Crack Capitalism

CRACK CAPITALISM John Holloway

Instituto de Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades Benemerita Universidad Aut6noma de Puebla

First published 2010 by Pluto Press 3 4S Archway Road, London N6 S AA and 17S Fifth Avenue, New York, NY10010 www.plutobooks.com Distributed in the United States of America exclusively by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of St. Martin's Press LLC, 1 7S Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010 Copyright © John Holloway 2010 The right of John Holloway to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN ISBN

9780 74S3 30099 9780 74S3 300 82

Hardback Paperback

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This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental standards of the country of origin.

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Contents

Part I Break

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Break. We want to break. We want to creat :l different world. Now. Nothing more comm n, nothing more obvious. Nothing more simple. Nothing more difficult. 2 Our method is the method of the crack. 3 It is time to learn the new language of a new struggle.

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Part I I Cracks: The Anti - Politics of Dignity

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The cracks begin with a No, from which there grows a dignity, a negation-and-creation. A crack is the perfectly ordinary creation of a space or moment in which we assert a different type of doing. Cracks break dimensions, break dimensionality. Cracks are explorations in an anti-politics of dignity.

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Part I I I Cracks on the Edge of Impossibility

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Dignity is our weapon against a world of destruction. 9 Cracks clash with the social synthesis of capitalj I 10 Cracks exist on the edge of impossibility, but th y do exist. Moving they exist: dignity is a fleet-foot -" dance.

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Part IV The Dual Character of Labour

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'I 'he 'I'�1 -k are th� revolt of one form of doing against another: the revolt of doing against labour. ' I 'll' abstraction of doing i nto labour is the weaving of capita l i sm. 'I 'he a bstraction of doing i nto labour is a historical proce s of transformation that created the soci a l sy nthesis of capitalism: primitive accumulati o n .

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Part V Abstract Labour: The Great E nclosure

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Abstract l abour encloses both our bodies and our minds. The a bstraction of doing into labour is a process of personification, the creation of c haracter masks, the formation of the working class. The abstraction of doing i nto labour is the creation of the male labourer and the dimorphisation of sexuality. The abstraction of doing into labour is the constitution of nature as object. The abstraction of doing into labour is the externalisation of our power-to-do a nd the creation of the citizen, politics and the state. The abstraction of doing into labour is the homogenisation of time. The abstraction of doing i nto labour is the creation of total ity. Abstract labour rules: the a bstraction of doing i nto la bour is the creation of a cohesive I�\w-bound totality su tained by the exp l oitation of labou r. The la bour movement is the movement o f :lhsrr