The Politics of Theory: Producing Another World, with Some Thoughts on Latour

Abstract

This essay explores the politics of theory and how theoretical analysis in science and technology studies might inform real-world conduct. I focus on objects and projects that can serve as ‘ontological theatre’ for a non-modern perspective—that both evoke and act out the ontology that I associate with my analysis of ‘the mangle of practice.’ These are my models for ‘producing another world.’ In conclusion, I contrast this proposal with Latour’s political articulation of actor-network theory: Latour aims to reassemble the social at the meta-level of political representation, without modifying our mundane practices, while I am concerned here with possibilities for systematically transforming the latter.