{"id":4879,"date":"2019-06-05T09:06:53","date_gmt":"2019-06-05T13:06:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/?p=4879"},"modified":"2019-06-05T09:06:53","modified_gmt":"2019-06-05T13:06:53","slug":"john-finnegan-necroresistance-as-destitution","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/john-finnegan-necroresistance-as-destitution\/","title":{"rendered":"John Finnegan | Necroresistance as Destitution"},"content":{"rendered":"

By John Finnegan<\/strong><\/p>\n

Banu Bargu\u2019s ethnography and theoretical exploration of the Turkish death fasters differs from many of the prior texts read in this seminar series in declining to offer much prescriptive content. Unlike, say, Chantal Mouffe\u2019s For a Left Populism<\/u> or Moten and Harney\u2019s The Undercommons<\/u>, Bargu\u2019s Starve and Immolate<\/u> does not attempt to answer directly the question of \u201cwhat is to be done.\u201d Rather, the book offers its readers a story of what has been done, already, by the Turkish death fasters, and interprets those acts through a critical lens. In the process, Bargu extends Foucault\u2019s conception of sovereignty and biopower to argue that the Turkish state\u2019s power regime constituted what she calls \u201cbiosovereignty,\u201d a term \u201cdistinguished by its paradoxical combination of the power of <\/em>life with the power over <\/em>life.\u201d[1]<\/a> The death fast, Bargu argues, emerges from that assemblage as a resistance that \u201cdisrupt[s] biosovereignty by rejecting its domination and refusing obedience.\u201d[2]<\/a> This specific type of resistance, as exemplified by the death fast, is what Bargu terms \u201cnecroresistance,\u201d and it is this concept that drew me in. From my reading of Starve and Immolate<\/u>, necroresistance\u2019s logic of \u201crefusal<\/em> against simultaneously individualizing and totalizing domination that acts by wrenching the power of life and death away from the apparatuses of the modern state\u201d seems to be the same kind of \u201cdestituent logic\u201d called for by the Invisible Committee in Now<\/u>.[3]<\/a> The death fasters, in seizing power over their own lives and proclaiming a right to die, engage in a similar act of breakage to that called for by the Committee, albeit taken to a far more final end.<\/p>\n

This comes through most clearly towards the end of the book, after Bargu has detailed the state\u2019s conception of the death fasts and how the various left movements within the prisons settled on the death fasts as a viable tactic for resistance. In describing the contours of necroresistance, Bargu makes clear the \u201cmultivalent\u201d nature of it, noting that \u201c[t]he performers of necroresistance had a plurality of intentions, motivations, and desires, and this diversity was reflected upon the different ways in which they interpreted the objectives of the struggle.\u201d[4]<\/a> Singling out three strands of militant thought, Bargu argues that the death fasters saw their struggle in the following ways: \u201cresistance, a defensive struggle against torture and oppression in the name of human dignity . . . war, a manifestation of the struggle among classes; and . . . refusal, an exodus that expresses a desire to break away from the existing order.\u201d[5]<\/a> Putting aside the other aspects of necroresistance, it is the last strand\u2014refusal\u2014that corresponds with the Invisible Committee\u2019s call \u201cto desert, to desert the ranks, to organize, to undertake a secession\u201d in Now<\/u>.[6]<\/a><\/p>\n

Much as the Committee praises the power of breaking things as an affirmative<\/u> act, one that demonstrates to the world \u201cagainst all appearances: \u2018This is ours!\u2019\u2019\u2019[7]<\/a> Bargu describes the death fasters of this strand as viewing their act as both an act of negation and affirmation. Even as the faster violently exits<\/em> the control of the state by taking back the sovereign power of life and death through her fast, the faster produces \u201cthe revolutionary collective, facilitat[ing] the emergence of the latter as an alternative locus of sovereign power through this usurpation of the power of life and death from the state.\u201d[8]<\/a> The negation of the state\u2019s control thus generates an alternative to the state in itself, making possible what the fasters believed was \u201ca truly political life, one whose relation to justice has not been severed.\u201d[9]<\/a> When faced with the choice presented by the Invisible Committee\u2014the \u201cchoice between two crimes: taking part in [this world] or deserting it in order to bring it down\u201d\u2014the fasters chose the latter option.<\/p>\n

I hesitate to go too far with this comparison, given both the temporal and contextual distance between the two texts. I doubt the Invisible Committee had the death fast in mind as a form of destituent power, or that the fasters, had they had the opportunity to read Now<\/u>, would have agreed with the Committee\u2019s theory of change (particularly given the disdain the Committee seems to have for traditional leftist collectives, of which the fasters were undoubtedly a part). But I cannot help but draw parallels between the two, given their shared emphasis on what most would consider purely \u201cnegative\u201d activity as a means to build a positive construct.<\/p>\n

If we view the death fasts as a destitutive activity, would that then change the evaluation of the movement\u2019s legacy? Bargu closes the text with the construction of an (admittedly necessarily incomplete) \u201cbalance sheet\u201d of the movement, focusing on both the instrumental and expressive aspects of the movement\u2019s goals, and asking whether either of those aspects succeeded.[10]<\/a> The instrumental aspects Bargu notes were largely unsuccessful,[11]<\/a> and even the expressive parts of the project appear to have been in part frustrated, as \u201cthe dramatic impact of the weaponization of life was continuously submerged, repressed, and co-opted by the strategic choices and practices of the state.\u201d[12]<\/a> Bargu laments that the fasters\u2019 strategy underestimated both the \u201cagility of the Turkish state in attending to its own wounded sovereignty\u201d and the \u201ccynicism with which the state was able to churn out whatever shame it was supposed to suffer as a result of the deaths of prisoners . . . in the form of a self-righteous display of pride and strength in its struggle against terrorism.\u201d[13]<\/a> While the book explicitly withholds any overall judgment of the fasters\u2019 success or failure, in reading this litany it is hard to not come away with a sense that the movement faltered, its goals unrealized, its martyrs in vain. The movement\u2019s end in 2006\u2014with the reframing of its purpose by human rights advocates as \u201cadvanc[ing] claims against isolation on the grounds of the basic and universal \u2018right to live,\u2019\u201d[14]<\/a> lends further strength to this impression, with Bargu arguing that the this reframing \u201cunwittingly affirmed the \u2018sanctity of human life,\u2019 a claim that had ironically stood at the core of the state\u2019s justification to use violence in order to reestablish its control.\u201d[15]<\/a> This inevitable co-optation sounds in the same register as the Committee\u2019s disdain for those leftists who \u201cthink they can make something happen by lifting the lever of bad conscience.\u201d[16]<\/a><\/p>\n

But, if one instead focuses solely on the expressive aspects of the death fasters, on their attempts to refuse<\/em> the state\u2019s control, to exit from the state\u2019s reach, to destitute the state\u2019s sovereignty, then the legacy left behind by the fasters becomes less marked by failure. Indeed, some of the fasters themselves viewed the act this way, emphasizing that victory had already been won merely by deciding to fast: \u201cTo make the decision for the death fast is to get ahead 1\u20130 against the state . . . to make the decision for the death fast is our victory.\u201d[17]<\/a> In this view, the act itself of fasting, then, brings the fasters to victory against the state and against biosovereignty. Regardless of the materialization of a larger movement that followed suit or the furtherance of the fasts\u2019 more tangible goals, by seizing power through the fast the state has already been overcome. This conception of the act of fasting conforms again with how the Invisible Committee calls for breakage: \u201cThe true richness of an action lies within itself. . . . the impact potential of an action doesn\u2019t reside in its effects, but in what is immediately expressed in it.\u201d[18]<\/a> And of course, the fasters in death appear to have achieved precisely what the Committee called upon its readers to do: \u201cto make ourselves ungovernable.\u201d[19]<\/a> By supplanting the state\u2019s sovereignty with their own power, the fasters rejected the governance of the Turkish state forever and irrevocably, destituting entirely the attempts by the state to control their lives. This alone, I think, would be seen as cause for celebration by the Committee, as fully realizing their call to destitution, even at such a high price. We might question whether such a victory is \u201cworth it\u201d as a strategic matter, but should not deny its existence.<\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> Banu Bargu, Starve and Immolate: The Politics of Human Weapons 54 (2014).<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> Id.<\/u> at 84.<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a> The Invisible Committee, Now 78\u201379 (2017) (\u201c\u201c[S]omeone who breaks doesn\u2019t engage in an act of negation, but in a paradoxical, counterintuitive affirmation. They affirm, against all appearances: \u201cThis is ours!\u201d Breaking, therefore, is affirmation, is appropriation. . . . The destituent gesture is thus desertion and attack, creation and wrecking, and all at once, in the same gesture.\u201d).<\/p>\n

[4]<\/a> Bargu at 272\u201373.<\/p>\n

[5]<\/a> Id<\/u>.<\/em> at 273\u201374.<\/p>\n

[6]<\/a> Now<\/u> at 18.<\/p>\n

[7]<\/a> Id.<\/u> at 88.<\/p>\n

[8]<\/a> Bargu at 306.<\/p>\n

[9]<\/a> Id.<\/u> at 330.<\/p>\n

[10]<\/a> Id.<\/u> at 330\u201331.<\/p>\n

[11]<\/a> See<\/u> id.<\/u> at 331 (\u201cIn keeping with the practical-political goals of the death fast struggle, it would not be inaccurate to say that the movement has largely failed in securing its immediate objectives.\u201d).<\/p>\n

[12]<\/a> Id.<\/u> at 336.<\/p>\n

[13]<\/a> Id.<\/u> at 337.<\/p>\n

[14]<\/a> Id.<\/u> at 218.<\/p>\n

[15]<\/a> Id.<\/u> at 222.<\/p>\n

[16]<\/a> Now<\/u> at 9.<\/p>\n

[17]<\/a> Bargu at 308.<\/p>\n

[18]<\/a> Now<\/u> at 80.<\/p>\n

[19]<\/a> Now<\/u> at 81.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By John Finnegan Banu Bargu\u2019s ethnography and theoretical exploration of the Turkish death fasters differs from many of the prior texts read in this seminar series in declining to offer much prescriptive content. Unlike, say, Chantal Mouffe\u2019s For a Left… Continue Reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2166,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[38984],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4879","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-resources-12-13"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4879","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2166"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4879"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4879\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4879"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}