Reticulations: Jean-Luc Nancy and the Networks of the Political (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9780816654901)

Revealing how networks reopen our understanding of political discourse today

Significantly advancing our notion of what constitutes a network, Philip Armstrong proposes a rethinking of political public space that specifically separates networks from the current popular discussion of globalization and information technology.

Analyzing a wide range of Jean-Luc Nancy's works, Reticulations shows how his project of articulating the political in terms of singularities, pluralities, and multiplicities can deepen our understanding of networks and how they influence community and politics. Even more striking is the way Armstrong associates this general complex in Nancy's writing with his concern for what Nancy calls the retreat of the political. Armstrong highlights what Nancy's perspective on networks reveals about movement politics as seen in the 1999 protests in Seattle against the World Trade Organization, the impact of technology on citizenship, and finally how this perspective critiques the model of networked communism constructed by Hardt and Negri.

Contesting the exclusive link between technology and networks, Reticulations ultimately demonstrates how network society creates an entirely new politics, one surprisingly rooted in community.

Author: Philip Armstrong
ISBN-10: 0816654905
ISBN-13: 9780816654901
Publisher: University of Minnesota Press
Language: English
Published: 05/01/2009
Pages: 336
Format: Paperback
Weight: 1.20lbs
Size: 8.90h x 6.00w x 0.90d

Review Citation(s):
Reference and Research Bk News 08/01/2009 pg. 160