PEOPLE WHO HAVE VIVIONS NEEd A DOCTOR. (1)
About the relationship between politics, art and visions.
Or: How we rejoiced too soon about losing something we miss today.

An exchange of ideas between Andreas Hirsch and Peter Rantasa.

Andreas Hirsch
How do I research a concept? I enter the appropriate term in a search engine. If I enter »visions«, I will find out that the term has been appropriated by religious fundamentalists. Christian, Catholic, and fundamentalist charities, environmental organizations and religious portals like to use this topos. We subsequently catch glimpses of scholasticism and of intellectual patterns that we thought we had overcome a long time ago. The hope-filled term »vision« may lead to tendencies that would in turn take us back to the time before Enlightenment. I have just picked random examples, but they reinforce my unease with the term »vision«.
Peter Rantasa
The religious concept of the term »vision« is an individualized one: it corresponds to an »inner face«. In order for such a vision to become articulated, the problematic figure of a prophet needs to come to the foreground. A collective moment does not occur until later, when a utopian social concept is formulated. I am not sure whether we should leave the term »vision«, like so many others, to the circles you just described or whether it wouldn’t be more promising to retrieve the term and give it a positive, more emancipatory meaning so it can be used for political purposes.
Hirsch
In the present media context, we could define »visions« as a meme, a cultural information unit that spreads through communication and gathers a positive momentum in a »culturally determined history of development« (2). In order to do that, the term has to swim in a memetic gene pool. From this vantage point, it may be worth our while to retrieve the term »vision«.
Rantasa
But who inserts this meme into the gene pool? – Feuilletonists and researchers who examine trends over time. Fortune-telling has become just as generalized as the art and business world. Trend researchers such as Toffler, Naisbitt, Horx, and Gerken all act like popstars. What interests me is how their predicted reality influences capital markets or political think tanks after they have taught seminars to CEOs and after investment bankers and fund managers have studied their work. Take the new economy as an example. Even when we deal with such apparent self-fulfilling prophecies, we see how the future can be shaped.
Allow me to take a look in the rear mirror since we are on this topic: I hope the twentieth century is over. I feel strongly motivated in my actions by my hope to leave it further and further behind.
Hirsch
When fighting through its toughest challenges, the twentieth century was still coming to terms with the nineteenth century. We can now start to come to terms with the controversies of the twentieth century … to finally get rid of them.
Rantasa
The twentieth century was marked by two world wars and nameless atrocities that were summed up in catchphrases like Holocaust, Gulag, Hiroshima and Nagasaki. All these atrocities revealed the distorted face of ideas about progress, development and technology that had initially been the driving force behind visionary inventions. However, some twentieth-century reactions still merit further discussion: the declaration and collective establishment of human rights or peace projects such as European integration which, in its essence, is helping to overcome the concept of nation states.

Hirsch
Slavoj Zizek addressed the relationship between visions, illusions and realism when he pointed out that real socialism did not fail because it attempted to realize an illusionary, utopian vision of humanity, but because one of its forms, Stalinism, suffered from an excess of »reality«, and subsequently underestimated the actual power of illusions.(3)
Rantasa
Let’s discuss such reflections or refractions a little further. Michel Foucault (4) said that fascism was humanism in its most radical form and considered himself an »anti-humanist«. This deconstructivist position is opposed to all utopian positions, i.e. all great stories of Enlightenment. In view of the unparalleled atrocities of history, we need to reinforce the activisms of micropolitics developed by Foucault himself. However, Foucault wants to improve the world, as well.
Seen from a greater distance today, we realize that the discursive figure that was erroneously called postmodernism (especially with a view to an era that was being shaped by constructed reality), actually was a transitional period. What is happening now is that we distinguish between early modernism and second modernism, which is also surfacing in the architectural debate.(5) What we can glean from such a supposed recourse is the subject’s ability to act, an inherent characteristic of modernism.
Hirsch
If we follow present sociological opinions voiced by Ulrich Beck and Anthony Giddens, for example, we encounter a »reflexive modernization«, a radical change in modernism’s bases and fundamental tenets.
Rantasa
The above-mentioned distorted face into which the »inner face« of modernism degenerated in the concentration camps, caused a shock and gave rise to the idea that integrative, emancipatory concepts might have been wrong models.
What we have to regain is our ability to take political action. Not only in our daily lives, to which this ability had been reduced by vulgarized postmodern social clichés such as: »My art is my political statement«. To quote Pierre Bourdieu in his last years (6), in the present situation political actions have to appeal to intellectuals, as well. That is how they can become engaged in an institutional framework. Political activism should encompass notions of integrity, progressiveness, critical, visionary, utopian thinking, and a better world, if we may use all of these terms again. All the deconstructions, which had a valuable unveiling and demystifying effect, remain in place: as helpful tools not to fall into the same old traps.
Hirsch
I would credit the twentieth century for the experience of »globalization«, which came about when people realized how endangered our civilization is and how finite the resources on our planet are. Globalization opens an avenue to global actionism, which in turns gives rise to hope.
As mentioned above, the nation states are losing their influence and power due to what Saskia Sassen has called »a new geography of power«.(7) Globalization has redefined the role of the territorial exclusiveness of sovereign states and its effect on international systems. It has led to a break in the history of the modern state and modern concepts of government.

Rantasa
One of modernism’s defining characteristics is its tendency to overcome the limitations of geographical space.(8) At the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century, a cosmopolitan world view, expressed in the anthem about international solidarity, came to leftists as naturally as the ideals of ESPERANTO to Dr. Zamenhof.
On account of excessively negative effects, globalization is viewed with skepticism today. We encounter yet another one of the above-mentioned refractions: Bolstered by cultural and ecological arguments, national protectionism may suddenly seem progressive. As if we had forgotten what consequences such an attitude entailed!
As a matter of fact, we should not view today’s controversies in the old pattern of »left and right«, but rather examine the essence of politics. The public sphere – a political and democratic environment defined by the electorate – versus the private sector, which, by contrast, is profit-oriented and maximizes revenues by concentrating on shareholders’ interests. The private sector is organized in global business groups and its mechanisms for carrying responsibility are not democratic.
In view of all of this, we have to consider the above-mentioned question of how far the scope of political action goes. Vested with the mandate of representative democracy, policy-makers are first
responsible for social development. Secondly, they have been given the power to do so. Of course, structural changes are taking place, but when policy-makers complain about their decreased scope of action, they must actually be held responsible for their part in the decline of democracy.
Hirsch
The scope of political action has not decreased overnight: Over the past two decades global markets, i.e. the business structures, have swallowed up large parts of the governments’ former sphere of influence. This process was supported by political parties of different colors.
Rantasa
While capital is being developed and perfected further, the intelligentsia’s retreat into micropolitics with its concomitant limited scope of action causes an imbalance that is slowly being criticized as a neoliberal dominance in globalization. As politics is being devalued and political institutions are losing their creative potential, i.e. human beings with values, visions and utopias, the public sphere is left to opportunists. Seen from this angle, it becomes apparent that all of us contribute to the defensive position of politics, whose agents have become conscious of its dependencies.
Hirsch
As I take a critical stance towards global neoliberalism, which is often mistaken as a synonym of globalization, I do not want to lose sight of the fact that »globalization« has become a new universal term, a late offspring of the cosmopolitanism mentioned by you (9) and of the educational value of a humanism with no space or time limits. Accompanied by the computer as a universal tool, the term »globalization« may also develop a positive visionary potential.
Rantasa
This evaluation may be confirmed by the organizational structures of critics of globalization and their use of media such as the computer. The term »adversary of globalization« does not take into account that a critical stance towards globalization may be ambivalent. This ambivalence is thus depoliticized by a reductionist view. However, the term has become a battle-cry for neoliberal publications such as the British »Economist«. This magazine employs the term to prevent critics of globalization from disseminating their views.
Hirsch
All the readings that we are constantly forced to mention lead us to believe that we are witnessing the end of an era, a sea-change. At this moment, brand-new theories with a strong visionary bent are being formulated. The dynamism of Michael Hardt’s and Antonio Negri’s well-received work shows that a vacuum exists. These two authors compare their concept of »Empire« (10) with imperialism.

Rantasa
Although the visionary contents of this very work may be subject to debate, this inventory, a social utopia, may be helpful in spite of its lack of focus. In addition, its pop appeal further contributes to its reception. As this change of eras is being assessed for its political content, the concept of labor takes on a central role, especially as it concerns the arts and culture. Catchphrases such as »creative industries«, »copyright industries« or their corruption as TAKEOVER, the motto at Ars Electronica 2001, for example, must be viewed in this context.
Saskia Sassen gives us an analysis of a phenomenon that has already been the focus of »Snowcrash«, Neal Stephenson’s visionary work of science fiction.(11) He described a world organized in franchises. He reduced the United States to the headquarters of the CIA, surrounded by territories of different franchisers. This dystopian vision, in which the public sphere has lost its battle against the private sector, actually has some legitimacy.
Hirsch
A strong shift in labor concepts has occurred and is showing far-reaching effects. What is particularly interesting is the increased flexibility of workers (12); the pressure on workers to be open towards short-term changes; the demand for them to come to terms with changes with a flexible mind-set and to disregard previously established, clear rules and procedures such as career patterns and the validness of their education.
Rantasa
Flexibility, openness towards changes, etc. – these are all qualities attributed to the »cultural worker«, who became the model of the »knowledge worker« of the information society. These qualities affect the organization of labor in atypical employment contracts.
If we follow Hardt’s and Negri’s summary of the shifting concept of labor from agriculture and industrialization to symbolic and affective employment, we have to wonder about the character of these changes and whether, in order to define our position, we can discern or construct some form of order, in cycles for example.
Let’s try it this way: Economic theory has used the Kondratieff cycles.(13) The first cycle started around 1825 when the steam-engine was invented and cotton was a primary commodity. The railway, shipping and steel industries were at the center of the second cycle. The third cycle revolved around electricity and chemistry and lasted from 1893 to 1939. The car, mineral oils, and electronics were the focus of the fourth cycle. In the fifth cycle, information, knowledge, and ecology have come to the fore. This cycle will last until 2015. We are now preparing for the sixth Kondratieff cycle.
Hirsch
If we take Jeremy Rifkin’s theses into account (14), markets are being replaced by networks in the present cycle. Property is becoming less important than resources such as information and knowledge. Third parties may obtain a limited use of intellectual »capital« through licenses. Rifkin describes this development as part of a wider transformation in the capitalist system. Industrial production is being replaced by cultural production.
Rantasa
Josef Schumpeter (15) developed Kondratieff’s theses even further and advanced an economic development model in which innovations, i.e. discoveries and inventions and their general accessibility, were important factors in triggering off these cycles. One of globalization’s problematic effects has been the formation of business concentrations and monopolies. Like in the past, they may stall development.

Hirsch
Even those who advocate unhindered globalization have become more careful when they speak about »ideal markets«. Yet, they still demand free enterprise and largely reject governmental regulations.
Rantasa
If we subscribe to such views, the prerequisites for economic dynamism have shifted to the immaterial realm of knowledge and a »knowledge economy«. These prerequisites have dematerialized and are no longer tied to a certain territory.(16) Established regulative mechanisms of political sovereignty, the process of state formation, and nation-states can no longer work. International agreements increase in importance. This market is being regulated through patents, protected trade marks and copyrights. In the first half of the nineteenth century people were still engaged in a heated debate about whether the safeguarding of intellectual property through patent rights could actually result in an improved economic competition. The controversy surrounding bio-patents and bio-piracy (17) shows how topical this long-forgotten discussion still is to this day.
Copyrights were established by the French revolution and by Enlightenment. They were supposed to protect an artist’s intellectual property. With the help of these rights, artists were able to transform their private visions into publicly available products. The concept of intellectual property«, which at present is paving the way for a dematerialization of the means of production, tied economic developments to culture (or art in particular). It reversed the established materialistic view that considered art a superstructure. The former superstructure now becomes the basis of a political economy, of means of production and productive relations. This shift is of a truly historic scope.
In controversies about copyrights and knowledge monopolies, global enterprises make use of copyright protection laws to safeguard their own interests. The vehemence of these controversies suggests that the protagonists expect the beginning of a new era with a concomitant »land conquest« rather than the usual turf war. Unless participatory decision-making processes are introduced during this stage, established legal models will remain in place unquestioned. In conjunction with new technologies, this development will lead to an end of Kondratieff’s and Schumpeter’s cycles in a worst-case scenario.(18) During the second modern era, the political battles of the first modern era, caused by rural exodus, will have to be waged again in view of the changed paradigms. At present, we run the risk of losing the controversy between the public and the private in the intellectual sphere as well before it has even begun.
Hirsch
The Open Source movement plays an important role in discussions about »intellectual property«. When we consider the concept of »tool« in a broader context, we become aware of an approach developed by people who use the computer as a tool. Their visionary approach to »intellectual property« is strongly marked by their work with this tool. They were the first ones to be concerned with accelerated, collective development processes and a faster removal of software errors.
Rantasa
Part of the above-mentioned reflections and refractions is that hackers are supposed to have the future of competition in their hand, hackers, who have often assumed a problematic position outside the law or have been relegated to this place by others. We are dealing with another one of Foucault’s patterns. A strange alliance of individual anarchists and representatives of societal knowledge (from universities, for example) is taking shape in projects such as Linux. It is this alliance that makes further development possible. The Linux project is an active, participatory model of technological development which goes far beyond the passive influence of design through consumption. Monopolized knowledge, on the other hand, has always led to limited social structures.
Hirsch
In view of this scenario, is there still a place for artists and artistic visions?
Rantasa
Against this background, artistic visions realized within the art system will not suffice to overcome contradictions and open up new avenues for escape. All movements that have tried to make a visionary escape from their substratum – Polit-Pop, Punk, Fluxus, Dada, Agit-Prop, Underground, etc. – were overtaken and integrated in artistic systems that utilized them. Artists subsequently acted as if caught in padded cells. No artistic movement was able to eradicate the privileged figure of the artist, who, according to Karl Marx, represented the social division of labor and became superfluous in his utopia: a communist society had no painters, but rather people who also painted images.(19)
To explain my point even further: In the end, the art system is always based on individualized expression. Even though art may be a utopia, the artist himself cannot reach beyond his vision. Art compares to work as value does to money: the utopia of art can never be realized, but a universal barter value becomes manifest in the work to represent the artistic idea.
This is how the misconception of cultural politics as a mere bureaucratic system to allocate funds comes full circle: political and social actions always require visions and utopias.
Hirsch
People who don’t have visions may need to see a doctor.

Translation by Karin Hanta

Andreas Hirsch
developer of cultural systems - raconteur des histoires et metteur en scène - impresario di arte analogico e digitale | http://electrolyte.net/

Peter Rantasa
Peter Rantasa: lebt in Wien und ist ausgebildet in Nachrichtentechnik, bio-medizinischer Technik und Elektronik sowie elektro-akustischer und experimenteller Musik. Gründung des Wiener Elektronikfestivals "PhonoTAKTIK" und der Wiener Elektronik Plattform "Rhiz - Bar Modern". Musikprojekte seit 1992. Peter Rantasa ist derzeit auch geschäftsführender Direktor des mica – music information center austria.

(1) The comment on the relationship between politics and visions has been attributed to the former Austrian chancellor Franz Vranitzky He supposedly made it during a discussion of Thomas Bernhard’s novel Holzfällen. Franz Vranitzky has always denied making such a comment.
(2) Cf. Richard Dawkins, »Mind Viruses in: Memesis - The Future of Evolution, Ars Electronica 1996«, Linz 1996.
(3) Slavoj Zizek, On Believe, London 2001, p. 81.
(4) Foucaults criticism of humanism comes along with a criticism of human sciences. Cf. Michel Foucault, The Order of Things : An Archaeology of the Human Sciences. Vintage Books 1994 (Reissue edition).
(5) Ulrich Beck, Anthony Giddens, Die reflexive Moderne, Frankfurt/Main 1996. Ulrich Beck, Wolfgang Bonß (eds.), Die Modernisierung der Moderne, Frankfurt/Main 2001.
(6) Cf.: Pierre Bourdieu, Gegenfeuer, Wortmeldungen im Dienste des Widerstandes gegen die neoliberale Invasion, Konstanz 1998, p. 20f.
(7) Cf.: Saskia Sassen, Losing Control: Sovereignty in an Age of Globalization, Columbia University Press 1996.
(8) Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, Stanford Univ Pr 1991.
(9) Norbert Bolz, Friedrich Kittler et al. (eds.), Weltbürgertum und Globalisierung, Munich 2000.
(10) Michael Hardt, Antonio Negri, Empire, Cambridge 2000.
(11) Neal Stephenson, Snowcrash, Bantam Books 1992.
(12) Cf.: Richard Sennett, The Corrosion of Character: The Personal Consequences of Work in the New Capitalism, Norton & Company 2000.
(13) Nikolai D. Kondratiev, The Long Wave Cycle. New York 1984.
(14) Jeremy Rifkin, The Age of Access: The New Culture of Hypercapitalism, Where All of Life Is A Paid-for Experience, New York 2000.
(15) Joseph Alois Schumpeter, Theory of Economic Development : An Inquiry into Profits, Capital, Credit, Interest and the Business Cycle. Transaction Pub 1983.
(16) The physical layer of networks is still tied to geography and is subject to national jurisdiction. Courts and law-makers in various countries have examined this apparent contradiction. Some of them have tried to establish national borders on the Internet, as well.
(17) Bio-patents and bio-piracy: Major pharmaceutical enterprises have customarily gained access to the traditional knowledge of primitive peoples with the help of anthropologists. After taking the plants from these regions, they researched them and had them patented and reexported to the same countries.
(18) On the present legal debate, cf.: Lawrence Lessig, The Future of Ideas: The Fate of the Commons in a Connected World, 2001.
(19) We discussed this topic in a conversation about TAKEOVER, the motto of Ars Electronica 2001. Cf.: http://electrolyte.net/archive/takeover/sub_rantasa.html