This book begins from the assumption that we have entered an era where the concept of political representation is seriously compromised. Eschewing the flawed promise of acting for the ‘common good’, or in accordance with the ‘general will’ of an homogenous body politic, it delves into the process of individuation, the diverse reality of individuals and communities alike in order to elucidate contemporary experience as relational phenomena of networked human and non-human actors.
Clearly this task is ambitious, for it must bridge the gap between the needs, aspirations, emotions, and anxieties of individuals on the one hand, and the desired emergence of collective co-operation on the other. Now that we have entered an age where the irresistible rise of global mega cities and big data appear to determine the outlook for generations to come, it is more pertinent than ever to challenge the technological promise of a future where numbers speak for themselves.
The full-blown heterogeneity of the multitude thrives on the general intellect and the activity of the speaker. To act is to start anew and to intervene in the circulation of empty signifiers upon which we are called to assign the name of an event. Emancipating the Many therefore is a book about difference marked as intervention, an emergent ‘constitution of time’.
