Empire (83 page)

the capitalist, who functioned like an orchestra conductor or a field

general, deploying and coordinating productive forces in a common ef-

fort. See
Capital,
1:439–454. For an analysis ofthe contemporary dynamics ofsocial and productive cooperation, see Antonio Negri,
The Politics
of Subversion: A Manifesto for the Twenty-first Century,
trans. James Newell (Oxford: Polity Press, 1989).

23. See Saskia Sassen,
The Global City: New York, London, Tokyo
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991).

24. On the network enterprise, see Manuel Castells,
The Rise of the Network
Society
(Oxford: Blackwell, 1996), pp. 151–200.

25. Bill Gates,
The Road Ahead
(New York: Viking, 1995), p. 158.

26. A number ofItalian scholars read the decentralization ofnetwork produc-

tion in the small and medium-sized enterprises ofnorthern Italy as an

opportunity to create new circuits of
autonomous labor.
See Sergio Bologna and Andrea Fumagalli, eds.,
Il lavoro autonomo di seconda generazione: scenari
del postfordismo in Italia
(Milan: Feltrinelli, 1997).

27. On the growth of‘‘producer services’’ in concentrated centers ofcontrol, see Sassen,
The Global City,
pp. 90–125.

28. Peter Cowhey, ‘‘Building the Global Information Highway: Toll Booths,

Construction Contracts, and Rules ofthe Road,’’ in William Drake, ed.,

The New Information Infrastructure
(New York: Twentieth Century Fund Press, 1995), pp. 175–204; quotation p. 175.

29. On rhizomatic and arborescent structures, see Gilles Deleuze and Feĺix

Guattari,
A Thousand Plateaus,
trans. Brian Massumi (Minneapolis: University ofMinnesota Press, 1987), pp. 3–25.

N O T E S T O P A G E S 3 0 0 – 3 0 7

463

30. On the false egalitarian promises of the ‘‘information superhighway’’ in the United States, see Herbert Schiller,
Information Inequality: The Deepening Social Crisis in America
(New York: Routledge, 1996), especially pp. 75–89. For a more global analysis ofthe unequal distribution of

information and technology, see William Wresch,
Disconnected: Haves and
Have-Nots in the Information Age
(New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1996).

3 . 5 M I X E D C O N S T I T U T I O N

1. For an analysis ofthe passages ofMarx’s and Engel’s work that deal with

the theory ofthe state, see Antonio Negri, ‘‘Communist State Theory,’’

in Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri,
Labor of Dionysus
(Minneapolis: University ofMinnesota Press, 1994), pp. 139–176.

2. See M. C. Ricklefs,
A History of Modern Indonesia,
2nd ed. (London: Macmillan, 1993). The complex relationship among the Dutch administration, traditional Javanese authorities, and economic powers at the be-

ginning ofthe twentieth century is described beautifully in Pramoedya

Ananta Toer’s great four-volume historical novel,
The Buru Quartet,
trans.

Max Lane (London: Penguin Books, 1982–1992).

3. See Brian Gardner,
The East India Company
(London: Rupert Hart-Davis, 1971); and Geoffrey Wheatcroft,
The Randlords
(New York: Athe-neum, 1986).

4. Marx argued that the greater concentration and centralization ofcapital

acted against the forces of competition and was thus a destructive process

for capital. See Karl Marx,
Capital,
vol. 3, trans. David Fernbach (London: Penguin, 1981), pp. 566–573. Lenin took up this same argument in his

analysis ofthe monopoly phase ofcapital: monopolies destroy competi-

tion, which is the foundation of capitalist development. See V. I. Lenin,

Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism
(New York: International Publishers, 1939), pp. 16–30.

5. See, for example, Richard Barnet and John Cavanagh,
Global Dreams:

Imperial Corporations and the New World Order
(New York: Simon and

Schuster, 1994).

6. The concept ofthe ‘‘autonomy ofthe political,’’ which belongs to the

tradition ofpolitical theology, was given its first great definition by the political theologian Thomas Hobbes. The concept was raised to even

greater heights by Carl Schmitt; see principally
The Concept of the Political,
trans. George Schwab (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press,

1976); and
Verfassungslehre,
8th ed. (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1993).

The political is understood here as the foundation of every social relation-464

N O T E S T O P A G E 3 1 2

ship and the originary evaluation or ‘‘decision’’ that constructs the sphere ofpower and thus guarantees the space oflife. It is interesting to note

that Schmitt’s conception ofthe political is ineluctably tied to the juridical definition ofthe nation-state and inconceivable outside ofits realm.

Schmitt himself seems to recognize this fact after having witnessed the

catastrophe ofthe German nation-state. See Carl Schmitt,
Der Nomos der

Erde im Vo¨lkerrecht des jus publicum europaeum
(Cologne: Greven Verlag, 1950). The most extensive consideration ofSchmitt’s conception ofthe

political that we know is contained in Carlo Galli,
Genealogia della politica:
C. Schmitt e la crisi del pensiero politico moderno
(Bologna: Il Mulino, 1996).

This critique ofScmitt’s concept ofthe ‘‘autonomy ofthe political’’ should

also be applied to the various positions that in some way derive from his

thought. At two extremes we can cite Leo Strauss, who tried to appro-

priate Schmitt’s concept under his own liberal conception ofnatural right,

and Mario Tronti, who sought to find in the autonomy ofthe political

a terrain that could support a compromise with liberal political forces in

a period when the Western European communist parties were in deep

crisis. For Strauss’s interpretation ofSchmitt’s text and their ambiguous

relationship, see Heinrich Meier,
Carl Schmitt and Leo Strauss: The Hidden
Dialogue,
trans. J. Harvey Lomax (Chicago: University ofChicago Press, 1995). For Tronti, see
L’autonomia del politico
(Milan: Feltrinelli, 1977).

7. There are numerous excellent critiques ofthe media and their purported

objectivity. For two good examples, see Edward Said,
Covering Islam:

How the Media and the Experts Determine How We See the Rest of the World
(New York: Pantheon, 1981); and Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky,

Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of Mass Media
(New York: Pantheon, 1988).

8. See, for example, Elise Boulding, ‘‘IGOs, the UN, and International

NGOs: The Evolving Ecology ofthe International System,’’ in Richard

Falk, Robert Johansen, and Samuel Kim, eds.,
The Constitutional Founda-

tions of World Peace
(Albany: SUNY Press, 1993), pp. 167–188; quotation p. 179.

9. For characterizations ofthe activities ofvarious kinds ofNGOs, see

John Clark,
Democratizing Development: The Role of Voluntary Organizations
(West Hartford, Conn.: Kumarian Press, 1990); Lowell Livezey,
Nongov-ernmental Organizations and the Ideas of Human Rights
(Princeton: The Center ofInternational Studies, 1988); and Andrew Natsios, ‘‘NGOs and

the UN System in Complex Humanitarian Emergencies: Conflict or

Cooperation?’’ in Peter Diehl, ed.,
The Politics of Global Governance: International Organizations in an Independent World
(Boulder: Lynne Reiner, 1997), pp. 287–303.

N O T E S T O P A G E S 3 1 3 – 3 1 8

465

10. James Petras, ‘‘Imperialism and NGOs in Latin America,’’
Monthly Review,
49 (December 1997), 10–27.

11. See Polybius,
The Rise of the Roman Empire,
trans. Ian Scott-Kilvert (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1979), Book VI, pp. 302–352.

12. See G. A. Pocock,
The Machiavellian Moment: Florentine Political Thought
and the Atlantic Republican Tradition
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1975).

13. On the transformation from a model of bodies to a functional model in

the U.S. Constitution, see Antonio Negri,
Il potere costituente: saggio sulle
alternative del moderno
(Milan: Sugarco, 1992), chap. 4, pp. 165–222.

14. It is interesting to note here that, at least since the constitutionalism ofthe Weimar Republic, the continental European tradition ofconstitutional

thought has also adopted these principles, which were presumed to belong

only to the Anglo-Saxon world. The fundamental texts for the German

tradition in this regard are Max Weber,
Parlament und Regierung im neu-

geordneten Deutschland
(Munich: Duncker & Humblot, 1918); Hugo

Preuss,
Staat, Recht und Freiheit
(Tu¨bingen: Mohr, 1926); and Hermann Heller,
Die Souveranita¨t
(Berlin: W. de Gruyter, 1927).

15. Generally the analyses that come from the Left are the ones that insist most strongly that the genesis ofEmpire activates the ‘‘bad’’ forms of

government. See, for example, E

´ tienne Balibar,
La crainte des masses
(Paris:

Galileé, 1997), a book which in other regards is extremely open to the

analysis ofthe new processes ofthe (mass) production ofsubjectivity.

16. For an analysis ofthese processes and a good discussion ofthe relevant

bibliography, see Yann Moulier Boutang, ‘‘La revanche des externaliteś:

globalisation des ećonomies, externaliteś, mobilite´, transformation de l’eć-

onomie et de l’intervention publique,’’
Futur anteŕieur,
no. 39–40 (Fall 1997), pp. 85–115.

17. It should be clear from what we have said thus far that the theoretical condition underlying our hypotheses has to involve a radically revised

analysis ofreproduction. In other words, any theoretical conception that

regards reproduction as simply part ofthe circulation ofcapital (as classical economics, Marxian theory, and neoclassical theories have done) cannot

deal critically with the conditions ofour new situation, particularly those resulting from the political-economic relations of the world market in

postmodernity. Our description ofbiopower in Section 1.2 is the begin-

ning ofsuch a revised analysis ofreproduction. For the definition ofsome

fundamental elements that relate to the integration of labor, affect, and

biopower, see Antonio Negri, ‘‘Value and Affect’’ and Michael Hardt,

‘‘Affective Labor,’’
boundary2,
26, no. 2 (Summer 1999).

466

N O T E S T O P A G E S 3 1 9 – 3 2 7

18. We are refering once again to the work of Michel Foucault and to Gilles Deleuze’s interpretation ofit. See our discussion in Section 1.2.

19. This first variable and the analysis ofthe functioning ofthe network in constitutional terms relates in certain respects to the various autopoietic theories ofnetworks. See, for example, the work ofHumberto Maturana

and Francisco Varela. For an excellent analysis ofsystems theory in the

context ofpostmodern theories, see Cary Wolfe,
Critical Environments

(Minneapolis: University ofMinnesota Press, 1998).

20. The various advances in systems theories contribute also to our under-

standing ofthis second variable. Niklas Luhmann’s work has been the

most influential for the analysis ofautopoietic systems in terms oflegal

and social philosophy.

21. Jameson offers an excellent critique of ‘‘the conception of mass culture as sheer manipulation.’’ He argues that although mass culture is ‘‘managed,’’ it nonetheless contains utopian possibilities. See Fredric Jameson,

‘‘Reification and Utopia in Mass Culture,’’ in
Signatures of the Visible
(New York: Routledge, 1992), pp. 9–34.

22. See Guy Debord,
Society of the Spectacle,
trans. Donald Nicholson-Smith (New York: Zone Books, 1994); and
Comments on the Society of the

Spectacle
(London: Verso, 1990).

23. Fredric Jameson, ‘‘Totality as Conspiracy,’’ in
The Geopolitial Aesthetic:
Cinema and Space in the World System
(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992), pp. 9–84.

24. Thomas Hobbes,
Leviathan,
ed. C. B. Macpherson (London: Penguin, 1968), p. 200.

25. See Brian Massumi, ed.,
The Politics of Everyday Fear
(Minneapolis: University ofMinnesota Press, 1993).

3 . 6 C A P I T A L I S T S O V E R E I G N T Y

1. Gilles Deleuze and Feĺix Guattari,
Anti-Oedipus,
trans. Robert Hurley, Mark Lane, and Helen Lane (Minneapolis: University ofMinnesota Press,

1983), p. 224.

2. On Deleuze and Guattari’s conception ofthe axiomatic ofcapital, see

Gilles Deleuze and Feĺix Guattari,
A Thousand Plateaus,
trans. Brian Massumi (Minneapolis: University ofMinnesota Press, 1987), pp. 452–473.

3. Robert Blanche´,
Axiomatics,
trans. G. B. Keene (New York: Free Press ofGlencoe, 1962), pp. 30–31.

4. There is, ofcourse, one element oftranscendence and segmentation that

is essential to the functioning of capital, and that is class exploitation.

This is a boundary, however flexible or indiscernible it may be at times,

that capital must maintain throughout society. Class divisions continue

N O T E S T O P A G E S 3 2 8 – 3 5 4

467

to be centrally effective in the new segmentations that we investigate

later in this section.

5. See Michel Foucault, ‘‘La ‘gouvernementalite´,’ ’ in
Dits et ećrits
(Paris: Gallimard, 1994), 3:635–657; and
Il faut defendre la socie´te´
(Paris: Seuil/

Gallimard, 1997).

6. See Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri,
Labor of Dionysus
(Minneapolis: University ofMinnesota Press, 1994), pp. 257–259.