Dynamics of Modernity: Berman Canclini

Dynamics of Modernity: Berman Canclini Compare and contrast Marshall Bermans and Nestor Garcia Canclinis account of the dynamics of Modernity To be modern is to live a life of paradox and contradiction. It is to be overpowered by the immense bureaucratic organizations that have the power to control and often to destroy all communities, values, lives; and yet to be undeterred in our determination to face these forces, to fight to change their world and make it our own. (Berman:1983:13-14) Modernity has long been hailed as one of the most powerful forces to have emerged in the world, with the capacity, according to Marx, to move mountains, and to ensure that all that is solid melts into air. Within the statement by Berman that begins this essay, we can see one of the dynamics that has created this impression. Modernity, despite its deeper roots, begins to be talked about by a series of thinkers who combine a high degree of abstraction with a imperative to act. Thus Marx argues for huge motors of historical telos that exist outside of our will, and at the same time argues for an immanent need to change historical conditions. This relationship between abstraction and concreteness is perhaps the most fundamental dynamic of modernity. It gives rise to the planned economies of communism, and the controlled biopower of modern states that Foucault (1998) talks about, which attempt to rule over the function of life itself. At the same time is gives rise to what Badiou (2005:12 ) calls the passion for the real; the search for an authentic existence in the absence of the certainties with which previous epochs lived. What is crucial about these two movements is the way in which they inflect each other. The idea of authentic will becomes possible only with the collapse of grand narratives and the rise of administered life, and the administered life then uses the same notion of self-fulfilment within consumerism to further be able to administer biopower. It is this covalence that is fundamental to modernity, and which this essay will argue is entirely misunderstood by Berman. One of the reasons for this is that, as Braudel (1995:14) notes, â€Å"each civilisation tends to overestimate its own objectivity.† Likewise, each age tends to see itself as more unique than the last. However, this is particularly a problem with the period called modernity because during this period it was thought reason could break with the past, and a utopia of the state was possible. We can see this legacy in both the Communist economies and in the artistic movements such as Marinettis futurism, which had as its mot to: â€Å"make it new.† It is precisely this trap that Berman falls into: confusing the ideas of modernity with the effects of modernisation. In fact, Bermans fetishished notions of will and authenticity, played out in the ahistorical telos of his modernist planar development, resemble nothing as much as a 19c treatise on the movement of history. Perhaps part of the reason for this is the combination of Bermans European sources with his background in the strong individualist tradition of American pragmatism, as we can see in his first book (1970). Canclini stands just south of Berman, but from the perspective of Mexico, modernity is a not a finished project to be talked about nostalgically in the way Berman does. Because this project is unfinished, Canclini is much better placed to understand the complex and intertwined relationship between what is constructed as tradition and what is constructed as modernity. His notion of hybridity, placed in the context of a heavy reliance on Gramscis theory of hegemony, allows one to understand that supreme category of modernity: tradition. For instance, Canclini notes (1995a:53) that there is no clear line between popular and hegemonic culture, because (ibid:75) peasant culture is necessary for capitalism as a symbol of national identity and because (ibid:83) it offers the construction o f a hegemony through the management of cultural fragmentation.† Thus modernity can be seen here as a hybrid form whereby old identities are mobilised rather than changed and uprooted. Canclini understands that modernity, if it means anything, means a change in underlying structure rather than the type of cultural universalism which lies as the undertone of the work of Berman. This essay will consider how Berman sets up the dynamics of modernity within this ahistorical schema, and argue, as previously alluded to, that he misses the important aspects of the relation. It will also be argued that Canclini, within his much more modest project, understands the underlying dynamics of the abstract and the concrete to a far greater degree. Perhaps Bermans problems begin with his tripartite division of modernity into modernity, modernisation and the modern, without every looking at how these categories are mutually constitutive of each other. Modernity, Berman explains is (1983:15): â€Å"a mode of vital experience – experience of space and time, of the self and others, of lifes possibilities and perils.† Bermans book is more of an evocation than a scholarly argument, but nonetheless is seems pertinent to insist on some evidence for such a claim: did other ages not experience space and time? The problem here is not simply that Bermans generalisations do not tell us anything about modernity, but that they conceal the real dynamics of the process. For instance, Berman often insists on the sense of newness, of authentic experience, within modernity. Yet understood as what Berman construes it to be, the sense of the new is not an experience particular to modernity at all. What is important here about the dynam ics of modernity is the way in which the experience of the new, what Berman calls modernity, is an essential part of the process of modernisation. This has been argued well by one of Bermans claimed inspirations, Walter Benjamin, whose Arcades Project (2002) traces the way in which a sense of wonder was used to create the consumer sensibility. This is also laid out in the work of Canclini, who chronicles the powerful political effect created by constructing modernity as something to come – around which one can mobilise people towards new identities and on new political projects. However, this is a discursive effect, rather than a fundamentally new ontological possibility for the modern subject, and Berman asserts the latter as a property of the former without giving a single argument. Instead, Berman (1983:15) gives us evocation and adjective, one strung after the other. The underlying dynamic of modernity for him is: â€Å"modernity is a paradoxical unity, a unity of disunity: it pours us all into a maelstrom of perpetual disintegration, of struggle and contradiction, of ambiguity and anguish.† Underlying all this purple prose is Marxs statement, that inspires the books title, that all that is solid melts into air. Yet what Marx is talking about is the ability of capital to undermine use-value and create a world of people alienated from their labour and extracted of surplus value. Now one can take issue with Marxs account, (as Baudrillard (1983) most usefully does by pointing out that use-value is also a fetishisation, this time of authenticity, and that the original alienation occurs with the construction of value) but what he draws attention to is the way people see the imaginaries of capitalism as real: capital is perceived by people in Marx as somethin g actually existing, rather than a maelstrom of perpetual disintegration. Here, Berman fails to give proper account of why he diverges from Marx. What can we salvage from Bermans account of the dynamics of modernity? It is true to say that the political subject in modernity was thought of as massively flexible and capable of continual reinvention. Though it must be added that this notion has much broader historical roots that Berman gives credit for: one can already see it in Machiavellis (2004) notion that people are capable of masking their intentions and this constitutes the basis for politics. However, this continual possibility for reinvention led to some of the most firm sets of continuities the world has seen for some time: the idea of class war, the tradition of the French bourgeoisie, and the modern state. Berman writes off in a few lines most of the great thinkers who have analysed this mutually constitutive relationships, Adorno here meriting a line. Canclini, in contrast, is alert to the way the supposed newness of modernity function to preserve power, and in his account of modernity in Mexico draws attention to th e the way newness is made a continuity of ritual and hegemonic power. Berman then separates out modernization as the social process that brings this maelstrom into being. In doing so he outlines some clear divisions between the phases of modernity. These phases resemble nothing so much as the clear evolutionary steps of early modern thinkers like Morgan. In doing so he makes a mockery of the patient work of people like Arrighi (1994), who have worked to uncover all the continuities that exist between different periods. Furthermore, his account is not even internally consistent. There is insufficient clarity in his work as to the difference between the 19C and 20C: Pushkin and Biely are made manifestations of the same movement, despite the widely different impulses that inform their work. What Canclinis work manages to do very well is to understand the way in which modernity, more than any other epoch (for it is the epoch of men who make history themselves without reliance on religious narratives) is complicit in its own construction of history. He trac es the way in which history is used as a political tool, and that the function of the type of planar divisions Berman uses is to extract a continuity from a succession. Which is to say that such divisions function as a political tool to extract a notion of destiny and objective inevitability from a history which is contingent and uncertain. Bermans one-sided and simplistic reading of modernity reaches its apex in his account of the American city. His account is a one sided view of power, as if Le Corbusier had artfully created American cities and all the modern man needed to do was stand up against this bloody tyrant. Canclini (1995b: 743-755) charts the way in which the modern man is complicit in the spaces that he builds, and that the solution is to problems of alienation that occur in such spaces is not some type of revolt by a careful reworking of the practices and delimitations of space that occur in the city. It is working through the very dynamics of modernity that one resolves its problems, and to do so requires an understanding of their complex inter-relation. Such an understanding is accurately posed by Jameson (1992:335) in his understanding of how it was the very construction of space in Los Angeles that led to the possibility of that constructions overthrowing. Furthermore, Berman misunderstands how contest ed Le Corbusier is in architectural theory. He fails to see the varying currents that inform modernity and that produced a diverse and heterogeneous formation of space, even within Le Corbusiers own school (Rabinow: 1991). Theoretically, he also fails to see what De Certeau (2002:19) has persuasively argued for, which is that it was the very relationship of time and space in modernity that leads states to forget the possibility of space. He argues that the spatial organisation laid out by the modern state was predicated on a notion of time as mode of organisation (e.g. wage labour) and a possibility of reinvention which necessarily allowed the particularities of space (as somewhere one has a proper place and a tradition that cannot be reinvented) to left to the people. Thus the conditions for contesting the state in modernity emerges from the intertwining of the micro and macro processes. These complex processes are ignored by Berman, because he is looking for a will-to-power to set against what he sees as the large bureaucratic structures of modernity. This is why he is so against Foucault, who attempts to set out the co-relation between these things. In attempting to find human creativity outside of any sort of system (though without offering any kind of rigorous account of how that might be achieved) he gives to much credit to bureaucratic systems. Canclini, in understanding how the four divisions of modernity he sets out (the rationalising, renovating, emancipatory and democratising projects) are frequently in conflict and lead to a conflicting and contested legacy, is in a much better position to understand. Ultimately, Bermans work seems as if it was written with a long nostalgia to badly understood 19C authors. He uses a notion of freedom as fetishised will (where he deploys what one could reasonably call a notion at all) without understanding that the development of modernity has destroyed this very category. As Zizek (1999:389) artfully pointed out it is the search for the real, for fetishised will, that, when not placed in a grand narrative, ends up in indulging in its simulacrum; the real emptied of risk. Likewise, it is the bureaucratic form of government that has led to the globalisation and decentralisation of its own form. These processes are ignored by Berman, who sees modernity as a universalism, even if a contradictory one, issuing like a new beacon of hope from a centre in Europe. Canclini understands modernity as a hybrid formation that cannot be tied to Europe, and has begun to chart the complex ways that modernity brings to bear on itself, and construct it own legacy. Bibliography Arrighi, G. 1994: The Long Twentieth Century. London: Verso. Badiou, A. 2005: La Sià ¨cle. Paris: Seuil. Baudrillard, J. 1983: For a Critique of the Political Economy of the Sign. London: Telos. Benjamin, W. 2002: The Arcades Project. Harvard: HUP. Berman, M. 1983: All that is Solid Melts into Air: Experiences of Modernity. London: Verso. Berman, M. 1970: The Politics of Authenticity: Radical Individualism and the Emergence of Modern Society. New York: MacMillan. Braudel, F. 1995: A History of Civilisations. London: Penguin. Canclini, N. G. 1995a: Hybrid Cultures: Strategies for Entering and Leaving Modernity. Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press. Canclini, N. 1995B: Mexico: Cultural Globalization in a disintegrating city. American Ethnologist. Vol. 22, No. 4: pp. 743-755. de Certeau, M. 2002: The Practice of Everyday Life. Berkeley: UCP. Foucault, M. 1998: The History of Sexuality: The Will to Knowledge. London: Penguin. Jameson, F. 1992: Postmodernism: Or the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism. London: Verso. Machiavelli, N. 2004: The Prince. Oxford: OUP. Rabinow, P. 1991: French Modern: Norms and Forms of the Social Environment. Mass: MIT. Zizek, S. 1999: The Ticklish Subject: The Absent Centre of Political Ontology. London: Verso.

Economic control Essay

Traditionally the reasons of the rules and regulations were to control human relations in an effort to make the behaviors of other individuals known (Pennell, pp3). rules are also employed to provide other purposes, these includes punishing offenders, providing social economic control, banishing private retribution, deterring criminal acts and reflecting public opinions (Pennell, pp3). Conventionally prevention of crime was intended provide advice on defensive behaviors and security. On the other hand laws are supposed to be malleable and should serve as a tool of social engineering (Pennell, pp4). They are supposed to be transformed with arrival of new thoughts and societal changes. The human rights and needs of victims of crime are essential aspects of criminal justice systems, especially currently, as the issues of victims have emerged since 1970s. Since 1970s, legal and emotional reactions of the nation have changed dramatically and currently more attention is being paid on restorative justice. There are many activities that are involved in restorative justice (Pennell, pp6). In order to give an insight of the various forms that restorative justice is taking and the activities that are involved this paper will focus on practices, origin context and limitations of restorative justice (Pennell, pp6). Victims Rights The current legal codes in federal government evolved from the conventional codes and attempts to define and deal with criminal behaviors. The aim of the codes is to focus on the deviant behaviors of the criminals and they rarely focus on the victims and their needs. The primary focus of the law is to deter the criminal activities (Aldana-Pindell, pp45). Several decades ago within the federal government when reconciliation for victim offenders was being set restorative justice did not exist within the criminal justice system (Brown & Bunnell, pp87). Restorative justice has evolved currently within the criminal justice system in recent years following philosophical writings of van ness and others. Various debates which have been held have facilitated the emergence of processes within the restorative justice such as impact panels, conferences, sentencing circle etc (Aldana-Pindell, pp45). Since 1970s several practices and programs have assisted to develop the restorative justice moments. Early practices for restorative justice were focusing on the moderated meetings involving the offenders and the victims (Aldana-Pindell, pp46). As time went by the meetings were expanded and included friends and family members from the two parties. The meetings also included professionals and other individuals who had access of public resources. In recent years the system has paid much attention on the participation and involvement of members of the community (Normandeau, pp34). In 1970s some practitioners and scholars believed that offenders are victims of social neglect, poor societies and racial, ethnic and gender discrimination. As a result the advocates of restorative justice focused to change the conditions in the prison, reduce incarceration use and eliminate prison and jails as institutions (Normandeau, pp34). In this regard there are some individuals who were seeking to make a caring society instead of prisons and jails that would address the issues of victimizers and victims (Brown & Bunnell, pp92). The activists of caring communities brought the issue of interests of the victims in the criminal justice system in a progressive manner rather than focusing on the right of the victims (Meister, pp54). In 1970s and 1980s the population of people in the prisons in United States was becoming progressively overcrowded and contributed to the use and popularity of intermediary sanctions (Aldana-Pindell, pp47). However, during this time restorative justice and mediation of victim offenders were not common within the criminal justice systems as alternatives. The establishment of boards of societal justice and centers for neighborhood justice in the federal government reflected their wishing to achieve more justice and this was characterized by public participation and casualness (Aldana-Pindell, pp49). These were new forms of resolution of conflicts in the late 1970s and they showed a developing disenchantment which involved trial procedures of adjudication and finding facts in accordance to adherence to strict legal principles. On the other hand the systems in resolution of conflicts placed much importance on negotiation, agreements between the disputants and placed less importance on the role of legal professionals (Aldana-Pindell, pp49). In mid 1970s reconciliation programs in the United States were introduced for victim offenders. These programs were based on the principles of Mennonite that focuses on dialogue and exchange (Marshall, pp20). Reconciliation programs involved offenders and crime victims meetings after being sentenced and included impartial third party. Reconciliation programs for offenders and victims aimed at restoring good relationship that is supposed to exist between the parties. The proponents of these programs were focusing to establish a good working relationship and use of principles of religious institutions and also as an option to incarceration (Marshall, pp21). In the rate 1970s advocates and the victims increasingly focused on mediation rather than reconciliation programs for offenders and victims’ interactions. However, the model of the mediation program was similar to models of reconciliation program, although additional individuals affected by the differences would be involved in the meeting, especially when addressing serious crimes (Meister, pp57). Mediation programs for offenders and victims were developed in western part of Europe, Scandinavia and England in the end of 1970s and early 1980s, and were use primarily to handle justice cases for the youths. Since 1980s the programs have shown a significant growth in the United States and other nations (Marshall, pp22). Progressive voices and conservatives suggest that victims of crimes do not have the voice in the criminal justice system. In late 1970s and early 1980s activists of feminists and social scholars of legal doctrines paid more attention on making courts and law enforcement officers to be accountable to children and women who may be physically or sexually abused (Marshall, pp22). The groups that advocated for victims right focused on compensation for crime in the processes of courts, using formal voice and on safety of the society. In early 1980s Reagan organization released a report of task force on victims of crimes that facilitated the development of groups that advocated for the rights of the victims. Since 1990s there is a tremendous growth of alliances between groups that focuses on the reforms of criminal justice and victim support. This tremendous growth has been as a result of realizing the common interests among the offenders and victims based groups (Anwander, pp71). In 1980s New Zealand government started reassessing Waitangi treaty focusing on the implications of the relationship between the whites i. e. Pakeha and indigenous people the Maori. In 1986 a report that was prepared by ministers recommended for structural changes in the practices and policies of the government towards the indigenous people (Marshall, pp24). In 1989 the administration had great structural changes in the way matters regarding family welfare and justice for the youths was handled. Before introduction of these changes indigenous people were overrepresented in prisons and jails and decision making processes were dominated by the whites (Meister, pp58). These structural changes employed in youth justice can be used in various juvenile offenses, but mostly they are used in serious cases and minor cases solved trough diversions of police. Family welfare and youth justice programs are different from offenders and victim reconciliation and mediation programs since they involve more community members in the discussion of the offense, pay more attention on participation of the family and recognize more victimized individuals. Family welfare and youth justice programs also reduce the intervention of the state and changes the roles of professionals in problem solving (Marshall, pp26). Youth justice and family welfare programs were introduced first in Australia in late 1991 and formed part of law enforcement operations that focused on one jurisdiction. Conferences run by the police were also introduced in the capital city of Australia and later on the northern states (Meister, pp59). In late 1993 and early 1994, conferences for handling juvenile cases were introduced in the southern and western part of Australia and they were involving non professional police to run the conference. In Queensland and south wale conferences to handle juvenile cases, have been recently introduced and they are mostly employed in Queensland schools (Meister, pp59). Circles of sentencing were established in Canada in 1980s, and were the fist groups of the nation to respond to offenders (Marshall, pp26). The aim and objectives of circles of sentencing are resolution of conflicts, restoring harmony and order, and healing of offenders, victims and family (Anwander, pp73). Circles of sentencing involves processes of consensus and includes all the victims of crimes and families of the victims, their next of kin, and community members in order to respond to the behavior and formulate sanctions that addresses all the needs of those involved. Circles of sentencing are currently being used in United States and in Canada by non indigenous groups that include blacks in Minnesota. Since 1980s, there are other practices which have emerged and use the principles of restorative justice (Marshall, pp27). Compensation boards in Vermont involve the members of the community and design penalties for offenders of juvenile. These penalties involve service of the community and rarely involve offender and victim mediation. The meetings do not involve the victims (Anwander, pp76). Panels of victim impact have also been introduced by mothers and focuses on drunk driving. The panels give a room for the victims and the members of the family to give their suggestions about the impact of driving when drunkard to the offenders who have been ordered by the court to attend. However, these panels for victims are different from most of the processes of restorative justice, since they do not employ voluntary attendance (Marshall, pp29). On the other hand they have an important element of bringing contact of offenders and victims in the process, which lacks in traditional proceedings of criminal justice. These panels are employed extensively across the United States. On the other hand research and theories have contributed to the development of restorative justice. In 1970s scholars of social and legal doctrines developed several theories focusing on formal and informal justice. Theoretical and empirical studies of formal and indformal justice which have been conducted in industrialized countries and in less developed countries suggest that, it took less one decade to change optimism for pessimism. With emergence of theories and research disillusionment had already set in by 1990s (Marshall, pp30). In late 1970s and early 1980s there were arguments from the criminologists in Netherlands, Norway and from elsewhere to abolish prisons. During this time the activists paid more attention on decarceration and alternatives to jails and prisons. However, currently there are few individuals who would argue for complete abolition of prisons although few people argue for their minimal use (Marshall, pp31). In 1996 there was an international conference to address penal abolition held in New Zealand and supported resolutions and discussions to facilitate restorative justice. Scholars have also attempted to focus on the merits of informal methods that can be applied in social set ups to regulate order in the society (Marshall, pp31). This involves reintegrative shaming in response to a crime that may be integrative and not stigmatizing. These ideas have been employed in conferencing models such as in wagga, in Australia. Before the wagga conference these ideas were not included in youth justice and family welfare programs and they did not form part of many conference held across the globe. The united states are currently employing the wagga model, although there are some arguments on the issue of shame and whether it should be the central issue in processes of conferencing (Marshall, pp32).

Getting the Best Essay Topics for Old Man and the Sea

Getting the Best Essay Topics for Old Man and the Sea Essay Topics for Old Man and the Sea It really did feel as a dream. The scenario, however, is very interesting for the section of the old man. The man does not have any doubts about his destination, and this is the place where the magic of perception arrives to action. It is suggested to look for the one which has a superior reputation and offers high-quality papers at very affordable prices. In fact, there is absolutely no food. The land must earn a difference too, in the form of the clouds. The significance of the sea for a setting. The Hidden Gem of Essay Topics for Old Man and the Sea The underlying fact about the social advertising is that they wish to earn a beneficial effect on the society in general, it's the drive to find a better society which makes the foundation and core business of the organizations involved with social advertisements. 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Essay on Diomedes, the True Hero of Homer’s Iliad

Diomedes, the True Hero of The Iliad In The Iliad, written in a 3rd person omniscient point of view, Homer gives a very serious account of the tenth and last year of the Trojan War. It was in Homers account that the very idea of becoming a legendary hero reached its pinnacle; the choice of the better hero was not decided on the events they participated in, but rather by their characteristics. The ancient Greeks had strict criteria for individuals to follow if they were to be seen as heroes. Above all, a man needed to be a skilled warrior, but this was not the only requirement. To be a hero, a warrior had to respect authority, both governmental and religious. The Greeks gave heroes no room for pride. These men were to be modest,†¦show more content†¦However, this fight may have never happened if Athena had not disguised herself as one of Hectors brothers and convinced him to fight (260). That was not enough though, as Athena then helped Achilles win the fight (260-261). This seems to be the case with all of Ac hilles battles. A god, goddess, or gods help him in battle by strengthening and encouraging him and his men, or they rally a Trojan army into entering a futile final battle. Diomedes is also guilty of receiving help from the gods. After praying for Athenas aid, Diomedes proceeds to not only slay Pandaros (who wounded him earlier) and many other Trojans, but also wound Aeneas in his hip and his mother Aphrodite in her hand (60-64). Later on in the same battle, Diomedes thrusts his spear through the belly of Ares, also done with the help of Athena (73). Another example of Diomedes skill comes when he and Odysseus spy on the Trojan camp. Diomedes goes ahead of Odysseus and strikes down so many Trojans that the ground was reddened with blood (124). Even before this, Diomedes prayed again to Athena for help. It seems no Greek warrior could fight their own battles; instead, they requested help from the gods. This fact makes it difficult to discern the better fighter between Achilles and D iomedes, but the common choice would probably be Achilles because of his legendary status and he was the son of an immortal.Show MoreRelatedAnalysis Of The Iliad 915 Words   |  4 Pagesâ€Å"In great literature, no scene of violence exists for its own sake.† This is a quote from an AP Literature Exam Essay Question to be answered during the year of 1982. When discussing this quote, thousands of great novels and other texts can be used as evidence to support this line. One such work of literature is Homer’s great epic, The Iliad. This poem, encompassing the telling of the great Trojan War, is one of the best examples of such a text. Throughout the text, it lays before the reader manyRead MoreIliad - Self image1193 Words   |  5 Pagesï » ¿The Iliad Essay Prompt 1. Complete one take home essay. Provide textual evidence, specific lines and incidents from The Iliad that proves your thesis. You may also draw from The Odyssey. Use in text parenthetical documentation according to MLA standards. The style guide that many colleges use is DianaHacker.com. We will use this style guide for both MLA format and grammar and mechanics. If you have any questions about MLA format, refer to DianaHacker.com. This paper needs to read asRead MoreExistentialism And Akhilleus : State Of Affairs1182 Words   |  5 Pagesand Akhilleus’ State of Affairs in Homer’s Iliad Existentialism is a philosophy that deals with human existence. This philosophy is a complex subject that asks questions about life that include meaning, purpose, choice, morality, ideology, and individuality. When reading other texts one could easily make connections to existential themes within the book’s literary tropes. Occasionally, some books have an overloaded abundance of existential themes. Homer’s Iliad is one of the books that comprise ofRead MoreDestiny And Freewill : Fate And Destiny1800 Words   |  8 Pages Destiny and Freewill Fate is the driving force in many epic poems, tales, and stories. This is what predetermines where the hero will go, who they are going to meet along their journeys and what they will become. It may lead to a romance so strong that it forces two cities into a war. Whether they go on to live a long life filled with glorious gifts and honour or, whether they die in battle, a glorious death or otherwise. It is these fates and destinies that are strongly woven into the