CCCB Veus

In recent times we have witnessed a two-way movement. On the one hand, words that had apparently been tucked away in the folds of history have made a forceful reappearance in public discourse. This, for example, is the case of “class”, which seems to have had its explanatory power restored, or “common” and “community”, which have not only recovered their original senses but have opened up a whole array of new meanings. On the other hand, some of the words we have traditionally used to describe and explain the world seem incapable now of accounting for the radical changes we are all experiencing. When we use them, we have the feeling of putting on someone else’s shoe: it is the perfect container for a foot which clearly isn’t ours.

The world we know has undergone far-reaching changes over the past few decades. Traditional ways of doing politics and the democratic institutions are suspect today and floundering in the midst of an unprecedented crisis of legitimacy. The situation is further complicated by the changes in scale, speed and perspective of a globalised world, and new, disconcerting relationships between identity, power, state and market. The decisive exposé in the form of the international financial crisis with its revelations concerning the conditions of neoliberal capitalism and depth of technological change have extended and, in some cases, forced the limits and possibilities of customary words and categories. In this regard, what is happening with the ideas of “equality”, “freedom”, “sovereignty”, “citizenship”, “state”, “work”, “capitalism” and “party”? In their standard formulation do they still help in making the world we share intelligible, and articulating and coordinating the sense of our actions? Which aspects of our experience and our surroundings remain hidden and which are illuminated when we use them? Which new senses and perspectives must we incorporate into our political present in order to re-focus, re-interpret and re-formulate it?

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