Seventeenth International Conference on Interdisciplinary Social Sciences

Abstract

It is heterodox to suggest liberation can come from any other form than sharpening or dulling contradictions—through revolution or reform. I suggest there is a third form and the historical record has preponderance of it. In this paper I explore theoretical approaches of “engaged withdrawal”. That is individuals and groups that pursue lines of flight rather than direct conflict or negotiation. A suggestive list of examples includes the nomadic practices of fission-fusion, self-barbarianization in ancient world, escaped slaves of marron societies, religious forms of exodus i.e. Anabaptists, colonial subjects self-absconding, 170 years of reoccurring back-to-the-land movements, and 1960s communes. Despite diverse historical cases, little serious attention has been paid to this form of liberational struggle. In fact, the assumption is that but not engaging in the structures of authority, one is not a rebelling but is surrendering. Those who do not engage are weakening the movements that do by siphoning off resources and allowing the oppressive situation to linger. Never are these conclusions empirically tested. Opposite this position are ways of understanding self-removal in more nuanced ways. This is articulated in the following. Hirschman’s exit as organizational maintenance. Resistant exit such as exiles. ‘Weapons of the weak’ seen in peasant flight. Incorporation of interstitial projects into Marxian frameworks seen from Erik Olin Wright to Hardt and Negri. As counter intuitive as it may seem withdrawals are not, as Virno wrote ‘negative gesture that exempts one responsibility’ but rather ‘modify the conditions of conflict’ and may provide social value.