Afflicted Powers: Capital and Spectacle in a New Age of War

by Retort, Iain Boal, T.J. Clark

Afflicted Powers is an account of world politics since September 11, 2001. It aims to confront the perplexing doubleness of the present’s lethal mixture of atavism and new-fangledness. The world careers backward into forms of ideological and geo-political combat that call to mind the Scramble for Africa, and the Wars of Religion. But this brute return of the past is accompanied by an equally monstrous political deployment of (and entrapment in) the apparatus of a hyper-modern production of appearances. Capital is on the move again. In the Middle East and elsewhere it is attempting, nakedly, a new round of primitive accumulation and enclosure.

Now, however, it is obliged to do so in unprecedented circumstances. Never before has imperialist victory or defeat depended so much on a struggle for hegemony in the world of images; never before has the dominant world power been subject to real catastrophe in the realm of the spectacle. The present turn to empire and enclosure, what Retort terms military neo-liberalism, is confronted not only by various forms of radical Islam but by a new kind of vanguard armed with the toolkit of spectacular politics. This book attempts to rethink certain key aspects of the current global struggle within this overall perspective, and to provide some critical support for present and future oppositions. Its main themes are the spectacle and September 11, blood for oil, permanent war and illusory peace, the US–Israel relationship, revolutionary Islam, and modernity and terror.

Genres: Politics, Nonfiction

240 pages, Paperback

First published June 30, 2005

About the author

Retort is a community of about forty writers, teachers, artists, and activists, all self-styled opponents of capital and empire, which has been based for the past two decades in the San Francisco Bay Area. Retort is a collection of Antinomians. This is not a typical team, there is no clear program. Retort is a motley crew - writers, artists, teachers, artisans, scientists, poets - entered into the web-to maintain friendly relationships, they share the same antagonism to the present order of things.

The retort holds its meetings on a regular basis over the past two decades, for the most part, to eat and drink together, but also to talk about politics, history, aesthetics, and the conditions and tactics of the root and branch opposition in the capital of the Empire and various versions of the barbarism currently on offer. There is a deep appreciation of the old cafes and taverns of the city, competing with the trend in favor of the outdoors - walking, wilderness, tidepool, picnics, wild swimming.

The Assembly has prepared boards and brochures for special occasions and from time to time they also organize social events - reading, conviviums, movie nights, and so on. Cooperation of many kinds in the environment. The name "retort" recognizes that the project is engaged in a broader dialogue whose terms and assumptions, they reject, and that Retorters stand on the ground, rhetorical and otherwise, not of our own choosing. Some feel that you have to spend a lot of time - too much - in denials, demurrers, objection. In short, distillation.

The name of the gesture in a strange secular 1940-ies of the magazine with the same name, which first new retort seriously thought about the revival. It was edited and published from a cabin in bearsville, a hamlet near Woodstock, new York. Retort pouch with printing houses belonged to the eloquent wobbly agitator Carlo crash before he was murdered on the streets of Manhattan, perhaps agents of Benito Mussolini. Journal of the retort was anti-statist, anti-militarist and published essays on art, politics, and culture. Poetry is also the first issue published Kenneth Rexroths poem, which begins: "Now in Waldheim where the rain / Has fallen careless and unthinking / For all an evil centurys youth, / Where now the banks of dark roses lie."

Retort press also published prison etiquette convicts compendium of useful information compiled by opponents of the war, particularly in prison for refusing to cooperate with the government or with the Anabaptist "peace Church", which was agreed with the US government to run rural work camps for conscientious objectors. Finally, in the retort, as the alchemists vessel, which are fermented, distilled, transformerait. Its fragile, needs to be fired, there may be problems with the basic theory, but sometimes magic.

Retorts wide angle neither war nor peace was prepared for distribution at the demonstration against the impending American invasion of Iraq in spring 2003. It was later expanded in the book afflicted powers: capital and spectacle in a new age of war, written by Ian Boal, T. J. Clark, Joseph Matthews and Michael watts and published on the back of the book. In the paper "all quiet on the Eastern front" was part of the installation of the retort at the second Seville Biennale.

Associate members include the British geographer Michael watts, an Irish social historian Ian Boal, a British art historian T. J. Clark, the radical attorney Joseph Matthews, labor historian cal Winslow, editor Eddie young, economic geographer Richard Walker, art historian Anne Wagner, Victor Serge translator James brook, microbial ecologist Ignacio is shapely, poet and writer summer Brenner, Balkan anarchist Andrej Grubacic, and the Italian literary scholar Franco Moretti.

Reviews

[yuni · Rating 5 out of 5]

Clouds parted biblically with the last chapter

[Maya · Rating 3 out of 5]

dry but interesting to see a theoretical perspective of the issue from 2005

[Andrea dM · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a MUST read for a deep and clear explanation of the US in geopolitics today. It combats the popular untruths about oil, US-Israel friendliness, a whole lot I didn't know at all about revolutionary Islam, and lastly, an analysis of how to synthesize all this into strategies for social movements. It's intellectual, will probably expand your vocabulary by a word or two, and well worth the effort. The 4 Retort folks who wrote this are unconventional thinkers, and gain credibility in their rigorous analysis and stated political values. They're geographers and good eggs.

[chase Adams · Rating 4 out of 5]

f modernity amirite guys o/

[erin · Rating 5 out of 5]

a lesson about collective writing -- it's better when 4+ minds are involved. very good insights and critique about post-9/11 image world. a teachable book.

[Sandra · Rating 4 out of 5]

good

[Al Matthews · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ah, yes. You will be watchlisted for this one.

Also deep analysis. Cards: counted.

[Mills College Library]

909.83 R4387 2005