Ionia and the Hobbesian "Perpetual Peace" of Kant
Sections VI.3C-VI.3D ("The Problem of Scale (Part 1)")
Dr. Samuel Loncar in a conversation with David McKerracher considered if there was value in “the earth” and being human, critiquing certain strands of transhumanism. Dr. Loncar incorporated Chesterton and said it is not that we found the ideal of being human inadequate, but that we found being human too difficult and left it untried. To be human we would have to engage in Rhetoric and be Children, and that would require us to face incredible anxiety (there is an argument to be made that we have not really tried “creativity” or Democracy, in a way, as we will later discuss with Tocqueville). As a result, we seem to be handing over the future to AI, which is the logical next step of Discourse and Capital, which (to go further back) might follow from Writing (which might align us with “dolphin evolution”). Dr. Loncar suggests that “the Human is the Event not yet tried,” an “always unfolding Apocalypse,” while perhaps Discourse is a principality and “rumor against us” (like “spiritual warfare”). To stress, this doesn’t mean Discourse is necessarily always bad, but it is bad when it becomes “autonomous,” and when (to allude to Dr. Loncar) we forget after asking math questions (“What is two plus two?”) to then ask (in honor of Rhetoric), “What does it mean that humans can ask math questions?” In the acts which make humans wonder-full, we have forgotten to ask if those acts make us wonder-full, and so in them we have “practically lost” ourselves.
Dr. Loncar suggests we need to be “better materialists” who don’t lose sight of the reality that materiality emerged to beings who could do mathematics and then later engage in physics that would help us do math, as we do math which helps us do physics (“the street goes both ways” now, as Dr. Loncar notes). A philosopher is aware of the work to be human for Dr. Loncar, and I do think it is true that without philosophy we cannot engage in a “language” of Rhetoric which could construct the subject alternative to the subject of Discourse. Dr. Johannes Niederhauser with Guy Sengstock (“Coming into Wonder”) noted that for Aristotle “philosophical friendship” was necessarily for the health of the polis, and perhaps the rise of the “Liminal Web” is an effort to practice and learn “philosophical friendship” in light of the collapse of institutions, economics systems, governments…? Indeed, as we as subjects require philosophy to be Children, so we need philosophy so that friendship might be structured by Rhetoric instead of Discourse. More will be said later in Belonging Again (Part II), but perhaps we are seeing the loss of friendship in the world today because friendship can’t last under Discourse. Where Discourse prevails, friendship hence dies, and then we are isolated and depressed. We prove too weak to make Absolute Choices, and so Artificial Intelligence prevails. Dr. Niederhauser also explored the difference between Atlantis and Athens for Plato, with Atlantis being a civilization of commerce and business that lost sight of Being (we could say), and thus ultimately failed. Atlantis is a symbol of a world where Discourse prevails, where Athens is a place of Rhetoric. Our choice today is between Atlantis and Athens (and in my view “Tocqueville’s Democracy” and avoiding “The Great Stagnation” requires us to move into Athens from Atlantis, paradoxically, which requires us to change “the medium condition” of the classroom, following Neil Postman). Land waits.
But perhaps instead of “Athens” following Plato we might speak of “Ionia,” as does Kojin Karatani in The Structure of World History? There are inadequacies and failures to seemingly all terms and language, but considering Ionia for a moment here could be of value, around which Karatani orbits his book Isonomia and the Origins of Philosophy. Ionia consisted of Greek colonies in what we now call Turkey, and Ionia lacked direct rulership, social divisions, and established equality more on mobility and immigration than say law. At the same time, ‘[c]ommerce and industry were highly developed in [the cities of Ionia], and they were centers of overseas trade’ (suggesting hope that avoiding a Meaning Crisis must require us to give up prosperity).⁷⁶⁵ To quote Karatani:
‘Under Athenian democracy, the impoverished majority kept the wealthy minority in check, achieving equality through redistribution. But the principle of isonomy, as Arendt notes, associates equality with freedom. This is possible only in situations where society is free, in other words, nomadic — when, for example, people were free to emigrate if inequality or despotism arose within a polis. Isonomy is premised on nomadic mobility [(which brings to mind “The Frontier Thesis” of Frederick Turner, as we’ll discuss later with Tocqueville and “nonrationality”)]. In this sense, isonomy negates the constraints and bonds of clan society, but at the same time it marks the return of nomadic mobility that had characterized it. In other words, isonomy marks the return of clan society in a higher dimension.’⁷⁶⁶
This might suggest that democracy in its best form, which is more Rhetorical and Isonomic, is only possible where there are “frontiers” for people to explore, or “open borders” with nations which aren’t despotic—but what if all nations are corrupt (under Discourse) and/or there are no frontiers left? Must we go to Mars or Virtual Reality? Might “lack” be a basis of a new nomadic lifestyle? Does the failure to address this problem guarantee “The End of (True) History?” Questions arise which must be addressed, but what we see in Ionia is the possibility of what could be called “freedom in” (or perhaps “freedom before,” as I discussed with Ken Lowry, #148), which is distinct from “freedom from” or “freedom to” (to allude to the famous discussions of Isaiah Berlin). “Freedom in” is the freedom of home, of having “belonging” and “meaning,” a condition which historically has proven to risk possible injustice and exclusion, but in Ionia we might see a possibility of avoiding this mistake which doesn’t present us with options of freedom that ultimately leave us like someone in Kafka or Faulkner who flees to a desert, without food or shelter, all alone, wearing glasses without lenses, whispering, “Freedom.” Freedom requires a home, but how might we have a home without power and exclusion? Ionia is a possible model, though it depends on nomadic movement. Is something like this what we see possible online with communities like Voicecraft, Philosophy Portal, Theory Underground, Other Life, and the like? Perhaps, and perhaps we see an “Ioan orbiting lack-as-river-hole?” Time will tell.
Unfortunately, ‘Ionian isonomy ultimately collapsed, as the region fell victim to conquest at the hands of the neighboring Lydia and Persia […] Greece would emerge victorious from the Persian War that followed, and the Ionian city-states again became independent, but they never recovered their original form.’⁷⁶⁷ Karatani argues that ‘[t]he destruction of the Ionian poleis occurred because they lacked sufficient military power to defend themselves,’ but this could only be expected, for ‘the real greatness of Ionian city-states lay precisely in their practice of not relying on military might. Unlike democracy, isonomy is in principle incompatible with a reliance on the state and military power.’⁷⁶⁸ Militaries require bureaucracies, which means they require rulers — only a vulnerable Ionian seems possible.⁷⁶⁹ Karatani has much more to say on Ionia, which we will revisit later, but to discuss Iona as distinct from Athens one last time:
‘Athenian democracy is inseparable from [a] kind of nationalism. The isonomia of the Ionian cities was fundamentally different. Whereas Athenian democracy was grounded in the exclusionary tribal consciousness of the poleis, Ionian isonomia grew out of a world that transcended tribe or polis […] [T]he development of democracy created an increasing need for slaves [(and “labor” more generally, to consider us today)], and the citizens of Athens came to scorn manual labor as the work of slaves — a sharp contrast with the citizens of Ionia. This difference is clearly manifested in the difference between the natural philosophy of Ionia and the philosophy of Plato or Aristotle.’⁷⁷⁰
It is possible that we consider Ionia alongside Childhood and Rhetoric. Perhaps it was “historically inevitable” that Ionia would fall, but something like Ionia might be possible now with the invention of nuclear weaponry, which makes war and invasion more unimaginable (though not necessarily, please note — this is a dangerous line to follow), and with the invention of Web 3.0 where “nomadic possibilities” are opening up. I’m not sure, but while ‘Athenian democracy was based on the principles of a closed community,’ we might see in what is perhaps “Ionian Democracy” a form of democracy that is rather “based on the principles of an open community.”⁷⁷¹ Alternatively, nuclear weaponry might make bureaucracy and State more powerful and something like Ionian “no-rule” more impossible — the case is not so obvious.
Karatani suggests we cannot overcome our predicament (or stop approaching “The End of (True) History”) by anything short of a new Ionia, for we must replace the entire “Capital-Nation-State,” not just one part of it. For this reason, Karatani stresses “the means of exchange” versus “the means of production,” which sets Karatani up in opposition to much Marxist thought. Karatani is not arguing that “production” and “labor” have no bearing on the manifestation of “the value-form” in Capitalism though — in fact, as we will explore later in Belonging Again (Part II), labor is how value is quantified and made intelligible — but rather Karatani wants us to realize we cannot think of “exchange” as more on the side of a “superstructure” that will dissolve once we change “the means of production.” The institutions like the State which make possible exchange are part of the base: production and exchange are all indivisible in what could be called “a situation” (alluding to Leibniz). Take a paragraph from Capital which suggests the indivisibility:
‘The value of commodities is the very opposite of the coarse materiality of their substance, not an atom of matter enters into its composition […] Yet in so far as it remains an object of value, it seems impossible to grasp it. If, however, we bear in mind that the value of commodities has a purely social reality, and that they acquire this reality only in so far as they are expressions or embodiments of one identical social substance, viz., human labour, it follows as a matter of course that value can only manifest itself in the social relation of commodity to commodity. In fact, we started from exchange value, or the exchange relation of commodities, in order to get at the value that lies hidden behind it [which is quantifiable thanks to labour].’⁷⁷²
“A purely social reality” and “social use-value” are examples of phrases Marx uses often, and a “society” is fundamentally a “means of exchange.” If labor-value requires social use-value, then “labor” is only definable as itself (from say mere “work”) thanks to the system of exchange, and so we might say that Karatani wants us to place the social institutions which make possible exchange at the base versus in a “superstructure” (which, if we consider exchange through ‘the dazzling money form,’ which Marx focuses on, we might say the Federal Reserve is “base’ not “superstructure”).⁷⁷³ Commodities work because a given commodity becomes (via something like “givens”):
‘a mysterious thing simply because in it the social character of men’s labour appears to them as an objective character stamped upon the product of that labour, because the relation of the producers to the sum total of their own labour is presented to them as a social relation, existing not between themselves, but between the products of their labour […] social things whose qualities are at the same time perceptible and imperceptible by the senses.’⁷⁷⁴
How does this “mysterious process” occur? Well, the “transubstantiation” requires an entire social order, one that has authority, which brings to mind How Institutions Think by Mary Douglas. Something is only social if exchangeable, so “social use-value” is fundamentally a matter of exchange, but that exchange requires a way to quantify value into intelligibility that labor makes possible (there must be a ‘true relation hidden behind the appearances, namely, [a] relation to each other as mere expressions of human labour’).⁷⁷⁵ The “mysterious process” hence requires labor and exchange equally, and we might say that Karatani is trying to correct an overemphasis on “the means of production” which has led to severe Marxist errors. This can be debated, and indeed we will have to give more attention to the debate between “The Value-Form Theory” and “The Labor Theory of Value” later on in Belonging Again, but for now let us focus again on Karatani.
For Karatani, ‘Marx argued that real material processes in themselves contain[ed] the ‘premises’ that necessarily [led] to communism,’ which is to say that ‘the moral moment’ in which a society gains an “enlightenment” by which all people will learn to treat one another differently, according to say a Kantian ‘kingdom of ends’ (Karatani sees Kant’s vision and Marx’s communism as ‘hardly differ[ing]’), will naturally arise once “the modes of production” are transformed and “labor” liberated.⁷⁷⁶ ‘The problem is,’ Karatani tell us, ‘insofar as you look at material processes or economic substructures from the perspective of modes of production, you will never find the moral moment.’⁷⁷⁷ It is not the case that once economic forces transform the State likewise “melts” because citizens have gained a morality and rationality that renders the State unnecessary: there is what Karatani calls “The Capital-Nation State” which characterizes ‘advanced capitalist nations […] a triplex system,’ and which furthermore keeps the State in place.⁷⁷⁸ Karatani elaborates:
‘Capital, nation, and state all differ from one another, with each being grounded in its own distinct set of principles, but here they are joined together in a mutually supplementary manner. They are linked in the manner of a Borromean knot, in which the whole system will fail if one of the three is missing.’⁷⁷⁹
The State sets the terms of “the means of exchange” according to which morality and “how people exchange one another” is set and organized (hence, ‘the economic moment must be sought not in economic structure but in the idealistic dimension’).⁷⁸⁰ For many Marxists, there is a belief in ‘the relative autonomy of the superstructure’ (which is to say State was fairly divided from the economic “base”), and this ‘led to the belief that State and nation were simply representations that had been created historically and that they could be dissolved through enlightenment. This view overlooks the fact that state and nation have their own roots in the base structure and therefore possess active agency.’⁷⁸¹ To put it another way, there is a Marxist view which ‘regards the state as a mere ideological phenomenon that is determined by bourgeois society. This led in turn to the conclusion that if the economic structure were transformed, the state and nation would automatically disappear.’⁷⁸² As history has shown, this is not so, for it is not only “the means of production” which are part of “the base,” but also “the means of exchange” as indivisible from the State.⁷⁸³ Indeed, it was thought that ‘the state and nation [were] part of the ideological superstructure, on par with art or philosophy,’ but might art and philosophy actually themselves be part of “the base” in somehow “conditioning” it (as suggested by McCloskey’s Rhetoric)?⁷⁸⁴ Things that seem unneeded might not be so unneeded after all…
Why exactly “The Capital-Nation-State” arises and comes to exist like it does can be considered if we take seriously the realities of Discourse and Rhetoric, which are also what we must consider if we are to hope for a new and transformative “moral moment.” Our very minds organize us toward “low order causality” and anxiety: this is part of the human condition, not simply the material condition. Yes, humans under “The Capital-Nation-State” are different from humans who are under a different socioeconomic and sociopolitical structure, but the reason a historic process commenced which lead us to a Capital-Nation-State is ultimately for human reason (as we’ll elaborate on through Mary Douglas, Tocqueville, and others; furthermore, we already discussed how Capital is pleasurable in providing understanding, which has contributed to our world formulating like it has). If we want to morally and philosophically transform people, then we have to take “exchange” seriously, which in my view is to take Discourse and Rhetoric seriously (and “medium conditions”), for ‘[t]he moral moment is included within modes of exchange.’⁷⁸⁵
“How we talk” (and think) is not the only “mode of exchange,” no, but it is a central one, and in impacting the market (following McCloskey), it also impacts the State and vice-versa, for ‘[t]he belief that the capitalist market economy develops autonomously, outside the influence of the state, is simply mistaken.⁷⁸⁶ Ionia symbolizes “a new mode of exchange,” and we might associate Ionia with Rhetoric, which is a change in quality politically and economically (for ‘State and capital differ in character, yet they can only continue to exist through mutual interdependence’).⁷⁸⁷ But haven’t we spoken of Rhetoric as democratic, and isn’t Ionia not democratic? A fair counter, but Karatani writes:
‘The word ‘democracy,’ expressing even the majority rule, the rule of the many, was originally coined by those who were opposed to isonomy and who meant to say: What you say is ‘no-rule’ is in fact only another kind of rulership; it is the worst form of government, rule by the demos’ (passion) / ‘Hence, equality, which we, following Tocqueville’s insights, frequently see as a danger to freedom, was originally almost identical with it.’⁷⁸⁸
“Isonomia” is closer to what we hope to mean when we discuss Democracy than when we use the word “democracy” (funny enough), Karatani suggests, for in “isonomia” we see principle of “no-rule” and “people deciding for themselves,” while the word “democracy” actually means “majority rule.” Words come to mean different things through time, but “isonomia” seems closer to Tocqueville’s meaning of “democracy” than what we might mean today (though that will have to be explained). As Karatani quotes Hannah Arendt putting it:
‘The word ‘democracy,’ expressing even the majority rule, the rule of the many, was originally coined by those who were opposed to isonomy and who meant to say: What you say is ‘no-rule’ is in fact only another kind of rulership; it is the worst form of government, rule by the demos’ (passion) / ‘Hence, equality, which we, following Tocqueville’s insights, frequently see as a danger to freedom, was originally almost identical with it.’⁷⁸⁹
In equality there is a freedom from anxiety (perhaps like “home”), and if we are not free from that how can we say we are free? (Today, we must gain freedom from anxiety by facing and integrating with it.) The more isonomic the democracy, the better; otherwise, it’s hardly a democracy at all. That is, if by “democracy” we mean “rule by the people.” That must be “no-rule”; otherwise, we are ruled by the majority, which isn’t inherently bad, but it likely will be, in different ways, if it is likely that “the majority” reflect Discourse more than Rhetoric (though changing this probability might be part of our work).
Could Democracy lead to Ionia or must it stay in Athens? Might an “Isonomic Athens” somehow prove possible thanks to Rhetoric? Would an Isonomic Athens be a place where Thymos and the Bourgeois Virtues somehow coexist? Hard to say, but this “Ionia’ would need to be widespread (as perhaps possible with “a medium condition” like Zoom, which leads to Wordspread and Voicecraft). ‘No one has directly confronted Marx’s position that a socialist revolution is possible only as a simultaneous world revolution’ (which Karatani believes is only really possible through ‘sublating Capital-Nation-State’), but might this be possible with the internet (which arose from “the implicit” right when history needed it, following Hegel, precisely because “the world-wide character” was ignored)?⁷⁹⁰ Might we imagine a global spread of Rhetoric through a spread of “medium conditions” (which could help bring about ‘the abolition of all antagonism between states — meaning, that is, the abolition of the state itself’)?⁷⁹¹ Perhaps, and perhaps this would be natural, emergent, and more gradual through use of networks and the internet — might this “abolition of the state” suggest a dream of Web 3.0, the P2P work of Michel Bauwens, and others? I’m not sure, but there is a Vision here and there around the world which suggests possibility without overlooking what Karatani teaches regarding the Capital-Nation State. Additionally, Karatani makes a strong case that, if we take Kant’s “Perpetual Peace” seriously, we never escape that Vision until we take it on.
V1.3D: A Global Revolution of Lack and Regulatory “Perpetual Peace”
Through the example of Ionia, Karatani helps us understand that there is a difference in linking together “freedom” and “equality” where we only consider ‘equality of wealth,’ versus where we also understand freedom in terms of ‘nomadism,’ a mistake Karatani believes we can better avoid if we take seriously ‘the perspective of modes of exchange’ (“exchange” is a term that suggests “movement” and “change”).⁷⁹² It should be noted that there is a journey and movement that occurs in Dialogos, “circling,” the Cypher, and other ways of approaching “lack,” and perhaps this suggests why a “freedom” is experienced in the “flow” which can result from these practices. Karatani suggests there must be the possibility of movement for there to be freedom (“the freedom of the Dance,” we might say, bringing Dante to mind), and though obviously Karatani has actual movement in mind, it’s interesting to note how “flow” is a term which suggests “movement.” Perhaps we need to have “the freedom of movement” in many different ways in our lives to be Children? Perhaps so.
For Karatani, ‘[a] genuine [world of] ‘[f]reedom, equality, fraternity,’ can only be realized by superseding Capital-Nation-State, and that will require us to learn from Ionia.⁷⁹³ Furthermore, quoting Proudhon, Karatani does not believe ‘we […] should put forward revolutionary action as a means of social reform, because that pretended means would simply be an appeal to force, to arbitrariness, in brief, a contradiction.’⁷⁹⁴ Karatani believes we should take Proudhon seriously, who ‘advocated resistance to capitalism from within the process of circulation.’⁷⁹⁵ This is a change “within exchange,” but what might that exchange look like? As we will take up in II.2, it will look like “a change in abstract social norms,” which right now are mostly defined in the world by and under Capital. This case has to be elaborated on, but we are suggesting “a revolution by realization” versus “revolution by force,” which is to say a negation/sublation. Why is this necessary? Because otherwise there will keep being wars at greater and greater scales and intensities until we change. This is what Kant for Karatani was getting at when he discussed “Perpetual Peace.” ‘[This] is the very nature of what Kant called a regulative Idea.’⁷⁹⁶
For Marx, there must be ‘a simultaneous worldwide revolution, which in turn is possible only under the ‘universal intercourse’ produced by global capitalism.’⁷⁹⁷ It will not suffice for one nation to change here and another nation to change there: the change must be global and basically simultaneous, or else no change will ultimately prove sustainable (the notion of ‘a simultaneous world revolution’ is not supposed to be a mere ‘empty slogan’).⁷⁹⁸ The reason for this is because we are dealing with a Capital-Nation-State which must change all at once or one of the parts (or both together) will “race in” to fix and reverse changes in others. For example, bringing the work of Philip Rieff to mind, Karatani discusses “the problem of fascism” (from the Nation side of the Capital-Nation-State triplex), which is a ‘trap’ that ‘Marxists fell into’ in their efforts ‘to master capitalism by means of the state’ (without addressing the whole at the same time).⁷⁹⁹ Marx and Engles believed that ‘world revolution would arise as a decisive battle between two great classes, the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, transcending national boundaries. In reality, the opposite happened: issues and nation and ethnicity became increasingly important, taking their place alongside issues of class.’⁸⁰⁰ Why exactly this happens is hopefully clear through our work in Belonging Again (Part I) (generally “the loss of givens” causes an existential backlash which benefits the Capital-Nation-State (as if planned), following Philip Rieff), but the point is that the Nation is part of the base, not merely superstructure that can be “enlightened out of” with changes in “the means of production”; rather, it turns out that Nation ‘function[s] autonomously, independent of the state.’⁸⁰¹ It is psychoanalytical and the realm of culture and “givens,” what Karatani describes as ‘the imaginative return of the community or reciprocal mode of exchange.’⁸⁰² Nationalist movements like Fascism ‘attempt to transcend capital and the state through the nation,’ but they prove doomed to fail just like efforts to transcend the nation and state through capital or the nation and capital through the State — exactly as “The Capital-Nation-State” would have it and has seemingly designed it (brilliant strategy).⁸⁰³ The Capital-Nation-State assures that a revolutionary change must be “all at once” or one part of the Capital-Nation-State will come to the aid of the one or two, and ultimately the revolutionary effort will fail; in fact, the revolutionary effort will easily make the Capital-Nation-State stronger (as Karatani often notes) This is exactly what Belonging Again (Part I) hoped to show, suggesting a situation which can seem hopeless — but hope remains, if that is we might clearly identify our situation as a Capital-Nation-State, and focus in on the need for a new “abstract social norm” with global reach. Hence our concern with “lack” and “spreading Childhood” through a change in “the medium condition.”
‘The collapse of Marxist movements in the face of fascism in so many places came about because they regarded the nation as merely superstructure,’ and why exactly is what is explained to us through the work of thinkers like Philip Rieff, Peter Berger, and James Hunter. ‘Nazism was able to make use of the nation as the imaginary return of mode of exchange A,’ which ‘seemed to promise socialism — in other words, mode of exchange D,’ but this was not so.⁸⁰⁴ All the same, the Nation could be seen as providing psycho-weapons and psycho-defenses to the benefit of the Capital-Nation-State, and if Capital or the State are “attacked,” the Nation will use these psychotechnologies against us (we might also consider here the article “Unpsyopable” by Peter Limberg, who often discusses “philosophy as self-defense”). Given this incredible structure, is there any hope for us to negate/sublate the Capital-Nation-State from a system of “True History” (Land’s AI) to a system of “Absolute History?” Yes, but it won’t be easy. Then why try? Well, because ultimately we will suffer self-effacement under AI (as we have argued), but the other reason (which is complimentary) is because otherwise WWIII seems inevitable. This is a position Karatani takes, and he tries to explain and justify his position through Kant. Before Karatani, I always understood Kant’s “Perpetual Peace” as naïve, but thanks to Karatani I now have a better grasp on the notion as a ‘regulative Idea.’⁸⁰⁵ Funny enough, Karatani argues that ‘Kant held the same view as Hobbes: the essence of humanity (human nature) lay in unsociable sociability, which Kant believed could not be eliminated.’⁸⁰⁶ I used to see Kant and Hobbes as opposed, but Karatani made it clear to me that this was ‘a shallow understanding.’⁸⁰⁷ Karatani writes:
‘Kant’s proposal for a federation of nations as the basis for perpetual peace arose from his clear recognition of the difficulty of doing away with the fundamentally violent nature of the state. He did not think that this meant we should abandon the regulative idea of a world republic, but rather that we should try to approach it gradually. The federation of nations was to be the first step in this process.’⁸⁰⁸
Critically, Kant did not see this federation as a product of some enlightenment or what would be ‘realized through human reason or morality. Instead he believed that a federation of states would be brought about by human unsociable sociability — that is, by war.’⁸⁰⁹ This being the case, the “Long Peace” after WWII that Steven Pinker discusses could be seen as evident that Kant was right, but critically Kant understood us as ending up in peace more from a threat of the Apocalypse than from some great enlightenment — suggesting a difference from Pinker’s argument. Deterrence is more of what “wakes up” humans than “enlightenment,” and if we forget that we might become overconfident and end up in a disaster. After all, our “long peace” ‘came about as an expression not so much of Kantian ideals as of what [Kant] called humanity’s unsociable sociability, demonstrated on an unprecedented scale in the First World War.’⁸¹⁰
Kant held a ‘theory of a federation of nations’ that would arise with and after each expression of human horror, and after WWI the League of Nation arose, which failed ‘to prevent the Second World War,’ and after WWII then arose the United Nations.⁸¹¹ This is all exactly as Kant predicted, whose ‘thought conceal[]ed a realism much crueler than even Hegel’s.’⁸¹² Karatani acknowledged that the United Nations leave much to be desired and ‘is dismissed as Kantian idealism. Of course, the United Nations really is weak — but if we simply jeer at it and dismiss it, what will the result be? Another world war.’⁸¹³ As of 2024, Karatani does seem right.
Karatani describes a self-feeding cycle where wars lead to federations which lead to wars which lead to federations until a federation arises that’s capable of stopping war — that or “The End of (True) History” will occur. ‘A federation of nations is unable to suppress conflicts or wars between states, because it will not grant recognition to a state capable of mobilizing sufficient force. But according to Kant, the wars that will arise as a result will only strengthen the federation.’⁸¹⁴ Critically, as perhaps America has believed, ‘[t]he suppression of war will come about not because one state has surpassed all others to become hegemonic’ (even if this is a necessary and valuable step in the historic process of development), for other cultures and peoples will likely rise up in opposition in defense of their unique Daesin (as Aleksandr Dugin describes).⁸¹⁵ Rather, ‘[o]nly a federation of nations established as a result of wars can accomplish [an end to war]’; otherwise, there will be a single hegemonic culture which oppresses all the others (like Neoliberalism for Dugin).⁸¹⁶ Bringing Frued and Kant together, Karatani writes that ‘in this way, we can understand how outbursts of aggressiveness can transform into a force for restraining aggression.’⁸¹⁷
‘Kant located the way to perpetual peace not in a world state but in a federation of nations,’ which is not the same as bringing about ‘a state of peace through a transcendent, Leviathan-like power.’⁸¹⁸ For Karatani, this requires a change in our “modes of exchange,” and this will ultimately require a change in “the abstract social norm” by which people operate and live. This might sound idealistic, but I think it is less idealistic than ‘a simultaneous world revolution [as envisioned] through the image of simultaneous uprisings carried out by local national resistance movements in their own home countries.’⁸¹⁹ In fact, the kind of “exchange revolution” which is required has already occurred, in the sense that “medium conditions” have changed globally before and can change again (alongside legislation, education, etc.). We shifted from Oral to Writing Traditions successfully, so why couldn’t we shift to a Net Tradition that prioritized “the medium of Zoom?” I’m getting ahead of myself, but the point is that what Karatani suggests is not impossible, and if he is right about Kant we must make this change, or the problem of “World War” will keep coming back around (or be ended through self-effacement thanks to an Apocalypse or Artificial Intelligence). If we do nothing, we will end up in a war, and (assuming we survive) ‘a world war will only lead to the implementation of a more effective federation of nations’ — on and on until and a negation/sublation into Absolute History occurs.⁸²⁰ This is our “Absolute Choice,” which we can associate with ‘mode of exchange D’ as described by Karatani, another reason why it is inescapable.⁸²¹ ‘No matter how it is denied or repressed, it will always return. That is the very nature of what Kant called a regulative Idea.’⁸²²
If we want to avoid the Nation “running to the rescue” of the State and/or Capital (as described in Belonging Again (Part I)), then a new “abstract social norm” will be required. This could be “lack,” the basis of Childhood and a possible “river-hole,” but is the notion of a global federation based on “lack” imaginable? Is that absurd? Perhaps, but it could be that there is no other way to avoid “The End of (True) History.” If the world today is based on Capital, then we know it is possible for the spread of an “abstract social norm” around the world, and if has happened once, might it happen again? Yes, but how exactly will require more ink to be spilt…
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Notes
⁷⁶⁵Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 113.
⁷⁶⁶Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 114.
⁷⁶⁷Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 115.
⁷⁶⁸Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 115.
⁷⁶⁹This point might suggest what is required if we are to do business differently today, as I discussed with Layman Pascal on “The Metamodern Business Bureau: On the Hard Problems of Economics and Politics.”
⁷⁷⁰0Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 117.
⁷⁷¹Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 117.
⁷⁷²Marx, Karl and Friedrich Engels. Capital. Chicago, Ill: The University of Chicago (Great Books Series, Vol 50), 1952: 19.
⁷⁷³Marx, Karl and Friedrich Engels. Capital. Chicago, Ill: The University of Chicago (Great Books Series, Vol 50), 1952: 19.
⁷⁷⁴Marx, Karl and Friedrich Engels. Capital. Chicago, Ill: The University of Chicago (Great Books Series, Vol 50), 1952: 31.
⁷⁷⁵Marx, Karl and Friedrich Engels. Capital. Chicago, Ill: The University of Chicago (Great Books Series, Vol 50), 1952: 37.
⁷⁷⁶Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: xix.
⁷⁷⁷Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: xix.
⁷⁷⁸Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 1.
⁷⁷⁹Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 1.
⁷⁸⁰Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: xix.
⁷⁸¹Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 3.
⁷⁸²Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 2–3.
⁷⁸³The work of Mary Douglas in How Institutions Think could also be part of the puzzle, for she argues that a social system with authority is required for “human intelligibility” (especially across diversity that doesn’t share facticity) to be possible. However, Ioan suggests it’s possible to address Mary Douglas without “a ruling State,” for the “State’ and “society” are not similes, alluding to Murray Rothbard. However, it does seem as if something at least like the State is what follows from a growing interaction of numerous, diverse people who need “authoritative categories” so as to make sense to one another.
⁷⁸⁴Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 2.
⁷⁸⁵Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: xix.
⁷⁸⁶Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 197.
⁷⁸⁷Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 198.
⁷⁸⁸Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 113.
⁷⁸⁹Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 114.
⁷⁹⁰Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: xx.
⁷⁹¹Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: xx.
⁷⁹²Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 56.
⁷⁹³Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 235.
⁷⁹⁴Allusion to Proudhon in a letter to Marx, as found in The Structure of World History by Kojin Karatani. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 239.
⁷⁹⁵Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 240.
⁷⁹⁶Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 307.
⁷⁹⁷Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 251.
⁷⁹⁸Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 252.
⁷⁹⁹Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 257.
⁸⁰⁰Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 257–258.
⁸⁰¹Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 258.
⁸⁰²Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 258.
⁸⁰³Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 258.
⁸⁰⁴Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 258.
⁸⁰⁵Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 307.
⁸⁰⁶Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 299.
⁸⁰⁷Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 299.
⁸⁰⁸Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 299.
⁸⁰⁹Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 299.
⁸¹⁰Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 299.
⁸¹¹Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 299.
⁸¹²Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 300.
⁸¹³Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 300.
⁸¹⁴Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 300.
⁸¹⁵Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 300.
⁸¹⁶Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 300.
⁸¹⁷Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 300.
⁸¹⁸Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 302.
⁸¹⁹Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 306.
⁸²⁰Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 307.
⁸²¹Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 307.
⁸²²Karatani, Kojin. The Structure of World History. Translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs. Durham and London. Duke University Press, 2014: 307.
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