- The Multitude and Peace Week

The Multitude and Peace Week

by Robyn Morrison

Peace Week at PSR has just ended and I am left to ponder the complexity of the intersection between academics and activism; or intellectual activity and praxis. As one of four women who sat around a table in July brainstorming a vision of how a small group of committed student peace activists at Pacific School of Religion should participate in the International Day of Prayer for Peace (September 21, 2007), today I am awe-struck with the end result. Being a typical human meaning making machine, I assume that there are no insignificant synchronicities. Everything that happens has significance and often the Spirit/God (or a power beyond the human-being) is actively at work within the context of what is happening. Therefore, I praise God for working within and through us in our Peace Week activities.

When we met to plan Peace Week, we also discussed a book that the group is reading, Multitude: War and Democracy in the Age of Empire by Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri. I agreed to write a brief essay on the middle section of that book; the chapters describing their concept of the ‘multitude’. By its nature ‘multitude’ defies concise definition. Hardt and Negri describe the concept with these words, “A multitude is an irreducible multiplicity; the singular social differences that constitute the multitude must always be expressed and can never be flattened into sameness, unity, identity, or indifference.”[1] It is less a concept than a creative vision of the web of humanity as a powerfully complex tapestry of singular identities woven together through commonalities.

Hardt and Negri contend that the “multitude is the only social subject capable of realizing democracy, that is, the rule of everyone by everyone.” Part two of the book elaborates on the concept primarily from the socioeconomic perspective; the area that also intersects most closely with my experience working for economic justice. As they deconstruct older notions of dangerous concepts of economic class, they move beyond Adam Smith versus Marx polarities. Based upon my experience working with struggling small businesses and social entrepreneurs in rural areas, I found it refreshing that the discussion has moved beyond the ‘us versus them’ language of labor versus management. Instead we are invited to break open the box and think in terms of “human creative capacity.”

Neither capitalists nor Marxists have given adequate consideration to the poor of the world. The voices and creative capacity of indigenous people, rural agrarian communities, and migrant workers have not been adequately respected. Transnational capitalism has espoused the myth that industrial development and large scale production is the ideal for all people; a myth that we are now seeing as a life threathening farce. Hardt and Negri introduce the idea of the biopolitical and remind us that we share the earth and a common physiology; we are one body. As a person who struggles to address the complexities of dismantling the negative impacts of global capitalism while acknowledging that transnational corporate economic activity is both destructive and beneficial, I was particularly intrigued with their discussion of international debt and global financial institutions. Synchronistically as I read Part two of the Multitude, I was also deeply engaged in planning the PSR Chapel service for Peace week, and the Biblical text (Luke 16: 1-13) drew me towards the concept of the Lord’s Jubilee and the elimination of unjust and oppressive debt.

As I worked to pull together the liturgical pieces that would ground the Peace Week at PSR, I experienced first hand the concept of the multitude. My individual contributions to the communal project felt integral to my creative capacity. Three of the pieces I brought to the project were my knowledge of the connection between economic justice and peace-building, a passion for liturgies (the rituals that form and strengthen communities), and experience developing and deploying the leadership gifts of others. Other students would bring their unique gifts to the Peace Week community project; thereby allowing me to joyously contribute my creative capacity. That is exactly what I experienced, the power and creativity of the multitude.

Some of you reading this essay experienced the end result of the multitude of students coming together to create Peace Week at Pacific School of Religion. You are the fortunate ones. If you did not, you will simply be left to imagine or create your own manifestation of multitude. What occurred was a hap-hazard loosely connected diverse multi-cultural and powerful five days of activities focused on how people of faith (primarly but not exclusively Christians) can work collaboratively to lead peace and justice building ministries.

In a particularly divine moment for me PSR’s Chorale Director, Aeri Lee suggested a last minute addition to the music for the Tuesday service. The song, For One Great Peace, would be sung as a chorus of solos threaded together and eventually merging into a common voice. The following quote from Bishop Desmond Tutu was projected on the screen. “One of the wonderful things is how God depends on all of us… Each one of us has a contribution, each and every one of us.”

 

And that for me is the meaning of the multitude.

 

For One Great Peace[2]

This thread I weave,
this step I dance,
this stone I carve,
this ball I bounce,
this nail I drive,
this pearl I string,
this flag I wave,
this note I sing,

REFRAIN
One small part;
one small place;
one heart’s beat;
one great Peace.

This pot I shape,
this fire I light,
this fence I leap,
this bone I knit,
this seed I nurse,
this rift I mend,
this child I raise,
this earth I tend,

REFRAIN

This cheque I write,
this march I join,
this faith I state,
this truth I sign,
this is small part,
in one small place,
of one heart’s beat,
for one great Peace.

 

 

 

 

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[1] Hardt and Negri, Multitude, 105.

[2] Music by Ron Klusmeier. Words by Shirley Erena Murray. Words Copyright © 1992 by Hope Publishing Co., Carol Stream, IL 60188

- Multitude Discussion Online

Go check out the Multitude page (up in the right-hand corner of this home page) for the latest of our online discussion of the summer reading, Multitude. Emily posted a great reflection about religious language and war. Post your comments to let us know you’re still out there.

- Subverting the Means and Conditions for Perpetual War: A Call to My Seminarian Colleagues Across the Country

by Emily Joye McGaughy
Pacific School of Religion
May 17, 2007

In their recent publication Multitude, authors Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri put forth the idea that perpetual war has become the political modus operandi of the global empire. A current “state of exceptionalism” (applied in general by global networks but most specifically embodied in the political strategies and actions of the US) is part and parcel of this perpetual war paradigm. They cite this exceptionalism by locating its function in both legal and national behavior. A “state of exception” happens when, in a time of national upheaval, the constitution is “suspended temporarily and extraordinary powers given to a strong executive or even a dictator in order to protect the republic.” (Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri. Multitude: War and Democracy in the Age of Empire. (Penguin Books, NY: 2005) 7) This is the legal form of exception. The national form happens when any given nation state considers itself a) an exception to the rule of universal law and/or b) exceptional in its definition as superior over and above other nation states. Hardt and Negri contend the current disposition and political action of the US fits into this national “state of exception(alism).” In recent years, especially with regards to the US invasion of Iraq, we have both claimed our exceptionalism by assuming our supposed role as ambassadors of democracy and by preemptively striking Iraq without UN support.

Twentieth century neo-Marxist philosophers have often maintained that the ideology of super-structure is maintained by cooperation of ideological state apparatuses. (I am drawing here largely from the work of Louis Althusser.) These ideological state apparatuses must enforce the means of production and the conditions for reproduction that keep such an ideology afloat. Needless to say, in a state/world of perpetual war—and herein the ideology of super structure maintains that war is ontological—ideological state apparatuses must enforce means of production and conditions for reproduction that sustain the war industry. The war industry, though mostly dependent on the development of weapons, relies on various means and conditions: communication networks, political systems, rigid understandings of boundaries, the willingness of men and womyn to serve in the military, etc. This large spectrum of dependency creates an environment in which social apparatuses are largely responsible for and participants in perpetual war.

An ideological state apparatus can be two things: 1) an institution or group that is commissioned by and operative on behalf of the state, i.e. public universities, governments, police, etc and 2) an institution or group located within a particular state, though not commissioned by or operative on behalf of the state, that participates in the construction of infrastructure, public life & opinion, and social networking, i.e. non-profits, churches, private schools, etc. Again, the ideology of the super structure (in our case: “democracy,” capitalism, and “free speech”) is maintained when all ideological state apparatuses work in unison to upkeep the means of production and conditions for reproduction. The ideology of the super structure becomes vulnerable when one or two or three or four ideological state apparatuses start dancing out of sync.

Ideology is produced in a myriad of ways though we often assume word-systems are primarily responsible for the construction and deconstruction of ideology. While it is true that slogans such as “These colors don’t run” and “God is not a republican or a democrat”, documents such as The Communist Manifesto and Letter from Birmingham Jail, and speeches from the mouths of Malcolm, Stanton and Mao certainly participate in the ideological life of peoples, words are not solely responsible for ideology. Symbols systems and communal rituals also have the potential to enforce means of production and the conditions for reproduction. So now Christians, I hope your eyes and brain cells are waking up!

The Church in America is an ideological state apparatus. We do not work for the state, in fact in regards to the topic at hand we should be working against it, but because of our location in state territory we are participants in and susceptible to American ideology. Further, just because we are located in a certain nation state does not mean our allegiance must be given thereto. If our God is one whose love is not limited by borders, skin types, religious affiliations or mistakenness of human action—and really, isn’t that what grace implies?—then our attempts to be human in the image of God must mirror this limitless love. Our allegiance is not to the state, our allegiance is to love. And let us be clear about one thing: love is the opposite of war. If we believe that God came so that we may have life and have it more abundantly, then we simply cannot dance in sync with perpetual war. It is our duty, therefore, as the Church in America, as an acknowledged ideological state apparatus, to subvert the contemporary super structure. Our word systems, symbol systems and communal rituals must negate the role of violence and war in global politics.

I wonder, what does this mean for the way we have done worship? Can we continue to elevate a sign of politically-sanctioned torture as our dominant Christian symbol? Can we ever sing “Onward Christian Soldiers” or even allow this song to be reprinted in our hymnals? What about continuing the theological characteristics of God as vengeful, jealous, desiring the ‘victory’ and full of wrath? If we save these religious vestiges for the virtue of preserving tradition we are putting our stamp of approval on the super structure’s fascination with and reliance on mayhem.
My question for seminarians training to do religious leadership in the 21st century is this: what word systems, symbol systems and communal rituals will you promote and carry forward in this age of perpetual war? Let’s share ideas!