[P2P-F] prince of networks and grid group theory

Thu Mar 17 09:35:47 CET 2011

hi michel - responses throughout

>
>
> Thank you very much for your comments and attachments, I look forward to
> news of your completed phd research, for mentioning on the p2p blog,
>
> just for info, p2p in the sense we are using at the p2p foundation is not
> per se linked to the internet, it's essentially a relational dynamic, one of
> the four mentioned by Alan Page Fiske and which he calls communal
> shareholding, the only thing we are saying is that this particular dynamic,
> is expanding as the time/space limitations change through new technological
> affordances
>

yes, i am quite familiar with your vision. my reference to the net was
directed to ANT. people often think it's somehow about the internet because
it has network in the name.

>
> as for foucault and Latour, is your summary is true, one would have to
> dismiss the big phase transitions that have already occured in the past,
> such as the massive changes involved in the shift from feudalism to
> capitalism ... I can hardly believe they would deny such overwhelming
> historical realities ?? or has anything changed in human nature and social
> structures to make what was once a regular occurence, into an impossibility?
>

i'm no historian, so i am reluctant to comment here, but foucault was always
a thinker of continuity and discontinuity. he was critical of the idea of
revolution as it overlooked the continuities between seemingly different
governmental forms. the classic example, and one also taken up by the
frankfurt school, debord and others as well, is sovietism and its
centralised, totalitarian style. on the other hand, practices and discourses
that appear continuous (capitalism, liberalism etc) change constantly. this
is all pretty straightforward i think.

i haven't read latour on the question of large scale change - i don't think
he has written on it but i could be wrong. i'd guess he wouldn't say it
isn't possible, just very difficult. he's written a great book about a
failed attempt to introduce a new form of public transport in paris, titled
Aramis, where he details the difficulty of implementing a great idea that
everyone seemingly agrees upon.

>
> in my almost non-existent knowledge of latour, one thing that struck me as
> p2p was the relationship with objects,
>

yes, his work is thoroughly posthuman, but that's another story.

best

nate

>
> Michel
>
>
> On Wed, Mar 16, 2011 at 5:08 PM, nathaniel tkacz <nathanieltkacz at gmail.com
> > wrote:
>
>> Hi Michel, Jussi, P2P list,
>>
>> My PhD thesis is somewhat of an ANT-informed analysis of political
>> openness, read through the case study of Wikipedia. I wish it were done, so
>> I could give you a sense of what an ANT account of P2P might look - although
>> I'm by no means a faithful disciple! I see ANT more as a method-ontology: it
>> is a set of claims about reality that in turn proposes a particular type of
>> analysis. There is most definitely a politics to it, but it's not really
>> activist. Indeed, I would suggest that for Latour, much like Foucault but
>> for different reasons, massive change of the type envisioned by p2p is not
>> possible.
>>
>> Anyway, I won't get into it unless there is a desire to have a
>> conversation about it. I've attached Prince of Networks, Reassembling the
>> Social and also John Law's After Method.
>>
>> A few quick pointers:
>>
>> ANT has nothing to do, like Jussi wrote, with the Internet. Actor-Network
>> is a statement about reality.
>>
>> Harman's book is an exposition of the philosophy that underpins Latour's
>> work. It's definitely helpful, but it's a very particular take.
>>
>> If I was to read an explication of ANT I would start with John Law's After
>> Method. I think it's better than Reassembling the Social.
>>
>> Finally, although it's not an explication of ANT and P2P, I recently had a
>> well-intentioned but heated debate with Johan Soderberg and Mathieu O'Neil
>> over at the CSPP Journal about ANT and activism. You can find it here:
>>
>> http://cspp.oekonux.org/debate/ant-power
>>
>> It seems that in Europe ANT has quite a bad wrap and is seen as an apology
>> for capitalism or anything else conservative or boring. Here in the land of
>> Oz, the cultures seem more fresh and lively and more philosophical. Latour
>> is read in the tradition of Deleuze, Serres, Foucault (for me anyway) and
>> other process-based thinkers.
>>
>> Let me know if you want anything more, I have quite the catalogue!
>>
>> Best
>>
>>
>>
>> Nate Tkacz
>>
>> School of Culture and Communication
>> University of Melbourne
>>
>> Twitter: http://twitter.com/__nate__
>>
>> Research Page: http://nathanieltkacz.net
>>
>> Current project: http://networkcultures.org/wpmu/cpov/about-2/
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Mar 16, 2011 at 7:31 AM, Michel Bauwens <michelsub2004 at gmail.com>wrote:
>>
>>> thanks Jussi!
>>>
>>> On Wed, Mar 16, 2011 at 2:25 PM, Parikka, Jussi <
>>> Jussi.Parikka at anglia.ac.uk> wrote:
>>>
>>>>
>>>> Dear Michel
>>>>
>>>> well, I am biased, as I have always liked Latour's work - even if its
>>>> not without its problems. I have been glancing at Prince of Networks, but
>>>> would also recommend Reassemblign the Social by Latour himself; in terms of
>>>> P2P, there interesting texts include that is called something like "On the
>>>> difficulty of ANT", which is written as if an interview, and makes the point
>>>> that actor-network-theory is not necessarily about "networks" in the
>>>> concrete sense we often think they are...
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> http://books.google.de/books?id=DlgNiBaYo-YC&printsec=frontcover&dq=reassembling+the+social&hl=de&ei=uWWATc-2MIrMswb7qcXlBg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CDAQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false
>>>>
>>>> So definitely no direct translation to P2P perhaps, but that might make
>>>> the task to think P2P through only more interesting... to use Latour to
>>>> think of the various levels, scales, actants of which P2P is constituted:
>>>> from human actions to legal frameworks, physical infrastructures to social
>>>> desires, all meshed and mixed...
>>>>
>>>> best
>>>> J
>>>>
>>>> ______________________________________________________
>>>> Dr Jussi Parikka
>>>> Director of CoDE: The Cultures of the Digital Economy-institute
>>>> Reader in Media Theory & History
>>>> Co-Director of Anglia Research Centre in Digital Culture (ArcDigital)
>>>> Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge (UK)
>>>>
>>>> T: 0845 196 2851 (direct in UK)
>>>> F: <%2B44%20%280%291223%20417707>+44 (0)1223 417707
>>>>
>>>> http://jussiparikka.net
>>>> http://www.anglia.ac.uk/code
>>>> http://www.anglia.ac.uk/arcdigital
>>>>
>>>> *Book news*: Insect Media: An Archaeology of Animals and Technology is
>>>> published by University of Minnesota Press:
>>>> http://www.upress.umn.edu/Books/P/parikka_insect.html
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>> From: Michel Bauwens [mailto:michelsub2004 at gmail.com<michelsub2004 at gmail.com>
>>>> ]
>>>> Sent: Wed 16/03/2011 6:10
>>>> To: p2p-foundation
>>>> Cc: Andy Robinson; phoebe moore; Samuel Rose; Paul B. Hartzog; Parikka,
>>>> Jussi
>>>> Subject: prince of networks and grid group theory
>>>>
>>>> Dear friends,
>>>>
>>>> I have a question: should I read Prince of Networks, a biography of
>>>> Bruno
>>>> Latour, as perhaps constitutive of p2p-oriented theorizing? So the
>>>> question
>>>> really is: should I know more about Latour?
>>>>
>>>> I have only found a version which seems not copy-able or even printable,
>>>> see
>>>>
>>>> http://www.re-press.org/book-files/OA_Version_780980544060_Prince_of_Networks.pdf
>>>> , can this be hacked or has anyone access to another version?
>>>>
>>>> My second question is for Paul: could you have a look at the theory and
>>>> book
>>>> mentioned below? Comments would be very welcome,
>>>>
>>>> Michel
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> via
>>>>
>>>> http://charlesvanderhaegen.wordpress.com/2010/11/15/einstein-capitalism-socialism-machiavelli-and-vested-interests-preventing-clumsy-solutions-for-betterment-of-our-world/
>>>>
>>>> This brings me to the subject of a theory - it sails mainly under the
>>>> name
>>>> Cultural Theory but also Theory of Plural Rationality, Grid-Group
>>>> Theory,
>>>> Theory of Socio-Cultural Viability and even Neo-Durkheimian
>>>> Institutional
>>>> Theory -  of which the foundations were lead by Mary Douglas, and
>>>> courageously further developed by her followers, the leading researcher
>>>> of
>>>> which is Michael Thompson.
>>>>
>>>> I strongly recommend the book he edited with Marco Verweij: "Clumsy
>>>> Solutions for a Complex World:  Governance, Politics and Plural
>>>> Perceptions"
>>>> published by Palgrave.
>>>>
>>>> It is a powerful and original statement on why well-intended attempts to
>>>> alleviate pressing social ills so often derail, and how effective,
>>>> efficient
>>>> and broadly accepted solutions to social problems can be found.
>>>>
>>>> It takes its cue from the idea that our endlessly changing and complex
>>>> social worlds consist of ceaseless interactions between four organising,
>>>> justifying and perceiving social relations. Each time one of these
>>>> perspectives is excluded from collective decision-making, governance
>>>> failure
>>>> inevitably result. Successful solutions are therefore creative
>>>> combinations
>>>> of four opposing ways of organising and thinking. The book shows the
>>>> force
>>>> of these theoretically sophisticated, yet simple and practical ideas for
>>>> a
>>>> number of pressing issues from around the World.
>>>>
>>>> To introduce you to the matter, you might follow the link hereafter. It
>>>> will
>>>> lead you to what is substantially the first chapter of the book:
>>>> https://mercury.smu.edu.sg/rsrchpubupload/3224/SMUPreprint.pdf
>>>>
>>>>
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