Slavoj Žižek: disagreement

Transcript context

…My line of questioning for Slavoj has to do with the Marxist critique of political economy. First, in relation to Marx’s historical materialism, do you think there have been any major changes in the basic relations between economic infrastructure and more-than economic superstructure and capitalism between the mid-19th century and today? Has the role or weight of the economy in shaping social history altered over this period? Second, if you were to rewrite Marx’s critical rendition of economics for the 21st century, what components of it would you prioritize updating, revising, scrapping, or replacing? What would be some of the distinctive features of your own contemporary critique of political economy? They are all my friends. I know who will be, so I will . . . On the other hand, these are difficult theoretical questions. We need another two hours. I will just say that yes, I agree with — I cannot go into it now — with Adrian’s point, how the relationship between ideology, economic infrastructural change, and so on, and so on. But all I can do now is point out what he knows and both of us know, that already in Marx — and that’s one of the critical points, that we need to read Marx — what I really admire in Marx, because it’s not what you idiots — not you personally — but the thing is his theory of commodity fetishism. It’s not simply, “We believe in fetishists.” No! Marx’s theory is that we bourgeois subjects, in our actual life, we are usually pragmatic Anglo-Saxon utilitarians. The fetishist inversion is in how we act our reality structure. Marx has a wonderful theory where it’s not this Enlightenment vision — we dream illusions; the other thing is real life. No! We can be very . . . To repeat a joke that I’m sure you all know, but it renders perfectly the point — that story that I always repeat: Niels Bohr and the horseshoe. Niels Bohr had a horseshoe at his country house across the entrance door, superstitious item, and a friend asked me, “Why do you have it there? Aren’t you a scientist? Do you believe in it?” You know what’s Niels Bohr’s answer, “Of course I don’t believe in it, but I have it there because I was told that it works, even if you don’t believe in it.” [laughter] That’s how ideology works today. At this level, the extent — and maybe you would agree with this — the lesson of Marx is that that’s why, interestingly enough, commodity fetishism — he never calls it ideology because it’s something very strange — it is a system of belief and so on, but objectifies central part of infrastructure itself. Along those lines, I would say we have to go further than Marx, and so on, and so on. Second video question, please.…

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