Debating Empire a Edited by GOPAL BALAKRISHNAN ith contributions by Stanley Aronowita, Giovanni Atrighi, Timothy Brennan, Malcolm Bull, Alex Callinicos, Sam Gindin, Tom Mertes, Leo Panitch, Michael Rustin, Sanjay Seth, Charles Tilly and Ellen Meiksins Wood Vv(© hectic Vern 2003 "Kiger ‘Te moa ight of he sth hae ben sete ‘oh Yer en 05 1888 1-85964—452-9 pb) Acalogo ter fr On bat one ron e BA L hay of Congres Caton Pbcion Date Deity sn SA Bee ipeey mee esos Po dee lp Basie, Cl Aon ae, ‘ype 10/125 kei Sep La, Son Walden, Dace ond bund CR Clones Contents Introduction by Goal Balaban 1 Empire: Postmodern Theory of Revolution Michael Rustin 2 The New World Order Stan Aroouits 3. A Nebulous Empire hari Tay 4 Lineages of Empire Gino Argh 5 Back to the Future? Sanjay Seth 6 Gems and Baubles in Empire ‘Leo Pant and Sam Gindin 7 AManiferto for Global Captain? len Meisins Wood 8 You Can't Build a New Society witha Stanley Kite ‘Malin Bt <9 The lallan Heology Tinathy Brennan 19 26 29 8 2 a 8* conrENts| “10 Toni Negri in Perspective ‘Alex Calis 711 Gras-Roots Globalism Tom Mores Notes on Conteibutors Acknowledgements Index re 4 155 187 159 Introduction Gopal Balakrishnan No wort resonates more srongly today than “Empire, the te of 4 lierary sensation that as given a name to an enigmatie totality ‘of money, power and culture. The reception of ths coauthored ‘manifesto already forms an episode of contemporary intellectual history: @ work of omate erudition, profesing communist alle lances, becoming a bestseller in an atmosphere of improbable Iedia fanfare. Since its publication in 2000, i has a attracted a steady stream of reviews, 4 croxssection of which appear in this reader. Delating Emp is a collection of radial responses (0 Michael Harde and Antonio Negt’s bold, synoptic vision of the ‘volatile landscapes ofthe world sytem. Such works re provisional iuminations of a historical proces that appears to unfold in a narrative of decades. I important to keep in mind, then, that the contributory to this reader ate responding to text that was written between the frat Gulf War and the Kosovo intervention, ata time when the world capitals system seemed ‘miraculously heathy and robust, and the relationship between America and the top tier of Eurasian powers more relaxed, The ongoing relevance of Bnpie a6 an interventionist text will depend on the strength of is responses to the sharpest turns of events and ‘Empire bas et che stage fora critique of the matter rhetorcs of| slobalivaion, resuming the work of « Marxist tradition from an taller strategie conjuncture. Prior to its publication, diagnoses from the left seemed to offer ether a bleak scan ofthe historic bostom line, or ~ alternately ~ consolation prizes. At best, theih INTRODUCTION stemainew sender or cfdehson seemed ex combative bat eareyed pina, eiting the mid for 2 Long March again the new scheme of things dh mosphere the eet Sfpcsrnce of Enger has copia’ « evar beak Ie Hardt ant tonto Neg aeany oven the ee tht te lao decades wee tne of pave dfs forthe Ie After yea nig in French ene, Nog rer wo see the intense he rte in Ini thc aly 8 ding te cack dow onthe far nay ng a nme he csboia Fbon i Rome, whee ce Grama hel cae {cum Bit she work he and Har ve wren over ae we presen he Pram tes Fon ee al Funke fom tht hash state ehoning than he gat Empire Is borden that, appearances tote conta) ee 2 "pringie of peopien 8 rll overdoing wih touspe ocr In a period where abers merely cat abou for hey lings Hard nd Neg announce x pollen age ‘be develogs nrg theme'n at aac ay of reget The cllboraion Beween American lnery tee 2nd Kalan pal philsopher has produced s eee a {Pxctl work, af are mage diesel chess ee Sal teerence. Theol, and to tome eet achtecegs Cay Hard and Neg uate themacesn thei ot Dens td Guat Than Plamne Thee mor ely coe oe nary boundaries venting slletions on awsesne elke fconomics wih ceperte of concep doing oy ok tangng ftom the canon af European case phlsophy ce fing of coengey ren mca ee ae si not ose of sgh rm Celine i Metile‘or Robert Stal Hower comtnanne ‘lisions Empresas own terms wor of tien cas ‘The formal constriction of ths text rast a seas of fetes addrenedby Timothy Brenan, whose eonsibaion eas ‘enn ertigqueo mth composing ilo tec ta anagem spay em Ht sag conception of theory as sulags an aeortoent ot Se Buck trom dparate cana wort arranged into dation oe Intel tage, Boag. ln Niches ter ta torical consioune ina saiquvtan, oped ee te. Emp themats the otaos oat ancying ebay INTRODUCTION & ‘eologcal formation that sanctions the declension of polis to mere ructure of feling - revolutionary emoting, ast were In this fashion the harsh realities of modern captaiom and state power ae refracted into hry, enabling figures. Empire is ul rately a Sorelian myth of empowerment, offering consolation to ‘oppositional desire, in place ofa sober political relia "The authors of Empire would cai that every explosive expaa sion of the Anwwn werd fom the early modern conquest of the ‘New Work! 10 the New Times of globalization has sparked ‘outponrings of utopian desire that have scrambled inherited fncellectal schemas, offering new posibiides of asocaton and action. Seen in this ight, their electie genealogies are an atempe to trace the shimmering arc of human agency back to the inaugural moment of modernity ~ the European Renaiseance Hardt and Negri define modernity as an epochal crisis brought fon by the simultaneously liberating and enslving expansion of| the European word, progressively shattering all forms of Ke sanctioned by transcendent authori. Brecht’ Galileo captures the paradigmatic moment in the hitorical narrative of Empire & Renaisance outbreak ofthe will to truth and power, followed by the retoration of a morally threatened ancien regime, During the subsequent volatile centuries of politico-inteliectal civil war, the ominous figure ofthe modern sate crytalizd to contain the shallenge of ths radical secularization, neutralising i through a metaphysics of indivisible sovereignty. The contemporary era of| flobaliation is celebrated in Emre as the hisorie terminus of "his previously immutable political form. ‘Although Harde and Negri open their case by arguing that nationrtatebased sytens of power are rapidly unravelling in the forcefields of world capitalism, globalization cannot be under- Hood as a simple process of deregulating markets Far from withering, avay, regulations today proliferate and interlock 10 form an acephielous supranational order. The term Empie’, as they use i, refers not to a system in which tribute flows from peripheries to great capital cities, but t a more Foucauldian gure ~ a diffuse, anonymous network of allenglabing power. Hard and Negri lsim that the sinew ofthis phantasmie polity its Hows of people, information, and wealth — ate simply too ‘unruly to be monitored from metropolitan control centres. Their account of ts origins adds a few striking nuances to now familarx ENTRODUCTION story, An older stast workd of ruling class and proletariat of dominant core and subject periphery, i breaking down, and in it place a less dichotomous and more intricate pattern. of ine ‘quiliy i emerging. Empire’ could be described se the planeta _pstal of thet flows ant hierarchies. “The historical sociologist Giovanai Arighi maintains that there fs no evidence for the caim that the awesome material gap Dbenseen the atfiwent core and dependent peripheries of world capitalism dating from the colonial era is ow closing In a concie ‘iif, Charles Tilly goes further, dismissing Enpireas a speculative caricature of the real world of power, money and mobili. Is ‘central claims, he ini, are ether unfasiiale o fale Indeed itis often hard to separate and test individual theses of this work, apart from the imposing lam of the whole. Hardt and [Negri maintain that the loge of this volatile totality evades and transgrenes all the inherited divisions of political thought: sate and sociesy, war and peace, contol and freedom, as well as core tnd periphery; even the distinction between systemic and ant "pstemic agency is blurred heyond recognition. The advent ofthis Empire i thus not merely a momentous episode in world history, i is an event of considerable ontological importance, heralded haere in the voice of impassioned prophecy. ‘The rupture in the history of capital that the authors announce invites inevitable comparkons to Marxist analyse fom the beginning of the last centary~ most notably Lenin’ attempt to compore'a general picture of the world capitalist system init international relationships at the beginning ofthe 20th century = fn the eve of the imperialist world war’. Lenin's pamphlet por trayed a process of market competion generating monopolies controlled by banks, locked into a frenmied struggle to secure Jnvesement opportuities in foreign raw: materials, railways and public debt, eventually ctalating into strugeles for exclusive spheres of influence and inevitable wars forthe redvision of the ‘ort luerave spheres. Lenin portrayed imperialism as the latest phase of capitalism, beyond which there could be others, unless the entire stem were overtumed in a world revolution. According to Hardt and Negri, the historic result of the file ofthe Inter enterprise is Empire ~ the las instance of a succesful restructuring of eapita ism under the impact of war and rebellion, They insist that = INTRODUCTION x ee ee at renee a ee po ame oem ba cna oe ee ee eres sing poe fer mpi er But i would be implausible wo suggest that the authors of Empire have simply spun out a new version of a shop worn lobalzaion shetoric, The latter characteriscally euphemines the reaties ofthe world market with the vfefocus notion of cv society. Hard and Negri by contas, cooly dismiss the claim that feven the most blameless NGOs are agencies of 2 global cil ‘ociesy pitted agsint the established powers. Rather they can be ‘compared to the Dominicans and Jessits of Ite feudal soce, functioning as ‘the charitable campaigns and mendicant orders of Empire’ Mediastaged crusades by Amnesty Intemational or Médecins sane Frontieres ply an essential role in mobilizing public opinion behind humanitarian interventionism. Te is no Surprise that Hardt and Nege'serque of interventionist jargon relies heavily oa the writings of Car} Schmit “The tradional concept of jus ar involves the baallation of war eas tit mstera political thought and the ineational communi of maconstates ese ened. These wo tational characterisai INTRODUCTION ave reappeared in ctr pstmosern word... Today the enemy, jt lke war hal, comes to be a ance banaied(eeaced to an get of routine pie sppresion) and absolute (a the Enemy an abso- Tate thet othe tcl order). One of the paradoxes of Empire is that it set into motion & reversal ofthe proces of secularization that defined dhe modern cra, Ici & world order in perpetual hot pursuit of absolute enemie: errors, Islamic fundamentals and rogue nationalist, regimes are the targets ofits eniading fury. Empire is, i legal terms, engulfed in a ‘permanent state of emergency and excep- tion justified by the appeal to essential value’ Although powerful and succinct, this formulation i dfbeule wo reconcile with Harde And Negri’ insistence that Empire is @ coherent constttional Structure, a selFenclosed legal sistem of the sort imagined by Hans Kelsen. A constitution engulfed in a permanent sate of ‘exception cannot form a selfenclosd legal system, and, i fet, ‘only nominally a juridical order. The ambiguities of Empire on this poine are symptomati: many of che insiaions thats loomed large atthe end of the Cold War and appeared to form the architecture of « New World order under Washington over. right ~ mott importantly the United Nations and NATO ~ are faltering under the hammer blows of American power. ‘According to Ellen Wood, Enpir's globalization paradigm cannot aecount for the indispensable role of territorial orga laed state power inthe reproduction of capitalist social relations ‘The sovereign monopoly of domestic violence is simultaneously incered in an anarchic interstate tem that embraces and holds the world market in place. Although the anarchy ofthis geopolie ical field fas been contained for half x century by the wltimate Sovereignty of the American state, the latter is now plying this role in an increasingly destabilizing fashion, ‘But Harde and Negri do not always seem to accept the claim ‘dar Empire has to be seen as the manifestation of the unfolding logic of capital. For the politcal order the portray has a universal imision of pacification comparable to those Empires of the past that strove to embrace the Known word, Virgil is cited to convey the sheer magnitude ofthe change. "The final age thatthe oracle foretold has arrived: the great order of the centuries is born again’ While Hard and Negri discern a clean break between tht INTRODUCTION si system and the state-based coloniaiams that preceded it, they place great stork in more ancient genealogies of this postmodern Empire. Those who want to understand the new universe should look tothe writings of Polybins who sought to explain to stpefied| ‘contemporaries how itwa that Rome bad risen to become master fof the Mediterranean world, Polyius held that Rome had tra scended the unstable eyelet of the casical poli, because is ‘constiition mixed monarchy, aritocracy and democracy in pro- portions that checked the degenerative potendal inherent in ‘any unalloyed form of government. Hardt and Negri argue that the new world order can be envitaged as an analogous struc lure, ia which US nuslear supremacy represents the monarchicl Principle, the economic wealth of the C8 and «ranenational Corporations the aristocrat principle, and the internet the democratic principle ~ Bomb, Money and Ether composing the contemporary version of the constinudon ofthe Roman Republic, ‘on the morrow of ts defeat of Carthage. But if this use of Plsbiss suggests an Empire at the threshold of centuries of ascendancy, ‘other lasseal allusions ~ Montesquieu or Gibbon ~ suggest simpy eclipse or decline: wopes not just of universal order, but of decadence, wansvaluation and grumbling limes. In this register, “Hard and Negr ken potenil revolutionaries of today to Crit tians of the later Roman Empire, witnessing the inexorable hallowing out of the terrestrial order of things andthe beyinnings fof anew, rejuvenating era of barbarian migrations. Parallels wth the Ancient World, central tthe shetorieal suategy of Empire, ‘oscilate between alternative meaninge: do they point to the rising ‘oF the falling forsnes of global capitalism? (Overall, che book suggests the later. Empite, its author insist, dl not emerge out of the defeat of sjstemic challenges to capital (On the contzary, is existence stands asa resounding, i paradox cal, trtimony to the heroic mats struggles that shatered the Eurocentric old regime of national states and colonialism. But the project of Third World revolutionary nationalism ~ although driven by emulation of the metropolitan core ~ simultaneously presupposed an antisitemic exit option from the world market. [Ara generalization, i could be sid thatthe accelerated erosion fof the peasantry as an object of modernization signals the end of| an era of subalten nationalisms, asthe annexation of the space ‘tae the world market moves to completion.a INTRODUCTION atin sharp contrat to the theo of postcolonial condion, so alto change nadonal narattesofsfdetenmnaton, the Iethore of Emforr mina thatthe homopeniting fictions of toreregn nationhood cannot be countered with polls of tall difference. For mere heterogloaia or hyridation eet to aleratie: the Keology of Empire has become 3 supple, tmulcultral aesthetic that deactater the reoluionay pos Uilies of otalzalon. Far from being eppostional, academic cnthisias for dersy arcuate the ince logic of spon tancour order at no longer depends upon a metphys o tatual ilerence aed herarey. Dieting Gea chi ew, Sniny Seth anges Gat tis rejection ofthe portcolonalcrtque of Burocentom tener te efface the awtosteicageaces tthe culral margins of Empire Raning through te work is the fervent bee that contem- porn caplallayakboughseeiogy tnperous wo andeptomi {allege isin ft alnerabe at al poins to rot and rebellion. ‘The nerenaing importance of tame, tvlecal labour tn bigheaueaded sectors ofthe economy i shaping a collective labourer wit heightened powers of aubrerson But inorder to ste the potential conbaciig of His multiarious proletariat, {eo Panich and Sam Gindich inst tat shaper picture ected of conpetllordrivenInouation in nance, ucknology Sd polical regulation that are reshaping the world of labour. Athough warmly congratulating the realuionary spit of the work, bat set that Empr'tosing sion othe Amer an worker eat pint he way out fo the imprisoned by the ‘Ameen dream Diegrding the formidable atomizing power of capt at work actos the ene range of working clas experience, Empespeaks Of an ieradcabl plebelan dere for emancpaion stoked Wythe increasingly apparent malleaiyofall oil elaonships and the permesity of al borer. The global mule, embracing Al chore who wort rare us poor, om compute cents Talo Ato wo sumer n So Palo, forms class hat, nts very quotidian mode of cxntence, te somnchow evohionary. ‘What historic experience her behind these counterintine auertons? Around the mideeventes Negi cae to the con Glsion thatthe facut working ca ano longer an agent of socal evolution, Out of + mounting url frusraton i INTRODUCTION ~ the face of deadlocked class struggles, he drew an innovative re reading of Marx's Grandi that dissolved any hard proletarian Cone into a broader pool of the dispossesed and disaffected. The fate, he contended, weve just a essential (0 the reproetion of ‘apt, and more prone to volatile upsurges. His prediction that {Tew weil worker was taking shape, although more atuned t0 fealty than certain Marxist orthodoxies ofthe time, ao encour eed a flight forward into a conception of revolutionary strategy fr siolene test of strength with the state. The failure of this ‘tempt to wansform the poor into proletarian and proletarians nto # liberation army’ did not Jead Negri down the path of Fesignation, What seems to have happened instead is that he ‘centuatly came to a residual conception of polities as a strategie field. In the age of Empire, revolutionaries no longer need to Cstinguish tactics and erstegy, postion and manoeuvre, weak links and invulnerable ones; they can now rely on & pervasive if ‘fare, popular desie for Hberalon and an episodic inition of friend ancl enemy. ‘Alex Calincos provides a critical reconstruction of Negn's career ata leading figure and theoredcian of the Italian Auton- ‘Sis movement. Callinicos diagnoses what he ses asthe strategie Ipopia ofthis most militant wing ofthe Halian Far Let stew hen into file and lately tl cashes withthe stat, the Communist Party aid the unions. Neg's rejection ofthe organ- ‘eed working cass in favour of those on the margins of the Labour market as the new subject of revolutionary pobiies found its ‘apresion in a conception of capitalism devoid of objective flelopmental tendencies. Callnicos maintains that i is impetse tive for lays renascent and boisterous radical scene 10 take a hhasder look at this legacy. Emr in his view, has an obsious “appeal in a milieu where paralyzing cynicism has been banishes dt often at the expense of the ability co make a dispassionate liscament of the balance of frees at lege let alone conceive of & path to power. ‘While ler class and ational Uberation struggles sent long: lasing shock waves across the interstate system, in the optic of Enpoe contemporary intfadss are of brief duration, medi dependent, and do not fan out across national, let alone global, ‘notlds of labour ls this celebrated age of communication, stg [es have become all but incommunicable. Such a penetratingws INTRODUCTION and sombre image of serialized outbursts of clas anger warrants indepth treatment. Undaunted by the sheer difcaly of ever imagining the condiions under which largescae clas solidaiies could reemenge, the authors simply discount i€ a a problem They suggest that such concems are irclevant to rebelions against the Empire that even now effectively capitalize on the ‘mbolic logic oF postmoder politic. In this alternaune space, vworld history unfold asa sequence of nearly magical serendipr Ses. For happily, although local sugges no longer uigger off horizontal, upwardly spiraling revolutionary sequences, they can ‘how immediatly catapult up to the global level as unforescen ‘media event By this more ditect vertical toute, the virtual centre ‘of Empire can be atacked a any point. For just because Empire is a medasteeted system of politcal publicity, iis permanently vulnerable to the impact of destabili: ing, marginal events that slip out of the contol of thore who manufacture consent, Empire ia society of the spectacle, seem ingly pomered by the puraut of happiness ~ but in reality based ‘on the mobilization of desires that are intimately wedded to th fear of file, excision and lonelines: This isthe polities ofthe he epectale in which the mates seek only the most immediate experiences of empowerment and agency, even if these ate only ever episodic This desire fr individual power and yecuity, inthe judgement of Michael Rosin, is the antithesis of that structure of feeling Which sustains the slidaries of the multitude, and ici dificult to see by what dialectic the former capsizes into the later, The future of Empire, he suggest, is much darker than Hard and [Neg acknowledge ~ more Hobbesan than Spinoctt. Intrigu: ingly, Hardt and Negri suggest chat this spectral social order, surtained by fale promises, void for the future ~ an abstractly framed moment when a great refusal suddenly becomes posible The thetoric ofthe text attempts to slot itself ito the narrane fa poutible event. la an excurus on Machiavelli they maintain that the time has come to compose great manifesoes that pry ‘open an empy space for transformative intervention and beckon the mulitude lo surge through. Taking their eve fom Aluser, they reason that Machiavelli invoked the masses in the transcend cent form of an ideal prince, because he assumed that collecixe ction could only be imagined inthe mediated form of singular society of INTRODUCTION sii agent but the task now sto demystify these osfed mediations~ Teaders, parties and unions ~ and reclaim their aluconded power forthe mulstide ‘Stanley Aronowitz i sceptical that thi defiant abstentionism ‘could be empowering, Motile networks of counter-Empire mil tants have found powesfil alsin organied labor, and il ind ‘acy more in the rank and file ofa reactivated union movement. Developing this Hine oferta, Tom Mertes quettions Michael iar verdicts on the World Socal Forum held inthe spring of| 2002 in the Brazilian cty of Port Alegre. The drastic erosion of public power no eatse for celebration amongst those struggling {o mioblize the dspostesed of the neoliberal era, Even as they reach out beyond the ternin of the nationstate in an arduous effort at consicting global soidartes, the variance in the collective experience of activins, operating in the qualcatively distinct zones of world capitalism, presents the decisive problem Toran effective antteaptalist poles, This problem is thovoughly sffaced in Hart's vision of elforless resistance in a stateless flobal order, But to tx the authors with vexing questions of seategy might perhaps be unfair ~ a category mistake with regard to gente. ‘Timotby Brennan's aigestion that Harde and Negi have con stricted a Soreian mth underscores the propheti apirations of Empire. Indeed a line from Spinoza encapenlates the goal of the book: the prophet creates his own people, But Machiaeli’s thoughts on prophecy surkea diferent note ~ one largely absent fn this text far from the comforts of a liberation theology, old Teams he considered tha there noting more dic teary ou hor moce double acces, nor more dangerous to handle than inate new order of things For the reformer as ax enemy in all those who prt bythe od der, and only aka defenders in all hove who woul prot rom the new order, thi ukevarmnes arising art ror fen of tei adveranien who ave the asin thee Er int party fom the sncedulty of mankind eho do at bebeve i Syhing sew uns they have Rad actual experienc of i We scarcely need to be reminded of the concision: all armed prophets have conquered, and unarmed ones filed, Th the 1970s, Negi might have understood this passage atil INTRODUCTION clarion call for frontal collisions with the state, Decades Inter, Empire offers by contrat an optimism of the will that ean only be ‘stained by a millenarian erasure ofthe distinction betmeen the anmed and the unarmed, the powerful andthe abjecty powerless. From an ironialy indeterminate polial standpoint, fee of any conventional progresve allegiances, Malcolm Bull challenges Empn’s account of the constituent power of dhe multitude for ie Inability to take cognizance of the reality of powerlessness. To ‘heir Spinoxist notion of a boundless capaciy ta form and reform the orter of human things, Bull counterposes a disconcerting ethic of unobirusie mutuality, beyond phantasies of victorious ‘empowerment What in the real world could Hardt and Negti point was ‘confirmation of the primal power of the seemingly helples: ‘multaude? The answer comes into view only near the end ofthe ‘work: Empire, scemingly in contro evenhere, i unable to bridle the planetary flow of workers seeking jobs and a better life in ich ‘countries. Reshaping social relations everywhere, immigration on this scale reveal, in their view, both the hostility of the multitude to the stem of national borders and its tenacious desire for ‘cosmopolitan freedom, This image of insurgent power as exodie conjoin the history of resistance that overturned New World slavery with the more recent experience of the collapse of the Soviet bloc. Although string as an emblem of agency, upon lover examination i dissolves into the ge drives contemporary iamigraton. In Keeping with ie ontologieal background, Empire docs not Aevelop any sustained programme forthe injured and insulted of the world. Logically, however, its most disnctve proposal (the right to a guaranteed basi income occupies second place) i for abolition ofall immigration controls: papers pour tus! For Hardt tnd Negi, this it a demand that opens up he possiblity of rejuvenating the politically stagnane core of global capitalism. But the desire to live, work and raise families in more affluent lands arguably finds its tue manifesto in the inscription at the foot of the Satue of Libery, holding out the promise of entirely prosaic freedoms, But while Hardt and Negri dosmplay the mailed ft ofthe US. in the global arena, they grant America a more grating centrale ity at a laboratory of domestie politcal innovation. AS they see i, survival ethic that INTRODUCTION we both the thesis and the ansthess of Empire lie inthe inclusive, expansive republicanism of the US Consitition, whic Tong ago ‘Shed the European fetish of a homogeneous nation, Their com Ception of the Constution as the orginal sxipe of democratic Selidetermination is perhaps farfetched no modern charter can Thval t for protecting wealth and prilege from the caprice of Clecoraes, Yeti is arguably not the jure form that is being ‘eserbed, but rather another myth. Hegel anticipated its basic structare of feeling = “America i the country of the future, and its world historical importance has yet to be revealed in the ages which le ahead... [ei the land of desire for all those who are Weary of the historical arsenal of old Burope™ In an era that, ‘extends from Tocqueville to Gramsci, American ascendancy could te plausibly linked to the retreat of old Europe before amenacing alternately liberating ~ revolt ofthe maste. Indeed its Bolshevik fenemy “heard the siren song of Americanism most cleary. The Challenge was 10 replicate the results of the capitalism that ad tchieved ite pinnacle in the United Stes’, During the second ha ofthe last century, America lon its pizmacy as the and ofthe most advanced forces of production, aid descended 10 the level ‘ofits competitors in the OECD zone: what now explains its ill Teslent status a the hegemonic exemplar of western capitalism? ‘A lliay hyperpower, a model ofboth unalloyed capitalism and ‘multicultural accommodation, a mast culture with neaely univer fal appeal ~ these are the elements of an organic formula of Inegemony that will be tested ia the coming years, Empire is a bold attempt to capture the latest phase af is development, and ‘an opportunity to resist older waditions, and rediscover their [coaliy. A question from Gramtel pinpoints the stakes of the ‘contention surrounding the work “The question {i} whether Americanism can consite an historical ‘pod, that fs wheter ican determine a gradual evolution ofthe ive reolton” peal of the bt century, of whether on the ier hand i des not spy represen the molecular aecumacion ‘laments deine oprece an ‘explain onthe each patternEmpire A Postmodern Theory of Revolution Michael Rustin [Ata time when globalization has become an increasing focus for poliical movements of different Kinds ~ effervescent demon ‘trations in th cities where congreses take place, and sustained ‘campaigns for international agreements on debt or climate change itis ioificant that a major treatise has appeared which aternps to give a coherent theoretical shape to global conflicts. Bpie by Michael Hardt and Antonio Neg is arate thing in the present age, 4 sstematie treatiee in political theory which sets out an rgumentfor revolution’ Much ofitsinterestis in iasptemaiciy “whether oF ot one agrees with it pilosophiva presuppostions, ‘or with its sociorhistorieal analysis is invaluable to see sch 3 fngument being constricted from frst principles, Just as liberal Philosophers lke Rawls or Novick have et out systematic politica philosophies from thei foundational principles of individual igh And freedom, ao Hardt and Negri have sought wo find systematic ‘grounds for their utopian conception of revolution. For this they hhave looked to construct an ambitious poreMarcst smthesis of ideas whore most important single source isthe work of Delewze and Guatan, but which drawsalso on ‘republican’ political theory. Foucault, Spinoza and Mars, among other sources. Emp etal» lishes a systematic and grounded argument fora transformative view of the present hiorical situation, from a revoluonary pr spective, and one does not have to agree with st argument t0 ecognize itas a landmark in contemporary poiial theory.2 DEBATING EMPIRE What is “Empire'? This complex idea ie Hardt and Negr's summation ofthe present sate of wotld historical development, in terms ofits jstem of governance, it mode of production, is forms of socialization and subjecdve identiy, and its porenials for transformation. Harde and Negri share with ~ indeed take from ~ Hegel and Marx a teleologial theory of histrical develop ‘ment, in which each neve stage of evolution creates the potential fora fuller expression of human potential. They also share with Marx the idea that eansitions from one rage of development 19 another are likely tbe explosive, occasioned by etises and sudden transformations in popular consciousness, Marx ‘explained this proces largely by reference to the development of the means of production, andthe overcoming of scarcity hat this rade posible. The advance of capitalist forms of production across the globe was a transitional stage for Mark in the later emergence of socialist forms of life. Hardt and Negri analysis also gives priority to the global difsion of capitalism, but they are less interested in is material than in ite political, juridical, ‘ultra and subjective dimensions, Where for Marx the and eventual reclamation of uma productive powers were principal sae, for Hardt and Neg the political and subjective simensions of the appropriation of umn powety i at Fast as important, Hare and Negu’s thinking has been shaped by Foucault and by Deleuze and Guatas as well as by Marxist political economy and they give a5 much attention to changing forms of government tality as to changing forme of production, "The space of imperial sovereignty’, they argue, is smooth’. What they mean by thi s that the vatious boundaries and barriers, not least those of| national sovereigntes, are being swept away by global capital, This creation of ‘one world, with no “ouside, as they put i, ‘creates a potentially unified space in which the liberation of “the ‘multitude’ by its own action becomes posible. Harde and Negri seem more anarchist than Marx in their identification ‘of kovernmental powers, not economic exploitation, as the main ‘obstacles to hurman iberation. “Empire alo signifies an emergent form of global governance, bus we wil consider this ater. ‘They bring together in their analysis of Empire a number of diferent “dicourtes? From neoMarsst political economy it Drought an analss ofthe post Fords, postindustial revolution. MICHAEL RUSTIN 3 ‘The lose of hegemony of india! production, and its partial supercession by an economy based on information and affect, i, Inthe authors view, ransforming the labour process and creating ‘much greater potential for mast resistance, and forthe reappro- Deaton of their own labour power by citizens, chan was posible Within the previous industrial regime. The argument eve is that thea durase of much mies pion, F process, and sgh on affect (the later arising from the increased weight of actives “Tocised-on health, education, social care in the post modern ex), Tapaher wi the Teeny Coastaiie of Ue ad Spnce central to glabalinta er Teac Nes vow “s ew peoleariat the siti competing multude”* ‘A second strand of Hardt and Negt's argument derives from ths hey ofthe sate. Although she autos ast hat the ast liberi the sare "ecm anon Mos roto in if view, alienate the autonom} of subjects and ctsh-sheis “trai powcr They devclop« historical argument shih ene Ties radical and conservative pole in Enlightenment thinking and ‘explains how the radical end of this anithesi ~ revoktionary Thumanism’~ was defeated, with die consequences for collective selfdetermination. “The revoluson of European suaderity into ie Thermidor:* Enlightenment thus iniated not popular elle, ut fmt a weneignty external fo andoiher than the in whose fame sovereign states claimed to gover, ‘Wines aF Wanscendence merely Wanstefred authority fom one tisplaced abstraction ~ God ~to another ~ Man, The enind-body spl insiuted by Descartes defeated, in terme of influence, the imamanentst doctrine of Spinoza, and this Ted to anodher dammag- ‘ng Kind of alienation. The Tits empiricist tradition, with Hobbes av its centre, was particularly lethal in its consequences for the idea of creative self rile, since t posited the necessity for the delegation of human powers forthe preseration of peace and security, Subsequent niigations of the extremity of thie position, ia Lockean theories of constutional government con: Strained by the natral rights of citizens, and later in che theory4 DEBATING EMPIRE and practice of representative democracy, didnot in Hardt and NNegt's view repair the fundamental flaws of this view of sover feigny, whose essence is that subjects are ruled and do not rule themeches ‘Empire brings together with this philosophical critique of so¥- excigny a Foucauldian argument concerning the changes in & forms of power and control which have been exercaed over society Foucault i one of the most important influences on Hardt and Negri’s work ~ they cast much of their historical analysis in terms ofa genealogy’ of present formations. They take from Foucault in pardcular the idea of ‘a historical, epochal pasage in social forms from discipinay soiay tthe society of ¢ontal® Diseiplinary society is constructed through ‘apparatuses ‘that produce and regulate customs, habits and productive prac tices This work of contol is accomplished through disciplinary insicuions such as ‘the prison, the factory, the asym, the hospital, he university, the schoo! an! x0 fort. They argue that thie paradigm of power ruled tiroughout the fir phase of apitalig sccumilation. By contrast, the society of control one ‘which develops atthe far edge of modemity and opens towards the postmodern” and is one in which ‘mechanisms of command ‘become ever more “democratic”, eter more immanent to the socal field’. Social control becomes interiorized within subjects themselves. Its exercised direc on the minds and bodies of subjects, through information sstems and wellare practices? I thus extends well outside “the structured sites of social insti tutions into the fabric of everyday life. This amounts to a form of "biopower’ that cegulates Ife rom the interior of subject, a power which they ‘embrace and reactivate’ fom their ow second ‘There is parallel ~ indeed a fusion = between the ‘vital! and ‘immanent’ properties of labour in the postindustal econ- fom, and the “interiorzed’ forms of conttal of the new kind of sovernmentality Hardt and Negri are describing «destruction or ‘compression of many previous differences and boundaries, Their description of this process is hardly precise ~ "the increasingly intense relationship of mutual implication of all social frees that capitals has pursbed throughout ie development has now been fully realised, Bn whereas erher Marxist wrtere sch a8 those of the Frankfurt School equated this ‘real subsumption of labour MICHAEL RUSTIN 5 under capita’ as a oneimensional and potentially totalitarian process, Hardt and Negi, drawing on Foucault, ake a contrary lind more postive view of it “Cal sociery is absorbed in the state but the consequence ofthis isan explosion of te elements that were previously coordinated and mediated in cil society. Calling fon Deleuze and Guattan, they argue that “resitances are no Tonger marginal but active in the centre of society that opens ‘up in networks; the individual points are singulaised in a dhow Sand plateaus’ The idea thatthe subjectvzation of power, and the virtualization of production, ceates the opportuni ‘nds of immanent resistance, connecting wipreditably and with ough the ‘shigames of pexwork society, the essential bast of Hardt and Negr's revolutionary optimism. fone puts their account inthe framework of complesty theory.” they model a complex but inherently increasingly unstable stem, ‘which has the potential to up suddenly from one alienated kind Df equilibrium of contol toa different potential for iberation. ‘Theis synthesis ofa theory of changing forms of governmental ity and sovereignty with their analysis of postindustral capitalism, allows them ta see Fmpire as both a new system of powerselations, land a highly vulnerable one. In the later more apocalyptic Sections ofthe hook, Empire is described aa parasitic formation, ‘whose supercesson ata global regime only awaits che awakening (Of the multitude to recognition of thei immanent powers. But, in eather chapters, the idea of Empire is elaborated in more positive terms, at an immanent emergent concept of global osernance'" Enpie was writen, ate authors expla, after the Gulf War and Before the Kosovo War. Its authors Convinced themselves in that context that wars could now be waged only on behalf of some version of universal right ane that in this sense some kind of global polity had already become fact! They Aistinguish their concept of "Empire’ ax a universal polity, from the Buropean colonial empires, and ftom those respects in which the curemt work, dominated by the US, sl resembles a conven tional empire.” The dlifereace between ‘Empire’ in their new sense, and the Eutopean empires, i that the European empires ‘defined themseives in relation tothe “other and inferior peoples ‘whom they subjugated, and were also of course in competition Iwith one another. The emerging ‘global’ Empire has no ‘other’ Just as captaliom as Marx predicted is now incorporating the6 DEBATING EMPIRE ire globe into ia stems, so the global pty is becoming Similar inchae- In their own way art ad Neg shar the New of efender of global apa nich a Francis FUR Thr he end of history has now avd snc nthe vew ter ip nom nth ican tht le mde WE SEGRE Tas oF prosvcion ane grerance “fot as wit the inenal order of sates Hardt and Negs diningish betcen alienating forms of sovereign, and rev ttoeary bunaria der vaich premppencs gorcemeat a 8 procs of selvelaon, so they dash Between tro {ions ofinemadonal ovemance, One =the order af wreregn Sionstates promulgated ite Tray of Wenpala of 1618 — Cenfines sovereignty onthin stucued terri domains. The cnet the len af perpetual pene defined y Kats imagines Grivel order gotensd by Common nora and citing stich moray overs the ci of soereign government They tiyve ihr ts lanereoncepion is beginning e become a Fay Sh comsequence of unied global economic ode, and ofthe ratenng and mal imerdependence of ind ato Sate in the face of probleme which confront them all Ther Dontion recall ti argument of wntere such at avid Hel! ho have dae tenn tothe vat inerease in tergovernme th enanizations and treats in recent eam and tod incensed ‘oy af inerasonal av, evidence at a new era of global fovemance i downing Hardt and Noga atach considerable {portance wo the United Nations, awed hough itis to the role cf romgoversental organizations (NGOs), and tthe deoey Sd price of ntratoal juan making tect They pcre an uncoevacngy my Seepon fhe sige nest ofthe consttonal bao the United Sates to otf the Siw thatthe hegemony ofthe US today is diferent fom that of Envir empire Tu costintion i they clan, expense aad Sichuivertather than resictve and exclane Ta idea of a Talance of eonstniional power which they compare wth the Ine of eontaonal Balance which Plo seme in iene Rome, fa them to aance the US Republic aa fom af pstsvereign government in hich the mulatade expeses its power through diferent consing an complementary agen Gir he fedenl principe an the famous separation of poe) St does noc utente av delegte them towome apa ah MICHAEL RUSTIN 7 other entity. This seems, asa description of current conupted and plutocraie US consintional practice, quite preposterous ‘Although there are some parallels between Hardt and Nege's account of the emerging global order, and those of liberal Internationals such a¥ Giddens and Held, they dferentiate their own postion from that more mebiorit one. Whereas the liberal tradition looks forward to a regulated sstem of sovereign tie all subject tothe sway of some wniversal juridical and ethical principles, Hardeand Negei hold the door open to a more total {pstemransformation, between what one might callacrullyexit ing Empire aud poscEmpire. The global dfusion of information, and the reposiesson of powers by subjects within the new systems ff non-material production and internalized regulation, create the possibly for new kinds of resistance and indeed uprising. ‘They draw a striking analogue between the wansformation of the Lunversal aspiration of the ancient Roman Empire to conseute Ll ofthe civilized world into the universalist and inclusive claims fof Chrisianty for equality before God (of all believers, one ‘Should add) and what might now be possible in terms of mobil ‘ation within the emergent order of global Empire. To pu this in fan older terminology, the multitude, which ie being constituted ty the global capitalist world order asa clas in itself, can now seize the mmosent to assert ielf af class for ile. Hardt and [Negh's view thatthe erosion of traditional forms of meckation and boundary (those of state sovereignty, for example) constitute ‘opportunities for new forms of collective reognition and mobil ation make them emphatically repudiate any form of radical politics that looks backwards historically, even to past moment of Telatve succes. They reject any politics based on nostalgia for lier compromises, for example those achieved within national tvelfare states ‘They share with the postsocialiss of the "Third ‘Way’ the view that we now have to aceept 2 new individual slobalized, networked socieg asthe only esses re Seton, though the action Wey envisge W apozaypile where The elo stsocialists seek only to mitigate anc Tate some ‘hat ke lore or pel capa to whch ey coange ho conceivable alternative8 DEBATING EMPIRE ‘The politics of Empire How should we ste hs ibhiow account or suton, and ‘hat conclsions can we dr fom i sega to quot of gene Hadad Noge’s excpon of te major weds of ‘scopes of bah the capa economy, and of fs major forme of gvemance, pohly im sczord th uch caret thaip of globaiaton. Sie beeen comomic stor te dtmnant ste of the information eeanomy, the sajectiton” ie, not ew hough te acne of fonsumpton, ed the issanang sates Yoo or nn ES idadngsogepoded by eons a cose eae coe ees nes wren eee 1 ented stent ein sheer [pee eer eer | kinds, the global flows of information, people, commodities, et. [eee eee Sis epee ear renee ee {resed nota creaive and cooperaive mld boty sg cine mow oe “Although Harde and Negi do pose the problematic of the transformation of Empice in amevbat taba tems intel ‘socaions of» unineral proktarat and ‘common multitude’, therein coniradcion between their pouMars, ttt some ¥ays traditional, formulation of directional change, and the forms of socal action to which eheir analysis actually point, MICHAEL RUSTIN 9 Atthough they pot & potenti ity of the sbi he trample of alial acon which they ce are anjhing but Citar Melle's Barly, Caetce's Michael the Inter ntionl Workers of the World (IWW), myriad relies an ‘migrant burr, St Franco Ass and Se Augustine ae igure ‘tho haelitle in common except being inxaners of consent (or preg) acti, sme maces the scvty ony of Jaasve tenance or tae ara Hrd and Negi ate hase to Mi consid limits to. human acon = to the princple of Shor tel and follows ha any pot movement hich ‘ean to conse el ava postive programme, wih tx own carbonic itaons, would come deeply eleconraditry in theiroy “Thee is a kind of social action which doe fellow fom his description f sce selFactiveselFonaiing ten neg Ste highly compethve, driven bythe dese Fore expeson fn power The B2gearald graduate who seep his own com ‘pet busines Sion Valley ay Te much an exemplar of “hsspirc a the NGO worker oping to preset famine, though thine are diferent Some change nthe pstndefn word Ss inde! trasmited by thea hisnmat! means, by netor, fd te vue replaion and muon of tide of actions Crude ihe control toma srctnes and Werar his Thi ¢Revocilogia truth of Hardt and Negri account The poll appeal of ir analy natural conimeney sf ger, ao {focal by ei’ nt aro fo and noe yoy to vestricion and rearatt, nt to the woul-be builders of new Sjtams and sutures, Ciba apa tas been the ringer of tTisconitn freedom. Kis this which has created aginst he pinion of sovereign dh ‘sooth space hich di ted mobili become gencial Shion Me Tar and Neg ‘ie anon to eatin, and ow could the baundanytee ‘pace wich they celebrate ave without i? ‘The question of human nature (One issue in coming to conclusions about the consequences of the loss of boundaries i the contribution vehich the inate features of human nature make to social arrangements, Hardt and Negti tke a postmodern view of his question, arguing that0 DEBATING EMPIRE human nature a legacy of modem ‘dualisms’ which posrlated| ‘outsides’ to human freedom in oder o justify imposing Hits it Although they may therefore regard the idea of human dom and creative possibility, human beinge will construct ‘cooperative and expresive world. The fact that people have not ways acted in thi spirit i not to be explained by inherent ambivalence in the innate human impuss, but by defective, alien ating and exploitative social arrangements, "Man is born free, but everywhere isin chaine’ would be one way of pting their underlying assumption. ‘Consider in thie connection Hardt and Negs’s challenging account of the Thermidorian defeat of revolutionary humanist in the early year of the Enlightenment. (Thisis one of the many fertile avenues for thought opened up by ths book) Hardt and [Negri seek to rescue the revolutionary tradition of epablican se determination, closely linked with Machiavelli, from neglet, and from is customary subordination to portvstic theories of law and sovereignty.” They do not, however, ask why this defeat took place, and why the arguments of the Hobbesian tradition (or of defences of the state in other taditions, such as that of Hegel) Ihave in fet proved so historically effective Mars offer one persuasive explanation of why these succes sive defeats of universal aspirations, embodied inthe experience of succesive emergent social clases, had taken place. is expla nation focused on the effects of sarc, in making unavoidable the appropriation of the means of prosiction by the collective seltintertof clases, rather than by humanity asa whole, Thus, ‘once scarcity had been overcome bythe fll development of the ‘means of production, there was reaton to believe thatthe histor ‘al ururpation of the general interest by sectional clases could be ‘wanscended. Although this argument dort not explain a* mich a8 Marxists suppoted, and although it use as a justification for polical action has often been both reductionist and oppresive Ie nevertheless reains considerable explanatory force, It, for ‘eaample, impossible 9 imagine any inclusive democratic World System being established whist the diferences in economic well” being between peoples remain as they are. — Hardt and Negei do not, however, deploy this long-established Marxian theorem. (Perhaps they tke a8 4 given.) Instead, ehey re a outmoded, they make dhe assumption that, given free MICHAEL RUSTIN n ane more intrested in what happens in the domain of desi {Sh understating and les, and in what ean be expected fom Tustrmatons at this level This element of ther argument tomes from a quite diferent tadion, va the work of Fowrult Sd Delcee and Guat, hs eli orgna etn writers sch a8 iewshe and Bergson, What one might cl enero = he des ofa potential ransformatv fore of wl of the mulitde = Comes ir ti somes, thong i tanormed in Hardt and scorn hans ina beng orem which ates ht [pa ane Vem haman begs cul tha lowe a Sl ther potent iferences, n cooperative harmony wih one Snsther ‘Suppore, onever, that this underlying view of human nature js flawed and paral? And not only paral but also internally contradictory, since the marrage that Hardt and Negd attempt tw effect beween what one might think of asthe ‘right andl ‘left Hrands of their own theoretical formation (the Nietchean and fhe Marxist) i given no explanation or junifcation. This x indeed a rather common contradiction in. postmodern social ‘theory in which a radial leftist ‘structure of feeling’ has survived the demolition or abandonment of most of the belts (eg concerning human nature, determining structures, objective realities) “on which transformative left politics originally ‘depended, and perhaps must depend. We do indeed have t0 detide what we think human nature brings to dhe world before ‘we can hope to understand what kind of world ¢ can be Deleuze and Guattari conducted a beiliant and wity erique ‘of Freud and Lacan in their dnt Ondipus whose central argume ‘ras that pvchoanalsis had wrongly endorsed the inevabliy of Fepresson iste account of human development and had on- ddensed into its model of a necessary Oedpial renunciation in fetch generation the wider gstem of socal authority ~ dhe law of the father, in Lacanian terms. They sought to rewrite pyehoanal jis as one might say fom the perspective of the id, invoking "desing machines as potential subjects. Freud, however, thought there was an inherent problem in the regulation and reconcii Sion of human desires, both heaeen and within generations His actual position wat not x0 eliferent from that of Harde and Negr's hero, Spinoza, in arguing that it was only understanding that could sender such choices and renunciations tolerable’ both2 DEBATING EMPIRE, for individuals and for wciety? Melanie Klein clarified these insues further in her investigations of early lie and through her discovery ofthe dual drives or emotions of love and hate in the infant (she thought the balance of these was positively oF nega- tively inflected by envizonment and murtute, but not solely an ‘outcome of this) and the widespread prevalence of anxiety a a basic human propensity: This Kieinian poston as Ihave tried to argue eliewhere, provides an tential foundation for politcal theory Tis necessary, that st sy, t take account of both the negative and destructive potenals of human nature, at well a of its positive and creative potentials, in considering the stems of socal organizadon that could bring about a beter human ‘The Hobesin account of the state of nature, ata wa ofall against all, places it weight on the destructive side of this neces ay dualism, and no ‘progresive’ socal thinking can be based 0: ‘hat foundation. eis, however swell to remember that Hobbes account docs address 4 part of reality ~ it desriber what can happen if destructive forces are given full reign and no authority cake to contain them. It demonsrates that the minimum and nnecesary role of government is always to keep the prace and ensure security of life. One reason why the "evolutionary human ise tradition lon out to is Thermidortan rival i beease his situation of fear and ansiety often obtained in reality, and sover. gn authority had some elfectiveness and wor some consent in eating with i “The problem with Hardt and Negus unrealiically optimistic view of human ecetvaion is that ach idealization i aveidably accompanied by what Kleinian psyhoanalyss called a spliting of {good and bad, love and hate, the destructive and the creative. Ia Hare and Nes argument, thie spiting invoes the loeation of all destructive forces in external authorides and ofall creative powers in subjugated individuals. Such demonization of authority nd idealization ofits opponents, is a dangerous guide to political practice ‘The political conjuncture of Empire “This brings us w the political moment of Hardt and Negr's book, Which they explain to us “was begun well after the end of the MICHAEL RUSTIN 1s Persian Gulf War, and completed well before the beginning of the war in Kosovo" I was published in 2000 before the evens ‘of September 11, 2001. T think this ming must now influence ‘one's reading oftheir argument. "The success the US may have had in the Gulf War exsis in presenting itelf ‘asthe only power able to manage international Justice not asa function oft on national ative ut inthe nae of ‘lola! right=* bas noc been repeated inthe aftermath of Septem ‘her 11. Nori any longer obvious, as Hardt and Neg put it ia discussing the Vietnam War, that “the Tet offensive», marked the imeverible military defeat ofthe US, imperial adventures ‘The idea that the US, unique among preponderant powers, depends on international consent and universalit criteria to legitimate what it does, and is constrained by a new form of| Empire, is at this point unconvincing. The present US govern- iment seems rather to have interpreted. September II" as. an ‘opportunity to demonstrate that its Vietnam defeat was an aber riton ~ mainly the result of is own inhibigons and miscalcul tions ~ and that in furure its military power can and will be Aeployed effectively wherever itis necessary, regardless of what ‘other nationstates may with. The ‘peace’ that the present US ‘dministration seeks to enforce refers to the suppression ot Aleterrence of its own supposed enemies and scems to have 20 more general meaning than this ls eusrent nisterialism is a direc repudiation ofthe universalist priniple and practice that Hardt and Negei hailed as definitive ofthe governmental norms fof "Empire, in contrast to previous empires. At the very lest, they have been premature in their welcoming of a new Kind of vor order. ‘One also nceds to review the larger dynamics of September 11 and it afiermath in the light of Hardt and Negi analysis Unfortunately, when one considers the kinds of political action that might be expected to lake place in the ‘amooth’ intercon nected spaces of Empire, by globalized, subjectively empowered, ‘hizomatic networks, Al Queda seems to qualify for inclusion as ‘much at NGO volunteers or journal working ia diester areas ae Na sae = ape They " Walter Benjamin: "What dacs obligeu DEBATING EMPIRE, the barbarian todo? To begin anew, to begin from the new: ‘They go on: "What exists, he reduces to rubble, not for the sake of the rubble bt for that ofthe way leading through it The new barbarians destroy wih afirmatve violence, and trace new paths of ie though their own material existence’ Tee unfortunately clear how references to ‘rubble’ may be read at this pardcular ‘moment, long after they were written, Hardt and Negri, however, make few useful distinctions Dberveen what kinds of interventions against Empire they are anticipating or ivi. In their concluding invocations of mile tanci™ they reer to the vrtues of insurretional action of two hundred years of experience’ othe organizers ofthe IWW, t0 St Franels of Assi and “his joyous life including all of being and nature’, and © the idea of turing ‘rebellion into a project of love’: Bu there can he no serious political action which does not take difference of motivation seriou. The interventions of NGO volunteer, investigative journalists, or juris, in a eis such as Rwanda oF Koro, evoke responses of indignation, compassion and solitary, which are supportive of the recognition and enforcement of globl ethical norms, More violent interventions tend to generate paranoid and vengeful reactions among both peoples and their government, Sach reactions are now authore: ‘ng possible military action by the US againet no les than seven nations. The problem with the open, unstructured, globalized ‘universe which Hardt and Negri celebrate is that i is lable to enerate many different kinds of insurectionary action, which fay include the various modes of carnival, witness, reparation and terror. Such actions may be visionary and prefiguraive, or langely destructive. The unstable and volatile “Erpire’ hat Hardt and Negsi describe may be capable of being tansformed in diferent ways, either i the direction ofthe Benign global goter- nance they describe in their eary chapters, o in the direction of etreme volence and retribution, These are alternative poss Diltes hat Hardt and Negri do not explore, though they have cm been brought into high focus by the ents of Septeraber 11, ‘or indeed those which have been taking place since then in Inrel land the Palestinian teitories, MICHAEL RUSTIN 1B ‘The psychosocial consequences of capitalism [A third major problem in Hardt and Negri’: argument is its underestimation of the problems which capitaiem: poses to the possibly ofthe inclusive and generous sociexy they with t tee Probably because of. their postmodern rejection. of, materialist, ‘SXplation,chey undevestmate the dominating pow fant Aterritorialzed oF not Gee much le deterritortalized than i sca covert ruling power. Ifthe ‘continues to constrain «ost forms of ation Across the globe, it matters litle if iis now exercised in more Shstrac,spaceless and invisible ways. The “destrctiraton” and lot nd igh abut aaa Dg a Se wel a iberatory ps Rew ‘wanwenal yn fella na rome one Biot ng tractus — wheter ation atats oan “unions, ames Uy oF ‘lnerbiity and exponare to danger explains both the current onformist mood of US pubic opinion in relation to its perceived enemies, and the xenophobic sift to the right which i taking place among voters across Furope. The idea that och sates of Sacra and Sere Iya gal odin, Negri nal progr Capitals an engine which generates aney and fea a8 normal concomitans, Is continvow snasion ofits and Uoundavies (which Flardt and Neg hall a progzesive ince it ta already destroyed the European colonial empires andi no including the peoples ofthe entre globe in thenew proteus) exposes not ony labourers and eens but even capital them selves to continuous isk and danger. nals an groups may ast ta athe eral and ar ard and Neg hope for. but there ae other poss precedent Further, aggre wa Tisanct necenay for Sua 5 the caplalst market and the more exposed the market, the6 DEBATING EMPIRE greater the pressures to be aggresive, The violence of which a state suc as the USis capable, both towards its onn deviants and its perceived external enemies, derives from its own dominant principle of existence thas seemed surprising that the eum ‘6f global capitalism over is communis rival in 1989 should have ‘been followed by an intensifacton, rather than a diminution, of fear and anxiety. We have never been in greater danger than ‘now, President Bush has recently sid, which considering thatthe caller danger was of massive nuclear attack is remarkable.” Te may even be thatthe more unfettered and triumphant capitalism is the higher the level of underlying anxiety and feat to which it ives rise: This may also explain why itis that US administrations, ‘which have been the most fundamentals in their comumitnents to capilism, and the least influenced by countervailing values, Ihave alo been the most paranoid in thei views ofthe world Hardt and Negri draw attention to an emergent sate of de- structuration, as the Commit Mansft's aphorin = all that solid meks into ai? ~ ie nearer to becoming realy, They may, however, misiudge its most Ukely outcomes, Unstable, exposed and turbulent conditions more often lead to catastrophic than luopian outcomes. The events of September 11 may yet prove to have been the triggering of just sich a destabilization. An awak- ening and insurgency of dhe multitude is one possible conse- ‘quence of such a situation, buts docs not seem the mest likely ‘one. Alternatively, the outcome of September 11 could yet prove to bea Third World War, arising perbape from the kinds of serial Dlundering that led to the Great War in 1914, There litle sige that these authors, admittedly at a more peaceful ime of writing, hha these darker passibiltes of Empire inthe Notes 1. Michael Hard and Antonio Ney pr, Cambie, MAC Harr Uninc Pre 2000 inhi eay, Rpt or Empire’ wih acpi rege ep tecm aareekk Antonio Neg, Te Pic of Sabo A Mons ote Tony Fr Grae tran Jones Neal, Cmbedge” Polly 1988 Anton Noge, The Smee ‘roma trans Michal Hart Mibaepolc Unie o Sneesota Pres 100, Michael Hid sed Aono Neg. Ltr 5) roy, Mente MICHAEL RUSTIN ” Minesta University Pres 194; a0 Plo Vien and Michal Hard ett ins Noaptea ra ff the proucton proce, Hand stat Nee derive this pos ren hat ‘Funny expect an nde of the abour press ibd p35. 5. toi. 78 6 Thi pts 1 Sotatar thre who workin thes tems ze concerned the idence te hat mene interred foo of conta ave ef ater than her: tise The tinng and complance procedures now whigutout it thet Soe eee 5 Ep. 2-4 : 5: Empire pe 2 Tia a reference to Gls Deere and Fels Gusta, A Thon Pie Londo. Ae 1988 1. Se Duel Beye, Comply Thy andthe Sa Sim, Lond oat 1958 Te dference in tone and asunpton beeen thee ton ery sing agen ha a dee direc apache TEE they pt the mprtane fhe Gal Wr devine ate om international sie ta fncton of sam nts mais hn Fett copa nl ye gees og tere dontaionefeced the US, and by the European coo ‘sopra thie pone thse icon to have more to Jo eh wre interest an oes meting pee (al, longtsare weapon te purchne of government in ona to tte and tec coral cp tow) sham wih the contra Hare and Neg soko ake hewcen Sd Itper power at ome new decrorived oro goal err Hite fac, tt has teen conaracng Hm tft hor for Sal, inating ht bern? soni oe ee 1S. See David fll, Antony McGrew, Dv Coldlt ad Jonathan eran ie Totnes a ud Ca Cage ako show no trot i the cmv fnew goverenal ames be atthe arpa Union ir wich pep mht be dened em ‘Soden rocky, wove members cme neat te coming the ew “deems on he contay ob tha he US. 1D: They quote fp. 19) Fro Jeon: “Pxtmodernian” what yo ‘oven emote pr amp dt TH They are, however cra of Rosen, regarding hk concep oftheas DEBATING EMPIRE 19. They flow Gras in fining in Machivell the Bey sure for & soe they af onsen sel goverment oo M.S ida Ran Then Season ae Beatie 199; ana Miche Ri Paso ad Uo, nd Conti 200 Bier pien 24 Mantel Cals, in the second volun of bis oman Ag toy. ‘The Par of ty, Oxi Bache 200) was pretend rca soc movemens came in many vrei pore tacos mimep ae Br tu, ps 2s components axe the ight o global cient’ “he sgh to 8 soc wage athe right wo repproeiton of he mean of production. Sais noteworthy tata concept of ary be! an mua terrence ‘tracred conte, bt deemed evant the ontalment foe The New World Order Stanley Aronowitz The United States never held a large number ef direct colonies fact that has prompted many political ieaders to declare i the ‘grea exception to colonialism. Yet the Monroe Docitine was for ‘century and a haf a rallying ery for American economic and rilitary engagement in Cental and South America, and, fuelled bby Cold War considerations, remained a hallmark of American {reign poliey into the nineties And for many, the Vietnam War ‘ras emblematic of US imperialism consitent with its Cold War {oreign policy, the United States assumed the role of protector of| 4 weak, antidemocraie but anc-communist regime and inter ‘ened to thirart the seléetermination ofthe Vietnamese people, ‘specially when they chose to live under communist rule. Even the collapse of Eastern European communism and the rapidly proceeding integration of China into the world market have filed to stem the steady tide of US miliary intervention into the alfa ‘of smaller, quas-sovereign nations While the rhetoric of anticommunism has given way to the hetorie of human rights 3 justification For involvements sich fas the Gulf War and the Kosovo War, for many these are merely ‘continuing examples of the sume old imperiatat adventures, But according to Antonio Negri and his American collaborator ‘Michael! Hardt, the Vietnam Wat was che lst great batle of the ‘old imperiliem In ther view we have entered the ea of Empire, 2 ‘supranational’ centre consisting of networks of transnational corporations and advanced capitalit nations ted by the one remaining superpower, the United States In this new, globalized20 DEBATING EMPIRE ‘economic and politcal system, a genuine world market has been created, national boundaries re increasingly porous and a new ‘system of imperial authority’ isin the proces of taking hold "The new paradign of Etupire ‘is both sytem and hierarchy, centralized constretion of norms and fareaching production of| legitimacy, spread out over world space’. The invocation of human rights is not merely fig lea for the imperium, iis past ‘of an effort to create enforceable international law in which the ‘institutions of Empire take precedence over formerly sovereign sates ~ in short, assume the role of world court as well ae policeman, While by no means minimizing the fact thatthe United States stands atthe pinnacle of the new system, Hard and Negr insist that the project is one of creating a stern in which disputes Doetween nations are adjudicated by a legitimate international authority and by consensus, upon which world policing may be premised. Eventhough the institutions are not place ~ moat of the initiatives remain ad hoc, ais evident in Afficn av ths very ‘moment ~ the authors announce the existence of a dominant ‘systemic totality’ or logic that, however invisible, regulates the new economic and politcal order that has taken hold almost ‘verywhere. The new paradigm of Empire has guined enormous strength since the collapse of the Soviet Union, but its not the direct vesul of Cold War uiumph, Ie emerged organically within the old system ae a result of the tremendons power ofthe postwar Inbour movements to bid up both wages and the social wage, the preture of national liberation movements on the ol imperialism and the gradual delegitmation of nation-states and their ins tutions to maintain internal cultural aswell x political discipline. Having increased its power atthe old industrial workplace, by the ssties labour was engaged in what Negri has previously termed ‘the refs to work Even a8 mas consumption Was rising, pro- dlctivity eroded, and profits in some instances actally declined ‘The uationatate ~ which since the great eighteenth- and nine- teenth century revolutions had, through education, ctzenship for the lower socal clases and imperial dcologies such as acim ad patriot, been effecive in enforcing internalized mast discipline wae increasingly unable to command popular allegiance as. one ter another, efforts to thwart Third Workd national liberation ‘movements ran aground Things came ta head in 1968 and 1969 STANLEY ARONOWITZ a when mass strikes, notably in France and Italy, almest toppled siting governments, disruptions and mass demonstrations also threatened the sabiliy of regimes in Mexico and the United ‘Sates, The authors argue thatthe conjunction of economic criss And the cris of rule was an occasion for renewal, not breakdown. ‘The renewal was signalled by President Nixon's earlpeeveties abrogation of the Bretton Woods agreement; the dollar rather than gold became the universal money standard. Weakened by international competition and rising costs of production and ‘governance, i war no longer posible to contain world prices by ‘monetary means and preserve the sytem of internal trade regs Jation. Now the dolla ‘floated’ along with other currencies In ‘quick succession, the United States removed most major regula tory controls: on banks, rucking and other transportation, and ‘most attitra restaints Fel prices and many others nov lead fn the market While Nixon started the process of ending the ‘tubborn legacy of the New Deal, the socalled Reagan revolution, ‘which the Clinton administration extended, greatly accelerated the changes. The doctrine of Keynesianism, which proclaimed that since capitaliam tended coward equilibrium below the level of fll employment, governments must intervene direct to stim late economic growth and employment, was declared dead. The fee market and with ithe idea that government shoud as much possible stay ost of the economy, except to regulate the sippy fof money and credit in order to stem infladonary tendencies, became the new religion. ‘A key clement in the new corporate strategy was to reduce wages by curbing the power of organized labour. Battered by the ‘deterritoralzation’ of industrial production as corporations moved plants offshore and by relentlew anilabour policies, by the eighties organised labor in all major industrial countries Was in full rereat. In the United States and Britain, unions proved tunable to prevent many features of the socal wage (welfareate benefits) won during the tires and early postwar years While the power of labour in other countries took a longer tme 0 diminish, the nineties were years of agony for most European Workers, Even when labour-acked soa governments 100k power in France, Germany and Illy, wellarestate croton, beasy lowes in the old materia-goods industries and the rise of largely ‘non-union information and communications sectors reduced the2 DEBATING EMPIRE pores of egal abr and, hf excepts, lo ‘Gin govenmens nce cone Pote Por ad at Navn wo the mao mechanism wove thee Te fey wanfomatons have cre sce the suerte ht economy fem he Soman of induration oma einer fe rd tart ov al commas: ural dre “ton, acral orl none tn uate the ssc tow ted between ‘se anomie’ and he de fe tonsa itor of puta erin an ara car Otecowomic an pelle. The fodcton a etc Solo ew te enon of site new communes and IMomaton tnduarcr hich hve hegre ihe ld Time of Ford prodrdon, Fodor he ‘Shier o walonaied uty wunering neice to Techies aueni ties and eer mele ge en Teplice wi what hasbeen tre Tojosan’ rants Oe ofthe came ee a th ew proteaon tod 1 tin me producion, Trough conputsce ors omipetece ner ae eecomraeue net the provion afar mate tthe tap Boor and he sea sein proces the hcg ech has ad another fe If {maton techno gies the nite of inmate [fant wh the emerece othe tomer mo pa) nomic andar wha Robert Reh hs dened “ambelicwnalyticyerices, actives that ental ‘problemsotng”_ | iui rokerng once petored cy ymanegenTnceenee | tow intitnevinmiral peductovnolnpeasccrserocy | isin pocasbs he cei Seta | recone popula bel no immune the gue of Spistaton (naty ot tem work on a arine cogent and | Sera tt eyye sg e | . potental actos in a potentally revived labour movement. Glob- sm is not primarily a regime of goods production bt, with the fi of science, leads toa new paradigm of the relations of humans | co the physical universe. Natute, 100, has been integrated into the ew system ~ witness the emergence of industries sed on biotechnology that teat life as 2 new eld for investment and production pa cae STANLEY ARONOWITZ 3 [Natonstaes, whieh emerged fom the dedine of the feudal monarchies and arsoeraces and thet replacement by eral Slemocrate stems, sl perform important tks for Empite ‘Without dem the contro of whole populations would be impos ible Yt imperialism has died precisely Becane mations are no longer the Key medistors of ntemational economics and poli ‘The nation may ail ignite Reree loyalties among subordinate peoples, but for Harde and Negi sno longer independent from the new wold order Having destroyed he old colonial stem by reoltion and chil wat the legacy of newly decolonied ate has been nodhing ‘Short of tragic Altwough the revolutionaries of Ai and Alsen achieved national independence, they were neve able 0 establish économie autonony. During the Cold War some, tke Toda, minted degree of independence by plying om the dsion becween the two great powers ober allied themaces rly on either sie. China under an often tral revolutionary dictator ship, broke with both sides and tried to modemize by ubjectng it om population to development by means of force In almost none of these nations were the majoriy of their populations ‘Mforded decent Iving standards, Inthe ear 2000 third ofthe ‘world's about force remains unemployed or uadereeployed, and milion have migrated inorder to make a lving. The term Thi Work” describes the pa Hing been rubordinated to Empire, these nations no longer offer an alternative. Acknowledging the hardships sulfered by victins of war, famine and unemployment, aa ant Noge sce «new proleaiat emerging om a word sale ‘utefthe amo crods of peas, « proletariat that may ‘become one fe onaTbeN Or resbiace sas Epc The ‘ld litinction between instil prodton and agra has “Seen sondered a hundred wlan OF people ae herded ito cies. Tone sin TRO Me RE-TE ME TEANG fecr “Weaplalt nds methods, tray factories i the Bel ‘Although Empresometines sr from ts central hee, ita bold move away from established doctrine. Hardt and Nexw's ieasence tat there really isa nee world is promulgated wih energy and conviction. Especially aking shee renucion of the tendency of many writers on globalization to focus exiuely fon the top, leaving the impresion that what happens down below to ordinary people, fllwsastomaticly from what the pres2 DEBATING EMPIRE poers da, In the final chapters they try to craft a new theory of historical actors, bat here they stumble, sometimes badly. The ‘main problem is that they tend to overstate their case. From ‘observations that the traditional forces of resistance have lost their punch tutional ‘mesiatione’. Not 0 fas. ‘One of the serious omissions in Amir analyse dscusion of the World Trade Organization, the International Monetrary Fund and the World Bank three of the concrete insitions of the repressive world government of Empire. Lacking an inst tional perspective ~exeept with respect to law ~ Hardt and Negr are unable to anticipate how the movement they would bring into being might acrally mount effective redetance. Although not obliged to provide a programme fora movement, the thors do offer indicators of which socal forces may politically take on the ‘colowus. Having argued that inadkulons such as rade unions and politcal pares are no longer reliable forces of combat, they are left with ‘the postmodern equivalent of the nineteenth-century proletariat, the ‘insurgent mit’. Inthe final chaptre of the book, incisive prose gives way to hyperbole, and the sharp dein: ‘ation of historical actors melts into a vague politics of ope Insiting that ‘resistance’ precedes power, they advocate direct confrontation, ‘with an adequate consciousness of the central represive operations of Empire’ as it seeks to achieve ‘global Citizenship’ AU the end, the authors celebrate the ‘nomadic revolutionary’ asthe mot likely protagonist ofthe struggle, ‘The demonstrations agains the WTO in Sextle in December 1999 and the subsequent ant-IMF and World Bank protests in Washington suggest a somevat diferent story. The 40,000 plus demonstrators who disrupted the WTO meetings and virwally shut down the chy consisted of definite socal groups: a consder- able fraction ofthe Isbour movement, including some of i top leaders, concerned that lower wages and human rights violations ‘would both undermine thee standards and intensify exploitation students who have been protesting sweatshop labour fr years and are forcing their universes to cease buying goods produced by ity anl a still numerous, if battered, detachment of environmen tals ~ a burgeoning alliance that appears to have continued, ‘These developments shed light on the existence of resistance to Empire but also on the problem of theories that wax in high the authors conclude that there are no more int STANLEY ARONOWITZ % abstractions Events argue that some of the traltona forces of ‘opposition retain a least a measure of fe. While direct confron- {ation isin my view, one appropriate strategy of socal struggle Toray it doce ot relive we ofthe obligation to continue to take the long march through insitutions o tet their mettle. After ll, ‘adequate consciousness’ does not appear spontancously it emerges when people discover the limits of the ol. And the only vray they can understand the nature of the new Empire is 1 ‘xperience the frsirations associated with altempes to achieve reforms within the nationstte, even asthe impulse to forge an international labour environmentalist alliance proceeds3 A Nebulous Empire Charles Tilly Enpirés dustjacket features a satellite photo of spiraling white ‘lous above indistinct purple seas. Beyond the earth's edge, it displays black nothingness, The designer mst have read the book. Although Saskia Sassen’s endorsement describes it as ‘An extraordinary hook, with enormons intellectual depth and a keen sense of the historysmaking transformation that is beginning to ‘ake shape’, Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri orbit so far from the concrete realities of contemporary change that their readers se lite but clouds, hazy seas and nothingnese beyond. Behold their central claim: an ineisiby sire Empire (always capitalized and always singular) is now dgplacing and surpassing the capital: Jat state ~ even the United States of America ~ asthe locus of world power. Terrotal, racial, sexial and cultural boundaries cease to matter. ‘With boundaries and diferences suppresied of set aside,’ Hardt and Negsi declare, “he Empire is a kind of ‘smooth space across which subjectites glide without wubstantial a “OF confer" NMpreoves, the Einpie™s "biopomer ‘EXE Bejond tools, machines and organizations to bodies, ‘thoughts and socal life as a whole. Despite existing in no particu. lar place, Empire exercises unitary agency. Ie advertises itself as history's eternal end, ‘That claim is false: in anew dlalectc, Empite creates its antith ‘isin a connected multitude (never capitazed, but alvays ‘Sngular) whose rising will eventually zeappropriate and «rane form imperial means of contol. The organizing argument sounds slobal echoes of the Communit’ Manifta Unlike. Marx and CHARLES TILLY 2 Engels, however, Hardt and Negi conser ther redeeming treed co coca ot of wort, tev of prey ato product, ccave subjects of globalization’ uch of he Eats fi haf ose nneend and teenet-centry word hisory at ah rom European to American imperial, nh the United Stats ar the new aca peace police But oth tmaser Redhance to Aion, imperil, in that goa diated American hegemony by connecting everyone wath totlvide network of apa Inte proces ineraonal mig on became the penal men of Cs eragger exioked people ocd ou (entnnasn for ths argent eats Haran Negi wldsmis nnetcentecenany Ali ian wrong 2s Liliputian” compared to tei ate owentitveentaycomter arts proportions speang the 30 rilnn Europeans and 9 Iles Abtcne rhe cred the Alans enceded tay ier ational flowe) Their gra align Hard ana Nege gains other leftists who eal Tor TeRSaREE TS ape “BASH son a scon saint sal ree Tess ST nev Torro satina c= dudig ie msceady ERREEMT FAK dupes of sons whose moral intr tenon scl atances te inperil work lbaran. Ai that shucking off of potential mpahincs ere insficient, ard and Ne eee sing conertencs a the Commun Monje making's times of tat rection, They can thee argument abel in dormcaaly defined ters, wih fo toners ltrs ofthe oct proses they hae ia mie ‘Tey natn face that he coming of pre ha sled txtcal citer for jiging polieal spt “in Emir, no subject soni, and al paces bare een subaned in enol hor place tans fon of pls can ne Kinger sad tp and has no argument wy beenwe meal ‘xistemirey within the reatm the soil and the politcal > As Fara and Nogi declare sucha poston rales ut conventional ferns of menturcnte ned core, A speal rnier ia neverles legitimately question te books presumptions snd {erdons Gin the mol eent fragmento, ea) a ittemecine conflict. what warrant have we for enchuding tat t iss Hard and Neg cai, rapid becoming seamless web of onto Whatprocew feat conquest and inraon col2 DEBATING EMPIRE possibly have woven that web? How did capital activate its Ubree leged means of contol ~ bombs, money. ether ~ and how did thowe three means produce their effect on the whole world's population? Is ie trie, for example, that expanded. comma. ‘ation impores a continous and complete creation of signs Might we not have thought, on the contrary, that the Internet (corrently accesible to about six per eentof the earth's pop tion, with dramatic inequalities of information avaiable to difer tent wegments ofthat sx per cent) exacerbates dicontinutis in the availability of information? Until we hear more about how Empire's causes produce thei effets, it would be wise wo retain 2 measure of scepticism, Notes kee aga amon Ng Ep, Ct, Hrd ———4 Lineages of Empire Giovanni Arrighi 1 Michacl Hardt and Antonio Negri’ Empare i a powerful antidote to the gloom, suspicion and hostility that have characterized the predominant reaction of the radical left to the advent of so-called slobalization. While excoratng te dexrucive aspects, Hardt and [Negri welcome globalization as the dawn of x new era full of promise for the realization ofthe desires ofthe wretched of the earth. In the same way that Marx insisted on the progressive nature of capitalism in comparison with the forms of sciesy it displaced, they now daim that Empire isa great improvement ‘over the world of nation-states and competing imperialism that preceded ie Empire isthe new logic and structure of rule that has emerged with the globalization of economic and cultural exchanges Its the sovereign power that effectively regulates these global exchanges and thereby governs the world, Unlike empires of pre- moder and modem times, the singular Empire of postmodern times has no territorial boundaries or centre of power, Ie a dered and. darth apparatus of rule that incorporates the entire global realm. “The establishment of this new logic and structure of rule has gone hand in hand with ‘the realization of the workd market and the real subsumption of global society under capitals The world of natioatates and competing imperialimes of modern ties» DEBATING EMPIRE ‘werved the needs and furthered the interests of capital in its phase of global conquest. At the same time, however, it created And reinforced rigid boundaries... that effectively blocked the free flow of capital, labor and goods - thus necessanly precluding ‘he full eliration of the world market.” As eapital rears itself in the workd market, it ‘tends toward a smooth space defined by luncoded flows, flexibility, continval modulation, and tendential equalization» The idea of Empire as ‘smooth space’ is a central theme ‘of the book. The smoothing does not hut afleet the division of the world into. nation-states and their empires, merging and blending the distinct national colours ‘in the imperial global rinbow' Most significant, i affects its division into Fist, See fond and Third Worlds, North and South, core and periphery. While the Second Workl has disappeared, she Third. World “entered into the Firs, esablishes itself at the heart as the het, shanty town, favela'? The Fist World, in turn, is tanfer re to the Third in the form of stock exchanges and banks, ‘tanmational corporations and ‘cy skyscrapers of money and command’* Asa result, ‘center and periphery, North and South no longer define an intemational order but rather have moved ‘dower to one anther"? ‘As in mont accounts of globalization, Hardt and Nege trace is origins to the new power that the computer and information evolution has putin the hands of capital By making it possible ‘to lnk together eliferent groups of labor in real time across the word’, the revolution enabled capital ‘ta weaken the srcural Tesistances of labor power” and to impose both temporal flexi ‘iy and spatial mobiliy.* Speculative and financial capital strengthen the tendency by going ‘where the price of labor it lowe and where the administrative force to guarantee exploit tion & highest? Asa resul ‘the counties chat sill maintain the rigidities of labor and oppose its full flexibility and mobility are punished, tormented, and finally destroyed. Ta contrast to most accounts of globalzason, however, Hard and Negtt do not conceive ofthe forces of labour asthe more or leas reluctant recipients of the tendencies of capital. On the one yhand, proletarian struggles ‘caused directly’ the capitalist rst of the late 1960s and early 1970s, and thus forced capital to modify ins on structures and undergo a patadign shift" GIOVANNI ARRIGHT a1 he Viewam War had not ake pc, there had wot ben worker ane eet revolts i the 1980, if here had not eer 1968 ad the cle eres of anbimperiia wragle, captal would fave been Content to sintain it sn acrangement a poe. I wouldve teen content for several good reawons Bees the wai Line of development served it well becae these y the develope ‘ment of immaterial labor eee tke that the ane moby fa hybridization of word Ibor power opened dhe potential for new tric and cvs conflicts ona order never before experience. The Testing of prodction «wae anticipated by the rie of new subject wae driven from below, bya proletariat whose compo- ‘Stn had sired changed On the other hand, thisew proleariat~ o ‘mubitude’ as Hardt and Negri ell it ~ promptly seized the new opportinites of empowerment and liberation created by globalization. The key practice in this eapect has been sigration. “The muliude's Fesintance to bondage ~ the struggle against che avery of belong Tg tation, an Wey, Anda people, and thus the desertion {Gom sovereign and the limits it places_on subjectivity = i cirely postne.... The real heroes ofthe liberation ofthe Third “World way may rally have been the emigrant ad the Mais oF population that have desinyed oid and new boundaries: The “ouliide is hus Doth protagonist and benefcar of dhe desruc- tion of boundaries that mark the coming of Empire. ‘Moreover, the ver globalization of capitals networks of pro- ‘duction and control etspowers each and every point of revolt orionalareulations among struggles and hence the medi tion of leaders, unions and parten ~ are no longer needed, ‘Simpy by focusing their own powers, concentrating heir ener= es in a tense and compact cil struggles strike dec atthe highest articulations of imperal order” "As Hardt and Negri recognize, this double empowerment of ‘he multitude under Empire leaves open the fundamental ques- tion of what kindof poical programme can enable the mle te to ross and break down the limits that impera nities «continually reestablish on is desire of bration Al they can say 2 this point i that global izenship (pis pur tous is «fist ‘clement of sucha programme, followed bya second clement: a social wage and & guaranteed income forall individuals. ‘Once2 DEBATING EMPIRE [global] citaenship is extended to al, we could call this guaran teed income i citizenship sncome, due each ata member of [world] socer.* This s probably the most optimise picture oft ‘consequences of globalization proposed thus far by the radial left. The authors endeavour todo avay with any nostalgia for the omer structures ofan earlier era of capitalie development i, in ‘ny view, commendable. And so is their endeavour t show that the emerging logie and structure of word rleis bth a response to past struggles of the exploited and oppressed and a more favourable terran than previous structures for ongoing struggles against new forms of exploitation and oppression. There ate, honetheless, serious problems with the wiv Harde and. Negri pursue these commendable endeavours Most problems arise from Hard and Negi’ heavy reine on metaphors and theories and systematic avoidance of empirical ‘evidence. While many readers will undoubkedly be taken in by the ‘erudition deplored throughout the book, more sceptical readers Will be pot off by statements of fact tnbacked by empirical idence or, worse sil, easly fsifable on the basis of widely salable evidence. Iwill mit myself to two eral examples, one Conceming the ‘smoothness af the space of Empire, and the ‘other concerning the role of the contemporary abil of labour and capital in equairing condition of production and reproduc ton actos that space. T's hard to question that the disappearance of the Second ‘World makes it anachronistic to continue to epeak ofa First and 4 Thied World There i alo plenty of evidence thatthe signs of ‘modernity associated with the wealth ofthe former First World (the cy skyscrapers of money and command’) have proliferated in the former Third World: and it may also be the case thatthe ‘signs of marginalization astciated withthe poverty of the former ‘Third World are now more prominent in the former First World than they were twenty or thirty years ago. Nevertheless, it does not follow rom all this thatthe ditance between the poverty af the former Third World (or South) and the wealth of the former Firs World (or North) has decreased to any significant extent Indeed, all avalable evidence shows an extraordinary persistence of the North-South income gap as measured by GNP per capita Suffice i to mention tha in 1999 the average per capita income GIOVANNI ARRIGHI Pa ‘of former ‘Third World” countries was only 45 per cent of the per capita income of former ‘Fine World) countries, that i, Almost exactly what it was in 1960 (4.5 per cent) and in 1980 (43 per cent) Indeed, ifwe exclude China from the calculation, the percentage shows 4 steady decrease from 6-4 in 1960, t0 6.0 $n 1980 and 5.5 in 1999." Hiarde and Negr’'sasetion of an ongoing supertestion of the North-South dive it thas clearly fale. Alo flawed are thet assertions concerning the direction and extent of contemporary ‘lows of capital and labour. For ove thing, they gros exaggerate the extent 10 which these flows are unprecedented. ‘This ie ‘apecialy true oftheir dismissal of nineteenth-eentury migrations 2 Lilipuvian’” compaced to thei ate twenteth-century counter ‘parts Proportionately speaking. nineweenth-centuy lows were in fact much larger, especialy # we include migrations within and from Asia! Moreover, the asertion that speculative and financial capital has been going ‘where the price of labor is lowest and there the administrative force to guarantee exploitation is high st is only in small pare true. Tes true, that i, only if we hold all inds of othe things equal, fis and foremost per capita national Income. But mos other tings (and especially per capita national Income) are not at all equal among the world’s regions and jrindictons. Asa result by far the Ingest share of capital flows | Iheseen wealthy countries (where the price of labour is compare tively high and the administrative fore to guarantee exploitation ‘comparatively low) with relatively litle capital actually flowing from wealthy to poor countries These are not the only statements of fact in the narrative of Enpire that, on close inspection, ern out to be false. They ate nonetheless, among the most crcl fr the credibility not jst of the book's reconstruction of present tendencies but fort polit fal conclusions aswell For Hardt and Negri’ optimism concern ing the opportunites that globalization opens up for the IMberation of the mutitude largely rests on their assumption that capital under Empire tends towards a double equalization af the Conditions of exirtence of the multitude: equalization through ‘apital mobility from North to South and equalization dhrough labour mobility from South to North, But if these mechanisms are not operative ~ as, for the time being, they do not appear to bbe the road to global citizenship and to a guaranteed income