Sociology Reading Group

Bernard Stiegler's Vision of Contemporary Society

In responding to the current crisis of global capitalism, the contemporary French writer Bernard Stiegler has written a three volume study entitled Disbelief and Discredit in which he outlines the psychological and sociological dimensions of our contemporary social malaise. The first two volumes of this study have now been translated into English and published by Polity Press. The objective of this reading group is to explore Stiegler’s work and examine his account of contemporary capitalist society.

In Stiegler’s work, which extends Max Weber’s classic explanation of the origins of capitalism, the contemporary neoliberal form of capitalism has hit a brick wall, primarily because nobody believes in a capitalist future anymore. This is the case, in his view, because the totally rationalised form of capitalism, which calculates the cost benefit of everything and leaves nothing to chance, destroys the openness of the future, and the possibility that things will ever change. In the face of this process of total mechanisation or total marketisation, what Weber called instrumental rationality in the early 20th century, Stiegler argues that it is impossible for us to believe today, simply because belief no longer makes sense in a completely rationalised social form. But what are the social consequences of the situation?

For Stiegler the ultimate consequence of this new faithless version of capitalism is social collapse or the emergence of what he calls the uncontrollable society. In his view, the uncontrollable society is born when the individual loses faith in the future. What can I do? How can I change? How can I improve my life? If these questions seem unanswerable, Stiegler argues that the individual first falls into despair, and then later, adopts a kind of nihilistic, destructive, position where they act without care for self or society. In the second volume of Stiegler’s study, which focuses on the uncontrollable society, this is where we are today – society has become a care-less, destructive, place.

Although Stiegler’s works originally appeared before the global economic crash, they have clearly taken on added significance since 2008. This is the case because one of the fundamental psycho-social effects of the crash has been a loss of faith, hope, and possibility in the future. This ‘failure of the future’ is, of course, perfectly reflected in the social policy of the Coalition government in Britain which is more or less wholly negative, and committed to deficit reduction, and devoid of a positive vision for the future. In responding to this situation, Stiegler’s argument is that what is required today is less rationality. Instead, he thinks we need to re-imagine the form of industrial society which gave birth to the discipline of sociology and re-think its foundational principles outside of the confines of economic calculation.

By engaging with Stiegler’s recent works on disbelief and discredit, the purpose of this reading group is two-fold: first, to explore Stiegler’s work, and second, to think about the kind of utopian politics he thinks we need to develop if we are to find some way out of our current impasse.

For an introduction to Stiegler’s project, please see his Ars Industrialis Manifesto posted on the internet at http://arsindustrialis.org/manifesto-2010.

If you are interested in taking part in this reading group, please contact Mark Featherstone at m.a.featherstone@keele.ac.uk