Capitalist Sorcery

PHILIPPE PIGNARRE writer, activist and the director of Les Empêcheurs de penser en rond, at La Découverte in Paris. He has written extensively on the pharmaceutical industry, on psychotherapy and more recently on Olivier Besancenot and the NPA (Nouvelle Parti Anticapitaliste) in France.ISABELLE STENGERS philosopher of science and the author of more than two dozen books on the philosophy of science and the politics of knowledge. Once a student of Ilya Prigogine, with whom she wrote Order out of Chaos, Stengers has written book length studies of hypnosis and the history of chemistry. Her more recent work – on cosmopolitics and on Alfred North Whitehead – is currently in press in translation. ANDREW GOFFEY Senior Lecturer in Media, Culture and Communication at Middlesex University, UK. A writer and a translator he researches on the links between philosophy, science and culture and is the author (with Matthew Fuller) of Evil Media. He has translated numerous articles in the field of philosophy by Isabelle Stengers, Barbara Cassin and Eric Alliez, amongst others.

• AcknowledgementsIntroduction: On the Witch's Broomstick; Andrew Goffey PART I: WHAT HAPPENED? Inheriting from Seattle What Are We Dealing With? Daring to be Pragmatic Infernal Alternatives Minions PART II: LEARNING TO PROTECT ONESELF Do You Believe in Sorcery? Leaving Safe Ground Marx Again... To Believe in Progress No Longer? Learning Fright PART III: HOW TO GET A HOLD? Thanks to Seattle? The Trajectory of an Apprenticeship Fostering New Connections Sorry, but we have to Reactivating History PART IV: NEEDING PEOPLE TO THINK A Cry Interstices Ecosophy Political Creation Empowerment Reclaim Above All, Not to Conclude Notes Index

'Stengers and Pignarre launch call to invention, against the spell of the infernal alternatives that bind us to the capitalist 'realist' logic of choosing between the lesser of unliveable evils. To counter this capture, they propose a political 'magic' capable of creating new possibilities. But do not be misled: the 'magic' is all in the technique, and the technique is all in relation. Capitalist Sorcery is a veritable toolbox for an anticapitalist politics of collective empowerment, essential reading for all those interested in movement politics post-Seattle.' - Brian Massumi, Communication Department, University of Montreal, Canada.'...a detailed and thought-provoking pragmatics of resistance...' - Culture Machine