historicisthistory

that at first glance seems similar to Deleuze's 'resonance'. There are, however,
differencesbetweenBenjamin's constellationand Deleuze's resonance. The Thesesis
somewhatresistantto interpretation;its aphoristic style, and its use of the not easily
reconcilablemethodologiesof Marx andNietzsche,shoulddiscouragea simple reading.14
Nevertheless,it is possibleto teaseout a problematicpoint. One is left wondering about
the natureof the historical memory that 'flashes up' in 'definite' constellationwith the

RE- in the word representation signifies this conceptual form of the identical which subordinates
differences." (Deleuze 1994: 56)
12"We will call 'nonempiricist'every theory accordingto which, in one way or another,relations are derived
from the nature of things." (Deleuze1991: 109)
13Deleuze(1983:5) somewhatcryptically warns that "...genealogy does not appear on the first night..."
and that "...a new force can only appear and appropriatean object by first of all putting on the mask of the
forces which are already in possessionof the object."

45
present. This image has two apparent problems. First, it seems to follow a simple faith
in the ability of an historical event to break through the strictures of historiography (and
Benjamin is clear about the power of historicist conformism to police historical content).
Without the chronological narratives of historicism to draw-out a 'connection'
(necessarily being against a history always written by the 'victors', and no longer using
the teleologies of vulgar historical materialism), one wonders how transhistorical links are
formed, how exactly events 'unexpectedly flash up', and how they can be recognised
'instantaneously' (before they 'disappear irretrievably'). There seems to be something of
an involuntary political unconscious at work that 'recognises' the similarity of a previous
era in some transhistorical lightning-flash of interconnection. Second, this constellation
through a political unconscious appears to be formed through an understanding of definite
subjects and objects of history. Thus, tying these two elements together, Benjamin
writes that "history in the strict senseis thus an image out of involuntary mindfulness, an
image that suddenly sets itself in to the subject of history in an instant of danger."
(modified translation from thesis VI by Bahti (1979: 15); emphasis added)
In an indirect way, Deleuze's (1972) work on memory and 'signs' in Proust
addresses these problems of constellation and helps mark the difference of empiricism.
Here Deleuze distances himself from a notion that the unity of Proust's 'search' lies in
'involuntary memory' (the spontaneous flash of 'remembrance' that is first experienced
through the taste of the madeleine) for it is still posited on an historical object. He
suggestsinstead that this is only the start, a 'setting in motion' of the search:

involuntary memory, utilising only given resonances,is no more than a beginning

...
of art in life, a first stage....it remains to be explained why, by the solicitation of the
madeleine, Combray is not content to rise up again as it was once present (simple
associationof ideas), but rises up absolutely, in a form which was never experienced,
in its 'essence' or its eternity. (Deleuze 1972: 137,12)

The search finds not an historical object of Combray in the memory induced by the taste
of the madeleine, but, with much work, finds an 'experience' of complication of its
present.15 Proustian memory, then, is not a past recollection or remembrance, but a
process of creation from memory: "... to remember is to create, is to reach that point
where the associative chain breaks, leaps over the constituted individual, is transferred to
the birth of an individuating world. " (99) Memory brings fragments into resonance, but
not as things. Rather, the Proustian unity of creation and memory arises in so far as
resonance is a process of extracting "its own fragments" from the subject and object in
relation (134) in producinga new multiplicity:

14 Indeed for this

reason Benjamin had not intended the Theses for publication, saying that "it would open
both the door and the gate to enthusiastic misunderstanding" (cited in Bahti 1979: 3).
15 Deleuze presents five 'levels'
of interpretation that Proust works through to reach a pure resonance.

46
 It is in this sense that the work of art always constitutes and reconstitutes the
beginning of the world, but also forms a specific world absolutely different from the

others, and envelops a landscape or immaterial site quite distinct from the site where
we have grasped it.... This is precisely the originality
of Proustian reminiscence: it
proceeds from a mood, from a state of soul, and from its associative chains, to a
creative or transcendent viewpoint - and no longer, in Plato's fashion, from a state
of the world to seen objectivities. (Deleuze 1972: 98)

Benjamin's constellation through 'involuntary mindfulness' would seem, then, to

describe what Deleuze sees as only the first stage of an historical search. A stage which
does not yet break with identity for it maintains subject and object intact. Where
Benjamin looks for an instantaneous remembrance that forms a constellation between

similarities, Deleuze seems to go further in insisting that what is 'found' is not an

historical moment which fits with the present subject, but something of a sensation that is
both within and against the historical object and the contemporary subject as they resonate
(not resemble) to produce a different form. 16
To summarise so far, empiricism is not a process of opening historical events to
find different historical truths to bolster a new perspective. This would remain in the
realms of historical memory, simply of a new subject position. Both the object and the
subject, the represented and the representant need to change in the relation. Perspective is
the means by which different things are brought into a relation that in a new 'alliance' or
4encounter' opposes the coherence or identities of each (cf. Deleuze 1994: 57). This is a

perpetual process such that the 'alliance' is not a third different identity, but part of a

complex and continual process of variation. Essentially the point is that empiricism
pursues (observes and actualises) the specific form of relation that Deleuze and Guattari
call a 'becoming'. A relation of becoming is an 'affiliation' whereby two things relate as
multiplicities such that elements within each side 'resonate' in a 'zone of proximity' with
elements in the other and produce a third multiplicity, which itself must enter different
relations of resonance. Becoming is not a dialectical process because there is no
dominance of one term over the other (thesis and antithesis), or necessary outcome
(synthesis). There is only resonance. Relations between things are always, then,
'variable relations', and empiricism must continually affirm this variability:

The object must therefore be in no way identical, but torn asunder in a difference in
which the identity of the object as seen by a seeing subject vanishes. Difference
must become the element, the ultimate unity; it must therefore refer to other
differences which never identify it but rather differenciate it. Each term of a series,

16 Benjamin's complex text has more of an ambiguous relation to the facticity of the historical
object than
presented here. Whilst Bahti (1979) also points to the paradox in Benjamin's fixing of the fleeting image of
the past that I have focused on, in retranslating the expression Eingedenken (theses XV and B) from
'remembrance' to 'mindfulness' ('innering' or interiorising the past, and 'imagining') he makes the case that
Benjamin also offers more than a remembrance, with a certain active production of meaning.

47
 being already a difference, must be put into a variable relation with other terms,
thereby constituting other seriesdevoid of centre or convergence. Divergence and
decentring must be affirmed in the series itself. Every object, every thing, must see
its own identity swallowedup in difference, each being no more than a difference
between difference. Difference must be shown differing. (Deleuze 1994: 56)

Yet, if empiricism seeks relations of resonance rather than constellations it is still

not clear what might be the cause of the relation, the 'start' of the search. In Proust the
search is driven and delineated by the narrative of an in&vidual life, where connectivity
starts from a lived 'memory'. 17 Since I am concerned with empiricism as a more general
methodology applicable to the histories of the ivorld where historical events have not
usually been experienced by the 'subject' of research this is no solution. As I have
shown, Benjamin overcomes this problem of expanding 'memory' into a relation with all
of history by retaining a subject of history, the proletariat, in connection with a
transhistorical political unconscious. But Benjamin's solution is not possible for Deleuze
since the body of resonance that is produced has no historical subject. He suggests that
the dialogue of resonance is more about 'hand-to-hand combat' and that "... the pairing of
the present moment and the past one is more like a struggle than an agreement, and what
is given us is neither a totality nor an eternity but "an irregular short-lived body. "
......
(1972: 109) Deleuze does, however, propose mechanisms for starting the search that
indeed are based on a form of 'standpoint'.

The empiricist standpoint: the untimely minoritarian

Empiricist resonancesoperate in an 'untimely' fashion. In Nietzsche's (1980: 8)
formulation, they "...act againstthe ageand so havean effect on the ageto the advantage,
it is hoped, of a coming age." From Anti-Oedipus to What is Philosophy?Deleuzeand
Guattari thus write of, or indeedfor a "... future form, for a new earth and people that do
not yet exist." (Deleuzeand Guattari 1994: 108; cf. also Aff: 382) At first sight this
appearsto be a somewhat transcendentmodel for Deleuze and Guattari's immanent
materialism. But their 'future form' is not astranscendentas it may seem, and, though it
is infrequently commentedupon, it is an important elementin the mechanicsof their
politics.
There is a strong sense of a 'future' transcendence,a coming event in
Nietzsche's, and Deleuze and Guattari's formulations. For Nietzsche it is the
transvaluationof nihilism, for Deleuzeand Guattari, often sounding like Marx, it is the
affirmation and destructionof capitalismin "the people to come and the new earth."
(DeleuzeandGuattari 1994: 109). Ansell Pearson(1999: 211) aptly describesthis figure

17This statementavoidsdealingwith one of the many complexities of Deleuze's book on Proust, namely
his assertionthat the Proustian'literary machine' is concerned with producing extra textual affects on its
readers. Deleuze thus suggests that "The 'subject' of the Search is finally no self, it is that we without

48
of overcoming as a "vision and indeed it is intended as something for the
and riddle",
earth to decipher (cf. also Holland (1999) for discussion of the 'new earth'). But, as is
the nature of a 'riddle', there is always an immanence to the project. If "... the new earth
('In truth, the earth will one day become a place of healing') is no more behind than
...
ahead... " (A(E: 382) then something of it is always present. The 'future form' is not
awaited in temporal fashion, but is rather the very immanence of becoming as that zone of
exchange between terms, as I have discussed, placed in resonance: "... it is this double
becoming that constitutes the people to come and the new earth. " (Deleuze and Guattari
1994: 109; cf. also Aff: 322) Thus the project of overcoming does not follow a
C:
1
teleology, but always starts 'in the middle', in any situation; it is in "the middle" where
the untimely emerges, where "very different times communicate" (Deleuze 1997c: 242).
Thus, whilst for orthodox Marxism the immanent practice of the class is toward the
coming communism (in and through the maximisation and the contradictions of
capitalism), the empiricist coming age is always immanent to the present. As Deleuze and
Guattari (1994: 100) write, this is "... to posit revolution as plane of immanence, infinite
movement and absolute survey, but to the extent that these features connect up with what
is real here and now in the struggle against capitalism. "' 8
This untimely fonri is what Deleuze and Guattari more commonly call the 'minor'
or 'minoritarian', as distinct from the 'major' or 'majoritarian'. The next chapter explores
in detail the specific techniques of minor composition, but a general mapping is useful
here so as to understand the 'standpoint' of empiricism. Minor and major are expressions
that characterise not entities, but processes It is not a question of size or number, but
.
relations across and between numbers. Essentially the major is defined as having fixed
relations between its numbers such that each situation is denumerable and in relation to a
standard, and the minor is nondenumerable in so far as it forms relations and connections
of becoming and proliferation which deviate from any major axiom, or standard-19
Deleuze and Guattari identify three basic treatments of matter as "... the majoritarian as a
constant and homogenous system; minorities as subsystems; and the rnnoritarian as a
potential, creative and created becoming. " (ATP: 105-6). The minoritarian is not, then, a
minority 'sub-group', but is seen in the movement of groups, in their variations,
mutations and differences and hence has no membership, coherence, identity, or
constituency in itself. It is a becoming of which no one has 'ownership' (ATP: 106).
But the minor is not somehow 'outside' of identity. Rather, it is always implicated in any
major or 'identitarian' configuration. Deleuze and Guattari are adamant that they are not

content which portions out Swann, the narrator, and Charlus, distributes or selects them without totalising
them. " (1972: 114)
18This formation of 'the people to come and the new earth' is rather close to Marx's definition of the 'real
movement' of communism cited in Chapter 1.
19"What distinguishes them is that in the case of a majority the relation internal to the number
constitutes
a set that may be finite or infinite, but it is always denumerable, whereas the minority is defined as a non-
denumerable set, however many elements it may have. What characterises the nondenumerable is
neither the set nor its elements; rather, it is the connection, the 'and' produced between elements,
b-etA pnj3ets, and which belongs to neither.... " (ATFI 470)

49
producinga new dualism; identity and difference are intricately enmeshedin a continuum
of more or lessdeterritorialisedand decoded forms (the molar looks like identity, but it is
only that, a 'likeness' or 'optical effect', produced on the surface of something that is
always dissipating). Deleuzeand Guattari's materialismthus produces a nice twist on
psychoanalyticconceptionsof the subject in asserting that the one form that does not
is the major subJect20:
achievecompleteness

For the majority, insofar as it is analytically included in the abstract standard, is

never anybody, it is always Nobody Ulysses whereas the minority is the
- -
becoming of everybody, one's potential becoming to the extent that one deviates
from the model. There is a majoritarian 'fact', but it is the analytic fact of Nobody,
as opposed to the becoming-minoritarian of everybody. (ATP: 105)

The minoritarian is thus a model of creation founded on the continual

displacementand proliferation of contours as a 'universal' untimely process of the
deterritorialisationof every componentof one's existence. It is somethingthat is active
yet unformed. Or, rather, it is active in as much as it escapes the already formed. As
Deleuze and Guattari say of the related concept of the war machine .....it exists only in its
.
own metamorphosis... " (ATP: 360). This is not to say, however, that the minor does not
have concrete points of emergence. Though Deleuze writes that "[e]verybody's caught,
in
one way or another, a minority becoming that would lead them into unknown paths if
they opted to follow it through" (N: 173), he and Guattari tend to look for minor
processes within the 'subsystems' of minorities, as if they have a tendency, in their
struggles and slight deviations from the abstract molar standard, to form different

relations:

Minorities, of course, are objectively definable states,statesof language,ethnicity, or

sex with their own ghetto territorial i ties, but they must also be thought of as seeds,
crystals of becoming whose value is to trigger uncontrollable movements and
deterritorialisations of the mean or majority. (ATP: 106)

The minor, then, is a category which links an empiricist understanding of the

primacy of relations of becoming to concrete minorities. A strange 'standpoint' emerges
as that which is of minorities, subaltern, marginalised, oppressed groups, not as the
bolstering of their identities, but rather as their overcoming. Minor processes emerge
through the problematisation and becoming of minority groups as they challenge the
contours of their identities. That is, as they seek relations of resonance which break up
the mechanisms which produce them as minority identities. An empiricist relation with
history is not, then, driven by an identity, but by the set of aspects of minority identity

2() That the constant is hollow would not surprise Lacan, but an assertion that this as the only incomplete
form is saying more about part-objects than psychoanalysis can allow.

50
which would be problematised. So, there is no subjectof a political unconsciouswhich
seemsto 'know' its similarity with the past, there are rather a series of problems and
axiomswhich seekresonancewith the past in order to break open contemporarysubject
positions. So, to consider the use of empiricism in this thesis, I do not problematise
liberal and workerist politics by delineatinga new object of the refusal of work as some
'other' to the worker that would align with a contemporarysubjectof the refusal of work.
Rather, a senseof a set of contemporaryconcerns(notably, the intensificationof work,
the possibility of a politics of differenceand minority that does not fall back on identity,
and a feeling of political impasse)drives researchinto historical momentsthat have some
potentialto offer further problematisation,elaboration,extension,' or 'ways out' of these
concernsand possibilities. It is not a questionof finding historical precedentor origin,
but of putting historical eventsto use, framing them differently, seekingtheir differences
and momentsthat containelementswhich resonatewith contemporaryconcerns.

Conclusion
To sum up a little, an empiricist history serves not as a psychological or collective
memory, a memory of a people already formed, or as a future-oriented coming to
consciousness. Both thesemodels lack attentivenessto the present. Whilst empiricism
neither forgetshistoriesof oppressionnor ignoresa temporalfuture, it is the possibilities
of immanentcreationthat are its concern. Empiricism is an intricate grasping of 'things'
that looks not for their coherencebut for their relations, and their power of difference,
their 'virtuality'. The implicatednatureof the perspectiveis thus not only recognised,but
affirmed. Against the will to researcha completeobject and presentits own core truths,
the possibleproductivity of objects-as-multiplicitiestakesprecedence.This is an infinite
processof interpretationand reinterpretationto which nothing, from the most abstract
conceptto the apparentlyfinite particular,is immune. It is a meansof forming a relation
betweentwo termsthat doesnot affirm either position, but cuts and draws both terms to
form something new, disrupting our selves by multiplying our relations outside of an
historically producedsubjectivity. In this, empiricism is a way of interpretingthe world
that both witnesses and actualises processesof becoming. It is thus a political
methodology,not becauseit servesto bolster the concernsof a new radical subjectivity,
but becauseit seeksto actualiseminoritarianprocesses. These processesare actualised
through forming relations with questions and problems that arise from the axioms of
identity that minorities find themselveswithin.
Such a move away from representationto creationand minoritarian actualisation
may soundsomewhatpresumptuousand wilful. But, as Haraway (1991) has argued in
her not unrelatedmethodologyof 'situated knowledges', it is actually the reverse: it is
totalising representationthat is presumptuous, for it claims to have fully captured in
knowledge that which is never finished. Empiricism may also appear to manifest a
dishonestrelation with historical events. It might appear,for example,to 'misrepresent'

51
historical events which have had a hard enough time coming to the table of representation
at all. Certainly there are Marxist guardians of the communist movement (perhaps even
people involved in the movements I consider) which would consider empiricist
interpretation as a false appropriation. Yet, whilst empiricist history is not a wilful
disregard for the concerns of particular movements (to form a resonance one can not
simply extract a movement from its context or concern), it is to be somewhat sceptical of
the notion that being 'honest' to, or affirming a movement concerned with political
change is to represent it as a closed historical thing within a particular self-determined
trajectory. Instead, responsibility and 'objectivity' might not be to a mapping of a
particular set of activities and goals, but to affirming the 'sense' of political change in a
movement (as this senseis rethought and redeployed in contemporary contexts), to affin-ri
the 'potential' of historical events. Deleuze puts it like this: "To affinn is not to take
responsibility for, to take on the burden of what is, but to release, to set free what
lives.... to invent new forms of life rather than separating life from what it can do. "
(1983: 185)

52
Chapter 4
The Minoritarian: a Politics of Cramped Creation

hold to the Particular as an innovative form... (ATP: 471; emphasis changed)

we are not interested in characteristics;what interests us are modes of expansion,

propagation, occupation, contagion, peopling. (ATP: 239)

The last chapter presented empiricism as a 'political' methodology of placing things (as
multiplicities) in resonance to amplify untimely minoritarian processes, where the
minoritarian is a mode of composition that is processual and complex rather than
identitarian, and one that is especially available to minorities as they problematise the

particularities of their identity. This chapter explores the specific techniques and
operations of the minor in detail. It describes how the minor functions as an intensive
process through intimate engagement with the regimes, stratifications, and particularities
that traverse minorities. This is a model of political composition that is at once intricately
situated, and anti-identitarian.
The chapter develops through an examination of a series of minor techniques. It
is important to stress that these are only abstract techniques or general processes, which
in concrete engagementwould be actualised in varied ways. Whilst the minor does offer
certain political tools, it is more concerned with orienting analytic perception toward, and
contributing to minor processes that already occur. First the chapter considers the
reduction of identity to a situation where minorities are 'cramped', fully traversed by

social forces, such that the first principle of the minor is not identity but creation. Then
the general problematic of 'deterritorialisation' is explored to show how the minor is a
continual process of engagement with molar regimes, rather than a marginal identity. The
way that the 'particular' and the 'social' are treated in minor composition is then
considered in detail. In this section the concepts of 'inclusive disjunction' (to show how
a milieu emergesof continual experimentation and reconfiguration within and against each
6particular' situation or identity), and the primacy of social 'lines of flight' (such that the
n-unorhas affinities with the 'proletariat') are brought out. This is a general presentation
of the place of the social which is explored in detail as a capitalist system in subsequent
chapters. The chapter then describes the minor 'author-function' and its relation to the
collective, before moving outside the argument a little to consider Deleuze's reading of
Foucault's 'resistance'. This section is intended to stress how the minor is different from

a theory of resistanceby considering Deleuze's interpretation of one of the more

influential poststructuralistpolitical figures.

53
Cramped space and the centrality of creation
The minor is a politics for thosewho are composednot in terms of subjectiveautonomies
and securities,but for oppressed,subaltern,minority peopleswho find their movements
and expressions'cramped' on all sides such that they can not in any conventionalsense
be said to have their own coherentself-defined 'identity', to have carved out a social
spacesuchthat they could be called 'a People'. Minorities, in this sense,are those who
are cut off, as Spivak (1996: 289) puts it, from the "lines of mobility" of a culture. They
lack the ready made structures of history, narrative, tradition, principles, that would
enablethe easypassageof a demarcatedautonomousidentity through a culture. Life for
minorities is thus somewhatcomplicated. Ratherthan offer an easy path, eachparticular
situation is a something of a "cramped space" (K: 17) and necessitatesa complex
engagement.Practiceis thus not a simple caseof self-expressionalong legitimatesocial
routes within which one 'fits' but is a tentative manoeuvrearound and within each
situation.
But Deleuze's(1989: 216) suggestionthat the minor begins from the knowledge
that "the people are missing" is also an assertionthat the sociopolitical figure of 'the
People' is itself the closure of politics (and dangerouslyso, insofar as 'the People' can
becomeso easily functional to the parcelling out of complex desiring relations around
identitarianattractors,most notably of 'race' and 'nation' (cf. Aff, esp.Ch. 2)), Indeed,
any notion of plenitudeor coherentidentity is challenged,such that the minor opposes
both the liberal humanist model of the 'citizen',. and the orthodox Marxist 'becoming-
conscious'. 2
The minor beginsin a different site. In a manoeuvrethat confronts conventional
liberal humanistnotionsof freedom (as a delimited autonomousspace)headon, Deleuze
and Guattarisuggestthat it is preciselyin crampedsituations,in the enforcedproximity of
peoples,histories, and languagesthat creation occurs: "Creation takes place in choked
" (N: 133) Indeed, Deleuzegoes so far as to write that "[a] creator who isn't
passages.
grabbed around the throat by a set of impossibilities is no creator." (133) Thus,
alongsidea perceptualsensitivity to very real crampedconditions, in minor composition
there is also a certain "willed poverty" (K: 19) such that "one even strives to see [the

1 Deleuze (1989) argues that though Kafka was one of the first to write of a form of composition on the
basis that the people were missing, the condition becomes most obviously apparent in the 'third world', or
colonialism, where "a people ... is doubly colonised: colonised by stories that have come from elsewhere,
but also by their own myths become impersonal entities at the service of the coloniser. " (222) Here the
problematic of the minor emerges in the shift to postcolonial forms in order to avoid the transformation of
these myths of the colonised into new nationalities. The actual complexity of this process is clearly
evident in Deleuze's writings on the Palestinians. Deleuze writes in impassioned fashion of the
Palestinians as a people who are missing. He writes that "From beginning to end, [Zionist terrorism]
involved acting as if the Palestinian people not only must not exist, but had never existed" (1998a: 30).
The particular processes of construction of the Palestinians as a non-people are described and decried by
Deleuze, and he rightly talks of the need for recognition of the Palestinians as 'a people'. But his political
model is such that he would be particularly attentive to the dangers in the construction of a Palestinian
'state', even if it could manage to be more than an efficient mechanism for the management of Palestinian
struggle, as it seems to be at the moment (under the Arafat-Israeli peace process). I doubt Deleuze would
today give Arafat the stature of "grandeur' he did in 1983 (Deleuze 1998a).

54
boundary] before it is there, and often seesthis limiting boundary everywhere" (Kafka
cited in K. 17).3 The minor is thus markedby a certain 'impossibility'. Every movement
presentsa boundaryor an impasseto movementratherthan a simple possibility or option.
There is no identity that is not 'impossible' to inhabit unproblematically. Yet the
impossibility of action is matchedwith the impossibility of passivity if anything is to be
lived. As in Beckett's (1979: 382) formula, "I can't go on, I'll go on", creation thus
becomesa process of "... tracing a path between impossibilities..." (N: 133) This
difference betweencrampedcreativity and liberal freedom is expressedwell by Kafka
(1978) in 'A Report to the Academy'. Here, an ape 'pinned down' in a cageon a ship
suchthat he hasno possibility for movement,choosesto becomehuman to effect escape.
It is the very condition of being crampedthat leadsto, or compelshis innovative change,
but not becausehe desires abstractfreedom (or indeed anything particular about being
human). Whilst 'freedom' appearsto have somevalue, it is an ambiguousform ("all too
often men arebetrayedby the word freedorif' (1978: 150)), and in this caseonly offered
a suicidal flight overboard. Insteadthe ape simply seeks a 'way out' of his particular
condition, for which the human presentsa boundary and a possibility as, through close
observationand laboriousrepetition,he learns and embodiesa seriesof human attributes
(aidedby a certainanimality in the sailors, which is reflectedin a little double becoming
when his first teacheris almostturnedinto an ape as the narrator's ape naturefled out of
him). The ape-now-human describes his form of 'escape' thus:

I fear that perhaps you do not quite understand what I mean by 'way out'. I use
the expression in its fullest and most popular sense. I deliberately do not use the
word 'freedom'. I do not mean the spacious feeling of freedom on all sides....
'self-controlled movement'. What a mockery of holy Mother Nature! Were the

apes to see such a spectacle, no theatre walls could stand the shock of their laughter.
(Kafka 1978: 150)

The minoritarian, then, is not a pluralist process of minority groups 'speaking

out', of voicing an identity. Whilst the minoritarian is concerned with expression
(Deleuze even writes that it is a question of getting "... people without the right to speak,
to speak." (N: 41)), such expression is not 'communication' as the manifestation of an
identity or a process of bringing people into a public sphere where all may be heard, since
the people are missing. The question is rather one of the 'invention' or creation that
occurs in a cramped space. The minor political questions are not 'are we communicating
enoughT, 'are we all heardT, but are of a different order, concerned with how we are
composed, and how we create and compose in fashions that deterritorialise dominant or

2 Ever since the reterritorialisation of the Soviet revolution (Deleuze 1997a: 88), "[tlhere's
no longer any
image of proletarians around which it's just a matter of becoming conscious. " (N. 173)
3 Kafka seems to reflect this when he says to Janouch (1971: 20) that he is in
a cage, "not only in the
office, but everywhere.... I carry the bars within me all the time. "

55
major forms, where "Creating has always been something different from
communicating." (N: 175)
Deleuzeand Guattari explore the questionof a minor creativity most extensively
underthe rubric of 'minor literature' and 'minor language'. Putting to use Kafka's (1972)
diaries, particularly discussion of 'the literature of small peoples' in the entry for
December25 1911, Deleuzeand Guattari (1986) explore 'Kafka' as a form of creation
that challengespsychological, biographical, individualist readings with a model of a
4writing machine' that seeks to turn everything into assemblages,and to induce
4 As Morris (1994: 130)puts it, "Kajka is a biography
experimentaleffectsin its readers.
of a particular mode of creation." KaJka is simultaneouslya minor practice itself in
'treating' the works of a canonicalliterary figure,5 and an elaborationof the conditions
and processesof the minor mode of creation. It is theselatter conditions and techniques
that areelaboratedhere.
Deleuze and Guattari (K: 18) draw out three closely interrelated defining
characteristicsof minor literatures:they affect languageand major forms generallywith a
'high coefficient of deterritorialisation', the individual is fully traversed by social
concerns such that 'everything is political', and they are a mode of 'collective
enunciation'.6 BecauseI am consideringthe minor in a more generalaccountof Deleuze
and Guattari's politics, these three characteristicsare loosely used to structure the
discussion,in conjunction with other aspectsof their conceptualapparatus. I should say
here(though it was signalledabove,and will becomeclear in the discussion)that 'minor
literature' is not a specifically 'literary' concern. At one level it concernsany art form.
Cinemaand theatrein particular get singled out (Deleuze 1989: 222; 1997c), and it is
noteworthy that Beckett, a privileged figure in the discussionof the minor, works in all
three mediums. But more than this, 'minor literature' describes a process of the
composition of minorities, where 'art' and 'life' are fully entwined (K: 41). The
importantaspectof minor literatureis not the literary, cinematic,theatricalproduct itself,
but its expressionof a general process of deterritorialisationand minor composition.
When situated around this general process, minor 'literature' should be read in this
chapternot as a 'literary' procedure,but as a generalterm for the composition, intrigue,
and practice of minority groups as part of more generaleconomy of 'minor politics'.
Aspectsof this discussionfocus more on literary and linguistic production (notably the
following section),whilst othersare more concernedwith interventionin social relations.

4 "Writing has a double function: to translate everything into assemblages and to dismantle assemblages.
The two are the same thing. " (K. 47)
5 Deleuze and Guattari describe three components of Kafka's literary machine the letters, the short
-
stories, and the novels. Though there is communication across them, each has particular modes of
composition and effects (though the novels are singled out as the true achievement for their emphasis on
social assemblages (cf. K. 39)). The diaries are seen as "the rhizome itself", the milieu or site of
distribution of all the work (K. 96).
6 Kafka (1972: 150-1) himself characterised the 'literature of small peoples' thus: "Il. Liveliness:
a.
Conflict. b. Schools. c. Magazines. 2. Less constraint: a. Absence of principles. b. Minor themes. c. Easy
formation of symbols. d. Throwing off of the untalented. 3. Popularity: a. Connection with politics. b.
Literary history. c. Faith in literature, can make up their own laws. "

56
The point, however,is that when brought togetherthey show how minor composition as
a whole occurs,a compositionin which cultural or literary production, and practice (what
Deleuzeand Guattari call expression and content) are not clearly delineated, but are
interlaced.7

Deterritoriallsation as first principle

The minor is a rather self-effacing figure. Not only is it without demarcated subject
positions, but it lacks the arrogance, certainty, and self-inflation of much overt statement
of the political. This is not to say that its effects are not 'violent' in the sense conjured by
Deleuze and Guattari's related concept of the 'war machine' (to be minor is "[flo hate all
languages of masters." (K: 26)). But its violence is directed at the order, direction, and
structure of major forms that cramp minority potential, and hence is manifest as an
indeterminate, uncertain, tentative, and (thus Deleuze and Guattari's
mutable process
fondness for Kafka and Beckett, whose work they
characterise in terms of 'stammering',
'dryness', 'sobriety', and a 'willed poverty'). Deleuze and Guattari's first characteristic
of minor literature is thus that it effects language "with a high coefficient of
deterritorialisation. " (K: 16). To explain this it is
necessary to elucidate the difference
between major and minor language.
For Deleuze and Guattari, language is never a distinct and innocent universal
plane of human relation that can be considered in itself outside of particular material
assemblages. Language is not 'representation' but is as much a material form as any
more apparently 'concrete' practice or process (though it has no priniary structuring
agency), and is hence immanent to the system of relations that actualise configurations of
matter, or assemblages (as with Foucault (1970), it is the composition of the milieu that
counts, not any 'words and things' distinction). 8 A 'major language' is not an
autonomous language, but a language that is immanent to the formation of molar identity
(though one of the characteristics of major language is that it is naturalised, not least by
linguistic 'science', as a distinct practice). It operates in terms of constants, universals,
standardisation, and regularised grammar: it composes 'territory'. A 'minor language',
on the other hand, is any language immanent to the process of 'deterritorialisation' of
molar identity. It is less a process of communication between identities than creation
across and against identities. But the minor does not designate a different language as

7 This will be clearer in the empirical chapters. For

example, in Chapter 6 IWW songs and newspapers
(expression) are seen to be immanent to practices of community building and tactic dispersal (content).
8 Deleuze and Guattari (1988: 83) put it like this: "A type of statement can be evaluated only as a function
of its pragmatic implications, in other words, in relation to the implicit presuppositions, immanent acts, or
incorporeal transformations it expresses and which introduce new configurations of bodies. " Following
Henri Gobard, Kafka identifies four forms of language in terms of their territoriality and effects:
'vernacular' as local and rural, 'vehicular' as urban governmental associated with business and
bureaucracy, 'referential' of a culture and its frame of sense-making, and 'mythic' as a spiritual language
on the limits of cultures. Importantly, no national language can be identified as exclusively of one form. in
Kafka's time for example, the different languages of German, Czech, Yiddish, and English operated in
varying degrees of dominance in each of these forms. German, for example, was the vehicular
bureaucratic language, whilst also, through Goethe, being a cultural referential language.

57
such. Minor languagesare not ghettoisedlanguagesof minorities that exist as self-
identical reflections of autonomouscommunities- if the people are missing, they can
never be 'at home' in a language,but rather always live in a languagethat is 'not their
own' (hence Kafka, a Prague Jew, writes in German). Minor languagesinsteaddescribe
different fittictions, and insofar as they are political practices, treatmentsof a major
language(whetherit is a 'majority' or a 6n-tinority'language):"Minor languagesdo not
exist in themselves: they only exist in relation to a major language and are also
investmentsof that languagefor the purpose of making it minor." (ATP: 105) The
different techniquesand characteristicsof minor languagevary in different authors, but
essentiallyit is characterisednot by constants,but by 'continuous variation'. Minor
languagesrestrict constantsand overload and extend variables (though, it seems, more
with sobrietyand dryness Beckett and Kafka, than excessand exuberance - Joyce (K :
-
19)), such that one is not positionedwithin constants,but rather they are 'sidestepped'
(ATP: 104). Deleuze(1994a: 25) writes: "as in music the minor mode refers to
...
dynamiccombinationsin a stateof perpetualdisequilibrium."
DeleuzeandGuattari often use the exampleof 'ghetto languages'. For example,
the language of American black popular culture is presented not as an autonomous
'Black' language (or even a distinct 'patois') as other to English, but as a minoring of
English, a 'Black English' (cf. ATP: 104). Kafka (1954) himself exemplifies the point in
his description of Yiddish theatre. He presents Yiddish as a "tangle" in "continuous flux"
without coherent grammar (382). Though Yiddish is of course a language in itself, for
Kafka its importance is as a composite form, and mode of practice:

It consists solely of foreign words. But these words are not firmly rooted in it, they

retain the speed and liveliness with which they were adopted. Great migrations
move through Yiddish, from one end to the other. All this German, Hebrew, French,
English, Slavonic, Dutch, Rumanian, and even Latin, is seized with curiosity and
frivolity once it is contaminated with Yiddish, and it takes a good deal of strength to
hold all these languages together in this state.... (Kafka 1954: 382)

And this language has effects on identity. Kafka suggests that the mode of engagement
with Yiddish, mutating tangle that it is, is not only more one of 'intuition' than 'sense' (as

representation), but, in this, is a process of deterritorialisation of the subject:

You begin to come quite close to Yiddish if you bear in mind that apart from what
you know there are active in yourselves forces and associations with forces that
enable you to understand Yiddish intuitively... But once Yiddish has taken hold of
you and moved you - and Yiddish is everything, the words, the Chasidic melody,
and the essentialcharacterof this East European Jewish actor himself - you will have
forgotten your former reserve. Then you will come to feel the true unity of

58
 Yiddish, and so strongly that it will frighten you, yet it will no longer be fear of
Yiddish but of yourselves. (385-6)

The minor, then, is not a questionof who one is, but where one is situatedvis--
vis a particular set of identities, relations, practices,and languages,and what one does
with this situation. One is always 'in the middle' of a major language,working with a set
of conditionsandpossibilitiesthat this languageoffers. Inasmuchas one feels cramped,
and seeksto expressa different community, the minor is a processof forming relations
with theseconditionsthat deterritorialisethem,or causethem to mutateas somethingnew
is created:

One must find the minor language, tile dialect or rather idiolect, on the basis of
which one can make one's own major language minor.... It is in one's own
language that one is bilingual or multilingual. Conquer the major language in
order to delineate in it as yet unknown minor languages. Use the minor language to
send the major language racing. (ATP: 105)

Jean Genet describes the creativity and politics of George Jackson's (1971)
Prison Letters in these terms,9 but, so as to stress the non-exclusively literary focus of
rriinor literature, a different example is useful. Genet (1989) reports the radical effects
(what I translate here into Deleuzian terms) produced in a television interview with the
Black Panther Party's Bobby Scale, filmed in San Quentin prison. Whatever the motives
behind the Californian authorities' decision to let the film be broadcast, one can not really
doubt that the arrangement had a rather heavy majoritarian tendency (it was certainly not
the BPP's normal territory or mode of expression). And indeed, as Seale responds to the
first question about food with detailed descriptions of his mother's and his wife's
cooking, Genet reports being "shattered" at seeing "the revolutionary leader" reduced to
"talking like a chef'. But then, "suddenly", he understood that Seale was not talking to
him, that this was not a 'broad'-cast. He had misunderstood the process because he was
not part of the community being created. The exchange did not reduce Seale to a
decontextualised imprisoned revolutionary (molar form). Rather, the familiarity, ease,
and loving detail of his account was part of the formation of lines of connection with his
community (within and against this most major of forms, the TV talking-head). Because
of this line and its direct affective links, when Seale moved to talk about politics Genet
perceived effects that broke any representational major form (where Seale would be either
'chef', or decontextualised 'revolutionary'):

9"He has then only one recourse: to accept [the enemy's] language but to
corrupt it so skilfully that the
white men are caught in his trap. To accept it in all its richness, to increase that richness still further, and
to suffuse it with all his obsessions and all his hatred of the white man. That is a task.... words will no
longer serve concepts inculcated by the whites, but new concepts. " (Genet in Jackson 1971: 22)

59
 Then suddenly - and it was suddenly, again - both his face and his voice hardened.
And to all the Blacks listening in the ghetto he addressedrevolutionary slogans all
the more open and uncompromising becausethe saucesrecommended at the outset
had been so smooth. The political messagewas brief. Bobby had won. So much
so that the television channel had to give the film a secondshowing. (1989: 216)

Minor literature,then,deterritorialiseslanguage.Onecan imaginethis in terms of

C, :D
literary andcultural creation,and also theoreticalcreation(deterritorialising,for example,
forms of orthodox Marxism with conceptsthat emergethrough it, but that describeflux
and non-identitarian relations). But it is not just on the 'literary' level that
deterritorialisationis important. The importanceof deterritorialisationas a first principle
is that it emphasisesprocessesof becomingin and againstthe stratificationsof identity,
rather than the affirmation of a marginal identity. Gone is any existential or political
securityof a ghettoisedmargin. Deleuzeis indeedsomewhatcontemptibleof such states:
"Marginals havealwaysinspired fear in us, and a slight horror. They are not clandestine
enough." (D: 139)10Marginals in this senseare those who appreciatethe cramping force
of major forms, but, rather than chooseto engagewith these relations, seek instead to
carveout an autonomousidentity againstthem, shoring up their own particularity against
the world. This is perhapsthe greatestthreatto the minoritarian becoming of minority
groups, who after deterritorialising major identity (as cultural or national minority,
worker, heterosexualand so on) can easily reterritorialise around particular minority
identity (as self-affirming - and outside-excluding- minority-Nationalist, Communist,
Anarchist, Feminist, Homosexual and so on). Camatte (1995), who is particularly
attentive to such dangers in the proletarian movement, has seen this as a pervasive
tendency. He arguesthat leftist organisationstend to composethemselvesas particular
identity through faith in a seriesof conceptualabstractionswith internal coherenceto a
particularpolitical model. In this, a political 'racket' tendsto coalescein terms of what it
collectively self-affirms itself to be rather than in terms of its critical practices, what it
does, as internal differencesare subsumedaround particular models in an 'authentic'
unity in opposition to external relations (be they social forces or other rackets).
Coherenceand intemal hierarchy (be it formal or informal; cf. Freeman n.d.) are
produced around attraction points of central characters,revered texts, or sanctioned
practices,and enforcedthrough the motive power of political 'commitment'. Ultimately

10In a passagethat is worth citing at length, Deleuzecontinues:"in any case, they scare me. There is a
molecularspeechof madness,or of the drug addict or the delinquent in vivo which is no more valid than
the great discourses of a psychiatrist in vitro. There is as much self-assurance on the former's part as
certainty on the latter's part. It is not the marginalswhich create the lines; they install themselves on
these lines and make them their property,and this is fine when they have that strange modesty of men of
the line, the prudenceof the experimenter,but it is a disaster when they slip into a black hole from which
they no longer utter anything but the micro-fascist speech of their dependency and their giddiness: 'We
are the avant-garde','We are the marginals'."

60
the racketmanifeststhe organisationalandidentitarianforms of capitalist society at large -
only, so often, more so.II

The particular and the social in minor composition

Summing up so far, the minor emergesin a crampedspacewhere major languagesare
comPlexified, reduced, mixed, assembledto break their representationalfunction, so
turning them into sites of creation againstidentity (i. e. deterritorialisation). I can now
consider in more detail how this manifests in minor composition by exploring the
relationshipof the particularandthe social.
In the work of major literatures,autonomous,'particular', or individual concerns
are able to soar into a self-actualising grandeur since the social exists as a mere
backgroundor environment facilitator of the molar individual form. Of course these
-a
individual concernsmeetwith others,in a 'society' of sorts. But society here is only of
the most liberal democraticform - individuals in communication- since each individual
concernis on a similar scale,asan 'exclusive disjunction' (either this identity, or that, but
neverin between)with a closetedinterior space:

In major literatures the individual concern (familial, marital, and so on) joins with
...
other no less individual concerns, the social milieu serving as a mere environment or
a background; this is so much the case that none of these Oedipal intrigues are
specifically indispensable or absolutely necessary but all become one in a large
space. (K: 17)

In minor literatures, on the other hand, the social milieu is everything. There are
'individual concerns', but it is an individuality comprised of a conjunction of many
different individual concerns of different forms and scales cramped and interlaced
together, which are subject to a "multiplicity of interpretations" (Kafka 1972: 149).
Because there is no autonomous identitarian space, these individual concerns are
composed of, and work on social forces. There are two aspectsof this socially traversed
particularity that needto be consideredin detail.

11Highlightingthis process, Luther Blissett (1997) and Blissettand Home (n.d.) have recently argued that
the self-declarationof 'anarchist' has becomeenough of an entry card to an 'integral' anarchism that the
apparent identity protects against critical interrogation, such that a wealth of reactionary theories and
groups can exist under the broad banner. Notable here is the Green Anarchist Network, where a purist
distinction between those 'in' and those 'against' the system of capital even includes claimants who
struggleagainst the JobseekersAllowanceas part of the problem inasmuchas they seek to survive within
capitalism,and where, in the Anarchist Lancaster Bomber,the suggestion is made for the necessity for
populationculls in order to have a more ecologicalrelation to the earth. If this is a process of formation
through inclusion,an exampleat the other extreme is the InternationalCommunistCurrent, which excels
in a process of protecting its historic identity through the exclusions and denunciations of all who differ
from it as'parasitical' (cf. for example ICC 1999:3; and for a critique, McIver 1999).

61
The particular and inclusive disjunction First, in minor literaturethere is a move
away from grandthemes,traditions,and projectstoward a focus on particular, quotidian,
'minor' detail. Of this literatureof small peoplesKafka writes:

There is universal delight in the literary treatment of petty themes whose scope is
not permitted to exceed the capacity of small enthusiasmsand which are sustained
by their polemical possibilities. Insults, intended as literature, roll back and forth.
What in great literature goes on down below, constituting a not indispensable cellar
of the structure, here takes place in the full light of day, what is there a matter of
passing interest for a few, here absorbs everyone no less as a matter of life and
death. (1972: 150)

Leaving aside the question of polemic for the moment, here Kafka suggests that the
importanceof the quotidian 'petty theme' is amplified to a matterof 'life anddeath', yet at
the sametime it is kept from exceedingits position as a 'small enthusiasm'as it is unable
to hook up to normativestructuresthat would enablethe easy passageor elevationof the
particularinto a grandautonomousevent in the erectionof a 'language' or a 'work'. 12 1
have alreadyexplainedthe basis of this 'inability' in terms of crampedspace,so now
want to look at how the 'petty theme' works.
This mode of engagementwith particularities, and the effects it has on the
communityis describedby Deleuzeand Guattarias a processof 'inclusive disjunction'. 13
Deleuzeand Guattari frequently use Beckett to explain this process. Beckett does not
presenta vast array of characterand intrigue, and neither is his composition of individual
autonomousforms. Insteadhe movesinto the intricaciesof an apparentlysimple plane of
life. For example,in Beckett's (1954) most successfulplay, the eponymousGodot never
arrives, leaving us instead with a series of quotidian moments (where the 'end' or
treason' is suspendedthrough the almost masochisticdeferral of Godot's arrival (cf.
Deleuze 1991)). We encounterthe first character,Estragon,involved in a simple process
that he starts, stops exhausted,and starts again, before uttering an apparentclosure in
openingthe play:

12 Thus minor literature does not operate in conditions of conventional literary production. Kafka talks of
Ischools' and 'magazines' as the site for the polemic, debate, and contestation of minor literatures.
13 Anti-Oedipus describes three 'syntheses' of desiring relations: the connective synthesis of production,
the disjunctive synthesis of recording, and the conjunctive synthesis of consumption-consummation.
The exploration of these three syntheses is one of the most difficult parts of the book, and I can not
properly elaborate here. Essentially, though, the first synthesis is the site of the undifferentiated 'flow' of
desiring production, the second is the recording 'break' of desiring production that inscribes production on
a surface (the Body without Organs) as a series of disjunctions, and the third is the deepening of the
subject through a localisation of sensual pleasure and a demarcation of disjunctions. Operating together
the three syntheses describe the production and investments of subjectivity in a social system, all of
which are indispensable, but all have approaches that tend toward the more minor or the more molar. The
inclusive-disjunctive relation is the "greatest paradox" (AM 76) - the abstract extreme or limit-point of
becoming. Its importance is to show how desiring production (rather than 'interest') can operate in an
affirmative rather than oedipalising or identitarian way once disjunctions are already produced (since
minor processes operate in relatively molar social systems, and disjunction, in any case, is necessary for
abstract life to be lived).

62
 A country road. A tree.
Evening.
Estragon, sitting on a low mound, is trying to take off his boot. He

pulls at it with both hands, panting. He gives up, exhausted, rests,

tries again.
As before.
Enter Vladimir.
ESTRAGON: (giving up again). Nothing to be done. (1954: 6-7)

But Beckett's quotidian focus is important not so much as a space (something like a
6poetry of the everyday'), but as a particular mode of engagement where even the most
simple situation (or demarcated 'disjunction') is still a composite form to be explored,
reiterated, and reconfigured. Thus Deleuze suggests that Beckett's characters 'exhaust'
the possible variations of a situation in a continual process of combination without order,
preference, or end: "one combines the set of variables and perinutations of a situation, on
the condition that one renounce any order of preference, any organisation in relation to a
goal, any signification. " (1997a: 153) This is Anti-Oedipus' 'inclusive disjunction'. The
exclusive disjunctions of "decisive choices between immutable terms" as an "either/or"
formula (where each disjunction is "closet[ted] inside its own terms" (A(E: 78)) are
...
replaced with an inclusive disjunction of "either or or" of continuous movement
... ...
and relation across the disjunctions (Aff: 12).
This relation 'across' disjunctions is not an Hegelian manoeuvre of a new
synthesis of identity from the disjunctions (Aff: 76), neither is it a simple affin-nation of
'flow'. The disjunctions do not subsume in a new form; the differences between them
are maintained. But, as they are placed in relation with each other in continuously
reconfiguring permutations, a process of deindividualisation occurs that breaks the
structures of exclusive disjunctions. The net effect of such inclusive disjunctions is the
construction of an intensive milieu that is never autonomous in itself, but always
composed of different variables in ever-new configurations. However small, personal,
or individual such a milieu, it is still always characterised by a combinatorial process.
Particularities and anomalies are not seen as alien bodies to be synthesised or negated (as
if a 'better', more 'appropriate' disjunction could be found), rather they are to be actively
engagedwith. As the engagement with the disjunctions (everything in a milieu that can in
some way be embodied or used) accelerates,the components of a group (its members,
theories, literatures, concepts) lose their distinct identities in a space of experimentation
and reconfiguration (in the involution of a world and a subject in each other). Even the
smallest intrigue becomes connected, debated, affirmed, negated, but above all, 'taken
up' within the milieu.
At the extremes the process affirms the infinite virtual within any particular actual,
as in Nietzsche's delirious formula, "every name in history is V (cited in AM 21) (where
each name signifies a state of being, a zone of intensity that is affirmed as part of a

63
reconfiguring seriesthat the 'subject' traverses). The extremeis evident too in Deleuze
and Guattari'saccountof the 'schizophrenic'process:

[The schizophrenic] is and remains in disjunction: he does not abolish disjunction

by identifying the contradictory elements by means of elaboration; instead, he
affirms it through a continuous overflight spanning an indivisible distance. He is
not simply bisexual, or between the two, or intersexual. He is transsexual. He is
trans-alivedead,trans-parentchild. He does not reduce two contraries to an identity
of the same-,he affirms their distance as that which relates the two as different. He
does not confine himself inside contradictions; on the contrary, he opens out and,
like a spore caseinflated with spores,releasesthem as so many singularities that he
had improperly shut off (A(E: 76-7)
...

However, minority inclusive disjunctive processes,crampedas they are, never reachthis

extremelimit-point. In practice they are more pragmatic and situated. Hence, with a
more groundedfocus,Bensmah (1994: 214-5) describesthe processsuchthat "Literature
no longer begins with man in general ... but rather with this particular man or that
particular woman...... where the particular, even at its smallest levels (even in an
apparentlyevent-lessspace)is itself a complex inclusive disjunction. Hence Kafka's
4particularity'is actuallyan inclusive seriesas"a Jew, a Czech, one who speaksYiddish
and Czechbut writes in Germanin a Pragueghetto...")4
The minor, then,displaysan intricate attentionto, and affirmation of differencein
the particularquotidian relationsthat a body finds itself crampedwithin, as a series of
ever-new configurations and movements. It is at once an assertion of the 'indispensable'
importanceof the marginalquotidianevent (a matterof 'life and death'), and a refusal to
ossify any pailicular configuration (so that it can not exceed a 'small enthusiasm').
Indeed it raises the importance of the marginal event by affirming processes of
complication and expansion within it. The minor, then, is intimately aware of its
tsituations', the complex assemblageswithin which minorities are formed, and it is' an
intensiveengagementwith themto draw out elementsthat can be used and reconfigured.
It as if without an autonomous space of manoeuvre, every disjunction triggers an
intensive vibration, some kind of rhizomatic domino-effect, such that "everything" in
"is
minor composition political" (K. 17). One reachesboundaries,intrigues interconnect
and multiply, nothing can stand alone. In this way Deleuzeand Guattari seek to show
how desiring processescan break from investmentin identitarianforms and practices
(mummy-daddy-me,boss- for oneselfand others,race,and nation to namethe dominant
investmentsthey describe)andcometo invest the flows of the socius (a necessarymove
since the basis of their is
politics not the manifestationor critique of 'political interest',

14 Guattari (1996: 220) writes of Genet (who, in the best traditions of the minor, always sought to break
from being a purely 'literary' figure) in similar terms: "His writing resulted not in a dialectical uplifting, but an
exacerbation of his contradictions and upheavals. "

64
'ideology', or 'consciousness',but the active assemblingof, and investmentin the flows
of life (cf. ME: 104-5)).

The social and the line of flight The particular individual concern is thus not a
productof a demarcatedidentity, but of relationsacrossidentities, territories, and forms.
This is not so much a suggestion that 'the personal is political', but rather that the
personalis alwaysalreadycoextensivewith varied and diversesocial relations. Thus, the
secondpoint to stressabout the particular in minor literature is its intimate relationship
with social forces. If it is concernedwith minor detail and small intrigue, this is far from
a parochial concern. Indeed, the parochial is a much more fitting characterisationof
nzajor literatures since, in as much as they flourish in a social environment, major
literaturesleavesocial forces largely unproblematised. Since, for minor literature, social
forces fully traverseand cranip minority milieu, social, even global concernsare their
very substance- the site of their deterritorialisation. Thus, if the minor tends to
deterritorialise'sense' (as Kafka was seen to say about Yiddish), this in terms of the
identities that are composedin sensible, molar regimes. The minor does not signify
nonsensebut non-identity. Indeed,in as much as the deterritorialisationof identity is an
engagementwith the 'real', it is immanentto a greater understandingof the world.15
Pursuing this minor relation to the social, Deleuzeand Guattari (1986: 41,95)
point out that what made Kafka most indignant was being presentedas a writer of
intimacy and solitudewithdrawn from the world. Indeed they suggestthat Kafka-studies
only truly beganwhencritics noticedthe importanceof the 'double flux' of his belonging
to the strong bureaucracyof the Workmen's Accident Insurance Institution, and his
attraction to Prague's socialist and anarchist movements:

from one end to the other, he is a political author, prophet of the future world,
...
because he has two poles that he will know how to unify in a completely new
assemblage:far from being a writer withdrawn into his room, Kafka finds that his
room offers him a double flux, that of bureaucrat with a great future ahead of him,
plugged into real assemblagesthat are in the processof coming into shape,and that
of a nomad who is involved in fleeing things in the most contemporary way and
who plugs into socialism, anarchism,social movements.(K: 41)

By situating Kafka at this 'double flux' of 'most contemporary' forms of 'work' and
4socialmovements' Deleuze and Guattari are suggesting two very important aspects of the
minor relationship to the social. First, the minor is specifically concerned with the
intricacies of modern capitalist social arrangements. Thus, in comparison with the
definition of major literature given above, Deleuze and Guattari write:

15 Writing of fetishism, value, and common sense in Marx, Deleuze (1994: 207-8) says that every
'solution' to a social problem is doubled with a 'false problem' where the identities produced in social

65
 Minor literature is completely different; its cramped space forces each individual
intrigue to connect immediately to politics. The individual concern thus becomes
all the more necessary, indispensable, magnified, because a whole other story is
vibrating within it. In this way, the family triangle connects to other triangles -
commercial, economic, bureaucratic,juridical - that determine its values. (K: 17)

Kafka does not, then, write abstracttreatiseson becoming, but explores the modes of
composition of these commercial,economic, and bureaucratic forces (especially in the
novels) and displays a continuing fascinationwith maids, servants, workers, judges,
bureaucrats,lawyers, bailiffs, and technical machines(all of which are part of social
machines). Second,moving to the other side of Kafka's 'double flux', politics does not
develop an ideal form or model that it seeks to manifest, nor does it abstractly affirm
4everyname in history', but rather it is brought forth around a 'most contemporary'
problematisationof thesesocial forces, which is marked here as the 'social movements'
of anarchismand socialism,but which I will call communismso asto easemy argument.
There are two aspectsto this politics. First, it is contemporaryproblems which
startthe political process.Thus, Deleuze and Guattari (1988: 470-1) write: "Once again,
this is not to say that the struggleon the level of the axioms is without importance;on the
contrary,it is determining(at the most diverse levels: women's struggle for the vote, for
abortion, for jobs )." Essentiallypragmaticprocessthat the minor is, minorities could
...
be expectedto begin with major forms they felt most pressing, or that offered some
possibility for movement, and hence are likely to begin through already existing
problematisations or movements (cf. Massumi 1992: 102-3). Yet, to considerthe second
aspect, this is only the start of the process. The minor is only actualisedinsofar as these
major forms are deterritorialised, and hence the passagecontinues: "But there is also
alwaysa sign to indicatethat thesestrugglesarethe index of another,coexistentcombat".
This 'other coexistentcombat' is the generalprocess of deterritorialisationthat is the
essence of life (and is seen in the minor processes described so far). But
deterritorialisationonly emergeswithin social systems,eachof which engineersits own
lines of deterritorialisation,such that there are "objective lines [or deterritorialisations]
which cut across society" (Deleuze 1997: 189). If the minor is an engagementwith social
forces and begins from problematisationsof particular crampedsocial sites, the second
aspectof Kafka's 'double flux' does not simply link the minor to deterritorialisationin the
abstract,or to situatedsocial movementsin general,but to social movementsthat seek to
engagewith the 'objective' lines of flight immanent to the social system (communism).
This crucial point needs elaborating. Deleuzeand Guattari's affirmation of the
primacy of flows and differencerather than identity is such that identity is 'warded off'
through the prinzary processesof lines of flight (what I have more frequently called

regimes become objective truths in social consciousness (such that "[tlhe natural object of social

66
creation,deterritorialisation,or politics). For this reasonDeleuzeand Guattari write that
"... the diagram and abstractmachinehave lines of flight that are primary, which are not
phenomenaof resistanceor counterattackin an assemblage,but cutting edges of
" (ATP: 531) Assemblagesare thus determinedas much as by what
deterritorialisation.
escapesthem, as by what they fix. This primacy is often posed against a Marxist
affirmation of the primacy of 'contradiction' (for example,ATP: 216). Yet whilst it is
true that Deleuzeand Guattari's conceptionof flight challengesa simple bi-polarity of
contradictions(forces of production/ relationsof production, bourgeoisie/ proletariat),
this is not such a profound differencewith Marx. For Marx and Deleuzeand Guattari,
capitalismis a radically transformativesocial systemthat is premised on lines of flight; it
was born through a new meansof mobilising and conjoining flows of money and flows
of labour. Politics is not an assertionof a class or marginal identity, but is a processof
engagementwith these 'objective' line of flight (of people, ideas, relations, machinesin
mutual interrelation,that lead an assemblageelsewhere).But inasmuchas an assemblage
'works' in a social system, its lines of flight are functional to it (they are not in
themselvesrevolutionary). Thus politics seeksto engineertheseflows differently, and in
a sense,pushthem further or take them elsewhere.This is why for Marx the communist
movementneedsto follow a path through the flows of capitalism, not opposean identity
to it, and why DeleuzeandGuattarisuggestthat minorities do not so much createlines of
flight, as attachthemselvesto them (cf. Deleuzeand Pamet 1987:43).
The communistmovementis of course not the only site of escape,or movement
to attach itself to social lines of flight, and that it has so often been the site of
reterritorialisationis notedby Kafka, suchthat his relation to the workersmovementis, at
most, tangential. 16 Nevertheless, insofar as "[Kafka] didn't 'flee the world"' but
"[r]ather, it was the world and its representationthat he madetakeflight" (K: 46-7), and
insofar as the minor seeks "to bring to bear the force of the non-denumerablesets,
however small they may be, against the denumerablesets" (the plane of which is

consciousness or common sense with regard to the recognition of value is the fetish.")
161tis worth saying a little about Kafka's personal relations with socialist and anarchist movements. As
he reports to Janouch (1971: 86), an incident in his youth when his family cook playfully called him a
Ravachol (the name of a French anarchist, though he knew this only later, being told at the time that it
meant murderer and criminal) left him with a lasting "groundless sense of guilt" such that he says "I knew
that I was an Ishmael, a criminal, in short -a ravachol. " (89) Later he studied in depth the lives and ideas
of the historical figures of anarchism, and frequented various circles and meetings, including in 1910, the
anarchist Club of the Young. He says that he "devoted much time and money to the subject" (90). But his
relationship is clearly not a simple one of identity with these movements (as one would expect of a minor
author). A sense of ambiguity is clear in this section form Janouch: [The anarchists] all attempted to
realise the happiness of mankind without the aid of Grace. But -,' Kafka lifted both arms like a pair of
broken wings and let the fall helplessly, 'I could not march shoulder to shoulder with them for long. '" (90).
Kafka also says that he knows the Czech anarchists "A little", but, "very nice, jolly people" that they are,
he has trouble taking their radical pretensions seriously. And when coming across a workers march he
says: "These people are so self-possessed, so self-confident and good-humoured. They rule the streets,
and therefore think they rule the world. In fact, they are mistaken. Behind them already are the
secretaries, officials, professional politicians, and all the modern satraps for whom they are preparing the
way to power... At the end of every truly revolutionary development there appears a Napoleon Bonaparte. "
And in response to Janouch's questioning of his feelings about an expansion of the Russian Revolution,
Kafka says: "As a flood spreads wider and wider, the water becomes shallower and dirtier. The Revolution
evaporates, and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy. The chains of tormented mankind are
made of red tape. " (119-20)

67
capitalisin as a whole) (A TP: 47 1), the framework set up in Kafka's 'double flux' has
affinity with the communist perspective. This is not so much because of the concrete
manifestations of communist practice (though Kafka and Deleuze and Guattari have
relations to this), but because of their similar approach to the social processes of
deterritorialisation (where politics emerges from the social, seeks to deterritorialise the
social by starting from particular intrigues, and attaches itself to objective social lines of
flight; such that in Kafka's case, for example, the exploration of animal-becomings is a
fully social and political project). It is this situation of Kafka's 'double flux' that I would
suggest is the basis for Deleuze and Guattari's alignment of the minor with the proletariat
(ATP: 472), following their argument that the criteria of "proletarian literature" "are
obviously difficult to establish if one doesn't start with a more objective concept - that of
minor literature. " (K- 18)

The collective, the singular, and the minor author-function

Expression and composition are not opposed in minor literature; "living and writing, art
and life, are opposed only from the point of view of major literature. " (K: 41) The
creative process is thus immanent to the process of composition, and hence has been the
general subject of the chapter. But though the argument has now been largely made, I
want to consider the role of the minor author (or 'creator'), and her relation to the
collective. There are two models of literary or creative composition that Deleuze and
Guattari refute: collective 'representation', and the individual 'master' author. If in this
production "everything takes on a collective value" (K: 17) this is not because the rninor
author is an "ethnologist of his people" (Deleuze 1989: 222). Such a model of authorship
is still be based on an archetype of 'consciousness' as the knowledge of conditions and
truths of a particular group situation, and a fully present people that the author would
express - and we have seen that the people are missing. Deleuze (1989: 220) writes:

The death-knell for becoming conscious was precisely the consciousness that there

were no people, but always several peoples, an infinity of peoples, who remained to
be united, or should not be united, in order for the problem to change.

But neither is the author an individual 'master'. Each authorial moment is not the product
of an autonomous author committing his experiences to prose, but is rather a complex
elaboration and proliferation of the collective intrigue as it is expressed in particular
moments by particular authors. It is a 'collective enunciation' that emerges in the
crampedconditionsof a culture:

Indeed, precisely becausetalent isn't abundant in a minor literature, there are no

possibilities for an individuated enunciation that would belong to this or that
'master' and that could be separatedfrom a collective enunciation. Indeed, scarcity
of talent is in fact beneficial and allows the conception of something other than a

68
 literature of masters; what each author says individually already constitutes a
common action, and what he or she says or does is necessarily political, even if
others aren't in agreement.(K: 17)

Yet this is not to say that there is no space for innovation or singularity - far from it. The
author is both of the milieu that s/he actualises 'collectively' and, in as much as the people
are missing or lack coherence, is in a position to express a different configuration, a
different sensibility unconstrained by a fixed identity (and relatively freed from the weight
of tradition that would come with a coherent people). The author is both part of the actual
(community), but also draws out the virtual (the community to come) within the
community and the social (cf. Bensmaa 1994: 217). At the same time, because there is
no space for the elevation of master authors (cramped as the community is), the author
function is distributed across the milieu, such that the collective and the author are both
implicated in each other, in a process of continuous feed-back (a position evident in
Deleuze's (1989: 221) expression: "The arteries of the people to which I belong, or the

people of my arteries...").
The minor author function is thus a reversal of that identified by Barthes and
Foucault as that which functions to produce a coherent and regular individual oeuvre.
Minor literature tends to emerge in what Kafka (1972: 148) describes as the "incessant
bustle" of "magazines" and "schools" in a series of ever-new and changing 'borderlines'

or 'anomalous' points that incorporate and amplify difference in a community. The minor

author is like the 'subject' of this account of the 'pack-form', only it is a characteristic of
all elements of the pack:

I ain on the edge of the crowd, at the periphery; but I belong to it, I ant attached to
it by one of iny extremities,a hand or a foot. I know that the periphery is the only
I
place can be, that I would die if I let myself be drawn into the centre of the fray,
but just as certainly if I let go of the crowd. (ATP: 29)

There is, as Kafka (1972: 150) writes, plenty of space for polemic. Or as Guattari (1998:
196) puts it: "It's not a question of creating agreement; on the contrary, the less we agree,
the more we create an area, a field of vitality... " But if polemic and disagreement are not
to end up producing what Camatte (1995) called 'rackets' (closed in on themselves), they
need to tend to be sites of productive borderlines, not of self-certainty and exclusive
disjunction (for all groups, this is a real test). Thus, if the author-function is situated on
the periphery, between the community and the outside, it is driven be the concerns of the
limited community, but also by the relations that cross it. 17 In this sense the authorial
moment, just as the general form of minor composition, is an engagement with an outside

17 "Sometimes it is a specific animal that draws and occupies the borderline, as leader of the pack.
Sometimes the borderline is defined or doubled by a being of another nature that no longer belongs to the

69
that is almost 'forced' rather than 'chosen', but that finds in such engagement,new
relations,new inclusive disjunctions.

Creation against resistance (Deleuze and Foucault)

As shouldbe clear by now, the minor is not a theory of 'resistance',but of creation. The
conceptof resistancehashad someprominencein postmodernpolitical discourse, as if it
conveys a situatednessand a more modest remit than the classic modern paradigm of
class struggle. This focus has often, if implicitly, been associatedwith Foucault (no
doubt this has been aidedby Foucault's refusal to link his work to the grand project of
Marxism'8). Oncethe more malevolentcritiquesof Foucault (that he foreclosedpolitics
in a disciplinary archipelago)were overcome,19his name has come to signify not only
our times of micropowers,but also our appropriatepolitical response(seeing, as he did,
that a "multiplicity of points of resistanceare present everywhere in the power
...
network" (1980: 95)). Yet this idea of resistanceis problematic (and actually a poor
reading of Foucault). Before concluding this chapter, I want to briefly return to this
questionof resistancein Foucault,or ratherin Deleuze'sinterpretationof it, to emphasise
how the minor challengesa theory of resistance,and show how Deleuze's and Foucault's
politics might relate.20
The problematic of resistance is a persistent theme in Deleuze's engagement with
Foucault. The great resonance between Deleuze's and Foucault's work (cf. N: 85) is
such that it would be a stupid move indeed to pose this question in terms of a serious
disjunction. It is much better to think of it as a productive differential in their relation, as
the fact of Deleuze's not infrequent return to the subject conveys. The nub of Deleuze's
argument is that in his latter years Foucault had a sense of becoming "trapped in

something he hated" (N. 109), namely 'power': that Foucault felt he was "getting locked
into the play of forces" that he had mapped and that "he needed 'some opening"'(N: 92,
109). Deleuze thus attaches considerable importance to Foucault's eight year break in
book publication after the first volume of The History of Sexuality (Deleuze talks of this

pack, or never belonged to it, and that represents a power of another order, potentially acting as a threat
as well as a trainer, outsider, etc." (ATP 245-6)
18 Foucault's 'anti-Marxism' is misconceived if it is seen as a refusal of a serious and wide ranging political
project. If anything, Foucault's problem with Marxism is that it is not radical enough (being caught, as he
sees it, in the nineteenth century paradigm of Man (Foucault 1970: 262)). It is thus noteworthy that
Foucault also presents Marx alongside the privileged figure of Nietzsche as a force that decenters
anthropology and humanism, albeit one that is continually subject to reterritorialisations: "One is led
therefore to anthropologise Marx, to make him a historian of totalities, and to rediscover in him the
message of humanism; one is led therefore to interpret Nietzsche in the terms of transcendental
philosophy and to reduce his genealogy to the level of a search for origins... " (Foucault 1972: 13)
19 Bringing together the two dominant misinterpretations of Foucault that the 'death of man' was a
-
nihilism, and that Foucault's later works marked a 'return to the subject' - Deleuze writes that
misinterpretations are never innocent, they're mixtures of stupidity and malevolence" (N: 99).
20 1 am only reading this problematic from Deleuze's perspective, not 'objectively' assessing the
accuracy of his reading of Foucault. It is beyond the scope of this thesis to approach the question
through Foucault's work. It is worth noting, though, that if Foucault had problems with the question of
resistance, he did not feel the need to respond directly to Deleuze's interpretation. Perhaps there is some
truth in Deleuze's rather touching comment after Foucault's death about their relation: "I needed him much
more than he needed me" (N. 83).

70
as a "generalcrisis" (N: 83)), when the planned structure of the series was suspended
(eventhough the researchwas probably mostly completed(N: 108-9)), and from where
emerges Volumes 11 and III around the new paradigm of 'subjectification', and
'techniquesof the self' (in what Foucault (1982: 208) calls his third "mode of inquiry").
Deleuzeis rightly very careful to presentthis third dimensionas the product of the whole
of Foucault's work, as a "broken line" (N: 92) of invention, crisis, probing, blockage
(that itself is "the mark of [his thought's] creativity, the mark of its ultimate consistency"
(N: 83)), rather than as some kind of 'new Foucault' (it is "a creative crisis, not a
recantation"(N: 98)). However, it is clear that Deleuzesees this point as Foucault's
overcomingof theproblem of 'resistance'.
It is preciselyat this time of 'crisis' that Deleuzetakes it upon himself to pass on
to Foucault a seriesof notes on his interpretationof their similarities and differences-a
piece which circulatesaround the questionsof resistanceand the line of flight (Deleuze
1997).21 Of all Deleuze'scommentaryon Foucault, these notes are the most critical
(thoughthe essayfollows Deleuze'susualpracticeof drawing out lines of resonancewith
other works, here he also quite explicitly marks his and Foucault's differences).
Deleuze's argumentcentres around his positioning of the primacy of assemblagesof
desire (rather than power) and the centrality of lines of flight in the constitution of
assemblages(as I showedabove). Deleuzesuggeststhat, since for him lines of flight or
desiring relations are primary, and hencethe site of political composition, he "ha[s] no
needfor the statusof phenomenaof resistance"(189). In Foucault, on the other hand,
becausedispositifsof power are constitutive(and there appearsto be no equivalentof the
line of flight in his work), politics can only be a 'resistance'to power, and hencepolitics
is a strangelyunmotivated, almost reactive phenomena(188). Though in Volume I
Foucault (1980) presents three political possibilities (a fully situated set of micro-
resistancesthat work 'vis--vis' the dispositifs, a new conceptionof a counter politics of
truth, and the affirmation of 'bodies and pleasures'against 'sex'-identity), Deleuzesees
Foucaultgrapplingwith the problem of the 'status' of thesephenomena,the question of
wherethey come from, and he arguesthat "their character,their origin, their production
were still vague" (Deleuze 1997: 188; N: 98,109). Deleuze perceives this as most
evident in 'The life of Infamous Men' (which he frequently presents as both a
masterpiece,and as a text of the 'crisis' (N: 90,108)). Here Foucault (1979) grapples
with the problem of bringing little momentsof excess,crime, transgression(in the mid
seventeenthto mid eighteenthcentury) into analysiswithout losing their intensity. In the
past, he says "for want of the necessarytalent" these intensitieswere left outside his
analysis, yet he credits the vibration and intensity of these moments as a fundamental
driving force of his research(77). We can think of Foucault willing himself to do
something with this intensity, but his solution here is to simply present these little

71
transgressionsin picaresquefashion as they are lit, for brief moments, by power
relations. Their intensity is not theorised,but displayed.
However, once Foucault (1990,1992) moves into the problem of
'subjectification' and 'techniquesof the self' in Volumes 11 and III, Deleuze sees the
problem of resistanceovercome. He reads the new work as the full emergenceof a
problematicof the 'Outside' that pervadedall of Foucault's work, as itself the line of
flight, or the primacy of undeterminedforce in a kind of vitalism (N: 91). This is no
return of the subject, but an emphasison the ways power is deflected, opened, and a
space of the self-as-event (or series of events) is produced in 'foldin,, s' of the
Outside/forceand in the invention of 'styles of life' (N: 93,108-9,114-6). Thus,
Deleuze's(1988) readingof Foucault's work as a whole ends with a considerationof
'Foldings' and the 'Oven-nan'through a kind of Foucauldian 'primacy of resistance'
which has resonancewith his own emphasison composition (and includes noneof the
positioning of his and Guattari's differences to Foucault, that were evident before (cf.
Deleuze 1997;ATP: 530-1)).

Conclusion
'Resistance', then, is too plain a concept for minor politics. It is too binary, and not
intimate enough with the creative deterritorialising forces of the world. But this is not to
say that the minor is a simple affirmation of a people. Minor composition poses a direct
challenge to political models founded on a delineated identity where a particular people
with coherent consciousness seek to determine ordered programmes, concepts, histories,
and trajectories. Minor politics is seen in the processes of creation, composition, and
change within and across identities, programmes, and practices. It is an intensive

engagement with the forces and relations which traverse minorities, disrupting the
regimes of identity and equivalence which maintain a situation (a subject, a group, a
practice) in ordered, molar forms, and an opening to the potential or virtuality of the
world. One does not judge political movements by their successor failure - whether they
achieved a set of goals or not - because the minor has no final goal, "only stagnation can
do harm" (Kafka 1972: 148). This is not to say that creation is unrelated to intended
goals, or that this is a renunciation of the possibility of radical social change (in favour of
little creations). This would be a misunderstanding of Deleuze and Guattari's politics,
and one which Deleuze (1994: xx) suggests is the "greatest danger" of his invocation of
difference; letting it lapse "into the representations of a beautiful soul: there are only
reconcilable and federative differences, far removed from bloody struggles.1122But the
point is that the way to interpret political movements is to consider their major and n-dnor

21 Frangois Ewald (1994) explains how in 1977 Deleuze had entrusted these notes to him to pass them
on
to Foucault. Ewald describes the notes as not only unpublished, but as having something intimate,
secret, and confidential about them.
22 When Deleuze (1994: 207)
returns to this problem of misinterpretation of the philosophy of difference,
Marx becomes a mechanism forwarding it off ("the name of Marx is sufficient to save it from this danger").

72
tendencies,what relationsof identity they deterritorialise,and what they manageto create
(and what we may continueto createwith them), following the senseof Guattari's (1996:
124) observationthat "[o]ne cannotunderstandthe history of the workers' movementif
one refuses to see that, in certain periods, institutions of the labour movement have
produced new types of subjectivity...... "mutant" workers in "veritable wars of
subjectiviV'.
As this chaptershowed, the processesand techniquesof minor politics are two-
fold. First, politics beginswith specific andparticularminority identities and oppressions
within which peopleare 'cramped'. Eachcrampedsituationshowsa point of departure,a
point of deterritorialisation. Particularsituationsor disjunctions are intensively engaged
with, elaborated,and complicated,to open out the either/or disjunctions of identity into
movements and pen-nutationsacross disjunctions such that an intensive milieu of
inclusive disjunction emerges. The particular thus becomesthe site of innovation (not
identity) asminorities rework their territory and multiply their borders.
But second, such an intensive milieu, even as its concerns become collective
mattersof 'life and death', must always maintain a contact with social forces (and not
reterritorialiseon particularintriguesand minority identities;the minor is not a marginalist
escapefrom social relations). Thus, at the sametime as minor political processesaffirm
and problematise their 'little intrigues', they draw-in and problematise new social
relationsandconcerns.The closerelation to the social is markedby the fact that, without
an autonomous identity, compositioncan only be of social forces (that traverseminority
cramped space). Beyond this general process, the minor relation to the social is
characterisedby Kafka's 'double flux' as a site of contemporarysocial arrangementsand
their lines of flight. The first part of the double flux requiresa perceptualawarenessto
both the ways social machineswork (for example, the bureaucracyof The Trial, as a
complex machineof endlessdeferment), and to the ways they mutate and the lines of
flight they engineer(henceKafka's bureaucracyis seento make 'impossible' connections
wherepeopleand rooms are polymorphously connectedin a self-transforminglabyrinth,
as a sign of 'diabolical powers to come' (cf. K: 83)). It is at this site of social
assemblagesand their flight that the little intrigues of minor composition emerge and
operate. Hence,following the secondside of the double flux, Kafka has affinity with the
6mostcontemporary'political movementswhich seek to addressthe flows of capitalism,
and, more generally, the minor has affinities with 'the proletariat' and 'communism' as
processeswhich havesoughtto find and actualisefissures, cracks, and deviationsin the
flows and arrangementsof the capitalist socius.
I have mapped a minor orientation, a set of concerns, techniques, and a
sensibility. Beyond this, however, the minor hasno programme. As Deleuze and Parnet
(1987: 137) put it: "Politics is active experimentation,since we do not know in advance
which way a line is going to turn." The next chapter moves to consider the relation
betweenthe minor and the proletariatby consideringMarx's proletariatas a minor figure.

73
Chapter 5
The Lumpenproletariat and the Proletarian Unnamable

Let us accept once and for all that classesare not social super-individualities, neither
as objects nor as subjects...(Balibar 1991: 179)

When the proletariat proclaims the dissolution of the existing world order, it is only
declaring the secret of its own existence, for it is the actual dissolution of that order.
(Marx 1975a: 256)

In the last chapter I showed how the minor is related to the social as the process of
problematisingthe social forces and relations that traverse minorities, and exacerbating
the lines of flight that are immanent to the social. The emphasiswas placed on how
minor composition occurs at this juncture. This chapter takes a step back from the
techniquesof composition,so asto situatethe minor in relation to the 'proletariat'. I am
essentiallyseeking to explain Deleuzeand Guattari's (1988: 472) comment that "[t]he
power of minority, of particularity, finds its figure or its universal consciousnessin the
proletariat." But, to this end, the chapteris an exploration of the proletariat in Marx's
work, albeit an exploration that developsan understandingof the proletariat as a minor
figure. In subsequentchaptersthe proletariat and the minor are brought together to
considerparticular forms of composition. In exploring Marx's proletariatthe chapteralso
considers Marx's lumpenproletariat. The degree of detail in the discussion of the
lumpenproletariatmay appeara little indulgentsincethe categoryoften appearsto be little
more than a polemicaland rather moralistic catch-all term of abuse for all non-Marxian
radical positions. However, it is actually an important heuristic device in Marx's
elaborationof theproletariat (evenasit is oneof the leastcritically developedcategoriesin
his work). Beyond this, there are three specific reasons for considering the
lumpenproletariatthat relateto the core problematicsof this thesis - the minor, the refusal
of work, and a proletariatof difference.
First, it is in the lumpenproletariatthat the questionof differenceand anomaly as a
property of peoplesis most clearly foregrounded by Marx. Marx's category of the
lumpenproletariatencompassesa rather ambiguous and nebulous set of assorted
marginals and diclass9s 'without trace'. Hence, when placed in contrast with our
conventionalimagesof the Marxian proletariat(as 'universalsubject'), it appearsto be an
attractivecategoryfor resonancewith the minor (attentiveasthe minor is to difference and
variation). It is noteworthy, for example,that when Walter Benjamin and Asja Lacis (in
Benjamin 1986)describethe porous,intoxicatedlife of the peopleof Naples in a fashion
similar to Deleuzeand Guattari's minor (where "each private attitudeor act is permeated
by streamsof communal life" and "[plovertly has brought about a stretchingof frontiers

74
that mirrors the most radiant freedomof thought" ( 171)), they are writing of what Marx
and Engels seeas the most lumpen of cities.I
Second, a core feature of Marx's lumpenproletariatis its lack, even refusal of
work, henceit is an importantsite of interest. A number of movementsof the '68 era
which developed forms of the refusal of work/er (from the Black Panther Party to
counterculturalgroupslike the Dutch Provos and those on the fringes of the Situationist
Internationalsuch as Heatwave and King Mob) have seen the lumpenproletariatas the
arenaof revolutionary politieS.2 For example, though not actually holding a lumpen
position themselves,the Situationist International suggest that "the lumpenproletariat
embodiesa remarkably radical implicit critique of the society of work." (Vaneigemin
Knabb 1981: 126) There are of coursedifferent reasonsfor the take-upof the category
amongstthesegroups,but two elementsare prevalent. First, there seemsto have been a
generalsensethat the CommunistParty's conflation of Marx's proletariatwith the Party,
and the incorporatingeffects of regular employmentand consumerculture (in processes
of 'embourgeoisment','one-dimensionality', 'recuperation' and so on) had curtailedthe
proletariat's revolutionary potential. Second, a growing population of unwaged,
marginalised,excluded,and counterculturalgroups were seento be unrepresentedin the
conventionalfigure of the proletariat (work-based as it was).3 Thus whilst still being
readersof Marx, andinsistenton praxis at the level of 'capital', thesegroups, in different
ways, replaced the proletariat with a different, apparently revolutionary subject, and
indeedone that carrieda particular frisson of radical excess.
However, despitethe way the lumpen appearsto resonatewith the concernsof
this thesis (the minor and the refusal of work), ultimately the lumpen is a problematic
category for minor politics. In this chapterI show the lumpenproletariat
to be a category
fitting with Deleuze'sunderstandingof the 'marginal' as molar identity, rather than the
minor as social becoming. Nevertheless,once this is shown through the elaborationof
the conceptualform of the lumpenproletariatandproletariat,a third reasonfor considering

1 Engels saw Bakunin's popularity in Naples as evidence for calling him the "lumpen Prince" (cited in
Bovenkerk 1984: 25).
2 For examples of these lumpenproletarlan positions see Clarke et aL (1994), Cleaver (1970,1972),
Cleaver (1975), 'What is the Provotariat? ' in Heatwave (1993), and Gray and Radcliffe (1966). Eldridge
Cleaver's (1970: 7-8) description of the lumpenproletariat, though more sophisticated than that of most of
these groups in its attempt to theorise the class formation of the US black ghetto, is not untypical: "O. K.
We are Lumpen. Right on. The Lumpenproletarlat are all those who have no secure relationship or vested
interest in the means of production and the institutions of capitalist society. That part of the 'Industrial
Reserve Army' held perpetually in reserve; who have never worked and never will all those on Welfare or
...
receiving State Aid. I Also the so-called 'Criminal Element', those who live by their wits, existing on what
they can rip off, who stick guns in the faces of businessmen and say 'stick'ern up', or 'give it up'! Those
who don't even want a job, who hate to work... / But even though we are Lumpen, we are still members of
the Proletariat... / In both the Mother Country and the Black Colony, the Working Class is the Right Wing of
the Proletariat, and the Lumpenproletariat is the Left wing. "
3A similar approach is evident in academic sociology. Sixties and seventies work on deviancy and
political marginality frequently employs a model of an integrated working class and an extra-legal and
subcultural lumpen (cf. Hall 1974; Horowitz and Liebowitz 1968; Taylor and Taylor 1968). Horowitz and
Liebowitz (1968: 293) clearly express this thesis when they write: "If any group has emerged as the human
carrier of the breakdown between political and private deviance, it has been the lumpenproletariat, or the
non-working class. This group has replaced the established working and middle classes as the deciding
political force in America. "

75
the lumpen emerges;it helps move the empirical proletariat away from its orthodox
moorings in the Eurocentricimage of the British factory working class (and its rather
curtailedrepertoireof radical forms). That is, the particular forms and practicesthat are
dismissedas lumpen can usefully complicatethose of the conventional proletariat, once
they are consideredwithin the conceptualframework of the proletariat. Throughout the
thesis I use the refusal of work as the conceptualemblem of this complication of the
proletariat,but it includessuch attributesand forms as picaresqueand variable income-
attainment,counterculture,and the questionof crime and illegality (as will be clearer in
the more empirical chapters).
The chapteris in two main sections. The first considersthe contours of Marx's
lumpenproletariat. It starts with a brief summaryof critical work on the category, and
then showshow it emergesacrossMarx's works. The secondsection, on the proletariat,
begins by showing how Marx's critique of the lumpenproletariatas a non-revolutionary
(non-)classis related to his critique of anarchism. Despite looking like difference the
lumpen is shown, at a conctptual level to be a political category of identity. The
proletariatis then elaborated,using Balibar, as a situated and complex non-identitarian
minor form - an 'unnameable'- linked to the mutational plane of capital. The chapter
ends by considering how Marx's more empirical problem - his failure to successfully
cleave-off lumpen peoples from proletarian peoples - is a point of departure for
consideringwork and political practicein more complex ways than Marx and orthodox
Marxism does, or rather, againstthe very real problems of these understandingsof the
proletariat.4

Marx's lumpenproletariat
Critical work on the lumpenproletariat In the relatively small amount of critical

work devoted to explication of Marx's lumpenproletariat it is almost a truism that Marx

leaves the category rather undeveloped. Yet although one may be tempted to interpret this
conceptual underdevelopment as a sign of the relative insignificance of the category,
compared to the serious business of Marxian political economy (one might hence point
out that it is in Marx's historical and journalistic essays, rather than say Caj)ital, where the
category figures most prominently), the lumpenproletariat actually has a pivotal place in
Marx's understanding of radical class formation. The critical work on Marx's category
falls roughly into two schools. First, in the 1970s it tends toward a mapping and
clarification of the category, and second, in the eighties and nineties, the

41 should say here that my distinction between 'conceptual' and 'empirical' elaborationis not intended to
reproducethe argument(immanentto orthodox understandingsof the Party) that distinguishes correct
political practice (conceptual level) from empirical application, where the latter would inevitably deviate
from conceptual purity. Whilst my 'conceptual' level does develop an abstract political and
methodologicalperspective, it is one that seeks to understand and exacerbate processes of deviation
and complicationin empiricalforms and practices (followingmy presentation of the minor). I should also
state clearly here that, though the argumentis evident throughout the discussion, in the 'proletariat' I am
not talking about an empirical group of people. This is a conceptual account of a constellation of, and
project for social relations (which compose,traverse, and deterritorialiseempirical peoples).

76
lumpenproletariatreturnsasa site of differencein poststructuralistattemptsto deconstruct
Marx, andopenup differencein his texts. I will briefly considertheseperspectiveS.5
The classic work by Draper (1972) begins by lamenting the tangled
"misunderstandings, misinterpretationsand even mistranslations" (2285) that have
accompaniedthe categoryof the lumpenproletariat.In an admirableexplication, Draper
developswhat he seesas the specific historical, political, and econon-dcmeaningsof the
category, suggestingthat though underdeveloped,there is neverthelesssomething quite
distinct about the lumpen as, most essentially,a description of those elementsthat "are
being exuded, extruded, excreted from the class structure and onto the scraphead. "
(2308). Though Draper's essayis devoid of the vehemenceof Marx's critique, his use of
the category, now clarified, is largely uncritical (this is clearer in a later work, Draper
(1978), when the category is used unproblematically as a definition of reactionary
content). Hirst (1972) undertakesa similar task of clarification, though this time in
favour of laying bare the facts of Marxian class analysis in an analytic arbitration that
replicatesMarx's contempt,but now specifically directed at 'radical deviancy' theorists
who would seek to include criminal practiceand marginalswithin the community of the
workers movement. Hirst suggests that the condemnation of the lumpenproletariat
should not be dismissedmerely as a bourgeoismoralism on the part of Marx and Engels;
on the contrary, it is the result of a sophisticated materialist understanding of the
reactionarynatureof the marginaland criminal classes.Thus, nestledin the certaintiesof
seventiesstructuralist Marxism behind Marx and Engels' "uncompromisingly political"
standpointof "the proletarianclass position", Hirst further reinforces the boundariesof
scientific socialismagainstindividualist and idealist all-comers. Hirst's question to ask
"of any socialclass or socio-politicalactivity [is] what is its effectivity in the struggle of
the proletariatfor socialism,doesit contribute to the political victory of the exploited and
oppressed? " (40), and the answerwith the lumpenproletariatand crime is a decisive 'no'.
As I show, however, the conceptualcontours of the lumpenproletariatare far
from easily identifiable. Marx's accountof this nebulousnon-classin its multiple guises
(from financial aristocracyand Louis Bonaparteto secretsociety conspirators, criminals
and indeed 'pen pushers') can not be easily read as a simple analytic cleansing of the
dangerousclassesfor the simple fact that he does not succeedin producing a clear
constituency- successfullyexcisedor not. Questioningthe historical accuracyof the
variousaspectsof Marx's and Engels' account,Bovenkerk (1984) thus arguesthat their
use of the categoryis sloppy and inconsistent.6 It sometimesseemsas though Marx is

5A third area of debateis more empiricallyand politicallygrounded around questions of race, crime, and
-
unemployment(cf. for example Cleaver 1970; Gilroy and Simm 1985; Hall et at. 1978). Because this
chapter works on a conceptuallevel, this complex field is largely beyond its scope.
6 Followingother historical work by Traugott (1980), Bovenkerk argues that the key groups Marx and
Engels describe as lumpenand reactionary turn out not to be so easily definable as such, by their own
criteria. The Bonapartist'swampflower'of the MobileGuard,for instance,are shown by Traugott (1980) to
have been of a very similar social composition to the proletarianinsurgents, indeed being typically more
skilled (with their relativeyouth being the most markeddifference). Most bizarrely Bovenkerk tells of how
the December10 Society (which as we will see is almost the archetype of the lumpenproletariat,and for

77
playing a Fort-Da game where the identity of the proletariat is to be produced in relation to
the continual exclusion and return of the non-identity of the lumpenproletariat. Yet rather
than shoring-up identity, the Fort-Da process actually leaves us with much (not
unproductive) confusion. This confusion has led some more recent psychoanalytic and
poststructuralist influenced theorists to posit the lumpen as the moment of heterogeneity
in Marx. In a fascination/repulsion account of lumpen decrepit excess Andrew Parker
(1993) suggests that in Marx's lumpen we see the "(de)structuring effects of eroticism"
Z:1
(23) and a repressed "economy of anal pleasures" (34) between Marx and Engels. And
Peter Stallybrass (1990) argues that Marx practices a version of Lacanian identity
forrnation whereby the purity of the dialectic is constituted through the spectacle of
heterogeneity. In this he suggeststhat the lumpen may be the space of 'the political' as it
escapes from deten-nined class composition (which would seem to make Laclau and
Mouffe, with their 'autonomy of the political', cultivators of a contemporary lumpen
swamp flower). But the classic work here is Jeffrey Mehlman's (1977) Revolution and
Repetition. Mehlman argues that on Marx's contact with the lumpenproletariat in The
Eighteenth Brumaire "a certain proliferating energy is released" (13) that disrupts all
...
dialectical identities with an unassimilable heterogeneity:

Where the higher was inevitably to be overthrown by the lower the bourgeoisie by
-
the proletariat - those two poles remain constant and are mutually impoverished by
a strange irruption of something lower than the low at the top. For Bonaparte
...
seems to short-circuit both dialectic and class struggle in gathering in his service the
'scum (Auswurj), offal (Ab/all), refuse (Abhub) of all classes', the lumpen-
[A] specular - or reversible relation is exceeded by a heterogeneous,
proletariat... -
negatively charged instance whose situation is one of deviation or displacement in

relation to one of the poles of the initial opposition. (1977: 12,13)

Mehlman's rather Derridean conclusions that, despite himself, Marx can not help
affirming the heterogeneity of the lumpen, and his notion that it is a specifically literary
Marx where difference emerges, are problematic (not least, as is also the case in Derrida
(1994), because the argument fails to seriously address the materialist core of Marx's
thesis). However, MehIman's concern not to elaborate the identity of the lumpen but to
consider its relation to heterogeneity in Marx is one I have some affinity with. Where I
differ is that I present heterogeneity not as a lumpen disruption of a neat dialectical
schema of the bourgeoisie and proletariat as two distinct classes, but as ultimately a
property of the category of the proletariat (where the lumpen, despite appearances is
actually a category of identity). To make this case, however, the detail of Marx's

Marx of central importancein Louis Bonaparte'saccessionto Emperor)is so undocumentedthat Traugott

even suggests that this "mysterioussociety may have been largely imaginary"(cited in Bovenkerk 1984:
41).

78
lumpenproletariatneedsto be mapped. What follows is a brief accountof the main ways
that the lumpenis described.

The proletariat as bourgeois knave class Marx's category of the

lumpenproletariat does not emerge as a simple addition to an already fully developed
historical materialist lexicon, populated with clearly elaborated class agents. Indeed in
many ways the categories of the proletariat and lumpenproletariat develop integrally. In
the 1840s as Bestor (1948) has shown, the vocabulary of the nascent socialist,
,
communist, and anarchist movements was in a state of formation, and many different
terms were coined in rapid succession in a veritable neological feast.7 It is striking, for
example, that when in 1848 Marx and Engels announced that a communist spectre was
haunting bourgeois culture, the word 'communist' was only eight years old (emerging
from the secret societies under the July Monarchy) and was still very much undetermined
in its content. 8 More importantly here, whilst the term proletarius was used to describe
the lowest class of ancient Roman community, the European variants of the words
4proletariat' and 'proletarian' were only emerging into a modem definition as 'free wage
worker' in the late thirties and forties with the developing workers movement after the
1830 revolution (cf. Bestor 1948: 275; Draper 1972: 2286; Linebaugh 1991: 121-2).
Originally designating those who had no value other than that they produced offspring,
then vanishing from use in the second Christian century (Briefs 1937), from the
fourteenth century up until Marx's era, 'proletarian' was a derogatory term akin to
'rabble' and 'knave'. In Samuel Johnson's 1755 Dictionary (cited in Linebaugh 1991:
122) for example, the proletariat were described as "mean, wretched, vile, or vulgar",
and later, in the 1838 Histoire des classes ouvrires et des classes bourgeoises, Granier
de Cassagnac described them as a sub-human class formed of a cross between robbers
and prostitutes (cited in Benjamin 1983: 22). Haussmann wrote of a "mob of nomads",
and in 1850 Thiers spoke of "this heterogeneous mob, this mob of vagabonds with no
avowed fan-iily and no domicile, a mob of persons so mobile that they can nowhere be

pinned down... " (cited in Chevalier 1973: 365,364). It seems as though Sismondi was
the first to use the term in a modern sense in his Etudes sur Viconomie politique in 1837,
and it is not without importance that Marx prefaces The Eighteenth Bruntaire (1978: 5)

7 As one example, a partial list of the Parisian 'sectes communistee in 1842 included 6galitaires,
fraternitaires, humanitaires, unitaires, communitaires or icariens, communistes, communionistes,
communautistes, and rationalistes (Louis Reybaud, Revue des Deux Mondes, cited in Bestor (1948:
291)). Bestor's analysis of the invention, mutation and differentiation of terms is a fascinating insight into
the diversity and creativity of the early workers movement. With avid advocates of neologism around like
Fourier it would of course be wrong to take the multiplication of terminology as simple evidence of
diversity, but it would seem to indicate a degree of vitality.
8 Incidentally, as Bestor (1948) points out, Engels explains that Communist rather than Socialist was
employed in the Manifesto because of its revolutionary connotations: "Whatever portion of the working
class had become convinced of the insufficiency of mere political revolutions, and had proclaimed the
necessity of a total social change, called itself Communist ... Thus, Socialism was, in 1847, a middle-
class movement, Communism a working-class movement. Socialism was, on the Continent at least,
respectable'; Communism was the very opposite. " (Engels' preface to the 1888 English edition of Marx
and Engels 1973: 12-13)

79
with a referenceto his definition: "People forget Sismondi's significant saying: The
Roman proletariat lived at the expenseof society, while modern society lives at the
expenseof the proletariat." I will return to this 'modern' proletariatlater.

The lumpenproletariat as Marx's

knave class At the most basic level, the
lumpenproletariatis Marx's mechanismfor freeing-uphis conceptof the proletariatfrom
this conceptionof a seethingrabble;he transfersall the old content into the new category
of the lumpenproletariat.
9 But inasmuchas Marx is concernedwith the problematic of
revolutionary class formation (rather than, as was the case in the bourgeois accounts,
moral condemnationof the mass- thoughof coursethis was not without its own political
effects),as this chapterargues,there is a lot going on in this transfer.
Marx and Engels are credited by the OED as the first to coin the composite
'lumpenproletariat';initially in TheGennanIdeology whereit is usedto describeboth the
ancientRomanplebeians(as"midway betweenfreemenandslaves,neverbecoming more
than a proletarian rabble [lumpenproletariatin German]") and Max Stirner's self-
professedradical constituencyof the Lumpenor ragamuffin (Marx and Engels 1976: 84,
202). The prefix 'lumpen' is not to be taken as synonymous with poverty. Though
Marx and Engelsdo often usethe term to describethe very poor, Draper (1972) suggests
that the principle root is not Lumpen meaning 'rag' and 'tatter', but Lump (pl. Lumpen,
Lumpe)meaning'knave'. This definition of the lumpen as a class of depravedknaves is
no clearer than in Marx's famously excessivedescription of Louis Bonaparte and his
December10Society:

On the pretext of founding a benevolent society, the lumpenproletariat of Paris had

been organised into secret sections Decayed rottis with dubious means of
...
subsistence and of dubious origin, ruined and adventurous offshoots of the
bourgeoisie, rubbed shoulders with vagabonds, discharged soldiers, discharged
jailbirds, escaped galley slaves, swindlers, mountebanks, lazzaroni, pickpockets,
tricksters, gamblers, maquereaux, brothel-keepers, porters, literati, organ-grinders,
ragpickers, knife grinders, tinkers, beggars - in short, the whole of the nebulous,
disintegrated mass,scattered hither and thither, which the French call la boUlne;
from this kindred element Bonaparte formed the core of the December 10 Society.
A 'benevolent society' - in so far as, like Bonaparte,all its members felt the need to
benefit themselvesat the expense of the labouring nation. This Bonaparte who
constitutes himself chief of the lumpenproletariat, who here alone rediscovers in
mass form the interests which he personally pursues, who recognises in the scum,

9 Thus Marx's presentation of the lumpenproletariat is, at the level

of description, not dissimilar to many of
the old accounts of the proletariat and 'dangerous classes'.

80
 offal and refuse of all classesthe only class upon which he can base himself
unconditionally... (Marx 1978: 73)1()

The constituencyof this knave class is hybrid indeed. And as if to match this
hybridity conceptually, the word lumpenproletariatis itself unstable in Marx's and
Engels' work. In the various translations, including those by Engels, the German
'lumpenproletafiat'is variously translatedas 'social scum', 'dangerousclasses', 'mob',
iswell-mob', 'ragamuffin', 'ragged-proletariat'. And Marx and Engels often use other
terms in placeof 'lumpenproletariat'(particularly Va bohMie', and 'lazzarold' but also
German versions of the above English translations), all of which conjure different
specific meaningsas they are used to characterisean apparentgroup of people. This is
indicative of the way Marx seemsto needto resort to empiricaldescriptionof the lumpen
(albeitin a rather theatricalfashion) rather than presenta neat conceptualclass definition
(such aswith wagelabourers:'those who have nothing to sell but their labour'). He sees
the lumpenproletariatas by definition a nebulous, disintegratedgroup without stable
collective determination- they are a 'non-class'. The lumpenproletariat,as Marx writes
of the Mobile Guard (Louis-Bonaparte's lumpen rrfilitary constituency), are "people
without a definite trace" (1973a:52-3).
If Marx transfers nineteenthcentury understandingsof the proletariat into the
categoryof the lumpen this is not the only function of the category;he does not leave it at
that. One needsto considerthe specific ways the lumpen functions for Marx as it is filled
with different characteristicsand attributes,and is seento have different political effects.
The nebulouscharacterof the lumpenproletariat,and indeedits political danger, is made
mostapparentin the way the categorydevelopsin the farcical story of Louis Bonaparte,
whereit hasa specific function in Marx's accountof historical development.

The lumpenproletariat and the backing-up of history Marx's most detailed

considerationof the lumpenproletariatemergesthrough his accounts of the 1848-52
revolutions in France (or more precisely the triumph of counter-revolution) in Class
Struggles in France and The Eighteenth Brumaire o)f Louis Bonaparte. Indeed, in
identifying the 27 times that Marx and Engels use the term 'lumpenproletafiat' and its
direct cognates,Traugott (1980: 712) has shown that the bulk appearin this four year
period. The yearsof reactionthat followed the wave of revolutions were not a good time
for the emergingworkers movement,or for the predictive efficacy of Marx's historical
method. MehIman (1977: 24-5) thus suggeststhat The EighteenthBrumaire reads as

1()1will refrainfrom explainingall of these terms, but one is worth noting. The lazzaroni were the lowest
(and most numerous)class of Naples who lived in complex archaic fiefdoms without engaging in modern
'work' (cf. Hobsbawm(1959) for a more nuanced analysis). In the context of my general argument it is
worth noting that though Nietzschecan present a good corrective to the love of work in Marxism, and at
times even in Marx (with expressionslike this: "...the 'blessing of work' is the self-glorification of slaves.
Incapacityfor otium [leisure]." (Nietzsche1968: 758; cf. also 1982: 173,206)), he is also critical of the -
lazzaroni,and (thoughI am jumpingahead of my argumenta little) for not dissimilar reasons to Marx; they
are content in their identity (cf. Nietzsche1968: 911).

81
though"Marx must have lived the history of Francefrom 1848 to 1852 - the revolution
careeningbackwards - as resemblingnothing so much as a latrine backing up..." In
France,despite a relatively developedcapitalist social structure and the easeby which
Louis-Philippe was deposedand the SecondRepublic established,Marx witnessed not
the beginningsof proletarianpower, but the return of reaction under the leadershipof
Louis Bonaparte. The EighteenthBrumaire is Marx's attemptto explain this reaction.
Thus quite contrary to Engels' assertionthat the essayreflectsMarx's discovery of "the
greatlaw of the motion of history" (prefaceto Marx 1978: 7), The EighteenthBrumaire
readsasMarx's attemptto explain an historicaldevelopmentthat by his system is actually
somewhatof an anomaly. Thus the opening pagesof this explanationconsider not the
neatdevelopmentof classstruggle(aslaid out, for example,in the Manifesto, written just
before the 1848 revolutions), but the nature of the relation between memory and
forgettingin the passageof revolution in a fashion that resonatesmore with Nietzsche's
accountof herd morality than the historical narrativesof orthodox Marxism. Marx writes
that at the momentof revolution, rather than interrogate,borrow, criticise and ultimately
overcome the inherited conditions and identities of the past in the process of a
revolutionary transcendence,the people are insteadinclined to make a reactionaryreturn
to the identitiesof the past. Hence history famously repeatsitself, as 'farce'; repetition,
as Deleuze (1994: 91-2) interprets the passage,falls short of accentuatingdifference."
Insteadof tragic metamorphosiswe seecomic involution:

An entire people, which had imagined that by meansof a revolution it had imparted
to itself an acceleratedpower of motion, suddenly finds itself set back into a defunct
in
epoch and, order that no doubt as to the relapse may be possible, the old dates
arise again, the old chronology, the old names, the old edicts... The French, so long
as they were engaged in revolution, could not get rid of the memory of Napoleon
...
They hankered to return from the perils of revolution to the fleshpots of Egypt ...
(Marx 1978: 12)

Faced with this great historical anomaly, Marx's problem is how Bonaparte is
able to constitute a state without a class-base in the bourgeoisie or the proletariat proper.

11 Here Marx's account of historical relation has resonance with Foucault's (1977) reading of Nietzsche's
genealogy (as discussed in Chapter 3) where the "substitution" of "alternate identities" (160) from the
historical store-room of costumes is merely a guise for the "comic" repetition of the identity form. The
moment of the overcoming of identity, what Foucault describes as our'unrealisation', is described by Marx
in the bourgeois revolutions as a borrowing from history that "exalts the new struggles" (1973: 148) and
recovers the "spirit of revolution" against the repetition of the same (though despite "storm[ing] from
success to success", they rapidly fall back on their limited content (150)). For the proletarian revolution,
on the other hand, the content exceeds itself, exceeds it "words" or names. Marx hence writes that the
social revolution "can only create its poetry from the future (149). But if this sounds like an undermining
of a critical relation with history (in favour of an abstract 'future'), Marx insists that the formation is part of
a tricky and complex repetition (with difference): "Proletarian revolutions ... constantly engage in self-
criticism, and in repeated interruptions of their own course. They return to what has apparently already
been accomplished in order to begin the task again... " (150) Final resolution aside, the full account of this
proletarian self-criticism has remarkable resonance with Kafka's (1972: 150) description of the particular
intrigues of 'small peoples'.

82
Though he does say that Bonaparte also has a base in the peasant class, it is the
lumpenproletariatwhich fulfils the explanatory role (and in any case, Marx presents
considerablesimilarity between the conservativepeasantand the lumpenproletariat).12
The Bonapartist state is a great farcical ruse whereby the non-class of the
lumpenproletariat,in the December10 Societyandthe Mobile Guard,seemto transfix the
properworkings of history. They becomethe agent and the sign of the farcical return of
the old identities. Thus, as I showed above, Marx presents Bonaparte's lumpen
December10 Society as having set itself up as somethingthat it was not (a 'benevolent
society' only in so far as it was a parasiteon society), and he provides a plethora of
farcical identities, ruses, and anomaliesin a world turned upside down, where the
bourgeoisiecried "Bourgeoissocietycan only be savednow by the headof the Society of
10 December! Only theft can still saveproperty; perjury, religion; bastardy, the family;
disorder, order!" (1973: 245). As Parker (1993) has argued, Marx's reading of the
period 1848-52is quite literally as a farcical pieceof theatrewhere correct class roles are
underminedas the people act through their confused simulacral roles as "remplaqants"
and "substitutes"(Marx 1973:244). Thus the descriptionof Bonaparteand his "society
of disorder, prostitution and theft" (198), the "drunken soldiery, which he has brought
with liquor and sausages"(124) continues:

An old, cunning roui, he conceives of the historical life of nations and their state
proceedings as comedy in the most vulgar sense, as a masquerade in which the
grand costumes, words and postures merely serve as a cover for the most petty
trickery.... For his landing in Boulogne he put some London flunkeys into French
uniforms to represent the army. In his Society of 10 December he assembled ten
thousand rogues, who were supposed to represent the people in the way that Snug
the joiner represented the lion.... the serious clown [Bonaparte] who no longer sees
world history as a comedy but his comedy as world history. (1973: 197-8)

The lumpenproletarian financial

aristocracy Marx continues to amass
characteristicsin the category of the lumpenproletariatin his discussion of the July
Monarchy (1830-48) in Class Struggles in France, where this time the financial
aristocracyarepresentedaslumpenproletarian:

The July monarchy was nothing more than a joint-stock company for the
exploitation of France's national wealth... Commerce, industry, agriculture, shipping
- the interests of the industrial bourgeoisie were inevitably in permanent peril and at
a permanent disadvantage under this system.... the same prostitution, the same

12 "Bonaparte represents a class, and the

most numerous class of French society at that, the small-
holding [Przellen] peasants not the revolutionary, but the conservative peasant; not the peasant that
.....
strikes out beyond the condition of his social existence, the small holding, but rather the peasant who
wants to consolidate this holding ... those who, in stupefied seclusion within this old order, want to see

83
 blatant swindling, the same mania for self-enrichment - not from production but by
sleight-of-hand with other people's wealth - was to be found in all spheres of
society, from the Court to the Caf6 Borgne
4n [disreputable bars and caf6s]. The same
unbridled assertion of unhealthy and viscous appetites broke forth, appetites which
were in permanentconflict with the bourgeois law itself, and which were to be found
particularly in the upper reachesof society, appetites in which the wealth created by
financial gamblesseeksits natural fulfilment, in which pleasure becomes crapuleux
[debauched], in which money, filth and blood commingle. In the way it acquires
wealth and enjoys it the financial aristocracy is nothing but the lumpenproletariat
reborn at the pinnacle of bourgeois society. (1973a: 38-9)

The lumpenproletariat is not, then, a category that only applies to the poor. If the
December 10 Society was an historical inversion where the social dregs of society had
somehow swindled their way to the top, here we find the social elite performing as the
social dregs, where financial speculation replaces the proper class role of engagement
with productive industry, and leads to crapuleux pleasures.

Lumpenproletarian spontaneity Yet further complication of the category emerges

when Marx writes of possible radical tendencies in the lumpenproletariat. The lumpen is
not always counter-revolutionary. Though in his extremes Engels supports the shooting
of thieves at the beginning of the revolution (cf. note 17), Marx and Engels' sense of the
relative capacity of the lumpen as a revolutionary group is ambivalent. The
lumpenproletariat vacillate (in The Peasant War in Germany Engels suggeststhat each day
of the revolution sees them change positions) and are prone to reaction, usually offering
their services to the highest bidder, but they can also find themselves involved in

revolution, as their lack of stability leaves them easily swept up into revolutionary
fervour. 13 Thus even the lumpenproletarian 'swamp flower' of the Mobile Guard, in so
far as it was "thoroughly tractable" was "capable of the greatest acts of heroism and the
most exalted self-sacrifice" (as well as, of course, "the lowest forms of banditry and the

themselves and their small holdings saved and favoured by the ghost of the empire. " (Marx 1978: 125,
127)
13 Sergei Eisenstein provides a cinematic version of this thesis in his account of lumpenproletarian
reaction in the'agitguignol' Strike (1924). Following the classic lumpen thesis (Bordwell (1993) talks of the
film as a whole as an anatomy of a political process), the lumpenproletariat are drawn forth to help break
the strike (ironically marked as 'work'), at the behest of a secret service agent and with the call from the
lumpen king, "I need 5 unscrupulous men" (to which the reply naturally returns, "None of us have any
scruples"). The scene emphasises extra-temporal debauched excess much like Marx's description in the
Eighteenth Brumaire. The secret agent enters into a marginal space that is far from the mapped territory
of every other scene in the film (factory, police office, street), avoiding a dead hanging cat en route to an
encounter with the lumpen king where the comic effect, which pervades the whole encounter, is produced
through a jazz soundtrack and the inversion of aristocratic trappings (before preening himself the 'king'
spits in his dresser mirror, held by his midget servant, and he sleeps in a dilapidated car which doubles as
a thrown, and so on). In a most bizarre scene we then meet a mass of assorted ragamuffins as they
emerge from a field of sunken barrels. The stark contrast between the purity, coherence, and identity of
the workers and the filthy proliferation of the lumpenproletariat is very clearly marked (cf. Bordwell (1993)
for a reading of the deployment of animalistic tropes, machines, geometric shapes, and water to construct
an identity/perversion dichotomy between the workers and their assorted class enemies).

84
foulest corruption") (Marx 1973a: 52-3). 14 Marx (1978) makes a similar case with regard
to the secret society professional conspirators. 15 His argument is that their 'precarious'
means of subsistence dependent on 'chance' in 'irregular lives', and their 'constant
dangers' situate this group as part of la boUine with an inclination to spontaneity. First
t:l
Marx writes of their readiness to insurgency:

the greater the insecurity, the more the conspirator hastensto seize the pleasures
...
of the moment... The desperaterecklessnesswhich is exhibited in every insurrection
in Paris is introduced precisely by these veteran professional conspirators, the
hommesde coups de inain [Men of daring raids]. They are the ones who throw up
and command the first barricades,who organise resistance,lead the looting of arms-
shops...In a word, they are the officers of the insurrection. (1978: 318)

But thoughinsurgent,Marx criticisesthe conspiratorsfor their spontaneity. As 'officers

of the insurrection' (rather than the revolution) these conspiratorsmistake the adequate
preparationof their conspiracyfor the revolution, and thus they attempt

to launch a revolution on the spur of the moment, without the conditions for a
...
revolution... They are like alchemists of the revolution... They leap at inventions
which are supposed to work revolutionary miracles: incendiary bombs, destructive
devices of magic effect, revolts which are expected to be all the more miraculous

and astonishing in effect as their basis is less rational. (1978: 3 18)

The externality of the lumpenproletariat to social relations It seems as if

Mehlman (1977) was right. The content and contours of the lumpenproletariat appear to
proliferate beyond all reason as a nebulous mass in an indeterminate category. This is

not, however, a simple emergence of undetermined difference without cause. There

14 This attribute of 'spontaneity' is a central basis of not only Bakunin's affirmation of the lumpen (as I
show below), but also of its use as a revolutionary agent in the thought of a number of Marxist figures such
as Mao Tse-Dung (cf. Bussard 1986: 20; Harris 1978: 18,32) and Fanon (1967). See Bussard (1986) for a
fuller account of the place of the lumpen in Marxist thought more generally.
15 Marx's efforts to drive the secret societies out of the First International (as a Masonic social form far
from the mass open movement that Marx saw in The Chartists and sought to develop in a 'proletarian'
organisation (cf. Nicolaevsky, 1997)), owe much to his conflicts with the Bakuninists and the
conspiratorial forms of revolutionary politics most clearly expressed by Nechayev (1989) in his Catechism
of the Revolutionist. Nechayev describes the correct ethics of the covert nihilist revolutionary in full gory
detail. To site one passage amongst many: "The revolutionary is a dedicated man. He has no interests of
his own, no affairs, no feelings, no attachments, no belongings, not even a name. Everything in him is
absorbed by a single exclusive interest, a single thought, a single passion - the revolution.... Night and
day he must have one thought, one aim - merciless destruction. " (4-5) Though the controversy as to the
source of this essay seems to have cleared Bakunin from its authorship (cf. Avrich 1987), the
conspiratorial and elitist thinking of Bakuninist anarchism whereby the revolution is declared as popular,
but is to be secretly driven by a handful of conspirators, is put as strongly by Bakunin as Nechayev. For
example, Bakunin (n.d.: 26-7) writes: 'We are bitter foes of all official power, even if it were ultra-
revolutionary power. We are enemies of all publicly acknowledged dictatorship... Rejecting any power, by
what power or rather by what force shall we direct the people's revolution? An invisible force - recognised
by no one, imposed by no one - through which the collective dictatorship of our organisation will be all the
mightier.. But imagine, in the midst of this general anarchy, a secret organisation which has scattered its
members in small groups over the whole territory an organisation which acts everywhere according to a
This is I ...
what call the collective dictatorship of the secret organisation. "
common plan...

85
remains one central defining characteristic that continues to recur throughout the accounts
of the lumpenproletariat (as has been implicit above). The lumpenproletariat exists
somehow outside, above, or below, social relations, being without social content. This
is brought together in the assertion that the lumpenproletariat is an unproductive class. If
the December 10 Society, the financial aristocracy, the bomb-throwers, and lazzaroni
seem to exist outside of historical social flows, this is closely related to the fact that they
live off national wealth without engaging in bourgeois industry or work (without
producing 'surplus value'). Indeed Marx's most vehement critique is often saved for
those who seem to revel in surviving outside of the wage relation. This point is made
implicitly in Marx's critique of the debauched pleasures of the lumpenproletarian
drunkard, but the point is also made explicitly. In an example highlighted by Draper
(1972), Engels contemptuously describes a procession of the "unemployed" (his
parenthesis) through Pall Mall (organised by H. M. Hyndman's Social Democratic
Federation) as "mostly of the kind who do not wish to work - barrow-boys, idlers, police
spies and rogues... the lumpen proletariat Hyndman had taken for unemployed" (Engels
letter to Bebel 15.2.1886 in Marx and Engels 1995: 408; emphasis added).
For Marx, then, the lumpenproletariat's debauched pleasures and unhealthy
appetites, its instability in ethical and political practices, are a 'natural fulfilment' of its

externality and unproductivity. It is the lack of clear relation to production that seems to
have freed everything up. This is marked most clearly, in the negative, when Marx
warns that the theatrical simulacra of Bonaparte will be finally challenged by the hard

reality of productive relations: "his experiments will burst like soap bubbles when they
in
come contactwith the relationsof "
production. (1978: 129)

Bakunin on the lumpenproletariat as radical identity, and Marx's

critique
This characterisationof the lumpen does not occur in a political vacuum. The reasons
Marx excludes the lumpenproletariatare as 'political' as they are 'conceptual' (that is,
they relateto the politics of his time asmuch as to his conceptualsystem);and indeed, in
the lumpenproletariatthe implication of thesetwo aspectsis very clear. If we think of
Marx as immersedwithin a communistmilieu as much asin the Blue Books in the British
library (despitehis apparentpreferencefor the latter)6),it is in the unfolding of the First

16 On this question of an apparent conflict between Marx's textual and political practice, Lyotard (1993)
offers a rather damming critique of the libidinal economy of Marx's project. Lyotard perceives a conflict
between Marx's obsession with the (textual) 'prosecution' of capital, and his continual deferral of the
conceptual and practical elaboration of the proletariat (which, for Lyotard, can function in this libidinal
economy onlyin terms of deferral). Lyotard (1993: 99) cites as evidence a letter from Marx to his Russian
translator where, referring to the workers' movement, Marx writes: "there are circumstances where one is
morally bound to busy oneself with things much less attractive than study and theoretical research. "
Lyotard's point is not uninteresting (and Marx's more bourgeois pretensions are no doubt problematic), but
it is not the only way to read Marx's inability to elaborate the contours of the proletariat. The argument of
this chapter is a conceptual development of this point, but a minor reading of the sentiment displayed in
Marx's letter would be equally attentive to the configuration of libidinal forces, but might see it pointing to a
Marx that is a borderline for the workers movement, ambivalent about his community, and at times even
standing outside it for a community to come.

86
International- the emergingsplit betweenanarchismand Marxism - that a political basis
for the critique of the lumpen emerges.17 Though the conventional presentationof the
split between Marx and Bakunin centres on a statism/anti-statismargument on the
questionof the 'dictatorshipof the proletariat', what is important for my argumentis their
differenceson the questionof the revolutionary agent.18 WhereasMarx, as I consider
fully below, seesthe emergenceof the revolutionary proletariatas concomitantwith and
internal to the developmentof capitalism (as in the Manifesto, for example, where not
only global social labour developsas a new collective supra-individual force, but work
itself is seento concentrateand discipline the class),Bakunin considersthis integration as
destructive of more primary revolutionary forces. For Bakunin the revolutionary
archetypeis found in a 'peasant' milieu (which is presentedas having long standing
insurrectionarytraditions,aswell as a communistarchetypein its current social form - the
peasantcommune19),and amongst educatedunemployed youth, assorted 'marginals'
from all classes,and in the diclassi types, the brigands and robbers, the impoverished
masses,those on the marginsof society who have escaped,been excludedfrom, or not
yet subsumedin the discipline of emerging industrial work - in short, all who Marx
to
sought capture in the category of the lumpenproletariat(cf. Pyziur 1968, esp. Ch. 5).
Thus, as the people capableof uniting "private peasantrevolts into one general all-
people'srevolt", Bakunin focuseson:

17The rationale behind the exclusion of Bakunin's Alliance of Social Democracy from the International is
explained in some 120 pages (Marx and Engels 1988), but begins by stating that the danger of a broad
banner workers movement, as the International's explicit concern, was always in letting in d6class6
(lumpen) elements. Draper (1972) makes this case that Marx's critique of the lumpenproletariat emerges
through his conflict with the anarchists. Draper draws attention to the fact that Engels' most aggressive
attack on the lumpenproletariat was in a later preface to The Peasant War in Germany which was written
around the time of the split in the International and is hence suggestive of an implicit critique of the
Bakuninist revolutionary agent. It is worth citing Engels' passage to convey the degree of hostility
levelled at the lumpenproletariat: "The lumpenproletariat, this scum of the decaying elements of all
classes, which establishes headquarters in all the big cities, is the worst of all possible allies. It is an
absolutely venal, an absolutely brazen crew. If the French workers, in the course of the Revolution,
inscribed on the houses: Mort aux voleurs! Death to thieves! and even shot down many, they did it not out
of enthusiasm for property, but because they rightly considered it necessary to hold the bandit at arm's
length. Every leader of the workers who utilises these gutter-proletarians as guards or supports, proves
himself by this action alone a traitor to the movement. " (cited in Draper 1972: 2298-9) This said, it should
be born in mind that the split between Bakunin and Marx only fully manifested in the late 1860 s, long after
the main explication of the lumpenproletariat in The Eighteenth Brumaire. Indeed in 1864 Marx and
Bakunin were close enough for Marx to write to Engels that "I must say that I liked him very much, and
better than before. " (Marx and Engels 1981: 111) Bakunin was also the first translator of the Manifesto
into Russian and was commissioned to translate yolume I of Capital (only pulling out in 1870 under
Nechayev's influence). But this does not really alter the argument about the political causes for the
emergence of the lumpen thesis, because in earlier explications the incitement to critique is Max Stirner,
whose position on the lumpen is not wholly different to Bakunin's.
18The argument that Bakunin perceives in Marx the seeds of the statism of the Soviet Union is not
uninteresting, but it can be made only by ignoring the centrality of Bakuninist notions of organisation and
'invisible dictatorship' (cf. note 15) to Leninist politics (cf. Bilissett and Home n.d. ).
19 Engels refers to this as "that old pan-Slav swindle
of transforming ancient Slav common property into
communism and portraying the Russian peasants as born communists" (Marx and Engels 1981: 44). For
discussion of Marx's understanding of the possibilities of the commune see Camatte (1978).

87
 free Cossacks,our innumerable saintly and not so saintly tramps (brodiagi),
...
pilgrims, members of 'beguny' 20
SeCtS, thieves, and brigands - this whole wide and
numerous underground world which from time immemorial has protested against
the state and statism... (Bakunin n.d.: 19)21

Such people, Bakunin argues in a fashion not so different from Marx's account of
lumpen 'spontaneity"22 are fired with a transhistorical instinctual rage, a "Iwtive
movement"of a "turbulent ocean" (n.d.: 20), and it is this revolutionary fervour aspart of
their timelesspresence,not class composition within capitalism which elects them for
their political role:

Marx speaksdisdainfully, but quite unjustly of this Lumpenproletariat. For in them,

and only in them, and not in the bourgeois strata of workers, are there crystallised
the entire intelligence and power of the coming Social Revolution.
A popular insurrection, by its very nature, is instinctive, chaotic, and
destructive, and always entails great personal sacrifice and an enormous loss of
public and private property. The massesare always ready to sacrifice themselves-,
and this is what turns them into a brutal and savagehorde, capable of performing
heroic and apparently impossible exploits, and since they possesslittle or nothing,
they are not demoralised by the responsibilities of property ownership... they
develop a passionfor destruction. This negative passion,it is true, is far from being
sufficient to attain the heights of the revolutionary cause; but without it, revolution
would be impossible. Revolution requires extensive and widespread destruction, a
fecund and renovating destruction... (Bakunin 1973: 334)23

Marx's critique of the lumpenproletariatand anarchism is not, then, simply

polemic (however polemical,and at times rather 'bourgeois', moralistic, and even racist it
iS24).In the disputebetweenMarx and Bakunin we havetwo perspectiveson an identity.

20 An editors footnote explains: "The Beguny or Straniki were orthodox sects founded in 18th century
Russia who believed that Antichrist ruled the world and that the Russian Tzars were his personification.
They believed that all laws were unsupportable by true believers and were persecuted. "
21 Elsewhere Bakunin focuses in particular on the brigand, as "a hero, a protector, a people's avenger, the
irreconcilable enemy of the state.... the revolutionary without phrases, without rhetoric culled from books,
an indefatigable revolutionary, irreconcilable and irresistible in action, a popular and social revolutionary,
not a political or class revolutionary... " He also suggests that "He who is not in sympathy with [brigandage]
belongs to the enemy camp, among the supporters of the state... " (from The Setting of the
...
Revolutionary Question, cited in Marx and Engels 1988: 520)
22 The Marxist critique of spontaneity and insurrection is usually a more or less explicit critique of
anarchism. As one example, Engels dismisses the English Social Democratic Federation for attempting
'to conjure up overnight a militant movement which ... necessarily calls for years of work". In this they are
employing "childish pranks such as we are otherwise wont to see only among the anarchists. " (Marx and
Engels 1995: 408)
23 In The Principles of Revolution Bakunin writes that this destruction should reach the level of "complete
amorphism"and in Publications of the 'People's Judgment' Society (no. 1) he writes of a "universal pan-
destruction" (cited in Marx and Engels 1988: 521,523; cf. also Pyziur 1968).
24 By not writing about the highly dubious moral sentiment that is pervasive in Marx's accounts of the
lumpenproletariat I am in no sense trying to save Marx from critique, or suggest that his ethical
dispositions are unrelated to his theoretical positions (a political interpretation of Marx's life would be very
interesting). I am simply trying to extract a useful conceptual configuration. That said, the very real moral

88
Though Bakunin's categoryof the lumpenproletariatmay have a broader catchmentthan
Marx's, both seemto largely agreeon the componentsof lumpenproletarian'identity' as
that which is a volatile, almost extra-capitalistentity.25 Their differences reside on
whether it is or is not a revolutionary identity - and this is a simple yes (Bakunin) or no
(Marx). But the point of division I want to emphasiselies not around the actualpeople,
but around the questionof capitalistsocial relations. Bakunin affirms lumpen elements
preciselybecausethey are marginal to capitalismand have not beeninculcatedwithin the
'bourgeoisstrataof workers', and for almost the samereason,Marx rejectsthem. Whilst
Bakunin seeksto describea rebellious identity as the basis of his politics, Marx attempts
to producean identity of disparateelementsto exclude them from his class-basedpolitics
on the basisthat they are an identitarian,extra-socialform.
Hereinlies the fundamentalsplit with anarchism. Marx's position, put into stark
relief by the conflict in the International, is not an either/or presentation of two
revolutionary identities proletariat or lumpenproletariat. Marx's politics is intricately
-
relatednot just to capitalism as one mode of production amongst others, but to capitalism
asa system of radically transformativeand expansive social relations. The proletariatthat
is to emergeis, in a sense, wholly other. Bakunin, on the other hand, appeals to a
present identity as something almost pre-capitalist,or transhistorical. Bakunin writes of
instinctual rage, timelessradical groupings, a completelevelling of society in a 'pan-
destructive' 'amorphism', and simple revolutionary / counter-revolutionarychoices, that
are immanent to these identities. Thus, when he does delve into theory he places a
premium on abstract humanist conceptslike freedom and equality.26 Anarchism is thus
subjectto the same critique Marx raised againstUtopian Socialism, as that which posits a
transcendent idea of a perfect social form, and deploys historically decontextualised
"eternaltruths" of "Human Nature" and "Man in General" rather than engagewith the

and racial problemswith his figure should be mentioned. It is in the accountof the correlateof the lumpen,
the nationally and ethnically defined 'unhistorical peoples' (the Slavs for example) that Marx's and
especially Engels' methods display their most unsavoury aspects (as evident, for example, in Engels' use
of Hegel's expression'ethnic trash'). Ritter (1976) usefully argues that Engels' attitudes are a fall-out not
so much of a nationalismand racism, but of the fanaticism of his proto-DarwinianEurocentric method
(thoughof course, such Eurocentricevolutionismwas historically immanentto racist formations). Whilst
it is probablymore productiveto critique Marx and Engels for their method than their personal prejudice,
the two can not be wholly divorced. For example, Engels' (1943: 90-4) racist account of the Irish,
contemptible in itself, can be seen to contribute to and reflect a flawed reading of the proletariat, in the
formation of which, as Linebaugh (1991) has masterfully shown, the Irish contributed much in
internationalismand practical innovation. All this said, though it is by no means an excuse, Marx and
Engelsnever really match Bakunin in racist sentiment.
25 Bakunin seems to practice what Marx and Engels (1988: 520) refer to as a "law of anarchist
assimilation",wherebya whole series of groups (from religious sects to student youth and brigands) are
broughtunder the banner of a spontaneist 'anti-authoritarian'movement. Marx's critique is not just that
this is often little more than a mere wilful dreaming, but that it is also a cynical deploymentof a populist
rhetoric that disguises a tapestry of secret societies and 'invisible dictatorship', to use Bakunin's own
expressionfor the secret guiding hand of his 'internationalbrotherhood'(cf. Marx and Engels 1988).
26 In RevolutionaryCatechismBakunin (1973:76) writes: "Replacingthe cult of God by respect and love
of humanity,we proclaimhuman reason as the only criterion of truth; humanconscience as the basis of
justice; individual and collective freedomas the only source of order in society,"

89
expansive "fluid state" of material life in specific sociohistorical relations. (Marx and
Engels 1973: 69,67, Marx 1976: 103)27
At a conceptualandpolitical level the naming of the lumpenproletariat,even as its
characteristicsproliferate, and even as it is 'without trace', is Marx's attemptto exclude
transcendentidentity from political practice. The repetitionof naming is not an attemptto
grasp
C, the ungraspable,
z:1 but an assertionthat presentidentity, or extra-historicalidentity is
not part of his politics. I am now in a position to consider the proletariat. If the
lumpenproletariat is a category of identity, the proletariat is a non-identity which resides
in the complex, situated, and expansive relations of the capitalist socius. To make this

point I want to focus on two aspects of Marx's notion of the proletariat: the 'absence' of
the proletariat, and the place of 'work' and manifold relations. I should say here that

these points neither encompass all that could be said on class in Marx, nor are they
extracted as the 'truth' of Marx's class analysis (which can also be read in conventional
dialectical materialist terms - Marx's work is not unambiguous). Rather they are

consideredto elaboratehow the proletariatcan be seenasa minor figure.

The unnamed proletariat

Balibar (1988,199428) presents a very useful explication of Marx's proletariat, and I
want to use it as the basis for my argument. Balibar begins by pointing to a central
paradox in Capital, namely that the agent of Marx's politics, the proletariat, that which
links the analysis of exploitation to revolution, is almost completely absent. It is absent
from the consideration of the labour process, the process of exploitation, and wages,

emerging only in terms of its insecurity, instability, and embodiment of an economically

instituted violence, rather than, say, its positive force. The proletariat appears almost
external to the analysis. This is the same absence that led Negri (1991) to elaborate his
Marx beyond Marx through the Grundrisse rather than Capital with its apparently 'closed'
objectivist reading of capital circulation. There is considerable force in Negri's argument
zl.

27 Debord (1983) presents one of the most concise and incisive Marxist critiques of utopian socialism and
anarchism (albeit a critique that could be levelled at the Hegelian Marxism and'radical subjectivities' of the
Situationist International itself (cf. Ansell Pearson 1997: 155-60; Blissett 1995; Debray 1995)). Having
argued that Marx's 'science' is an understanding of forces and struggle rather than transcendent law
(Debord 1983: 81), Debord writes that: "The utopian currents of socialism, although themselves
historically grounded in the critique of the existing social organisation, can rightly be called utopian to the
extent that they reject history - namely the real struggle taking place, as well as the passage of time
beyond the immutable perfection of their picture of a happy society - but not because they reject science.
On the contrary, the utopian thinkers are completely dominated by the scientific thought of earlier
centuries. They sought the completion of this general rational system... As Sorel observed, it is on the
model of astronomy that the utopians thought they would discover and demonstrate the laws of society. "
(83) Debord then continues to consider anarchism: 'The anarchists have an ideal to realise... It is the
ideology of pure liberty which equalises everything and dismisses the very idea of historical evil....
Anarchism has merely to repeat and to replay the same simple, total conclusion in every single struggle,
because the first conclusion was from the beginning identified with the entire outcome of the movement...
[I]t leaves the historical terrain by assuming that the adequate forms for th[e] passage to practice have
already been found and will never change. " (92)
28 These two references are to different translations and versions of the same essay. The later version
omits some useful explanatory references, including an acknowledgement of the importance of Tronti and
operaismo and a short critique of Gorz's post-work/proletariat thesis. It does, however, have a slightly
different conclusion, and at times is a clearer translation and so I reference both versions here.

90
that the Grundrisse,asagainstCapital, works on a structureof antagonismand difference
(ratherthanclosedcategories)within which a revolutionary subjectof differenceemerges
(and someof this is exploredin Chapters7 and 8), but here, rather than take the absence
of the proletariatasindicative of a closedtext, I want to argue, following Balibar (who is
as attentive as Negri to political and poststructuralist concerns against economistic
readingsof Marx's categories, and also displaces Hegel with Spinoza in developing
Marx's politics), that the absenceis centralto the radical possibility of Marx; it enablesthe
proletariat to be seen within the framework of the minor (as a figure of potential and
variation rather than identity).
Balibar bases his explication of the possibility of the proletariat as 'political'29
subject on Althusser's argument that Marx opens a "new continent of thought" (1994:
149) vis--vis not just liberal humanist categories of economics and politics, but also the
radical political tradition of which he is part. But this opening is not manifest as a neat
break, with the presentation of a new subject. Balibar argues that Marx's situated
materialist method operates against presenting new positive identities within the terms of
the milieu and epistenzehe works within. Balibar thus points to Marx's vacillations
between oppositions of economics/politics, statism/anarchy, compulsion/freedom,
hierarchy/equality not becauseMarx can not make up his mind, but because these are the
essence of the political and conceptual argument of his time, within which he is

constrained (the space being 'full', or perhaps 'cramped'), and with which he is

continually engaged, playing different sides off against his own position. He is thus
'unable' to write an 'Anti-Lassalle' or an 'Anti-Bakunin' (however much more timely
than Anti-DUhring these would have been), but rather he presents 'notes' on the Gotha
Programme and various notes and critiques of Bakunin as interventions in a series of
political arguments.30 As Balibar argues:

In fact, what these still allusive analysesdemonstrateis that Marx's 'political' theory
and action have no proper space in the ideological configuration of his time. For
this configuration is itself a 'full' space,devoid of any gap in which a specifically
Marxist discourse could have established itself alongside, or opposite, other
discourses. This is why Marx finds himself reduced to playing these discourses off
against one another. In the same vein, practically, all of his political 'art' consisted
in building more and more massiveorganisations of the working-class movement,
while playing different tendencies off against one another in an attempt to dilute
their antagonismand add to their strengths,at least for a while. (1994: 135)

29 1use the quotation marks because Balibar rightly suggests that Marx's works break open bourgeois
conceptionsof politics and economics as distinct categories.
30 1would suggestthat Marx's 'interventionist' engagementis not so much an expression of an 'inability'
to write, for example, an 'Anti-Bakunin' (because there is much detailed critique of the various other
positions),but is related to the nature of intensive, or minor political engagement(where, as I showed in
Chapter4, int(iguestend to proliferatein 'schoolsand magazines'rather than in 'books').

91
 Nevertheless, something of Marx's proletariat must emerge from this 'full' space
if Marx is to be seen as an innovator. Balibar makes two points in terms of Marx's
explicit referencesin Capital. First he suggests that the dedication to Wolff, and Marx's
citation of significant passages from earlier work draw a 'bridge' from the Communist
League to the project of Capital that serve to embed the text in the communist movement
(such that it is not an autonomous work). Second, Balibar draws attention to the addition
of two references to the proletariat in the second 1872 edition: Marx's suggestion in the
postface that the 1848 revolutions saw the irruption of the hidden political content of the
proletariat into the terrain of 'scientific thought', and his discussion of autonomous
working class activity and its relation to the development of capital and law (around the
Combination Acts). Balibar's point is that in these additions Marx links the emerging
Marxist perspective, political practice, and capitalist relations.31
Marx's inability to present a 'positive identity' is not, then, because he is stuck
within a Derridean metaphysics of presence, or because, as Foucault's (1970: 262)

critique would have it, Marxism is completely implicated in a nineteenth century

productivist paradigm ("like a fish in water unable to breathe anywhere else"), because
...
he is naming something that complicates and escapes these configurations, that is not an
identity. 32 The proletariat can not be posited, because Marx's materialist method enables
no simple positing of a 'beyond', but that does not mean that it can not 'disrupt' the space
of the political. Indeed for Balibar this act of disruption and complication is the very
essenceof the critical force of Marxism, as, rather than posit an identity within nineteenth
century political discourse, it compels a "perpetual work of refutation, interpretation, and
reformulation. " (1994: 136). 33 It is perhaps precisely because it is unnamed that the
radical force of the proletariat, vis--vis the identities and dichotomies of nineteenth
century thought, is maintained. From here Balibar links this unnamed proletariat to the

31 The two passages are as follows. 'The Continental revolution of 1848 also had its reaction in England.
Men who still claimed some scientific standing and aspired to be something more than mere sophists and
sycophants of the ruling classes tried to harmonise the political economy of capital with claims, no longer
to be ignored, of the proletariat. " (Marx 1976: 97-8) "The barbarous laws against combinations of workers
collapsed in 1825 in the face of the threatening attitude of the proletariat. " (Marx 1976: 903) Balibar
argues that the 1872 additions are linked to the contemporary developments and projects of the aftermath
of the Paris Commune, the struggle with the English trade unionists and anarchists in the International,
the return to the question of the 'dictatorship of the proletariat', and the work on the theory and
organisation of the revolutionary party (1994: 129).
32 Caygill (1993) situates this problem of Marx's 'inability' to delineate a positive identity of the proletariat
around a tension between critique and political decision; a tension that he argues is similarly evident in
Nietzsche. Caygill proposes that their tension resides in the problem of invoking a subject of overcoming
without succumbing to ressentiment (a problem which hence leads to the interminable nature of their
projects). Whilst I agree with Caygill's analysis of the (productive) problem, by tying the proletariat to the
extra-subjective manifolds of labour/life in capitalism, I argue below that it is possible to describe a
process of proletarian composition which is not a subject (of ressentiment), whereas Caygill sees this as
more problematic, "once Marx abandoned the early humanist logic of a return to a human 'species being
(199). In my interpretation, following Deleuze and Guattari, 'species being' is not primarily a humanist
category (though it clearly can be read this way), but is part of the flows of life that are as evident in Marx's
late, as early works.
33 Whilst Balibar's thesis evidences a little of a rose-tinted image of the development of Marxist politics
(within which autocriticism has not always been so prevalent), there would seem little doubt that Marxism
has retained considerable prominence in political and intellectual life (even as a mechanism for the
recuperation of radical energies, it needs to have some situated relevance to be an attractor). If the

92
social relations' of capitalism (as was indicated in the 1872 additions). I will explain this
more generally.

Work and manifold relations

If the proletariat is a political 'disruption' it is because it is a figure immanent to the social

relations of capital. In Marx's work as a whole the proletariat exists in its interrelation
with labour-power and the communist movement. That is, it is part of the flow of
organic and inorganic Life (labour/Nature) as it is mobilised as supra-individual force in
z:1
capital, whilst at the same time being the existent process of the communist dissolution of
identity in "absolute becoming" beyond capitaliSM.34 So, Marx famously ties the
proletariat (in contradistinction to the lumpen) to 'abstract' (social) productive 'work'.
This is a 'work' that produces more than mere subsistence, or 'surplus value' as value in
excessof the equivalent (it is, as Spivak (1996: 109) puts it, "super-adequate"). 35 Marx
thus says some rather outrageous things about the educational benefits of child labour, 36
and we have the legacy of orthodox or workerist Marxism to highlight this, as for

example in the Soviet Union where communism was collapsed into a red wage slavery. 37
But, and this point is often obscured (no doubt with the help of some of Marx's texts
themselves), this necessary relation to work in the production of a revolutionary class is
not an affirination of work itself. Marx is developing a politics from a situated relation to
the sociohistorical composition of life (the social relations of the 'mode of production' of
capitalism), not any transcendental categories or practices: 'work' is his means of
describing the material community of capitalism. The point is that work hooks up identity

history of Marxism had been the simple application of a set of coherent tenets across time and space it
would have merged into the "banality of dominant ideas" (1994: 135) (at least at a quicker rate).
34 See in turn Marx (1975: 328) (1975: 328), Marx and Engels (1973: 36), and Marx (1973: 488), and the
citation at the start of this chapter for the making of these points.
35 The point I am stressing here is that capitalism is an especially excessive and transformative social
system compared to others, in that excess and dissipation are immanent to the transformation of
identities (as Deleuze and Guattari argue, following Marx, it is the first to be premised on abstract flows
and axioms rather than identity). The important question of the degree to which this super-adequate work
is an exclusively human attribute (albeit a human that is in continual interrelation with a wider Nature),
which seems to be Marx's point, or is something that is part of all animal life (cf. Ansell Pearson 1999: 241-
2), is beyond the scope of this chapter; though I can make a brief point. Inasmuch as all life is
increasingly enmeshed in capitalist relations, as is particularly evident in Haraway's work, any
anthropomorphism in Marx's category becomes increasingly redundant. That said, Marx's (1974: 341)
first point of critique of the Gotha Programme can help us take his argument in this direction. He writes
that it is capitalism that attributes supernatural powers only to labour rather than Nature as a whole
(because primitive accumulation - the removal of the worker from the means of production - leaves labour
as simultaneously the only means of survival for the mass of the world's population, and the 'variable' that
must be induced to ever-greater productivity). For a communist account of the central place of animals
(that is, a wider Nature) in primitive accumulation, in capitalism generally, and as an important site of
capitalist innovation (from the emergence of work, through the Fordist production line, and into
xenotransplantation) see Beasts of Burden (1999).
36The starkness of this point is evident not so much in the narrative of the Manifesto but in the Critique of
the Ghotta Programme where Marx places work on a par with education as a necessary component in the
production of the proletarian class - for children. He writes that a general prohibition of child labour "- if
possible - would be a reactionary step ... the early combination of productive labour with education is one
of the most powerful means for the transformation of present society. " (1974.358)
37 It is interesting to note that from 1937 the workers of 'socialist societies' were, in official Soviet
definitions, no longer a 'proletariat' (Gould and Kolb 1964: 547). The difference between the empirical
reality of Soviet workers' lives (cf. Haraszti 1977; Haynes and Semyonova 1979), and their conceptual

93
 1
to the manifold relations, super-adequate forces, and lines of flight of social labour. It is
in work that identities are dissolved in complex global relations. Marx makes this clear,
negatively, in the Eighteenth Brumaire when he describes the peasant class. The problem
is that the peasant condition, however massive (they are 'the most numerous class'), is
not one of multiple relations:

The small peasantproprietors form an immense mass, the members of which live in
tile same situation but do not enter into manifold relationshil?s with each other.
Their mode of operation isolates them instead of bringing them into mutual
intercourse... the smallholding, permits no division of labour in its cultivation, no
application of science and therefore no diversity of development, variety of talent,
or wealth of social relationships. (1973: 238,239)

The peasantclass Marx tells us, then, is composed of "the simple addition of
isomorphousmagnitudes,much as potatoesin a sack form a sack of potatoes." (1973:
239) In contradistinction,the proletariatare composedof complex manifold relations, as
they are hookedup to that systemwhere"[a]ll that is solid melts into air", and that covers
"the whole surface of the world ... establishing connections everywhere" (Marx and
Engels 1973: 37).
By situating the relation to work at the level of complex social relations we can

understand why Marx's position is also a negation of work. In work these manifold
social relations are simultaneously reterritorialised and recoded into the identitarian form

of 'worker' (with the attendant formal equalities and freedoms, fetishisms, alienations,

and exploitations) so as to enable the extraction of surplus value, such that work is also
the 'vampiric' mechanism of capitaliSM. 38 The abolition of work, as the passage cited in

Zerowork (1975) in the introduction to the thesis showed, is hence immanent to the

communist abolition of property, where as Dauvd puts it, "The proletariat is not the

working class, rather the class of the critique of work. " (in Dauv6 and Martin 1997:
31). 39

definition (as a proletariat so much 'for itself' that it had self-dissolved in the end of pre-history) hardly
needs pointing out.
38 Marx (1976: 342) famously describes the capital/labour relation thus: "Capital is dead labour which,
vampire-like, lives only by sucking living labour, and lives the more, the more labour it sucks. " Hence, in
stark comparison to the passage about child labour above, Marx (1976: 548) writes: "Factory work
exhausts the nervous system to the uttermost; at the same time, it does away with the many-sided play of
the muscles, and confiscates every atom of freedom, both in bodily and in intellectual activity. " See Marx
(1973: 123) for a clear statement that this is nothing peculiar to 'factory' work, and Midnight Notes (1981:
1) for a more recent version of this formula.
39 Inasmuch as the proletariat is its own destruction Dauvd links the refusal of work to the refusal of
worker: "All theories (either bourgeois, fascist, stalinist, left-wing or 'gauchistes') which in any way glorify
and praise the proletariat as it is and claim for it the positive role of defending values and regenerating
society, are counter-revolutionary. Worship of the proletariat has become one of the most efficient and
dangerous weapons of capital. " (in Dauvd and Martin 1997: 30)

94
The proletariat and the minor
I am now in a position, and by way of summary, to contrast the lumpenproletariat and the
proletariat, and show how the latter relates to the minor. I have argued that Marx refuses
the lumpenproletariat at a concelvial level becauseit is a category of difference as present
identity (however heterogeneous the identities are), not difference as the super-adequate
process of life/labour and communism - the 'proletariat'. The proliferation of nan-iing of
the lumpen without determining content is in contradistinction to the unnaming of the
proletariat with a content that is the manifold potential of capitalist social relations.
Hence, the lumpen is most interesting not because it is the moment of variation from class
interest, the heterology of Marx, or that it indicates Marx's true polymorphous desire
(though it may show some of these things), but because it signposts the problem of a
politics at the level of molar identity as abstracted from expansive social relations, even as
it looks like difference. In the process of the exclusion of the lumpenproletariat, Marx, in
intricate relation to the workers movement, does not seek to compose a different
proletarian identity, but a different tendency within the complexities of capital; a tendency
that can not 'face' capital becauseit is entirely immanent to its relations. There can not be
a proletarian subject as such because this would be to separate something from manifold
and expansive social relations. 40 The proletariat is never present, or 'outside' these
relations, but is rather always immanent to them. The proletariat is thus, as Balibar
suggests, that 'nonsubject' that emerges inten-nittently (in dropping the 'subject of
history' he breaks with latent evolutionism in Marx) from within the social relations and
flows of capitalism, that is coniposed through these relations (but not guaranteed by
them4l), and that actualises a complexity against them. The proletariat is hence not a
description of a group of people (classically, the 'industrial working class'), but of a
process that traverses people; it is immanent to the "powers of the nether world" that the
sorcerer of capital has conjured up, and is unable to control (Marx and Engels 1973:
39). 42 It signifies a situated tendency that is composed within the social relations and
t:1
identities of capital ('work'), and seeks to escape them, or make them escape ('absolute
becoming') such that it is the process of its own abolition (Marx 1975a: 256). Thus, as
with the minor, rather than look for proletarian identity, we should look for complexity -
both in its composition in capitalism, and in its forrns of politics against capitalism.

40 Balibar hence argues in another essay (1991) that there has been no contemporary movement from
class struggle to non-class struggle (in what is sometimes called 'new social movements'), but rather
political expressions and forms (which in the past might have been more frequently declared as class
struggle) have always been an 'effect' of the political configuration of social relations (the important point
is not how they self-declare, but whether they compose themselves as identity or complexity).
41 For Balibar, the great failure of Marxism was to think of the proletariat as the subject of history, and
hence remain within the antinomies of dominant knowledge. This is manifested in two central problems of
orthodox Marxism: first, the assumption that the Party represented the essential continuity of this subject
in history, and the resultant illusion that Party unity equated with class unity; and second, the related
positing of proletarian identity in terms of (true) 'consciousness', rather than in a more situated 'theory'.
42 Marx's definition of the proletariat is thus'social'
ratherthan 'moral' or 'racial', and thus Benjamin (1983:
22) is right to emphasise the parody of the old definitions in Marx's presentation of the proletariat as a
"race of peculiar commodity-owners". I would suggest that Deleuze and Guattari's (1994: 109) comment

95
 Without going into detail (for the argument is made fully in Chapter 7), the core of
Marx's understanding of the composition of life/labour in capitalism is taken up by Anti-
Oedil)tts virtually whole. Thus, Deleuze and Guattari's (1983) presentation of class in
capitalism, as something that is radically decoding and deterritorialising in its essence, is
not of two classes, but of one capitalist class within which all are formed (253). 43 Once
capitalism as the universal decoding and deterritorialising socius is constituted, the
proletariat could not compose as an identity, but is rather that which attaches itself to the
social forces of deterritorialisation, and pushes them further. Thus Deleuze and Guattari
argue that the question, as I showed in Balibar, should not be between two identities, but
between that which integrates within the identities immanent to the manifold social
relations of capitalism, and that which 'escapes' it - with the proviso that (as I showed in
the last chapter) escape is a radically anti-identitarian process that is not an escape from
the social, but makes the social escape (A(E: 341). As we saw at the start of this chapter,
the 'proletariat' is the 'universal consciousness' of this process (ATP: 472). 44
The proletariat, then, is a minor figure, an 'unnamable'. 45 It operates in Marx's
work something like what Deleuze (1998) calls an "empty square". It is a never filled-in
meaning or subject that haunts the manifold relations of the socius. But it is also the
process of the deterritorialisation of these social relations. The question for Balibar and
Deleuze and Guattari now becomes one of the composition of this proletarian unnarnable
if it is not a process of identity, but rather of 'praxis' (A(E: 255). And this is where
minor composition emerges. The abstract techniques of this composition were the subject
of the last chapter, and can now be explored in empirical fashion in the rest of the thesis
around what I am arguing is the nexus of the minor/proletarian condition, the refusal of
work/er. But first there is one more use for the lumpenproletariat.

about the 'minor race' cited at the start of this thesis should be read in similar terms (though the context
for their use of 'race' is a critique of Heidegger's relation to Nazi formations of race and nation).
43 Though this argument is made in Chapter 7,1 will briefly present this important point here. Against any
kind of personification of capital, following Marx, Anti-Oedipus suggests that the abstract machine of
capital is itself a kind of agent. (This is an interpretation that is fully in accord with Deleuze and Guattari's
analysis at the level of extra- and supra-individuality - abstract machines, assemblages, and
singularities. ) Once 'production for production's sake' takes off, the bourgeoisie, as much as the
proletariat, become 'slaves of the machine': "... more utterly enslaved than the lowest of slaves, he is the
first servant of the ravenous machine 'I too am a slave' - these are the new words spoken by the
...
master. 'Only as personified capital is the capitalist respectable. As such, he shares with the miser the
passion for wealth as wealth. But that which in the miser is a mere idiosyncrasy, is, in the capitalist, the
effect of the social mechanism, of which he is but one of the wheels. ' [Capital" (254) In the same way 'the
worker' is only a function of territorialised labour capacity (263).
44 --the theoretical opposition is not between two classes it is between, on the one hand, the decoded
...
flows that enter into a class axiomatic on the full body of capital, and on the other hand, the decoded flows
that free themselves from this axiomatic The opposition is between the class and those who are outside
...
the class. " (ACE.255) As the translator notes, the French is les hors-classe which has affinity with hors-
caste (outcast) and hors-la-loi (outlaw), though it should be clear by now that this 'outside' is immanent to
the system of social relations. Incidentally, it is at a similar point in A Thousand Plateaus that Deleuze
and Guattari (1988: 472) mention the Italian 'refusal of work' as an example of minor processes.
45 1have used Beckett's (1979) term 'unnamable' because it fits
well with the notion of the proletariat as
an unnamed and immanent potential. Essentially though, following Deleuze and Guattari's (1983: 20-1)
use of the term, the unnamable is another way of saying the minor.

96
The empirical lumpen/proletariat
I have shown the conceptualform of the proletariat as a site of minor difference in
contradistinction to the lumpen. However, it is neverthelessthe case that Marx's
accounts of the actual content and fornis of work, and forms and styles of proletarian
practice are, are at best,ratherlimited (and at worst, often moralistic and Eurocentric). If
the proletariatin the abstractform is an unnameableor minor potential, in its actuality,
through the teleologiesof Marxism, the fetish of the Party, and not least, the orthodox
Marxist and social democraticaffirmation of 'work', it has neverthelesscome to be
somewhat 'filled in' or molarised. The more empirical relationship between the
lumpenproletariatand proletariathighlights a possible way out. In this I am taking up
Guattari's (1995a: 42) suggestionthat the empirical question of the lumpenproletariat
becomesan "interzone", or what Foucaultwould call a site of 'problematisation'.46
Despitethe various accountsand denunciationsof the lumpen, Marx is finally
to
unable make a clear split between the people that populate the category of the
lumpenproletariatand the proletariatproper, as indeed is highlighted by the composite
lumpenproletariatitself. This should be no surprise, given Balibar's point about Marx's
interventionistmodeof engagementandrefusal to posit a 'subject'. But thereis an aspect
of Marx's problem here that helps us think the proletariata little differently to Marx. A
few examplesfrom Marx's and Engels' work show the difficulty of making a clear
lumpen/proletariansplit. In keeping with the way Marx transferspre-Marxist definitions
of the as
proletariat social dregs into his categoryof the lumpen (so as to free up the new
meaning) he suggeststhat the lumpen class was a precursor to the proletariat. In this
sensewe can see the lumpen clearly as part of the 'old society'. Marx makes this
developmentcleartowardsthe end of Capital when he writes of the transformationof the
peasantinto the modem worker: "Thus were the agricultural folk forcibly expropriated
from the soil, driven from their homes, turned into vagabonds, and then whipped,
branded and tortured by grotesquely terroristic laws into accepting the discipline
necessary for the system of "
wage-labour. (1976: 899). The point is also made in The
GennanIdeology (Marx and Engels 1976: 202) in the critique of Stimer: "ragalnuffins
who have existed in every epochand whose existenceon a massscale after the decline of
theMiddle Ages precededthe massformation of the ordinary proletariat..." Yet, despite
this historical narrative, Marx and Engels, as we have seen, seem mostly to use the
category of the lumpenproletariatin describing particularly modern situations. The
motley crew of tinkers, pimps, and pick-pockets describedin the EighteenthBrumaire
would appear to be a particularly urban phenomenon. Indeed in The PeasantWar in
Gennany Engels reverses the narrative by suggesting that amongst the plebeian

46 This is one of the very few times Deleuze or Guattarl mention the lumpenproletariat. Here Guattari
includes other social groups alongside the lumpenproletariat (such as the aristocratic bourgeoisie, the
aristocracy of the proletariat, the non-guaranteed elite) as problematising interzones of a neat class
dichotomy, but inasmuch as the lumpenproletariat has a particular conceptual role in Marx's
understanding of the proletariat (as a revolutionary figure, not a descriptive term for empirical social
groups), it has a level of importance that is not drawn out by Guattari.

97
opposition were "numerous precursors of the lumpenproletariat, who existed even in the
lowest stages of urban development." (Marx and Engels 1978: 407; emphasis added).
Further, making a direct relation between the modern industrial city and the lumpen,
Engels explains lumpen involvement in the peasant war by saying that "a great many,
namely those living in the towns, still had a substantial share of sound peasant nature and
had not as yet been possessed by the venality and depravity of the present 'civilised'
lumpenproletariat. " (1978: 408)
If the historical placement is not clear-cut, neither is Marx and Engels'
presentation of the contemporary relation between the proletariat and the lumpen. Marx

writes that "the lumpenproletariat in all towns, forms a mass quite distinct from the
...
industrial proletariat." (1973a: 52) And in Capital (1976: 797) he distinguishes the
lumpenproletariat from even the lowest sediment of the 'relative surplus population' (the
latter still having a productive role to play). But though the conceptual distinction
between the two lies on an assertion of the 'unproductive' relations of the lumpen, in
Marx is unable to find such a distinction. Thus in Class Struggles
empirical observation
in France, immediately before and after telling us of the distinction between the two, he
lumpenproletariat the the Mobile Guard (the
writes that the are part of proletariat:
archetypal lumpen 'swamp flower') are formed "to set one section of the proletariat
Thus the Paris proletariat was confronted by an army of 24,000
against the other....
foolhardy men, drawn from its own midst. " (1973a: 52,53) Then in a
youthful, strong,
letter to Engels in 1882 Marx even uses the term to describe a group of Cannes service
workers ("the garons d'hotels, de caf, etc., and doniestiques, who belong to the
Lunipenproletariat. " (Marx and Engels 1992: 272)) who, though not an industrial

proletariat, are clearly 'working' in modern institutions.

Two points emerge from this, to do with productive relations, and politics. First,

if at the level of historical description the lumpen seem to pop up everywhere, it is

because Marx 'unproductive' people (and

could not separate off an empirical group of
delineate a clear constituency of proletariat or lumpen) becauseeven in his time productive
relations tended to traverse the social, rather than limit themselves to the work-activities of
Such an awarenesscan help alter the historical narrative of the formation
a single group.
of a modem proletariat away from the centrality of English factory production and the

white male working class, as is evident in different ways in the work of Linebaugh,
Rediker, and Gilroy, where hybrid and transatlantic cultural and political forms are seen
to be immanent to the development of global capitaliSM.47 And if we project forwards

47Though Linebaugh (1991), Linebaugh and Rediker (1990), and Rediker (1987) do not discuss the
the lumpenproletariat, they resituate the emergence and political composition of the
problematic of
of those who Marx and Engels are wont to see as ever close to the lumpen, such
proletariat around many
as the Irish, escaped slaves, and sailors (as is most evident in Linebaugh and Rediker's description of the
working class grogshops, tippling houses, and dancing cellars of the Atlantic ports). By placing the
transatlantic relations and flows of people, ideas and practices at the centre of analysis, Linebaugh and
Rediker show how a complex, vibrant, multi-racial, transatlantic working class existed a good hundred
years before Marx and Engels were writing in the Manifesto of the rather territorially and culturally fixed
factory-based form. This methodological and political emphasis on transatlantic complex formations -

98
from Marx, we do not have to go as far as tric Alliez (1980: 119) who wrote in the
seventies, no doubt polemically, that "[t]he factory becomes a sort of social welfare for
unproductive workers", to suggest that we can no longer demarcate unitary spheres of
productive and unproductive work, or of production, reproduction, consumption. All
would seem to be included in ever-more subtle and sophisticated networks of value
production (which, as I consider in Chapter 7, are by no means tied to conventional
understanding of work). If this is so, one would need to consider the 'empirical'
4-)
lumpenproletariat, the organ grinders, pen pushers, and escaped galley slaves, these
people with picaresque, unstable, and complex modes of life, as part of the manifolds of
capitalist production.
Thus, and this is my second point, one must look at the practices of the people
Marx dismissed as 'lumpenproletariat' as critically as at those of the more conventional
'working class'. The differences and variations of life for the people named by Marx as
lumpenproletariat might throw up alternate forms of empirical proletarian practice, which
remains so unfleshed out in Marx, and so filled in by orthodox Marxism. In this
development of the proletariat we might want to orient our perceptual sensibilities away
from the certainties, unities, and stabilities of the orthodox Marxian 'working class', and
toward the great flux, permeability, instability, and virtuosity of modem life found by
Benjamin and Lacis (in Benjamin 1986) amongst the poor of Naples. This is the point at
which the thesis moves to more empirical considerations in the following chapters.

Conclusion
I have argued that, far from a simple set of class subjects, Marx's lumpenproletariat and
proletariat are complex figures. My elaboration of these figures is a direct challenge to
orthodox Marxist understandings of the proletariat as universal class coming to self-
consciousness. It is also a problematisation of the notion that the lumpenproletariat is a
class of difference (and, indeed, that it is a neat category for the 'criminal classes'). The

chapter argued that the lumpenproletariat and the proletariat emerge integrally in Marx's
work. I showed the various ways that Marx used the category of the lumpenproletariat in
his conceptual and political production and engagement. In each situation it appears to be
a category of difference, with its varying degrees of decrepit practices and pleasures being

contrasted, if sometimes only implicitly, to a rather pure set of correct class roles and
social relations. This is most clear in the description of Bonaparte and the farcical

against interpretationsbased on racial, cultural, and national essentiaiisms - is also developed by Gilroy
(1993), though here the political formation, what he calls the 'black Atlantic', is followed from the
experienceof slavery ("the concentrated intensity of the slave experience is somethingthat marked out
blacks as the first truly modem people..." (221)) to contemporarysocial and cultural forms. Gilroy does
not use the term 'proletariat'to describe this condition,at least in part becauseof its orthodox baggage of
an affirmationof work (and which any thought about slavery could have no time for), and the deadening
weight of orthodoxclass theory which tends to perceivenew movementsand minority politics and cultural
creations as marginal and deviant (cf. 1993: 39-40; 1987: 199-203). Nevertheless the hybrid
countercultural' form of the black Atlantic is a political figure specifically concerned with what I have
describedin this chapter as the milieu of proletarian politics in that it is composed in the complexities of

99
'backing-up' of history, where revolutionary forces seem to have been tricked into a
r
theatrical decrepit excess. Yet, when I moved to consider the proletariat, I showed that
Marx was not simply replicating bourgeois morality (in a distaste directed against a new
'dangerous
t class'), or simply dismissingZl a set of practices and lifestyles - though, no
doubt, this is evident. Rather, as becomesclear in the dispute with Bakunin, the
lumpenproletariatis a category of identity; a category for those who would compose
'outside' of the manifold social relations of capitalism. Hence the lumpenproletariatis
affirmed by Bakunin as a group that hasnot yet been subsumedin capitalistrelations and
the 'bourgeoisstrataof workers'. I then moved to consider the proletariat, and showed
how it is ratherabsentfrom Capital. The point was madethat this absenceis part of the
constructionof a political categorythat is immanentto manifold relations, and hencecan
not be seenas an identity, a simple presence,or even an empirical group of people. I
showedhow Marx ties the proletariatto work; not becausework is to affirrned in itself,
but becauseit is the mechanismof global interrelationand production of surplus value.
We were thus able to understandMarx's apparentlycontradictory argumentsabout the
necessityof work, and its alienating, exploitative, and oppressivenature, such that it
neededto be 'abolished'. This is an ambiguity that orthodox Marxism resolved,no doubt
with a little help from Marx, by affirri-iing work itself. I showed, however, that Marx's
thesis can be taken in a different direction such that the proletariat is a class of work
(which will later be seento include a wealth of social practices),and of its refusal. The
refusal of work, as refusal of the identities of capitalist relations, was argued to be the
core of the proletarianproject. The proletariatis thus a minor figure, an unnamable. It
has no subjective form, but is rather a process of continual engagementwith, and
problematisationof the regimes,relations, identities, and lines of flight of the capitalist
socius.
In Chapters4 and 5 the argumenthas been at a conceptuallevel, showing the
the not
milieu and niode,of political engagement, any concretemanifestation of this. This
may appearodd, particularly in discussion of the proletariat. However, insofar as the
proletariat and the minor are situated political figures rather than sets of subjects or
groups, they can not be used to posit any timelessor transcendentpractices(this would
be to close down potential into identity). Instead, they necessitatesituatedelaboration.
The thesis now moves to considerparticular minor proletarianformations, starting with
the Industrial Workers of the World.

global capitalist relations, whilst simultaneously creating cultural and political forms against these
relationsin mutationalrather than identitarianprocesses.

100
Chapter 6
The Wobblies: Abstract Labour, Minorities, and Industrial
Sabotacie

Shall we still be slaves and work for wages?

It is outrageous - has been for ages...
(from the IWW song 'Workingmen, Unite! ', in RV: 13)

The wobbly movement has never been more than a radical fungus on the labour
movement. Those who could not fit in to a normal rational movement. (Samuel
Gompers, President of the American Federation of Labour, cited in The Wobblies
1979)

To an assembly of nearly 200 assorted unionists, revolutionaries, socialists and

anarchists from thirty-four state, district, and national organisations, William D.
Haywood opened the founding convention of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW)
in Chicago, June 27 1905, with the words "Fellow Workers. This is the Continental
Congress of the Working Class." (Proceedings of the First Convention of the I. W. W.,
cited in RV: 1) The Preamble to the Constitution, reiterated in every lWW publication,
elaborates the contours of this 'working class' a little further:

The working class and the employing class have nothing in common. There can be

no peace so long as hunger and want are found among millions of the working
people and the few, who make up the employing class, have all the good things of
life.
Between these two classes a struggle must go on until the workers of the

world organise as a class, take possession of the earth and the machinery of
production, and abolish the wage system.
We find that the centering of the management of industries into fewer and
fewer hands makes the trade unions unable to cope with the ever-growing power of
the employing class. The trade unions foster a state of affairs which allows one set
of workers to be pitted against another set of workers in the same industry, thereby
helping defeat one another in wage wars. Moreover, the trade unions aid the
employing class to mislead the workers into the belief that the working class have
interests in common with their employers.
These conditions can be changed and the interests of the working class
upheld only by an organisation formed in such a way that all its members in any
one industry, or in all industries if necessary,cease work whenever a strike or
lockout is on in any department thereof, thus making an injury to one an injury to
all.

101
 Instead of the conservative motto, 'A fair day's wages for a fair day's
work', we must inscribe on our banner the revolutionary watchword, 'Abolition of
the wage system'.
It is the historic mission of the working class to do away with capitalism.
The army of production must be organised, not only for the everyday struggle with
capitalists, but also to carry on production when capitalism shall have been
overthrown. By organising industrially we are forming the structure of the new
society within the shell of the old. (IWW 1972: 5-6)1

It would be difficult to produce a more concise definition of a constituency. This is the

'working class' as universal subject with identity and trajectory much like that found in
the more naive sections of Marx and Engels' Manifesto. There is no unnarnable
antagonistic multiplicity working its anti-teleological escape from the axioms of capital
here - it is enough to make poststructuralist theorists of the political blanch.
Such identity is not, however, as simple as it appears. For a start, the founding
convention was attended by many an unconventional 'worker'. One member of the,
albeit politically opposed, American Federation of Labour (AFL) described it as "the
greatest conglomeration of freaks that ever met in a convention. " (cited in Conlin 1969:
g t:1
41) But leaving aside the specific composition for the moment, in a number of ways the
IWW's unified 'working class' is not a molar subject, but an abstract plane for the
emergenceof minor relations. That is, the apparent identity of class becomes a plane of
composition against identity, and the condition for minor composition. If Haywood's

announcementof a global working class movement appropriate to the technical precision

of modern industrial manufacture and exploitation is dated and sanctioned by conference,
another founding image of the IWW conveys a sense of the more variable nature of the
movement. The IWW are more commonly and affectionately known by others and
amongst themselves as 'the Wobblies'. There is no legitimate base for this name, only a
myth that it emerged from a strike in Vancouver where a Chinese man who had been
feeding the strikers pronounced 'IWW', as 'I Wobble Wobble'. Or perhaps, though less
usually proposed, it came from the lumberjacks 'wobble' saw (Murphy in Bird et al.
1987: 50). The name either comes from an experience peculiar to the IWW of North
American political movements, 4racial' interrelation, or from a technical device used by

I This is the full text of the 1908 Preamble that is still used today. It includes some important amendments
to the 1905 version following the split with Daniel De Leon over his advocacy of 'political' (electoral)
struggle. In the 1905 version the second paragraph reads: "Between these two classes a struggle must
go on until all the toilers come together on the political, as well as on the industrial field, and take and hold
that which they produce by their labour, through an economic organisation of the working class without
affiliation with any political party." (in RV. 12). However minor the 1908 change appears, it evidences the
outcome of an important and heated conflict in the IWW's early history. In some ways, as I am arguing
here, it reduces the IWW's principles to an even simpler form. Gone are references not only to 'political'
organisation, but also to 'economic' organisation. Instead the single word, 'class' is used. The 1908
version also appeals to an at once more generalised, and more specific appropriation of 'the earth and the
machinery of production' and the 'abolition of the wage system' rather than the appropriation of the
'products of labour', itself a much less avowedly revolutionary goal (more akin to workers management of
production than the overthrow of work). The last two paragraphs elaborating a more Marxian teleology of
the destruction of capitalism were added in 1906 and 1908.

102
itinerant workers. Either way, 'Wobbly' is a name with uncertain origins, and a
relativelycomplexconfigurationnot rootedin any single identity.
The chapteris in five main sections. First, I consider the plane of work at this
particularjuncture of industrial, and emergingTaylorist capitalistproduction. Second, I
look at the seriesof cramped 'reductions' and complicationsof identity enactedby the
IWW (vis-A-visthe dominantmolar forms of worker, minority, immigrant, the American
citizen, the People). This movesinto considerationof the relation betweenthe 'rebel' and
'solidarity' as an anomalous/packrelation. Third, I discuss the generalmilieu of minor
cultural composition, and fourth and fifth I draw out some of the specific rninoritarian
aspectsof the hobo, and the practiceof sabotage. In doing this I am drawing on the
structureof Marx's definition of the proletariat(as explored in the last chapter)that was
situatedaround 'work' and 'manifold relations', and showing how this develops into a
seriesof forms that deterritorialiseorthodox Marxian notions of class constituencyand
practice, following the framework of the minor (developed in Chapter 4). These
processesincorporateattributesandpeoplesthat Marx dismissedas 'lumpenproletarian'-
degrees of refusal of work, 2 and 'marginal' groups and practices that would
be
conventionally seenas 'backward' or diclassi - within a proletarianform.
I should saytwo things about the methodologicalapproachof the chapter. First,
this is an 'interpretation' of the IWW. I am consideringthe IWW in terms of its minor
processes,not 'representing' a completemovement;as said I in Chapter 3, this is the
driving force of Deleuzianempiricism. But to approachan empiricist reading it is not
to
enoughsimply explore the minor in a particular event. Such exploration must also
encourage resonance with contemporary questions and problems. The two political
movementsexplored in this thesis (the IWW and autonomia) are chosen generally for
what they may contribute to a contemporaryminor/ity politics and problematisationof
work, but they In
also raises1mcificquestions. many ways the IWW is a minor figure of
a different time, the first political formation of what the Italians called the 'mass worker'
(seeChapter7), or what we could as shorthandcall the Taylorist worker, rather than our
own 'socialisedworker' (the worker of 'post-fordism'). As such, its resonancewith our
era can not be based on a simple similarity. That said, a number of elementsand
problematisationspursued by the IWW remain pertinent to our time. Even as they
emerge at the birth of the massworker (following the 'skilled worker' of Marx's 'formal
subsumption13),the IWW was a movementof highly flexible and mobile workers, and

2 The question of how much the wobblies developed a full 'refusal of work' (since they talk of 'workers
management' of production after the revolution) is not one I am particularly concerned with. The problem
of 'self (as a prominent theme in parts of the twentieth-century communist movement) is
-management'
discussed in the next chapter, but in considering the wobblies, it is enough for my methodological
emphasis on the refusal of work/er as a tendency that they composed in and against the structure and
form of work and identity of worker, and sought the'abolition of the wage system'.
3 The 'formal subsumption of labour in capital' is explored along with these other terms in Chapters 7 and
8, but essentially it is Marx's (1976: 948-1084) means of describing the configuration of early capitalism
where capital appropriates labour as it finds it (such that individual craft skill retains a certain autonomy),
before increasingly subsuming labour in the capitalist social machine, and so removing its autonomy ('real
subsumption').

103
their structuraland political composition is one of minorities, and indeed non-citizens.
This composition has resonance with contemporary insecure flex-employment and
increasingawarenessof a global
ZID and flowing productive community of minorities (rather
than, say, national unities), with differentially moulded juridical contours (cf. Appadurai
1996; Agamben
Z, 1996). Alliez (1980) thus suggests that the milieu of IWW activity, the
mobile worker, has made a kind of return in contemporary diffuse work (cf. Chapter 7),
and Hardt and Negri (2000) also site the IWW as suggestive of organisational forms
appropriate for the deterritorialised forces and apparatus of 'Empire' sovereignty. That
said, it is beyond the scope of this chapter to 'make the links' explicitly, and hence whilst
the chapter suggestsresonancethrough its focus, except for an extension of the question
of 'sabotage' it is an exploration of one movement.
Second, if looking for minor processes that resonate with contemporary
questions, it is nevertheless important (indeed immanent to the concept of the minor) to let
the object-as-multiplicity 'speak'. There is nothing less empiricist than a theory which
reaches into social events to bolster its vreconceived interpretations. Thus the
methodology of the minor developed in Chapter 3 is not overlaid on the IWW as a set of
methodological rules which will force it to comply. Rather, the general framework of
minor processes(cramped peoples, connection to the social, life/practice immanence, little
inventions and small intrigues) are used to ask of the lWW 'what it can do'. The point is
to see how the IWW operates or functions as a kind of machine for generating minor
effects. What is important, then, is not whether this or that concept or practice sounds
Gminor' or not, but how the machine as a whole operates. Thus certain aspects of the
lWW may seem, or indeed are, rather un-Deleuzian (particularly a sometimes naive
conception of scientific progress), but the minor will or will not be found in the overall
consistency within which these aspects are functional. This said, one of the remarkable
aspects of this investigation is how fitting the minor is as a means of interpreting the
IWW, and this despite the general concerns of the milieu of modem radical politics, with
its historical peoples, linear narratives and so on.

Abstract labour and the working class

Prod uction- based inclusivity When the IWW declared that it was an organisation
of the 'working class', it meant this in the most simple or pure, and dualistic of senses.
The employing class and the working class composed two communities on either side of
a cleavage derived from 'the essential point' (St. John 1988: 43) of production relations.
This was the IWWs 'Declaration of Independence' (Smith, in RV. 113-20), as is evident
in the Preattible. Whereas craft unionism had been composed of numerous distinct
groupings and craft-subdi visions, representing an 'aristocracy' of skilled labour (against,
not least, women, black descendants of slaves, and immigrants), the IWW sought to
bring all workers into 'One Big Union' appropriate to modem machine-intensive work
where, following a classic Marxist position, old craft distinctions were being subsumed

104
into a mass proletariat: "The worker, wholly separated from the land and the tools, with
his skill of craftsmanship rendered useless,is sunk in the uniform mass of wage slaves."
(IWW 1988: 7) Such a configuration of class is more than evident in the opening to the
1905 Manifesto:

Social relations and groupings only reflect mechanical and industrial conditions.
The greatfacts of presentindustry are the displacementof human skill by machines
and the increaseof capitalist power through concentration in the possessionof the
tools with which wealth is produced and distributed.
Becauseof these facts trade divisions among labourers and competition
among capitalists are alike disappearing. Class divisions grow ever more fixed and
class antagonismsmore sharp. (IWW 1988: 7)

This understanding of class makes the IWW a distinctly modem workers organisation.
The political constituency of the working class is composed from a form of work that, in
Marx's terminology, is becoming truly 'abstract', where the particularity of work as a
distinct practice assembled around the rhythm of the labourer, has been subsumed in
capital and the globalised interrelation and rhythm of the machine.4 The craft unions were
thus seen by the IWW as reinforcing an old and redundant model of politics based on
respect for particular subdivisions of work, and indeed for 'work' itself, which for the
IWW was simply 'wage slavery'. As a redundant form, craft unions were also
reactionary since they were unable to fight capital on its modem terrain. Indeed the craft
unions were seen as reinforcing the identities, particular 'skills', subdivisions and
institutions of work necessary,for the effective exploitation of abstract labour and as such
were "an instrument of capitalistif' themselves (Industrial Union Bulletin 1907, cited in
Ramirez 1978: 200; cf. also Oscar Ameringer's 'Union Scabs', in RV: 14-15). 5 In this
situation, as Haywood put it, the IWW was a shift from 'caste' to 'class' (in RV: 50).
The membership criteria of the One Big Union was: "None but actual wage workers shall
be members... No one shall be excluded from membership because of creed, colour, or
sex." (IWW 1972: 9) This race and sex inclusivity was in itself groundbreaking, but the
IWW also included itinerant labour (as we shall see, this group had considerable
significance) and the unwaged (it was the first American labour union to consider

4 In Capital Marx was already looking to North American as starting to manifest the developed form of
capitalism, or 'real subsumption', where labour becomes a fluid and abstract force distinct from any
concrete identity: "Nowhere does the fluidity of capital, the versatility of labour and the indifference of the
worker to the content of his work appear more vividly than in the United States of North America...
nowhere are people so indifferent to the type of work they do as in the United States, nowhere are people
so aware that their labour always produces the same product, money, and nowhere do they pass through
the most divergent kinds of work with the same nonchalance. " (1976: 1014)
5 Ramirez (1978: 196) cites some contemporary employers' fears that a gap in representation by the craft
AFL could be filled by the IWW. The advocate of collective bargaining, Ralph Easley, wrote that "if the
(steel-workers] are not organised by the American Federation of Labour, an organisation standing for
American Institutions, they will sooner or later be organised by the Industrial Workers of the World. "
Gertrude Beeks similarly argued that "the AF of L is the greatest fighting force in the country against
Socialism and the IWW's. "

105
housework as work, and to organise chambermaids and prostitutes and it is still unusual
-
in this (Bird et al. 1987: 55-6)). Later constitutions thus continue: "No unemployed or
retired worker, no working class student, apprentice, or housewife, shall be excluded
from membership on the grounds that he or she is not currently receiving wages." JWW
1972: 9). 6
So, the criteria for working class unity is not a liberal humanist notion of
inclusivity (which would make it a transcendentformation), but a practical necessity
arising out of their notion of abstractlabour and understandingof the meansto refuse it
(which makesit a situated'proletarian' formation). Bologna (1972), Davis (1975), and
Ramirez(1978) have all stressedthis point. Davis argues that the IWW developedin
direct relation to the emerging Taylorist configuration of labour with its semi- and
unskilled mobile labour force. RamirezandBolognaboth arguethat this is the emergence
of a 'mass worker', a "mass-productionand mass-serviceworker who generally lacked
skills, was highly mobile, was largely of immigrant origin, and was increasingly female."
(Ramirez 1978: 195). "[Ilt was the type of labour force on which the entrepreneurial
dynamism of the mass-productionsectors largely rested, and thus it was an essential
elementto the innovativeprocessesmarking the capitalist developmentof those years."
(195) For the IWW it was through organising a massof differentially identified workers
(aroundcraft, race,sex,nationality, language),or rather,against their differential identity
on a more abstract plane as 'fellow workers' that their collective response to the
employerswas to be effective.
Effective organisationof the class as a whole neededto begin with those in the
worst conditions, and indeed in the case of the unskilled, this was often against the
skilled workers as much as the employers.7 This is especiallyevident in the IWW's

6 This account should be seen

as marking the IWW from other movements, and showing at the very least
its political intentions, not as suggesting that all social prejudice was overcome. Tax (1980) provides a
fully critical analysis of the place of women in the IM which shows both its progressive and reactionary
aspects, with much fascinating detail on the forms of organisation developed by IWW women, and their
relation to the wider feminist movement (and their conflicts with some of the more reactionary male
members). As well as organising radical activity amongst women, she argues that the IWW's most
important contributions here were in linking the workplace and the community, and integrating the demand
for (and indeed much practice of) reproductive freedom with the general class struggle. Tax locates the
problematic aspects of the IWW's gender politics around their "economism". This is a not unsurprising
target (since economistic workerism has been so exceptional in marginalising women from left-wing
politics), but, as my argument should make clear, I think in this case it is an inadequate basis for critique,
since it is through the IWW's emphasis on class that so much innovation and broad appeal occurred. This
inadequacy is actually evident implicitly in Tax's work itself. These two sentences, for example, jar; "This
economism ... was a severe weakness in the IWW's work. Despite it, the IWW was able to reach out in an
extraordinarily sensitive way to women... " (127).
7 Haywood made this point at the founding
congress: "I do not mean that this organisation is going to
improve the condition of purely skilled workers, but I mean we are going to get at the mass of the workers
and bring them up to a decent plane of living. I do not care a snap of my fingers whether or not the skilled
workers join this industrial movement at the present time. When we get the unorganised and the unskilled
labourer into this organisation the skilled worker will of necessity come here for his own protection. As
strange as it may seem to you, the skilled worker today is exploiting the labour beneath him, the unskilled
man, just as much as the capitalist is. " (cited in Ramirez 1978: 200) In this sense the IWW fit a very
different configuration of work to another non-party form, the workers council movement in Germany at the
same time. Bologna (1972) offers a very interesting analysis of how these two forms were intricately
related to particular developments or stages of capitalist production. The workers councils had a
revolutionary effect, but were essentially a last revolutionary fight of the labour aristocracy. In the USA at
the same time, the labour aristocracy had been superseded.

106
efforts toward the organisation of black labour. As Foner (1976) has shown, the
traditional craft unions had frequently been not only exclusionary, but often at the cutting
edge of racist practice (racism and sexism were effective means of reinforcing craft
identity).The railroad brotherhoods of the late nineteenth century were often more
backward than even the judiciary and the mainstream Church in their exclusion of black
workers not only from the unions, but from jobs themselves, and into the twentieth
century they continued to express a most pernicious racism. 8 The IWW on the other
hand, even in the South, sought to organise black and white workers in the same unions.
Essentially the point was always that working class equality was the only means of
preventing differential wages, strike breaking (a common AFL accusation against black
zn C)
workers), and racial prejudice.9 "If you are a wage worker", an IWW leaflet addressed
'To Coloured Workingmen and Women' declared, "you are welcome in the IWW halls,
no matter what your colour. By this you may see that the 1WW is not a white man's
union, not a black man's union, not a red man's union, but a working man's union. "
(cited in Foner 1976: 110-111)10 Such a concern with the recruitment of black workers
also necessitatedwork on the prejudices of white workers. To give one example, a 1912

article in the Southern IWW paper Voice of the People by Phineas Eastman, entitled
'Down with Race Prejudice', asked that

fellow workers of the South, if they wish real good feelings to exist between the
...
two races (and each is necessary to the other's success), to please stop calling the
coloured man 'Nigger' the tone is
some use an insult, much less the word. Call
-
him Negro if you must refer to his race, but 'fellow worker' is the only form of

salutation a rebel should use. (cited in Foner 1976: 109)

Production based cramped politics If the IWW's definition of class follows what
Kornbluh (1988: 131) describes as their 'simple Marxism' (where class is tied directly to
the conditions of production, forming a single plane of definition against the
particularities of skill, race, or sex), so their site of politics is equally stripped-down (and

equally inclusive in this). Following the split with De Leon in 1908, the IWW concerned

8 One example conveys the extremes of racism in this milieu. In 1910 the assistant grand chief of the
Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers explained why they abandoned attempts to organise in Cuba in
these terms: "...we were unable to distinguish the nigger from the white man. Our colour perception was
not sensitive enough to draw a line. I do not believe the condition will improve in a year from now or in 10
years from now or in any other time, unless you stock the island of Cuba with a new race, entirely getting
rid of the old ... I hope the time will never come when this organisation will have to join hands with the negro
or a man with a fractional part of a negro in him." (cited in Foner 1976: 107)
9 When black workers did scab on craft unions the IWW argued that it was induced by the unions
themselves: 'The whole trend of the white craft labour organisation is to discriminate against the negro
and to refuse to accord him equal economic rights. When, as a consequence, the negro is used to their
own undoing, they have no one but themselves to blame. " (cited in Foner 1976: 109)
10 Despite their progressive approach to the sexual division of labour and stance toward what we would
now call sexism (cf. note 6), the IWW do tend to use the expression 'man' for the generic human. I have
not highlighted this in citation partly because it clearly reflects a feature of the language of their time, and
partly because much of the language cited has accidental and deliberate syntactical 'error', which,
following Deleuze and Guattari's concept of deterritorialisation, has a certain importance for my argument.
A differing use of 'sic'would get complex indeed.

107
itself exclusively with 'economic' struggle. That is, struggle at the 'point of production'.
t t:1
Unlike the contemporary Second International, the IWW discounted both parliamentary

politics and the vanguard Party; II leading to a split with Bolshevism. Though the IWW

were initially very excited by the Soviet revolution, 12 and, according to Draper (1956:
150), were at first the Second International's greatest hope for an American Communist
Party, by 1920 Lenin (1975: 46) condemned the IWW along with the left-communists for
their 'infantile' refusal to work within orthodox unions and the political system. 13
Against Leninism, for the IWW, both immediate practice and future revolution were to
1:
come through
Zn the struggle at work under workers' own control.
The strictly limited franchise meant that the IWW's constituency was largely
excluded from conventional political participation. 14 Thus, as Bologna (1972: 21) has
argued, for the mass of people, the liberties of the bourgeois civil and political spheres
had been reduced to a single 'freedom to work'. For the IWW's 'citizens of industry',
work became the only site of possible struggle. This site was 'cramped' indeed; there
was little space for political practice outside of it and it determined life in some rather
certain ways. But if the IWW located their struggle in the 'economic' sphere of work,
this was not a narrow, or a-political concern as such. Rather, through this focus, all
aspectsof work become sites of politics. Haywood (1988) makes the expansiveness of
this narrow 'economic' focus very clear. "The Industrial Workers of the World is not a
political organisation" he says, but this does not mean that it is not 'political'. Indeed, as
he puts it:

industrial unionism is the broadest possible political interpretation of the working-

...
class political power, because by organising the workers industrially you at once
enfranchise the women in the shops, you at once give the black men who are

11 An IWW cartoon from 1916 called 'Now He Understands the Game' illustrates the argument clearly
enough. A'class conscious worker'carrying 'demands legislated in the union hall' confronts a rotund top-
hatted capitalist hiding behind a puppet 'ballot box' with three identical characters all saying "Vote your
power into my hands. I'll do your fighting for you. Vote, and be saved. " (in RV 57) Though the IWW
decisively broke with 'political' struggle in 1908, it never prevented individual members campaigning for
socialist candidates, and Union Hall's would sometimes carry electoral propaganda.
12 For example, Harold Lord Varney, a one time acting secretary of the IWW and father of the 'proletarian
novel', though later editor of the extreme right-wing journal The Awakener, said in 1919 that "Bolshevism
was but the Russian name for the I.W.W." (cited in Draper 1957: 111)
13 Draper (1956: 242-3) cites a letter from Moscow, intercepted in December 1919, that was intended for
the American movement, which clearly includes the IWW in its expectations for an American Communist
Party (the organisation of which was to be effected in Moscow, of course). Of the AFL the letter said "This
must be smashed in pieces. " Only seven months later at the Second Congress of the Comintern in July
and August 1920, following Lenin's policy of entering mainstream trade unions (as circulated to all the
delegates in what became 'Left- Wing'Communism) the IWW's refusal to join the AFL led to their split with
Bolshevism. An editors footnote to the Beijing edition of Lenin (1965: 130-1) describes the IVVWthus: "Its
activities were marked by pronounced anarcho-syndicalist traits: it did not recognise the necessity of
political struggle by the proletariat, denied the leading role of the proletarian party, the need for an armed
uprising to overthrow capitalism and the struggle for the dictatorship of the proletariat. The I.W. W.
refused to work in the American Federation of Labour unions and subsequently degenerated into a
sectarian anarcho-syndicalist group exerting no influence whatsoever on the workers. "
14 As Georgakas (in Bird et al. 1987: 5) writes: "All women, all the many
workers under twenty-one, and all
unnaturalised foreign-born workers - the vast majority of working America - were legally disenfranchised.
In those parts of the United States where black tabour was dominant, procedural harassment and outright

108
 disenfranchised politically a voice in the operation of the industries; and tile same
would extend to every worker. (1988: 50; emphasis added)

At this apparently minimal 'point of production' struggle there was a simple political
practice of 'class struggle', encapsulated in their one political goal: 'Abolition of the Wage
System'. There was no workers' identity to be found, or carved out in work itself.
Work, as a plethora of images in the literature show, was a space of war. The Manifesto
for example,statesthat

This worn-out and corrupt system offers no promise of improvement and

adaptation. There is no silver lining to the clouds of darkness and despair settling
down upon the world of labour.
This system offers only a perpetual struggle for slight relief within wage

slavery. (IWW 1989: 8)

So far I have suggested that the IWW was based on an at once simple and
unsophisticated, and yet also rather modem conception of class that was composed in
work where all unskilled workers were essentially equal 'wage slaves', or at least should
come to see themselves as such. These are a limited people, without rights or
representation, unsophisticated and cramped in these conditions. But from this condition,
'everything is political' as the lWW challenges the cramped condition for a generalised
abolition of work. From this simple unified plane of composition something of a minor
peopleemerges.

Reductions and complications

Having describedthe wobbly planeof compositionarounda simultaneouslyinclusive and
crampedconceptionof class,now I want to considerin more detail the way this relatesto
the major identities (and structured minority sub-identities) within which they were
formed. A fitting placeto start is with a line from The Intemationale. As I will show,
songhad central importancein the politics and lives of the wobblies, and it is hencenot
surprising that The Intemationalewas sung (as it has been throughout labour history
since it was written at the defeatof the Paris Communethrough the SpanishCivil War,
May '68 and the 1989 Beijing uprisings) at the founding IWW congress. Summoning
the wretchedof the earthto call forth the new world, it announces"We have beennaught,
we shall be all". This section is structuredaround this distinction between zero and
Z:I with the latter.
totality, starting
If the condition of the wobblies is crampedin work, they presentan image of a
future transformation of the chaos of capital into a "well-ordered and scientifically
managedsystem" (Wetter, in RV: 348). Notions of liberation, technologicalprogress,

intimidation kept most blacks from voting. Other large blocks of workers
- seamen, itinerants, and

109
universal humanity, all figure strongly. The almost messianic religious structure to this is
abundantly evident in wobbly literature. Countless wobbly cartoons feature the IWW
logo (an IWW and three stars floating over a polar-coordinated world) as a brilliant rising
sun on the horizon of assorted scenes of wage slavery, want, and degradation. One
cartoon, for example, shows the workers, arms raised, emerging from the swamp of
4craft unionism' and 'capitalism', being ushered by a classically enrobed figure of
'science', and 'economic development' to a glorious FWW sun and 'industrial
democracy' (in Bird et al. 1987: vii). The wobblies themselves were not averse to
suggesting that the movement had a certain religious fervour and structure to it. As
Giovannitti, an Italian born socialist and wobbly, said in court (in his defence against
charges of accessory to murder of a striker by a policeman in the 1912 Lawrence Strike):

But I say and I repeat, that we have been working in something that is dearer to us
than our lives and our liberty. We have been working in what are our ideas, our
ideals, our aspirations,our hopes - you may say our religion... But I say, whether
you like it or not, we are now the heralds of a new civilisation. We have come here
to proclaim a new truth. We are the apostles of a new evangel, of a new gospel,
is
which now at this very same moment being proclaimed and heralded from one
side of the earth to the other. (in RV: 194)

If the court-room induces intensities of rhetoric that are not commonly in evidence (and
indeed pragmatic argument to win a jury's sympathy), there are many other examples. A
journalist in the Anterican Magazine wrote of the same strike that "There was in it a
peculiar, intense, vital spirit, a religious spirit if you will, that I have never felt before in

any strike. " (RV- 160). The prominent wobbly activist Elizabeth Gurley Flynn described

the importance of a religious sensibility in the mobilisation of strikers: "Stimulation, in a

strike, means to make that strike and through it the class struggles their religion; to make
them forget all about the fact that it's for a few cents or a few hours, but to make them
feel it is a 'religious duty' for them to win that strike. " (in RV: 217) And, of the 'new
civilisation', Haywood said to the 1913 Patterson strikers: "It will be utopian. "
The IWW had a characteristically simple notion of a movement from zero to
fulfilled industrial democracy through increased industrial action and an eventual general

strike. 15 But in many ways the wobblies were, as Anderson (1961: 234) puts it, 'anti-
evolutionary'. If industrial democracy was an almost utopian goal, it was not a
4:1
mechanism for deferral of practice, or something which came from a gradual reform of

lumberjacks- were unable to maintainregistrationat fixed polling sites."

15This was not particularlynew. The roots of the general strike can be found in WilliamBenbow's (n.d.)
1832 treatise on the 'Grand National Holiday' (influential in the Chartist movement and the 1926 British
GeneralStrike), and no doubt before that (the late-eighteenthcentury radical use of the biblical 'Jubilee' is
anothersource (cf. Linebaugh1990)).

110
work. 16 It was, rather, a mobilising mechanism(however bland 'industrial democracy'
may soundtoday) for the immanent practiceof 'class war'. It is this 'class war', linked
to the other side of the formula, "we have been naught", through which the wobblies
were composed,and which the rest of the chapterfocuseson.
This W-lught' is fundamental. On a seriesof levels the wobblies could be said to
be a zero people. The wobblies were a movement of immigrants, women, racial
minorities, migrant workers, adventurousyouth, hobos (and various combinations of
these) - none of which had anything like full citizenship. And when they became
'working class' they were not exactly subsumedin a wobbly unity or full plenitude.
Rather,throughmembershipof the One Big Union and the formation of 'class' relations,
they deterritorialisedcertain major identities, and composedminor forms. I will discuss
the first part of this in terms of the main more or less major identitarian forms of the
immigrant, the American,the citizen, the 'People', and the leader.

Neither immigrants nor Americans... Wobbly publications appearedin myriad

languages(Rosemont(1988: 439) lists Finnish, Russian, Hungarian, Czech, Italian,
Spanish,Swedish,Bulgarian, Polish, Romanian,Lithuanian, Croatian, Yiddish, French,
German,Chinese,and Japanese). They were a complex compositeindeed. An account
of a 'free speechfight' in Aberdeen,Washington in 1911 illustrates the constituencyof
the IWW well. A seriesof wobblies take it in turns to standup on the soap box and utter
a few words before being arrestedand taken away (the object of free speechfights was to
the
swamp-to-bursting courts and jails of towns where wobblies were prevented from
street-cornerspeaking,and it becamequite an art form17). Each one is differentiatedby
his national or cultural background, and concomitant dialect. After a "Down East
Yankee""descendentof the Pilgrims of the Mayflower"

came a short, swarthy German, evidently from the Schwartzwald. 'Mein Fellow
...
Vorkers! Schust you listen by me vhile I tells you somethings!' But what that
'something' was he could not tell before he was seized and hustled in the wake of
the other two. After the German came a large, raw-boned Irishman with the brogue
of the ould sod thick on his tongue. 'Fellow Workers! Oi'm not much of a spaker,
but Oi don't suppose Oi'll be allowed to talk long, anyhow.' That was all the
speechhe was allowed to make before he too was led away.

16 One wobbly later commented on the question of immediate gain and future revolution thus: "When I
joined up in 1919,1 didn't know if there was going to be a revolution; but I knew there was going to be better
conditions. That was what we were after, more for the immediate than the ultimate. The ultimate was more
or less what the philosophic anarchists and socialists in there were talking about, pie in the sky, but I
wanted the pork chops on the table right now. " (in Bird et aL 1987: 50-1)
17 An account by Kornbluh (1988: 71) seems quite typical of the style: "Another soapboxer, an outdoor
lecturer in the Spokane area, had been a circuit preacher in the South. Dressed as an old Southern
colonel in a longtailed black coat and a soft-brimmed black hat, he would drawl softly: 'This is my text
tonight, Fellow Workers. It's about the three stars. They're not the stars of Bethlehem. They're better
than the stars of Bethlehem. The stars of Bethlehem lead only to Heaven which nobody knows about.
These are the three I.W. W. stars of education, organisation, and emancipation. They lead to porkchops
which everybody wants. "'

ill
 Next in line was an Italian who shouted the regular greeting of 'Fellow
Workers', spoke a few rapid fire words and was taken towards tile jail. From
another part of the crowd a five-foot man with the unmistakable rolling gait of a
sailor sprang to center of the cleared street, shouted 'Fellow Workers', and had time
enough to make perhaps the longest 'speech' of the evening. 'I have been run out
of this town five times by the Citizen's Club, and every time I have found my way
back. This proves conclusively that the world is round.' (Payne in RV: 103)

The wobblies - their ideas, practices and people - seem to exceed the nation state.
'If you don't like it then go back where you came from', was a familiar heckle to wobbly
agitators (and many were deported for political activity), as was a popular distrust of
'foreign' agitational ideas. Their continuous harassment and demonisation led one
wobbly to suggest, in an open letter from prison, that "... the I. W. W. is like the Mexican
in the movie show; he is always the villain. " (in RV: 348) But the wobblies 'imntigrant'

status was complex. They took no 'foreign' identity as their own. As the soapboxer J.
P. Thompson put it, "there is no such thing as a foreigner. We are all native-born
members of this planet..." (in RV, 316). 18 But neither were the wobblies 'American' in
the patriotic, rugged-individualist senseof the word. They left their old nations yet they
experienced little of being 'American', save the freedom of wage-labour. One cartoon by
Joe Hill (in RV: 129) interpreted the constitutional guarantee as "Life?, Liberty? and the
pursuit of -a Job!" with a migratory worker pursuing a fleeing nymph with 'Job' on her
crown, and holding a pork chop just out of reach (the veritable utopia of the pork chop is
a persistent wobbly theme). A song, 'My Country', written by O. E. B. during the 1914-
18 War, begins as a patriotic ode to the author's 'country', only to reveal later that "My
country is boundless / It has no limit / No king, no potentate -/ Only a race of human
beings." The absence of this country is then marked: "I do not dwell in my country, / But
I can live in the hopes it holds / For the future... " (in RV: 329). Yet it is in America,
amongst theseeclectic immigrant people that the wobblies emerged. The movement was
not a collection of minorities and immigrants infusing in an American melting-pot, but a
particular conjunction of modem industrial capital, poverty and oppression, internal

18This is evident in one of Joe Hill's most popular songs 'Scissor Bill', which describes the racism of the
scissorbill, or'non-class conscious worker'. A few lines convey the sense of the song. "He'll say, 'This is
my country', with an honest face... And Scissor Bill he says: 'This country must be freed / From Niggers,
Japs and Dutchmen and the gol durn Swede. '/ He says that every cop would be a native son / If it wasn't
for the Irishman, the son-of-a-gun. " (in RV 136) Another song, 'Dan McGann' by Dublin Dan enacts a
conversation between a 'foreign man' and a scissorbill 'Dan McGann'. Dan McGann says: "Don't talk to
me of the bourgeoisie, / Don't open your lips to speak / Of the socialists or the anarchist, / Don't mention
the bolshevik/ I've heard enough of your foreign stuff... " The reply affirms not so much the other's
'foreigness'but the already hybrid nature of the USA: "The 'foreign' man looked at Dan McGann, / And in
perfect English, said: VI cannot see, for the life of me, / What you have got in your head. / You boast and
brag 'bout the grand old flag / And the foes you put to rout, / When you haven't a pot in which to spit, / Or a
window to throw it out. / You howl and kick about the bolshevik, / The anarchist and Wob - Nou defend this
rotten system when / you don't even own your own job. " "You're working for an Englishman, I You room
with a French Canuck, / You board in a Swedish restaurant / Where a dutchman cooks your chuck; / You
buy your clothes from a German Jew, I Your shoes from a Russian Pole, / And you place your hope in a
dago pope, /To save your Irish soul... " (in RV 30-2)

112
marginals, and Europeanmigrants across the American social plane. An anonymous
1922article entitled 'Why I am a Member of the I.W.W. ' put it like this:

And lastly, although I am a foreigner, it is only becauseI am in America that I am

an I.W.W. For, contrary to the belief of many, the I.W.W. is an outgrowth of
advanced economic development in America, and the Italian, the Russian or the
Swede that you may find in the organisation here would not have been 'wobblies'
had they remained in their native countries. (in RV: 289)

... nor citizens or 'People' I have already shown how the constituency of the
wobblies was largely unrepresented in the form of the democratic 'citizen'. Women,
blacks, immigrants, itinerant workers, youth were all 'denizens' (as Agamben (1996),
following Tomas Hammar, describes the current condition of the noncitizen refugee in the
North). One wobbly, who says he is a 'citizen of industry' and has no other nationality,
is asked by a prosecution council "Where is your home?", and the exchange continues:

Cook County Jail

Before that?
County Jail, Cleveland, Ohio
And before that?
City Jail, Akron, Ohio
Are you a citizen?
No
That's enough. (in RV: 345)

Yet, if the wobblieswere 'missing' from this social democraticcategory, the lWW made
no attemptto enfranchiseits constituencyin any conventionalliberal democraticsense-
this was the discreditedpracticeof 'politics' that only constitutedjuridical democracy.
The 'citizen', eventhe 'People' were problematiccategoriesfor the IWW. The citizenry
figure most frequently in wobbly literature as a molar majority that claims historical
authenticityagainstthe foreignessof labour radicals. They are 'good Christian people'
who, stars and stripes flying high above the cross, went to the new world to freely
practicetheir religion, and force othersto do the same(cf. Smith in RV. 115, and the two
wobbly versionsof 'Onward Christian Soldiers', and 'Christians at War' in RV: 327-8).
A song to the executedanarchistsSaccoand Vanzettiby Jim Seymour conveys well the
wobbly impressionof the 'American'. The American says:

But the hell of it is, they ain't got no -

...
Wotta ya call it?-
Oh yes, no historic past.
If they ever get one O'them they'll be all right.

113
 Then they can talk about 1776
Instead of yellin' their foot heads off About Garrybaldeye an' Spartycuss.

But they're nothin' but God damn dagoes.

Now me: I'm an American, I am.
We're the real people, we are

They not only don't know nothin' about books W music,

'N' inventin' W science,
'N' makin' purty pictures W such things,
But they don't even know howta talk
The American language right. (in RV: 358)

Perhapsthe most famous wobbly, Joe Hill, wrote a short pieceon 'The People'
(in RV. 136-7). It beginswith the opening line from 'The Red Flag' - "The People's flag
is deepestred" - and the question, 'who are the peopleT Hill suggeststhat assorted
bossesand governorshave always been 'for the people', but that "When the Red Flag
was flying in Lower California [the Tia Juanauprising] therewere not any of 'the people'
in the ranks of the rebels. Common working stiffs and cow-punchers were in the
majority, with a little sprinkling of 'outlaws', whatever that is." (137) 'The people'
simply came to gawp at "The wild men with their Red Flag" before fleeing back to the
"Land of the Graft and the Home of the Slave". The lesson for Hill was that "... it is
about time that every rebel wakes up to the fact that 'the people' and the working class
have nothing in common. Let us sing after this 'The Work-ers'flag is deepest red' and to
hell with 'the people'." (137)

but 'rebels' in 'solidarity' One is tempted to see a little of the romanticism of the
...
outsider and the marginal in Hill's figure of the rebel. Yet here too there is a reduction, or
a complexity. The rebel breaks with the citizen and the people, but not in any splendid
isolation. The rebel is only such as part of the community of the working class. Hill
mentions 'outlaws' with uncertainty ('whatever that is'), but rebels are part of a definite
'working class' (which, as we have seen, is itself a compendium). I will consider this in
terms of a solidarity/rebel couplet, following the framework of the pack/anomalous form
(described in discussion of the minor 'author-function' in Chapter 4), as against a liberal
community/individual form, or a vanguardist membership/Party arrangement.
The wobblies were against any conventional forms of leadership (a popular

refrain was 'we are all leaders'), practised a cult of anonymity, and subsumed the
individual in the collective. One prisoner writes:

We hardly thought of ourselves as individuals and gauged our actions by the value
they would be to the defence, the organisation and the working class. We did not

114
 feel this as those who profess religious conviction by some sort of sudden revelation,
but by the association with one another and the realisation that the group and the
thing that the group stood for were far more important than the individual. (from
'Jail Didn't make them Weaken' by Jack Leonard, in RV: 126)

The wobblies frequently testify to an absolute faith in the organisation (and indeed many
experienced harsh repression for membership and activity - thousands were imprisoned,
tortured, tarred and feathered, beaten, lynched and shot). This faith is usually sanctioned
in terms of 'solidarity'. Pierce C. Wetter writes: "Solidarity - the basic, ineradicable,
human faith that an injury to one is an injury to all - is the spirit, the very essence of our
organisation.... [T]o compromise the principle of solidarity is essentially disloyal not
only to the rest of the group, but to the whole vital cause for which we stand." (in RV:
348) Yet this community, if a subsumption of an autonomous individual, is not a
negation of singularity. Singularity is a function not of the individual, but of 'the rebel'.
The rebel is a marker of creativity, or 'action', but his or her author-function is always
part of the milieu, and as such can be seen as an 'anomalous' or 'bordering' tendency in a
community rather than a distinct subject. The creation comes not from the rebel's
rebellious identity, but from pushing and developing an aspect of a politicised
configuration or situation (be it in literary production or tactic innovation and practice; in a
strike, for example, effective 'individual' action is necessarily part of a collective). This
is not to say that the wobblies did not have their prominent figures - Bill Haywood,
Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, Ben Fletcher, Joe Hill - but unlike a Lenin (at least once the
Revolution stabilised) or a Stalin, these people were proper names that, when seen within
their milieu, signified and induced minor rather than molar multiplicities. 19 These people
had certain styles or competencies that at times tipped the community elsewhere, but they
did not 'lead' as such and had no autonomous authorial role. 20
For example,we can interpret the proper name 'Joe Hill' in anomalousterms,
following the 'turbulence' of the spread and use of his songs, cartoons, reputation,
almost his 'myth', as they filtered through the wobbly movement. Two moments from
the story of Joe Hill's imprisonmentand death illustrate the pack/anomalousrelation.21
First, an appeal for defence funds:

19 One deflection of a cult of biography is evidenced by Joe Hill, about to be executed, who, when asked
for some biographical detail by a friend replied from prison that he was "a citizen of the world", and his birth
place was "the planet earth" (cited in RV. 127).
20 Gurley Flynn makes this case in a speech analysing the failure of the Patterson strike of 1911 (in RV.
215-226). She insists that purist criticism of tactics, criticism from outside, falls to grasp the collective
nature of the event which is a complex amalgam of workers, wobblies, appropriate tactics, local
experience and tradition, reaction, and so on where IWW 'control' would make no practical sense.
21 Joe Hill was executed by firing squad 19.11.1915 after having been
convicted of shooting and killing a
Salt Lake City grocer. That there was only vague circumstantial evidence, and the trial (in the court and
the media) was conducted as much against the IWW as against Hill leaves the question of his actual guilt
open (cf. RV. 127-132).

115
 Now there is not one in this organisation that can say he does not know this man.
For wherever rebels meet, the name JOE HILL is known. Though we do not know
him personally, what one among us can say he is not on speaking terms with
'Scissor Bill', 'Mr. Block' or who has not heard the 'White Slave' or listened to a
rendering of tile famous 'Casey Jones' song and many others in the little red song
book? (Solidarity 18.4.1914, in RV: 129)

Second,his funeral rites. After his execution, and a large and long funeral ceremony
(therewere addressesin ten different languages),Hill was cremated. His wobbly badge,
cuff-links and necktiewere removedto be preservedat fWW headquartersand the coffin
handleswere detachedto be melteddown for a plate with the words of Hill's last letter
engravedon it "Don't wastetime mourning for me - organise". The flowers were sent to
IWW locals, and in a strangerite, his asheswere parcelledup into envelopesand sent to
locals aroundthe world with instructionsto scatterthem to the winds on May Day 1916.
So, in the Solidarity appeal,Hill's fame and influence is signalledvia his songsas they in
turn arelinked to the obligatory marker of wobbly community, 'the little red song book',
suchthat his namehelpsmanifestsolidarity, and then every aspectof his deathand body
is utilised for the movement. It is as if nothing can be wasted for the cause of
'organisation', within which Hill's complexity and rebel creativity, rather than simple
identity is implicated.

The repetition and difference of wobbly culture

After thesereductions,the 'cramped' wobbly condition, I want to turn more clearly to the
cultural productionsof the IWW. This section is a generalaccount of wobbly culture,
following the senseof the minor literaturethesis, before a considerationof some more
specific figures (the hobo and sabotage)in the following sections. I have mentionedthe
rebel againstthe people, the proper nameas anomalousrather than the leader,but these
forms are only suchwithin a general
4D movementor culture.
What quickly becomes apparent in reading wobbly literature, history, biography,
song, cartoon, accounts of tactics and organisation, and so on, is the interchangeability or
interrelation of these forms. Propaganda, entertainment, community-building, and tactic
dispersal can be found across each form. A pageant is valued in its artistic, morale
building, and fund raising terms, and condemned if it is divisive or fails to raise enough
money (even if it had a huge turnout and produced the spectacle of a ten foot high bright
red electric light 'IWW' on the sides of Madison Square tower) (cf. R V: 201-2,210-14).
Songs are propagated to boost morale or class consciousness, to raise money, to spread
propaganda and tactics, and to tell histories. Even space travel for Joe Hill was to have
wobbly possibilities: "Tomorrow I expect to take a trip to the planet Mars and, if so, will
immediately commence to organise the Mars canal workers into the I. W. W (in RV:
......
127).

116
 Initially one sees a paucity of themes. There is a continual repetition of the
simple propositions of 'One Big Union', 'fellow workers', 'an injury to one is an injury
to all', 'solidarity forever'. 22 Yet the operation of this culture is not dogmatic or
programmatic for this. These simple refrains could not lead far if they were not mined
from within, applied in different contexts, communicated or lived in different sites, and
put to use. The repetition of these expressions and concomitant practices needs to be
understood as necessarily bringing in the difference of situation, and of 'rebel' practice.23
Every simple expression, following Kajka, connects to varied and particular intrigues as
it traverses the cultural forms and life process of individual wobblies, and so becomes
complicated and differentiated - imbued with a political vibration. Wobbly 'literature' is
thus full of tales and ruses, comedy, parody, and coarse speech, pictures, poems and
songs that convey the messagesand tactics in both blunt and subtle ways. The readiness
to use every vehicle at hand and to pragmatically 'live' the tenets and tactics of the
movement may go some way to explain how it was that the wobblies innovated in so
many fields - they used montage as early as European Dada, were the first labour group
to use cartoons, questioned the effectiveness of the tactic of the strike, and even subverted
popular advertisements in a fashion that is conventionally credited as a Situationist
invention (cf. Sakolsky 1990).24 This is not to say that the wobblies offer a wonderfully
rich cultural formation - again, the standard for judgement should not be conventional
aesthetics, they should not be set up as a popular cultural equivalent of Walt Whitman -
but that across their n-tilieu there is considerable production of culture and ways of life.
The works themselves tend toward a 'collective enunciation' and they
deterritorialise many major forms. Wobbly publications extend from prison pencilled
newspapers (such as 'The Can Opener' from Cook County Jail (cf RV: 336)) to national
dailies such as Solidarity and Industrial Worker. By 1920 close to 60 official and semi-
official IWW periodicals had been published. Anderson (1961: 188-9) suggests that
much of this material came from the many hobos for whom writing was an important

22 The simplicity of IWW propaganda is evidenced well by Bill Haywood who, in his public speaking
resisted 'theorising', and seemed able to convey a sense of wobbly politics through anecdote and tale,
and waving his arms about a lot. G. D.H. Cole said that "Haywood could make himself understood by a
crowd that did not know a word he said, merely by waving his arms and shouting. " (cited in RV. 45; cf. also
Carlo Tresca'With Big Bill Haywood on the Battlefields of Labour in RV. 208-9)
23 This repetition and difference is reflected in the IWW's organisationai form. Built around the basic
tenets, the IWW operated with considerable local autonomy, and though I do not have space to go into it
here, there was much debate and argument about different practices and orientations. Even wobbly
mainstays such as sabotage and the free speech fights were subject to widely differing opinions and
interpretations. Bird et al. (1987: 161-2) describe this process: "In contrast to the Communist
organisational method, the Wobblies lived by a kind of democratic decentralism in which every higher level
of authority was rendered as powerless as possible. IWW's did not accept organisational limitations on
individual freedoms. Members who disagreed with a particular policy simply didn't support it with their
personal direct action and were free to use their own judgement on how much disagreement to air in public.
The IWW halls and press were filled with criticism and debate which generally seemed to strengthen rather
than weaken the morale of activist members. " Though this is no doubt a rather glowing representation
(indeed the wobblies suffered a near death-blow over a centralism / decentralism schism in 1924), the
sense that the possibility of dissent was a positive wobbly trait is clear.
24 16 subverted advertisements by William H. Hinkelman
are in Rosemont (1988: 436). Two of those
recognisable today are 'His Master's Voice', where the dog listens to the words "Be contented. Work hard.
Save your money. Everything is all right. Blah-blah etc. ", and 'Arm and Hammer where the caption is
"Labour produces all".

117
element in their practices of 'killing time' (even if it was not always intended, or used for
publication). Letters pages in the various papers were the main sites of open publication,
though there was also room for short stories. But the IWW developed and spread their
culture in other ways. 'Silent agitator' stickers spread the cause with simple aphorisms
and cartoons, for example: "Slow Down - The job you save may be your own! ", "What
time is it? Time for a four hour day! ", "Beware Sabotage - Good pay or Bum work",
"The Scissorbill's Prayer - Now I get me up to work, I pray the Lord I may not shirk. If
I should die before the sun, I pray the Lord my work's well done" (cf. Bird et al. 1987;
R V). The wobblies also made considerable use of cartoons. These range from
professional works, to, more usually, simple amateur drawings. As Rosemont (1988)
writes, they tend to present the world in "defiant simplicity", showing a world of bosses,
scabs, and strong noble workers. 25 Many have a utopian future in the background, and,
as with the silent agitator stickers, there are frequent appearancesof the black cat and
sabot of sabotage. But again, there is variation and humour. One of Joe Hill's cartoons
depicts two wobblies dressed as deep-seadivers in an IWW submarine shaped as a sabot,
firing a direct action torpedo at a ship called capitalism, carrying "all necessities of life"
and manned by a typical rotund Mr Plute. Mr Plute, ever ignorant of the subtleties of
wobbly tactics, is looking through a telescope saying "all is well and no I. W. W. 's in
sight", whilst the torpedo comes up from underneath. A passing fish says "That's a new
one on me" (in Bird et al. 1987: 26).
Songs were a central aspect of wobbly composition, and the 'little red song
book', started around 1909, was carried almost like a Bible. Often written anonymously,
or credited to an individual wobbly's membership number, or the moniker 'slim', the
songs invariably utilised existing material. They were sung to traditional hymns, folk

tunes, even the star spangled banner, and usually retained an anchoring line from the
original, making the parody stronger. Sometimes one tune would be sung to different
lyrics and vice versa. The songs were spread at meetings, strikes, socials, hobo 'jungles'
(camps), and sold in the little red song book or on individual cards as fund raisers.
Words were sometimes changed to fit individual occasions (these were known as 'zipper
songs' (Bruns 1980: 154)). Writing from prison Joe Hill reported that his song 'It's a
Long Way Down to the Soupline' (sung to '... Tipperary') in "spreading like the
smallpox" amongst the unemployed was changed to fit the brand of soup dished out in
New York (in RV: 151).26 Even The Intemationale was sung with references to

25Althoughthere are a fair numberof hobos in these cartoons, by far the most prominentrepresentation
of the lWW as a movementis a well-built white worker, in what we would now see as a very 'workerist'
style. This is of course problematicfor a movementof minorities. Such a representationis usually used
when, in a mythicalposture, the collective force of the movementis being conjured (either to encourage
membershipand a sense of collectiveworth, to contrast the workers' power to that of the capitalists', or to
convey the eventualtriumph of 'industrial democracy'). When the representationof particular struggles,
recurrentpolitical problems,or picaresqueaspects of workers' lives is the purpose,the cartoons are more
likely to use less workerist images.
26The genealogyof the wobbly battle song 'Hold the Fort' shows this form of emergence
well. The title is
from a Civil War incident when trapped Union troops read flag messages conveyed from mountain to
mountainsaying 'GeneralShermansays hold fast. We are coming.' This anecdote was then used as the

118
industrial unionism. In these songs, again, there is a repetition of similar themes,
sabotage,one big unionism, solidarity, but also elaborationof particular eventsin labour
history, parablesof 'block head' workers, picaresquetales of hobo life, parodies of
religion and nationalismand so on. Their function in the compositionof the movementis
such that, asJack Leonardsuggests,eventhe 'tone' of the songs was politicised: "There
was as much difference in the mannerof singing, as there was in the words. Our singing
taught defiance,not obedienceto our masters." (in RV: 125)
Storiesand parableswere a popular form. Theseare often parodies, particularly
of religion, law, and nationalism. They usually make use of political events(often very
bleak ones), dominantlanguage,stereotypesof wobblies, judicial procedureand so on.
One examplefrom a Seattlemonthly 'smoker"27 called 'Their Court and Our Class',
enactsa trial of a wobbly who had beenon the Verona,28as it rather subtly parodiesthe
constructionof legal and
argument, recountsin humorousterms a tragic episode. This is
a short section:

COUNCIL - Object! your honor, the witness by his own admission

-PRISONER'S
is in the habit of lying.
JUDGE - Objection overruled! That is why the witness is here!
PROSECUTOR- Tell the court what you saw from your reclining position on the
dock.
ANANIAS -I saw the Verona steam up to the dock and there was a crowd of
I.W.W. 's on board. This man (indicating the prisoner) was one of the leaders.
PROSECUTOR - How do you know he was a leader?
ANANIAS - Becausethey were ALL leaders...
ANANIAS - he cried out in a loud voice, 'Give me Liberty or Give me Death! '
... ...
There was no liberty in Everett to give him, so the deputies started to give death. I
saw him deliberately dodge several bullets... (Walker C. Smith, in RV: 114)

If the court is parodied to the point of ridicule, Christianity is treated in a more

complex manner. The Church itself is considered with little but contempt, being

populated with assorted hypocritical preachers, gore-loving Christian soldiers, and the
'Starvation Anny' (cf. 'Christians at War', RV: 328). Joe Hill's most famous song,
'The Preacher and the Slave', conveys the essence of the IWW critique of religion with
its chorus, from the priest: "You will eat bye and bye / In that glorious land above the
sky; / Work and pray, live on hay, / You'll get pie in the sky when you die. " (in
Anderson 1961: 210) But Christ himself is used a little more tactfully. In one

theme for a gospel hymn by the popular evangelist Philip Bliss in 1870. This in turn was introduced by
another evangelistto England,and in the late nineteenth century, membersof the British Transport and
GeneralWorkersUnionparodied the hymn, singing the new version in strikes and demonstrations. This
versionwas then popularisedby the wobblies (RV: 105-6).
27 'Smokers' were fund-raising socials that usually consisted of four three-round boxing bouts, a
voluntaryprofessionalperformer,a propagandatalk, and a propagandasketch (PV.- 112).

119
particularly bizarre tale by William Akers ('Thightline Johnson Goes to Heaven'),
Johnson dreamshe is at the pearly gates of Heaven, a land without wages, but for
understandablereasonshastrouble at Judgment. God, 'the squeeze',is dubious because
Johnson has led a rugged hobo lifestyle, scorning the gifts tl of company, sexual and
C
the
gregariousurges, pleasuresof accumulation. "Kangarooed again, by God! " Johnson
says, but in walks Jesus,with "eyes that looked like thoseof a married man with a family
who hasjust got the sack becausehe had the guts to carry a red card" (91), who lets
Johnsonrecountthe life of the hobo in the strangehuman world of wage slavery, where
it is not for a lack of desirethat's God's gifts are neglected. At the end of the tale, God,
'the old geezer',breaksdown and cries (in RV: 87-93).29 There are also some parodies
of prayer. In one, 'The Lumber Jack's Prayer' by T-Bone Slim, a prayer for ham and
eggs,custardpies, Quail on toast, and pork chops is answered

by the 'old man' himself. He tells me He has furnished plenty for all - and
...- -
that if I am not getting mine it's because I am not organised SUFFICIENTLY

strong to force the master to loosen up... He absolutely refuses to participate in any
children's squabbles. He believes in letting us fight it out along the lines of
Industrial Unionism. (in RV: 269)

In reply to another prayer, 'Jerusalem Slim' says:

You say that you pray and work like a mule

You're not a worker but Henry Ford's tool.
You thank me for working 12 hours a day,
Why blame it on me -I never made you that way.
You scoff at the rebel and lynch him 'till dead
But I was an outcast and they called me a 'Red'.
You call me Christ Jesuswith intelligence dim
But I was a Rebel called JerusalemSlim.
And my brothers: the outcast, the rebel and the tramp,
And not the religious, the scab or the scamp... (from 'The Outcast's Prayer' Anon.
in RV: 86)

A last example has a prayer in the structure and style of the Old Testament recommending
industrial sabotage:

Chapter 13
.

28 260 wobblies, sailing from Seattle to Everett for a free speech fight, were shot at from the docks four
-
were killed.
29 Another example tells us that "Christ was a TRAMP / Without a place / To 'lay his head', / And WE are
tramps, / And I guess / That fifth chapter / Of the epistles of James, / Telling the RICH FOLKS I To weep
and howl / For what was COMING, / Must have been written / By a WOBBLY! " (in RV: 272-3)

120
 (2) Where dwelleth one called Bill which is surnamed Scissor, and seeing him sore
afflicted with patriotic leprosy we administered unto him much Industrial Unionism.
(3) Saying unto him, Go thou into the harvest and work for a dollar,
(4) And when the harvest is ripe and thy lord needeththee sorely
(5) Strike for two dollars, saying unto thy lord:
(5) Behold, thy fruit goeth unto the devil, pay us two dollars or great shall be the
destruction thereof... (from 'The Flight into California' by W. Metcalf, in RV: 75)

It becomes apparent that the wobblies were able to create a cultural milieu through
the repetition and difference of certain simple themes, in a series of languages and sites
that were not essentially their own. Though their assertions of something like a true
Christianity called the IWW are paralleled with assertions of a true America, it is clear, by
their irreverence and refusal of 'pie and the sky' preaching, that these are sites of
deterritorialisation and cultural creation ('using everything at hand'), not serious attempt
The wobblies have a sense of being outsiders and rebels, but
at starting a new church.
these are not autonomous identities, but processes which traverse the cramped sites and
identities of work, American, minority and so on, in a 'working class' collective that
seems only to live in the practice. I now want to consider two aspects of wobbly
composition in more detail, first the itinerant worker and hobo agitator, and second,
sabotage.

The hobo anomalous

If the 'rebel' holds a specialplace in wobbly politics, no one group manifested this
anomalous position more than the itinerant worker, the hobo. There is much to say about
the lives of wobbly hobos, but rather than attempt to fully map their contours, I focus
here on the complexitiesthat were maintained,even nourished in the hobo amalgam,or
'inclusive disjunction' of migrant worker, marginal outsider, and wobbly, and their
concomitant political and cultural inventions.
If the wobblies (largely composed of unskilled minority workers outside of
traditionalunion and political structures)were not particularly the classicconstituencyof
Marx's and Engels' working class,the hobo embodiesa good number of the attributesof
the classic 'lumpenproletariat'. When a Departmentof Justice agent reported on the
activitiesof the IWW in California and Washington, saying that it was composed "chiefly
of panhandlers, without homes, mostly foreigners, the discontented and unemployed,
to
who are not anxious work" (in Preston 1963: 60-1), he was referring to the hobo

constituency, but this could be Marx's description of the lumpenproletariat. The

wobblies themselves tend to

not use the terin (though in the classic history of the IWW,
Dubofsky (1969: 346) suggests that the IWW constituency included "some of the
lumpenproletariaf',and 'slum proletariat' figures occasionally(cf. Anderson 1961: 186,

121
223)).30 This is hardly remarkablesinceMarxian terminology did not figure prominently
in wobbly literature.31 But more than that, the hobo was a particularly popular wobbly
figure, and, insofar as hobos were workers, they were a prime constituency for
Haywood's conceptionof 'organising from the bottom up' (not an extra-sociallumpen).

Workers and outsiders Essentially, the hobos were itinerant labourerswho travelled
the country for seasonal and temporary employment, particularly in logging and
agriculture (but also in construction, sheep shearing, fishing, ice harvesting, railroad
laying, trench digging and so on (cf. Anderson 1961: 107-9;Bruns 1980: 137).32 In this
emphasison work one can make a weak distinction betweenhobos,tramps,and bums: "a
hobo works and wanders,a tramp dreamsand wanders,and a bum drinks and wanders."
(Holbrook, cited in Feied 1964: 17; cf. also Anderson 1961: Ch. 6; Speek 1917) There
is, unsurprisingly, much interrelation between these types, both in terms of their
representationin dominant culture, and in hobo practice. One hobo anecdoteconveysthis
well. A wobbly stands at a door asking for work. The little girl who answers says
"Mama, there's a bum at the door", but her mother answers, "That isn't a bum; that's a
harvestworker." A month later, when the harvest seasonis over, the sceneis repeated,
only this time the little girl says, "Mama, there's a harvestworker at the door", and her
mother replies, "That's no harvestworker; that's a bum." (Murphy in Bird et al. 1987:
45) There is a tendencyin secondaryliteratureto presenta narrativeof downward spiral
from hobo to tramp (cf. Parker 1920: 121 for example),but I am concernedwith how the
attributesof thesecategoriescirculatearoundthe hoboas migratory worker (since it is on
this planethat they are part of the IWW).
If the 'cowboy' was born of the capitalisationof cattle (Beastsof Burden 1999),
Anderson (1961) suggeststhat the hobo was the cowboy of the secondfrontier, 'called

30 In one of the few times I have seen the term lumpenproletariat appear it is in a rather classic Marxian
manner. In reminiscing on wobbly activism and its failings Joseph Murphy says: "I think now that one of
the mistakes we made was to spend too much time trying to organise the riffraff instead of the home
guard, the guys who stayed in one place.... We made men out of many of them on skid row, but when you
have proletarian riffraff - as Marxists called them, the lumpenproletariat - you got an awful low life form to
organise. " (in Bird et al. 1987: 45) This is a very strange statement in so far as it misses the points that
migratory workers were both central to American industry - and hence needed to be organised (until
changes in population and technology reduced the need for migrant labour following the 1914-18 War) -
and that it seems as though the hobos were recruited by other hobos, not a distant leadership. In 'The
Floater' Charles Ashleigh offers a different perspective of the effectiveness and centrality of wobbly
hoboes: "The proud aristocrats of labor had also stood aloof from [tramp workers], considering them
worthless of organizing efforts. And, then, suddenly, lo and behold, the scorned floater evolved his own
movement, far more revolutionary and scientific than his skilled brother ever dreamed of!" (in RV, 83)
31 This is not to say that individual wobblies did not read Marx. Along with Jack London novels and
specific IWW literature, each Union Hall would carry copies of Capital in its library, and wobblies
considered it their duty to read up on political economy (cf. Anderson 1961: 187-8 for an IWW
recommended reading list). Reading was a particularly popular hobo pass time. Finding reading material
through radical bookshops in 'Hobohemia' (such as'The hobo'and 'The Proletariat'in Chicago), from 'soap
box' speakers, itinerant wobblies, and general circulation, hobo interests were eclectic. As well as radical
literature, Anderson (1961: 186-7) reports that short story magazines, sex stories, and engineering,
railroad, and popular mechanic magazines were particularly popular, as were works on phrenology,
palmistry, Christian science, hypnotism, astronomy, and books on jokes, tricks, riddles, and detective
stories. Hobos were thus often rather well informed (Parker 1920: 111), and indeed Bruns (1980: 136)
suggests a number had professional skills and qualifications, even if they were not used.

122
forth' by the railroad and the spread and intensification of industry across the (now
largely colonised)territory, and disappearingwith the growth and spreadof mining and
manufacturingtowns (that is, an increasingly sedentarypopulation), and technological
change(both the increasingmechanisationof labour-intensivejobs, and the automobile,
which enableda very different form of mobility (cf. Bruns 1980: Ch. 8)). If capital both
requiredand madethe hobo, then concomitantwith his mobility was his autonomous,
selective, and adaptive capacity: "Adapting to the strange and new in tools, work,
machines,and sceneswas for him a normal consequenceof moving." (Anderson 1961:
xiv) Thus, one wobbly writes that:

The migratory workers were the most versatile body of men that ever developed on
this continent. A tunnel had to dug, a bridge built, a dam constructed. The word
went out and the workers with various skills would respond. The painters, riggers,
mechanics, printers, teamsters- any trade you name would arrive at the job by
boxcar. (Jack Miller, in Bird et al. 1987: 37)

The work that hobostook was both elusive, and, as for most wobblies, unpleasant- far
from a positive sourceof identity. But the productive centrality, and concomitantethical
fon-nationof the hobo - that which makesthem structurally 'proletarian' - was matched
with much deterritorialisationandminor creation. This is evident in their senseof being
'outsiders' or the 'excluded'.
If central to production, the itinerants were usually represented as rather sorry
marginal and/or dangerous figures, 33 and were frequently arrested as vagrants. But
wobbly literature and the hobos themselves convey the outsider situation a little
differently. The first four wobbly songs all concerned the life of the hobo. The most
popular of these was 'Hallelujah on the Bum'. It is a not untypically daft wobbly song
that, as the author claimed, appealed to the 'jungle stiffs' with its "rollicking, devil-may-
care lilt" (cited in RV: 71). The chorus runs: "Hallelujah, I'm a bum, / Hallelujah, bum
again,/ Hallelujah, give us a handout 4 To revive us again." In the songs and other
literature there are frequent referencesto complete exclusion and poverty ('It's not living,
just saving funeral expenses' was a popular refrain). In one song, 'The Popular Wobbly'
by T-Bone Slim (in RV: 85), a 'n-tild manner'd' wobbly experiences a whole host of
oppressors from police, judge, jailer, to the bedbug and flea who "go wild, simply wild"

32Hoboswere often knownas 'blanketstiffs' or 'bindlestiffs' because of the bedding they carried on their
backs, the only real propertythey owned (and even this was to be burned on each May Day).
3317orexample,Carlton Parkerand RexfordTugwell, respectively,suggestthat the hobo was "stamped by
the lowest, most miserablelabour conditionsand outlookwhich Americanindustrialismproduces" and was
a rather patheticfigure ... wracked with strange diseases and tortured by unrealiseddreams that haunt
his soul" (cited in RV*66). Parker (1920) presents a kind of materialist Freudianreading of the IWW as a
psychological by-product of the neglected childhood of industrial America" (100), where "inferiority
phobia" (46) induces "sublimation activities" (49) and aggressive "inferiority compensation" (51), most
notably as inferior work, wanderlust, sabotage, and the strike. The determinism of Parker's reading is
such that "it is impossibleto view an I.W.W. as a mobile and independentagent... he is more or less a
finished product..." (96).

123
over him. Perhaps, he suggests, even the roses will do the same in his grave. Joe Hill's
'The Tramp' tells a similar story, where in the chorus the hobo is told to 'keep on a-
tramping' by assorted figures who appear in each verse. Even Heaven casts him out, so
"In despair he went to Hell. / With the Devil, for to dwellj For the reason he'd no other
place to tlgo./ And he said, 'I'm full of sinj So for Christ's sake let me in! '/ But the Devil
said, 'Oh beat it, you're a 'bo. "' (in RV.- 139-40)
Yet the hobos did not wallow in their exclusion; in many ways they affirmed it.
They were indeedpoor and oppressed,the most zero of people, but there is a clear verve
and vibrancy in the culture. Jack London presentsthe hobo, if a little romantically, in
termsof Nietzsche'soverman(indeedit his direct experienceof hoboing that induces his
unstableethical alignmentof Marx and Nietzsche)(cf. London 1907; Feied 1964). An
article in Solidarity in 1914(cited in RV- 66-7) describedtheir situationthus:

The nomadic worker of the West embodies the very spirit of the I.W.W. His
cheerful cynicism, his frank and outspoken contempt for most of the conventions of
bourgeois society, including the more stringent conventions which masquerade
under the name of morality, make him an admirable exemplar of the iconoclastic
doctrine of revolutionary unionism.

Such an account may be just good romantic propaganda, but descriptions of these
attributesof irony, optimism, and verve are not only prevalentin wobbly literature, but
also in critical (even hostile) accounts of the movement (though here, whilst these
attributes are sometimesseen as a continuation of 'frontier spirit', they are usually
diagnosedas an effect of psychological dysfunction (cf. Parker 1920, and note 33)).
These accountsshould not hide what must have been a very complex affective and
psychologicaldisposition, and inasmuchas I am arguing that the hobo is a proletarian
figure, one should be awareof the need for its overcoming (toward which its creations
are directed). Nevertheless,the degree to which wobbly literature is written by the
wobbles themselvesmakes such accountsinteresting, at least as presenting a desired
political and ethical form. This affirmation, however, did not stand alone. The
importanceof theseattributesis in their relation to other aspectsof the hobo condition.
The above account goes further:

His anomalous position, half industrial slave, half vagabond adventurer, leaves him
infinitely less servile than his fellow worker in the East. Unlike the factory slave of
the Atlantic Seaboardand the Central States,he is most emphatically not 'afraid of
his job. '
His mobility is amazing. Bouyantly confident of his ability to 'get by'
somehow, he promptly shakes the dust of a locality from his feet whenever the
board is bad, or the boss is too exacting, or the work unduly tiresome... (RV: 67)

124
In this representationof the hobo's celeritas,skill, mobility, and contemptfor dominant
culture is isolatedand linked to a condition of being in an anomalousposition. For the
hobo was not simply a romantic wanderer, but simultaneouslya worker, a shirker, a
hobohemian,a traveller, and a memberof the IWW, and it was through his position at the
points of interrelationof theseforms that he composedhimself.

Anti-work, jungle culture, and hobohemia If the hobo was a versatile worker,
work was not a popular pastime. In most accounts,tales, and songs of the hobo, one
finds him upping andleaving work ratherreadily; if going to anotherjob, it is distantjobs
that are popular (rather than local, if better paid ones) (Anderson 1961: 5). In his
wobbly/hobo biography Henry McGuckin (1987: 11) recounts his first lesson in hobo
ethics. Amongst other things, including a pragmaticjudgement on theft based on the
relative likelihood of capture, his hobo friend conveys that "Work was something to be
doneonly as a last resort. As long as you could eat and sleepwarm without it, leave it
alone." 'King' Dan O'Brien sirriilarly suggestsa dislike of work was prevalent: "[The
hobo] swearsthat when work becomesan art and a joy, he will take off his coat and go to
work." (cited in Feied 1964: 17-8)34And, in 'The Hobo's Last Lament', the last words
of a dying hobo are for "No tears"becausehe is going to a land "Where beef-stewsgrow
on bushes.... Where they hate the word called work. " (in Anderson 1961: 212) Other
accountshave hobos desperatefor non-existent jobs and rejectingthe notion that they are
bums.35 But for the 'proletarian' condition, these two positions are not mutually
exclusive. It is perhaps best to see the anti-work ethic operating as a propulsive force
away from each job (and indeed, in terms of 'class war', within and againsteach job), in
conjunctionwith the attractorof the (necessityof) the wage to eachnewjob.
The nodal points of hobo life between work were the hobo 'jungles' and
'Hobohemia'. Quite a complex machine in itself, the jungle was usually situated near
railway junctions, and skirted the edgesof towns, close enough to enablehobos to 'bum
rD
lumps' (ask for handouts),find or steal food, and organise,but not so close as to attract
attention. Many report a considerabledegree of jungle ethicsand organisation. The hobo
poet Harry Kemp describesthejungle in somedetail:

It is often a marvel of cooperation. Discarded tin cans and battered boilers are
made over into cooking utensils and dishes. Each member contributes to the
common larder what he has begged for the day. There is usually in camp someone

34in one of the early sociological approaches to vagrancy, and one which advocates for the socialising
and civilising effects of work, Lewis (1907: 611) links anti-worktendenciesto the 'downwardspiral' thesis:
'The love of change, the roving spirit, temporary accident or injury, are causes that tend to make the
workmanan accidental vagrant, who is liable to acquire an intention not to work, and become thus an
habitual vagrant."
35 Evenwhen hobos self-identify as bums, it is usually only in comparisonto the capitalists as the 'real'
bums.One tale called 'The Two Bums' considers hobos alongside capitalists as bums, only the former is
'lighter'and his conditionis caused by the latter. One verse runs: "The bum on the rods is a load so light/
That his weight we scarcelyfeel,/ But it takes the labour of dozens of men/ To furnish the other a meal." (in
Milbum 1930: 120-1)

125
 whose occupational vocation is that of cook, and who takes upon himself, as his
share of the work, the cooking of meals. Stews are on great favour in trampdom
and especially do they like strong, scalding coffee. Usually the procuring of food
in such a camp is reduced to a system such as would interest economists and

sociologists. One tramp goes to the butcher shop for meat, one goes to the bakers
for bread, and so forth. And when one gang breaks up, its members are always very

careful to leave everything in good order for the next comers. They will even leave
the coffee grounds in the pot for the next fellow so that he can make 'seconds' if
he needs to. These things are part of tramp etiquet, as is the obligation each new
arrival is under to bring, as he comes, some wood for the fire. (cited in RV: 67)

Anderson (1961: 20-1) lists seven main jungle crimes, including lighting fires at night
(which might attract the police), robbing other hobos while they slept, wasting food, not
washing up the pots, damaging any equipment, and not rustling wood for the fire.
Relations in the jungles appear to have been based around news and some impromptu
entertainment and song, where intimate attention to ethical form was concomitant with the
maintenance of personal anonymity and temporary, though not unproductive, relationS.36
If the jungle was the temporary camp, 'Hobohemia' was a longer stay nodal point
(especially in winter). Chicago (the largest railroad centre), or 'Big Chi', as Bruns
(1980: 162) describes it, was the hobo Mecca: "For the 'boes all roads, it seemed, led to
Chicago. " As Anderson's (1961) complex territorial and social map of hobohemia
unfolds, one is left with little doubt that Marx and Engels would have found it a swamp
of lumpen deviation. Hobohemia was an isolated part of Chicago, subdivided in four
parts, all known as the 'main stem' (though West Madison Street marked a core), with a

central 'Loop', 37 and was made up of 'flop houses', cheap meal houses, and saloons,
where "swarm[ed]" a "polyglot population" of bootleggers, dope peddlers, professional
gamblers, 'jack rollers', drunks, 'lady barbers', 'bathing beauties', vagabond poets, non-
hobo workers seeking a cosmopolitan night out, bohemians, and so on (1961: 5-9).

36 See Bird eta/ (1987: 30), Bruns (1980: 31), and Anderson (1961:
after 10) for photographs of jungles.
In the latter, a strangely empty jungle is captioned "A jungle camp - the 'bos' hid from the camera".
Anderson (1961: 21-25) has a valuable first-hand account of 'a day in the jungles'.
37 Each area, and its sub areas has a particular constituency: 'West Madison' 'slave market' of
-
employment agencies, and home of the more down and out, and petty criminal, 'Bum Park' -a place for
sleeping and paper reading, 'Crumb Hill'- the same, but with more drunks, 'Bughouse Square' - the 'Latin
Quarter of hobohemia, where bohemia and hobohemia meet. As one may guess, Anderson's account is
extensive indeed (no doubt "the most far-reaching examination of Hobohemia ever undertaken. " (Bruns
1980: 183)). He himself had an immigrant and hobo background and lived in hobohemia whilst doing his
research. The research itself was inspired by a meeting with the 'hobo surgeon' Ben Reitman, and written
whilst a graduate student in Sociology at the University of Chicago. In the context of the empiricism of the
Chicago School it is interesting that Anderson describes his research as not the kind of 'participant
observation' where one would "descend into the pit, assume a role there, and later ascend to brush off the
dust." (1961: xiii) Rather it was immanent to his "exit", a way of "getting by' (and he deliberately uses the
wobbly term) on his way out, into the academy. Perhaps not unrelated to these conditions of production,
the text has a strange oscillation between a love of detail that at times approaches affirmation, and an
insistence on the paucity and poverty of hobo culture (such that each chapter ends in a list of policy
suggestions to cure a problem). This is in interesting contrast to Parker's (1920) only slightly earlier
research, which, whilst it claims a certain intimacy with its object against 'detached academic'
observation, actually mobilises a most transcendent and determinist theoretical framework to capture the
IWW as an always already foreclosed tragic product of an immature society (cf. note 33).

126
Unlike Marx's description of the lumpen of Paris, however, Anderson has a keen sense
of the dynamic of hobohemia. This dynamic has multiple causes, but is most essentially
linked to its condition as a centre for hobo workers. It is not just that, because of this,
more money circulates, but that also a cosmopolitanism is brought in through the
complexity and movement of hobo culture. He thus contrasts the mass of (propulsive)
employment agencies in hobohemia to the similar numbers of (more inert) rescue
missions in New York's Bowery (1961: xvi).
Hobohemia was functional both to capital (as a labour exchange, or 'slave
market'), and to the consolidation and multiplication of hobo styles. As well as having
bookshops (such as 'The Hobo' and 'The Proletariat'; the latter also provided mail
collection and storage services for hobos) and from 1915 the lWW Head Quarters
(enabled largely from the membership dues of migratory workers (Bruns 1980: 157)), it
was where the hobo arts of 'getting by' and 'killing time' were honed and spread.
Listening to the speechesof 'Soap Boxers' was a constant activity. Though Anderson
(1961: 219-20) describes the speeches as "like a game with a limited number of pieces
and a limited number of moves", the wealth of styles, tricks, ethics, disciplines
(economics, biology, psychology, sociology, class war, free love), that he describes
(216-229), as well as their popularity, make it clear that there is considerable difference in
the repetition.

Dromomania If the jungles and hobohemia were hobo nodal points, then the
trajectories were defined by railroads under the impetus of possible jobs, radical actions,
or changing seasons.
Zn Hobos would move around the country by riding the 'rattlers'
(freight trains), inside or on the 'rods' (drawrods beneath the freight carriages) by
'flipping' (boarding a moving train) on the outskirts of towns. According to Parker
(1920: 121),railroad companiesestimatedthat therewere half a million hoboes riding the
rails at any one time (this being only a fraction of the total number). Though they would
sometimeshave help from railroad workers, mostly it was a complicatedand dangerous
practicesincethey were up againstnot only railroad police, but also hijackers who would
extractmoneyor throw them off the train, so 'greasing the rails' (cf. Murphy in Bird et
al. 1987:46). According to Parker (1920: 121), between 1901 and 1905 nearly 23,964
trespassers(largely tramps and hobos) were killed on the railroads, and over 25,236
injured. Nevertheless,freight riding was the only means of movement, and the YWW
madeefforts to preventthe hijacking with 'flying squads', who had beenknown to cut
and scar 'IWW' on the facesof any hijackersthey caught.
Though freight riding is often presentedas a necessity to be avoided (it was
certainly dangerous), it is also frequently explainedin terms of 'wanderlust', and what
was pathologised
z: 1 as 'dromomania'. 38 One wobbly describes'riding the rails' as a way

38'Dromomaniacs'was the name given to deserters in the

ancien regime, and in psychiatry, to compulsive
walkers (Virilio 1986:153). If the hobo wobblies were dramomaniacs it was not in terms of the 'pure speed'

127
of experiencingthe 'grandeurand beauty' of the West, suggestingthat "That's the feeling
we all had. I think that's one of the reasonswe kept on moving..." (Archie Green cited
in RV: 7 1). Another 19 year old "does not know why he travels except that he gets a
thrill out of it... He has tried [to settledown] a few times but the monotony of it made
him so restless"(Anderson 1961:83). The famous 'hobo surgeon' (and sometimelover
of EmmaGoldman),Ben Reitman, expressedhis ambivalentattitudeto freight riding by
self-pathologising his love of movement as a "neuropathic craziness, a fugue,
'ambulatoryautomatism."' As Bruns (1980: 171) put it: "It was his hobby, his sport,
and his disease.
" Whateverthe reason, the mobility of the hobo is reflected in a rather
individualisedpractice. There were virtually no women hobos until the 1930s (Feied
1964: 14), and the vast majority of hobos were single (Anderson 1961: 4).
Homosexuality appearsto have been quite widespread (Anderson 1961: 144; Parker
1920: 73), and it seemsas if it developed(and was affirmed) in a form appropriatefor
hobo culture, as a temporary'uncomplicated'meansto intimacy (Anderson 1961: 148).
As Anderson (1961) describes in detail, hobos had a wealth of means,
techniques,grafts for 'getting by' whilst on the road, themselvesoften described as
'work'. Hobo songs often give practical and political information. In 'The Suckers
Sadly Gather' by RichardBrazier, the practiceof theft is pitted againstthe 'suckers' that
buy non-existentjobs. Oneverseruns like this:

The Hoboes quietly gather 'round a distant water tank,

While the Bulls [police] are safely resting home in bed,
And they sadly sit and ponder on the days when they ate pie,
And occasionally some moldy punk instead.
But now they're living high when a chicken coop is nigh,
For the rancherssend them chicken every day,
So to the jungles they skidoo to dine on chicken stew
Where the silvery Colorado wends its way. (in RV: 73)

In another story Tightline Johnson breaks into a wealthy house, justifying himself along
the lines of jungle ethics where a hobo would rightly help "himself to the grub, livin'
strictly up to the code by whitlin' shavin's and washin' the dishes before mushin' on next
mornin'. " (William Akers in RV: 89)

Hobo sang and hieroglyphics As is evident already, the hobos developed a

particular slang to describetheir various practicesand experiences. In an index on the
languageof the migratory worker Kornbluh (1987: 405-8) lists some240 different terms,
ZD

that Virilio (1986) describes as the essence of late capital, but more what he calls a "revolutionary
wandering" (1986: 5) that was immanent to a series of radical practices, of constructive planes, as much
as capital flows, such that speed was part of composition (cf. ATR 559 and Plateau 12 generally for a
delineation of Virilio's different forms of speed, which, whilst they are indeed always implicated in each
other, also tend toward different forms of composition).

128
including: 'Angel food' - mission preaching; 'Carrying the banner' avoiding the
-
expenseof a bed at night by walking, pretendingto wait for a train and so on; 'Cat' -a
worker well fitted in with someoccupationalsubculture such as 'hep cat', or, sometimes
short for 'sab cat' of sabotage,as in 'turn the cat loose'; 'Coll' - deluxe hobo dish of
mashedpotatoes,onions and liverwurst; 'Crum' - louse; 'Gay cat' - new hobo; 'Glom' -
to catchonto, as in to 'glom a gump', to steal a chicken; 'Pearl diver' - dishwasher; 'Pot
latch' - grandreunionor social; 'Snipe' - sectionhand,or cigarettebutt, and as a verb, to
retrieve a cigarette butt; 'Stakebound' - having accumulateda sum of money on a
temporaryjob and feeling free to leave it'. As Anderson (1961: 99) points out, the
languagewas in continual flux. Extensive use of a term would lead to variation in
meaning,and subdivisionand further invention of terms. At the extremeshe cites (1961:
100-1) a list by 'A No. V of 47 types of tramp, categorisedby everything from their
practices (Troper stiff' - considers manual toil the acme of disgrace; Throniker' -
hoboedwith cooking utensils),to their physical coherence('Peg' -a train rider who has
lost a foot; 'Wingy' - one or both arms). It seemsas though the hobos also developed
...
a form of hieroglyphics. Symbols would be left at assortedsites of note by passing
hobosto indicate such things as placesgood for handouts(a cross on a gate, or parallel
lines on a station),hostile towns (two semicircleswith dots for eyes),and restaurantsthat
offer food in exchangefor dish washing (a plate with knife and fork) (cf. for illustrations,
Anderson 1961: 15; Bruns 1980:32; RV* 86).

Hobo/wobblies The lWW madeconsiderableeffort at organising hobos, and though

recruitmentwas initially very slow, after their involvement in the WheatlandHop Fields'
Riot in 1913 (cf. Parker's (1920: 169-99) report to the Governor of California),
membershipincreaseddramatically(andenabledthe founding of the Agricultural Workers
Organisation). Whilst, evenat its high point, only a minority of hoboswere in the IWW,
it was by far the most popular of hobo organisations(cf. Anderson 1961: Ch. 16). But
for two main reasonsit is best not to think of the hobo/lWW relation simply in terms of
numbers(of almost 'converts'). First, the relation between the organisation and hobo
culture is less one of identity than becoming. Whilst wobbly rebel activity marked a
changeof composition for the hobo, many lWW practices were formed through the
structural and ethical practices of hobo culture (such that Anderson (1961: 230-1)
suggeststhat "[The IWW] was conceivedon the 'stem', and cradled and nurtured by the
floating workers"). Second,wobbly membershipwas quite a looseand fluctuating thing,
relatedto particular events and situations. There are reports of wobblies effectively
forcing membershipon hobos (the IWW red card enablingthem to enter certain jungles
and ride certain trains; though this was frowned upon officially), and there is no doubt
that membershipdues were central to the organisation(unlike the other prominent hobo
organisation,the less radical InternationalBrotherhood Welfare Association, which was
bank rolled, and largely controlled by James Eads How). But membership is not best

129
seenin this 'direct' way. All reportsmakethe casethat on the whole hobos relatedto the
organisationin a loose fashion, joining during periods or sites of radical action, and
letting duesandinvolvementwane at other times (indeed dues tendednot to accumulate,
but emergeas momentarystrike funds).39 Being a wobbly was not, then, an either/or
question,but more of a fluid relation, dependingon situation. Thus, though of course it
had many permanentcore militants, the lWW as a mass movementwas not so much a
fixed body, but a seriesof intense'swells' from a milieu where individuals may or may
not call themselveswobblies, or be permanentmembers. Parker (1961: 115) conveys
this:

In the history of American labour there has appeared no organisation so subject to

fluctuation in membership and strength. Several times it seemed on the point of
joining the Knights of Labour in the graveyard of labour class movements, but
energised by some strike flare it appearsagain as an active force.

This senseof a 'swell', and rather anonymous, even mysteriousmovementis evident in

popular opinion. One Senator said: "... you cannot destroy the organisation.... It is
somethingyou cannotget at. You cannot reachit. You do not know where it is. It is not
in writing. It is not in anything else. It is a simple understandingbetweenmen, and they
act upon it without any evidence of existence "
whatever. (cited in RV: 255)
To give some examplesof IWW/hobo relations, one of the most successful
wobbly unions,the Agricultural Workers Organisation(AWO, foundedin 1914) invented
a systemof recruitmentbased on migratory practices.40 Unlike conventionalorganisation
based around a particular stable territory, the recruitment of migratory workers was
enabled by the invention of the 'job delegate system'. Essentially a group of mobile
organisers,would start in the early Spring at the Mexican border, and end in late Autumn
in the Canadianprovinces, recruiting new members, collecting dues, selling literature,
passingon news and techniques,organising strikes and so on. As Georgakas(in Bird et
al. 1987: 8) puts it, "[al local could exist in the hat or satchelof a mobile delegate.
"
Anderson (1961: 234) describesin more detail how the more skilled agitators would
operate a threewave strategy: the first 'official agitator' would arrive and merely 'fan the
flamesof discontent',making no attemptat organisation,the second,'pioneer organiser',
started the work of forming a local beforebeing dismissed,and the third, 'real organiser',
would work more subtly and quietly at detailedorganisation,often only becomingknown
to the employeroncedemandswere first made.
The characteristicwobbly practices of street-cornerpreaching and song also
originated with the hobos, when J. H. Walsh organised a travelling wobbly band, the

39 Anderson (1961: 232) suggests that

probably only a third or a quarter of those who called themselves
wobblies were in good standing.

130
'Overalls Brigade', that, dressedin black shirts, denim overalls, and red kerchiefs, toured
the Northwest around 1907-8, parodying Salvation Army hymns and popular songs to
attractworkersto street-cornermeetings. The songs were printed on pocket-sizedcards
and sold for 10 cents. Around 1909this was expandedto becomethe first wobbly song
book (RV: 54-5). The Overalls Brigade was initially formed en route to the 1908
Conventionwhere its vocal enthusiasmfor direct action is said to have helped tip the
the
conventionagainst political action tendency(Bird et al. 1987:35).
C

Sabotage
Of all the wobbly deterritorialisations of worker identity, little is more prominent, yet also
elusive than 'sabotage'. 41 If wobbly composition can be seen in terms of minor
processesacross the plane of class (rather than 'identity'), in sabotage we find a correlate
in 'direct action' tactics. It links the aspects of culture, variability, work, and immediate
economic goals together, whilst being immanent to anti-identitarian, or minor processes.
The signs of sabotage - the black cat and the sabot (wooden clog) - crop-up throughout
wobbly literature, song, cartoon and silent agitator sticker in varied fashion. This is not
to say that sabotage can not be initially defined. Conventional wisdom is that the word
derives from the act of French workers throwing their sabots into the works of the
machine. This is, however, a little inaccurate. Erriile Pouget (1913), who first
introduced the term to the syndicalist movement (at the General Confederation of Labour,
CGT, Toulouse conference in 1897), traces the word to the expression "de travail e.V&utj
6conane et coups de sabots"' - 'to work clumsily as if by sabot blows', or '... as if
wearing sabots' (Pouget 1977: 3; 1913: 37). This in turn, he suggests,
t
derived from a
Scottish practice of 'Go cannie', meaning to 'Go slow' (and he cites an English pamphlet
from 1895 that sought to popularise the tactiC).42 Pouget's point is not that the practice
was particularly new (he cites an account from Balzac of its use in the 1831 Lyon riots,
and Gurley Flynn (1993: 10) calls it an instinctive defence), but that it was not until the

40 According to Bird et aL, in the first year of its existence the AWO enrolled 3,000 members, increasing to
20,000 or 70,000 in 1917 and 1918 (Bird et al. and Kornbluh (1988) respectively), with the help of 300
mobile delegates.
41 Georgakas (in Bird et aL 1987: 6) suggests that the
ambiguous use of the term sabotage resembled the
60 s civil rights movement's use of "the vague but menacing phrase 'by any means necessary"'. The
difference, however, is that sabotage was linked rather concretely to the plane of work, and, probably for
reasons not unrelated to this, has not been so easily incorporated within dominant cultural catch-phrases.
42 Fred Thompson (in RV 37) offers a slightly different inflection,
suggesting that'saboteur' was a general
term for peasants (still wearing wooden shoes whilst industrial workers were wearing leather) who were
frequently used as strike-breakers. On return to work the workers would mimic the clumsy work of the
saboteur. Following this, Gurley Flynn (1993: 11) cites a circular sent to all Scottish dockers after losing a
strike in 1889: "The employers like the scabs, they have always praised their work, they have said how
much superior they were to us, they have paid them twice as much as they ever paid us: now let us go
back on the docks determined that since those are the kind of workers they like and that is the kind of
work they endorse we will do the same thing. We will let the kegs of wine go over the docks as the scabs
did. We will do the work just as clumsily, as slowly, as destructively, as the scabs did. And we will see
how long our employers can stand that kind of work. " Apparently in this case the
employers did not stand
it for long, and the workers won most of the demands (that the strike had failed to
achieve).

131
late 1890s that it was introduced into the fonnal labour movement. 43 From here
sabotageemerged in the IWW, where the word appears first in Solidarity (June 4 1910)
in the context of strike solidarity. 44 From here on, sabotage became hotly debated in
wobbly and public circles. Between 1914 and 1918 it was directly recommended by the
lWW (but the practice extends before and after these dates in less formal ways - it seems
as though the lWW ceased advocating sabotage for fear of prosecution). The Socialist
Party of America, on the other hand, condemned the practice (as have all socialist parties
that I know of) and included in their 1912 convention the 'Section Six' clause, that "any
member who opposes political action or advocates crime, sabotage or other methods of
violence as a weapon of the working class to aid in its emancipation, shall be expelled
from membership of the party." (cited in Pouget 1913: 5)45

Work-based tactics Sabotage was particularly suited to the wobblies for a number of
reasons. First of all, it fitted perfectly to their 'stripped down' attitude to work. As I
have said above, work was a site of 'class war', a meeting point of two fundamentally
opposed camps that produced no in-between plane of compromise and possible identity
formation. As we saw in the Preanible, there was no identity founded on 'A fair day's
wages for a fair day's work', but simply a complete 'Abolition of the wage system'.
But, if work was a 'differend', in Lyotard's (1988) sense, one side had the ability to
define the terrain; workers had to work. 46 The only route for the wobblies was, then, to
push a particular tendency in the regime of work. This tendency was characteristically
simple: 'Fewer hours, more wages and better conditions' (under the maxim: "No terms
with an employer are final" (Bruns 1980: 147)). With a tendency rather than a 'fair
demand', the lWW propagandised for anything from the eight hour day, to the six hour,
even four hour day, four day week, and maintained a policy of refusing all labour

43 By focusing on the conjunction of sabotage and the organised labour movement I am in no way seeking
to valorise its 'organised' over 'unorganised' use. In his classic and influential study of resistance to
slavery, Rawick (1972) has shown how important sabotage can be for those for whom formal organisation
is a near impossibility (and through this one can see how leftist condemnation of sabotage as ignoble and
primitive can be closely linked to Eurocentric and rather majoritarian understandings of political practice).
The effects of sabotage on accumulation will always be felt by capital (whether it is part of the composition
of a movement, or a particular strategy or goal, such as a pay increase, or as a means of passing the
time). In any case, it would be wrong to suggest that sabotage outside of formal organisations is
'unorganised'. For discussion of these points, which are largely beyond the scope of this chapter, see
Echanges et Mouvernent (1979); Gidgit Digit (1982) and Processed World generally; Kelley (1994);
Midnight Notes generally; and Sprouse (1992) (though these are only a few references to what is a
persistent theme in communist and countercultural writings).
44 "[W]orkers in other firms where the material for the strike-bound firm was made, 'sabotaged' their work
to such perfection" that the striking worker's demands were granted (Solidarity cited in RV 37).
45 it was this condemnation that is the expressed reason given by Charles H. Kerr for the translation and
publication of Pouget's Sabotage into English.
46 Lyotard presents this example of work: "[C]ontracts and agreements between economic partners do
not prevent - on the contrary, they presuppose - that the labourer or his or her representative has had to
and will have tD speak of his or her work as though it were the temporary cession of a commodity, the
'service' which he or she putatively owns. This is required by the idiom in which the litigation is
...
regulated ('bourgeois' social and economic law). " (12)

132
contracts. Contracts were seen as means of producing and supporting differentials
betweenworkers,andpreventingsolidarity action.47
Wobbly work-basedpolitics tended, then, toward practical and pragmaticforms
concernedwith the ability to pursuethis trajectory in and againstwork, and nothing else.
"Right and wrong" one wobbly claims (in an essayexplaining why he took up a piece-
ratejob - something that the IWW discouraged)"is a matter of gettin' results" (Ralph
Winsteadin RV: 283). This immanentconception of ethics (following Deleuze 1997a:
126-35, more a question of 'decision' and 'combat' than transcendentJudgernent') is
repeatedin lWW propaganda.For example:

As a revolutionary organisation the Industrial Workers of the World aims to use any
and all tactics that will get the results sought with tile least expenditure of time an
energy. The tactics used are determined solely by the power of the organisation to
make good in their use. The question of 'right' and 'wrong' does not concern us.
(cited in Bruns 1980: 145)

Beyond 'the strike' This practical orientation was the motive for Pouget's (1913)
Sabotage pamphlet; to elucidate a new workers 'direct action' tactic. "Of all things
revolutionary, so far", the report to the CGT on boycott and sabotage wrote, "we have as
yet found and applied only the strike - and it is the strike alone that we continually resort
to." (1913: 49). The strike was an old technology. Linebaugh and Rediker (1990: 240)
describe its origin as far back as 1768 when sailors in London ports collectively decided
to 'strike' the sails of their ships, bringing commerce to a halt. What is more, for the
wobblies, the strike had certain draw-backs.
Sabotage is best understood as an intensification of the strike; a manifestation of
its 'sense' rather than its timeless structure. As one definition put it, to sabotage was to
"strike and stay in the shop" (Frank Bohn 'Some Definitions: Direct Action - Sabotage' in
RV. 53). There was no general critique of the strike tactic (and it remained a mainstay of
wobbly practice), but an awarenessthat the strike was neither enough in itself (evidenced
by the very emergence of a new tactic at all) and that it was at times counterproductive.
Seen in the context of craft unionism, the strike had a divisive function. The ebb and
flow of craft union workers striking, returning to work, accepting arbitration, and signing
different contracts with non-interference clauses was such that the strike became part of
the production of craft identity in and around work, not part of the process of the refusal
of work. The strike can also be somewhat destructive of radical energies. Trautmann for
example describes how "a tremendous epidemic of strikes a few years ago, conflicts

47A 1911essay by WilliamTrautman('Why Strikesare Lost' in RV 18-24) provides a damningcritique of

craft autonomyand the respectof contracts. He argues that, in his example, the contract enabled craft-
unionjustificationof the continuedoperation of industryduring a strike that it itself had called, since only
individualgroups of contractedworkers could strike. The wobbly song 'The Big Strike' put the case thus:
"Why do you make agreementsthat divide you when you fight/ And let the bosses bluff you with the

133
expressiveof a general discontentfinding its outlet in vehementeruptions" ended "only
rn
with a pitiful exhaustionof vitality... " (in RV. 18)
As a little aside,this problematisationof the strike is the start of a marginal theme
in communistmovements. In the 1970s Zerzan (1974), for example, made a convincing
casefor the destructivenatureof the union-management-strike triad of 'organisedlabour'
and the 'spectacleof union strikes' (cf. Echangeset Mouvenient 1979). One examplehe
providesfrom Brecher(1972) is particularly illuminating for the sourceof the discussion
- articlesin the Wall StreetJournal by representatives
of General Motors and United Auto
Workers. After reporting the discussionthe paperwrites:

Surprisingly, among those who do understand the need for strikes to ease intra-
union pressuresare many company bargainers ... They are aware that union leaders
may need such strikes to get contracts ratified and to get re-elected. In fact, some
company bargainersfigure strikes actually help stabilise fragmented unions and, by
allowing workers to vent their 'strike need', actually buy peace in future years.
(cited in Brecher 1972: 280)

The Indian collective Kamunist Kranti/Collectivities have more recently addressed

this question. Through an analysis of a series of Indian strikes they have taken the
critique of the strike as far as to deny outright its efficacy for the workers, seeing it
instead as a managerial tool (Kamunist Kranti 1998; cf. also 1997,1998a; Goldner
1998). Kamunist Kranti's critique is particularly interesting in so far as it places strikes
in the context of relations of identity appropriate to unions, traditional leftism, and
managementwhere control in work and the elevation of what they call 'big' movements
coincide. 48 Making the case for a 'non-linear connectivity' of workers' self-activity
(rather than identity), Kamunist Kranti (1998) argue that 'big' mass movements produce
a spectacular arena of 'direct confrontations' and 'mobilisation' of the media,
personalities, parliamentarians, and so on. This replaces the transversal self-activity of
workers with military-style operations that lead to defeat, disillusionment, passivity on
the side of workers, but identity and control for management, trade union, and left
institutions.49

contract's 'sacred right'? / Why stay at work when other crafts are battling with the foe; / You all must stick
together, don't you know?... " (cited in RV 36)
48 In their A Ballad Against Work (1997: 59) Kamunist Kranti characterise their "collectivities" not as
identities, but as having "neither a Centre nor a periphery" and "a multifacetedness that could be called
faceless". In another piece they suggest that this composition functions not as one of 'equals' on a
universal plane of similarity, but as 'not as unequals' of differential practice and experience (Kamunist
Kranti 1998).
491t is worth citing Kamunist Kranti (1998: 17) at length: "Big implies mobilisation on a mass scale.
Conducting and directing committees are intrinsic to such events. Seemingly a large number of people
become active, but actually it is representatives and leaders who think, decide and issue orders whereas
numbers at large have to march to the tunes trumpeted. Mobilisations by representatives are for
representatives.
Defeats are camouflaged as victories in order to legitimise the re-creations of these
representational forms. Repeated experiences with 'big' have led wage-workers at large to keep aloof
from them. This is often characterised as passivity and apathy of wage-workers.

134
 This asideis intendedto illustrate a trajectorythat in the IWW is more latent (since
the strike holdsconsiderableimportance),and that continuesthe critique of links between
identity around work and tactics that I am suggesting lies at the core of FWW
composition. Returning to the wobblies, we come back to the idea that sabotage
embodies an intricate tactic in the overall 'tendency' against work. To extend one
wobbly's proposition,they were "faced with a condition of things, not a stateof mind" or
an abstractideal or identity, "and the only way for to deal with conditionsis by the use of
tactics,not by using a line of appealsto be good", or a regimentedand a-historicalset of
sanctionedsocialist tactics. Sabotageis not, then, a reflection of a plane of workers'
identity. Ratherit is immanentto the structural situations and politics of the IWW. This
is evident in Pouget's (1913: 59) argumentthat sabotageis "derived from the capitalist
conceptionof human labour [as] commodity. " More specifically, as Davis (1975) has
...
argued, the tactic is intimately linked to the condition of mass semi- and unskilled
employmentin emergingTaylorist production. Thus, rather than a luddism, or outright
destruction, sabotageis almost always presentedas a flexible, innovative engagement
with the particularitiesof work,50following Gurley Flynn's (1993) definition of sabotage
as"the consciouswithdrawal of the worker's efficiency". One had to be a 'cat' to be a
saboteur. For example,JoeHill wrote that:

Striking on the job is a science and should be taught as such. It is extremely

interesting on account of its many possibilities. It develops mental keenness and
inventive genius in the working class and is the only known antidote for the
infamous 'Taylor System'. ('How to Make Work for the Unemployed' in RV: 142-
3)

Rather than an heroic, identity-forming walk-out, the wobblies argued, then, that the
workers' best weapon was more often 'striking on the job'. 51 There are countless
testimoniesto the effectivenessof this tactic which enablesworkers to continue drawing
pay, preventlay-offs and direct confrontationswith the police (who were far from averse

When wage-workers daily routine oppositions become too much for a management or when a
management has to go in for a major restructuring, retrenchment, wage-cut or intensification, it often
resorts to spectacular work stoppage. Since production enterprise is no longer the private property of
individuals (i.e. capitalist), prolonged stoppage of production is no longer a question of life and death for a
management as it was for a capitalist. When necessary, managements resort to strikes, lockouts, work
suspensions, suspension of operations by creating factory-wide, area-wide issues with the help of
representatives. "
50 Or as Pouget (1913: 32-3) puts it, if overplaying the point a little: "Sabotage can be practised only by
the most intelligent and the most skilful workers who know thoroughly the technique of their trade, as
Sabotage does not consist in a clumsy and stupid destruction of the instruments of production, but in a
delicate and highly skilful operation which puts the machine out of commission only for a temporary period.
The worker that undertakes such a task must know thoroughly the anatomy of the machine which he is
going to vivisect... "
51 Dashiell Hammett (1982: 12) shows a subtle take on wobbly awareness of the difference between
effective tactics and historic (and tragic) identity when in Red Harvest an lWW organiser's advice to use
sabotage rather than go on all out strike is disregarded for not being "active enough" (though in practice,
the strike is used to break the movement). The narrator says, disparagingly, they "wanted to put
themselves on the map, make labour history. " (Whether the use of insider knowledge (about the date of a
return to work), for financial speculation was a popular wobbly practice is another matter. )

135
to using guns), maintain anonymity, and yet cause considerable upset for the employer -
so encouraging him to meet the demands. Joe Hill thus advised:

The best way to strike is to 'strike on the job'. First present your demands to the
...
boss. If he should refuse to grant them, don't walk out and give the scabs a chance
to take your places. No, just go back to work as though nothing had happened and
try the new method of warfare. (in RV: 142)

Anonymity and proliferating characteristics From this initial premise, sabotage

has a number of characteristics. First of all it is anonymous. It is something that is
carefully and selectively taken up, but unnamed and unidentified. In his rather romantic
turn of phrase, Pouget (1913: 36) writes that "[i]t is present everywhere and everywhere
invincible... ": "There can be no injunction against it. No policeman's club. No rifle diet.
No prison bars. It cannot be starved into submission. It cannot be discharged. It cannot
be blacklisted. " It is "worse than a pestiferous epidemic... " (73) The mysterious, almost
mystical nature of sabotage is also celebrated in wobbly literature. The black cat itself

was already "an old symbol for malignant and sinister purposes, foul deeds, bad luck,
and witchcraft... " (Archie Green cited in RV: 59), and the wobblies frequently conjure it

up as an almost abstract force. One poem suggests, for example, that "They'd better not
throw 'wobs' in jail/ And leave the kitten free. " ('The Kitten in the Wheat' in RV: 61)
That sabotagewas a tactic of an unnamed collectivity is further suggested by the fact that
it seems as though no wobbly was ever prosecuted for the practice (RV: 38).
If it is anonymous, sabotage also offers of a proliferating series of practices and
tricks. Since the particulars are determined by individual conditions and knowledges,
Pouget (1913: 101) suggests that the possible forms are as infinite as "an endless rosary".
The intricacy of the practice is exemplified with one of numerous sabotage variants:
'following the book of rules'. It is clear that the time needed to comply with safety rules
and regulations is not compatible with the timetable of production. Yet if an accident
occurs, 'the book of rules' enables the individualisation of responsibility to a particular
employee rather than the employer (or the production process itself). Deliberate and
responsible attention to the rule book thus operates as a break on production, utilising
instituted regulations against that particular work regime (cf. Gurley Flynn 1993: 20-22).
Other examples include: over-adulteration or under-adulteration, such as drug clerks
using better quality ingredients (harming the producer rather than the consumer); 'open
mouthed sabotage', such as leaking information about insanitary conditions;
'accidentally' diverting trains, as Haywood reported of French train workers (Pouget
1913: 55); and running streetcar services without collecting fares. Pouget (99) recounts
how a group of striking fur factory workers reduced the size of the patterns by a third so
that all orders completed whilst they were on strike would be wasted (and the patterns
could easily be readjusted once they returned). In one court case the flexibility of the term
enabled a defendant to twist the argument away from the worker's criminality by arguing

136
that sabotagewas actually integral to the operationof capitalismas the everydaycapitalist
r
practicesof using shoddy materialS, 52cooking bad food, built-in obsolescence,general
cutting-cornersand so on, that profit margins could hinge upon (cf. Pouget Ch. 6; and
'Testimony of J. T. Doran' in RV: 61-3). Gurley Flynn even includes workers' family-
4: as at one with the spirit of sabotage('reducing the supply of producers'), and
planning
indeed,asTax (1980) shows,a class-basedreproductiveand sexualpolitics was a central
aspectof feminist wobbly activity (when mainstreamfeminism shunnedit in favour of the
suffragequestion).
The point hereis that sabotageoffered a very useful tool for the wobbly tendency
for 'fewer hours, more wagesand better conditions'. In using the work processagainst
itself, sabotagedevelopeda very different relation betweenskill and knowledge than that
requiredby work, and drew out rebel momentsin the community without naming him or
her, so adding to the plane of the movementand its intensity, without contributing to a
fixed identity. It alsoopenedup new technologyof collective action,that infused wobbly
culture and beyond. The practice continued throughout modem political history,
sometimesas an addition to the strike, other times as a meansof relieving stress and
boredom at work as it moves into counterculturaltendencies. The San Franciscogroup
ProcessedWorld, for example, has specialisedin spreading anecdotesand analysis of
office worker sabotage,in what they call the 'contradiction' - though what I have argued
is the natureof the minor proletariancondition - of "favouring workplace organising on
the one hand,while on the other handadvocatingthe abolition of work." (1991: 237)

Conclusion
I have arguedthat the IWW was a 'class' movementwhich sought to unite all workers,
startingwith the unskilled andthe most marginalised(and including those usually seenas
outsideof the realm of production, such as domesticworkers). It emergedfrom a new
configuration of the 'mass worker', as capitalist production took flight from the
formationsof the 'skilled worker'. It also emergedas a composition of the flows of
diverse peoplesand cultures acrossthe plane of America. The IWW's class-form was
intendedto overcomethe divisions, racisms,xenophobia,and trade identitiesof the trade
union movement,and to composea group capableof combatingcapitalism and work as a
whole. Politics was to begin at the 'site of production', for it was here that workers were
'cramped', and identities and practices formed which were compatible with the
maintenanceof capitalist relations. However, this focus of politics on the terrain of
production was less a reduction than an amplification of politics, a 'broadest possible'
definition. It was an incitementto political activity not in an autonomoussphere, but
throughoutthe experienceof work, in all its varied manifestations.

52'Dynamiting' silk (mixing it with destructive

chemicals to increase its apparent quality for sale, before it
rots quickly afterwards) was a popular production practice highlighted by the IWW.

137
 The IWW's plane of composition emerged between a fulfilled future identity ('we
shall be all'), and a cramped immanent practice ('we have been nought'). This, however,
followed not a gradual improvement of conditions, a 'progress'. Rather, the future-form
operated as a mobilisation mechanism immanent to the particular practices of politics in
the present. The rnilieu of practice for the struggle against work was always a cramped
space. The wobblies sought no plenitude in work; even labour contracts were refused,
since they were seen as means of carving out a territory and a legitimate identity that
institutional ised political antagonism.
It was the way that the wobblies treated this
cramped space that minor effects were produced. In their composition the identities of
worker, American, Citizen, immigrant, minority were problematised. But the class-form
of the One Big Union did not subsume difference. The particular conditions, cultures,
and work sites of different minorities were seen to be the site of political innovation (in a
composition that was so diverse and varied that the president of the AFL called it "a
radical fungus on the labour movement" (cited in The Wobblies 1979)). The emphasis on

particular experience was inflected in the organisational form of the IWW as a 'swell-
type' organisation that was based less on formal rules and structures, than direct practice.
The organisation was thus formed through the 'pack-form' of the solidarity/rebel couplet,
where particular practices, creations, or anomalous moments were seen to emerge in
various situations (not determined by fixed leaders), to be supported by, and distributed
across the movement as a whole.
I explored wobbly cultural production (literature, songs, cartoons) as a process of
the complication of rather simple 'little intrigues' that were, in a sense, collectively
authored and distributed, and that combined political practice, theory, propaganda,
morale-building, tactic dispersal, and irreverent humour. In particular the chapter
focused on one group, the migrant worker or hobo. The hobo was a most contemporary
line of flight of that stage of capital. His culture and mode of life developed through the
experience of work and travel. But he was neither an affirmation of mobile work, or a
romantic wanderer or 'outsider'. Rather, work, travel, ghetto living, political practice
and IWW membership combined together to produce a series of complex cultural forms;
many of which infused the IWW as a whole. Last, the chapter considered the wobbly
tactic of sabotage, as a form of practical engagement in and against work; a kind of
'striking on the job'. The tactic was noteworthy because it was functional to the IWW's
mode of composition which was not concerned with forming a fixed 'historic' identity,
but simply with having effect for the politics of more pay and less work. To this end,
sabotage could be practiced at all 'points of production' in different ways depending on
situation, by anyone, whilst anonymity could be maintained (such that the practice, and
its signs, the black cat and sabot, took on an almost mystical character, as a practice of a
movement more than of individual subjects). Sabotage also enabled political action
without loss of pay (as a conventional strike necessitated). In these aspects, sabotage
was a tactic that overcame some of the problems of 'the strike', which was used by the

138
orthodox trade union movement to maintain labour distinctions, and could be dangerous
and counterproductive (exhausting workers' energiesin long drawn-out disputes).
If the IWW was a minor proletarian movementof the mass worker, the next
chapter is the first of two which explore minor composition and the refusal of work in a
more recent, European movement, and with the emergence of a different configuration of
work, in the 'social factory' and the 'socialised worker'.

139
Chapter 7
The Social Factory and the Socialised Worker

Capitalism is a system of relationships, which go from inside to out, from outside to

in, from above to below, and from below to above. Everything is relative,
everything is in chains. Capitalism is a condition both of the world and of the soul.
(Kafka, in Janouch 1971: 151-2)

If in its beginnings the factory came out of the social body and tended to separate
itself from it in order to elaborate its own rules of operation, it must now

reincorporate this social body in order more than ever to dominate it... (de
Gaudemar 1985: 286)

Introduction to autonomia for chapters 7 and 8

1havealreadymadethe casethat the methodologicalforegrounding of problematisations
and creationsin genealogyand empiricism is more concernedwith creation and resonance
than representation,and indeedthat empiricism starts from a recognitionthat all histories
are perspectival. I should,nevertheless,stressthat the next two chaptersin no way try to
write a comprehensivehistory of operaismoand autonomia, since they are extremely
complex political formations. Whilst the 'area of autonomia' has sometimes been
representedas a flowering of post-political potential, it is comprised of such diverse
political figures andperspectives(with organisedautonomyor ailtollonlia o1mraiaon one
side and the more counterculturalautononda creativaand feminism on the other) that it
be to it
would problematic represent as a coherentmovement. Operaismoand autonomia
nevertook the forms of pervasiveand organisedparties, and indeedthe movements have
alwaysbeen characterisedmore by small groups, schools, and magazinesthan by policy
statementsand fixed groups. There was not even coherenceof position between key
figures such as Tronti and Negri (cf. Bologna (1980a) for a short account of the
variations of position, and Piotte (1986) for relations between Tronti and Negri). '
Thoughgroupslike Potere Operaio ('Workers' Power') andLotta Continua('Continuous
Struggle') had considerableimportance, they never characterisedthe whole movement,
and relatively quickly dissolved into the emerging 'area of autonomia'.2 Wright (1988:
287-8)conveysthe complexity well when he writes:

I Tronti rejoined the PCI in 1971 (Piotte 1987: 28).

2 Potere Operaio dissolved following a meeting in 1973 (Padova, July 28 to August 4), saying: 'We have
rejected the logic of the political group in order to be within the real movement, in order to be within
organised class autonomy. " (in Red Notes 1979: 32) Bifo (1980: 151-2) suggests that following the big
FIAT-Mirafiori occupation earlier that year (cf. Negri 1979b), within which the revolutionary groups only had
a marginal presence, Potere Operaio's dissolution showed that they were the only group to recognise the
changes taking place in the movement.

140
 Making sense of Autonomia as a whole is no simple matter. Ideologically
heterogeneous, territorially dispersed, organisationally fluid, politically
marginalised: Giorgio Bocca's analogy of an archipelago is an apt one. Never a
single national organisation, much less the mass wing of the armed groups, the
'Area' of Autonomia would begin to disintegrate almost as soon as it had attained
hegemony within the Italian far left.

And if operaismo and autonomia developed through the specific situation in Italy, the
movement took much of its history and innovation from abroad, with people and
movements from Martin Glaberman, George Rawick, and C.L. R. James, to Foucault and
Deleuze and Guattari, from the Wobblies to Socialisme ou Barbarie and American
counterculture. Marazzi thus writes:

What can be considered as the most original theoretical contribution to Italian

workerism originated abroad.... There is nothing 'Italian-C about the class warfare
in Italy.... To erect a monument to Italy is to play the game of the Italian State: to
misrepresent as specific ('the production of certain intellectuals') what is in fact
rooted in the worker's history, rooted, above all, in its international dimension. (in
Sendotext(e) 1980: 12-13)

I can, however, describe the core premises of operaismo and autonomia. The
roots of autonomia lie in the early sixties with the emergence of operaismo
('workerism'3) which sought to analyse the new forms of work and politics based on an
increasing concentration of Southern migrant workers in the industrial centres, and their
distance from orthodox trade union and party structures. This analysis, found most
importantly in the writings of Panzieri, Tronti, Alquati, Bologna, and Negri in the
journals Quademi Rossi ('Red Notebooks' 1961-4), Classe Operaia ('Working Class'
1964-6), and later Potere Operaio ('Workers' Power' 1969-73), was based on a dual
strategy of concrete interpretation of particular and new forms of work and struggle, and
a rereading of Marx in a rather heretical focus on obscure unpublished material, the
Grundrisse, the 'missing sixth chapter' of Volume I (Marx 1976: 948-1084), as well as
Volumes 11and III of Capital. The operaists followed a methodological insistence on the
primacy of (changing forms of) political antagonism in a dynamic 'class composition',
and brought everything from absenteeism, housework, to changes in the petrochemical
industry into consideration. 4 This approach was to remain central to the development and

3 The translation of operaismo as 'workerism' is, as Hardt (1990: 249) points out, problematic: "The
English usage of 'workerism'and the French 'ouvri6risme' correspond to the Italian 'fabrichismo' in that
they are used pejoratively to designate those who cannot or will not recognise the power of social
strugglesoutside the factory. The characteristicof 'operaismo'is that it has been able to transform itself
in step with the changing nature of work."
4 Pioneeredby RomanoAlquati the operaists adopted Marx's method the 'Workers' Inquiry' (cf. Marx
of
1973b)as a means of 'hot investigation' into the conditions and forms of resistance in the factories (cf.
Bologna 1991). Ironically, as Moulier (1989: 14) reports, such 'hot investigation' received considerable

141
mutation of autonomia, and proved to be a very practical, situated, and politically
productive researchparadigm. The practicality of the operaist position is evidencedin
Moulier's (1989: 13) anecdotethat the bedroom walls of activists saw the substitution of
diagrammaticmaps of the FIAT-Mirafiori factory-city for the epinal figures of Mao or
ZP
Che Guevara.
At the core of the readings of Marx by Panzieri, Tronti, and Negri was an
understandingof capitalismin terms of Marx's prediction of the 'real subsumption' of
societyin capital. Against the eurocommunistItalian Communist Party (PCI) for whom
(following neo-Gramscianunderstandingsof the relative 'autonomy of the political')
strugglewas to be of class alliancesin the legitimateterrain of social democraticpolitics,
operaismo sought to show that capital had extended its control and processes of
valorisationacrossthe social suchthat all of society was subjectto, or 'subsumed' within
the demandsand structuresof capitalistproductivity in what they called a 'social factory'
or 'diffuse factory'. In the social factory differencesbetweenproduction, reproduction,
and consumption, work and non-work, were seen to be dissolving in a social
productivity and 'generalinterest' of 5
capital. The political responseof operaismowas to
break from any conceptionof the generalinterest and affirm a working class 'partiality'
againstpolitical and economicintegrationin a 'society of work'. This was to be done
throughan 'autonomy' from any form of political or trade unionist body that would seek
to tie workers' practicesto the developmentof capital (cf. Tronti 1973: 118-9). Such
partiality was located in the productive function of work/er, but was composedthrough
its struggle against capitalism across the social factory (and hence it includes the
unwaged). As is in
considered the next chapter,this is not in favour of a different, 'more
human' form of work (as Tronti put it, "labour equals exploitation" and nothing but
(1972: 22)), but a generalisedinsubordination, a "labour anarchy" (Tronti 1973: 119), a
refusal of work, and of the subjectof worker.6 But insubordination was not merely a
nihilism (even if it could descendinto this), for two reasons. First, it was conceptualised
asthe very force that causedcapital to reconfigure itself (to effect the captureof revolt in
new productive regimes), and develop new technologies;it was the creative force in
capitalistrelations.7 This was not, however, a theory of progress(though elements,as I

interest from the employers who found it gave more insight to the functioning of their factories than
conventional studies.
5 In talking of a diffuse factory against theories of the autonomy of the political it is important to be clear
that this is not an 'economic determinism'. Rather it is a suggestion, not dissimilar to Foucault and
Deleuze, that the whole of the social is caught up in intricate relations of productive power. Politics is
hence immanent to socialised production rather than operating in a distinct sphere.
6 As Negri (1991: 27) puts it in his rather iconoclastic tone: "All progress in the socialisation of the form of
circulation accentuates the content of exploitation: it is thus the progression of that nexus that should be
destroyed, along with all the ideological and institutional forms that represent and dynamise it - all the
more if they are 'socialist'. "
7 Negri's essay on Keynes (in Negri 1988), where Keynesianism (productivity/pay tie-ins, the welfare
state, the general interest of labour) is presented as the capitalist response to the Soviet Revolution, is
the classic example. Though Negri seems to move away from this understanding of the primacy of
struggle, which at one point he calls "the rotten dialectic of workerism" (1989: 87-8), he returns to it in full
force in Empire where he and Hardt write "it is always the initiatives of organised labour power that

142
show, did come to think of it as such). For, second,political practicesought to use each
configurationto the proletariat'sadvantagefor lesswork and more pay, and to expand the
values,ways of life, and forms of collective composition of the proletariatagainstwork,
asexpressedin the operaistformula 'we want everything'. I will return to the conception
of the refusal of work in Chapter8, but in Chapter71 want to develop the argumentof
the social factory and real subsumptionin detail.

Introduction to chapter 7
In Chapter 81 consider the productivity of autonomia across the different territories of the
social factory using the framework of minoritarian processes,but Chapter 7, on the social
factory, is more exclusively concerned with operaismo's and autonomia's theories of
work and capitalism. The concept of the social factory is still an aspect of minor
composition, for it is a deterritorialisation of Marxism induced by a set of cramped
political problematics (not least the closure effected by the PCI's dominant position in the
left, and its emphasis on political and economic integration within the mechanisms of
social democracy and work). However, I do not map the forms of production of the
concept of the social factory, but rather have extracted it a little from its milieu. I have
done this for two reasons. First, I am presenting autonon-tia as a political process
intimately linked to an understanding of a form of capitalism. The social factory is thus
presented as the plane of composition of autonomia, just as the IWW's understanding of
abstract labour was the premise for the One Big Union. The difference, however, is that
the understanding of capitalism developed by operaismo and autonomia is considerably
more complex than that of the IWW, and is an important element of its 'creation' such
that it necessitatesdetailed consideration. Second, and related, because the concept of the
'social factory' has maintained a vitality and a degree of consistency from Mario Tronti's
operaist writings in the early 1960s (collected in 01)erai e Capitale in 1966) up to the
present day (in recent work by Virno, Lazzarato, and Hardt and Negri for example), and
is useful for understanding contemporary forms of production and work. Thus, as well
as exploring operaismo's and autonomia's presentation, I also bring this into relation with
Deleuze and Guattari (not that their work was uninfluenced by the Italian trajectory8).
Hence, whilst this chapter is part of the discussion of autonomia, it also develops the

determine the figure of capitalist development" such that "[t]he history of capitalist forms is always
necessarily a reactive history" (Hardt and Negri 2000: 208,268).
8A Thousand Plateaus, for example, cites Yann Moulier, Tronti, and Negri in terms of new forms of
socialised work, the emarginati, the problem of the Subject of orthodox Marxism, and the refusal of
work/er (469,571-2). Guattari wrote an essay with Negri (Guattari and Negri 1990) and had some
involvement with autonomia (cf. Guattari 1980,1980a; and Semiotext(e) (1980 133) for a photograph of
Guattari in Radio Alice's studio). He wrote the preface to Collective A/traverso (1977). As well as signing
the petition against the repression of autonomia, along with Sartre, Barthes, and Foucault, amongst
others (cf. Red Notes 1978: 36-7), Deleuze wrote a letter against Negri's imprisonment in 1979 (Deleuze
1980), and a preface to the French edition of Negri's The Savage Anomaly. The influence of Deleuze and
Guattari on the emarginati was such that a student questioned in France about Franco Piperno (who had
fled Italy to escape prison) was asked if he had read Anti-Oedipus (as reported in Lib6ration, cited in
Massumi (1987: 71)).

143
understanding of capitalism presented in Chapters 4 and 5, and presents an understanding
of contemporary work where a minor 'refusal of work' may be situated today.
The chapter starts with Panzieri's presentation of the crucial operaist problematic
of the immanence of forces and relations of production, and explores this through Marx's
understanding of 'machines' and 'real subsumption'. I then consider the development of
the social factory thesis in Tronti's interpretation of 'social capital'. The chapter then
moves to consider the forms of 'worker' which populate the social factory. To do this I
consider in some detail the 'general intellect' and the 'social individual' of Marx's
'Fragment on Machines' in the Grundrisse Whilst this may appear to be an indulgent
.
excursus into theory (and certainly the first part of the discussion takes a step back away
from the argument), it has a specific purpose. Aside from the fact that the Fragment
holds a pre-eminent place in operaist and autonomist theory, it is considered in detail to
draw out two different aspects which are rarely recognised, but have important
ramifications in its continued use, particularly in Negri's later work. I then consider
Negri's presentation of the 'socialised worker' and the 'multitude'. This section is also a
critique of Negri's late work (and leaves the question of a minor interpretation of the
socialised worker open for the next chapter). Deleuze and Guattari's understanding of
capital (axiomatics, control, and machinic surplus value) is then used as a corrective to
Negri that returns to the conceptual plane of the social factory. I then end with a
summary of the argument through a discussion of how the social factory thesis helps to
conceptualise contemporary forms of work.

Panzieri and Marx on machines and the social

The operaist use of Marx is intensive. Surrounded and cramped by the culture of
orthodox,and then eurocommunistMarxism that permeatedthe Italian left with its strong
Communist Party (that, contrary to the dominant leftist interpretation in Britain,
functioned"as a kind of prison chaplainto the proletariaC'(Abse 1985: 7)), the operaists
chose to return to Marx.9 Moulier (1989: 35) reports that the Marx around which
operaismocirculatedwas hereticalenough to at times be said by its opponentsto be a
fabrication, and that indeed there was a joke that Enzo Grillo's translation of the
Grundrissewas better than the original. Anecdoteaside, in many ways the focus was
actually rather orthodox. A central concern was with the question of technology and

9 Abse (1985) argues that the dominant leftist interpretation of the PCI (by far the strongest Communist
Party in Europe) found in Britain during the 1970s and 1980s (most notably in Marxism Today and
includingEric Hobsbawmand perhaps even Stuart Hall, and seen in the developmentof neo-Gramscian
ideas of 'hegemony' ) was that eurocommunismoffered an exemplary model of socialist practice for
Europe,and one that could help in overcoming the deficiencies of labourism. What these interpretations
failed to see was not only how efficient a mechanism the PCI was for curtailing radical energies and
disrupting progressive political development (even in the most obvious forms of student and feminist
politics),but also how it was used to implementthe most pernicious cuts in the standards of living of the
Italianpopulation. The PCI did not overcomethe problems of labourism, but took them in new directions,
and to the extreme. See Abse (1985) for an excellent and very measureddevelopmentof these points
(despitehis rather poor presentationof autonomia).

144
social relations in 'real subsumption'. Raniero Panzieri's work was particularly
important.
Even at a basic level, Panzieri's analysis of the technology-capitalnexus is still
oneof the relatively few analysesof Marx that has seriously consideredthe development
of technology
t outsidethe double figure of good or evil (gradually freeing up the human
or oppressinga naturalisedwork). Nietzsche's diagnosisof the need to overcome this
limited framework of human judgment - good and evil - is appropriate insofar as
Panzieri's approachto technologicaldevelopmentseeks an uncertain 'beyond' that is
formed within and againstsocial and technicalconfigurations;more of an 'overcoming'
than a 'progress' or 'negation'.
Panzieri (1976,1980) sought to show that technological development (fixed
capital) played a centralrole in the intricate integrationof labour (variablecapital) in the
developmentof a vast and pervasivecapitalist socius that Marx, in the 'missing sixth
chapter' called 'real 10
subsumption'. Panzieri challengedorthodox ('objectivist') Marxist
readings that posited a technological 'rationality' (as a self-moving development of
scientific innovation as part of a politically neutral 'forces of production') distinct from
capitalist 'relations of production'. In this objectivist approach politics is situated
externally to the technical process, concerned with wages and consumption and an
eventualassumptionof technologicalprocessesas they are in a socialist 'planning' (the
USSR being the prime exemplar)." For Panzieri, technological rationality, or the
'machine' (and all the organisationalmethods and techniquesinvolved), was the direct
manifestation(andnaturalisation)of capitalistpower andcontrol in a "unity of 'technical'
and 'despotic' moments" (1980: 57). 12 Any socialist assumption or planning of the
'forces of production' was thereforea misguided approachwhich failed to recognise(or,
even, actively disguised)the immanence of capitalist relationsandtechnics:

Faced by capital's interweaving of technology and power, the prospect of an

alternative (working-class) use of machinery can clearly not be based on a pure and
simple overturning of the relations of production (property), where these are

1() 'Results of the Immediate Process of Production' (often known as 'the missing sixth chapter') was first
published in 1933 in German and Russian, but took on particular importance when it was republished in
other European languages in the late sixties (1976 in English). Its conceptual distinction between formal
and real subsumption has had particular importance in the work of the Italian extraparliamentary
communists (discussed here) and the neo- and post-Bordighist French ultra-left (the most prominent being
the journal Invariance and Camatte, and Dauvd).
11 In a 1919 speech entitled 'Scientific Management and the Dictatorship of the Proletariat' Lenin thus
wrote: "The possibility of socialism will be determined by our success in combining Soviet rule and Soviet
organisation or management with the latest progressive measures of capitalism. We must introduce in
Russia the study and teaching of the Taylor system and its systematic trial and adoption. " (cited in Bell
1956: 41)
12 'The capitalist objectivity of the productive mechanism with respect to the workers finds its optimal
basis in the technical principle of the machine: the technically given speed, the coordination of the various
phases and the uninterrupted flow of production are imposed on the will of the workers as a 'scientific
necessity'... The capitalist social relationship is concealed within the technical demands of machinery and
the division of labour seems to be totally independent of the capitalist's will. Rather, it seems to be the
simple and necessary results of the means of labour's 'nature'. " (Panzieri 1976: 9). Marx (1976: 1024)

145
 understoodas a sheathingthat is destined to fall away at a certain level of productive
expansion simply becauseit has become too small. The relations of production are
within the productive forces, and these have been 'moulded' by capital. It is this
that enables capitalist development to perpetuate itself even after the expansion of
the productive forces has attained its highest level. (Panzieri 1976: 12)

I will explain the detail of this argument through a consideration of two aspects of Marx's
work - the question of machines, and the real subsumption thesis.

Machines In the spectrum of apparent 'determinisms' with which Marx's work has
been charged (economic determinism, labour essentialism, teleological historicism and so
on), the charge of 'technological deten-ninism' is not uncommon. 13 However, Marx's

understanding of technical machines, as theorists like Panzieri (1976,1980) and

Rosenberg (1982) have argued, is rather sophisticated. I want to present it here in
relation to Foucault and Deleuze, for this will help set up the framework for the rest of the
chapter. We can start with the example of Foucault's (1991) now familiar analysis of
Bentham's Panopticon.
The Panopticon is most visibly an architectural technology where the structure of
each prison cell is open to observation by a central tower with an unseen occupant, such
that, not knowing whether s/he is being watched by another or not, the prisoner begins to
check his/her own practice (such that the Panopticon produces internalised self-
government). But this architectural device does not stand alone, or emerge from the blue.
It only functions when seen within the social environment (what Foucault calls the
'diagram', and Deleuze and Guattari call the 'abstract machine') of 'discipline'. The

similarity of the Panopticon (which, in a strict sense, remained unbuilt) with prisons,
barracks is
and so on not in the details of their physical form as such, but in the
schools,
way subjects and masses are assembled together or formed in similar fashion in each
space. That is, the Panopticon's diagram of discipline is immanent to each space, even
though in varying scales and degrees of intensity. It is not that the physical technology
determines the practice, rather the technology is the solidification of a social practice. 14
As Deleuze (1988: 39) puts it:

the machines are social before being technical. Or, rather, there is a human
...
technology which exists before a material technology. No doubt the latter develops

puts it like this: "With the production of relative surplus-value the entire real form of production is altered
and a specifically capitalist form of production comes into being (at the technological level "
too).
13 As Rosenberg (1982: 36) points out, this accusation usually follows a citation from The Poverty of
Philosophy, where Marx writes "The handmill gives you society with the feudal lord; the steam-mill, society
with the industrial capitalist. "
14 This is not to deny the possibility of specifically technological innovation, but it is to say that it is only
as an expression of social problematisations, possibilities, and lines of flight that a technological
innovation could be possible, and maintain any consistency. To paraphrase an expression of Marx's that
Deleuze is fond of using at these moments, a society only gets the answers to the questions that it is
capable of posing (cf. Deleuze 1994: 186).

146
 its effects within the whole social field; but in order for it to be even possible, the
tools or material machines have to be chosen by a diagram and taken up by the
assemblages.

Oncemanifestedin concreteform, the technologyof the Panopticonhas great efficacy,

but only in so far as it manifests the diagram of discipline. So, to the degree that
sovereignsocietiesexist before disciplinary ones,and discipline might be breaking down
in 'control' societies(seebelow), the concretetechnology of the prison, "like a Cartesian
diver", rises and falls in prominenceand effect "on a scalegauging the degreeto which
the disciplinary diagram [or abstractmachine] [is] fulfilled. " (Deleuze 1988: 41-2). In
this schema, the particular technology is only ever a visible sign of a set of social
relations, even as, or becauseit has far reachingeffects and functions acrossthe social.
That is, the visible technical machine is part of a more general or abstract machinic
environment.
Marx's works are full of accounts of technical machines in a conceptual
frameworkthat bearsresemblancewith Foucaultand Deleuzeinsofar as the technology is
presentedas the manifestation,the visible sign that is selectedby more abstractsocial
relations (such that abstract machine and diagram in Deleuze and Foucault, roughly
correspondto 'mode of production' in Marx (cf. note 54)). Thus, rather than the work of
individual genius or autonomous scientific progress, Marx writes that:

A critical history of technology would show how little any of the inventions of the
eighteenth century were the work of a single individual.... Technology reveals the
active relation of man to nature, the direct process of the production of his life, and
thereby it also lays bare the process of the production of the social relations of his
life, and of the mental conceptionsthat flow from those relations. (Marx 1976: 493;
emphasis added)

An examplecanmake the case. In a footnote to Capital Marx readsa particular form of

rather rudimentaryplough as the visible technologyof an abstractmachine, or mode of
production called slavery. The slave, bought wholesale rather than piecemealby the
hour, is treated,following his definition in antiquity, as little more than an animal, as a
"speakingimplement" (who combineswith a "semi-muteimplement" of the animal, and a
implement"of the plough). In this assemblagethe plough employedis of a most
44mute
unsophisticatedform, the "rudest and heaviest[of] implements" which is "difficult to
damageowing to [its] very clumsiness." As Marx says,"In the slave statesbordering on
the Gulf of Mexico, down to the dateof the Civil War, the only ploughsto be found were
thoseconstructedon the old Chinesemodel, which turned up the earth like a pig or a
mole, instead of making furrows." (1976: 303,304). Marx's point is that the
instrument'sclumsinessis not due to a lack of technologicaldevelopment(it is 'rude' for
its time), but rather it is a selectedcharacteristicappropriateto this slave-basedmode of

147
production which lacks the intricate device of the wage and complex structuring and
orderingmachinesto preventthe rough treatment,or resistanceof the slave in his use of
the plough.

Real subsumption With this basic presentationof the relations between machinesand
social relationswe can move to an analysis of machines within what Marx called 'real
subsumption'. In the 'missing sixth chapter' to Capital and in a sectionof the Grundrisse
known asthe 'Fragmenton Machines' Marx developsa thesis(implicit in parts of Capital
itself, notably Ch. 15) that with time, work loses any artisanalautonomy and worker
control as it is 'subsumed' in an increasinglycomplex 'automaton', of human parts and
concretetechnicalmachines.
In 'fornial subsumption' capitalist forms of valorisation subsume the labour
processas it finds it ("on the basis of the technical conditions within which labour has
beencarriedon up to that point in history" (Marx 1976: 425)) and extractssurplus value
by extendingthe working day ('absolutesurplusvalue'):

The work may become more intensive, its duration may be extended,it may become
more continuous or orderly under the eye of the interested capitalist, but in
themselvesthese changesdo not affect the character of the actual labour process, the
actual mode of working. (1976: 1021)

This form of production has its problems, due both to the limited technical principle of
handicraft, and the insubordination of workers, 15and hence over time labour becomes
increasingly subdivided and mechanised, and concomitantly 'cooperative' (necessitating a
form of overarching management and social plan (cf. 1976: Ch. 13; Panzieri 1976: 6-
7)). 16 This social process with its technical consolidation in machines, develops into
what Marx called the "specifically capitalist mode of production" or 'real subsumption'
where labour and social life itself becomes enmeshed or 'subsumed', and hence

transformed, in the intricate processes of machinery in large-scale industry. 17 Thus, to

summarise the development, Marx writes:

15 Marx makes these points as follows. First: "... manufacture was unable either to seize upon the
production of society to its full extent, or to revolutionise that production to its very core. it towered up as
an artificial economic construction, on the broad foundation of the town handicrafts and the domestic
industries of the countryside. At a certain stage of its development, the narrow technical basis on which
manufacture rested came into contradiction with requirements of production which it had itself created. "
Second: "the complaint that the workers lack discipline runs through the whole of the period of
manufacture. " (1976- 490)
16 "Cooperation in its capitalist form is the first and basic expression of the law of (surplus) value"
...
(Panzieri 1976: 7). This is the directly 'capitalist' process where the super-adequate power of collective
labour is manifested after the sale of individual labour at its necessary price (cf. Marx 1976: 451).
17 "The specifically capitalist mode of production not only transforms the situations of the various agents
of production, it also revolutionises their actual mode of labour and the real nature of the labour process
as a whole. " (Marx 1976: 1021)

148
 The social productive forces of labour, or the productive forces of directly social,

socialised (i. e. collective) labour come into being through co-operation, division of
labour within the workshop, the use of machinery, and in general the transformation

of production by the conscious use of the sciences, of mechanics, chemistry etc. and
similarly, through the enormous increase of scale corresponding to such
developments... (1976: 1024)

It is herethat machinerycomesinto its own as a solution to the needof the social

relationsof capital to reorient the motive force and unity of production away from the
labourer ("It is machinesthat abolish the role of the handicraftsmanas the regulating
principle of social production." (Marx 1976: 491)). 18 That is, what is crucial in the
developmentof real subsumption (and why it is the specifically capitalist form of
production)is that the unity of the labourer, alreadybroken-down in simple cooperation
in manufacture, is radically disrupted and absorbed in a system driven by an
"... autornaton consisting of numerous mechanicaland intellectual organs, so that the
workers themselvesare cast merely as its consciouslinkages" (1973: 692). Hence the
governing power or unity ceasesto be one of the rhythms of labour, but the rhythm of
capital itself under the temporality of the machine which, as we saw in Panzieri,
technicallyembodiesthe cooperationand socialisationof labour and thus "constitutesthe
power of the 'master"' (Marx 1976:549).
We haveseen,then,the immanentrelationsbetweenthe machineand the social in
real subsumption. Here the extraction of relative surplus labour (the intensive use of
labour rather than the 'absolute' surplus producedthrough the extensionof the working
day) is enabledthrough a subsumptionof the labour processinto the technicalmachine
such that the unity of the labourer is replaced with that of the 'automatic system of
machinery', which itself is the "virtuoso, with a soul of its own in the mechanicallaws
acting through it" (1973: 693). As I showed,we should think of this 'automaton' not in
terms of distinct technical machines, but more in terms of Deleuze and Guattari's
transversalsocialmachinic assemblage. 19
in

The social factory: social capital, the collective capitalist, and the
general interest of labour
This situation of human/technicalrelations and increasing socialisation of capitalist
relationsin real subsumptionwas describedby Mario Tronti in 1962as a 'social factory',
where political, economic,cultural sphereswere seen to be subsumedin a generalised
social productivity. As he argued:

18 Marx thus writes: "it would be possible to write

a whole history of the inventions made since 1830 for the
sole purpose of providing capital with weapons against working-class revolt. " (1976: 563) Other crucial
elements of this new machinic environment, as Linebaugh (1991) and Thompson (1967) have emphasised,
are the wage and the clock.
19This is not to say that Marx does
not sometimes break from this machinic definition (cf. Deleuze and
Guattari 1977: 131; and the argument below).

149
 The more capitalist developmentadvances,that is to say the more the production of
relative surplus value penetrates everywhere, the more the circuit production -
distribution - exchange - consumption inevitably develops; that is to say that the
relationship between capitalist production and bourgeois society, between the
factory and society, between society and the state, become more and more organic...
[Sjocial relations become moments of the relations of production, and the whole
society becomes an articulation of production. In short, all of society lives as a
function of the factory and the factory extends its exclusive domination over all of
society. (in Quaderni Rossi no. 2, cited in Cleaver 1992: 137)

Tronti's argument of the unity of the social factory follows Marx's interpretation in
Cal-fital Volumes H and III of a subsumption of 'individual capital' in an aggregate 'total
social capital':

Every individual capital forms... but an individualised fraction, a fraction endowed

with individual life, as it were, of the aggregatesocial capital, just as every individual
capitalist is but an individual element of the capitalist class. (Marx, cited in Tronti
1973: 98)

The argument needs breaking down a little. The maintenance of circulation on a broad
scale (total annual commodity-product) necessitates not the operability of individual

capital, or of 'production' and 'consumption' as distinct spheres, but the maintenance of

capitalist relations as a whole across society, such that: "Capital's process of
socialisation" becomes "the specific material base upon which [the process of
development of capitalism] is founded" (Tronti 1973: 98; emphasis added). Though
analysis at the level of individual moments may show the break-down of one firm, or the
composition of the particular exchange value of one commodity, at the level of social
capital, we see a continuity of circulation as the expansion and maintenance of value,
where social capital operates like a "ramified factory system". This process is only
possible, of course, insofar as tendencies toward competition are matched with a
collective ownership, and hence both Panzieri (1976) and Tronti (1973) stress the
importance of Marx's understanding of the socialisation of ownership of capital (through
share holding and credit in Volumes 11and 111),such that profit will be a division of total
social surplus value (not the surplus value the individual firm extracts - though it still
seeks to extract above average surplus value (cf. Tronti 1973: 106)). 20 Such collective
ownership, Marx writes in a suggestive way, is "the abolition of capital as private

20 In the second and third volumes of Capital Marx

explains how through credit and finance, initially
through the formation of stock companies, capital develops into a social system that is in a sense 'social'
in its ownership. Individual capitalists and separate spheres of society, all competing with each other,
and necessarily not supporting an 'unproductive' (reproduction) sphere, are replaced by a mutually self-
supporting system of 'social capital'. Competition is no less important, but it increasingly becomes a
mechanism internal to the social whole (rather than a game between distinct players).

150
propertywithin the framework of capitalist production itself' (1974c:436), or, as he says
elsewhere,a "capitalist communism" (cf. Panzieri 1976: 23). "Here social capital is not
just the total capital of society: it is not the simple sum of individual capitals. It is the
whole processof socialisationof capitalist production: it is capital itself that becomes
uncovered,at a certain level of its development,as a social power." (Tronti 1973: 105).
Individual capitalists thus become less owners, than managers,that is, functions of
capital:

[Clapital comes to represent all capitalists, and the individual capitalist is reduced to

an individual personification of this totality: the direct functionary, no longer of his

own capital, but of the capitalist class.... Thus capital raises itself to the level of a
4general social power', while the capitalist is reduced to the level of a simple agent,
functionary, or 'emissary' of this power... (Tronti 1973: 105,107)21

Concomitant with the collective capitalist is a new form of general interest of

labour that emerges in social democracy and the welfare state (cf. Negri 1988).
According to Bologna (n. d.: n.p. ), the operaist formulation of social capital was a
deliberate and direct challenge to the neo-Gramscian notion of the 'autonomy of the
political', so central to the PCI's eurocommunism (especially after its 'Historic
Compromise' (cf. Negri 1979: 112)). The social factory thesis "eliminate[d] the very
bases of the concept of hegemony", since, as Tronti put it, "[t]he process of composition
of capitalist society as a unified whole ... no longer tolerates the existence of a political
terrain which is even fon-nally independent of the network of social relations. " (cited in
Bologna n.d.: n.p.) Operaismo argued that social democracy becomes not the means of a
gradual improvement of working class conditions as a leftist hegemonic formation cleaves
open a space for progressive social development, but rather, socialist dreams of a "society

of labour" and a "general social interest" (Negri 1994: 67) were seen to be actualised - as
the very basis of domination. In 1964, Negri (1994) thus describes the centrality of
labour to the post-war Italian Constitution22 not as a capitalist ruse, but as the penetration
of "fundamental ideological principles of socialism... [in1to the heart of the Constitution"
(56-7):

21 Marx (1974c: 388) puts it like this: "But since, on the one hand, the mere owner of capital, the money-
capitalist, has to face the functioning capitalist, while money-capital itself assumes a social character
with the advance of credit, being concentrated in banks and loaned out by them instead of its original
owners, and since, on the other hand, the mere manager who has no title whatever to the capital, whether
through borrowing it or otherwise, performs all the real functions pertaining to the functioning of capitalist
as such, only the functionary remains and the capitalist disappears as superfluous from the production
process. " Deleuze and Guattari (1983: 265) explain the process similarly: "Individual persons are social
persons first of all, i. e., functions derived from the abstract quantities; they become concrete in the
becoming-related or the axiomatic of these quantities, in their conjunction the capitalist as personified
...
capital - i.e., as a function derived from the flow of capital; and the worker as personified labour capacity -
i.e., a function derived from the flow of labour. "
22 The first article of the 1948 Italian Constitution reads: "Italy is a democratic republic founded on labour. "
(Hardt and Negri 1994: 55)

151
 The 'democracy of labour' and 'social democracy' consist of the hypothesis of
...
a form of labour-power that negates itself as the working class and autonomously
managesitself within the structuresof capitalist production as labour-power. At this
point, capitalist social interest, which has already eliminated the privatistic and
egotistic expressions of single capitalists, attempts to configure itself as a
comprehensive,objective social interest.... The models of humanitarian socialism are
assumed as emblems of reunification. The patriotism of common well-being in
social production is the ultimate slogan of the capitalist effort at solidarity. Like
soldiers, all producers are equally employed in the common sacrifice of production
in order to win the battle of accumulation. (62)

In this regime of production, as Alliez and Feher (1985: 339) propose, workers need no
Ionger be persuaded to be reasonable in their institutionalised demands against
management, since they are now responsible for the profitability of the business in a
sharing of interests with its owners. This is indeed "a long way from the idyllic image of
a continual process of development from democracy to socialism" (Negri 1994: 80) in

that socialism actually affirms the development of the social factory. 23

The Fragment on Machines

Having seen how the capitalist becomes a functionary of total social capital, now I want
to
to move consider the forrns of worker that to
were seen populate the social factory, but
in order to do this I first need to step out of the narrative of the argument a little, and
consider the theses of the 'general intellect' and the 'social individual' in Marx's
'Fragment on Machines'. 24 This is necessary because the Fragment has a central
importance in operaismo, autonomia, and contemporary work by Negri and 'immaterial
labour' theoriStS,25 and because, and this is the reason for their interest, it brings in the
question of new forms of productivity ('general intellect' and the 'social individual') and
lays the basis for the 'socialised worker' thesis that I develop below.
Since its first publication in Italian in the same issue of Quademi Rossi (no. 4,
1964) as Panzieri's (1976) essay 'Surplus Value and Planning', the interpretation of the
'Fragment on Machines', as Paolo Virno (1996) suggests, has been akin to Biblical
exegesis. Such exegesis has not been a replication of authorial truth, but a reiteration of

23The American journal Zerowork (1975: 6) neatly summarises the case against socialism: "Our analysis
of the crisis implies a rejection of the basic proposal of the Left: socialism.... [Socialism] can mean only
one of two dubious things. Either, as the ideology of the libertarian Left, it finds in small-scale production
the solution to the 'degradation of work', or it is a capitalist strategy of economic planning. In the first
respect socialism is romantic and quaintly useless. In the second respect, however, socialism means
primarily disciplining the working class ... In both cases the demand for socialism clashes with the working
class demands against work. "
24 The'Fragment on Machines' covers the end of Notebook VI and the beginning of VII of the Grundrisse,
but the exact page references vary a little between commentators. I use Negri's (1991) inclusion of pages
690-712 (in the Penguin edition, 1973) rather than Virno's 693-706 because the extra later pages include
some discussion of 'disposable labour time' that is useful for understanding the thesis.

152
the text in different sociohistoricalcontextsaspart of the composition of varying political
forms:

We have referred back many times to these pages - written in 1858 in a moment of
intense concentration - in order to make some sense out of the unprecedented
quality of workers' strikes, of the introduction of robots into the assembly lines and
computers into the offices, and of certain kinds of youth behaviour. The history of
the 'Fragment's' successive interpretations is a history of crises and of new
beginnings. (265)

The Fragment itself is indeed a particularly complex and provocative text26 that raises a
number of possibilities for understanding the trajectories of capitalism and the possible
processes and forms of communism that are rarely, if ever, so evident in Marx's work.
The difficulty of the text, and this sense of its varied deployment make a general
presentation of the thesis of the Fragment difficult. I will start with the general argument,
and then show two variationsthat it takes.
The complex implication and disruption of unities in the machinism of real
subsumption (the point made so far) is made especially clear in this famous passage from
the Fragment:

The production process has ceased to be a labour process in the sense of a process
dominated by labour as its governing unity. Labour appears, rather, merely as a

conscious organ, scattered among the individual living workers at numerous points
in the mechanical system; subsumed under the total process of the machinery itself,

as itself only a link of the system, whose unity exists not in the living workers, but
rather in the living (active) machinery, which confronts his individual, insignificant
doings as a mighty organism. (Marx 1973: 693)

The radical thesis of the Fragment is that in this 'automaton' or 'organism' it is no longer
the distinct individual entities of the productive workers that are useful for capitalist
production, nor even their 'work' in a conventional sense of the word, but the whole
ensemble of sciences, languages, knowledges, skills that circulate through society that
Marx seeks to describe with the terms general intellect (706), social brain (694), and
social individual (705). This is a Marx that points to a very different understanding of
productive labour than Marxian orthodoxy, and indeed the thesis is challenging enough
that Virno (1996: 265) suggeststhat it is "not at all very 'marxist"'. There are, however,
two different ways of reading the thesis, that, if they are not wholly at variance in Marx's

25 Negri for example suggests that the Fragment is "without doubt, the highest
example of the use of the
antagonistic and constituting dialectic that we can find, certainly in the Grundrisse, but perhaps also in
the whole of Marx's work. " (1991: 139)
26 Because of its compressed complexity, Baldi (1985: 33)
calls the Grundrisse Marx's Finnegan's Wake.

153
text, can certainly led to very different interpretationS.
27 The following discussion of
thesetwo interpretationsis basedaround two very similar citations (which I have noted
[A] and [B] to help referencesto thesepassagesthroughoutthe chapter):

[A]
But to the degree that large industry develops, the creation of real wealth comes to
depend less on labour titne and on the aniount o labour employed than on the
power of the agencies set in motion during labour time, whose 'powerful
effectiveness' is itself in turn out of all proportion to the direct labour time spent on
their production, but depends rather on the general state of science and on the
progress of technology, or the application of this science to production. (704-5;
emphasis added)

[131
[The worker] steps to the side of the production process instead of being its chief
actor. In this transformation, it is neither the direct hunian labour [the worker]
performs, nor the tinie during which he works, but rather the appropriation of his
own general productive power, his understanding of nature and his mastery of it by
virtue of his presence as a social body - it is, in a word, the development of the
social individual which appearsas the great foundation-stone of production and of
wealth. (705; emphasisadded)

Both thesecitations make the Fragment's general argumentthat labour time and direct
labour diminish in importancein relation to a new force, but they offer slightly different
inflections on this force. The first, [A], emphasisesthe productive power of 'science'
and 'technology', whilst the second, [B], proposes the 'social individual' as the new
productive force. The resultantarguments needpursuing through Marx's text.

[A] Contradiction? General intellect outside of work, and the 'watchman'

As we have seen,Marx seesa narrativein the developmentof work toward ever-greater
simplification and abstractionwherethe dissectionof the division of labour "... gradually
transforms the workers' operationsinto more and more mechanicalones, so that at a
certainpoint a mechanismcan step into their places." (1976: 704) In the Fragment this
leadshim to introducesomethingof a dichotomy betweenthe worker on one side, and
generalintellect andthe machineon the other. The dichotomy is signalledin [A], but he
also puts it more firmly: "The accumulationof knowledge and of skill, of the general

27 In highlightingthis 'ambiguity' I am trying to show a productive 'problem' (rather than a 'mistake') in

Marx's thinking. The text is traversedby so many lines of argumentand such a great concern to diagnose
future developmentsin both capitalist and communist trajectories, that, almost by intent, it has many
possibleinterpretations,none of which should fix its meaning. As will be evident, however, I do think that
there are problematicelementsin the Fragment (though Marx does overcome them). That said, in all the
interpretations that seek to utilise, update, or correct the Fragment(such as those of Negri, Virno, and
Guattari used here), I have only found one - Rovatti (1973) - which raises the problem of its internal
inconsistency.

154
productiveforcesof the social brain, is thus absorbedinto capital, as opposedto labour,
and henceappearsas an attribute of capital, and more specifically of fixed capital..."
(694) As the 'social brain' or 'general intellect' is absorbedinto machines,"the human
beine,comesto relatemore as a watchmanand regulatorto the production processitself'
(705). Contrary to what we might think, this relegationto 'watchman' function is less a
sign that work hasbecometedious and alienated,than a manifestationof a new and fatal
contradictionfor capital, and an indication of the possibilities for a communism without
work. In as much as the productive force comes from general intellect embodied in
machinesand not workers, productivity seemsto bypass work (indeed, compared to
scienceembodied in machines. .....the value-creatingpower of the individual labour
capacityis an infinitesimal, vanishing magnitude..." (1973: 694)). Hence the capitalist
valuationof life in termsof work-done becomesincreasinglyanachronistic:"rhe theft of
alien labour tinte, on which thepresentwealth is based,appearsa miserablefoundation in
face of this new one, created by large-scaleindustry itself." (705) An explosive
'contradiction' emerges(705-6) becausecapitalismcontinuesto measurethese forces in
termsof (increasinglyunproductive)labour and labour time, and the possibility emerges
for the valuationandcreationof life basedon the needsof the 'social individual' and 'free
time'. Thus we see in the forces of capital the potential for a communism where:

on one side, necessary labour time will be measured by the needs of the social
...
individual, and, on the other, the development of the power of social production will
grow so rapidly that, even though production is now calculated for the wealth of all,
disposable tinzewill grow for all. (708)

The free development of individualities, and hence not the reduction of necessary
labour time so as to posit surplus labour, but rather the general reduction of the
necessarylabour of society to a inininuan, which then corresponds to the artistic,
scientific etc. developmentof the individuals in the time set free, and with the means
created, for all of them. (706; emphasisadded)

This is a crucial moment in understanding Marx's politics (especially for an anti-work

perspective) for it posits communism not on a militarisation of work, or an unalienated
labour, but on the destruction of the category of work enabled through complex
mechanical processes, and a life of expansive creativity, art, and science beyond the
drudgery of repetitive manual labour, or, indeed, work at all. 28 In as much as this is
presented as a possibility founded on an analysis of capital, and one that does require a
politics ("the mass of workers must themselves appropriate their own surplus labour"

28That said, there is a slight problem here in that communismappears to be less an overcomingof the
division of human life into work and science/art, than an affirmation of the latter against the former (cf.
Rovatti 1973). The problematisation of 'art' as a cultural form integral to capitalist relations had to wait
until the emergenceof the early twentiethcentury avant garde (cf. BOrger1984).

155
(708)), this is, to use Deleuze and Guattari's (1994: 171) term, a crucial political
'fabulation'. But in asmuch asMarx presentsit as a 'contradiction' it is problematic.
As we have seen, the contradiction is based on a disjunction between work and
general intellect/machines, with an increasing diminution of the productive force of the
former (both quantitatively and qualitatively (1973: 700) shrunk to mere 'watchman')
-
vis-ii-vis the latter.29 But the contradiction only holds insofar as the new productive
potential of general intellect lies outside of work in some kind of 'pure science' (if it did
not, capitalist valuation would still circulate around a productive force and there would be
no new contradiction). 30 But since 'work' is Marx's category for describing the capitalist
structuring of human labour or life in general (which necessarily embodies varying
historically formed competences, skills, and knowledges) and since all social systems call
forth their human relations (there is no undetermined abstract form of human life), it is
hard to imagine how in Marx's own terms this could be the case. With this dichotomy
between work seen as 'watchman' and general intellect as the new productive force (an
understandable interpretation of the trajectory of factory production of his time), and the
contradiction this would manifest if it was the case, it is as if we witness Marx willing the
new productive force of general intellect to be the foundation for a new communist mode
of production. That it is actually not so simple is discussed in the next section.
This 'contradiction' thesis has not been uncommon in interpretations of the
Fragment. Leaving Negri until later, it is worth mentioning a few examples. Montano
(1975) cites these sections of the Fragment to argue that "we are witnessing the
...
abolition of productive work within the capitalist mode of production itself' (54) such that
labour is no longer a form of production but of control (58). Most famously, Andr6 Gorz
similarly (though without a class struggle perspective) uses the Fragment to argue that the
majority of the population belong to a 'post-industrial neo-proletariat' whose precarious
work "will Lin the not too distant future] be largely eliminated by automation" (1982: 69),
that the "inicro-electronic revolution heralds the abolition of work" (1985: 32), and that
already "the amount of time spent working and the relatively high level of employment
have been artificially maintained" (1982: 72) in a capital that has moved from production
to domination (1985: 39). Even Virno (1996), whose interpretation of the realisation of
the Fragment's thesis within capitalism is similar to the argument of this chapter, still calls
this a 'post-work society'. 31

29The contradiction also resides on a more familiar proposition that individual tabour time diminishes in
importancecomparedto collective labour, which, in conjunction with machines enables the extraction of
an ever-greater proportion of (relative) surplus tabour to necessary tabour, leading to problems of
overproductionand realisationof surplus value.
30 There are, thus, sections in the Fragment,notably at the one
point where Marx uses the expression
'general intellect' (706), which seem to present technologyas a generic 'human' creation, an almost 'pure
knowledge'without referenceto capitalist relations.
31 For an excellent critique of these interpretations the
of end of work from an autonomist-influenced
perspectivesee Caffentzis (1996,1998).

156
[B] The social individual and more intensive work The potentialcommunism
of generalintellect-richproduction Marx describeshas been far from materialised,even
with a massiveexpansionin the use of machinesand the developmentof third generation
information machines.32 We can usethe Fragmentto explain why. Insteadof positing a
distinction between a 'watchman'-form of labour without content, and machines
operatingon a generalintellect that seemsto emergeoutsideof capitalistrelations, we can
point to other parts of the text which, following the argumentdevelopedabove through
Panzieri, stressa more machinicintegration. In section [B] Marx says not that science
embodiedin machineryis the productive force, but that 'the social individual appearsas
the greatfoundation-stoneof production and of wealth'. Marx uses generalintellect and
the social individual largely interchangeably,but when he talks of the social individual we
see a much richer idea of social rather than technologicalproductivity. The social
individual still seemsto free-float outsideof work, but if we follow the real subsumption
thesis we could imagine that the 'automaton' that subsumesthe manual worker would
also subsumethe social individual. Thus the productivity of the social individual would
emergealways alreadyin a work relation. When Marx writes in the Fragment that the
worker is "regulatedon all sidesby the movementof the machinery" (693) such that "The
niost developednzachinerythusforces the worker to work longer than the savagedoes,
or that he hiniself did with the simplest, crudesttools" (708-9) what we need to add is
that this is not just becausegeneralintellect invents machinesthat are used to make more
manualwork, but that generalintellect and the practicesof the social individual emergeas
work - as parts of a social machinicsystem. The individual worker is still increasingly
irrelevant(in her particularity asagainstthe socialwhole she contributesto), but this time
it is becausegeneralintellect signifies the extractionof surplus value not from repetitive
manual labour, but from all sorts of different, more complex forces in the social
individual's 'combinationof socialactivity' acrosssociety (not just within, but including
work time). It is not that a pure sciencebecomesproductive, but that a whole seriesof
capacitiesandknowledgesareproductiveand exploitable;work is not emptiedof content,
but filled with different content.
The productivity of general intellect, then, signifies a process not toward an
increased unproductivity and irrelevance of work, but to the greater expansion of the
content of life that can count as work. 33 We can thus understand Marx's other, rather
tragic conclusion concerning the "... paradox that the most powerful instrument for

32Caffentzis (1997: 30) cites a range of sources to show that in the US the work day, the work year, and
the number of waged workers have all significantly increased since the 1973-4 energy crisis (and that
OECD figures show similar for the 'advanced capitalist world').
33 This interpretation of the incursion of general intellect into the realm of work is most evident in the
Fragment when Marx writes that free time or immersion in general intellect changes the subject of work
- -
so that when s/he reenters work s/he is more productive. Free time is "time for the full development of the
individual, which in turn reacts back upon the productive power of labour as itself the greatest productive
power.... Free time - which is both idle time and time for higher activity - has naturally transformed its
possessor into a different subject, and he then enters the direct production process as this different
subject. " (711,712) Though one might want to problematise this free-time/work split, if the possessor of

157
reducinglabour-timesuffersa dialecticalinversionandbecomesthe most unfailing means
for turning the whole lifetime of the worker and his family into labour-time at capital's
disposalfor its own valorisation." (1976: 532).

Socialised workers
So far I have presentedthe social factory as a milieu of 'social capital' that composesa
unitary body of productive arrangements, with the 'social individual' as the 'worker' of
the process. Now I want to move into a closer examination of the social individual
throughthe conceptof the 'socialisedworker'. 34 Due to the emphasisof this chapter, I
am only consideringthe socialisedworker's forms of work, leaving its 'refusal of work'
(which is actuallyimmanentto the category)to the next chapter.
Operaismowas based around the theory of the 'mass worker' (essentially the
workers of the large industrial plants of the North, notably FIAT, and including a large

proportion of Southern migrant workers). But though the massworker always stretched
beyond the walls of the factory to include the community (inasmuch as Fordism was a
social system), it is arguably not until the seventies and the development of work and
politics aroundthe figure of the 'socialised worker' that the worker of the social factory
is
proper theorised. That the
said, concept of the socialised worker is considerablymore
controversialandunstable than that of the mass worker. The term was coined by Alquati
in 1974, but it is closely associatedwith Antonio Negri (from Proletari e Stato in 1975
onwards (cf. Wright 1988: 306)) and hence this elaboration is a commentary on his
conception (in the next chapter I consider more empirical aspects of the movement that
this figure seeksto describe). Negri is a central figure in the developmentof operaismo
and autonomia,and the formation and variation of his analysis bears somerelation with
the movementfrom 'workers' centrality' in operaismo,to the diffuse 'area of autonomia'
and the Movement of '77, and the emergence of 'new social subjects'. It is beyond the
to
scopeof this chapter chart the full intricacies of Negri's development (from his more
Leninist understandingsof political praxis during Potere Operaiato his current Spinozist
gconstituentpower' and 'multitude', and in any case,this has been done in considerable
detail by Hardt (1990), Ryan (in Negri 1991)andWright (1988) amongstothers. Suffice
to say that Negri's analysis has changedconsiderably, and has been at times a little
controversialamongst the movements he has been associatedwith. This is no more so
than with the figure of the socialised worker, a concept which itself has varied
considerably in Negri's own analysis (cf. Wright 1988: Ch. 7). It is this aspectof his
I
work want to focus on. Negri's writings on the socialisedworker show aspects of both
his importantcontribution to political theory (his situatedand rather rapid argument, the
novelty and innovation of his reading of Marx, poststructuralism, and diffuse and

general intellect uses it when s/he 're-enters' the production process, one would be inclined to think that
s/he is doing more than 'guarding' a machine in this process.
34 'Sociallsed worker' is a translation of operaio sociale, which is also translated as 'diffuse worker' and
'social worker'.

158
changingforms of work and political practice), and his tendenciesto over-generalisation
and wilful optimism (notably the argument,explainedbelow, that the technical-scientific
labour of the global 'multitude' is currently the living practiceof communism, if only we
would shrug-off external capitalist control).35
If the theory of the mass worker marked the emergenceof a class of generalised
abstractlabour, the socialisedworker thesis seeks to describethe class composition of
fully socialisedcapital. Negri suggeststhat the massworker was a stagein the movement
of real subsumption between the skilled worker and the fully socialisedworker (1988b:
217). He links the emergenceof the socialisedworker with the strugglesof 1968, and
suggests that "[flor a large part of Europe, the niass worker had been conceptualisedand
had becomea realityjust when its period of existencewas in fact about to end." (1989:
75) Negri (1988a) argues that in the recomposition of capital away from the large
factory-cities,the increasingdiffusion of workers across the social, and the regime of
austerity measures in the 1970s, the power of the mass worker to extend demands
beyond the factory was effectively curtailed.36 This necessitatedan expansion of the
contentof classcomposition from the massworker. He explains this as the needfor

the broadest definition and extend the concept of

of class unity, to modify
...
working-class productive labour, and to eliminate the theoretical isolation of the
concept of mass worker (insofar as this concept had inevitably become tied to an

empirical notion of the factory simplified factoryism due to the impact of the
-a -
bosses' counter-offensive, the corporatism of the unions, and the historical and
theoretical limitations of the concept itself). (1988a: 208)

The new classcompositionis that of the fully diffuse proletariat- the younger generations
in the factories who were less schooled in the traditions of the orthodox communist
movement, but also the enzarginati (youth, women, sexual minorities, and the
unemployed),whose productive centrality was relatedto the expansionof casual, part-
time and non-guaranteedwork, the underground economy, as well as housework and
non-remunerated work. For the PCI this was the terrain of the non-disciplined class,
almost the lumpenproletariat
(as I show in the next chapter,'plague bearers'and 'parasitic
strata'), but for Negri and the Movement of '77, this diffuse proletariat was a new central
force of production.37 Thus he suggeststhat this class composition might be better seen
not so much as a 'working class', but as 'social labour-power', to reflect

35 One is better able to understand the style of Negri's work if one sees him as part of a theoretical and
movement. As Hardt (1990: 173-4) suggests, the sometimes rather uneven nature of Negri's
political
prose is often attributable to the political immediacy and the complex dynamics of much of its production.
This is not a weakness of Negri's texts (indeed it is an aspect of minor creativity), but it does require one
to actively engage with his work, sometimes rather selectively, and should discourage treatment of Negri
as an autonomous author.
36 Negri traces this development as a direct response by capital to the effective power of the mass worker
(cf. 1988a: 212-6).
37 It is crucial to understand that this idea
of marginality is very different to Marcuse's (1969) affirmation
of the marginal. These marginals are the precarious, often highly-educated, casual, flexible workers that

159
 ...the potentiality of a new working class now extended throughout the entire span
of production and reproduction -a conception more adequate to the wider and
more searching dimensions of capitalist control over society and social labour as a
whole. (1988a: 209)

Negri's expansion of the figure of the mass worker across the social is an
important correction to the narrow definition of productive labour in Marxian orthodoxy.
It also has considerable analytic force when seen in conjunction with the political
movements that might express it (as considered in the next chapter). But from here on he
makes some strange and unproductive moves that echo the problems of the Fragment's
apparently autonomous general intellect, and indeed evidences the potential problems with
the operaist 'reversal of perspective' in its sometime tendency to present resistance and
autonomy in universalising terms (cf. Holloway 1995). In 'Archaeology and Project'
Negri (1988b) still remains within the position mapped out by Tronti that because
capitalist relations are immanent to work, the refusal of work is a necessary negation of
the working class. Indeed Negri eloquently expresses the autonomist refusal of work
formula:

Labour is the essence of capital. It always has been so. It is also the essence of man,
inasmuch as man is productive activity. But capital is real - while human essence is
only a dream. The only human essence of labour which approximates to the

concretenessof capital is the refusal of work. (1988b: 226)

But from here he begins to say somethingelse. I will trace the argumentthrough two
interrelatedpoints.first, that the content of socialisedwork has a tendency to become
increasingly'communicational'and 'immaterial', and second,that this form of work is
majoritarian communist collectivity. I then compare Negri's socialised worker to
Deleuze'sminor, since Negri makessome (problematic)links to it. In this discussionI
am combining Negri's later his
work and work with Michael Hardt (1994,2000). There
is no doubt that Empire (Hardt and Negri 2000) stretchesto overcomethe conceptual
problems I will identify, but it does not really manageit. That Negri himself does not
seemto seethe accountof the socialisedworkersof Empire as a break from his previous
work is marked by his decline to include this work in his critique of the 'immaterial
labour' theorists(2000: 29).38

in the social factory are fully implicated in productive activity. But, against Alliez' (1980: 119) somewhat
polemicalextreme(cited in Chapter5) which posits the factory as an almost parasitic strata, this should
not be seen as denying the continued productivity of more conventional forms of work. The point is that
distinctions betweenworkers and marginals are being overcome by a much more fluid and intricately
differentiated process of productivity.
38The broader argumentof Empireconcerning the history and contemporaryforms of global community
and governanceis beyond the scope of this thesis.

160
Communication and affective labour Following aspects of the Fragment on
Machines, Negri argues that socialised work is extremely rich in techno-scientific
knowledge,becomingthe living collective of generalintellect, where "the productive side
of work is now apparentprincipally on the intellectual level." (1989:47). In particular he
saysthat communicationbecomescentral. Thus in The Politics of Subversion (1989) he
writes that the "raw materialon which the very high level of productivity of the socialised
worker is based... is science, communicationand the conitnunicationof knowledge."
(116) Communicationbecomescentralbecauseit is the form of cooperationof the vast
socialwhole: "intellectual work revealsthe mechanismof interactionfor all social labour
it produces a specific social constitution - that of cooperation, or rather, that of
...
intellectualcooperation,i. e. conimunication-a basis without which society is no longer
conceivable." (1989: 51) Negri (1989: 117) thus employs Habermas' theory of
4communicative action' to saythat "It is on the basis of the interactionof communicative
actsthat the horizon of reality comes to be "
constituted.
Two contradictoryargumentsseemto develop from this, as is no more apparent
than in Empire. On one side Negri recognisesthat this communicativelabour is a
'subjective', and later (Hardt and Negri 2000), a 'biopolitical' and 'affective' (that is, not
just linguistic) interrelation.39 He even poses a critique of immaterial labour theorists
(such as those collected in Vimo and Hardt (1996)), for presenting the forces of
production I have been considering"almost exclusively on the horizon of language and
communication." (Hardt and Negri 2000: 29).40 Enipire suggeststhat this immaterial
labour is not an autonomousplane of production (though there are new forms of labour
which involve the manipulationof information, code, and sign), but is immanentto the
various regimesof production as a whole. Manufacture,for example,does not vanish,
but is informationalised, increasingly orchestratedthrough information technologies
(293). Thus, as an emphasis on Foucauldian biopower would necessitate,
communicativeand affective labour is seenasenmeshedin materialforms of practiceand
control ("constantcapital tendsto be constitutedandrepresentedwithin variablecapital, in
the brains, bodies, and cooperation of productive subjects." (385)).

Subject as multitude If Negri left it at this he would have updatedthe social factory
thesis to include affective labour. But then, on the other side, he continues to conflate
affective biopolitical processeswith communication. But not only does he suggest that
"... communication has increasinglybecomethe fabric of production" (Hardt and Negri

39 Hardt and Negri (1994: 235) give a fuller definition: "... living labour is manifest above all as abstract and
immaterial labour (with regard to quality), as complex and cooperative labour (with regard to quantity), and
as labour that is continually more intellectual and scientific (with regard to form). This is not reducible to
simple iabour - on the contrary, there is a continually greater convergence in techno-scientific labour of
artificial languages, complex articulations of cybernetics and systems theory, new epistemological
paradigms, immaterial determinations, and communicative machines. This labour is social because the
general conditions of the vital process (of production and reproduction) pass under its control and are
remodelled in conformity with it."

161
2000: 404), but that affective labour tends toward increasing autonomy. Ignoring the
radical divergence between Foucauldian frameworks (the discursive and diagrammatic
implication of 'language' which is never 'autonomous') and Habermassian autonomous
communicative action, Negri perceives a rather pure linguistic 'activity' coming to the
fore in 'communicational society' (1992: 105). 41 Even when in Enipire a more
biopolitical slant is offered, biopolitical immaterial labour still tends toward autonomy.
Hardt and Negri write, for example, that biopolitical labour "calls into question the old
notion ... by which labour power is conceived as 'variable capital', that is, a force that is

activated and made coherent only by capital, because the cooperative powers of labour
power (particularly immaterial labour power) afford labour the possibility of valorising
itself. " (2000: 294) The reasons Negri tends to see the autonomy of immaterial labour,
he
even as uses Foucauldian and Deleuzian conceptions of the immanence of power in all
social relations, are not unrelated to Marx's desire in the Fragment to witness an emerging

revolutionary form.
Just as Marx wants to seethe new content of productive activity tending toward
communismand the abolition of work (rather than being subsumed in capitalist relations),
Negri similarly seesthis increasinglyautonomousplaneof communicationaland affective
activity as a communistessence. Thus, in one readingof the Fragment (in 1988c), he
uses the section noted [A] above to argue that the quantitative contradiction (mass
socialisedproductionmeasured in individual terms) is "brought to a head" as labour-time
is indeed a "dissolving factor", and science is "immediately incorporated into
production". Negri does not follow Marx in seeing this going on outside work, in a pure
productive 'science' (for Negri, communication is work). Rather he seessocialisedwork
itself asincreasinglyoperatingnot in termsdominatedby numeration,equivalenceand the
value-form ('ivork' determined by capital), but in terms of 'free individualities' labouring
in a self-determinedfashion and driven by their own needs ('activities'). 42 He writes
that:

4() There is no self-critique here, even though his version of Habermassian communicative action is
considerably more extreme than that found in these theorists.
41 Negri talks of this communicational network of activity/work as both a Foucauldian 'spatial universe'
(1989: 78) and a site of Habermassian 'communicative action'. The grounding premise of Foucault's work
is of course that micro-powers proliferate and traverse the social, being its very constitution. The degrees
of intensity and complexity of this is such, contra Habermas, that any talk of pure communication is a
theoretical fiction. For Negri to utilise Foucault's image of proliferating networks as constituting a
possibility for communism as an equality in communication is thus, to say the least, problematic. The idea
that communism is collective control over a purified language resurfaces in Empire where Habermas is
again deployed, only this time he is seen as presenting the possibilities of communicative action in a too
limited fashion: "[Habermas] grants the liberated functions of language and communication only to
individual and isolated segments of society' (Hardt and Negri 2000: 404).
42 Negri sees this process as an overcoming of the law of value, interpreted as a quantitative relation
between labour-time and price (and its replacement with a 'law of command' (Negri 1991: 172); cf. also
Hardt and Negri 2000: 357-8,401). This is a reductive interpretation of the law of value, which, as Elson
(1979) argues, should not be seen as a question of the price of a commodity, but of the form labour takes
in capital (hence she calls it a 'value theory of labour'). However, insofar as Negri suggests that
production becomes determined by social needs rather than the extension of capitalist work he seems to
have dropped both a limited, and a full concept of the law of value. Caffentzis (1998) explicitly takes up
this point in Negri.

162
 The exchange of labour-power is no longer something that occurs, in determinate
quantity and specific quality, within the process of capital; rather, an interchange of
activities determined by social needsand goals is now the precondition, the premise
of social production... Work is now an immediate participation in the world of social
wealth. (1988c: 117-8; emphasis added)

This 'interchange of activities', then, tends to autonomous self-organisation where

"cooperation is posed prior to the capitalist machine, as a condition independent of
industry. " (Negri 1992: 78; cf. also Hardt and Negri 2000: 294)43 Thus, following
Negri's substitution within Marxism of (his understanding of) Spinoza's plenitude for
Hegel's dialectic (explored at length in The Savage Anomaly (1991a)), the qualitative
process of socialised production is seen to develop beyond the subsumption of the
worker in capitalist relations (as in the real subsumption thesis) to become an
'ontological' subject (1989: 50) of full communist plenitude, or the 'multitude' (defined
as "the innumerable multiplicity of powers and social knowledges the web of
...
in
meanings everyday activity" (1992: 81)). Here "The socialised worker is a kind of
actualisation of communism, its developed condition. The boss, by contrast, is no longer

even a necessarycondition for capitalism. " (1989: 81)44

This is problematic for two reasons. It is difficult to see, first, how this 'subject'
is really any different to liberal humanist or orthodox Marxist conceptions of an historical
subject (a de-subjectified subject of the multitude, when given all the ontological force he

gives it, is still a subject), 45and second, and most importantly, why this expansive super-
adequate ontology (in Marx's and Spinoza's senses) is not intimately structured and
traversed by capitalist relations (as Panzieri, Tronti, and Negri's earlier work on real
subsumption, as well as his use of Foucault and Deleuze would suggeSt). 46 Negri seems
to offer a strange inversion of the neo-Gramscian presentation of a tendency toward an
autonomy of the political (which he rightly criticises (cf. Hardt and Negri 2000: 45 1)),

whereby it is the realm of the econornic, or production which becomes autonomous. That
is, he has gone from a position, mapped through Tronti above, that social capital cannot

43 Indeed, Negri writes that "[t]his combination of autonomy and cooperation means that the
entrepreneurial power of productive labour is henceforth completely in the hands of the post-Fordist
proletariat", and that "[c]apital becomes merely an apparatus of capture, a phantasm, an idol. Around it
move radically autonomous processes of self -valorisation that not only constitute an alternative basis of
potential development but also actually represent a new constituent foundation. " (Negri 1996: 216; Hardt
and Negri 1994: 282-3)
44 "Living labour is organised independently of the capitalist organisation of labour" (Negri 1994: 234), as
a "new principle, a new subjectivity, which is being constructed at the social level, and which is communist
in its content. " (Negri 1988c: 116; emphasis added)
45 Negri even tells us that the socialised workers are "beginning to emerge as true historic subjects. "
(1996: 222; emphasis added)
46 By moving toward the affirmation of the current composition of life as communist, Negri starts to sound
like the 'planning' perspective critiqued by Panzieri which was based on the separation of relations and
forces of production. Whilst, no doubt, certain forms of general intellect-rich labour are composed of
much more diffuse and complex attributes and forces that far exceed the limited form of composition of
factory work, as Bifo (1980: 168) writes, "it would be simplistic to conclude that the revolution needs to
...
substitute a Leninist seizure of Knowledge for a Leninist seizure of the State. The problem is in reality

163
tolerate a political realm outside of its control, to almost an affirmation of work in the
social factory as itself autonomous. Thus, though Negri oscillates between seeing this
multitude in forms of work and in forms of resistance, essentially the resistance becomes

not so much a refusal of work (for 'work' has in a sense been overcome), but an

affirmation of the collective embodiment of affective labour: "In effect, by working, the
multitude produces itself as singularity" (Hardt and Negri 2000: 395; emphasis added).47
This is not to say that Negri dismisses the category of exploitation. He writes that

this labour is "inextricably and emotionally linked to the principle characteristics

(exclusion, selection, hierarchy) of the labour market" (1989: 47), and that this "does not

mean mocking the reality of exploitation" (1994: 235). 48 But insofar as the multitude
tends toward autonomy, exploitation becomes increasingly 'external' and 'empty' (1994:

238): "capitalist power dramatically controls the new configurations of living labour, but
it can only control them from the outside because it is not allowed to invade them in a
disciplinary way. " (1994: 235) It thus becomes increasingly unclear what exactly

exploitation iS.49
To summarise, when Marx sees general intellect tending to autonomy outside

work (either as a slightly decontextualised social individual, or a general intellect

embodied in fixed capital), Negri sees it as emerging in work, but a work that itself is

largely autonomous and almost communist, at a time when the Fragment's proposition is

apparently materialising: "the point at which the material basis of private appropriation

and the law of profit itself are too weak to resist the growth of the collective individual. "

(Negri 1989: 57). 50 At his extremes Negri even favours labour market deregulation (as if
t., t:)
'deregulation' was not always a process of intricate regulation) to enable the development
of this potential (1989: 79), and turns away from the refusal of work in a variant of the

old theme of 'self-management', as a "reappropriation of the social essence of production

to ensure an ever-richer reproduction of accumulated immaterial labour. " (1996:
...
221). 51 The "blind objectivism" of orthodoxy which Negri writes "wait[s] for some
miraculous power to transform living labour 'in itself' into the working class 'in and for
itself ...... (1994a: 234) is indeed problematic, but it can not be opposed by a wilful
naming of contemporary capitalist production as almost a communist multitude.

much more complicated, since not only the properties and use of Knowledge, but also its structure, are
determined by its capitalist functioning. "
47 Further confusion is added when Negri describes living labour as having a "clandestine existence"
(1992: 92).
48 See the very strange exchange between Negri and Derrida on this point in Sprinker (1999).
49 For example, "Exploitation" is defined as "the expropriation of cooperation and the nullification of the
meanings of linguistic production. " (Hardt and Negri 2000: 385) But if immaterial labour is precisely the
linguistic communication with an external capitalist control, one wonders in what sense it is
effectivity of
'nullified'.
50 Negri's (1992: 89) assertion that "the new labouring processes are founded on the refusal to work" and
that "[tlhe social worker's productive cooperation is the consolidation of the refusal to work" makes little
sense unless we see, as Negri is seeming to do, these'new labouring processes' as already non-work.
51 Hardt (1994: 227) makes this point about self and it is stated rather clearly in Hardt and
-management,
Negri (2000: 411).

164
The minor as new majority This problem of an autonomousmultitude working its
way to communism is highlighted most starkly in Negri's approach to Deleuze and
Guattari's figure of the minoritarian and Haraway's cyborg. In conversation with
Deleuze(N: 169-76), Negri asks if in 'communicationsociety'52the communismof the
Fragmentas the "transversalorganisationof free individuals built on a technology that
makesit possible"is "less utopian than it usedto be". He also raisesthe possibility that,
though domination becomes more perfect, perhaps "any man, any minority, any
singularity, is more than ever before potentially able to speakout and thereby recover a
greaterdegreeof freedom" (N: 174). Though posed as a question, this is clearly a
presentationof Negri's generalargument. Deleuzeresponds,however,by making a very
different point. He suggests that instant communication is more concomitant with
advanced forms of 'control' (see below) than 'communism', that "[tlhe quest for
'universals of communication' ought to make us shudder", and that speech and
communicationare "thoroughly permeatedby money - and not by accidentbut by their
very nature." (175) Here we have two Spinozists offering two fundamentallydifferent
interpretationsof the socialisedworker. Negri seesa 'subject', a multitude of liberation
emerging to communist presencethrough interconnectionand pure communication in
autonomy from capital, and Deleuze sees ever-more cramped 'dividuals' in
capital/communication-permeatedcontrol societies, where politics would not reside in
'speaking out', but in a much less 'present' form of lines of flight in "vacuoles of
noncommunication". Haraway (1991) makesa similar point that the common language
of communicationsciencesis not a freed-upspaceof communicatingcyborgs so much as
"the translation of the world into a problem of coding, a searchfor a common languagein
which all resistanceto instrumental control disappearsand all heterogeneitycan be
submittedto disassembly,reassembly,investment,and exchange." (164)
Despite these apparent differences, Negri suggests that the politics of the
socialised worker is related both to the cyborg (Hardt and Negri 1994: 28 1) and
Deleuze'sminority (Negri 1998: n.p.), but when thesefigures both expressa cramped,
difficult, and minor position (that can in no sense be a simple affirmation of
communicationand its collective whole), he wantsto read them as plenitudeand majority
in a process that seems inevitable, that "cannot help revealing a telos, a material
affin-nationof liberation" (Hardt and Negri 2000: 395)). Thus Negri (1998: n.p.) says
that DeleuzeandGuattari'sconceptof the minoritarianwas a recognition of the socialised
worker, but "from the point of view of phenomenologicalanalysis" the "sociopolitical

52 'Communicationsociety' is Negri's term for Deleuze's model of 'control society' (cf. Negri 1992:105).
Deleuze's expression 'control' clearly brings pejorative connotations to an understanding of a system
(wherecommunicationis indeed prevalent) that Negri would like to elide, as is evident in this question.
Though in Empire control emerges to an apparently central place, as the book develops it seems to
becomesubsumedin the categoryof 'Empire',which itself becomes increasingly 'empty'. When Deleuze
andGuattari (1988:460) write of the return of 'empire' ("modernStates of the third age do indeed restore
the most absolute of empires"),it is immanentto the most intricatecontrol.

165
definition given in A Thousand Plateaus does not really go much further than this" 53 He
suggests that the minoritarian is a figure of the multitude and that it contributed to an
understanding of a "new concept of the majority". Now we know that for Deleuze and
Guattari the sine qua non of the minor is that it is never a majority, always by definition a
deterritorialisation of the majority. In an earlier essay Negri (1992) acknowledges this by
suggesting that the limitation of Foucault, Deleuze, and Guattari is in "pose[ing] the
critique of power as a line of flight" (105) and refusing to identify a "constitutive power".
But then, on the same page, Negri recognises that actually they do have a constitutive
power, but this is quite unfathornably linked to their typology of dominant abstract
machines and diagrams:

According to Foucault and Deleuze, around this final paradigm

[control/communication] there is determined a qualitative leap which allows
thinking a new, radically new, order of possibility: communism. If in the society of
sovereignty democracy is republican, if in the disciplinary society democracy is
socialist, then in the society of communication democracy cannot but be
communist. Historically, the passage which is determined between disciplinary
society and the society of communication is the final possible dialectical passage.
Afterwards, the ontological constitution cannot but be the product of the multitude
of free individuals... (1992: 105)

Nothing in Deleuze and Guattari (let alone in Foucault, of all people) suggests that their
0
politics leads to a seemingly inevitable communist plenitude of "the multitude of free
individuals", or that this could be a determined epochal relation as natural to 'the society

of communication' as 'socialism' was to discipline.

The way DeleuzeandGuattari'sminor can be usedto analysethe refusal of work
within the social factory/socialisedworker thesis is developedin the next chapter, but
I
now want to turn to elaborate their understanding of contemporary capitalism, in
t7
particular the 'axiomatic', 'control', and 'machinic surplus value', to problematise
Negri's thesis of an emergingautonomy, in a position more in keeping with the social
factory thesis.

The capitalist BwO

BwO, axiornatics, and class For Deleuze and Guattari, the capitalist socius operates
as an ever-mutating 'abstract machine', 'megamachine', or 'Body without Organs'
(BwO). The abstractsocial machine of capitalism is fundamentallydifferent from the
'prin-dtive' and 'despotic' abstract social machines in that it functions not by codes
(coding and overcodingmaterial flows) but on codes(decodingand deterritorialisation)-

53 In EmpireHardt and Negri (2000) go so far as to suggest that Foucault "fails to grasp the real
...
dynamics of production in biopolitical society", that Deleuze and Guattari "discover the productivity of

166
this is its "most characteristic" and "most important tendency" (A(E: 34). 54 The two
principle flows that are brought into conjunction are the deterritorialised and unqualified
worker 'free' to sell his labour capacity (no longer coded as slave or serf), and decoded
and unqualified money (no longer determined as merchant or landed wealth) capable of
buying labour power. But this in itself is not sufficient a description. After all, all social
machines operate some form of decoding and deterritorialisation. There are two marked
differences with the capitalist socius. First, it is characterised by a generalised and
continuous process of decoding and deterritorialisation. 55 This is because there is no
particular structural regime or configuration of life to maintain, but a single objective of
'production for production's sake'. The 'essence of wealth' is no longer a concrete
objective thing, but "the activity of production in generar' (A(E: 270). 56 Second,
concomitant with this deterritorialisation is a simultaneous reterritorialisation, for
'production in general' does have a purpose - the extraction of the capacities of life as
4surplus value'. For the creation and realisation of value (utilisation of existing capital,
commodity consumption, reinvestment in new capital, and profit), there needs to be a
form of control, measurement, and organisation that determines and creates particular
forms (such as worker and consumer) immanent to this abstract production. Capital, the
continuous deterritorialisation of life, is thus necessarily populated by, or it "miraculates"
(A(E: 144) at every moment, particular determined forms or identities. We could call
these identities 'codes', except that through the continual process of de/reterritorialisation
they are forever changing. They are thus 'conjunctions' or 'axioms'. In the axiomatic

social reproduction ... but manage to articulate it only superficially and ephemerally" (28), and that,
indeed,their responseswere "pallid" againsta metaphysicaltraditionthat can now be overcome(368).
54Anti-Oedipusprovides a'universal history' of three types of abstract social machine: primitive/ savage
territorial, barbariandespotic, and civilised capitalist. What defines each social machine is its mode of
compositiondefined by three syntheses (connective,disjunctive,conjunctive(cf. Chapter 4, note 13)) by
which the whole and its parts operate as a socius (ACE:33). The question is one of the territories and
codes by which each social machine engineers its material flows in specific relations and so fashions a
'memory' (followingNietzsche'sGenealogy- though 'memory' does not have to be particularly 'deep' (cf.
Ansell Pearson 1999: 217-8)) of corporeal, incorporeal, technical, relations for the human: "The social
machineis literally a machine, irrespective of any metaphor, inasmuch as it exhibits an immobile motor
and undertakesa variety of interventions: flows are set apart, elements are detached from a chain, and
portions of the task to be performedare distributed." (ACE.141) Despite the clear intones of linearity,
Deleuzeand Guattari's universal history describes abstract social machines not by their temporality, but
by their mode of operation. That is, they "define social formations by machinic processes and not by
modes of production (these on the contrary depend on the processes)" (ATR 435), where 'modes of
production'are dated concrete configurations (though I think that this should be seen as an addition to,
rather than negationof Marx's method, which is equally more concerned with modes of composition than
dated histories). And further, each concrete form is always a composite of different abstract social
machines - the abstract machines are coexistent 'extrinsically' (they all interrelate - even the primitive
machine, following Clastres.(1989), has to 'ward off' the State) and 'intrinsically' (each machine can be
taken up into another machinicform, as for example, the return of the despotic Urstaat or 'empire' in the
capitalist socius) (cf. ATR 435-7,460). Thus, in a sense, the abstract comes before the concrete, and
within the concretewe can always find a coextensivefunctioningof different abstract machines.
55 Thus Deleuze and Guattari are fully in accord with Marx when he famously marked capitalism as
"Constant revolutionising of production, uninterrupted disturbance of all social conditions, everlasting
uncertainty and agitation ... All fixed, fast-frozen relations, with their train of ancient and venerable
prejudicesand opinions,are swept away, all new-formedones becomeantiquated before they can ossify.
All that is solid melts into air, all that is holly is profaned, and man is at last compelledto face with sober
faces his real conditionsof life and his relationswith his kind." (Marx and Engels 1973:36-7)
56 For Marx's account of the centralityand novelty the
of quest for 'wealth itself' in disrupting all previous
modes of community(and the denunciationof such practicein antiquityfor fear of this very potential) see
Marx (1973: 540-1).

167
process, intrinsic (more 'intemalised') codes are replaced by a plethora of immanent
(more 'surface') abstractrelationswhich traversethe socius, but which have no essence,
rules,or meaningbeyondtheir immediaterelation, and what is functional to them: "... the
axiomaticdealsdirectly with purely functional elementsand relations whose nature is not
specified,and which are immediatelyrealisedin highly varied domains simultaneously."
(ATP: 454) This axiomaticprocessis enabledthrough the transformationof particular
wealth-creatingpractices, and forces and forms into an abstract or universal form of
wealth ('abstract labour') through the medium of money.57 Money is the general
equivalentwhich enablesthe commensurabilityof all activity, and, becauseit can be
accumulated,the potentiality of surplusor boundlessproduction beyond that immediately
necessary(A(E: 258-9). Any flow of labour (as an abstractquality) can then conjoin in
an axiomatic 'cash nexus' in any relation with a flow of capital in ever-new ways and
alwaysbegetmoneyin a fashion that is not determinedby its current concreteform and,
as I havesaid, is independentof any formal rules beyond simply the begettingof wealth
(cf. ATP: 453). There is no overall code, rather every axiom composesan immanent
relation between flows valuedquantitativelyin monetaryterms (A(E: 33). The axiomatic
process is the applicationor creation of ever-changing 'images', 'organs', or determinate
relations, acrossa socius, capitalism, which is in itself wholly virtual and imageless,a
BWO.58 The axiomatic process is both the means to conjugate an infinite series of
relations,and to formalisetheserelationsat eachinstantso asto extracta surplus. This is
how the processis 'directly economic':

The socius as full body has become directly economic as capital-money; it does not
tolerate any other preconditions. What is inscribed or marked is no longer the
producers or non-producers, but the forces and means of production as abstract
quantities that become effectively concrete in their becoming related or their
conjunction... (A(E: 263)

Following Marx, Deleuzeand Guattari argue that the capitalist socius operates,
then, on two levels, evidencedin the way money works on two (intersecting)planes.
'The true economicforce', the full body of the BwO of capital, is the total productivity of
this process(where surplus value emerges),where money begetsmoney in the realm of
financing. The other level is the reterritorialisation in (at anyone time) axiornatised

57 In this Marxian sense, money is first and foremost

not a mechanism of exchange, but of command and
management of labour (across the social whole). For an explanation of this proposition, and a series of
analyses of the politics of money that follow from it, see Bonefeld and Holloway (1996).
58 Massumi (1992: 128-9) explains this well: "Capital functions directly through incorporeal
transformation, without having to step down or up to another level Capital can be given an image - in fact
....
it must have one in order to act - but it is imageless as such. It is a body without organs. In other words, a
network of virtual relations, a selection of which is immediately actualised at ground level wherever one of
capitalism's working images (organs) goes. These images are conveyances (components of passage).
They bring to designated bodies at each spatiotemporal coordinate through which they circulate a relation
that fundamentally changes those bodies' social and physical reality. That relation is capital as an
immanent social agency. -

168
subjects that receive 'impotent' money as payment in an individualised quantitative
valuation. The two planes necessarily function in tandem because capital always needs to
exceed and realise itself. The process of exceeding itself (producing surplus value) is
discussed in the next section. To realise itself, everybody must be invested in the system,
receiving some form of 'wage' ('impotent' money) and concomitant identity from their
ZD
contribution to the total process(be this from work done in a factory, from managing a
sub-stationof a business,from shareownership,or from 'indirect wages', statebenefits,
'family wages', and so on). Due to this investment:

there are no longer even any masters,but only slaves commanding other slaves;
...
there is no longer any need to burden the animal from the outside, it shoulders its
own burden. Not that man is ever the slave of technical machines; he is rather the
slave of the social machine. ...there is only one machine, that of the great mutant
decoded flow - cut off from goods - and one class of servants, the decoding
bourgeoisie, the class that decodes the castesand the statuses,and that draws from
the machine an undivided flow of income convertible into consumer and
production goods, a flow on which profits and wages are based. (A(E: 254-5)59

Deleuzeand Guattari(1983: 253) thus write that here"there is only one class,a class with
a universalistvocation" (they call this classthe 'bourgeoisie',but it is easierto think of it
asa generalisedcapitalist class). This is because'class' signifies the very decoding and
deterritorialisationof castesand statusgroups. In as much as capitalismfunctions across
the social whole, it continually breaksdown any fixed identity or group: "the very notion
of class,insofar as it designates the 'negative' of codes, implies that there is only one
...
class." (255) Whilst in this system one can demarcate groups of people on a scale in
termsof how they accruemoney for their practices,with wages (even no wages) on one
side and profit on the other (that is, they are not saying we are all equal, far from it),
essentiallyall are concreteaxiornatisedembodimentsof the abstractprocess (and hence
politics, as I arguedin Chapter4, emergeswith minority problematisationsrather than
distinct 'classes', even though they are expressionsof a 'proletarian' tendency that
deterritorialises the 'one class')
To say that the capitalist axiomatic system operates on the level of abstract
quantities and is composed of one class is not to say that it does not produce subjects.
Deleuze and Guattari distinguish two subjective forms, both of which operate

59 This 'investment', as fundamental to identity as it is (since that

which is invested produces the identity
and its investment in the first place), is the basis for Deleuze and Guattari's crucial assertion that the
question of support for, and critique of the status quo resides not in one's 'interest', but in one's 'desire',
or libidinal investment. Since we are all, as Guattari (1996: 101-5) puts it, "machinic junkies", Anti-
Oedipus asks, how can one not invest in the great mutant flow of capitalism?: "... a pure joy in feeling
oneself a wheel in the machine, traversed by flows, broken by schizzes. Placing oneself in a position
where one is thus traversed, broken, fucked by the socius, looking for the right place where, according to
the aims and the interests assigned to us, one feels something moving that has neither an interest nor a
purpose.... a taste for a job well done... " (346-7) It is precisely because of this investment in the

169
simultaneouslyin the capitalist axiomatic- niachinic enslavementand social subjection.
Machinic enslavementcomposesan integratedmachineof human, animal, tool subjectto
a higher unity (the despotic State-form is the first example, but Marx's productive
'automaton' could be another), whereas social subjection isolates the human from the
machine to become itself the higher unity ("The human being is no longer a componentof
the machinebut a worker, a user. He or she is subjectedto the machineand no longer
enslavedby the "
machine. (ATP: 457)). In the capitalist socius, the functioning of the
axiomatic through abstract quanta (turning a force into a determined comparable
conjunctionor practice)is the elementof machinicenslavement,and the production of the
molar aggregate out of this, the personified capitalist, the worker, the consumer, is the
Z-1 t:1
social subjection. But eachmoment is simultaneously subjectionand enslavement. An
adaptationof Deleuze and Guattari's exampleof television (ATP: 458) can exemplify this.
The worker is subjectedin asmuch as s/heis subjectto the statements'you must work...
to survive/ for to to
the good of your soul/ contribute society' (where the is
statement a
materialcompulsion) and enfolds this as a subjectivecore with the enunciation 'I anz a
worker and it is good for me'. And the is in
worker enslaved as much as s/he is a series
of componentquanta reconfiguring in a work machine. Spivak (1996: 122) illustrates the
cofunctioning of these two forms when she writes: "It is a paradox that capitalist
humanism does indeed tacitly make its plans by the 'materialist' predication of Value
[what is here called the machinic enslavementof labour-power], even as its official
ideology offers the discourseof humanismas such..."

Control If this is the general axiomatic process, in 'Postscript on Societies of Control'

(N: 177-182) Deleuze makes some specific comments about the operation of
contemporary axiomatic processes a in time of real subsumption, or Control (which, as

we have seen, Negri calls 'communication society' and 'Empire'). 60 Deleuze argues that,

particularly after the Second World War, we are witness to the breakdown of the

relatively distinct spacesof Foucault's (1991) disciplinary enclosure. Discipline is based

on the double figure of individual and mass, where each site of disciplinary enclosure
both disciplines and maximises collective energies, and produces individual identities
appropriate to that enclosure. Though the form is similar (as I showed in the Panopticon,

a certain system oriented toward individual self-surveillance and self-maximisation), each

confinement has its own type of mass and individuality. The subject traverses different

sites of enclosure being subjects of the function of worker, prisoner, patient, student and
so on, in series. In control, there is a tendency to a collapse of these enclosures and
distinctions, such that one is always in a 'superposition', occupying a number of these
Rather discrete 'moulds' (in there is a
positions at any one time. than each enclosure),
continuous variation or 'modulation'. Hence coherent analogical individuals and masses,

break/flows of capital that politics needs to be thought in terms of machinic relations, and why it comes in
and through capital, rather than from outside it.

170
arereplacedwith much more fluid and digital 'dividuals' caught in overlapping seriesof
different 'self-transforming' and metastableconfigurations, where the contours of the
dividual are modulated through continuous absorption and feed-back of information
across 'data banks' (or 'nodal points' in communicatingnetworks - including agencies
such as the police, social work, psychiatry, as well as more recent consumer profiling,
and credit assessmentprocesses(cf. Rose 1999: 260)). The expression 'dividual' is
importantin emphasisingthat the self-autonomyof the individual (subjection)is breaking
down into a sub-divided series of changing capacities,possibilities and limits in each
modulation(enslavement),wheredividuals are not just 'normalised' but maintainedwith
a certaindegreeof what we could call functional differences(such as, for example, new
milieu of cultural innovation,or social and political 'danger'), such that the thresholdsof
knowledge and practice are always being reconfigured (cf. Rose 1999). There is no
discretepracticeor dispensionof energy in eachsite (work-time here, educationthere),
rather a varying overlay of these practicesin one site, where, as Joseph K testified in
Kafka's (1953) The Trial, one is never 'done' with anything. At any one time, of course,
thereare precisemechanismsof dividualised 'identity' (or 'subjection').
For Deleuze this is both an extension of discipline, a kind of permeation
(Massumi (1998: 56) describesit is a 'release' of discipline acrossthe social), and also
something new that is directly related to a post-Second World War "mutation of
capitalism" (N: 180). Rose(1999: 234) has warned againstreading 'Control' in epochal
terms since, like all Deleuze'sabstractmachines,it is a mode of 'configuration' rather
than a specific spatio-temporalsystem, and hence always operatesin conjunction with
other configurations(cf note 54). IndeedDeleuzeseesKafka's work, at the turn of the
century, as straddling discipline and control (hencethe super-positionsof The Trial - the
self-transfbrrninglabyrinths that emergewithin apparentlydistinct disciplinary territories
such as the court-house, and the endless postponementof the verdict - are control
experiences).Nevertheless, Deleuzedoes also specifically link control to some pervasive
featuresof post-War capitalism: the end of the gold standard and the emergenceof
floating exchangerates (N: 180), and a form of capital based not on production and
proprietorship, but on businesses,services, administrators,and computers. In many
ways 'business'becomesthe societalwide 'technology' much as the Panopticonwas the
technologyof the abstractmachineof discipline. Deleuzeis suggestingnot so much a
'social factory', but a 'social business'. "Capitalism in its presentform" is

essentially dispersive, with factories giving way to businesses. Family, school,

...
army, and factory are no longer so many analogous but different sites converging
in an owner, whether the state or some private power, but transmutable or

60 Incidentally, Deleuze (1995a: 51)

calls this text "completely marxist".

171
 transformable coded configurations of a single business where the only people left
are administrators. (N: 181)61

Machinic surplus value I will return to the 'social business' below, but first I want
to consider the labour and 'value' of this system. The question of the content of the
productivity of this axiomatic process is complicated, and here we get to that most heated
of Marxist debates, that of Value. I have shown how Marx raised this question of a
different content of activity as the general intellect and the social individual, and how
Negri tried to see it as the near actualisation of communism within the regimes of
biopolitical labour that had escaped the law of value. Deleuze and Guattari explicitly
address this question around what they call 'machinic surplus value', but unlike Negri,
they firmly situateit asan axiornatisedcapitalistform.
DeleuzeandGuattariwrite that capital dependsincreasinglyless on the extraction
of labour time and quantity than on a "complex qualitative process" (Guattari 1996: 206;
ATP: 492; emphasis added) in a fashion that at times seems to tie in with Negri's thesis
that we are heading beyond the labour theory of value. On closer inspection, however,
they are more 'Marxist'. In Anti-Oedipus they suggest, a little like section [A] of the
Fragment, that alongside conventional 'human' surplus value, machine-rich production
41:
1
sees the emergence of a 'machinic surplus value' of constant capital (232) that is the
product of an "intellectual labour distinct from the manual labour of the worker" (233).
But this is a mistake in their own terms, in that it presents machines and humans as
distinct entities rather than, as they always insist, products of a social machinic process
(and it makes a split between intellectual labour - 'machinic surplus value', and manual
labour - 'human surplus value', that makes little conceptual sense in that it seems to
exclude intellectual labour from the realm of the human). 62 This is, however, not
fundamental to their argument, and it is later rectified. The fundamental point of Anti-
Oedipus' discussion of surplus value is that the aggregate of the two surplus values is a
4surplus value of flux'. In A Thousand Plateaus surplus value of flux is replaced with
'machinic surplus value' (that is, this time defining the product of the whole machinic

61The importance of business as a variously concretely embodied diagram in diverse spheres is stressed
in a number of examples: TV game-shows are said to be popular "because they're a perfect reflection of
the way businesses are run" 179), continuing education and continuous assessment are "the surest way
of turning education into a business" (M. 179), and "[ejven art has moved away from closed sites and into
the open circuits of banking. " (181) This 'business' or 'enterprise' model is also forwarded by earlier Negri
as central to what he calls the 'crisis-state'. As with Deleuze, this is a form of control that arises with the
collapse of distinct enclosure, and of the normalising regulation of labour through Keynesian
wage/productivity tie-ins. In ever-more fluid productive space, the 'enterprise' comes to be the site of
productivity across the social as a modulating capture of energies, able to remove the stabilities of large-
scale production and compose forms of identity and self-control in varying and changing forms: "The key
control mechanism in this transformation is the enterprise, in the sense that it extends the norms of
factory-command over work to the whole social labour time." (Negri 1988: 123)
62 Clearly aware of the centrality of Marx's argument that machines cannot create value, Anti-Oedipus'
proposition of machinic surplus value is couched in what Deleuze and Guattari rather self-consciously call
a deliberate "indispensable incompetence". This is a ruse they take from Maurice Clavel's apparent use of
"wilfully incompetent questions" to Marxist economists concerning the credibility of the centrality of
human surplus value in the face of the productive power of machines (ACE:232), but they situate their

172
regimerather thanjust constantcapital). In this framework 'machinic surplus value' is
defined in two (fully interrelated)senses. First, it signifies not the differential between
the value of, and the value createdby labour capacity, but the break between the two
forms of capital - the flow of the full BwO and the axiomatisedidentities that are its
reterritorialisation. Thus the 'exploitation' of surplus value is the very forin that
axiomatisedsubjectstake in capital (as discussedabove).63 Second, machinic surplus
value signifies the societalwide extraction or production of the complex, qualitative,
machinicprocessthat the socialisedworker thesissoughtto describe,and the very diffuse
and unlocatablenatureof value in this system(ATP: 458,491-2).64
1 will consider this second point (having developed the first, above, in the
explanationof axiomatics). In an essayby Guattari (1996) that is in many ways a reading
of the Fragment's general intellect and social individual as categories of capitalist
productivity (he suggests,for example,that "The recastingof the quantificationof value
basedon work-time won't be, as Marx assumed,the privilege of a classlesssociety."
(206)), there is an explicit attemptto 'lift' Marx's 'collective worker' from a category
based on average labour with a generaliseddispension of energy (which can be
quantitativelycalculated)to a focuson the qualitativeintensity and variation of work. The
essay has a few 65
problems. Nevertheless, it emphasisesthe important point that a
qualitativevariationexistsin the contentof value beyond a simple definition of work and
work time. Thus Guattari writes that "it is complex arrangements- training, innovation,
internal structures,union relationsetc. - which circumscribethe magnitudeof capitalist
zonesof profit, and not simply a levy on work-time" (1996: 205), and that capitalism
actualisesproductivesocio-economicforms in varied desires,aesthetics,ecologiesand so
on (1995: 55). But capital still operates as the universal plane of these different
'universesof value'. That is, each of the different universes of value is subsumedin
capitalist generalequivalence(Guattari 1995: 54-5), or in a "machinic phylum which
traverses,bypasses,disperses,miniaturises,and coopts all human activities." (Guattari

'incompetence' around the question of the surplus value of flux which, as I am arguing, is fully
comprehensiblewithin the labour theory of value.
63Diane Elson (1979) has argued that this is the essenceof Marx's labour theory of value theory not of
-a
the determinationof prices, but of the form iabour takes in capital (to stress this point she thus calls it a
'value theory of labour'):"the objectof Marx's theory of value was labour. It is not a matter of seeking an
explanation of why prices are what they are and finding it in labour, But rather of seeking an
understandingof why labour takes the forms it does, and what the political consequencesare." (123)
64Though A ThousandPlateaus (492) suggests that machinic surplus value emerges "less and less by
the striation of space-timecorrespondingto the physicosocialconcept of worW'we have seen already how
'business' becomes a pervasive model for an increasingly subdivided and diffuse 'productivity', and
hence I would suggest that they are here using the word 'work' in a limited,descriptivesense rather than in
a machinic sense. In the sense in which this thesis defines work in abstract terms as the axiornatised
reterritorialisationof human practice (immersed in machinic configurations) immanent to the capitalist
mission of 'productionfor production'ssake', the extensionof machinic enslavementis simultaneously an
extensionof work (which, after all, is an inventionor product of machinicenvironments(cf. ATP: 400-1)).
65Notablythe essay overplaysthe reductionof work-timeas a measure of value (since the quantification
of labour, however impossible it is to really measure individual contribution, is still fundamental to
capitalist valuation of life), and suggests that the concept of 'average social labour' is an abstraction
inappropriatefor an understandingof the concrete practices of labour (when in fact it is related to an
understandingof the processesof abstractionnecessaryfor unbounded'productivity',as I argued above
through Anti-Oedipus).

173
1996: 207) There is now a qualitative variation in the 'value' of these practices- any
activity that can be, is capitalised. As Camatte (1995) argues, a 'capitalised human
activity' has escapedany fixed base-valuesuch that "human beings are fixed to its
movement,which can take off from the normal or abnormal, moral or immoral human
being." (43)
But, if subsumedin generalequivalence,this is not to say that this machinic
surplus value is produced 'autonomously' in society. Rather it is "miraculated", or
created by the sociusas it is needed(AM 144), becoming a "required" machinic surplus
value (cf. Guattari 1996: 208). There is no play of autonomouscreativity and capitalist
recuperation(cf. A(E: 337-8), but rather, as Massumi (1998: 57) puts it: "Control
involves the assimilationof powersof existence,at the momentof their emergence". And
at eachstage,thereis the axiomatic normalisation of each new form, where ...Normal' is
now "
free-standing. New aspects of social productivity might escapefor a little while.
Indeedcapitalismhasmany little autonomouszoneswhere creationis allowed to operate
outside productivity (Anti-Oedipus offers an image of the mad scientist creating on the
fringes, and we could add, at a different level, youth or countercultural practices as
examples (cf. Terranova (2000) for an examination of internet labour in these terms))
before it is generalisedas a new productive activity, but such spaces(or lines of flight)
enrichratherthancontradictcapital- at leastin normal functioning.
Again the 'business' is the archetype. Deleuze writes that in disciplinary
production discrete amounts of energy were extracted in the factory and costs were
reduced, but in control we see a buying of 'activities', and a 'fixing of rates'. Deleuze
thus writes that

the factory was a body of men whose internal forces reached an equilibrium
...
between possible production and the lowest possible wages; but in a control society
businessestake over from factories, and a business is a soul, a gas. There were of
course bonus systemsin factories, but businessesstrive to introduce a deeper level of
modulation into wages, bringing them into a state of constant metastability
punctuatedby ludicrous challenges, competitions, and seminars. (N: 179)

'Marketing' lies at the centreof this ISOU11.66 But I do not think that marketingshould be
seenasa distinct practicecircumscribedin a single social group,but more as a sign of the
business' free floating ability discern and require a wealth of activities through its
pen-neation and intimate control of social life, and understandingof the variation and
potentialof activity that its 'data banks' provide. Inasmuchas we all becomepart of the
'business', marketingcan also be seen to be a generalisedfeature of social activity (a
necessaryattributeof the 'dividual'). Making this caseLazzarato(1996) writes that, what
he calls 'communication' (marketing,productionof 'cultural content' such as fashion and
ID

174
taste,consumerfeedbackmechanisms,public opinion) is enmeshedin "the postindustrial
commodity" suchthat it "is the result of a creativeprocessthat involves both the producer
and the consumer." (142) This 'communication' emergesin a condition of intimate
axiornatisationwhere "one has to express oneself, one has to speak, communicate,
cooperate,and so forth" (135) and hence leads to a situation where every aspect of
subjectivity itself becomesproductive of value (143). But this is not only a 'subjective'
phenomena.As Massumi (1996) and Morris (1998) have startedto show, this processof
6communication'or 'work' occurs in a sub-human fashion, as the communicationand
axiomatisationof 'affect' or intensity immanent to particular machinic environments
(witnessthe useof biofeedbackmechanismsin focus-groupresearch67).

The little work-machines of the social factory

Returningto the termsof the social individual and the generalintellect in the Fragment, I
can now presenta clearerpicture. When Marx writes of the subsumptionof the general
intellect in machinerythis is actually a subsumptionof all society in capitalist relations
(where production thus extends into the realms, to use the Marxian categories, of
circulation and reproduction (cf. Negri 1991: 142-50)). That is, we can not consider
general intellect solely in terms of machinery [A]. Rather it is immanent to the social
individual [131acrossthe plane of the social, but (unlike Marx's hope, and in different
ways, Negri's analysis) this social individual is in continual mechanisms of
axiomatisation. Thus, if we think of generalintellect/machineryin more machinic terms,
we could subdivide Marx's technicalmachineinto a seriesof smaller and more complex
machinic assemblages across the space of society (traversing the, increasingly fluid,
division of 'work time' and 'free time'). Each would be composedof varying quantities
of technical and human parts, where in each instance the societal wide competences,
languages,knowledges, physical forces, interactions, skills, expertisesare present in
different degreesin the worker and the technicalmachine,andwhereeachwould maintain
a 'social' productivity, regardlessof whether they immediatelycontribute to what we
conventionally call work. As Guattari (1996) puts it, in this system, fixed capital,
variablecapital,and free time are interlacedin particular 'machinic environments', where
the whole ensembleof affects in each environment are 'axiomatised' and produce a
'machinic surplusvalue': "exploitation concernsmachinicarrangements at first - man and
his faculties havin9 becomean integral part of these arrangements. " (209) And even
t:,
when"Machinesin the factory seemto be working all by themselves,... in fact it is the
whole of society which is adjacentto them." (1996: 212) Since 'work' is the extraction
of surplusvalue andthe maintenanceof value in a particular form, then (adding to Marx's

66"The sales departmentbecomesa businesscentre or'soul' Marketingis now the instrument of social
...
control and producesthe arrogantbreed who are our masters." (N. 181)
67 Massumi (1996) provides an example of a study of children's experience of a TV film where, not
linguistic, but non-verbal bodily response, which contradicted verbal response, was the basis for
judgment of affect.

175
conceptionof work to include generalintellect) the activities of the social individual are a
form of work, including those activities which maintain the correct functioning of the
system,evenif they haveno wage.
We can envisageexamplesof these axiornatisedmachinic work regimes (of the
most modern and traditional kinds), from a fully automatedcar-plantat one end, fitting
well with Marx's accountof the 'watchman' thesis, to an advertising industry brain-
storming session, a garment worker sweat shop, the key-tap regulatedkey board, the
hourly labour contract, the zero-hours contract, the ResearchAssessmentExercise and
4vocationalism' in higher education, work-place drug-tests, telephone call-time
monitoring, e-mail answering speed regulation, housework, 'jobseeking', career
opportunity maximisation,collective responsibility, pleasingthe boss, neo-Puritanethics,
sheer poverty-driven hard work, to, indeed, consumer-feedbackmechanisms, and
correctly competentfashion-consciousconsumption.
This analysis has the advantageof accounting for the great mutability and
flexibility of a good deal of contemporarywork. Rather than one general portfolio of
skills that may be employedin the narrativeof a single careeror job over a life time, these
myriad little work-machines would pick up and incorporate a whole series of different
competencesat different times. This sense of being perpetually able to reskill, self-
employ, modulate ones demeanour, skill, aptitude, and competenceis, for example,
particularly evident in the emphasis on training and pursuit of jobs for the British
unemployed,now receiving their 'JobseekersAllowance' and their 'New Deal' on the
basisthat they are always ready, prepared,and preparingto be propelled into productive
arrangements. Vimo writes (1996: 22) that "[1]ooking for a job develops those
genericallysocialtalents- aswell asthe habit of developingno durablehabits at all - that
function astrue andproper 'tools of the trade' once work is found.1168In theseregimes,
one's lifestyles, ethics, even rebellious identities, and one's consumption and
reproductionpatternsbecomedirectly productive as generalisedpotential, actualisedin
varying specific enactmentof work. And within work-time, or the quantitativebasisfor a
wage, vastly different, varying, and expansive qualitative skills, knowledges,

68 Fox-Piven and Cloward (1972: 6-7) draw attention to the historical problem of unemployment which the
JSA and the New Deal are the latest attempts to overcome: "The regulation of civil behaviour in all
societies is intimately dependent on stable occupational arrangements. So long as people are fixed in
their work roles, their activities and outlooks are also fixed.... Each behaviour and attitude is shaped by
the reward of a good harvest or the penalty of a bad one, by the factory paycheck or the danger of loosing
it. But mass unemployment breaks that bond, loosening people from the main institution by which they are
regulated and controlled. Moreover, mass unemployment that persists for any length of time diminishes
the capacity of other institutions to bind and constrain people.... without work, people cannot conform to
familial and communal roles; and if the dislocation is widespread, the legitimacy of the social order itself
may come to be questioned. " It is with this in mind that Walters (11994)has shown how the 'invention' of
unemployment and its institutional apparatus was a strategy intended to construct a coherent
unemployed subject comparable to the employed subject. If today the emphasis in neo-liberal
governance has moved toward an ethically intensive process of 'jobseeking' (where benefit is only paid on
the basis that the jobseeker enters into arrangements of self optimisation - including training and
maintenance of acceptable physical appearance - and continual job application), the core focus on the
development of coherent subjective forms has not (and indeed JSA can be seen as a direct response to
the failure of the model of the unemployed subject that became evident under Thatcher and Reagan (cf.
Aufheben 1998)).

176
competences, relations, interactions, disciplines, languages and skills across social are
actualised, where it matters at least as much that workers work on themselves (optimise
their skills, and deploy and feed-back their complex knowledges and capacities in each
axiomised work relation) to enable the productivity of vastly complex assemblages, as
that they 'put in. their time' (even though labour-time retains a continued role as the - albeit
modulating rather than fixed - measurement of the 'value' of the system that the worker
accrues to herself).
We should not infer from all this that we have left behind the extremes of work-
place enclosure and control (indeed, in the age of multinational sub-contracting and
outsourcing, the extremes of 'post-industrial' infotech employment and the nineteenth
century sweatshop are fully interfaced - often in one and the same 'subject' (cf. Ross et
al. 1997; Lazzarato 1996: 137; Caffentzis 1996)), but it is the relative stability of
enclosure that is seen to be disappearing in a more fluid, axiomatic, and socialised model
of work (characterised, as Lazzarato (1996: 137) puts it, by "Precariousness,
hyperexploitation, mobility, and hierarchy"). Lazzarato thus characterises production
under the general intellect, or 'immaterial labour', not as a machine-based automated
system but more as a societal-wide machinic system, ever coming into being, and
dispersing again:

This immaterial labour constitutes itself in forms that are immediately collective, and
we might say that it exists in the form of networks and flows. The organisation of
the cycle of production of immaterial labour ... is not obviously apparent to the eye,
because it is not defined by the four walls of the factory. The location in which it

operates is outside in the society at large... The cycle of production comes into

operation only when it is required by the capitalist; once the job has been done, tile

cycle dissolves back into the networks and flows that make possible the
reproduction and enrichment of its productive capacities. (1996: 137)

This analysis does not fundamentally alter Marx's account, it just brings the
generalintellect and social individual into the framework of real subsumption (whilst
adding axiomatics and machinic surplus value to this), so resolving the apparent
contradictionof a society of watchmen/machinesand an indeterminatespaceof general
intellect. It is not that machines'end work society within capitalism', or that we are
witness to Negri's autonomousmultitude within work. Rather, the argument is that
through the ability of little work machinesto structure and mediate complex social
relations, induce the emergenceand productivity of diverse affective and biopolitical
forces (in a continual inducementto self-'marketing' and self-developmentof 'general
intellect'-competence)all kinds of socialrelationsandknowledgesbecomeproductivein a
more diffuse and machinic 'automatic systemof machinery'. Just as the Panopticonwas
the archetypeof productiveself-surveillanceandregulation('discipline') that was actually
embodiedin varying shapes, sizes, forms, and degreesof intensity across the social,

177
these little work assemblages of the social factory similarly embody something of the
archetype of the intelligent structuring technical machine. As Paulo Virno (1996: 22) puts
it: "In contemporary labour processes there are entire conceptual constellations that
function by themselves as productive 'machines', without ever having to adopt either a
mechanical body or an electronic brain. "

Conclusion
I have presented operaismo as a site of problematisation and political production that
emerged through analysis of Marx, new forms of work, and new forms of political
composition. This chapter analysed operaismo's and autonomia's conception of
contemporary forms of capitalism, work, and worker. I started with discussion of
Panzieri's and Marx's conceptualisation of machines and the 'real subsumption' of
society in capitalist relations, and Tronti's presentation of 'social capital' and the 'social
factory'. In this analysis, distinctions between relations and forces of production, work
and non-work, the political and the economic were seen to be overcome in a machinic
society-wide production and a general interest of the people in a 'society of labour'. The

capitalist and the worker were seen to be not 'subjects' but functional nodal points in

socialised production. For this reason, both 'objectivist' Marxist 'management of

production', and social democratic socialist politics - specifically the PCI's understanding
of the 'autonomy of the political' and the politics of 'hegemony' - were seen to be figures
immanent to the maintenance of capitalist relations.
The chapter then explored the revered text of Marx's 'Fragment on Machines'. I
showed how two readings can be made. One sees an explosive contradiction developing

around a vastly productive 'general intellect' that in is

emerges science, embodied in fixed

capital, and empties-out work of content and value-creating capacity. The other
interpretation places more stress on the emergence of a complex social productivity, the
6social individual', which,though Marx sees this as part of the contradiction,
nevertheless offers the means to think of new forms of capitalist social productivity in
keeping with the real subsumption thesis. I then discussed Negri's figure of the
6socialised worker'. I showed how this is an extension of Marx's social individual that
reflects both the innovations and problems of that category. The socialised worker is a
figure of complex communicational and affective labour across the social factory. It
enables us to think of work as a varied practice immersed in global networks that make a
wealth of social attributes 'productive', or 'work', including those which have

conventionally been seen as functioning in a realm of 'reproduction'. I argued, however,

that Negri replicates the problem with Marx's thesis in that this socialised work tends to
the labour theory of value breaks down and communism becomes 'so
autonomy, where
near' (Negri 1994a) as almost the practice of work. The problematic aspect of Negri's
thesis was seen to be most evident in his interpretation of Deleuze and Guattari's concept
of the minor. I then used Deleuze and Guattari's understanding of the capitalist socius,

178
axiomatics,class,control, and machinic surplus value to see how we can understandthe
socialisedworker, and the new attributesand networksof production,as emerging within
capitalistrelations,andbeing intricately structuredby them. This was seento be more in
keepingwith the real subsumptionand social factory thesis.
As well as exploring operaismo's and autonomia's conceptionof the intricately
crampedsite of work (where politics is to be situated)this analysis has fleshed out the
framework of the capitalist socius first proposed in Chapter 5.1 thus ended with a
summaryof the argumentthrougha considerationof contemporarywork; the little work-
machinesof the social factory. Any contemporarypolitics of the refusal of work would
need to engage with such work relations. The next chapter discusses the political
compositionof autonomia,as a movementwhich sought to politicise the emergingwork
regimesof the social factory.

179
Chapter 8
The Reversal of Perspective and the Emarginati

It won't be a few plague-bearers [untorelli] who will uproot Bologna. (PCI general
secretaryEnrico Berlinguer, cited in Morris 1978: 67)

All the 'unstated' is emerging: from the Chants de Maldoror to the struggles for

reducing the work-day. It speaks in the Paris Commune and in Artaud's poetry, it
speaks in Surrealism and in the French May, in the Italian Autumn and in
immediate liberation; it speaks across the separate orders of the language of

rebellion. (Collective A/traverso 1980: 131)

This chapter is concerned with the techniques and forms of political composition of
operaismo and autonorra in the social factory. I focus largely on the same constituency

as Negri - the socialised workers of the social factory - but I seek to understand it as a
minoritarian composition immanent to capitalist relations, and hence I take the politics of
the socialised worker in a different direction to Negri and his affirmation of a majoritarian
4-:
1
multitude that is seen as increasingly distinct from capitalist relations (even as I use some
of Negri's earlier formulations to do this). The chapter is in two main parts: the first
explores operaist and autonomist techniques and conceptions of antagonistic class
formation, and the second pursues these techniques into the politics of the 'emarginati' in
autonomia and the Movement of '77. At first sight this may look like a false subsumption
of very different forms of politics in an overarching schema - the first part is the
conceptual constellation of operaismo that circulated around the figure of the mass
worker, and the second concerns the practices of autonomia and the socialised worker.
There are two things to say about this apparent continuity.
First, there is no doubt that much changed between the early sixties and the late
seventies such that the Movement of '77 was indeed a very different political
configuration to the Hot Autumn of '69.1 Nevertheless, in many ways the Movement of
'77 can be seen as an extension and proliferation of the techniques developed in the
operaist organisations into the terrain of socialised work and counterculture, Showing
this link enables a move away from thinking of a distinct break between the politics of
'factory work' and 'immaterial labour' (which enables Negri, for example, to forward the
refusal of the former, and an affirmation of the latter) and to think of the ongoing
relevance of the refusal of work within the social factory, even as it includes a wealth of

I The Movementof '77 was the high point of

autonomia,characterisedby the emergenceand politicisation
of a wealthof marginalpractices, and mass occupations, especially in Romeand Bolognain the Spring.
The Hot Autumn of '69 was the central event in the autonomous struggles of the mass worker in the
Northernfactories. See Lumley (1990) for a detailed history of both movements.

180
practices,cultures, margins that are very different to those of the mass workers in the
factories.
However, second, if the techniques of operaismo can be seen to develop through
autonom-ia, in no way do they form the structure for a continuous movement. As I
indicated in the introduction to Chapters 7 and 8, autonorniadeveloped in vastly different
ways, and it would be misguided to try and neatly subsume these proliferations into one
coherent 'history of a movement'. This chapter seeks to draw out one particular aspect of
these movements. It is concerned with how, through a certain understanding of political
antagonism and composition, a wealth of politicised 'margins', or 'minority' concerns
and forms come to proliferate within and against the terrain of the social factory,
following the autonomist argument that the seventies saw the development of "margins at
the centre" (of production and politics) (Alliez 1980: 118). My particular focus is on the
ways that counterculture develops immanent to more conventional questions of
proletarian politics (work, income, collective needs and so on), as it seeks to become, in a
sense, funded by the (social) wage (cf. Cleaver in Bonefeld and Holloway 1996: 154).
This is evident, at one extreme, in the expression of one member of the movement, that
"the Mao of Western Marxism will grow the long hair of American counter-culture" (cited
in Lumley 1990: 297). But counterculture is also considered here in broader terms, such
as in the kind of social problematisations posed by the feminist movement, which are
equally concerned with alternate ways of living to dominant cultural forms. It should be
born in mind that my analysis of political practice starts at a time after nearly a decade of
intense political activity of the mass worker in the factories. It should thus be born in
mind that the background to this discussion is one of considerable worker unrest (cf. Red
Notes 1979); autonomia is not a political explosion of marginals against a background of
social stability, but rather the extension of political unrest to new areas. That said,
autonomia and the Movement of '77 emerge as the power of the mass worker was
becoming curtailed through the closure of the large Northern factories, the
decentralisation of production, mass unemployment, and a wealth of austerity measures.
Most of the aspects of the movement that I consider operate, of necessity, outside the
conventional realm of production. That is, the refusal of work is here most definitely a
practice of the social factory. It is, however, a social factory that was yet to fully develop
the kind of diffuse productivity that I described as 'little work machines' at the end of the
last chapter. If, as I show below, the operaists argued that the primacy of struggle is the
cutting edge of capitalist reconfiguration (as it seeks to capture workers' struggle and
innovation), arguably the Movement of '77, operating in a 'most contemporary' way,

was at once a deterritorialisation of work, and a laboratory for new forms of diffuse,
picaresque, cultural work that the theory of the social factory foresaw, but that in 1977

were still emergent (cf. Vimo 1996). What is most interesting in this regard is the way
that autonomia sought not to carve out an autonomous counterculture (as US sixties
counterculture tended to do, for example), though this was a feature, but to form

181
connections across the social factory with, or within other groups, including factory

workers, and sought to gain a social wage for their practices. That is, the importance of

autonomia is the way that the new practices of the emarginati were seen to be part of a
socialised work, not a simple space of 'freedom'. It was, arguably, this'understanding

and these connections that necessitated first the assertion by dominant groups, such as the
PCI, that these people were unproductive 'parasites' rather than workers (see below), and

the destruction of the movement. For it is precisely these forms of relations which could
disturb the transformation of countercultural practices (new media, alternate forms of
consumption, picaresque work) into the new regime of work and accumulation that the
social factory thesis foresaw. The argument of this chapter is not, then, that autonomia is
a flowering of a hugely innovative political culture (though it is a considerably creative
movement) that could join the pantheon of innovative political art (as, for example, dada,
surrealism, and more recently the Situationist International have come to be viewed), but

that it is a process of political engagement that sought to compose political communities,

relations, and practices against an emerging form of work.

In following this trajectory I am focusing on a vein in autonomia that can be seen

as lying between, even within the more molar forms of orthodox workerism, the

vanguardist aspects of autonomia operaia, and even the small 'militarised' groups that
emerged in the late seventies and the 'diffuse violence' of the P. 38 phenomenon (cf.
Senza Tregua 1980) (which, though largely a response to the repression, ended up being

not wholly different from the Red Brigades, particularly when it moved from being
'diffuse' to being 'clandestine'). Because of the considerable complexity of the 'area of
autonomia', these different aspects and forms were often interlaced, each being "crossed
by a multiplicity of tendencies" (Albertani 1981: n. p. ). 2 My point is to emphasise the

minor/proletarian aspects of autonomia, from within a movement that was characterised

by much else besides. That said, this is a situated reading. The minor processes that

emerge here do not fit with a formalised set of 'minor politics'. Rather, as in the chapter

on the IWW, I am using the minor methodologically to consider the development and
forms of a political movement.
First, I map the theoretical framework of operaismo and autonomia around the
concepts of 'class composition', the 'reversal of perspective', and the 'refusal of work'.
The point here is to show the almost 'technical' means by which operaismo and
autonomia formed a cramped and politically charged proletariat. Then I develop the
concept of 'autovalorisation', and bring in the 'emarginati'. The rest of the chapter
considers forms of composition across four planes: inclusive disjunctive identities and
4autonomy', money and the wage, factory and city, and language and counterculture.

2A complex flow diagram of the development left between 1968 and 1977
of the extraparliamentary
(including anarchists, Leninists, Trotskyists, situationists, Bordighists) resorts to the illustrative
technique of an amorphous bubble to 'map' the area of autonomia (from L'Espresso, duplicated and
translated in Red Notes 1979: 204-5).

182
Class composition and the reversal of perspective
The operaistfigure of 'classcomposition' is two-sided and dynamic, encompassingboth
the specific forms of work relations and axiomatics, and the political practices,
knowledges,needsand styles of its different elements. As Negri (1988: 209) explains,
first a more conventionalcompositionin termsof the developmentof capitalistproduction
andstratification:

By class composition, I mean that combination of political and material

characteristics - both historical and physical - which makes up: a) on the one hand,
the historically given structure of labour-power, in all its manifestations, as produced
by a given level of productive forces and relations...

Then an antagonistic,'political' composition:

and b) on the other hand, the working class as a determinate level of solidification
...
of needsand desires, as a dynamic subject, an antagonistic force, tending towards its
own independentidentity in historical-political terms.

Leaving aside the question of 'independentidentity', the emphasisis placed, then, on

structural and political variation. Class is "framed in terms of [its] historical
transfornzability..." (Negri 1988: 209); it is a "quality linked to dynamics and a field of
force." (Moulier 1989: 14) Ratherthan a Leninist or Trotskyist distinction between the
class 'in itself' and 'for itself' (where political 'consciousness' is injected from the
outsideinto an alreadystructurallyformed class),or a detached'objective' analysis, class
composition is the effect of a more machinic co-functioning and variation of social,
economic,technical,political, andcultural processes.
This said,emphasisis placedon the 'political' forms, variations, and creationsof
the composition. Class composition is to be understood through an immersion in
struggle, in a 'hot investigation' able to detect immanent changing forms of practice
(notably, unofficial strikes, 'base' committees, absenteeism,and sabotage, emerging
from traditionally non-active sectors, particularly the Southern migrant workers in the
Northern factories), and contribute to their development. This emphasis on political
practice arises from operaismo's fundamental assertion, following its 'reversal of
perspective', that working class struggle has a determining place in the dynamics of
capitalism, as the motor of its development. As Tronti's foundational text, 'Lenin in
England', put it:

We too have worked with a concept that puts capitalist development first, and
workers second. This is a mistake. And now we have to turn the problem on its
head, reversethe polarity, and start again from the beginning: and the beginning is
the class struggle of the working class. At the level of socially developed capital,

183
 capitalist development becomes subordinated to working class struggles; it follows
behind them, and they set the pace to which the political mechanisms of capital's
own reproduction must be tuned. (1979a: 1)3

For Moulier (1989: 15),this emphasison the primacy of struggle, and the social factory
thesis are the two "essentialdiscoveries"of operaismo. In this reversal of perspective,
capitalism proceedsfrom the imposition of machinesto structure and control workers
(following the manufacturersobsession with the obstinate worker) toward an ever-
increasingsocialisation(real subsumption)in so far as each stageof developmenthas its
refusal, its unproductive entropy (mass strikes in the factory and the break in the
Keynesianproductivity-wage tie-in lead to a dispersed social factory) which compels
capital to a new development('decomposition' of each new 'class composition'). The
revolutionary moment is the degreeto which capital has trouble reconfiguring around
working classcomposition. 4
This propositionis at oncea marker of operaismo'sand autonon-a'sinnovation -
the emphasis on struggle, composition, and variability against an analysis based on
objectivist categories- and its problems. It skirts the danger of presentinga bi-polar war
game between two camps,capital and labour, rather than a more immanent understanding
of their interrelations. In as much as capital is a configuration or axiornatisationof
labour, its forms mutatenot solely as a result of struggleand resistance,but as a result of
the wealth of attributesof labour and its manifold 'lines of flight', including its variable
productivity, its inventions, its desires as much as its unproductive entropy and its
resistance (cf. Holloway 1995; Tillium n.d.). But if such a principle in its naive
is
simplicity problematic,and many of the assertionsof operaismoand autonomiacan
appearwilfully simplistic, indulgent, and over-optimistic, it should not be seen as the
presentationof an all encompassing truth. Rather, as with the other conceptsconsidered
here,it is a first premisethat needsto be consideredin its ramificationsand proliferations
in political composition, not as an autonomous'theory'. As Moulier (1989: 23) writes,
"it is futile to point to its reductionistcharacterindependentlyof its results, and what it
to
enablesus understand. " Thus, though one may have some sympathy with Lumley's
(1980) criticism of some of the 'phantasmatic'assertionsof operaismoand autonomia,
the importance of someof the more naive and polemical theories can
and assertions not be
deniedsimply becausethey are simplistic or do not always describethe 'reality' of the
situation. If, as Lumley (1980: 129) puts it, Tronti's is
work a "new ideologism" and the

3 This is somethingof a sine qua non for autonomist theory. Midnight Notes (1981: 1), for example,
the principle thus: "our its
struggles against capital are only motors for development. This is not
reiterate
a pictureof some pure defeat in which the harder the
we struggles more perfect capital's dominion; rather,
the strugglesthat developin one mix of living and dead labour, in one social arrangementof exploitation,
force the specific arrangementto collapse. A crisis ensues. In the labyrinthof the crisis, capital can only
find its way by following the working class and trying to devour it at the exit."
4 The emphasison struggle immanentto capitalist social relationsis such that, as Tronti puts it, politics is
a situated and continuous process within capitalist relations, where "the workers' perspective does not
prefigurethe future" (cited in Piotte 1987: 20).

184
emphasis on the primacy of struggle "a theoretical and political regression" one wonders
what status should be given to the subsequent ramifications of this thesis in the
movements which imbibed it. For the purposes of drawing out the minor aspects of
autonomia I would suggest that this thesis on the primacy of resistance can be read in
Deleuzian terms as an account of the primacy of lines of flight - lines which are not in
themselves 'resistance' or radical class composition, but are the site of its practice.
Deleuze and Guattari (1988: 571) themselves saw this operaist principle as a fundamental
innovation, and when Deleuze (1988: 89,144) addressesthe question of the irreducibility
of resistance at the heart of power relations in Foucault he likens this to Tronti's
argument.

The refusal of work (against

self -management)
The central political aspectof class composition was 'the refusal of work'. As I have
beensuggesting,the refusal of work is best seennot so much as a programme,but as a
perspective. The particular developments of autonomia's understanding of this
perspectiveis the subject of this chapter, and so here I only want to map its initial
premise,through Tronti. As I showed in the last chapter, for Tronti the generalisationof
work across the social factory subsumesthe working class in a 'general interest' of
labour (in the Keynesian tie-in between production and the wage and the juridical
constructionof any outside to this regime as illegal).5 There are two conventionalleftist
responsesto this situation. One is a socialismthat largely affirms this processin a social
democraticequality through work (as was the role of the PCI). The other is the
affirmation of a working classparticularity through the reclamationof work in a council-
communist or anarcho-syndicalist community of workers, or 'self-management'.
Becauseof its influence, and so as to distinguishTronti's position I will say a little about
the latter.
Self-management
or 'councilism' as it developedthrough the critique of Leninism
in the Dutch, German, and Italian ultra-left, and groups such as Socialismeou Barbarie
has maintaineda degreeof prominencein the far left (despitetheir critique of work, the
workers' council remainedthe revolutionary model for the Situationist International for
example).6 The introduction to Barrot (1987: 7) suggeststhat councilism "dominated
virtually the entire theoreticalcorpus of the revolutionary minorities between 1945 and
1970" - though it should be said that some groups, notably those that emergedthrough
some relation to Bordiga and the Italian Communist Left maintaineda critique of self-

5 Tronti (1973: 115-6) writes: "the real generalisation of the workers' conditions can introduce the
appearanceof its formal extinction. It is on this basis that the specific concept of labour's power is
immediatelyabsorbedin the genericconcept of popular sovereignty:the political mediationhere serves to
allow the explosivecontent of labour's productiveforce to function peacefullywithin the beautiful forms of
the modern relation of capitalist production. Because of this, at this level, when the working class
politically refuses to becomepeople, it does not close, but opens the most direct way to the socialist
revolution."

185
management as a form of 'producer consciousness' from as early as 1918.7 Though
tn
devised as a means of organisation that was immanent to the workers themselves (as
against the abstracted Party form), 'self-management' often tends to function as an
irreproachable form of organisation in apparently radical political theories (following a
logic where workers or the oppressed speaking out and organising thentselves can not be
wrong). Here, a form of organisation is seen to display revolutionary content almost in
and of itself. 8 Such a possibility tends to be founded on variations of essentialist
conceptions of human nature or presence, which, if left to 'self-organise', will fully
realise itself. Camatte (1995: 161) thus argues:

The illusion [to 'participation' that breaks passivity and dependence in self-
management] is very great with those who, in thinking that they have superseded
Marx, say that the economy is no longer determinant, if it ever was, they add, that is,
only the struggle counts, that man is always there in fact, present in the social and
economic frame and in everyday acts and facts etc., and that there would always be
an immediate and continuous possibility of emancipation, which occurs with self-
management.

Such an interpretationof 'self-management' is amply evident in a recent book on

European 'autonomous movements' (Katsiaficas 1997), including autonomia, which
arguesthat "our natural tendenciesto favour equality and love freedom" are enabledin a
self-management (as againstvanguard politics) that lets the 'F speakforth (239). Though
the movementsKatsiaficasdiscussesare primarily a product of large industrial and post-
industrialcities (the very preconditionof metropolitansquatting, for example),he wants
to distil their essence(sometimes,it hasto be said, with the aid of the pronouncementsof
some of these movements themselves) to a naturalised humanity. He suggests, for

6 Thoughthey also offer considerably more than the 'self thesis, the main figures here are
-management'
Pannekoek,Gorter, and RGhle- those who Lenin (1965) describedas manifestingthe 'infantile disorder' of
left communism.
7 For this perspective see the introduction to Barrot (1987), Camatte (1995), Dauv6 and Martin (1997),
and, for a history of the Italian CommunistLeft, InternationalCommunistCurrent (1992). As one example
from this milieu, following Bordiga's assertion that "[s]ocialism resides entirely in the revolutionary
negation of the ENTERPRISE,not in granting the enterprise to the factory workers" (cited in N6gation
1975:81), the Frenchgroup Ndgationpresent a fascinatingcritique of this tendency of self-management,
in the case of the (early 1970s French)Lip watch factory occupation. Followingthe threat of closure the
workers occupied and ran 'their' factory, maintainedproduction and, with considerable support from the
left, even marketed their own watches (paying themselves from the profits - hence maintainingrelations
betweenwork-doneand wage, and the correct market price of the commodity). Such self-management
was for N6gationa reflection of both a 'producer consciousness' of the workers, and an example of real
subsumptionin so far as the workers (mistaking the boss rather than the enterprise as the problem)
becamea collectivecapitalist,exploitingtheir own labour - evidencedby their continued sporting of work-
shirts after the end of the working day and at support meetings, their continued practice of clocking-in
every day, and the organisationof themselvesand the communityaround the factory.
8 Dauv6('Leninismand the Ultra-Left' in Dauv6 and Martin 1997) argues that the ultra-left's assertion of
the centralityof the 'workers themselves' (against the Leninist Party) ultimately only affirms one subject
of capitalist relations, 'the workers', against another, 'the capitalist', because it posits its critique on the
terrain of 'management'rather than on that of the capitalist mode of production itself. Assertion and fear
of the Party (Leninismand ultra-ieftism respectively) are thus false problems (and mirror images of each
other) which over-emphasisethe 'form' of the communist movement against its 'content' which is the

186
example, that against Haraway's 'cyborg' figure, a "role of movement participation is to
preserve and expand the domain of the heart in social relations - of A that is uniquely
human, all that stands opposed to machine culture. " (238)
Returning to Tronti, 'self-management' is for him simply a microcosm of the
socialist affin-nation of work. This perspective still assumes that there is an autonomous
'labour' that the workers could manage for themselves, extracted from capital, as if
capitalism is composed of two simple classes, one of which is already the communist
subject. For Tronti this perspective fails to take into account the way that work is always
already capital. This is not just because it is sold to capital, but because work, and the
is
working class composed within capital, and hence is capital:

The anarcho-syndicalist 'general strike', which was supposed to provoke the

collapse of capitalist society, is a romantic naivete from the word go. It already
contains within it a demand which it appears to oppose - that is, the Lassallian
demand for a 'fair share of the fruits of labour' - in other words, a fairer
participation in the profit of capital.... [This is the incorrect] idea that it is 'working
people' who are the true 'givers of labour', and that it is the concern of workpeople
to defend the dignity of this thing which they provide, against all those who would
seek to debaseit. (Tronti 1979: 9)

Because the working class are always already structured as a capitalist class, they are
never 'giving labour', but only expending energy in a fashion structured by capital. The
form 'work' (as a relation between fixed and variable capital) has the class relation
immanent to it: "Thus, the worker provides capital, not only insofar as he sells labour
power, but also insofar as he enibodies the class relation.... From the outset, the

conditions of labour are in the hands of the capitalist. " (1979: 9).
There is, then, no simple subject of the working class. Everything about work
'cramps' workers' possibility such that there can be no space for self-affirmed identity.
Indeed, to be alienated from work, its form, function and subject, becomes the
revolutionary premise (Tronti 1973: 117). Politics is hence not a reclamation of work
against an 'external' control, but a refusal of work and the very subject of worker,
following Tronti's formula: "To struggle against capital, the working class must fight
against itself insofar as it is capital. " (cited in ATP: 57 1) So, summarising the argument,
Tronti (1972: 22) writes:

No worker today is disposed to recognise the existence of labour outside capital.

Labour equals exploitation: This is the logical prerequisite and historical result of

capitalist civilisation. From here there is no point of return. Workers have no time
for the dignity of labour.... Today, the working class need only look at itself to

organic product of the capitalist mode of production itself (which was where Marx's few comments on the
Party as a product of the 'real movement' are located).

187
 understandcapital. It need only combat itself in order to destroy capital. It has to
recogniseitself as political power, deny itself as a productive force.

Needs and autovalorisation

The reversal of perspectiveand the refusal of work are the basic operaist means of
conceivinga situatedpolitical trajectoryrather than an identity. With the developmentof
autonomia another conceptual tool emerges, that of 'autovalorisation' (or self-
valorisation). Autovalorisation is at once one of the more important conceptuaL
developmentsof autonomia,and one of the leastcoherentlydefined. The ambiguity of
the conceptresidesin the fact that it is situatedat the most problematicsite of autonomia,
the site of the political 'subject'. Autovalorisationcan tip either way as a definition of
complexsituatedcreativity in a minor fashion that resonateswith the refusal of work, or
as an accountof a coming to presenceof a more 'autonomous'subject(asit tendsto do in
the later Negri).
The conceptof autovalorisationis closely associatedwith Negri from his 1977 La
Forina Stato(wherehe takesup RomanoAlquati's use of the expression)up to his most
recent work. Alquati poses the question of "the possibility that the working class can use
the productive forces for valorising itself againstcapital, as an antagonisticclass. If an
alternativeuse of highly developed productive forces is possible." (cited in Hardt and
Negri 1994: 200) The basic framework of autovalorisationis laid out here. It is a
questionof opposingcapitalist relations and processesof valorisation through work, but
with a composition that in some way seeks to be of the forces that are created in
capitalism (as developedin Chapter 5 as the problematicof the proletariat). In many
ways the concept of autovalorisationfollows Panzieri's problematisationof orthodox
Marxist conceptionsof the socialistassumptionof alreadyexisting 'forces of production'
(Chapter 7). But it develops from Panzieri's critique in seeking to explore new and
different forms of radical class composition with the forces of capitalist life (and hence
'forces' in Alquati's words should be read in a broad senseas 'potential' and 'objective
lines of flight' ratherthan as the strict 'forces of production' of orthodox Marxism). It is
the play between forces actualisedin capital, forces in and against capital, and forces
'independent'of capital that autovalorisationseeksto comprehend. I will discuss this in
two parts,the proliferation of differences,and the centrality of the wage.

Autovalorisation and difference Negri's most sustained account of autovalorisation

is in Dondnation and Sabotage (1979), written as a direct response to the Movement of
'77. In so far as capitalism is a socialised mode of production, autovalorisation is

concerned with the totality of capitalist forces and relations. It is conceived by Negri as
the site of the 'power' of working class composition, and comprises two elements: the
'destructuration' of capital (essentially the practices of the refusal of work), and a
movement toward 'independence' (1979: 96). It is the question of 'independence' that

188
needselaborating. Negri presents "proletarian self-valorisation as alternative to, and
radically different from, the totality of the processes of capitalist production and
reproduction." (1979: 97) He describesthis 'alternative' site (which he calls an 'intensive
condition' and a 'productive being' (97-8)) with three methodologicalcriteria. First,
autovalorisationpresentsan 'otherness' to the orthodox workers movement, and as is
injunction to continual diversity anddiscontinuity in the forms and practicesof what Karl
Heinz Roth calledthe "other workers' movement". Second, the relationshipto capitalist
development is one of separateness,seen as a relation of destructuration and
recompositionrather than linear development(as in the reversalof perspective). Third,
and asa direct consequence,the forms, practicesand languagesof autovalorisationare to
be deliberately divergent from those of normative capitalist culture: "there is no
homology, no possible immediate translatability of languages, of logics, of signs,
between the reality of the movement and the overall framework of capitalist
...
development,with its contentsand objectives." (98-9)
This definition of autovalorisation has clear importance as a promotion of
innovative and continuously varying political composition, and clearly reflects the
diversity, variability, and productivity of the Movement of '77 (as will be explored
below). It does,however,indicate some of the problems that developedin Negri's later
work. Though the proletariatis presentedas a processof innovation and discontinuity,
and indeed as continually 'destructuring' capitalist relations, the content of activity
appearsto tend towards an independence'outside' of capital, a liberated subjectivity
where autovalorisationis an affirmation of its own 'being'. 9 The definition of self-
valorisationin the glossaryin Virno and Hardt (1996: 264) conveysthis ratherclearly:

self-valorisation refers to an alternative social structure of value that is founded

... ...
not on the production of surplus value but on the collective needsand desires of the
producing community. In Italy, this concept has been deployed to describe the
practices of local and community-based forms of social organisation and welfare
that are relatively independentof capitalist relations of production and state control.

This approach skirts the problems of autonomous subjectivity, of an 'authentic' space

outside of capital, a kind of "pure socialisation" (Virno's 1980: 113) which, as I showed
through Tronti and the critique of self management, is problematic. It certainly leads to
problems of conceiving political composition when increasing areas of life become
capitalised. 10 There are, however, other ways to read autovalorisation, where other work
by Negri ( 199 1) is useful.

9 Thus Hardt and Negri (1994: 280) link autovalorisation to the argument about productive autonomy that I
considered in the last chapter: "The new era of the organisation of capitalist production and reproduction
of society is dominated by the emergence of the labouring subjectivity that claims its mass autonomy, its
own independent capacity of collective valorisation, that is, its self -valorisation with respect to capital. "
10 See Castellano in Semiotext(e) (1980: 229-30) for discussion of the problems with the tendency to self-
affirmed marginality in the demarcation of autonomous marginal spaces.

189
Autovalorisation and the wage To move away from thinking autovalorisation as the
self-affirmation of a working class subject we can situate it around the question of
'valorisation' and 'needs'. Valorisation in Marx is the process whereby surplus labour is
produced in productive processes and actualised in circulation as surplus value. It is a
term that applies both to the specific production and actualisation of surplus value, and the
whole capitalist social milieu which supports this. Central to the process of valorisation
is the category of 'needs'. Workers work in order to gain a monetary wage which they
exchange in consumption to meet their needs. In general, the process leaves the workers
with enough wage to meet their 'necessary labour' - their current form of being, or
historically accumulated needs. For Marx, needs are necessarily variable over time and
place. This is his fundamental proposition about the nature of human development. At a
basic level, capitalism is only an expression (albeit at a rather exponential rate) of what
Marx saw as the ratchet-system of human composition around an expansion of needs, in
a conception of the human as an expansive assemblage in interrelation with Nature ("in
spite of the Bible" (1976: 285)). 11 In this formulation, 'values' (ethics, lifestyles,
desires, competences and so on) are as central as the apparently more structural forms of
'work', for needs are to be met through capitalist practices alone. That is, valorisation
occurs only insofar as needs are formed and met in terms of capitalist identities,
commodities, and money (working for a wage, maximising capacities to increase a wage,
the equation of desire and consumption), since needs are only to be met indirectly
(through consumption following the sale of one's labour for money).
Because 'needs', then, are the 'form of life', they are a crucial site of politics, and
one that autovalorisation is specifically concerned with. But rather than thinking of
autonomous, independent needs outside of capital, we can think of autovalorisation
operating in the machinic environments of capitalism, at the meeting points of the
expansion of needs and their axiornatisation. Autovalorisation would then be a process of
the proliferation of the former, and the disruption of the latter. There was much talk in
the seventies of affirming particular needs and expanding the needs, values, and styles of
the class composition and its minorities. Whilst aspects of these practices and needs were
concerned with cleaving-off autonomous spaces for self-production relatively
independent from direct capitalist relations (such as in self-managed squatted social
centres), they were also concerned with strengthening the collection of needs of the class
as a whole. And, since in the community of capitalism money is the means to meet
needs, the proliferation of needs and values was also part of a politics of increasing the
wage. At first sight this might seem to be problematic, since, as I have argued, the
valuation of activity in terrns of money is the means for moulding and controlling labour.
However, for autovalorisation, money is a political site, which, whilst expressing the

190
essenceof capitalist axiomatisation, can also be subverted. For Negri (199 1), money and
the wage were crucial sites of struggle (and the subject of one of the more important
books that Marx left undeveloped, despite his initial plan (cf. Negri 1991: Lesson 7)).
Hence, in seeking to have the proliferation of needs met by a wage, autovalorisation was
also part of a demand, and set of practices for 'more pay and less work' and 'we want
everything' (in a kind of 'reclamation' of surplus value) against any mechanism which
sought to tie the wage to productivity and correct practice. But if the mass worker fought
on the terrain of the 'wage' (according to Bifo (1980: 150), in 1969 alone wage rises
increased labour costs by more than 20%), and extended this beyond the factory to cover
the costs of transportation, housing and so on, as the socialised worker thesis developed
to consider the productivity of the social whole, the 'wage' was expanded to encompass a
6socialwage'. Negri reads Marx's assertion that, with the development of abstract labour
and social capital, the workers movement comes to demand a proportion of total profit,
rather than an individual wage (Negri 1988c: 114-5; Marx 1973: 597), as an argument for
the extension of wage demands not merely within the 'working day', but over the entire
'life span' (Negri 1989b: 219). The politics of the wage thus extends to include sectors
previously excluded from wage payment, and social services and consumption. This
became particularly important since it was on the terrain of the social wage that capital
was seeking to recoup the gains of the mass worker through austerity packages and
inflation (Negri 1979b).12
If we bring together the two aspects of autovalorisation - the continual innovation
that Negri developed in Domination and Sabotage, and the process of the expansion of
needs within the social wage, and against its axiornatising mechanisms - autovalorisation
can be seen as a proletarian minor practice. Autovalorisation is a kind of bordering which
connects the 'little intrigues' of autonomia to the social whole (for it is through money
and the wage that the social axiomatic operates as a metastable whole). It is concerned
with developing new needs and styles that emerge through the particularities of minorities
(what Guattari (1995: 55) calls new "universes of value"), it situates these not as
'independent' or 'real' needs, but as immanent to the capitalist socius (as they emerge
from the machinic processes of the social factory and seek to be supported by a wage),
and it seeksto deterritorialise the axioms of identity that capitalist valorisation is premised
upon (not least by breaking the link between productivity and the wage, and seeking a

11 As Marx and Engels (1974: 49) put it: "the satisfaction of the first need (the action of satisfying, and the
instrument of satisfaction which has been acquired) leads to new needs; and this production of new needs
is the first historical act."
12 This was at a time of a mass of austerity measures, instituted in 1976 by the Andreotti government and
backed and often implemented by the PCI (which had control of municipalities like Bologna) and the
unions. By the beginning of 1977 there was acute economic hardship with 25% inflation and
unprecedented unemployment (1,700,000 officially). Giorgio Amendola, secretary of the PCI, wrote in
1976 of the austerity measures: "... it wouid be wrong to view sacrifices as 'concessions' given to the
... ...
capitalists and the government.... On the contrary, the sacrifices are necessary in order to serve primarily
the interests of the working class by pulling the country out of crisis: so that the young might find
employment, for the betterment of the living conditions of the people etc." (cited in Semiotext(e) 1980: 91)
The PCI's leader, Berlinguer, even went so far as to forward austerity as a communist moral ideal (in
opposition to the wealth and waste of 'consumer society') (cf. Abse 1985: 27).

191
wage for a wealth of 'non-work' practices). Anything which attempts to settle this
expansion of needs and styles in equivalence is to be rejected, and hence autovalorisation
is a site of the continual problematisation of received subjectivity, of coherent languages,
or normative values and ethics, producing not an independent subjectivity, but a form of
practice. The expansive and continuous nature of this project is well expressed in 'Lia's'
version of the operaist formula: "I do not refuse anything, I want everything. But I do
not want what exists already... " (in Magale 1980: 140) It is put on, firmer conceptual
ground by Virno (1980: 112), when he describes the development of the Movement of
'77 as a practice of disrupting the identities and equivalence of work and Value, not with
a new identity, but with a qualitative and varied 'doing':

The practices and the languages adopted by the Movement seem to suggest an
alternate type of socialisation, different than that based on the exchange of
equivalent values...What counts is the qualitative consistency, profoundly varied, of
their 'doing'. To understand this proliferation of the concrete and the different
within socialised labour requires a constellation of materialistic concepts which are
totally detachedfrom that universality characteristic of the 'general equivalent' and
which are not used as the basesor synthesising elements for the actual processesof
liberation.

Margins at the centre: emarginati and untorelli

Having mappedthe techniquesof an antagonisticand variablecomposition,the rest of the
chapter considers specific aspects of the composition of autonomia. Of central
importancein the developmentof operaismo and autonomia was the role played by
minority and marginal groups. Two minority groups were particularly central to the
developmentof operaismo,- southern migrant workers in the industrial North, and
autonon-tia
- women (the role of the feminist movementis consideredin the next section).
The migrant workers, who had a huge presencein the northern factories, were said to be
"squeezedlike a lemonin the factory andmarginalisedin the city" (Lumley 1990: 210). 13
Without the networks and cultural security of the establishednorthern working class,
migrant workers had traditionally actedas a brake on union pressures(Bifo 1980: 150),
but in the strugglesof the operaist'Hot Autumn' in 1969they played a central role. That
the migrantshad lessof a work ethic than northernworkers is possible, but what is more
easilyverifiable is that the traditional PCI party and union structurehad less influence in
the immigrant ghettos, and further, had little understandingof the broader concernsof
immigrant workers that extended beyond the workplace to questions of housing,
discrimination, and welfare (Lumley 1990: 28). Hence, in their emergenceas an

13 According to Lumley (1990: 31,209), between 1951 and 196177%

of the 1,439,013 rise in population of
the Northern industrial triangle was the result of immigration and in 1967 and the opening of FIAT's Rivalta
car plant sixty thousand arrived in Turin. A member of Lotta Continua stresses the importance of
immigrant workers in the 1969 struggles, and says that something like 75% of FIAT's workforce were
immigrant workers (in Red Notes 1979: 184).

192
antagonistic group (in the 1969 struggles at the FIAT plants in Turin), these workers
developed novel practices unconditioned by traditional demands and structures that
crossed the work / community divide. Indeed, the early break with union structures
marked by the expression 'autonomy at the base', was coined by the migrant workers in
the large northern factories.
By the time of the Movement of '77, marginality developed into a prominent
political concern around the figure of the 'emarginati'. The emarginati were all those
active in the Movement of '77 who did not conform to the conventional model of (mass)
'worker'. A partial list would include proletarian youth, cultural workers, off-the-books
and precarious workers, students, sexual minorities, temporary workers, houseworkers,
feminists, the unemployed, service workers, and young workers of the small factories. 14
The nature of the 'marginality' of this group is complex, relating to political
marginalisation, counterculture, and economic productivity.
The term is in part used because a normative conception of 'the marginal' was
employed by dominant political and cultural groups to split the new active sectors from
'the workers' (in what Bologna (1980: 39) describes as a process of "Hunt the Parasite").
Thus the PCI characterised the emarginati in decrepit lumpenproletarian terms as
"parasitical strata" (cf. Printo Maggio in Red Notes 1978: 47). The PCI journal Vie
Nuove wrote of those involved in the '77 Bologna occupations that they were "just
common delinquents, organised Fascists, and misled youth" (in Red Notes 1978: 7), and
after the Rome university occupation a PCI sociology lecturer is reported to have said that
"there weren't any real students in there, only hippies, queers and people from the slum-
districts" (in Red Notes 1978: 54). The most famous of these attempts at naming the
disease of the ernarginati was the expression used by the PCI's general secretary Enrico
Berlinguer, who called them untorelli, or plague bearers. 15 The emarginati did not,
however, affirm a lumpenproletarian status. To challenge this marginalisation and insist
on the productive centrality of the class composition of autonomia, a number of theorists
of the Movement rejected the category of emarginati. Bologna (1980), for example,
sought to firmly situate the Movement around the diffused workers that emerged with the

14 The diversity of experience of the emarginati, even at a formal level, is evidenced by the myriad of
terms used to describe the socio-political position of these groups. Thus as well as the unemployed,
feminists, and emarginati, Lumley (1990: 341) lists: emergent groups (ceti emergentl), proletarian youth
(giovani proletan), minorities (minoranze), the unprotected (non garantiti), the precarious (precan), and
plebeians (plebe). That we are clearly on a terrain of ambiguity rather than distinct identity is evident in an
article in Primo Maggio in 1977 which states that this group "seems not to have any objective, material
reality" and yet that it comes together precisely "through a denial of its own material condition (the position
of being casual labour, lump labour, students etc)" (in Red Notes 1978: 41).
15 Such a position was not only held by the orthodox left. The British journal of the International
Communist Current (which situates itself in some relation to the German, Dutch and Italian left-communist
currents), expressed its opinion of this 'swamp' in no uncertain terms: "Today people talk about the 'Area
of Autonomy' rather than Workers' Autonomy. The milieu has turned into a somewhat g6my froth
composed of all kind of petty-bourgeois fringe groups, from students to street theatre performers, from
feminists to marginally employed teachers, all of them united in exalting their own 'specificity' and in
frantically rejecting the working class as the only revolutionary class of our epoch.... Contrary to what is
written in the bourgeois press, these marginal movements do not represent the Hundred Flowers of a
revolutionary spring: they are simply some of the thousand and one purulent snares of this degenerating
society. " (Beyle 1979: 20)

193
1970 restructuring and break-up of the large factories. But in doing this he seems to
exclude the countercultural elements, arguing that the refusal of work lost its critical force
as it moved outside of work, becoming a question of "individual subjectivity - everything
from absenteeismto the liberation of personal desires, from the worker who comes out as

gay, to the worker who sits and smokes dope." (Bologna 1978: 121) The problem here,
aside from the dubious practice of splitting cultural practices from politics, is that the
diffuse workers and those that raised these questions of 'individual subjectivity' were
enmeshed in each other such that these countercultural practices were part of the class
composition. Whilst many of those active in the Movement of '77 sought to compose
ways of life outside of work altogether, or with a minimum of necessary work, opting for
temporary, flexible, impermanent and non-guaranteed work (such that Bifo (1980: 155)
wrote of a "self-declared marginal living" (cf. also Echanges et Mouvenlent 1979)), the
refusal of work, even as it became a countercultural question, was rarely seen as
independent from the questions of work and income. Even those who withdrew from
work, in as much as they were part of a movement, can not be unproblematically seen as
opting out of capitalist relations. 16 The expression 'emarginati' thus continued to be

useful for the Movement as a means of bringing both productivity and counterculture
together. That is, the term emarginati enabled both discussion of the political practices of
diffuse workers (those who were no longer amassed in the factories, but were constituted
in marginal, diffuse ways across the social factory), and marginal, minority, or
countercultural questions within the framework of productive relations and class
composition. If the political and structural position of the emarginati can be characterised
with the Bolognesi's expression "margins at the centre" (the centre of production and of
politics), this is not because they were simply the new exclusive site of politics and
production, but because they (and their sometimes rather 'marginal' countercultural
practices) raise complex political questions and processes across the terrain of the social
factory, drawing in and complexifying an understanding of class composition. This is
important because what was emerging, following the social factory thesis, was not an
increased marginalisation of the population, but an increased integration and
differentiation of productive networks. It is on this terrain that questions of difference
and particularity needed to be thought in conjunction with relations of connection across
the social whole. 17

16 Thus, whilst talking of marginal living, Bifo (1978: 97) also writes: "I do not at all share the definition of
'marginalisation' which is being given to the mass of people who have been in the forefront of the struggle
in the Universities this week.
In particular I do not believe that there exists, in Italy, an area of society that is radically
excluded from the relations of production... "
17This perspective had some influence in the analysis of the political and cultural formations of black
populations (and others) in the British inner cities in the 1980 s- those who became the focus of official
attention through the apparent phenomena of 'mugging' and 'race riots'. Whilst the orthodox left talked of
the lumpenproletariat and the 'problem of unemployment', groups like Race Today (cf. 1974; Hall et al.
1978; Howe 1973) and the Riot Not to Work Collective (1982; 'After Marx, April' Collective 1981), though
attentive to the problems of poverty and racism, took a different perspective. In autonomous cultural
forms (such as blues dances and shebeen), long-term unemployment, hustling, and rioting, these groups
discerned a complex formation of counterculture, the refusal of conventional (low paid, unskilled,

194
 We can return to the PCI's attempt at naming the untorelli. Whilst this act of
namingwas effective in mobilising PCI and popular opinion (in an amalgamof ridicule,
condemnation,and excision (cf. Massumi 1987; Morris 1978)), it failed to reduce the
Movement(at leastat first) becausein many ways the expressionquite aptly characterised
their self-declaredviral-form. The name was not limited to identity, it expressedtheir
practice. That is, the emarginati-as-untorellican be seenas precisely concernedwith the
movement'sinsinuationin, andcontaminationof the recognisedand formalised structures
of the politico-socialwithin which they emerged;they were plague-bearerson the society
of work and austerity(cf. Recherches1977).18 1 will now turn to consider the form of
organisationof the emarginati,the different territorieswithin which it operated,and some
of its practices.

Inclusive disjunctive identities

and 'autonomy'
'Emarginati' is not, then, a short-handfor describing a diverse milieu. It is, rather, a
categorywhich describesa particularmodeof composition. The emarginatiwere first of
all a collection of productive subjects in the complex productive arrangementsof the
social factory, eachwith diverse experience. But they were not distinct groupings. The
emarginati were not exclusively unemployed, or students, or gays, or squatters, or
workers, but combinations(in varying degreesof intensity) of all of these. Thus, there
were ex-studentsand gaysand feminists in the factories,or doing off-the-books work, or
being 'unemployed' whilst working, or deliberatelytaking temporarywork, and so on.
In this sense the emarginati was a site of 'combinatorial' processesand 'inclusive
disjunction' (asdiscussedin Chapter4). 19They were studentsand squattersand off-the-
books workers, or feminists and part of a 'class' movementand cultural workers and so
on, at once embodying these different disjunctions, and moving across them. One

insecure) work, and income attainment through a collection of state benefits, practices in the unofficial
and illegal economy, and collective forms of mutual aid. For the Riot Not to Work Collective (1982),
following the sense of the figure of the emarginati, this was the emergence of an "impossible class" whose
relations of production did not separate into a conventional work / unemployment distinction, but emerged
through a "subterranean unofficial economy" which problematised distinctions between production and
consumption, work and leisure, and challenged the notion that leisure should be determined by work.
Rather than focus on the'problem'of these groups, emphasis was placed, then, on the forms of political
composition, following the sense of Darcus Howe's comment (about his experience of the Caribbean) that
the unwaged were not the "down-trodden, beaten population" that the "White Left" proposed, but a "vibrant
powerful section of the society" (in the Caribbean, the site of emergence of steel band, Calypso, and
reggae) (cited in Hall et at. 1978: 373).
18 This inversion of naming is not uncommon amongst radical groups. A recent example is the
appropriation of the word casseur (literally wrecker or hooligan) by the student and beur movement in
France in 1994 (cf. Nous Sommes tous des Casseurs n.d.) which replicates the form of the May '68 slogan
used after the deportation of Cohn-Bendit as an 'undesirable German Jew': "Nous sommes tous des
ind6sirables", "Nous sommes tous des juits allemands".
19 AsThe women of Studio Rlpetta' (in Magale 1980: 138)
put it: "Not an abstract identity, but existence,
not a focusing but a diffusion. Everything within everything else, everywhere, always at the same time.
Comblement is not planned any more, it is not a goal to reach, it is an excess, an extra."

195
'Metropolitan Indian' (discussedbelow) describesa desire to manifest the complexity of
identity in the letterspagesof Lotta Continua:20

We're tired (at least I am) of being the 'vanguard' which has to 'shoulder its
responsibilities', in the same way the Metropolitan Indians are tired of 'having' to
be ironic and witty, and the feminists are tired of 'having' to think about liberation,
and the gays are tired of 'having' to worry about sexuality, and even the freaks who
'have' to be into hypodermics and joints. We've got to stop this division of roles. I
want to be a whole militant fighting for the liberation of the total human being. I
want to be vanguard,Indian, gay, freak, and I want to roll joints (I already do). (in
Kunzle 1980: 23-4)

There is perhaps a certain amount of 'subsumption' here (around the 'total human
being'), but there is also a clear expression of a desire for combinatorial processes of
inclusive disjunction, where each disjunction - 'vanguard, [Metropolitan] Indian, gay,
freak' - is both maintained (with its own particular concern), and affirmed in one
'subject'.
Such an inclusive disjunctive form is particularly evident in the figure of the
university student. The combination of the liberalisation of access to the universities
since 1969, and the '150 hours' scheme of workers' paid study-leave from 1972 (which
may well have been intended to encourage social integration through upward social
mobility (Bologna 1980: 39)) led to a university composition that was no longer of a
privileged strata (Bologna 1978: 98), but of 'worker-students' (1978,1980). 21 Thus, the
big 1977 Rome and Bologna university occupations included all sorts of different
proletarianised social groups (including many who had been politicised in the factory and
high school movements), not so much because 'outside elements' infiltrated the
university, but because of the complex relations of the 'students' themselves. One

account describes the 'strange figure' of the student as something more than a coherent
identity:

There is a dense network of connectionsand overlaps between the students'

movement and sectors of the proletariat ... the 'strange' figure of the student crops
up in the disputes involving door-to-door booksellers, squats of empty Property,
and in the shape of the unemployed intellectuals going to the labour exchange ...
s/he appears equally as the 'strange' worker with the diploma, or the organised
unemployed, who study in the 150-Hours Scheme, or go to evening classes.
(Manconi and Sinibaldi cited in Lumley 1990: 299)

20After its virtual disintegration as a Party under pressure from the margins, the Lotta Continua paper
(which dramaticallyincreasedits sales with the demise of the Party) opened its letters pages to facilitate
discussionamongstthe mass of the Movement(cf. Kunzle 1980).
21 See Caffentzis (1975) for a detailed analysis of the changing composition and politics of American
studentsas they similarly became more internal to the social factory.

196
 This inclusive disjunctive formation had ramifications for autonomia's mode of
organisation - 'autonomy'. Autonomy is a complex term in autonon-tia that should not be

understood in terms of communist 'societies in miniature'. Such a popular notion of

autonomy is often interchangeable with self-management ideas, where 'autonomy' is a
separation of a 'free' form of life from the mainstream, either as the direct embodiment of
freedom, "the direct leap of the social movement into communist relations", or as "pre-
figuring the society to come, as being the embryonic form by virtue of the relations set up
in their being" (Pour une Intervention Conintuniste 1996: 6,8). 22 Arising from the
'reversal of perspective', and particularly prominent amongst the southern migrant
workers in the industrial centres of the North, autonomy for operaismo was primarily a
notion of 'autonomy at the base' (vis-ii-vis the union hierarchy and the PCI), a certain
'independence' of the needs of the working class, and something of a 'comportment' (cf.
Negri in Recherches 1977: 81-3). Against the PCI's 'hegemony', autonomy signified a
conflictual class whose particular material interests lay against, or 'autonomously' from

the 'general interest' of capitalist social organisation. In this sense, practices of the

refusal of work and autonomy were the same thing. But, pertinent to this section, as

operaismo and autonomia developed, autonomy also came to characterise relations

internal to the movement. An important aspect of autonomia was its ability to overcome
the problem of organisation that had plagued the twentieth century communist movement.
Rather than replicate the pro- and anti-Party dualism central to the split between Marxism
and anarchism, Leninism and council communism (cf. note 8), autonomia developed a
form of organisation that was immanent to its practices. It enabled both the development
and maintenance of political links, such that it can be called a 'movement', without
constructing orchestrated structural forms or negating difference. 23 Though, of course,
this was always a complex and negotiated process which veered off toward a certain

22In an interestinganalysisof the dangersof 'autonomy' from a sympathetic group, PIC continue: "... the
word 'autonomy' becomes vague and filled with confusion, as it no longer describes the search for the
political independenceof the proletariat. The word develops a magical quality whereby some people
imagine that they can shield themselves from events as they hold the key to the future: to be
'autonomous'is to have Ali Baba's'open sesame', ... which sometimesamountsto having 'already left this
worldT!" (1997: 7) "in the social movementtowards communism,the proletariat no more prefigures the
society to come through this autonomy, anymorethan it is the bearer of a political programwhich it then
realisesto the letter. Reachingout for its goal, it undeniablydisplays 'powerful indicators' of these new
relations, but it remains above all the gravedigger of capital. Communism shall be born 'of new people from
the heightof a new world.' (Marx)"(4) With this in mind, Hakim Bey's (1991) relatively popular idea of the
TemporaryAutonomous Zone as a momentary escape from capitalist relations, though an interesting
interventionin self-sacrificial 'militant' circles, and at times sounding a little like Deleuze and Guattari in
their more effusivemoments,tends to reflect the more immanent idea of autonomy, and for all its dadaist
frisson, limits the constructionof politics to a certain naturalism. Thus he valorises 'secret societies' for
their very secrecy ('escaping the eyes of the spectacle' - oddly invoking Foucault to help make his
argument that "that which is seen through the mediation of the media becomes somehow unreal, and loses
its power' (MoorishOrthodox Radio Crusade Collective 1992: 10)), and emphasises humanface-to-face
contact or'immediatism' as the essence of radical politics and humanity 'unmediated' ("We're not kidding
or indulging in hyperbole when we insist that meeting face-to-face is already 'the revolution (MORCC
1992: 13)).
23Though this is a concerndevelopedin considerabledetail by the left-communistsmilieu (cf. Dauv6 and
Martin 1997; and Camatte 1995), autonomia is rather unique in recent European history in operating in
these terms.

197
Lepinism at one extreme (particularly during the repression with the emergence of
militarised clandestine bands), and an anarchism at the other, it was, nevertheless, a
central aspect of autonomia's vibrancy and ability to ward-off identity (marked,
negatively, by the Italian State's need to construct an identity for the movement in order to
effect its repression24).
Rather than a general subsumption of all in a generic working class, each term in
the inclusive disjunctive series, with its particular interest, style, and form of oppression,
saw its relation with the movement as one of 'autonomy'. Such autonomy was not a
distinct separation, but a working process, a kind of relay of interrelation and
independence, alliance and disruption, or of borders and connections. It was akin to the
minor pack-form. Guattari (1980) sought to explain this process when he described

autonomia as a "proliferation of margins":

Their different components will in no way be required to agree on everything, or to

speak the same stereotypical language. Contradictions, even irreducible

antagonisms, will be allowed to co-exist... Here contradiction does not paralyse

action, but proves that a single position, a specific desire, is put into question. (110)

The difficult and complex operation of this form of inclusive disjunction and
autonomy is shown particularly clearly in the relationship between feminism and
autonomia. Perhaps precisely because of its problematic relationship to the
extraparliamentary left (not least because of the prevalent Catholic morality of Italian

culture), the women's movement was strongly influential in the development of

autonomia. The importance of the women's movement (as women broke from being the
'girl-friends of the militants' and 'Florence Nightingales of the duplicator'; Red Notes
1978: 114) is marked by Negri et al. (1988: 236) in their review of the movement (from
prison in 1983):

The feminist movement, with its practices of communalism and separatism, its

critique of politics and the social articulations of power, its deep distrust of any form

of 'general representation' of needs and desires, its love of differences, must be seen
as the clearest archetypal form of this new [post-19741 phase of the movement.

It was the very problematicand varied situation of women in the social factory
(expressedwell by the decision of the Roman collectives, during a discussion of the
4manytypesof woman's time' to placenot an hourglass,but a score by Sch6enbergon

24 Thus the prosecution said of a clandestine organisation which apparently united the whole of the
movement behind the Red Brigades: "this is the specific characteristic of the V under examination, which
some have defined as Negri's organisational miracle: namely the ability to create an appearance of a lack
of coordination between groups which, in reality, were rigidly centralised. " (in Italy'79 Committee 1982: 9)

198
the cover of their magazineDifferenceS25)
that brought in many of the novel aspectsof
autonomia. Whereoperaismotalked of the social factory, the centrality of wage workers
still predominated,but the feminist movementbrought to centrality the question of the
non-waged (emerging, in one form, into an international 'Wages for Housework'
movement),the critique of the ethical form of the militant (as a separationof politics and
life), andthe politicisation of needs(Bologna 1980:49). After the feminist intervention it
becamelesseasyto subsumethe political within the frameworks of 'workers' centrality',
and to prioritise the factory, or even paid work at all, over unpaid, socialisedwork, and
activity in 'the community'. (It alsobecomesdifficult to periodise'socialised' labour in a
simple fashion, as the factory is revealedto have never been the exclusive site of the
productionof value.) As one feminist put it in the late seventies:

we have fought to establish the fact that our daily life is political - we are
autonomous political agents. We have challenged the holy myth of the 'centrality'
of the industrial working class. We have stressed that social life has a primary
political importance, especially as far as women are concerned, as part and parcel of
the new restructuring of Italian capitalism along the lines of the 'diffused factory'.
(in Red Notes 1978: 114)

But the feminist movement did not present a simple independence from the
workers movement. Rather, it was an inclusive disjunction with it. One example of this
process can be seen in the workings of Lotta Continua's Rimini Congress (November
1976). This congress was a significant event in the development of autonomia for it
marked the dissolution of one of the major leftist groups under the influence of the
increasing inconsistencies it embodied under the pressure from the margins. The
congress' attempt to address the concerns of the emarginati is evidenced in its thematic
organisation around 'feminism', 'workers' centrality', and 'the nature of political
leadership' (Viale in Red Notes 1978: 82). 26 But pertinent to this discussion, problems
with autonomy were also raised. 'Laura from Turin' provides a telling story:

25 This is an interesting example of the strong sense of complexity these groups expressed: "The idea
came up almost by chance. We were pondering over time, on the many types of woman's time: on work
time and love time, on'free'time and 'liberated' time, on research time. One of us put forward the idea of
having an hourglass on the cover, an ancient instrument of time keeping. Then musical time came to
mind, perhaps just by playing on words. Someone else suggested putting the score of a Schonberg (sic)
piece on the cover, a piece called 'All in due time'. Later, we were not able to trace that score. In the
meantime we had started discussing Schonberg, whom some of us loved, some did not, and others knew
little about. It seemed that the contrasting readings offered on Schonberg were relevant to us: the drama
of dissolution of tonality and the ultimate failure in the attempt to construct a new musical norm, said
somebody. Others did not agree. Atonality and 12-tone music, breakdown of the old order and the
impossibility of a'spontaneous' and non-painful journey towards a new order of things... " (The Women of
the Centre Collective in Magale 1980: 137)
26 The crisis of the old form of organisation was evidenced most spectacularly by Adriano Sofri's (LC's
founder and leader of seven years) public self-criticism at the end of the congress. Sofri stated, for
example: "even though I am, and have been, firmly critical of comrade Lenin's thesis [of the external
vanguard'] and the conditions that gave birth to it, I myself, in all my life, have never managed to be an
internal vanguard of anything! " 1 am a very heavy paternalist - and my paternalism is proportionate to the
very widespread 'followerism' that exists in our organisation. In recent times, comrades have started to
question this seriously, and my position has become very uncomfortable. " (in Red Notes 1978: 95)

199
 I remember that in the branch meetings I tried to explain how we women were

organising ourselves, what we were doing in the area etc etc - all of which was
completely ignored. It was as though we had come from another planet. It was
impossible to get our ideas across.
This situation continuedand women comrades increasingly started
-
working outside the structures of our party. And what was the response to this? It
was: "We recognise the autonomy of women ..... ..We wouldn't want to stick our
noses into women's affairs ..... ..The women have their own autonomy - they can
do what the fuck they like. " (in Red Notes 1978: 88-9)

The point is starkly made. Autonomy should not be a process of the 'independence' of
different perspectives. In this case such operaist independence had operated to keep
feminist politics outside of the 'workers' position'. The simple demand that this speaker
put forward was that 'the workers' should entertain some relation with feminist
perspectives. 'Autonomy' should operate not as a line of demarcation between two
groups, but as a more complex interrelation (which is not to say subsumption of one in
another27).

The wage and money

I have already considered the central place of money and the wage and social wage in the
theory of autovalorisation. I can now consider an example, in the 'Wages for
Housework' campaign.28 Wages for Housework is consistently misrepresented as a
simple campaign for the wage. Gorz (1982: 40), as one example among many, uses this
campaign as an example of a workerist politics that seeks not the abolition of work, but
the translation of all activity into market relations, and as such sees it as the 'height of
alienation'. 29 The campaign, in fact, is a rather sophisticated attempt to consider the
politics of particularity - feminism, and the condition of the unwaged - in conjunction

27 The necessarily pragmatic form of interrelation and separation that the feminist
movement embodied
(what Magale (1980: 139) formulates as the continual problem of a relation with the 'outside' - dominant
institutions, male politics, the other marginalised) is marked by a particularly prominent and defining event
in autonomia, when male Lotta Continua stewards attacked a women-only march (the first big national
demonstration over abortion, December 6 1975) because they wanted to join in (cf. Red Notes 1978: 113).
One of the leading figures in autonomia creativa, Bifo, was expelled from Rosso, one of the organs of the
more hard line autonomia operaia (cf. Red Notes 1978: 111-2), for criticising this action (cf. 'Autonomie-
Autonomies' in Recherches 1980: 92-3).
28 The Wages for Housework campaign emerged with Lotta Feminista in the 1972 Programmatic Manifesto
of Housewives in the Neighbourhood (cf. Bono and Kemp 1991 -, Edmond and Fleming 1975 Federici 1982;
Fortunat! 1995; and, for some of the heated argument, Malos 1982). 1am only considering the early theory
of this campaign, as an aspect of the area of autonomia, not assessing its subsequent development.
29Gorz contrasts the "logical conclusion" of wages for housework as a "full-scale statisation" of family
services (not actually the position at all) with, implicitly his own position, a "redefinition of relations within
the couple" based on an equal sharing of household tasks between "male and female partners". With a
politics based on a movement away from the individualised activity of the housewife in the family
presented as "alienation" (and any talk of socialisation of activity subsumed in a category of "statisation"),
non-alienation seems to be found in the self-presence of 'household tasks' - equally shared within the
heterosexual couple.

200
with a class framework. Wages for Housework is best conceived, as Federici (1980)
argues,aswagesagainst housework,and againstwork in general.
The foundationaltext for this perspectiveis Mariarosa Dalla Costa's and Selma
James'(1972) Wonzenand the Subversiono the Community. Jamesand Dalla Costa are
concernedwith developingan analysisof unwaged'housework' as a complex historically
structuredpracticethat createsthe subjectof Woman as 'housewife'. They arguethat the
division of the homeand work-place,and the valorisationof the latter via the wage is the
basis for the estrangementof women from socialised activity. Yet the housework
economyand the fan-dlyare integral to capitalist production in 'liberating' the labourer
from the sphereof reproductionto sell his labour. But not only do they stress that the
unwagedare performing work integral to capital, but show how the lack of a wage for
housework has servedto mask its existenceas capitalistwork. Indeed 'housework' is
seento be doubly subordinated,first by capital as work without a wage, and secondby
the left itself which, becauseof the traditional emphasison production, excludedwomen,
as a 'non-productive' category from the realm of 'real' politics. By recognising
housework as integral to capital (rather than a natural 'injustice' or a decontextualised
patriarchyoutsideof capital) this perspectiveenablesan understandingof the way women
are as equally exploited by, and are as entwined within the wage-relationas working
men. The importanceof the politics of the wage, then, is not in raising all into full
equality in exploitation (Dalla Costa and James 1972: 35), but in traversing the
distinctionsbetweenthe unwagedand the waged,and in forming a milieu that generalises
the refusalof work, by including the wealth 'women's work' in the categoryof capitalist
work. As Federici (1982: 221) puts it, wages for housework "is the demandby which
our natureendsand our strugglebegins becausejust to want wagesfor housework means
to refuse that work as the expression of our nature". Simultaneously, becausethe
"peculiar combination of physical, emotional and sexual services" that are involved in
'housework', all sorts of previously 'hidden' questionsaround the nature of work and
social reproductionbecomepoliticised (Federici 1982: 220). This foregrounding of the
complexitiesof housework is thus an important point of departurein autonomiafor the
considerationof a wealth of attributesthat are included in the work of the social factory as
a whole (which, in a different context, Haraway(1991: 166)describesas a 'feminisation'
of work in a global 'homework economy').
The inclusive disjunctive mode of 'autonomy' is also evident in Wages for
Housework,taking as it did neither a distinct feminist, nor class position: "Rejecting on
the one hand class subordinatedto feminism and on the other feminism subordinatedto
class" (Dalla Costa and James 1972: 9). Such a position necessitated a complex

engagement around the questions of particular autonomy and interrelation with other
elements of the movement. Women and the Subversion of the Community is thus littered

with notes and comments about the nature of demands and practices as contextual and
limited, representing perspectives and temporary points of struggle rather than distinct
4D

201
and timeless 'positions'. For example: "the demand for a wage for housework is only a
basis, a perspective, from which to start The practical, continuous translation of this
...
is
perspective the task the movement is facing in Italy and elsewhere." (54) This is not
just an abstract position, but translates into specific strategic questions. Hence, the

question of separatism is framed in terms of uncertainty as to "how long these tendencies

will continue to drive the movement forward and when they will turn into their opposite"
(53), whilst particular politics of child support, equal pay, access to abortion, are
presented as necessarily embedded in broader feminist and class frameworks.
Returning to autonomia more generally, as well as a politics of the extension of
the wage to cover unremunerated work, the social wage was also seen to encompass
consumption. If the wage was to be expanded, the costs of consumption were to be
reduced. This was particularly important at a time of mass austerity (cf. note 12). One
innovative practice here was 'autoreduction', or self-reduction. Autoreduction had its
origins in the early seventies around a collective reduction in the payment of rents, but
quickly spread to other areasof social consumption such as public transport, utilities, and
later cinemas and festivals. In 1974 when commuters between Pinerolo and Turin found
that their bus fares had increasedby 30% they refused to pay, insteadsubstituting their
own fare reducedtickets and forcing a formal reduction (Ramirez 1975: 144; cf. also
Cherki and Wieviorka 1980). This sparked a spread of factory and community-based
autoreductioncommitteeswhich effectively institutedreductionon a wealth of utility bills
(wherepolitical relationswith workers in the statecontrolled electricity corporation were
such that they took part in refusing to disconnectsupply). As the Movement of '77
developed,this practiceextendedto include the realmsof popularcultural expressionwith
'proletarian youth circles', and Metropolitan Indians not paying at the cinema, or
expensiverestaurants,or going on 'autonomousprice-setting' (shoplifting) expeditions).

Factory and city

Though this chapter is largely concerned with the refusal of work in the social factory,
this should not be seen to exclude the factory (even though its break-up coincided with
the rise of autonomia, it did not disappear). The factory had maintained a strong
disciplinary coherence since the Second World War (with FIAT using complex vetting
procedures involving local police and priests to keep trouble-makers out (Abse 1985:
12)), and the 'dignity of labour' had been largely embodied in PCI ethics. 30 The
experience of work in the large Northern automobile plants such as FIAT-Rivalta and
FIAT-Mirafiori (the biggest 'city-factory' in the world, just outside the centre of Turin
(cf. Partridge n. d. )31) is central to an understanding of the mass worker and the

30Platania (1979: 176) writes: I couldn't understand the Communist Party blokes in the factory. They
made it a point of honour never to be faulted in their work by the foreman. "
31 A description of the Mirafiori plant from La Republica (21.2.1980, cited in Partridge n.d. ) presents a
statistical sense of its vastness. The plant covered a surface area of three million square meters, with 30
miles of railway tracks, nearly 120 miles of conveyor belts, 13,000 pieces of machinery, and an estimated

202
emergence of the refusal of work (cf. Balestrini n. d.; Platania 1979). Balestrini's
fictionalised autobiography of a FIAT worker, Voglianio Tutto, describes the experience
thus:

On the production line it was not a question of learning anything, but of habituating
the muscles. That is, habituating them under pressure to those movements, those
speeds... movementsfaster than the heartbeat ... operations that the muscles and the
eye had to do by themselves, instantly without the need to think at all. (cited in
Lumley 1990: 210)

By the 1969 'Hot Autumn', however, things had changed. The struggles of the
Hot Autumn are well characterised by the graffiti running along the external walls of the
FIAT-Mirafiori plant: "The only music the bosses can hear is the sound of shut-down
machinery", and "We want the sun in Turin too" (cited in Partridge, n. d.: n. p. ). The

struggles of the mass worker were very different from conventional PCI and union
struggles. They became an 'intensification' of the space of work that matched the
intricacies of Taylorist production with refusal (not unlike the IWW's 'striking on the
job'). Under a general demand of 'We Want Everything' (Voglialno Tutto), 32the refusal
of work was characterised by high levels of absenteeism, wild-cat strikes, 'internal

marches' or 'snakes', sabotage, demands for pay equalisation and pay increases

regardless of productivity, and the abolition of differential grading (Bologna (1980) and
Negri (1988b) offer the classic accounts). Operaismo's strikes were not formal, union
run events, but rather spontaneous wildcats within the factories, during the production

process. Each strike manifested differently according to the particular forms of

production, skill, local experience, each with different names: hiccups, snakes, chains,
chequer-boards (cf. Big Flame 1971; Lumley 1990: 227-8). Snakes were processions or
marches around the factory, growing in number as each work-station joined in. In

chequer-boards the factory was divided up into sections which would take it in turns to

stop work, sometimes organised by work station, or shift, or by sections of the alphabet
corresponding to workers' names.33 As well as strikes, leaflets and 'dazibao' (as in the
Chinese Cultural Revolution) were put up on the walls of factory, and thousands of
leaflets, often produced twice-daily, were distributed inside the factories and at the gates

65,000 workers ('we cannot be sure how many work there today'). One conveyor belt still had 60 radiators
from an old FIAT model circulating for more than ten years because they could not be removed without
stopping the whole factory (Red Notes (1979: 194) has an aerial photograph).
32The expression 'we want everything' originated in one of the first big struggles of the mass worker to
extend beyond the factory walls, the events of Corso Traiano in July 1969. A union organised strike in
FIAT plants Mirafiori and Rivalta in Turin extended beyond its formal structure to end in a day of street-
fighting. Written on a poster on one of the barricades was 'What Do We Want? We Want Everything! ' (cf.
Red Notes 1978: 191-3).
33 One worker describes the process: "it was enough that you struck for half an hour in the morning and
the same in the evening to make the mechanism break down. When you strike, you go around as pleased
as punch and you can't be stopped.... When you are busy with a 'checquer-board' action not even the
gatekeepers manage to understand the comings-and-goings.... The damage to the bosses was

203
(cf. Red Notes 1978: 183-191). The factories resourceswere also used. As Viale (cited
in Lumley 1990:222) reports,"in many factoriesthey are using the foremen's telephones
to communicateand organisestruggles."
By the seventies,amongst the youth there seems to have been a widespread
disaffectionwith work acrossthe board. Hilary Partridge(n.d.: n.p.) reports that by the
late seventiesamongstthe mediatherewas a commonsensethat "the 'honest worker' has
been transformed into long-haired beatniks making love in empty car-bodies and
displaying completecontemptfor work, for the trade unions, for the Party.1134And the
young workers said somethingsimilar: "... we young ones go into the factory.... with a
different kind of experience,a less serious way of seeing things; a bit of the outside
world comes into the factory with us...... "Look at me, look at me well: My gym-shoes
meandiscotheque,my shirt says'extremist', I've got the hair of a pop-singer,and an ear-
ring like a homosexual. Nothing about me says 'worker'! " (in Partridge). One account
of relationswith the foremen from a young worker at Mirafiori capturesthe senseof the
'ungovernablefactory' well:

On the line there are people who can quote Foucault (a psychologist) and the creeps
explode with rage because they haven't even heard of him. Then there are the
gays. They blow kisses and write 'Long Live Renato Zero (a pop singer) on the
walls. Others roll a joint and laugh like they're crazy-high. The feminists too,
giggle every time a man tries to give them orders. The FIAT foremen have never
seen the workers laughing, and they get really angry. (in Partridge)

If the territory of the factory was disrupted, the city too became a site of

contestation.The movement outsidethe factory into the community was most prominent
in the wave of squattingfor housing and social centres. This was prominent in Lotta
Continua's politics of 'Take Over the City'. LC's position was essentially that the
communityand the workplace were the samestruggle, and that an over-emphasison the
factory enabledthe workers' gainsto be offset in the community (cf. Take Over the City
1971: 2). 35 However, despitetalking of a diffusion of capitalist power, the Take Over
the City slogan was still basedon a work/community divide, where factory work took
precedence.The city, for example,is referred to as "an enormous dormitory in which
workersare allowed to regaintheir strengthafter it has beenbroken at work" (Take Over
the City 1971: 2), and the factory working class "continues to be the basis and
...
indispensableprecondition of any future developmentof the class struggle" (12) (and

enormous,unlike in the case of pre-organisedstrikes of previous years.... It was the expression of mass
creativity and inventiveness." (cited in Lumley 1990: 228)
34 The difference between the young workers and the Party is marked in the same piece by a PCI
maintenanceworker at Mirafiori:"so, you go and try to explain things to the young ones. If you tell them
that work dignifies a man, they laugh in your face."
35 The refrainfrom a Lotta Continua song put it like this: "A
red wind is blowing/ Over the factories and
estates./ It unites everyoneof us / Who've decided to fight / For revolution/ For freedom / Let's take over
the city." (Take Over the City n.d.: 7)

204
indeed factory workers 'leadership' will give social struggles a revolutionary orientation
(13)). As the Movement of '77 developed, a more complex understanding of the city
emerged, both in the growth of social centres, communal squatted living, housing
struggles, but also in a more poetic relationship to the city itself. This overall process is
exemplified in the change in demonstrations. Mass demonstrations were of course a
regular occurrence throughout the sixties and seventies. But with the emergence of the
emarginati there was a movement away from the orchestrated march toward a more
diffuse occupation of space.36 Torealta (1980: 105) reports how, during the national
meeting in Bologna in September '77, whilst one part of the movement chose to gather in
a sports amphitheatre, the rest entered the city, "conveying furniture and chairs outdoors,
conducting discussions and seminars in thousands of small groups, passing out the little
illegalities that had been produced for the occasion (fake train tickets, drugs, keys to open
telephone coin boxes and traffic lights, etc.)" Another account of the Bologna Spring '77
talks of an intermeshing of the city and the Movement:

During those days there seemed to be a real and strong 'contact' between the
young people and the City. There were all kinds of different people, with all kinds
of different ideologies, acting in all different ways, and this fed and nourished the
inventivenessand creativity of the movement. New demonstrationswere continually
being spawned; there were meetings everywhere, all the time (ranging from night-
time marchesto big meetings); new forms of organisation were being thought up all
the time.
For example, after March 15th, the police, the official political parties and
the local authorities were trying to deny the movement any possible political space
for coordination etc. The movement was drive out of the Old Centre of the city, and
was denied the use of premises. But the movement responded by planning on a
geographic basis: meetings were set up, on a rotation basis, in cinemas on the
outskirts of town (where the owners didn't make any difficulties), as well as in parks,
local squaresetc - which had the added advantage of involving local people even
more than before! (Pritno Maggio, in Red Notes 1978: 43-4)

Language and counterculture: the Metropolitan Indians and

Radio Alice
The last site of minor productionI want to consideris that of languageand a more clearly
foregroundedcounterculture. The Movementof '77 developedforms of countercultural
practice that were deliberately opposed to common sense, general equivalence, and
rational communicational models. Two groups were particularly influential, the
MetropolitanIndiansandCollective A/traverso and their Radio Alice. Before discussing

36 direct
More conventional demonstrationscontinuedthroughout the seventies, often becoming
with the police (this is at a time when the police, sometimes dressed as freaks, were using
confrontations

205
these groups it is worth saying a little about the form of language of autonomia more
a
generally.
In keeping with Deleuze and Guattari's argument about the deterritorialisation of
language, Moulier (1989: 20-1) suggests that the rather complex and arcane terminology
ZD
of operaismo was a necessary aspect of its emergence through the PCI-dominated left
milieu. He writes:

doubtless by the same token that Althusser ventured into the French Communist
...
Party under cover of scientific Marxism and Spinoza, the adherents of operaisillo
proceeded to use formulae that would not have shocked the old Stalinist
communists. One could even say that part of the strange character of operaisino in
the years 1964 to 1971 lies in this paradoxical way of saying in the very language
of the Communist Party things which are so contrary to its whole theoretical
foundation as to imitate its internal rupture.

But if the complex terminology had a cloaking function, it also reflected the considerable
creativity of the movement. Thus, though operaismo and autonomia used received
Marxian terminology, they also coined many other terms, from 'class composition' to
'autovalorisation' and 'autoreduction', each seeking to describe particular phenomena and
maintain an 'operationality'. The political problematics of the development of operaist
and autonomist language are raised by Negri (from the isolation wing in Rebibbia prison
in 1979) in response to a question about the difficulty of his language (and the consequent
difficulty of rank and file militants using it), and it is worth citing at length:

Certainly, the language is occasionally obscure. But it was far more obscure 20
years ago. At that time we had to find ways of inserting Marxist and revolutionary
debates into the official labour movement, and since at the same time we had to
avoid being expelled and marginalised, we found a hermetic style of language. The
bureaucrats did not understand it, and underestimated the power of what we were
saying. But since then things have changeda lot. Nowadays revolutionary students
are far more able to understandthe language that I and my friends use, rather than
the 'clear and distinct' language of the ideological falsifications of the official
parties.
Our language is difficult, but distinct. It speaksof things. Theirs is clear,
but not distinct: they speak of nothing. Our languageis difficult: but our comrades
study it, as they study the classics of Marxism, the critique of political economy and
many other things. (in Red Notes 1979: 206)37

live ammunition, which, under the provisions of the Reale Law, killed an estimated 150 people (Bifo 1980:
154)).
37 Viano (in Negri 1991: xxxviii-xxxix) makes some interesting points about the nature and form of
language in Negri and autonomia. Arguing that it is a bourgeois fallacy (rooted in the figure of a fully
present universal humanity) that assumes that a book should be consumed similarly by the spectrum of
social subjects, he suggests that Negri's language is a 'homage to difference' rooted in a cultural milieu

206
 In the Metropolitan Indians and Radio Alice the deterritorialisation of language is
extended beyond Marxism into the realms of dominant culture and the Movement itself.
Placing great stay in parody and irony (in conjunction with the other practices I have
surveyed), the Metropolitan Indians painted their faces, parodied political figures and
conventional political practices, went on collective 'autonomous price-setting'
expeditions, parodied PCI demonstrations (by, for example, bowing down to the

speakers and chanting such things as: "We are hooligans and provocateurs. The only true

communists are Lama and Cossiga [PCI luminaries]"), and called demonstrations where
they did not appear, or where they hung-out and had open discussion rather than marched
(distributing contraband, drugs and irreverent leaflets against the "pale faces" of the
pCI. 38 But they did this not to forge a new formalised identity. Torealta (1980) suggests

that the mainstream media sought to focus on their painted faces as signs of a distinct
identity, and so conceal the transversal nature of their practices. He argues that the

painted faces tactic should not be seen as the mark of a coherent autonomous

counterculture, but, as "an arbitrary characterisation of a future people... " who

"appropriates in an exhaustive way all possible terms and treats language as a science of
zn
imaginary solutions... " (102) If the emarginati, generally, formed an inclusive
disjunctive collective, the Metropolitan Indians sought to intensify this process. We can

think of the Metropolitan Indians as an attempt to develop a politics of autovalorisation

that enaa-ed with the increasing fluidity and 'dividuality' of the social factory. Torealta
4:1 z:1
(1980) arguesthat the condition of socialised work had disrupted clearly demarcated
matricesof value, and that the political subject of this processmust hencedo other than
retreatto forms of equivalence and identity. He writes:

For a social subject that is diffuse and forced into a relation with fluctuating and
...
indeterminate wages (and the question of wages, by definition, is the general
referent of all signs), the 'pangs of conscience' and discourses on 'political
economy' are completely useless-,one can not struggle against transience and
dispersion with the blows of purpose and conscience,
Thus the social conditions of simulation and of the arbitrary come into
being: there arises a social subject that is not reducible to one precise identity....
(1980: 103)

opposed to the repetition of the regular refrains and meanings of 'normal' discourse. He implies that the
language of the movement is more akin to atonal music, is self-consciously positioned at the margins of
the system of symbolic reproduction, and is comprised of many different parallel and divergent
expressions. This, of course, can not be an excuse for incoherent writing (and when traversing and
developing extremely complex Marxian figures such language is not without its problems), but it does
raise the question of the affective nature of language in a context - Marxian political discourse - where
such concerns are rarely evident. A less poetic reading of the difficulty of Negri's prose is marked by the
English translators (who are well schooled in the milieu) of the best-selling Domination and Sabotage
(Negri 1979), when they choose to omit a couple of pages because, as they say, "In translating, we found
the first two pages of this section almost incomprehensible. " (1116) See also Chapter 7, note 35.
38 See Morris (1978: 70) and Red Notes (1978: 57) for two of these leaflets, and 6 il '77 (1977) and
Grimshaw and Gardner (1977: 16) for photographs of'Metropolitan Indians'.

207
Thus, following the Rome University occupation (February 1977, consideredbelow),
Torealta(1980: 104) writes that "from that day will gush rivers of speecheson the new
needsof the youthful strataof the population; on that day hundreds of self-critical and
remorsefuldiscourseswill be made,yet only the Metropolitan Indians will remain silent."
They would remainsilent because,at least in Torealta's presentation,they were part of a
continual provocationand creation, an exerciseof difference that sought to open needs
and possibilities, rather than settle on any in particular. As they put it:
"Workers students. no future for you the Metropolitan Indians have
... -There's ...
arrived!" (Red Notes 1978: 124)
To give an example, when Luciano Lama (the secretary of the General
Confederationof Workers, close to the PCI) entered the occupied Rome campus,
spearheading the PCI call "to defend the University which is occupied by fascists" he
entereda space daubed with graffiti warning that capitalists and revisionists would be
"buried by a burst of laughter" signed by Godere Operaio and Godimento Studentesco
Morkers' Joy' and 'Students' Enjoyment' - both puns on the formal operaist
organisations)(in Red Notes 1988:52). In the courtyard where Lama was to speak there
was anotherplatform with a replica dummy of Lama, completewith a Valentine's heart
with the words Nessuno LAnza ('Lama Nobody', or 'Nobody Loves Him'). As Lama
beganto speaka crowd of Metropolitan Indians took to chanting 'Sacrifices, Sacrifices,
We Want Sacrifices!", "Build us more churchesand fewer houses", and "We demandto
work harder and earn less!
" (53). This event descended
characteristically into a riot (at
this time a suresign of impendingconfrontationwas the arrival of traderswith barrels of
lemonsto counteractthe effects of tear gas). But the event offered no program or even
direct assaulton the speaker(at leastnot at first), and no one took the podium. Rather it
was more an event intendedto underminethe regime of negotiation('leave now and we
shall seewhat can be done for your situation') by utilising and returning the expressions
of austerityand work that were deployedagainstthe emarginati.
Turning to the secondprominent counterculturalgroup, Collective A/traverso and
their Radio Alice was a configuration of operaist and autonomist understandings of
generalintellect and qualitativework (a number of membersof Alice had been in Potere
Operaio(cf. Collective A/traverso 1977: 104-9)), dadaisttheoriesof language,the avant
garde project of breaking the separationof art and everyday life, and US pop and
counterculture. In A/traverso's more theoretical texts, the general intellect thesis is
rehearsedto elucidatea 'techno-scientific'intellectuallabour that is enmeshedin capitalist
relations through the simplification, mathernaticisation, and codification of language
(Collective A/traverso 1977: 104). But unlike Negri's more recent tendenciestoward
Habermassiancommunicativeaction, Altraverso considered language as part of the
generalrelationsof equivalence:

208
 Tile system of production which is based upon the reduction of all aspects of
human life to abstract work, exchangeable against wages,could not separate itself
from the logic of language. Human language had to be reduced by capitalism to a
simple instrument of production, and thus first codified, confined within tile canons
of comprehensibility, and therefore had to root out all contradiction, and - given
that contradiction lay in the existence of the subject/class- root out the subject.
(Collective A/traverso 1977: 109-10; my translation)

Thus, building on an already developedform of political slang known as sinistresse,

A/traverso expandedtheir practice to include dadaist nonsense, and the disruption of
conventionalmodesof political expression(whilst seeking to locate this practice in the
terrain of the movementand the socialisedworker rather than in literatureor art). They
called this practice'mao-dadaism'(115) (Morris (1978), following Macciocchi (1978),
it
sees asa "semiological delinquency"). 39 The refusal of work was central to the project,
in
and a sensewas the connective, or what they called 'transversal', link across the
variousaspectsof their practice. The critique of work and A/traverso's specific point of
engagement on the question of codified culture is clear in this passage:

The guerrilla war of information, the organised disruption of the circulation of

news, the break in the relationship between broadcasting and the making known of
facts is to be found within the general struggle against the organisation and
...
domination of work...
The interruption and subversion of the fluxes of production and the
transmission of the signs given by authority represent a field of direct action...
(Collective A/traverso, in Guattari 1984: 236-7)40

A/traverso's activities were most evident in Radio Alice, one of the more
prominent of the free radio's that proliferated after the deregulation of broadcasting in
1976 (cf. Downing 1980).41 As well as 'mao-dadaism', Radio Alice also used the
composite 'Guattareuze' to characterise their practice. Indeed the name Alice was taken
from Deleuze's discussion of Through the Looking Glass in The Logic of Sense (as

39 The extension of this process of disruption through the milieu as a whole was not always popular. Bifo's
intervention in the September 1977 Conference on Repression (by letter from exile in France), which
began with the expression "[w]e have to go against the stream even when the stream is going against the
stream", was greeted by at least one of the audience with dismay, and an assertion of the need to
communicate with the masses with simplicity and immediacy (cf. Kunzle 1980: 115-6).
40 See also the mao-dadaist parody of the 'right to work', 'Work Makes You Free and Beautiful' (in Morris
1978: 70).
41 Downing (1980: 204) reports that in June 1878 there were an estimated 2275 radio stations and 503
television stations spread fairly evenly across the population centres of the country. Alice transmitted
from February 9 1976 until March 12 1977, using an old military transmitter located in two rooms of an
apartment building in a residential area of Bologna (cf. Cowan 1978; Grimshaw and Gardner 1977). A
Primo Maggio article reports that no sooner had Alice come on air than it was able to mobilise 2000 people
for a musical jam session, and that it had an average listening audience of 30000 (in Red Notes 1978: 41).

209
Umberto Eco (1977b) sought to 'expose'). 42 Following Deleuze (1990), Radio Alice's
adventures sought to open up not an 'underground' as such, but a world of surfaces,
nonsense, and events. With the 'circles of proletarian youth' as its particular foCUS,43
Radio Alice aimed to problematise 'radio' and 'language', to open cramped spaces (the
separation of home, work, families, sexism, individualising relationships (Collective
A/traverso 1980: 133)), to make language intensive, 'unproductive', tactile, and
'political' (indeed, their collection, Collective A/traverso (1977: 67-72), includes a pr6cis
of the minor literature thesis), and open to, as they put it, the 'unstated' and the
'uncanny'. Alice's transmission was a complex of music (the broadcast transcript in
Collective A/traverso (1977) includes Frank Zappa, the Rolling Stones, Don Cherry, Bob
Dylan, Monteverdi, Jimi Hendrix, Jefferson Airplane and the Beatles), discussion
programmes, phone-ins, and poetry ("Stop the blackmail of poverty. Value of desire -
41:
1
value in use - labour value. Working-class aristocracy and Lunilmnproletariat ... What
poverty? What work? Time must be reappropriated. It is our right to forget what time it
is" (Collective A/traverso in Guattari 1984: 237)). But Alice's Guattareuze was not
limited to language and radio content. It was specifically concerned with the connections
;z tD
between producer and audience that radio could enable (being heavily influenced by
Brecht's (1993) theories of radio's socialist potential). This is no more evidenced than in
its involvement in the Bologna '77 Spring. Opening its airwaves to telephone booth
callers in the midst of demonstrations and occupations, Alice enabled an ongoing
communication and coordination of the events by the people involved themselves
(relaying positions of the police and activists, suggesting actions and so on). This was a
common structural feature of the free radios that Eco (1994) describes as the form of
'token reporter' where calls from public telephone boxes were immediately relayed on air.
A/traverso saw this as breaking down the 'crossword' approach of conventional phone-
in's which are based on limited and structured responses (Downing 1980: 207). In
Alice's case, such arrangements were the pretext for its closure by armed police, under
the charge of "military coordination". The closure itself was transmitted live with hidden
microphones, and makes an unusual read, with the last words broadcast: "Police: Hands
up there! B: "We've got our hands up. They're telling us that this is a 'hive of

42 Umberto Eco suggested that Radio Alice was not being quite honest about the avant gardist and
academic origin of their mao-dadaism (1977: 116), that Anti-Oedipus and its 'metaphor' of desiring
machines needed to be read seriously, not reduced to easy slogans (116), and that the workers didn't
really understand (1977a: 126) and were using a 'laboratory language' in a (by implication, dangerous)
practical fashion (1994: 172). Bifo, and Pasquini (1977) responded by suggesting that "in Eco's article,
everything could be reduced to a little abstract game between Norm and Violation... But this is to forget
that behind this transgression of the Norm and the gestural and linguistic transformation there is a
practical, collective, subject, which produced behaviour and signs capable of violating the codes of
interpretation precisely because the social practice of the subject is capable of violating that productivist
code of sacrificing a lifetime to an exploitative society. " (cited in Morris 1978: 69) For Bifo and Pasquino
(1977: 135) it was not the workers who did not understand (indeed they were practising 'mao-dadaism' in
FIAT-Mirafiori), but the bourgeoisie, or "Pale Faces".
43 "During the months of spring-summer'75, a new subject, the young proletarian, appeared on the scene,
no longer with the old frames of reference of the avant garde; a subject which moved in a certain
transversal fashion through the seperate orders, not reducible to the categories of politics, and therefore

210
subversiveactivity ...... (cf. the transcription in Red Notes 1978: 31-3).44 Albertani
(1981: n.p.) reports that some membersof the collective escapedover the roof tops and
continuedbroadcastingfrom a car driving through the Bologna streets.
..,

Conclusion
I haveargued(bringing in a little of Chapter7) that operaismoand autonomiacan be seen
as a plane of minor creativity. As with the IWW, work was the central site of an
apparently stripped-down politics. Through the social factory thesis, workers were
conceptualisedas a generalisedplane of socialisedabstractlabour. This gives 'mass',
then 'socialised' workers productive centrality, where a wealth of attributes become
subsumedin capitalist regimesof production and valorisation. However, it does not give
them a political identity, for the identities formed within work are capitalist 'worker'
identities. I thus presenteda seriesof 'cramping' manoeuvreswhich reducedthe identity
of worker and compelled political composition: 'class composition', the 'reversal of
perspective',and the 'refusal of work'. The political project which follows residesin the

immediatelyreduced (by the reformists and fascists) to the categories of criminology, of psychiatry, of
sociology,of spectacle." (CollectiveA/traverso 1977: 89-90; my translation)
44Theclosure of RadioAlice was part of the general repression of autonomia. This repression took a
complexpath indeed,and a full accountis beyondthe scope of this chapter. Nevertheless, a little needs
to be said. In the judicial procedures and criminal prosecutions the complex and mutating nature of
autonomia was converted into a hierarchical and organised body (displaying an efficiency that lead
Debord(1983a: 19) to describeItaly as "the most modern laboratory of internationalcounter-revolution." )
Central to the process was the deployment of the Red Brigades (BR) as a kind of consolidating 'agent'
enablingthe axiomaticsolidification of identity-forming regimes across the movement, The BR's politics
was always rather orthodoxworkerist,and, with their politics of "carry the attack to the heart of the State",
becameincreasinglyspectacular(with links to the secret services which, since the 1969-1973/4'strategy
of tension', had been a characteristic of Italian political control (cf. Bologna 1980: 45; Debord 1983a;
Sanguinetti1982)),and very far removed from the diffuse politics of autonomia (the Metropolitan Indians
parodiedthe BR position with the slogan: "Carry the attack to the heart of the Papacy! All power to the
armedvicars!" (in Red Notes 1978: 124)). Nevertheless,with the pretext of increasedviolence, the vague
historicallinks across the whole of the extraparliamentarymovement, and no doubt aided by some of the
violent rhetoric and practice of aspects of autonomia, the judiciary sought to 'expose' the subterranean
links betweenautonomiaand the BR, and prosecute the lot (though many 'repentant' Brigadists received
large commutations for implicating, frequently in contradictory ways, elements of autonomia). The
specific techniquesof identificationare described by Lotringerand Marazzi (in Semiotext(e) 1980: 19) as
a process whereby the state assumed something of its adversary's form: it "simulated the fluidity
characteristicof Autonomy." Thus, in considering the judicial procedure Deleuze (1980) argues that the
prosecution overcame two fundamental principles of democratic law: that justice must conform to a
principleof 'identifiableconsistency'where the content and subject of the charge must have a precise and
non-contradictory identity, and that in the committal hearings 'facts' must confirm to a principle of
'disjunction and exclusion' ("Either A is the case, or B; if B, then it is not X'; 182). The state thus
presented not a distinct series of subjects (there was only one, Potere Operaio = autonomia = Red
Brigades)but an 'orgy of identifications'that replicatedAnti-Oedipus'inclusive disjunction with a principle
of inclusion and accumulation of all contradictions. The fatal proviso was that the construction of the
inclusive disjunctive plane served to produce criminal subjects of the law, as the total plane was
subdividedinto units with degrees of responsibility for the whole. Thus everything from political actions,
texts, and archivecollections(all of Negri's works and files were trawled through and form the basis of his
prosecution (cf. Negri (1988d) for a sobering transcript of the process of the prosecution of ideas),
mysterious phone calls (Negri's alleged telephone call to Aldo Moro's wife), and, if we expand beyond
Negri's case, to cartoons (a comic strip in Metropoliillustrating the similarity of position between the BR
and the state was said to display knowledge of Aldo Moro's kidnap that only the BR could have (cf -
Semiotext(e)(1980: 300-14)for the comic strip) were used as points of connectionto 'autonomia/BR',with
simultaneously serious and vague and nebulous charges such as 'subversive association', and
'insurrection against the powers of the state'. Once 'connected' there was no need to maintain
consistencyin the charges since the specific content does not change the generalised guilt. Hence the
continual mutation in the charges against Negri (in a kind of 'endless deferment' that would have done
Kafka proud), enabledby the possibilityof up to 10 years of preventative detention, the use of witnesses

211
creation of forms of collective composition which disrupt work and the subject of
worker, and, with the development of autonomia, Practices of 'autovalorisation'.
Autovalorisation is a process of expanding and changing 'needs' (as forms and styles of
life) in the class composition (against any naturalisation of needs determined by austerity
measures or essentialist understandings of the human). In this expansion of needs,
autovalorisation was also a mechanism for warding-off tendencies to identity in

autonomia itself, for every minority of the movement was to assert and develop its

particular needs and new forms of practice, and distribute these across the movement.
But autovalorisation was also linked to the question of the social wage. It was through
the social wage that autovalorisation connected the 'little intrigues' of autonornia to the
social whole. The social wage becomes the site of a certain 'reclamation of surplus
value', and requires a continual process of struggle for a wage independent of work-
done, following the basic operaist demand for more pay and less work. In practice,

political innovation and the struggle to increase the social wage tended to be

simultaneous, as, for example, in the practices of 'autonomous price-setting' and

'autoreduction'.
With the emergence of the Movement of '77 the project of composition circulates
around the figure
4:1 of the emarginati. These 'marginals' are not 'outside' of capitalist

relations; they are central to the productivity of the social factory. In their processes of
the refusal of work/er and autovalorisation there is a tendency toward the enfolding and
distribution of various identities, needs, cultures across the plane of the movement, in a
politics which seeks not an independent outside, but an expansion and deterritorialisation
of collective composition in capitalism. The difference between this minor interpretation
of the socialised worker and Negri's later work is that, rather than talk of production
tending toward autonomy and communist form, here composition is always a
deterritorialisation of the identities, and potentially the 'dividualities' of a work fully
traversed by axiomatic capitalist relations. I showed a number of techniques, territories,
and practices within which this process occurred. First I argued that these groups were
inclusive disjunctive (for example, students and workers, feminists and components of
the workers' movement), and showed how the organisational form of 'autonomy'
manifested and facilitated this. I stressed, however, that this process of autonomy was
always complex, difficult, and involved much intensive engagement, debate, and
polernic. I then considered three aspects or territories of composition: the wage and
money, factory and city, and language and counterculture in the Metropolitan Indians and
Collective A/traverso. The importance of each of these territories and practices was found
both in the processes of deterritorialisation of particular sites and identities, and in the

engagement
t 4: 1 with questions of the wage
t; l and social wage.

with contradictory testimonies, and the refusal to present the prosecution's evidence to the defendants
(cf. Italy '79 Committee1982).

212
 If, as Negri (1989: 75) argues, the mass worker was theorised at a time of its
passingaway, the socialisedworker thesis was very much of its time. Indeed, in many
ways the Movementof '77 was the emergenceof a political tendency immanent to,
perhapsevenin advanceof new forms of socialisedwork. It thus operatedat a time of
high unemployment. That the various spaces of reproduction, consumption,
unemployment,andcultural formation were conceptualisedin terms of (socialised)work,
and that the questionsof the social wageand money were brought in to theseterritories is
one of the most radical aspectsof autonomia. But if autonomiawas a responseto these
structural changes, as the developmentof a new 'class composition' (the socialised
worker), it was destroyedbefore it fully developeda politics immanentto the new forms
of diffuse work. Instead,as Virno (1996c) argues,its innovations in the refusal of work
(suchas the affirmation of picaresquetemporarywork, new needsand styles, new forms
of autonomous creativity) becamethe basis of new forms of work. That is, whilst it
operated on the level of counterculture, the Movement of '77 opened new spacesand
styles which were subsequently capitalised in a kind of capitalist 'counterrevolution'.
Whilst for Negri this is a sign that the new labour of the socialisedworker is almost itself
a communistplenitude (since it is built upon these innovative practices), for Virno it is
part of a new regimeof capitalistproduction:

The masterpieceof the Italian counterrevolution was its having transformed these
collective tendencies,which in the Movement of '77 were manifested as intransigent
antagonism,into professional prerequisites, ingredients of the production of surplus
value, and leavening for a new cycle of capitalist development. (Virno 1996c: 243)

Nevertheless,insofar as the Movement of '77 was an anticipation (perhaps even the

conjuration)of future regimesof production,for Vimo its political potential - its forms of
interrelation between groups, its struggle for the social wage, its intertwining of
counterculture with more conventionalquestions of work and money is
- still current, as a
"future at our backs" (243).

213
Chapter 9
Conclusion

One never commences; one never has a tabula rasa-, one slips in, enters in the
middle; one takes up or lays down rhythms. (Deleuze 1988a: 123)

Paolo Vimo (1996b: 189) expresses a common sentiment about the state of current
political thought when he writes: "If nobody asks me what political action is, I seem to
know; but if I have to explain it to somebody who asks, this presumed knowledge

evaporates into incoherence. " This is a problem, but it is not a wholly new one. Indeed,
inasmuch as it is in the nature of politics to have an openness to virtuality, to potential,

and to undetermined worlds, a certain amount of uncertainty, if not 'incoherence', is one

of its central features. At the same time, however, uncertainty is necessarily subject to a
form of ordering, a stratification of political forms and potential around the question,

'what is to be doneT, is an attempt to call forth other worlds through

since politics
concrete engagement with the intricacies of the present. The problem is that such

ordering and engagement has so often occurred through processes of truth and certainty,
where politics has become less a site of uncertainty, experimentation, and creation than
dogma and resentiment. It would be wrong to say that Marxism was the only vehicle of

this form of stratification; the effacement of political virtuality in social democratic

consensus is at least as effective, and certainly more pervasive. Nevertheless, the Marxist
Party-form did such a good job of curtailing the innovation of politics that most serious

attempts, certainly within the academy, to conceptualise politics and open its potential
have, since the late 1970s sought to stay clear of Marxism, and even venture a certain
,
6post-politics', or a 'cultural politics' to get away from its anaernic territory. Deleuze and
Guattari's work is, I would suggest, in many ways attributable to a similar desire to

radically rethink politics away from certainty and dogma, and to address, in their own
particular way, the question of 'what is to be doneT Yet, rather than sever links with
Marxism, Deleuze and Guattari worked through a much more nuanced relation with it; as
if Marxism, as life in general, needed to be engaged with 'in the middle'. As I showed in
Chapter 1, Alliez (1997) made this clear when he suggested that all of Deleuze's works
C
come under the heading of 'capitalism and schizophrenia', and that we could use
Deleuze's missing book on Marx to think through a Deleuze-Marx resonance, or a 'virtual
Marx'. This thesis has sought to consider something of this Deleuze-Marx resonance
through a 'minor politics'. In conclusion, rather than summarise each chapter (for the
introduction, and conclusions to the chapters have done this), I will draw out the sense of
my argument by returning to a central underlying theme of the thesis; the nature of
Deleuze and Guattari's 'Marxism'. I want to emphasise in particular how this is a politics
not of subjects, but of forces, flows, and composition that, as well as showing

214
techniquesand points of departure,is able to live with the 'impossibilities' of the closure
of the political that our capital-permeatedsocietiesseemto haveinduced.

"... in our two different ways, perhaps"

Deleuzehimself only came to Marx in the sixties. He says that he read Marx and
Nietzschetogether(Deleuze1995a:51), and indeed a considerableamount of Deleuze's
work can be seen as a product of this reading. The reterritorialisation of Marx's and
Nietzsche's'untimely' thought (for a 'people to corne') in the most oppressiveof national
socialismsand fully presenthistorical peoples is such that the need to read Marx and
Nietzscheagainst their identities is apparent long before one discusses the details of
Deleuze's empiricist philosophy. Arguably, however, post-war French thought has
largely managedto delink Nietzsche's philosophy from National Socialism. One can
henceseeDeleuzeasa kind of Nietzscheanwithout offending too many sensibilities. Yet
to seeDeleuzeasa Marxist appearsto be more problematic, as if the identity of Marxism
is still too much of a molar attractor. We thus tend to put expressionssuch as 'new',
'unorthodox', 'post-communist' in front of the 'Marxism' that someone like Deleuze
might be pursuing. The sense of the danger of Marxist identity is even marked by
Deleuzehimself, who more than once presentsMarx as a figure of oppressive molar
thoughtand politics (cf. Deleuzeand Parnet 1987: 14). In following Deleuze'srelations
with Marx we are, hence, simultaneouslycompelledto maintain a certain separation. I
would not want to suggestanything else. The necessaryfocus of this thesis should be
seen as an attemptto add to, rather than circumscribe understandingsof Deleuze and
Guattari's politics. To consider a Deleuze-Marxresonanceis not to produce an identity;
to reduceDeleuzeto Marxism. What sucha resonanceshould do, rather,is to explore the
points of connection and complication between Deleuze and Marx. And in doing this,
what we find is that, a little like the way the operaistssought to overcomethe identity of
Marxism by returning to Marx, the Marxism of Deleuzeand Guattari is best seen as a
(in
return a process of repetition and difference)to somecore Marxian problematics.
These two aspectsof a certain distancefrom Marxist identity, and a return to
Marxian problematicsareevidentin the personalrelationsof both Deleuzeand Guattari to
Marxism, and in their reasonsfor self-declarationas Marxists. Deleuzemust be rather
unique in his generationfor never having joined the French Communist Party (even
Foucaulthad a brief stint in the PCF (cf. Macey 1993: 37)), just as he was never in
psychoanalysis;he remainedoutside the two dominant schools of French theoreticaland
political practice, and his direct political practice was never particularly 'practical' (cf.
Guattari 1995a:28-30; Deleuze 1997b). Guattari, on the other hand (no doubt as part of
the "wild rodeo" of his life (Deleuzeand Parnet1987: 11)),had a life-long involvement in
left wing politics, from an early membershipof the PCF, through Trotskyist splinter
groups and then many different post-'68 'groupuscules'; with his base not in the
academy, but in the psychiatric clinic La Borde (cf. Guattari 1995a; Genosko's

215
introduction to Guattari 1996;N: 13-24). It is a combination of thesetwo positions an
-
outside,at most borderingof Marxist politics, and an intensive engagementwith it - that
is perhapsthe basis of Deleuze's comment that he and Guattari were Marxists 'in two
different ways' (N: 171). It is also a useful way to see their Marxism; as somethingthat
operatedboth outside and beyond the identity of Marxism, and within its interstices,
following Guattari's (1996: 88) commentthat "[flor me, Marxism in general has never
existed." But if Deleuzeand Guattari make a deterritorialisationof Marxism, it takes
place on Marx's terrain. There is no post-Marxist shift from the 'economic' to the
'cultural' (indeedtalk of the 'post' (be it -Marxist, -modern, or -political) is inimical to
Deleuzeand Guattari's conceptualapparatuswith its incessant mixture of social and
conceptualmachines(cf. Guattari 1996: 86-7; 1994: 7)). Political thought, Deleuze(N:
171) proposes,must begin from an analysisof the capitalist socius, and it is becauseof
this proposition that he sayshe and Guattari were Marxists (N: 171). Capital, however,
is a dangerousword to brandishin political analysissince it can easily function as one of
those"earplugs", as Donzelot (1979: 73) puts it, which simultaneouslytotalise and close
down the territory of political culture. We should thus be very clear about Deleuzeand
Guattari's understanding.

Capital, the line of flight, and the impossibilities of politics

As I arguedin Chapters5 and 7, capitalism is not a 'thing'. It is a mode of relation, or a
'socius', within which abstractlife is continually reconfigured. If politics is to begin
from analysisof the capitalist socius,it is to begin with the forms of assemblagethat exist
it
within - at both macro and micro levels, for politics is always a situated engagement
with currentlife, not an abstractset of principles, ideals, or utopias . So, to foreground
6capital'is not to close down analysisand politics, but to open it up to the level of the
social and the intimate and complex configuration of life. If this is the first principle of
Deleuze'sMarxism, it is inseparablefrom another proposition; that societies are to be
analysedin termsof, and politics is to be founded upon 'lines of flight'.
The peculiarityof the capitalist socius for Marx and Deleuzeis that it is premised
on flows rather than identities. If all social systemsflee all over the place (ATP: 204),
capital takesthis processas its raison d'&re: it not so much shores up the lines of flight,
asseeksto continually engineermore. At the sametime it needsto composeidentities (or
6axioms')to keep the whole stable, and actualisesurplus value. The capitalist socius is
very efficient at this. As I arguedin Chapter7, value can now be composed from the
most variedof practicesandextremesof radical subjectivity. Thus, whenever 'capital' is
foregroundedin analysis,politics seemsto shrink to an ineffectual margin, in the shadow
of the greatmutantmachine. Certainly, as the operaistssaid in the 1960s , in their very
different readingsof Marx to neo-Gramscianthought, faced with this system of the
'social factory' (and, as I added, 'control'), any understandingof the 'autonomy of the
political' seems at best archaic, and at worst part of the legitimation and technocratic

216
 of the statusquo. Work and non-work, the cultural and the economic, the
management
z:1

biological and the political would seem to have been subsumed in one another -
irrevocably. But with this subsumption, other political positions also look more than a
little problematic. Even countercultural and avant gardist politics can look lack-lustre in
the face of the wealth of innovations and cultural forms of the capitalist work and market
place. Virno (1996b: 191) is perceptive when he writes that it appears today as if
"politics offers a communicative network and a cognitive content that are weaker and
poorer than those to be found within the present-day process of production. [Political]
[a]ction appears as less complex than Work. " It is this recognition that has led Hardt and
Negri (2000) to see the biopolitical labour of the global multitude as the site of political
practice; to look at the flows of life in the global capitalist machine as the site of politics
(as I showed in Chapter 7). 1 would suggest that they are right to do this. The problem
is, however, that in order to avoid any overly-depressing conclusions about the state of
capitalist axiornatisation they produce a kind of inversion of the Gramscian figure with a
certain autonomy, not of 'the political', but of productive forces and the global multitude.
Thus we seem to be poised on the edge of a coming communism in a theory which is not
only a little wilful, but replicates the very real problems of orthodox Marxian thought
where work itself is seen to produce a universal class, and one which would simply
manage its own work'better, once it throws off external productive relations. Zizek's
comment that Empire offers "nothing less than a rewriting of The Communist Manifesto
for our time" (Hardt and Negri 200: flycover) has some pertinence, but not for the right
reasons.
It is precisely at this point of the apparent closure of politics in 'real subsumption'
(of the social processes of production in axiomatic relations, even at sub-individual or
'dividual' levels), that Deleuze and Guattari's prioratisation of cramped minor processes
and the line of flight becomes most pertinent. If the operaists were a little naive in

presenting resistance as primary, the cutting edge of creation in any configuration of

constant and variable capital, they nevertheless articulated something crucial. Politics, as
I showed in Chapter 8, was not the manifestation of a fully present people; in the social
factory there was no autonomous subject of the working class, no plenitude either in or
out of work. But this did not leave politics without a point of departure; quite the reverse.
For the operaists, politics was to be the refusal of the subject of worker across the social
whole, in a process of engagement with the points of innovation, change, and mutation in
the social system. For Deleuze and Guattari, flight is not a product of 'resistance' or
politics alone, but it is the site of political practice. Because there is no autonomous
politics (no neat distinction between politics, and life in general), minor politics seeks not
to delineate pure spheres and territories of 'capitalist' and 'non-capitalist'; rather it seeks
out and tries to affirm the processes of flight that are immanent to the socius as a whole.
No longer is politics a reflection of identity, stability, and radical subjectivity somehow
'outside' capitalist relations, rather, it is a process of engagement with the complexity and

217
becoming throughout and within the capitalist socius, at every moment of the
configurationof life. The problem identified by Deleuzeand Guattari is that the flows
actualisedby the capitalistsocius are immanentlysubject to identity or axiornatisation. I
have made this point already. What I want to focus on now is the generality of this
process,sincethis can show us wherepolitics might commence.
For Marx, this axiomatisation,but also this politics, has a generality through
'work', for work is both the point of participation in manifold capitalist relations, and the
site of exploitation. By our time, work is no longer as easily conceived as it was for
Marx (evenin his time Marx's definition had problematicaspects). A plethora of lines of
flight and axiomshavebeen addedto the capitalistsocius such that Deleuzeand Guattari
(1988: 469) suggestthat "[o]urs is becomingthe age of minorities". Thus, for Deleuze
and Guattari, politics and community do not so much begin from the site of our
conventionalunderstandingof work, as from the axioms of minority identity. As I
argued in Chapter 4, it begins as minorities draw in social intrigues, and compose
themselvesthrough the problematisationsof these intrigues, intensifying their cramped
spaces. However, for Deleuze and Guattari there is also a certain universality to this
process;hencethey align the minor to the proletariat,as its 'universal figure' (ATP: 472).
I have tried to take this suggestionof an alignmentseriously, and have hencesuggested
that a dominant featureof social life is still the 'proletarian' experienceof 'work'. For
DeleuzeandGuattari,every aspectof life is production (cf. for exampleAff: 4), and thus
I arguedthat insofar as production is always axiomatised,it is simultaneouslya form of
work, or a 'Putting to work', even as work needs to be thought in new ways, and
in
understood termsof the maintenanceof the productivity of the social whole rather than
simply the conventional 'realm of production' (as seen in Chapter 7). Thus, if the minor
and the proletariatare 'class' figures, figures of the lines of flight or flows of the capitalist
socius, they are figures which seek to challenge the 'putting to work' of these flows in
axiomatic processes;processes which can still be usefully described as 'work'. For this
reasonI have combinedan understandingof minor and proletarian politics as untimely
figures, with a politics of the 'refusal of work/er', following a sense of Marx's
communism as "the movement which tries to abolish the conditions of life by
deten-nined
wagelabour." (Dauv6,in Dauv6and Martin 1997: 17)
Aspects of this politics were seen in the minor composition of the IWW and
autonomia(Chapters 6,7, and 8). Because of my emphasison the situatednature of
minor proletarianpolitics, neither the IWW nor autonomiawere presentedas 'correct
models' or 'exemplarypractice' that could be repeatedtoday. The importanceof these
groups for our times is the way that they functioned as machines for producing minor
effects,not from sitesof freedom and autonomy, but from sites of closure, in and against
work. They were both able to engagewith the mundane- with questionsof the wage and
work-time, and with the innovative forms identity, and in
- with new of work and worker
this they developed new forms of culture, political technique, and composition,

218
distributing all of this across a milieu that 'warded off' coherent identity. It was not,
0
then, in identity, but in political practice that life was affirmed. Benjamin expressed
something of this process, and the peculiar character of radical politics, when he wrote:
Z

The class struggle,

Z:) which is always present to a historian influenced by Marx, is a
fight for the crude and material things without which no refined and spiritual things
could exist. Nevertheless,it is not in the form of the spoils which fall to the victor
that the latter make their presence felt in the class struggle. They manifest
themselvesin this struggle as courage, humour, cunning, and fortitude. (Benjamin
1992: 246)

These movements were, of course, also inadequate. Though it may seem

counter-intuitive (given Deleuze and Guattari's rightful popularity as philosophers of
affirmation), one of the most important aspectsof Deleuze and Guattari's politics is that it
is a difficult, forever unfinished, and even 'impossible' process. They are not the kind of
thinkers to tell us that everything is all right, that if we become-minor in little autonomous
zones we can leave this world behind (we are always 'cramped' and 'choked' in
impossibilities). Minor politics is at once both a process of little intrigue, cramped space,
and intimate deterritorialisation, and a kind of 'impossible' project of calling forth a 'new
earth' and a 'people to come'. Though this might sound like the kind of slightly
embarrassing utopianism or teleological thought that postmodern thought has sought to
overcome, in Deleuze and Guattari's politics it has a particularly functional effect. Rather
than a deferral of political practice or the affirmation of a teleology, it is a mechanism for
the continual problematisation of any notion that political practice achieves a full
plenitude, that the people to come 'arrive'. By situating politics between the extremes of
a 'missing' people and a 'new earth', minor politics (much like the IWW, which
composed in the space between 'naught' and 'all') seeks to develop an affective condition
(through inclusive disjunction, little intrigues, engagement with the flows of the social)
that is able to live with, even be nourished by its incompleteness, its difficulties, and its
'impossibilities'. Minor politics develops a condition, that is, where Beckett's (1989:
101) formula - "Fail again. Fail better." - is manifest as an aff-innation of life; for it is
only if we are able to affirm experimentation, uncertainty, minor intrigue, even failure,
that we will be able to shift our affective investments away from our self-secure molar
identities.
To come back to Virno's problem of 'incoherence', in this thesis I have tried to
show how Deleuzeand Guattari's minor politics, in relation to Marx's proletariatand the
refusal of work, might indicate a way out. By situating politics at the level of both
t
capitalist axioms and flows, and minority intrigues, techniques, and inventions, this
politics offers a set of political methodologiesand techniquesfor generatingor guiding
political practice. Beyond this, however,minor politics is still a site of the undetermined,

219
for it is an intensiveandexperimentalengagementwith life and its virtualities, amongsta
tP
peoplewho are missing.

220
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