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The remarkable French thinker Simone Weil is one of the leading intellectual and spiritual figures of the twentieth century. A legendary essayist, political philosopher and member of the French resistance, her literary output belied her tragically short life. Most of her work was published posthumously, to widespread acclaim. Always concerned with the nature of individual freedom, Weil explores in Oppression and Liberty its political and social implications. Analyzing the causes of oppression, its mechanisms and forms, she questions revolutionary responses and presents a prophetic view of a way forward. If, as she noted elsewhere, 'the future is made of the same stuff as the present', then there will always be a need to continue to listen to Simone Weil.… (altro)
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In some ways a strange collection--the central essay is excellent, and some of the little squibs associated with it here are good, but I'm not sure you need to read the whole thing. The earliest piece suggests that the 20th century would witness a new form of oppression based on bureaucracy; it could be tied to power, as in the USSR or fascist states, and it's perfectly at home in capitalism too, except it eliminates most of the (non-economic) benefits of the latter. What to do given all this? We must accept that the working class has been destroyed, that 'socialism' is a form of oppression, and accept that we live in a world of total alienation. Better to understand this, she suggests, and hope for something better, than stick our heads in the sand. Fair enough.
She then asks if there can be organization without bureaucratization, and makes a case study of Lenin's thought--hardly the first place you'd go now, but more understandable in 1933. The answer, unsurprisingly, is that Lenin's thought does not give us a model of organization without bureaucratization, because he sees humans as objects, wants the masses to believe rather than think, that is, to blindly submit to "science". Which sounds like a good description of most forms of 21st century government, with a few tweaks on the definition of "science."
The main essay is a bit more diffuse, but also a laudable attempt to construct a unified theory of oppression. Weil starts with Marx, but insists that he only theorized one kind of oppression, not oppression as a whole. It's important to know what we mean when we say "oppression," because any use of the language of "revolution" without a clear concept of the former is empty--revolution away from what?
So we have to know, is it "possible to conceive of an organization of production which, though powerless to remove the necessities imposed by nature and the social constraint arising therefrom, would enable these at any rate to be exercised without grinding down souls and bodies under oppression"? To know that, we must set up, as an ideal, a model of social organization that is free of oppression entirely--while acknowledging that such a thing will never happen. It's a regulative ideal. Given our objective conditions, what is the least oppressive form possible? And how do we get there?
She argues that "oppression is exercised by force," and spends some time theorizing what "force" is--which is very similar to a lot of Marxist and Frankfurt school thought on why, despite the possibility of meeting everyone's needs, we do such a great job of meeting only a few people's. Weil's theory of "force" allows her to suggest that there is a contradiction at the heart of oppression: the material bases of power are necessarily limited, but the race for power is unlimited. Conflict is inevitable.
She gives us one version of the regulative ideal, based on recognizing the importance of collectivities and collective action, but also the importance of individual understanding and action within those collectivities--again, very post-Marxist, a vision of "society in which collective life would be subject to men as individuals instead of subjecting them to itself." She concludes with a scathing portrait of 20th century life as pretty much the opposite of this.
The book ends with fragments and an essay. The fragments are, well, fragments, but with some great little bits included, particularly on the use of contradiction in thinking (which comes very close to Adorno's negative dialectics). The essay, 'Is there a Marxist doctrine?' argues that there isn't, and, more or less, if there was one, it would be Christianity. You might not agree with that, but her argument that there is not yet a Marxist doctrine is convincing.
Weil is a real treasure, and she should be taken very seriously by anyone interested in critical theory of any stripe. She isn't, because critical theory types have, in the past, tended to be secular humanists of the no-time-for-any-religious-people kind. She saw the horrors of the USSR--not in practice, which anyone could have seen, but in theory--far earlier than most French people, at least (and thus contradicts Tony Judt's constant carping about French intellectuals). She made theoretical innovations that nobody else managed for thirty years. And she can write sentences that don't hurt my eyes. A minor miracle. ( )
"Riguardo alle cose umane non ridere, non piangere, non indignarsi, ma capire". Spinoza
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
"L'essere dotato di ragione può fare di ogni ostacolo una materia del suo lavoro e trarne vantaggio". Marco Aurelio
Dedica
Incipit
Il presente è uno di quei periodi in cui svanisce quanto normalmente sembra costituire una ragione di vita e, se non si vuole sprofondare nello smarrimento o nell'incoscienza, tutto va rimesso in questione.
Citazioni
Ultime parole
Per risolversi a un simile sforzo di analisi critica basta aver compreso che esso permetterebbe a chi vi si impegnasse di sfuggire al contagio della follia e della vertigine collettiva tornando a stringere per conto proprio, al di sopra dell'idolo sociale, il patto originario dello spirito con l'universo.
The remarkable French thinker Simone Weil is one of the leading intellectual and spiritual figures of the twentieth century. A legendary essayist, political philosopher and member of the French resistance, her literary output belied her tragically short life. Most of her work was published posthumously, to widespread acclaim. Always concerned with the nature of individual freedom, Weil explores in Oppression and Liberty its political and social implications. Analyzing the causes of oppression, its mechanisms and forms, she questions revolutionary responses and presents a prophetic view of a way forward. If, as she noted elsewhere, 'the future is made of the same stuff as the present', then there will always be a need to continue to listen to Simone Weil.
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A venticinque anni, nel 1934, Simone Weil scrisse queste "Riflessioni", vero talismano che dovrebbe proteggere chiunque è costretto ad attraversare l'immenso ammasso di menzogne che circonda la parola 'società'. Come sempre nelle parole più ovvie, in essa si cela una realtà segreta e imponente, che agisce su di noi anche là dove nessuno la riconosce. La Weil è stata la prima a dire con perfetta chiarezza che l'uomo si è emancipato dalla servitù alla natura solo per sottomettersi a un'oppressione ancora più oscura, ancora più capricciosa e incontrollabile: quella esercitata dalla società stessa, poiché "sembra che l'uomo non riesca ad alleggerire il giogo delle necessità naturali senza appesantire nella stessa misura quello dell'oppressione sociale, come per il gioco di un equilibrio misterioso". Da questa intuizione centrale si diparte, con cristallina virtù argomentativa, una sequenza di ragionamenti che svelano nei meccanismi del potere come in quelli della produzione e dello scambio altrettanti volti in una stessa idolatria. Scritto quando Hitler era al potere da pochi mesi e quando Stalin era venerato da gran parte dell''intelligencija' come 'piccolo padre' di una nuova umanità, questo testo non ha un attimo di incertezza nel delineare l'orrore di quel presente. Ma, come sempre nella Weil, lo sguardo è così preciso proprio perché va al di là del presente e percepisce un'immagine inscalfibile del Bene, in rapporto alla quale giudica il mondo. E' uno sguardo che ci induce a "sfuggire al contagio della follia e della vertigine collettiva tornando a stringere per conto proprio, al di sopra dell'idolo sociale, il patto originario dello spirito con l'universo".
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She then asks if there can be organization without bureaucratization, and makes a case study of Lenin's thought--hardly the first place you'd go now, but more understandable in 1933. The answer, unsurprisingly, is that Lenin's thought does not give us a model of organization without bureaucratization, because he sees humans as objects, wants the masses to believe rather than think, that is, to blindly submit to "science". Which sounds like a good description of most forms of 21st century government, with a few tweaks on the definition of "science."
The main essay is a bit more diffuse, but also a laudable attempt to construct a unified theory of oppression. Weil starts with Marx, but insists that he only theorized one kind of oppression, not oppression as a whole. It's important to know what we mean when we say "oppression," because any use of the language of "revolution" without a clear concept of the former is empty--revolution away from what?
So we have to know, is it "possible to conceive of an organization of production which, though powerless to remove the necessities imposed by nature and the social constraint arising therefrom, would enable these at any rate to be exercised without grinding down souls and bodies under oppression"? To know that, we must set up, as an ideal, a model of social organization that is free of oppression entirely--while acknowledging that such a thing will never happen. It's a regulative ideal. Given our objective conditions, what is the least oppressive form possible? And how do we get there?
She argues that "oppression is exercised by force," and spends some time theorizing what "force" is--which is very similar to a lot of Marxist and Frankfurt school thought on why, despite the possibility of meeting everyone's needs, we do such a great job of meeting only a few people's. Weil's theory of "force" allows her to suggest that there is a contradiction at the heart of oppression: the material bases of power are necessarily limited, but the race for power is unlimited. Conflict is inevitable.
She gives us one version of the regulative ideal, based on recognizing the importance of collectivities and collective action, but also the importance of individual understanding and action within those collectivities--again, very post-Marxist, a vision of "society in which collective life would be subject to men as individuals instead of subjecting them to itself." She concludes with a scathing portrait of 20th century life as pretty much the opposite of this.
The book ends with fragments and an essay. The fragments are, well, fragments, but with some great little bits included, particularly on the use of contradiction in thinking (which comes very close to Adorno's negative dialectics). The essay, 'Is there a Marxist doctrine?' argues that there isn't, and, more or less, if there was one, it would be Christianity. You might not agree with that, but her argument that there is not yet a Marxist doctrine is convincing.
Weil is a real treasure, and she should be taken very seriously by anyone interested in critical theory of any stripe. She isn't, because critical theory types have, in the past, tended to be secular humanists of the no-time-for-any-religious-people kind. She saw the horrors of the USSR--not in practice, which anyone could have seen, but in theory--far earlier than most French people, at least (and thus contradicts Tony Judt's constant carping about French intellectuals). She made theoretical innovations that nobody else managed for thirty years. And she can write sentences that don't hurt my eyes. A minor miracle. (