Re: <nettime> Quick Review..

[David Garcia <d.garcia@new-tactical-research.co.uk>]

> 
> On 2018-09-11 18:15, podinski wrote:
>> For me, it was interesting to zoom in and examine this notion that the
>> alt.right might be seen as co-opting elements of the transgressive arts
>> of the last decades... to fuel their own political power / agendas...
> 
> While this might be an adequate description on an esthetic level, what
> is lacking, and what has lacked for a long time on the left, is an
> analysis of power. [….]
> 
> This contributed to opening the space for the formation of a new
> power-block consisting of traditional conservatives (small government,
> tax cuts), segments of the economy that realized that China was
> beginning to dominate "free trade" and disaffected working and
> middle-classes who formulated their decline/frustration not in economic
> terms but in cultural ones (racist, misogynist, nativist, religious
> etc). This has been enabled and financed by those segments of the elite,
> who know that their game is ending (petrocapitalism and financialism)
> but want to continue the fracking of nature and society a little longer,
> privatizing more profits and socializing more costs.

Is this actually an opening of "a new space”... the “formation of a new power 
block”? Or is it a straightforward take-over of the Republican Party by a reinvigorated 
and atavistic far right ? A movement that has effectively burnt down the fire walls 
separating traditional conservatism from a new extremist generation who took Trump 
as their placeholder soon to be replaced by Pence who will actually be worse. 
This tendency goes beyond the US. Yesterday in the European Parliament we saw a strutting 
Viktor Orban (acting with impunity despite the vote) leading the highly repressive and growing 
tendency in European politics that is effectively replacing the old partnership of neo—liberalism
and mainstream conservatism ?  

Its true that outside of a European few rebel cities and the growth of some political 
parties there is very little analysis or serious engagement with -and even allergy- to power.
But its an exaggeration to say there is no analysis. 

David Garcia  
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