Complexity and Social Movements: Multitudes at the Edge of Chaos ...

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process which the Czech legal support organisation OPH also participated in (Interview British Activists [4 and 5]). Police forces appear to have been concentrated upon the Blue and Yellow marches associated with the highest probability of violent confrontation. This combined with the view that the Pink March lacked cohesion and direction created a significant freedom of manoeuvre which was accentuated by the hybrid communication strategy developed in the immediate pre-event phase. The apparent ‘chaos’ or ‘flow’ of Pink was in fact a form of deliberative and dialogical action based on observation, communication and reflection upon events in more or less real time within which individual free acts played crucial roles. In Kenney’s words: ‘The actors are not the famous dissident intellectuals [and the ruthless communists], but hundreds of lesser-known individuals’ (Kenney 2002: 16). We have been able to relate this account through the use of multiple qualitative and textual techniques predicated upon presence on the ground during the event, reinforcing the importance of Touraine’s commitment to direct engagement with and within movements. The themes and analytical concerns presented here are simply not available to accounts derived from mainstream media coverage of the event and are only present in a fragmentary form in movement media. The fusion of sources and interpretation is ours and we acknowledge that this is an inescapable part of the process of sense making involved in the interpretation of qualitative data. This process requires time, immersion and interaction. 15 In particular, we take responsibility for locating the data within the theoretical debates addressed throughout this book. Theory and praxis Identities, protest dynamics and technology 65 Theoretical accounts of the global movement contestation (Hardt and Negri 2000, 2004) emphasising the ascendancy and autonomy of capital over state forms stress the importance of ‘smooth space’, with deregulated global neo-liberalism representing this over-arching axiomatic. Smooth space enables network actors to sort circuit forms of interest representation associated with state forms delivering direct challenges to Empire. In this process technological mediation plays a central role in both the exercise of disciplinary effects within divisions of labour through the associated techniques and practices. These same techniques and practices are central to the radical uses of bio-power by the multitude operating as a network actor constitutive of unity in diversity. In this constitutive process multiple small world networks coalesce. Our account of the Prague plateau has emphasised the importance of both cutting edge and mundane technologies within this process. As Urry (2004) argues face-to face interactions remain central in maintaining and renewing network connections necessitating travel and a range of techniques of self. Urry differentiates between ‘aristocratic’ and ‘egalitarian’ network forms contrasting the World Wide Web with social networks to
66 Identities, protest dynamics and technology argue that approaches to small world phenomena need to be more sociological and more complex. As this account demonstrates plateaux are constituted around multiple axes including biographical availability; physical mobility; communicative competence; ontological security; spatial competence and the courage to engage in free acts. In this process the theoretical postulate smooth space is revealed to be more complex than the term implies. This is particularly evident in terms of physical movement where national borders represent potential choke points. The mode of physical movement across space is also significant in qualitative terms. Tactical Frivolity’s extended journey enabled a process of negotiated meaning and bonding which underpinned their performative integrity on the street, unlike taking a flight to Prague. Another significant feature of the interactions dealt with in this chapter is the dissonance between internationals’ expectations formed within the smooth space of CMC and their experience of prevailing conditions upon arrival in Prague. The outcomes of Prague were also clearly dependent upon pre-existing social networks constitutive of the third element, reinforcing the importance of the local in configuring AGM plateaux. Such ‘irregularities’ in smooth space arise through active struggles over meaning associated with ‘event density’ (McKechnie and Welsh 2002) and can be thought of in terms of degrees of abstraction, resolution or pixellation. National borders, offering barriers to physical mobility in this context, define the containers of nations, a role which includes the opportunity to apply trade tariffs and extract excise duty crucial to state finances. Autonomous capital seeks to avoid such fiscal choke points whilst states continue to limit the mobility of labour amidst the free flow of tourist nomads. Smooth space is in effect criss-crossed by multiple and shifting striations etched through the activities of multiple actors with implications for both ‘local’ and ‘global’ domains. Plateaux as sites of concrete contestation formalise both issues and the iterative evolution of process through reflexive framing. Irrespective of mainstream media’s pre-occupation with violence (see Chapter 4) the implications of smooth space a la Empire become embodied in acts which are broadcast, debated and reflected upon over extended periods of time through the use of recording and communication techniques which reconfigure the framing process constituting an ecology of action (Chapter 5).
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Complexity and Social Movements Che
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Complexity and Social Movements Mul
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Contents List of figures vi Acknowl
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Acknowledgements With thanks to all
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Preface ix activists and engaged ci
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2 Introducing global movements poli
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4 Introducing global movements arou
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6 Introducing global movements esta
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8 Introducing global movements Thes
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10 Introducing global movements exp
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12 Introducing global movements che
Page 25 and 26: 14 Introducing global movements Fra
Page 27 and 28: 16 Introducing global movements ‘
Page 29 and 30: 18 Introducing global movements for
Page 31 and 32: 20 Introducing global movements and
Page 33 and 34: 2 Prefiguration and emergence Intro
Page 35 and 36: 24 Prefiguration and emergence on T
Page 37 and 38: 26 Prefiguration and emergence 9 If
Page 39 and 40: 28 Prefiguration and emergence Prop
Page 41 and 42: 30 Prefiguration and emergence agai
Page 43 and 44: 32 Prefiguration and emergence C. E
Page 45 and 46: 34 Prefiguration and emergence The
Page 47 and 48: 36 Prefiguration and emergence Glob
Page 49 and 50: 38 Prefiguration and emergence In t
Page 51 and 52: 40 Prefiguration and emergence Neo-
Page 53 and 54: 42 Prefiguration and emergence from
Page 55 and 56: 44 Identities, protest dynamics and
Page 75: 64 Identities, protest dynamics and
Page 79 and 80: 68 States fight back when trust in
Page 81 and 82: 70 States fight back academically,
Page 83 and 84: 72 States fight back streets from d
Page 85 and 86: 74 States fight back ‘green Parli
Page 87 and 88: 76 States fight back to trivialise
Page 89 and 90: 78 States fight back beneath Big Be
Page 91 and 92: 80 States fight back ran out. The p
Page 93 and 94: 82 States fight back The attempt to
Page 95 and 96: 84 States fight back Accounts of th
Page 97 and 98: 86 States fight back hair, infringe
Page 99 and 100: 88 States fight back crisis is in e
Page 101 and 102: 5 Ecologies of action within global
Page 103 and 104: 92 Ecologies of action attractor wi
Page 105 and 106: 94 Ecologies of action embedded in
Page 107 and 108: 96 Ecologies of action The assimila
Page 109 and 110: 98 Ecologies of action compatibilit
Page 111 and 112: 100 Ecologies of action linking up
Page 113 and 114: 102 Ecologies of action occurred wi
Page 115 and 116: 104 Ecologies of action leading to
Page 117 and 118: 106 Ecologies of action siege of in
Page 119 and 120: 108 Beyond resistance to global nex
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116 Beyond resistance to global nex
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7 The death of collective identity?
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130 Global movement as a parallelog
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148 The map is not the territory th
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150 The map is not the territory of
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152 The map is not the territory Ne
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154 The map is not the territory mi
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156 The map is not the territory or
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158 The map is not the territory mo
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160 The map is not the territory of
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162 The map is not the territory ne
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Notes 1 Introducing global movement
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166 Notes 12 Ya Basta’s! subseque
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168 Notes 19 This practice has been
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170 Notes Afro Bloc parading drum b
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172 Bibliography Barker, C., Johnso
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174 Bibliography De Sousa Santos, B
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176 Bibliography Grubacic, A. (2003
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178 Bibliography Lash, S. (2002) Cr
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180 Bibliography O’Neill, J. (200
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182 Bibliography Thompson, E.P. (19
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Index Note: Page numbers in italics
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186 Index class: affinities 93; and
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188 Index G7 23 G8 23, 100; meeting
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190 Index London 52, 63, 69, 116; E
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192 Index Poland 44, 45; ‘Orange
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194 Index Taylor, P. 168 n.2; call
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