a post-neoliberal ecopolitics (philosophy today) by thomas nail

8/13/2019 A Post-Neoliberal Ecopolitics (Philosophy Today) by Thomas Nail

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A POST-NEOLIBERAL ECOPOLITICS?

DELEUZE, GUATTARI, AND ZAPATISMOThomas Nail

Between the philosophies of representationand critique in environmental politics, this es-say argues that the relationship betweenFrench philosophers Gilles Deleuze and FlixGuattaris theory of machinic ecology andthe Zapatistas ecological self-managementpractices in the Lacandon jungle in Chiapas,Mexico, offers a compelling direction for apost-neoliberal ecopolitics. While normativetheories of subjectivity, representation, andidentity in environmental philosophy havebeen able to secure and expand the conceptualand legal foundations of environmental andanimal rights, they have also come under in-creasing philosophical and political criticismby, what are being called, post-representa-tional or, non-centered environmental phi-losophies, in particular thoseof critical theory,ecophenomenology, and poststructuralism.Broadly, these critical theories argue that theexpansion of moral and political representa-tion to the non-human world is not the solution

to environmental devastation, but is rather partof the problem. It is the theoretical hubris ofsupposedly autonomous rational humanagency and juridical representation that hassubordinated the deeper network of non-hu-man relations to human mismanagement.Without criticism of this prevalent dualism be-tween humans and nature, environmental phi-losophy risks obfuscating the deeper ecologi-cal structures and relations common to theflourishing of both.

But as more and more environmental phi-losophersbegintodrawontheworksofMartinHeidegger, Merleau-Ponty, Jacques Derrida,

and the Frankfurt school for ecopolitical in-sight, I believe a certain twofold crisis is com-ing to the fore in this important and growingdiscourse. That is, despite the compelling cri-tique of reason and representation in environ-mental philosophy these philosophers havegiven, they have so far been unable to developa political philosophy of emancipation as a

consequence of their, admittedly devastating,critique of power, subject-object dualism, hi-erarchy, modernist rationality, and techno-capitalism. As Kerry Whiteside remarks, suchcritique becomes seriously counterproduc-tive . . . when a fascination with incommensu-rable discourses takes the place of any attemptto grapple empirically with a world undergo-ingrapidecologicaldeterioration.1 Broadly,itseems that thecarefulandphilosophical analy-sis of todays already existing ecopolitical ex-perimentshave tended tobe marginalized in anenvironmental philosophy that favors critiqueover construction. Additionally, by undermin-ing the dualism between nature and culture,non-centered ecopolitics risks erasing the cru-cial distinction that makes environmental phi-losophy specifically environmental.

Thus, one of the most important theoreticalproblems confronting ecopolitical philosophytoday is not that it lacks the proper conceptualtools for critiquing the various mechanisms

and dualisms of environmental devastation butthat it has neglected themore constructive taskof developing a theoretical alternative to them.That is, of developing a positive theory of howontologically heterogenous and non-centeredconditions, elements, and agencies function toform an ecopolitics without universal ordualistic foundations.

This first philosophical problem parallels asecond problem in the field of politics: the ap-parent exhaustion of emancipatory politics.The late twentieth century has signaled a tripledefeat for liberatory politics: the retreat andeconomic co-optation of feminist, environ-

mental, racial, and labor struggles of the1960sand70sin theFirst World; thedisintegration ofSoviet-style Socialismin the industrialSecondWorld; and the decline of colonial liberationmovements in the Third World. Ecopolitics inparticular, as Pierre Lascoumes argues (draw-ing on Foucault), has been largely co-optedinto a second stage of biopolitical power that

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Despite some of Halseys bolder claims, givenhis own seemingly totalizing critique againsttranscendental monoliths, it remains excitingto see the literature on Deleuzian environmen-

tal philosophy continue to grow.There ishowever, a certainaspect of thisap-

proach that remains radically under-theorized.That is, while much of the work done onDeleuze and Guattaris ecophilosophy hasbeen able to conceptually undermine variousforms of power even within environmentalphilosophy itself, very few have followed upon what I consider to be the most politicallypromising and original ecopolitical contribu-tion of Deleuze and Guattaris philosophy: thedeployment of an ecologic oroiko-logosableto understand the basic relationships and func-tions of specific non-representational politicaland ecological systems. Not as a meta-dis-course, but as a creative practice with its owntheoretical vocabulary. That is, while politicalpractices may be local and particular, they alsomobilize ideas with implications beyond theirown limited scope. I believe the creation ofthese conceptual networks and their relay isthe aim of Deleuze and Guattaris practicalphilosophical efforts. Praxis, as Deleuzesays, is a network of relays from one theoreti-cal point to another, and theory relays onepraxis to another.9 Sohowthenarewetoposi-tively understand the kind of environmental-

ism befitting such a new post-representationalpolitical sequence?Deleuze and Guattari begin their first col-

lective work,Anti-Oedipus, with the rejectionof the dualism between the supposedly auton-omous spheres of nature and culture. Whereindustry extracts its raw materials from nature,consumes them, and then returns its refuse tonature, Deleuze and Guattari argue, followingMarx, that this is not theoperationof relativelyseparate spheres (production, distribution,consumption), but ratheran activitypredicatedon thecommon structural relations of thecapi-talist division of labor and the concept of sup-

posedly fixed elements within the overallprocess of profit generation. Human beings donot autonomously extract raw materials fromnature, nor do they autonomously decide tosave nature from unsustainable extractionsor toxic waste disposals. While there are, ofcourse, human agents who speak of the rightsof nature and sustainable extraction, their

very ability to conceive of environmental pro-tection in terms of rights, labor, andvalue is conditioned by an advancedtechnoscientific coordination of research,

organization, and green capitalist industry. Forthis reason Deleuze and Guattari can say,

We make no distinction between man and na-ture: the human essence of nature and the natu-ral essence of man become one within nature inthe form of production or industry, just as theydowithinthelifeofmanasaspecies.Industryisthen no longer considered from the extrinsicpoint of view of utility,but rather fromthe pointof view of its fundamental identity with natureas production of man and by man. Not man asthe king of creation, butrather as the being whois in intimate contact with the profound life ofall forms or all types of being.10

Human activity and reason is thus condi-tioned on an enormous matrix of non-humanactivities (economic, biological, and techno-logical structures, etc.), just as nature is condi-tioned by an enormous network of human ac-tivity. To assert an independence of one fromthe other is sheer abstraction. Deleuze andGuattaris conclusion is thus that there areonlyprocesses of mutualproduction that areneitherstrictly human, nor strictly natural, but both,that is, artificial. Insofar as artifacts and tech-

nology are a mix between human activity andnatural objects, Deleuze and Guattari claimthat allprocesses of production (insofar as theytoo are always natural/human) are machines.Andeverymachine is a machine connected toanother machine, and the multiplicity of ma-chines connected up with one another formsthe Mechanosphere of the earth (AO 12/6).As Guattari insists, We might just as well re-name environmental ecology machinic ecol-ogy, because Cosmic and human praxis hasonly ever been a question of machines.11

So far, much of the environmental scholar-ship on Deleuze and Guattari affirms this con-

clusion of a non-dualistic machinic ecology.12But,on its own, I believe thisconclusion is the-oretically insufficient. We are still left with thetwo philosophical problems we began with:(1) Given such a non-centered ecological phi-losophy, how can we account for the capacityfor ecopolitical decision-making and valua-tion if everything is just a process of machines

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tion, there are the interests of the many entre-preneurs who view the displaced indigenouspopulations as cheap labour for maquiladorafactories. . . . And there is the Mexican govern-ments interest in extending its low intensitywarfare through different means, in order, onceand for all, to get rid of the Zapatista communi-ties in resistance and rebellion.19

This deployment of top-down science-based preservation tactics without regard forthe cultural context, or traditional ecologicalknowledge of those who occupy the forest, hasbeen empirically unsuccessful in the case ofthe Lacandon.20 Meanwhile, the LacandonMaya, indigenous to the forest, havebeen suc-cessfully managing an agroecosystem forgen-erations that both protects biodiversity and

produces for their familys needs.21 In the caseof theLacandon, theoften overlooked connec-tionbetween political conflict and biodiversitycannot be ignored.

It is at these frontiers of ecological defensethat the Zapatistas have had to invent anotherway of doing ecopolitics that I believe offersan excellent model for a post-neoliberal envi-ronmentalism based on self-management andautonomy. Neither reducible to romanticizedtraditional indigenous struggles for territory,nor to liberal democratic environmental par-ties, rights, or pleas forpersonal responsibility,nor to Marxist revolutionary ideologies of acommunist state, the Zapatistas have formedtheir own autonomous federation of villagesbased on participatory and democratic coun-cils for ecological self-government. Their re-jection of state representation, political par-ties, neoliberal conservation ethics, andpersonal consumer responsibility narrativesmakes them difficult, if not impossible, to un-derstand in the terms of normative environ-mental philosophy. Thus, in the subsectionsthat follow I would also like to argue thatZapatismo is best understood in terms of themachinic ecology of Deleuze and Guattari. In

particular, by three concepts that explain itsbasic conditions, elements, and agencies: itsabstractmachine, itsconcrete assemblage,andits personae, as Deleuze and Guattari callthem.22

The Abstract Machine and Zapatismo

Where one might locate the concept of anethical norm, law, or condition in envi-ronmental philosophy that allows disparatehuman voices to come to a common prescrip-tive agreement on a dispute, Deleuze andGuattari instead propose the alternative con-cept ofan abstract machine. A normdoes notdescribe the world the way it is, but how itoughttobe.Anormisthusatranscendentel-ement intended by an autonomous form ofconsciousness or sovereign state unhinderedby existential bias. For instance, the prescrip-tive value of ecological diversity is definedin conceptual or legal terms, prior to or inde-pendent from any specific thing that might be

described as realizing that value. Somethingeither realizes biodiversity and is right or itdoes not and it is wrong. A thing is right whenit tends to preserve the integrity, stability, andbeauty of the biotic community. It is wrongwhen it tends otherwise, as Aldo Leopold as-serts in his land ethic.23 Difference is thus onlya difference from the same, e.g., the normwhich represents the independent unity of thediverse.

Opposed to this, the abstract machine is anevent or shared condition for action and evalu-ation only insofar as it is immanently trans-formed by the concrete elements that realize

and d i f f e ren t i a t e i t . There i s t hus acoadaptation or reciprocal presuppositionof the two that allows for their participatorytransformation.24 The event thus changes innature each time there are reconversionssubjectives actuelles (actually occurring sub-jective redeployments) of it (DRF 217/236).Subsequently, according to Deleuze andGuattari, the abstract machine is absolutelysingular and unable to be deduced from eitherhistory or introspection.

In historical phenomena such as the revolutionof 1789, the Commune, the revolution of 1917,

there is always one part of the event that is irre-ducible to any social determinism, or to causalchains. Historians are not very fond of thispoint: they restore causality after the fact. Yettheevent itself is a splittingofffrom,a breakingwith causality; it is a bifurcation,a lawlessdevi-ation, an unstable condition that opens up a newfield of the possible. (DRF 215/233)


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The abstract machine is not deducible be-cause it is thecondition fordeduction, descrip-tion, and prescription itself: it is a more pri-mary evental commitment. This machine is

abstract in the sense that is not a thing amongother things, but also real (vrai-abstrait), inso-far as it is a condition that allows for the ap-pearance of new space-times and newsubjectivities antagonistic to representationand power (P 233/172).25 However, while itmaynot be a thing, the abstract machine is stillmarked by a singular and asignifying propername, date, and image, like the names of mili-tary operations or the names of hurricanes, asDeleuze and Guattari say (MP 51/28, 322323/264). These names do not represent, sym-bolize, or refer to anything at all. Rather, theyare spoken through. As a self-referencing andautonomous event independent from politicalrepresentation, theabstractmachineallows forthe shared expression and conjunction of thevarious heterogenous elements that speak andexist through it (MP 177178/142).

Zapatismo, as a non-representational politi-cal event that has brought hundreds of thou-sands of people together against neoliberalismand for the democratic defense of the earth,without folding to state politics, green capital-ism, or environmental bureaucracy, I believe,should be considered as an abstract machine.Like the phenomena of the revolution of 1789,

the Paris Commune, and the revolution of1917, what is singular about this event is itsirreducibility to social determinism and de-ductive causal chains: in 1994, in Mexico,Zapatismo held no resemblance to any recog-nizable, legal, or legitimate thing within thepresent state of affairs, i.e., no political rep-resentation (party), no market representation,linguistic representation (their languages arenot spoken or recognized by political repre-sentatives), or representation by the local in-digenous leaders (Caciques). There was nocausal necessity that Zapatismo should haveexisted, no way it could have been deduced

from the domains of rights and commodi-ties from which it emerged, and yet theyburst upon a world that denied their exis-tence anyway, as Zapatista scholar John Hol-loway says.26

From the representational point of view ofMexican politics, the marginalized and un-represented Zapatistas of Chiapas have no le-

gitimate existence. But what is most interest-ing about the Zapatista communities is thatthey do not legitimate their revolution strictlyby presupposed norms based on identity (pre-

scriptiverequestsforrights,theoverthrowofthe state, a new market economy, or a new eth-nic nationalism), but rather affirm a self-refer-ence or autonomy. Instead of simply valoriz-ing their difference and un-representability assuch, as Simon Tormey has argued, theZapatistas, I am arguing, have created a newform of ecopolitical evaluation that better al-lows them to realize the (self)management offorest commons.27 Contrary to normative theo-ries of environmental philosophy based onprescription, the Zapatistas practice a form ofrotational direct democracy where memberstake fourteen day shifts deliberating andfacilitating communal/environmental matters,where they consider the ecosystem to beinseparable from who they are as Zapatistas.As Subcomadante Marcos puts it,

For a long time, this place has existed wheremen are Zapatistas, the women are Zapatistas,the kids are Zapatistas, the chickens areZapatistas, the stones are Zapatistas, everythingis Zapatista. And in order to wipe out theZapatista Army of National Liberation, theywill have to wipe this piece of territory off theface of the earth- not just destroy it but erase it

completely, because there is always the dangerof the dead down below.28

Ifweare to take this passage seriously, whatit means to be Zapatista is also to be the stones,trees,andanimals of theZapatistaautonomouszones. Participatory (asopposed to representa-tive democracy) and collective (as opposed topersonal or moral conscience) decision-mak-ing actually is the whole ecological systemspeaking through (as opposed to for) theproper name of Zapatismo expressively.Zapatismo is thus not a thing, or norm, thatrepresents or signifies anything, but rather asingular and constantly renegotiated abstractmachine.

The Concrete Machinic Assemblage and

Community Forest Management

So far we have seen how the abstract ma-chine of Zapatismo provides an alternativecondition to the norms of state law and moral

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conscience as well as the affirmation ofmachinic multiplicities in general. But what isthe theoretical alternative to the concrete ele-ments that are supposedly intended by con-

sciousness or legislated by statepolicy? Whereone would typically find the concept of goalorientedactions andelements, whose being isrepresented in advance by their biological ormoral purpose, or by human deliberation,Deleuze and Guattari propose instead the con-cept of the concrete machinic assemblage.

First, the elements of a machinic assem-blage cannot be considered as normative orgoal-driven actions since they are continu-ally transforming the conditions or goals thatare supposed to normalize and direct their ac-tions. Such mutual transformations thoughshould not be mistaken for a kind of pragmaticrevisionism, where a hypothesis is tested,found to work or not work, and then rationally(or otherwise) revised accordingly, in order toground a narrative of political progress.29

Rather, ecopolitical problems themselvestransform and are transformed simultaneouslyby those who effectuate them and who are ef-fected by them (without knowing ends in ad-vance). When people demand to formulatetheir problems themselves, as Deleuze andGuattari say, and todetermine at least the par-ticular conditions under which they can re-ceive a more general solution, there is a spe-

cifically non-representational form of self-management and democratic participation(MP 589/471; DR 205/158).

But the concrete machinic assemblage thatDeleuze and Guattari develop is not simplysynonymous with the kind of procedural prac-tices found in environmental justice move-ments either. Where the concept of proceduraljustice still relies on the participatory capacityof all rational human subjects, who would beeffected by the outcome of an ecopolitical dis-pute to represent the plants, animals, and eco-systems at stake, Deleuze and Guattaris con-cept of the machinic assemblage is a purely

affective or expressive political procedure.30Affective decision-making is a procedurewhereby the collection of the situations ca-pacities toaffector beaffected bythe other ele-ments are determined. Each machine may cer-tainly have different capacities to be affected,but there is no single machine or affect that isindependent from or in charge of representing

the others. So while there are certainly thosewho speak (human language), speech does notnecessarily mean speaking for. As BrunoLatour argues, certain kinds of speech should

be considered as speech prostheses, i.e., notas representational acts but rather as spokenextensions of the plants, animals, and ecosys-tems themselves (like functional and expres-sive prosthetic appendages).31

Butlestwefallbackintoaffirminganundif-ferentiated multiplicity of such machines allspeaking through each other (and losing thespecificity of the concept), it is important tonote that not all machinic assemblages func-tion in the same way. One must count its af-fects, (on cherche faire le compte de ses af-fect s) (MP 314/257) . In A ThousandPlateaus,Deleuze and Guattari give theexample of the draft horse-omnibus-streetassemblage as such a specific collection ofnon-representational affects.

Itisdefinedbyalistofactiveandpassiveaffectsin the context of the individuated assemblage itis part of: having eyes blocked by blinders,hav-ing a bit and a bridle, being proud, having a bigpeepee-maker, pulling heavy loads, beingwhipped, falling, makinga dinwith itslegs,bit-ing, etc. These affects circulate and are trans-formed within the assemblage: what a horsecan do. (MP 314315/257)

The procedure of counting the affects of thesituation thus decides what canor will be donein theassemblage. There are no universal endsor values that inhere in things themselves,onlytheir immanent capacities to be assembled andreassembled in a continually renegotiated andexpressive machinic assemblage or relation.

Insofar as the Zapatistas practice such acontinual and affective renegotiation of theirecological assemblage, without drawing onthe concepts or practices of state-based or uni-versal environmental rights, they effect a con-crete machinic assemblage. That is, the Zapa-

tista communities practice a form of collectivevalorization that refers back not to the sover-eignty of the state, or the intrinsic value of na-ture, or any other pre-given teleology, but tothe immanent act of determining in each casewhat their collective ecological body is capa-ble of. Assembled in a heterogeneous mix ofNGOs, diverse indigenous traditions, and in-


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ternational influence, the Zapatistas have hadto learn how to manage the environment.

This commitment takes the form of severalspecific forest management affects: to be able

tocultivate the land by the no-till method, tobeable to ban slash and burn practices, to be abletotakealimitedamountoftreesfromtheforestor be penalized by having to plant and care fortwo more for every one taken in excess, and tobe able to ban agrochemical use. As a MontesAzules resident explains, we have been ac-cused of destroying the jungle. But we as in-digenous people are the true guardians of theenvironment, we live together with the jungle.If the jungle dies, we die with it.32 TheZapatistas do not speakforthe forest, becausetheyarethe forest, or rather, their life is an af-fect of the forest, to be Zapatista in theLacandon. Their political practices expressthe life of the forest and exist as so many af-fects within its collection. Even their relationsof production are owned in common and prac-ticed sustainably. The workers cooperatives(honey, coffee, textiles, etc.) in Zapatista terri-tory are based on collective or common (notprivate, or public) property, worker control,and self-management. While Zapatismo mayhave its flaws, the spirit of these institutions(the schools, the hospitals, the homes, thefarming, etc.) is, as Guattari would say,

to set up structures and devices that establish a

totally different kind of contact. A kind of self-management or self-organization of a set ofproblems which does not start from a centralpoint that arranges elements,inserts them into acontrol grid, or establishes an agenda, but that,on the contrary, allowsthe various singular pro-cessestoattemptarhizomaticunfolding.Thisisvery important, even if it doesnt work.33

Zapatismo is thus a struggle for the creation ofa maximum of participation, both human andnatural, in achieving an ecological self-man-agementconceivedoutside thecriteriaofa for-mal democracy that has proven to be sterile,as Guattari puts it (MRB 391).

Machinic Personae and the Third Person

Opposed to conditions based on moral andlegal norms,andopposedto elements based ongoal orientation and intentional conscious-ness, Deleuze, Guattari, and the Zapatistas

propose the theoretical practice of the abstractmachine of collective/ecological autonomy,and theconcrete machinic assemblage of com-munity forest management. But what alterna-

tivedo they propose to the independent subjectwho makes ecopolitical decisions? Where onewould normally locate an autonomous (hu-man) subject, whois able to independentlydis-cern a universal norm or environmental valuein order to then apply this norm or policy im-plication to concrete (natural) elements,Deleuze, Guattari, and the Zapatistas proposethe concept of the machinic persona or eco-logical/collective third person. Without af-firming either a dualism between humans (andtheir values) and nature (and its objects) or af-firming an undifferentiated multiplicity of hu-

man/nature machines, machinic personae are,according to Deleuze and Guattari, specificlocal operators who intervene in order toestablish an immanent connection betweenspecific abstract machines and the concretepolitical machines that effectuate them (QP73/75). But herein lies the difficulty: how canan agent of any kind bring about the conditionforitsownexistence?Thesubjectmustpre-ex-ist the event in order bring it into being but theevent must also pre-exist the subject as thecondition under which the subject is a subject-of-the-event. This is the paradox of eco-political intervention. Deleuze and Guattaris

solution to this problem, however, is to say thatboth interventions occur simultaneously in themutual presupposition of the other; problemand solution are co-given, as are humans andnature (QP 75/78; 79/82).

So while thefirstpersongenerally indicatesa self-conscious subject of enunciation whomakes decisions on a natural set of objectsindependent from it, and the second persondesignates the projection of the first, the thirdperson persona indicates an indefinite group-subject always in co-given adaptation with themilieu. InA Thousand PlateausDeleuze andGuattari say,

We believe . . . that the third person indefinite,HE, THEY, implies no indetermination fromthis point of view; it ties the statement to a col-lectiveagencement, as its necessary condition,rather than to a subject of the enunciation.Blanchot is correct in saying that ONE andHEoneis dying,heis unhappyin no way

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take the place of the subject, but instead doaway wi th any subjec t in favor of anagencementof thehaecceity type that carries orbringsouttheeventinsofarasitisunformedandincapable of being effectuated by persons(something happens to them that they can onlyget a grip on again by letting go of their abilityto say I). The HE does not represent a subjectbut rather makes a diagram of an agencement.(MP 324/265)

Thus, opposed to theindetermination of apure potential machinic multiplicity, or therepresentational first person of enunciation(based on contemplation, reflection, and com-munication), third person personae are indef-inite in the sense that they are not persons in-

dependent from the event, who look on, judge,and make decisions about how it should pro-ceed, but they are determinate in the sensethat they effectuate or make a diagram of theevent, immanent only to the necessary condi-tion of the collective assemblage. They are notsubjects of experience, rational reflection, dis-course, representation, or creativity in-itself,butare rather subjects expressive of an ecolog-ical and machinic consistency.

Asaneventthatrejectsthedualismbetweenpolitical struggle and ecological affect and af-firms thecollective third personof ecopoliticalself-management, the Zapatistas effect

machinic personae. Consider the figure ofwhat the Zapatistas call thecompa(short forcompaera/os: partner,comrade).Unlike anyEuropean vernacular/colonial language,Tojolabal (the native language of manyZapatistas) features an intersubjective correla-tion between first and third persons, that is, acode devoid of direct and indirect object, in-stead structured in the correlation betweensubjects.34 One of the implications of this, asWalter D. Mignolo observes, is that theZapatistas do not engage in acts of represen-tation, but engage instead in intersubjectiveenactements.35 Whencompasay I, You,

or They, these are not features of an ego orconsciousness, but features of an evental con-sistency that expresses their entire affective orecological situation. First and second personsstill function, but only as derivative features ofa more primary third person that effectuates anevent. Conflictsandagreementsstill take placebetween specific Is and Yous but only as

conflicts and agreements of the event they ef-fectuate: not outside it, or upon it, but withinand through it. Because, as SubcomandanteMarcos says, here in the EZLN the mistakes

are conjugated in the first person singular andthe achievements in the third person plu-ral.36A

dditionally, consider the compas use ofblack masks and bandanas to create a particu-lar but indefinite group-subject. WhileMarcos has given several different reasons forthese masks over the years, from making sureno one tries to become the leader,37 to portray-ing Mexicos covering up of its real Mexico,38

the collective practice of masking has pro-duced a very specific kind of subjectivity, im-manent not to consciousness or experience butto the event or abstract machine of Zapatismoitself that includes the thechickens, thestones,and everything in their affective territory. Thepractice of collective masking in Zapatsimo ishostile to both vanguardism and individualswho make free decisions about the situation,and instead creates a third person or compawho speaks as a Zapatista through the maskedanonymous (a-nomos) ecology of Zapatismo.Rather than affirm a pure alterity or potentialfor transformation as such, found in theface of a Thou39 against a representationalI/You opposition, the Zapatistas propose in-stead an indefinite but determinate third per-

son of the event. By covering their faces as apolitical action, the Zapatistas are able to cre-ate a unique political anonymity (open to any-one/anything, and yet unambiguously againstneoliberalism) that rejects both liberal andcritical models of subjectivity, in favor of asubject of the evental ecology itself.

Conclusion

Beyond representation and critique, I haveshown how the theoretical and practical in-sights of Deleuze, Guattari, and the Zapatistasoffer a compelling post-neoliberal ecopolitical

visionbased on machinic ecologyandecologi-cal self-management. While much of environ-mental scholarship on Deleuze and Guattarihas aimed at affirming a machinic ecology ofmultiplicities, eachconnecting to theother in acosmic web of non-dualistic interconnection(the Earth or Mechanosphere), I have pro-posed instead that their most significant con-


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tribution to ecopolitics is rather their machiniceco-logic composed of three different types ofmachines: the abstract machine, the concretemachinic assemblage, and the machinic per-

sona. These three structural elements workthrough a process of expression and affectiondemonstrated in the three practices ofZapatista forestmanagement: autonomy, com-munity management, and third personagency.

Based on their shared rejection of state poli-tics, capitalist economics, and normative sub-jectivity, Deleuze, Guattari, and the Zapatistasnotonly critique these institutions of represen-tational politics but have also worked hard todevelop an alternative theory and practice in-stead based on ecopolitical autonomy, self-management, andgroup subjectivityaimedatspreading forms of self-government or self-

managementthat are possible [in Chiapas],in a wayto other places, as Marcos says.40

Since eco-power has replaced much of thegrass roots environmentalism of the 60s and

70s, the Zapatistas have had to invent a newkind of ecological politics. By directly takingcontrol over their local forests and resourcesand defending them democratically, they areproposing a new ecopolitical strategy irreduc-ible to thepresentneo-liberal conjuncture. Butwhile a more rigorous cartography ofZapatismo cannotbe elaborated in thespace ofthis essay, I hope that I havebeen able to show,at least in an introductory way, the importanceof undertaking such an analysis of some of thenew political experimentations that are posingalternatives to the ecological devastation weface today.

ENDNOTES

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1. Kerry Whiteside,Divided Natures: French Contri-butions to Political Ecology(Cambridge: The MITPress, 2002), 146.

2. PierreLascoumes,Lcopouvoir: environnementsetpolitiques(Paris: La Dcouverte, 1994), 313.

3. ElinorOstrom, Governingthe Commons: TheEvolu-tionof Institutionsfor Collective Action (CambridgeUniversity Press, 1990). See also Ashwini Chhatreaand Arun Agrawalb, ed. Elinor Ostrom.Trade-offsand Synergies Between Carbon Storage and Liveli-

hood Benefits from Forest Commons(Bloomington:Indiana University Press, 2009). The Royal Swed-ish Academy of Sciences said Ostroms researchbrought this topic from the fringe to the forefront ofscientific attention, by showing how common re-sourcesforests, fisheries, oil fields or grazinglands, can be managed successfully by the peoplewho use them, rather thanby governments or privatecompanies. Ostroms work, in this regard, chal-lenged conventional wisdom, showing that com-mon resources can be successfully managed withoutgovernment regulation or [privatization]. httpp://nobelprize.org.

4. Patrick Hayden, Multiplicity and Becoming: ThePluralist Empiricism of Gilles Deleuze(New York:Peter Lang, 1998); Dianne Chisholm, ed.Rhizomes15: Deleuze and Guattaris Ecophilosophy(2007):http://www.rhizomes.net; Mark Halsey, Deleuze

And Environmental Damage: Violence of the Text(New York: Ashgate, 2006); Robert Mugerauer,Deleuze and Guattaris Return to Science As a Ba-sis for Environmental Philosophy, in Rethinking

Nature: Essays in Environmental Philosophy, ed.

Bruce Foltz(Bloomington: IndianaUniversityPress,2004), 180204; Moira Gatens, Feminism AsPassword: Re-Thinking the Possible withSpinoza and Deleuze,Hypatia15 (2000), 5975;Andrew Lopez, Machinic Environmentalism, pre-sented at ThinkingThrough Nature conference at theUniversity of Oregon, 2008; John Protevi and MarkBonta,Deleuze and Geophilosophy: A Guide andGlossary (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press,2004); PatrickHayden,GillesDeleuzeand Natural-

ism: A Convergence with Ecological Theory andPolitics, Environmental Ethics19 (1997):185204;Bernd Herzogenrath, ed., An (Un)Easy Alliance:Thinking the Environment with Deleuze & Guattari(Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2008);Bernd Herzogenrath, ed., Deleuze/Guattari andEcology(New York: Palgrave Macmillan. 2008).

5. Simon Tormey, Not in my Name: Deleuze,Zapatismo, and theCritiqueof Representation, Par-liamentary Affairs59 (2006): 138154.

6. Herzogenrath, ed., Deleuze/Guattari and Ecology,(back cover).

7. Halsey,Deleuze And Environmental Damage, 24.8. Ibid., 34.

9. Gilles Deleuze,Desert Islands: and other texts19531974, ed. Lapoujade, trans. Michael Taormina(New York: Semiotext(e), 2004), 207.

10. Gilles Deleuze, and Flix Guattari.Anti-Oedipus:Capitalism and Schizophrenia, trans. RobertHurley,Mark Seem, and Helen R. Lane (Minneapolis: Uni-versityofMinnesotaPress,1983),10; Capitalismeetschizophrnie:Lanti-Oedipe (Paris:Les ditionsde


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Minuit, 1972), 14. Hence forth cited as AO with theEnglish page number followed by the French.

11. Flix Guattari, The Three Ecologies, trans. IanPindar and Paul Sutton (New York: Athlone Press,

2001);Les trois cologies(Paris: ditions Galile,1989), 66. Hence forth cited as TO.

12. Alistair Welchman, Deleuze and Deep Ecology, inAn (Un)Easy Alliance: Thinking the Environmentwith Deleuze & Guattari, 131.

13. Gilles Deleuze, Difference and Repetition, trans.Paul Patton (New York: Columbia University Press,1994), 16264; Diffrence et rptition (Paris:Presses Universitaires de France, 1968), 17679.Henceforth cited as DRF.

14. Tim Golden, Revolution Rocks: Thoughts of Mex-icos First Postmodern Guerrilla Commander,NewYork T ime s ( Ap ri l 8 , 2 00 1) . h tt p: // www.nytimes.com/books/01/04/08/reviews/

010408.08goldent.html.15. Tormey, Not in my Name: Deleuze, Zapatismo,and the Critique of Representation.

16. John Ross,Zapatistas: Making Another World Possi-ble(New York: Nation Books, 2006), 194.

17. Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN),trans. Irlandes,Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon

Jungle. http://www.inmotionmagazine.com/auto/selva6.html.

18. Karen OBrien,Sacrificing the Forest: Environmen-tal And Social Struggle In Chiapas (New York:Westview Press, 2000).

19. February 24th Statement of the Zapatistas. http://www.enlacecivil.org.mx/acciones/020327.html.

20. D. Manuel-Navarrete,S. Slocombe, and B. Mitchell,Science for Place-Based Socioecological Manage-ment: Lessons from the Maya forest (Chiapas andPetn), Ecologyand Society11, no. 1 (2006). http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol11/iss1/art8/.

21. Stewart Diemont and Jay Martin, Lacandon MayaEcosystem Management: Sustainable Design forSubsistence and Environmental Restoration,Eco-logical Applications19 (2009), 25466.

22. These are the machines Deleuze and Guattari argueare thebasis of their philosophical logic developed inthe first three chapters of their last book together,What is Philosophy? Gilles Deleuze and FlixGuattari, What is Philosophy? trans. HughThomlinson and Graham Burchell (New York: Co-lumbia University Press, 1994), 176;Quest-ce quela philosophie? (Paris: Les ditions de Minuit,1991). Deleuze and Guattari additionally develop apolitical typology of each kind of abstract, concrete,and persona machine: capitalist, statist, territorial,fascist, and nomadic. Due to the constraints of thisessay I cannot go into developing each of these ma-chinesand theway in which they both internally and

externally transform Zapatismo. This essay exam-ines only, what I consider to be,the dominanttypeofmachiniccompositionof theZapatistas struggle: thenomadic type.

23. Aldo Leopold,Sand County Almanac(New York:Ballantine Books, 1986), 240.

24. Gilles Deleuze and Flix Guattari,A Thousand Pla-teaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia, trans. BrianMassumi (Minneapolis: University of MinnesotaPress, 1987), 91;Capitalisme et Schizophrnie, tome2: Mille Plateaux(Paris: ditions de Minuit, 1980) ,71. Henceforth cited as MP. What is Philosophy?Trans. Hugh Thomlinson and Graham Burchell(New York: Columbia University Press, 1994), 73;Quest-ce que la philosophie?(Paris: Les ditionsde Minuit, 1991), 77. Henceforth cited as QP.

25. GillesDeleuze,Negotiations 19721990,trans.Mar-tin Joughin (New York: Columbia University Press,

1997), 233; Pourparlers (Paris: Les ditions deMinuit, 1990), 172. Henceforth cited as P.26. John Holloway, Introduction: Reinventing Revolu-

tion, inZapatista!(London: Pluto Press, 1998), 1.27. Tormey, Not in my Name: Deleuze, Zapatismo

and the Critique of Representation.28. Subcomadante Marcos toProceso Magazinein an

interview in 1994.29. John Dewey, Beliefs and Realities,Philosophical

Review 15 (1906):11329. Belief, sheer,direct, un-mitigated personal belief, reappears as the workinghypothesis; action which at once develops and testsbelief reappears as experimentation, deduction,demonstration; while the machinery of universals,axioms, a priori truths, etc., is the systematization ofthewayinwhichmenhavealwaysworkedout,inan-ticipation of overt action, the implications of theirbeliefswithaviewtorevisingthemintheinterestsofobviating the unfavorable, and of securing the wel-come consequences (124).

30. John Rawls,A Theory of Justice, revisededition(Ox-ford: Oxford University Press, 1999), Chapter II,Section 14.

31. Burno Latour,Politics of Nature: How to Bring theSciences intoDemocracy (Cambridge, MA:HarvardUniversity Press, 2004), 67.

32. Quote taken from a commentary by Edinburgh-Chiapas Solidarity Campaign, submitted by Anony-mous on Thursday, 06/05/2004-04:34. http://

www.indymediascotland.org/node/824.33. Flix Guttari, and Suely Rolnik,Molecular Revolu-

tion in Brazil, trans. Karel Clapshow and BrianHolmes (New York: Semiotext(e), 2008), 178.Henceforth cited as MRB.

34. Walter D. Mignolo, The Zapatistass TheoreticalRevolution: Its Historical, Ethical, and PoliticalConsequences,Review25, no. 3 (2002): 245.This


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has important consequences. If, for instance, a givenlanguagelacks a subject/object correlation as a basisfor the elaboration of epistemic principles and thestructuringof knowledge, thespeakers of such a lan-

guage do not engage in acts of representation, butengage instead in intersubjective enactements.Consequenly, nature in the Tojolabal language andsocial consciousness is not an it. Further, acts ofenunciation in Tojolabal not only involve the co-presence of Iand you but also the presence of theabsent third person, she or they (ibid.).

35. Ibid.36. Marcos, quoted in, Gloria Muoz Ramrez, The Fire

and the Word: A History of the Zapatista Movement(San Francisco: City Lights Publishers, 2008), 307.

37. The main reason is that we have to be careful thatnobody tries to be the main leader. The masks aremeant to prevent this from happening. Marcos

quoted in Neil Harvey,The Chiapas Rebellion: TheStruggle for Land and Democracy(Durham: DukeUniversity Press, 1998), 6.

38. Medea Benjamin, Interview with Subcomandante

Marcos, inFirst World, Ha Ha Ha!: The ZapatistaChallenge, ed. Elaine Katzenberger (San Francisco:City Lights, 1995), 70. I will take off my ski maskwhen Mexican society takes off its own mask, theone it uses to cover up the real Mexico (ibid.).

39. MartinBuber,I And Thou (Tampa:FreePress,1971).40. There is a clear national effort aimed at spreading

forms of self-government or self-mangementthatarepossiblehere,inawaytootherplaces.Asfarasthe government or the political class are concerned,its not worth it to spend much time on them sincethey dont spendtime onus. Sobetter not tolosesleepover it. Marcos, quoted in, Ramrez,The Fire andthe Word, 308.

a post-neoliberal ecopolitics (philosophy today) by thomas nail

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