Table Of ContentŽIŽEK
A N D
COMMUNIST
STRATEGY
ON THE DISAVOWED
FOUNDATIONS OF
GLOBAL CAPITALISM
CHRIS McMILLAN
Žižek and Communist Strategy
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ŽIŽEK AND COMMUNIST
STRATEGY
ON THE DISAVOWED FOUNDATIONS OF
GLOBAL CAPITALISM
2
Chris McMillan
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© Chris McMillan, 2012
Edinburgh University Press Ltd
22 George Square, Edinburgh EH8 9LF
www.euppublishing.com
Typeset in 11/13 Sabon by
Servis Filmsetting Ltd, Stockport, Cheshire, and
printed and bound in Great Britain by
CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon CR0 4YY
A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978 0 7486 4664 7 (hardback)
ISBN 978 0 7486 4665 4 (webready PDF)
ISBN 978 0 7486 5549 6 (epub)
ISBN 978 0 7486 5 548 9 (Amazon ebook)
The right of Chris McMillan to be identifi ed as author of this work
has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and
Patents Act 1988.
The author would like to thank the editors of The International
Journal of Žižek Studies for allowing the reproduction of sections
of ‘The Communist Hypothesis; Žižekian Utopia or Utopian
Fantasy?’, originally published in vol. 5, no. 2, 2011.
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Contents
Acknowledgements vi
1. Introduction 1
2. Marxism after the Discursive Turn 23
3. Jouissance and Politics 48
4. Universality and the Trauma of the Real 76
5. Žižek’s Capitalism: What Can Sexual Difference Tell Us
about New Forms of Apartheid? 97
6. Žižek’s Realpolitics 134
7. The Communist Hypothesis: Žižekian Utopia or Utopian
Fantasy? 165
8. Conclusion 183
References 193
Index 203
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Acknowledgements
Writing can often appear to be a solitary pursuit. Long hours are
spent with one’s head in a book or hunched over a silent computer.
Large periods can pass without a word being uttered. Yet construct-
ing this book has been anything but a lonely experience for me. I
have been accompanied and encouraged by a range of characters
throughout the journey, without whom this document might not
have come to completion.
Much of this book enjoyed its fi rst life as a PhD thesis while I
studied at Massey University in New Zealand, where I was supervised
by Warwick Tie and Grant Duncan. I began working with Warwick
in my honours year and this project has been a culmination of several
years of debate and discussion which I have found to be nothing less
than a pleasure. Warwick has been a constant sounding board and a
great mentor for whom I have massive admiration. For this reason,
I owe Warwick, along with Grant, a huge debt of gratitude. I would
also like to thank Colin Cremin, Glyn Daly and Chamsy el-Ojeili for
their very useful critiques of my project.
The process of writing this text would certainly not have been
the same without the companionship and camaraderie of my fellow
students in the PhD room at the School of Social and Cultural
Studies. Being able to share this experience with you all is something
I will never forget. Also, to those within the school who provided
resources, guidance or a friendly smile, I thank you also.
I would also like to thank Edinburgh University Press for their
patient support and encouragement throughout this process, in
particular Nicola Ramsey and Eddie Clark, and their copy-editor
Jonathan Wadman.
To my good friends – Marty, Drakie, Doddy, Thames and Leon
– most of whom I have known since high school, I thank you for
putting up with my political rants and my strange habits, my lack of
funds and increasing withdrawal from ‘real life’.
To my family – Mum and Dad, James and Melanie, and Grandma
and grandparents lost – as well as my ‘new’ family, the Maynes, I
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acknowledgements
thank you for being the ongoing foundations of my life. If I have faith
in anything, it is faith in the love and support of my family. From my
early years to this day, this has never wavered and I’m sure this book
would have not have been possible without your support.
Most of all, to my wife Victoria, who has stuck by me through
thick and thin, from my days as an aspiring undergraduate business
tycoon, to scholarly communist, through breakdowns – academic,
fi nancial or ‘other’ – and adventures. Victoria, you have been my
constant companion throughout this journey, riding the ups and
downs as much as I have. You have tolerated the (occasional) long
hours, (constant) fi nancial sacrifi ce and my increasing detachment
from everyday life as this project lurched its way towards c ompletion.
I love you: I dedicate this book to you.
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1
Introduction
The dust jackets for Slavoj Žižek’s books often announce him as
‘Elvis of Cultural Theory’ or ‘The greatest intellectual high since
Anti-Oedipus’.* Whilst these conceptions no doubt irk Žižek as
mechanisms that subvert his radicalism by emphasising his popular-
ity, they aptly capture the excess of his appeal. Regularly drawing
audiences in their hundreds, if not thousands, Žižek appears to hold
a position of mastery for many radical Leftists. Despite repeated
attempts to subvert this position, Žižek is continually positioned
as the subject who is supposed to know, and then derided when his
latest book fails to provide a utopian blueprint (or even a concrete
conclusion). Everyone knows who Žižek is, but nobody knows what
he stands for – including Žižek, if his critics are to be believed. In this
manner, for many Žižek represents the failure of radical Leftist polit-
ical theorising to respond to the sustained and semi-permanent crisis
of Marxism and the contradictory failing, and continued t hriving, of
global capitalism.
There is no need to be reticent: I shall lay my cards on the table.
This tragic positioning of Žižek and Žižekian theory is not the posi-
tion taken in this book. Against the predominant production of
Žižekian theory as ‘good theory, bad politics’, I come to argue that
his work identifi es the path towards a regeneration of Marxist politi-
cal practice and an effective disruption of global capitalism in the
name of a better future.
Žižek is certainly an outstanding theorist of culture, of ideology
and of subjectivity, but his infl uence goes beyond this superstructural
analysis. Žižek’s renewal of Marxist analysis, thoroughly coloured
by Lacanian psychoanalysis and Hegelian dialectics, offers a critique
of capitalism that highlights the path to a communist future. This
restoration does not come with an idealist manifesto, or the detailed
* While these two quotes come from the Chronicle of Higher Education and the
Village Voice they are so ubiquitously clichéd that it hardly seems to matter: indeed,
it is diffi cult to source the original sources.
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