"Overturning the Majority?" The Insurgent Minorities and the Self-Questioning of Society

Abstract

This dissertation addresses the problem of how insurgent minorities can be democratic actors. This dissertation re-thematises the focus of a democratic, reconfigurative politics – by exploring the subject of insurgent minorities that instigate the self-questioning of society. I borrow and re-frame the Tardian process through which the minority ‘overturns’ the majority, by seeking to identify how such a process could be democratic – or, how groups that seek the re-configuration of society could be understood as democratic actors. I turn my attention to critical theories of democracy and post-Marxism. Uncovering the democratic potential of insurgent minorities, I develop an account of the democratic role minorities play in instigating a process of societal self-questioning. To derive and expand upon the democratic role and nature of insurgent minorities, I engage with the work of three post-Marxist thinkers, who are the focus of this study: Ernesto Laclau, Gilles Deleuze, and Jacques Rancière. I present three different accounts of the process of ‘overturning’, through which an insurgent minority may instigate the process of societal self-questioning. Through each of the thinkers, I derive a different understanding of what insurgent minorities seek to overturn; as well as a different primary focus on how this is achieved. Specifically, I explore the ‘overturning’ of the ‘hegemony’ through the equivalential logic in Laclau; the overturning of ‘arborescence’ through a ‘symplegmatic’ double-becoming in Deleuze; and the overturning of the ‘police’ through subjectivation in Rancière. As I explore, a core challenge and task of this dissertation is to establish the sense in which overturning a majority can be democratic. Drawing upon Cornelius Castoriadis, I posit that the defining criterion that establishes whether an insurgent minority is democratic relates to the process of societal self-questioning, and whether said group strives towards the closure or opening of future prospects for self-questioning. In each of the three thinkers explored, I expand upon how insurgent minorities bring about this self-questioning. In Laclau, I discuss the idea of a ‘democratic’ counter-hegemonic politics; in Deleuze, I address the inherent anti-fascistic approach which should guide insurgent minorities; and, in Rancière, I focus on the axiom of the presupposition of equality which sets apart insurgent minorities as democratic actors vis-à-vis other kinds of minorities engaged in other kinds of antagonistic politics. In doing so, I expand our theoretical accounts of democratic theory, expand post-Marxist critique, and deepen our understanding of the important democratic role minorities have in democratic societies.