> "'Nothing but a man' seems a very reductive conceptualisation."
It is reductive, yes, but not on the conceptual level.It goes back to Aristotle, with the premodern distinction between private life (zoe) and public life (bios).
A man nothing but a man is a mere zoe, a man without a biography, without right to action and speech ; a mere zoological life. Zoe expressed the mere fact of living, common to all living beings. Bios express the form, or the way of life, specific to an individual or a group.
As Arent points out, in the premodern world, private life was strictly confined, as simple reproductive life, to the "private realm" : the private realm is the space of life reproduction and its preservation. The mere fact of living was radically separated from the politically qualified life.
According to Foucault, biopolitics begins when the private realm (zoe) becomes a political problem, producing then the passage from the « État territorial » to the « État de population ». From then, the importance of biological life and the health of the population became a political problem. From then, the premodern distinction between private life and public life disappeared, the difference between nature and culture, zoe and bios.
Hannah Arendt, in the The Human Condition, analyses the process by which biological life (zoe) is centered on the modern political scene. She even suggests that it is because of that primacy of natural life over political action and speech that the pulic sphere declined and is under-animated.
So, when you (Mr. McIntyre) suggest "that it is not that a man is only a man that makes it possible for others to treat him as less than a man, but that a process of deconstructing the human/man - the act of making him not a man/human is what leads to inhuman treatment of him" we see now that it is the same thing : reduce a human to his mere biological life, and he becomes a "naked life" (Agamben), a pure zoon, without political cloth : he is a human only human, ("deconstructed" but I think this term is not fantastic here). Deconstructing the human, as you say, would then be to deny him the access or right to political speech and action, and to ignore is biography, thus reducing him to a zoological form of life.
I don't tkink you can substancialized "human rights" outside "power". The key may be what Peter Sloterdijk and Agamben are suggesting : never reduced of life of its form : but then, even animals are a form-of-life. Of course, knowing what "we" do to chicken or cows when they have fever (euthanasia), it may be dangerous to think correlatively human form of life and animal form of life. Either we produced Rights of Forms of life, either we maintain the specificity of human form.If "rights precedes power", we have to think of prepolitical rights, which seems non-sense. I don't know. I don't think it is possible to think about rights witout law and power. "Power precedes rights" and can also be exercise without law : directly under the police, as in the camps, without political mediation. Or, if you prefer, under a kind of state-police that rules the camp.
--The nation, the state and the politics of camps
"Arendt lived long enough to see Pinochet was denying Chilean nationals any rights. Jews born in Argentina and who had
full political rights were nevertheless tortured and murdered by the military regime because they were Jews, for whom the regime had a rabid hatred. People who were not stateless nevertheless went to the camps."
Yes and no : before going to camp, they were formally deprived of their political status. State people became statelss. This "deconstruction" was a must. Stateless, then they can go to camps. Arendt insists ont that point.
"Why should nationalism have such a totalising right over and above say Catholicism?"
Arendt would agrees with you ; she critizes the fact that human rights was accesible only to citizen : "Droits de l'Homme ET du citoyen"
That is the problem with human rights right now ; maby only a cosmopolitics can accord political right to those who became only zoon.
" is Foucauldianism incompatible with a universal culture of human rights? "
Maybe you mean : is it possible to develop a politics that can give political status to staless people ? To mediate between them and the police in the camps ?
McIntyre <mcintyre@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
But how much does this actually explain?
''It seems that a man who is nothing but a man has lost the very qualities
which make it possible for other people to treat him as a fellow-man." -
Arendt.
This tells us that there is a disparity in power relations and that given an
opportunity there are those who will seek to empower themselves while at the
same time disempowering others. 'Nothing but a man' seems a very reductive
conceptualisation. Is it not more accurate to say that it is not that a man
is only a man that makes it possible for others to treat him as less than a
man, but that a process of deconstructing the human/man - the act of making
him not a man/human is what leads to inhuman treatment of him?
The puzzle I am trying to look at is do rights have no substance outside of
the power to make them effective? Are rights only rights because of power -
or do they not precede power and then lead us to ask how best to use power
to make such rights less susceptible to violation? Are rights only rights
when codified or do rights have an ethical dimension which exist independent
of whether they have been codified and enshrined in law? If power precedes
rights
then power defines rights - it can give and it can take but it doesn't make
it just.
'In the name of the will of the people the state was forced to recognize
only "nationals" as citizens, to grant full civil and political rights only
to those who belonged to the national community by right of origin and fact
of birth.' - Arendt. But Arendt lived long enough to see Pinochet was
denying Chilean nationals any rights. Jews born in Argentina and who had
full political rights were nevertheless tortured and murdered by the
military regime because they were Jews, for whom the regime had a rabid
hatred. People who were not stateless nevertheless went to the camps.
'The practical outcome of this contradiction was that from then on human
rights were protected and enforced only as national rights and that the very
institution of a state, whose supreme task was to protect and guarantee man
his rights as man, as citizen and as national, lost its legal, rational
appearance.' - Arendt. Here Arendt seems to be accepting that the nation
state has some totalising call on the allegiance of people which in return
it will guarantee rights. Why should nationalism have such a totalising
right over and above say Catholicism?
It seems that because Foucault views 'man' as being produced that some view
this as meaning that rights have no meaning outside of the very power that
produces man. And because metanarrative is rejected then a universalising
human rights is conceptually indefensible. Basically the question I am
asking is: is Foucauldianism incompatible with a universal culture of human
rights?
----- Original Message -----
From: "Philippe Magnan"
To:
Sent: Wednesday, March 31, 2004 11:13 PM
Subject: Re: Human rights
>
> When Deleuze say that « Human right is a pure abstraction », what does he
mean?
>
> « It seems that a man who is nothing but a man has lost the very qualities
which make it possible for other people to treat him as a fellow-man."
Arendt.
>
> Human rights are not enough when only words, disconnected from any
specific situation.
>
> As Arendt points :
>
> "In the name of the will of the people the state was forced to recognize
only "nationals" as citizens, to grant full civil and political rights only
to those who belonged to the national community by right of origin and fact
of birth. 230"
>
> That the human rights are connected to the nation-state. Stateless people
become rightless can go straight to camp under no political protection but
under the police. Then the human is only human, without any political
rights. Only human rights : void. « It seems that a man who is nothing but a
man has lost the very qualities which make it possible for other people to
treat him as a fellow-man." Hannah Arendt Origins Of Totalitarianism, NY,
Harcourt, p. 300
>
>
>
> It is better develop a cosmopolitic that can protect from the
arbitrariness of police power those stales so they don't became rightless -
that is to say human only human. Without a cosmopolitics, human right
doesn't give them any political cloth outside the nation-state.
>
> Here is Arendt again :
>
> "The secret conflict between state and nation came to light at the very
birth of the modern nation-state, when the French Revolution combined the
declaration of the Rights of Man with the demand for sovereign nationality.
The same essential rights were at once claimed as the inalienable heritage
of all human beings and as the specific heritage of specific nations, the
same nation was at once declared to be subject to laws, which supposedly
would flow from the Rights of Man, and sovereign, that is, bound by no
universal law and acknowledging nothing superior to itself. (On the
principle of sovereignty, cf. Jean Bodin, Six livres de la République, and
Sabine's History of Political Theory on Bodin's main theories). 230
>
> "The practical outcome of this contradiction was that from then on human
rights were protected and enforced only as national rights and that the very
institution of a state, whose supreme task was to protect and guarantee man
his rights as man, as citizen and as national, lost its legal, rational
appearance". 230-1
>
> « The stateless people were as convinced as the minorities that loss of
national right was identical with the loss of human rights, that the former
inevitably entailed the latter. The more they were excluded from right in
any form, the more they tended to look for a reintegration into a national,
into their own national community."292
>
> « The conception of human rights based upon the assumed existence of a
human being as such, broke down at the very moment when those who professed
to believe in it were for the first time confronted with people who had
indeed lost all other qualities and specific relationship-except that they
are were still human. The world found nothing sacred in the abstract
nakedness of being human. And in view of objective political conditions, it
is hard to say how the concepts of man upon which human rights are
based-that he is created in the image of God (in the American formula), or
that he is the representative of mankind, or that he harbours within himself
the sacred demands of natural law (in the French formula)-could have help to
solve the problem. The survivors of the extermination camps, the inmates of
concentration and internal camps, and even the comparatively happy stateless
people could see [.] that the abstract nakedness of being nothing but human
was their greatest danger.
> "
> 299-300
> Philippe
>
>
> McIntyre wrote:
> I recall the Chomsky-Foucault debate, although the question of human
nature
> is what I remember most from it. I don't argue that people should be
> 'granted' the right to revolt - where does that ever happen? But I do
think
> they are right to revolt if their rights are denied. But if they do not
have
> human rights because human rights is a mere rhetorical device for idiots,
> what then is the basis of their revolt other than a very subjective view
of
> their own particularism? How then do we ethically distinguish between a
> particularism that revolts against a theocracy that demands women be
> mutilated or be stoned to death or wear veils, or a particularism that
> revolts against a secularism which seeks to abolish such practices?
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Arianna"
> To:
> Sent: Wednesday, March 31, 2004 10:02 PM
> Subject: Re: Human rights
>
>
> > 'To call out to justice -- justice does not exist, and human rights do
not
> exist.
> > What
> > counts is jurisprudence: *that* is the invention of rights, invention of
> > the law. So those who are content to remind us of human rights, and
> recite
> > lists of human rights -- they are idiots. It's not a question of
applying
> > human rights. It is one of inventing jurisprudences where, in each case,
> > this or that will no longer be possible. And that's something quite
> > different.'
> >
> > I don't see this as that far from Foucault's take on the law and
> sovereignty. do
> > you remember his debate with Chomsky? wasn't he seriously undermining
> there the
> > notion that justice is the motive behind struggles-similarly to what
> Deleuze does
> > here? in fact, even in the later text on confronting governments he
talks
> of
> > private individuals showing solidarity amongst themselves as governed.
> there is
> > no mention of human rights as a meaningful tool in its legal
application.
> at his
> > time the function of human rights could have conceivably been one of
> simply
> > denouncing the suffering of the governed. 'the suffering of men must
never
> be a
> > silent residue of policy'. but today, the notion of human rights and its
> full
> > embodiment in the workings of the executive, through the international
> courts and
> > police, ought to make one wonder as to the functions of its
applicability
> and
> > more especially its naming and enlisting operations and declarations, as
> Deleuze
> > rightly points out. in fact, when foucault calls for a revolt against
> those who
> > hold the monopoly of government - 'which we need to wrest from them
little
> by
> > little and day by day'- is he so far from Deleuze saying that it's a
> matter of
> > jurisprudence? 'Law isn't created through declarations of human rights.
> > Creation, in law, is jurisprudence, and that's the only thing there is.
'
> >
> > this is to say...I don't get your outrage.
> >
> > you seem to be saying that people should be granted the right to revolt,
> which
> > would be a nonsense in theory. and in practice, whilst in the positive
it
> > translates into 'the europeans, or whoever holds the monopoly of rights
> > assignment, should grant a right to the palestinians, or to the
> chechnyans, or to
> > the kurds, or to whoever is in fashion amongst moralists, to revolt...',
> in the
> > negative - and within the same framework- it also means that that
monopoly
> can be
> > equally legitimately exercised through the creation of sub-humans
> (suspected
> > terrorists-refugees-etc etc).
> >
> >
> >
> > > Glen - but is this not merely to say that rights are mere abstract
> > > formalities without the power to implement them? But this leads on to
a
> > > position that the powerless therefore have no rights to begin with.
And
> > > without rights to break out of their powerlessness what right do they
> have
> > > to break out of it? If rights are not specified as such how then do we
> claim
> > > they have been violated by human rights abusers? Is it not more the
case
> > > that Deleuze rejects human rights on the grounds that the Foucualdian
> > > rejection (and his own) of universals militates against developing a
> human
> > > right because it then becomes a totalising metanarrative? Yet without
> such a
> > > totalising concept do humans not abdicate their ethical responsibility
> to
> > > others by ceding grouind to every tin pot dicatorial regime that wants
> to
> > > opt out of systems that protect people from torure, rape, enslavement,
> > > arbitrary killing etc?
> > > ----- Original Message -----
> > > From: "Glen Fuller"
> > > To:
> > > Sent: Wednesday, March 31, 2004 2:41 AM
> > > Subject: Re: Human rights
> > >
> > >
> > > > I don't think he was antagonistic towards the concept as much as he
> was
> > > > antagonistic towards its deployment. My reading was that human
rights
> is
> > > > only a weapon in those circumstances where it is recognised as such.
> > > Deleuze
> > > > is arguing one step before the application or invocation of human
> rights,
> > > he
> > > > is arguing that groups need to be engaged on the level that can
create
> and
> > > > establish justice or rights. It is a 'pure abstraction' unless the
> > > > juridicial work (to legitimate the authority of the concept) has
> already
> > > > occurred - 'the invention of rights, invention of the law'. Negri
and
> > > Hardt
> > > > relate to this in Empire where they discuss the passage from the
> virtual
> > > to
> > > > the actual (i do not have my copy hear, so no reference!). Justice
> first
> > > has
> > > > to be actualised, that is, in the situation 'requiring' justice
> (creating
> > > > the 'requirement' of justice is the first step of its
actualisation),
> > > before
> > > > the instruments of that justice can be deployed.
> > > >
> > > > Cheers,
> > > > Glen.
> > > >
> > > > PhD Candidate
> > > > Centre for Cultural Research
> > > > University of Western Sydney
> > > > ----- Original Message -----
> > > > From: "McIntyre"
> > > > To:
> > > > Sent: Wednesday, March 31, 2004 4:52 AM
> > > > Subject: Re: Human rights
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > > Is Deluze really saying anything here other than accusing as
idiots
> > > those
> > > > > who advocate human rights? What right can he be talking about
> creating
> > > if
> > > > > not a human right? The discourse of human rights has caused
immense
> > > > problems
> > > > > for those who have abused them. Why surrender the weapon?
> > > > > ----- Original Message -----
> > > > > From: "Arianna"
> > > > > To:
> > > > > Sent: Tuesday, March 30, 2004 6:08 PM
> > > > > Subject: Re: Human rights
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > > yes, we put it here:
> > > > > >
> > > > > > http://www.generation-online.org/p/fpdeleuze10.htm
> > > > > >
> > > > > > and also recently published it on makeworld paper#4
> > > > > > the pdf for it should come online soon.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > arianna
> > > > > >
> > > > > >
> > > > > > ----- Original Message -----
> > > > > > From: "Glen Fuller"
> > > > > > To:
> > > > > > Sent: Tuesday, March 30, 2004 2:08 AM
> > > > > > Subject: Re: Human rights
> > > > > >
> > > > > >
> > > > > > > Arianna,
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Thankyou for the article, I enjoyed it! Can it be found
online?
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Glen.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > ----- Original Message -----
> > > > > > > From: "Arianna"
> > > > > > > To:
> > > > > > > Sent: Monday, March 29, 2004 3:01 PM
> > > > > > > Subject: Re: Human rights
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > foucault's article dated 1984 is only short but predictable:
> you
> > > > find
> > > > > it
> > > > > > > in the
> > > > > > > > third volume of the essential works, Power, it's entitled
> > > > 'confronting
> > > > > > > > governments: human rights'.
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > here is Deleuze on the issue :
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > The reverence that people display toward human rights -- it
> almost
> > > > > makes
> > > > > > > > one want to defend horrible, terrible positions. It is so
> much a
> > > > part
> > > > > of
> > > > > > > > the softheaded thinking that marks the shabby period we were
> > > talking
> > > > > > > about.
> > > > > > > > It's pure abstraction. Human rights, after all, what does
> that
> > > > mean?
> > > > > > > > It's pure abstraction, it's empty. It's exactly what we were
> > > > talking
> > > > > > > about
> > > > > > > > before about desire, or at least what I was trying to get
> across
> > > > about
> > > > > > > > desire. Desire is not putting something up on a pedestal and
> > > > saying,
> > > > > hey,
> > > > > > > > I desire this. We don't desire liberty and so forth, for
> example;
> > > > > that
> > > > > > > > doesn't mean anything. We find ourselves in situations.
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > Take today's Armenia, a recent example. What is the
situation
> > > > there?
> > > > > If
> > > > > > > I
> > > > > > > > understand correctly -- please let me know if I don't,
though
> > > that's
> > > > > not
> > > > > > > > the point either -- there's an Armenian enclave in another
> Soviet
> > > > > > > republic.
> > > > > > > > So there's an Armenian republic, and then an enclave. Well,
> > > that's
> > > > a
> > > > > > > > situation. First, there's the massacre that the Turks, or
the
> > > > Turkic
> > > > > > > > people, I'm not sure, massacre the Armenians once again, in
> their
> > > > > enclave.
> > > > > > > > The Armenians take refuge in their republic -- I think, and
> again,
> > > > > please
> > > > > > > > correct my errors -- and then, there, an earthquake hits.
> It's as
> > > > if
> > > > > they
> > > > > > > > were in the Marquis de Sade. These poor people went through
> the
> > > > worst
> > > > > > > > ordeals that they could face, and they've only just escaped
> into
> > > > > shelter
> > > > > > > > when Mother Nature starts it all up again.
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > I mean, we say "human rights", but in the end, that's a
party
> line
> > > > for
> > > > > > > > intellectuals, and for odious intellectuals, and for
> intellectuals
> > > > > without
> > > > > > > > any ideas of their own. Right off the bat, I've noticed that
> > > these
> > > > > > > > declarations of human rights are never done by way of the
> people
> > > > that
> > > > > are
> > > > > > > > primarily concerned, the Armenian associations and
> communities,
> > > and
> > > > so
> > > > > on.
> > > > > > > > Their problem isn't human rights. What is it?
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > There's a set-up! As I was saying, desire is always through
> > > > set-ups.
> > > > > > > > Well, there's a set-up. What can be done to eliminate this
> > > enclave,
> > > > > or to
> > > > > > > > make it livable? What is this interior enclave? That's a
> > > > territorial
> > > > > > > > question: not a human rights question, but a qusetion of
> > > territorial
> > > > > > > > organisation. What are they going to suppose that Gorbachev
> is
> > > > going
> > > > > to
> > > > > > > > get out of the situation? How is he going to arrange things
> so
> > > that
> > > > > > > > there's no longer this Armenian enclave delivered into the
> hands
> > > of
> > > > > the
> > > > > > > > hostile Turks all around it? That's not a human rights
issue,
> and
> > > > > it's
> > > > > > > not
> > > > > > > > a justice issue. It's a matter of jurisprudence. All of the
> > > > > abominations
> > > > > > > > through which humans have suffered are cases. They're not
> denials
> > > > of
> > > > > > > > abstract rights; they're abominable cases. One can say that
> these
> > > > > cases
> > > > > > > > resemble other, have something in common, but they are
> situations
> > > > for
> > > > > > > > jurisprudence.
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > The Armenian problem is typical of what one might call a
> problem
> > > of
> > > > > > > > jurisprudence. It is extraordinarily complex. What can be
> done
> > > to
> > > > > save
> > > > > > > > the Armenians, and to enable the Armenians to extricate
> themselves
> > > > > from
> > > > > > > > this situation? And then, on top of things, the earthquake
> kicks
> > > > in.
> > > > > An
> > > > > > > > earthquake whose unfolding also had its reasons, buildings
> which
> > > > > weren't
> > > > > > > > well built, which weren't put together as they should have
> been.
> > > > All
> > > > > of
> > > > > > > > these things are jurisprudence cases. To act for liberty, to
> > > become
> > > > a
> > > > > > > > revolutionary, this is to act on the plane of jurisprudence.
> To
> > > > call
> > > > > out
> > > > > > > > to justice -- justice does not exist, and human rights do
not
> > > exist.
> > > > > What
> > > > > > > > counts is jurisprudence: *that* is the invention of rights,
> > > > invention
> > > > > of
> > > > > > > > the law. So those who are content to remind us of human
> rights,
> > > and
> > > > > > > recite
> > > > > > > > lists of human rights -- they are idiots. It's not a
question
> of
> > > > > applying
> > > > > > > > human rights. It is one of inventing jurisprudences where,
in
> > > each
> > > > > case,
> > > > > > > > this or that will no longer be possible. And that's
something
> > > quite
> > > > > > > > different.
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > I'll take an example I quite like, because it's the only way
> to
> > > get
> > > > > across
> > > > > > > > what jurisprudence is. People don't really understood, well,
> not
> > > > > > > everyone.
> > > > > > > > People don't understand very well. I remember the time when
> it
> > > was
> > > > > > > > forbidden to smoke in taxis. The first taxi drivers who
=== message truncated ===
---------------------------------
Yahoo! Mail : votre e-mail personnel et gratuit qui vous suit partout !
Créez votre Yahoo! Mail
Dialoguez en direct avec vos amis grâce à Yahoo! Messenger !
--- StripMime Warning -- MIME attachments removed ---
This message may have contained attachments which were removed.
Sorry, we do not allow attachments on this list.
--- StripMime Report -- processed MIME parts ---
multipart/alternative
text/plain (text body -- kept)
text/html
---