Documenti di Didattica
Documenti di Professioni
Documenti di Cultura
Is Assange the "world-spirit embodied"? A Hegel scholar reports from the iek/Assange Troxy gig
Petri Autio, 09th July 2011 Subjects: OurKingdom [1] Culture [2] Ideas [3] Internet [4] England [5] London [6] Networked Society [7] Petri Autio [8]
WikiLeaks combats the hidden but constant brutality of institutionalized violence, not just by the news content it brings to light but by disturbing the formal functioning of power itself: it has the power to circumvent the oblique ways in which information flows and thereby rewrite the very rules which regulate how rules can be violated. The critical task is to keep this disruptive strength alive. After firing off his rapid salvo of ideologico-critical nuggets on the 1st of July at Cadogan Hall [9] in London, Slovenian philosopher and cultural theorist Slavoj iek revealed what he considers his favourite meeting between a famous thinker and a famous agent of change. The thinker [10] in question was, of course, the great philosopher of freedom Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, and the protagonist Napoleon Bonaparte, the year 1806. Hegel, then on the cusp of completing his first major work, The Phenomenology of Spirit, long enthused about Napoleon as the "world-spirit embodied." That is to say precisely as an agent (a capable one, to be sure) only contingently thrust into the world's limelight, pursuing his own aims - mostly oblivious to the true extent of the societal changes the processes he nominally leads are engendering - but nonetheless producing emancipation in his wake. It is only all too tempting to link this anecdote to the proceedings on the very next day, when iek (who is himself on the verge of completing a book on Hegel) met with the founder of WikiLeaks, Julian Assange, for a two-hour conversation moderated by the award-winning journalist Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! The flow of the relaxed event, held at the Troxy in Eastern London in front of over 9000 onlineviewers [11] on top of the nearly 2000 present in the hall, was carefully balanced: Goodman set the scene clearly and posed questions about the past and present of WikiLeaks to Assange, Assange then gave measured and factual responses, after whichiekwas let loose to try and elucidate what he saw as the broader significance of WikiLeaks and the replies given. Although the atmosphere at the Troxy was very genial, andiek generally enthusiastic about WikiLeaks (as he was in the London Review of Books article [12]he published about it), there was a distinct tension between the rather standard Enlightenment rhetoric employed by Assange (more facts, a more complete historical record, better educated journalists) and the significantly more radical conclusions the philosopher was drawing. This is why - whilst it should no doubt be read in a similar light as ieks own remarks on his position during the conversation (I feel now like that Stalinist commentator: the leader has spoken, I provide the deeper meaning) - the ventured analogy nevertheless contains a kernel of truth beyond its bombast: defining the emancipatory significance of phenomena should not be left to the actors alone. To illustrate: in response to Goodman's initial question on the significance of the Iraq war logs, Assange primarily emphasized the concrete revelations WikiLeaks had provided. He mentioned the 400.000 cables leaked, 15.000 previously unreported deaths revealed, a video of an American helicopter mowing down civilians, and so on. In contrast,iek went far enough to say that even if
Page 1 of 3
This article is published by Petri Autio, and openDemocracy.net under a Creative Commons licence [17]. You may republish it with attribution for non-commercial purposes following the CC
Page 2 of 3
Source URL: http://www.opendemocracy.net/petri-autio/is-assange-world-spirit-embodied-hegel-scholar-reports-f rom-%C5%BEi%C5%BEekassange-troxy-gig Created 07/09/2011 - 07:32 Links: [1] http://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom [2] http://www.opendemocracy.net/topics/culture [3] http://www.opendemocracy.net/topics/ideas [4] http://www.opendemocracy.net/topics/internet [5] http://www.opendemocracy.net/countries/england-0 [6] http://www.opendemocracy.net/cities/london [7] http://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/collections/networked-society [8] http://www.opendemocracy.net/author/petri-autio [9] http://www.intelligencesquared.com/events/slavoj-zizek [10] http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/works/letters/1806-10-13.htm [11] http://www.versobooks.com/blogs/609-slavoj-zizek-and-julian-assange-in-london-with-amy-goodman [12] http://www.lrb.co.uk/v33/n02/slavoj-zizek/good-manners-in-the-age-of-wikileaks [13] http://www.versobooks.com/books/348-the-sublime-object-of-ideology [14] http://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/ryan-gallagher/wikileaks-truth-is-not-treason [15] http://www.opendemocracy.net/openeconomy/tony-curzon-price/cupids-freedom-how-web-sharpensdemocratic-revolution [16] http://www.opendemocracy.net/tony-curzon-price/us-power-wikileaks-student-protest-christopher-hit chens-and-opendemocracy-under-at [17] http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/ [18] http://www.opendemocracy.net/about/syndication
Page 3 of 3