Category Archives: Violence

Arendt, Foucault, Benjamin: On Violence, State, Law

Posted on January 31, 2012 by Teo Ballvé

This post discusses some scattered points raised about violence  by Hannah Arendt’s On Violence, Walter Benjamin’s “Critique of Violence,” and Michel Foucault’s Society Must be Defended. Arendt makes a worthwhile distinction between power and violence, while recognizing that the two rarely … Continue reading →

Posted in Carl Schmitt, Critique, Illegality, Law, Michel Foucault, Power, Race & Ethnicity, Sovereignty, The State, Violence | 1 Comment

Gregory: The Everywhere War

Posted on January 24, 2012 by Teo Ballvé

A lecture given by Derek Gregory, a geographer at the University of British Columbia, is now online. Gregory discusses “The Everywhere War.” We now live in a world where death can be delivered across vast distances. Political geographer Derek Gregory examines three … Continue reading →

Posted in Boundaries, Insurgency/Counterinsurgency, Peace, Sovereignty, Territory, Terror, The State, Violence | 2 Comments

Afflicted Powers

Posted on January 19, 2012 by Teo Ballvé

Retort. 2005. Afflicted Powers: Capital and Spectacle in an Age of War. New Edition. London: Verso. Despite being a relatively short book, Afflicted Powers is a difficult one to summarize. Retort* sets for itself the immodest task of identifying the … Continue reading →

Posted in #Occupy, Everyday Life, Guy Debord, Insurgency/Counterinsurgency, Peace, Power, Primitive Accumulation, Spectacle, Terror, The State, Violence | Comments Off on Afflicted Powers

Occupy Volume, Occupy Verticality

Posted on December 1, 2011 by Teo Ballvé

#Occupy. Where does it go from here? How ‘bout up? I’m not 100% serious, but it’s been fascinating to see how #Occupy has expanded occupation to mean more than parking our collective butts on a flat—or at least, horizontal—and usually … Continue reading →

Posted in #Occupy, City, Everyday Life, Henri Lefebvre, Insurgency/Counterinsurgency, Power, Spatiality, The State, Violence | 6 Comments

The Mask of ‘Anarchy’

Posted on November 7, 2011 by Teo Ballvé

An article by Jonathan Jones in the Guardian has been making the rounds and offers some interesting commentary on the proliferation of the V for Vendetta mask at recent #Occupy protests. Coming on the heels of the Oakland General Strike, … Continue reading →

Posted in #Occupy, Bandits, City, Everyday Life, Insurgency/Counterinsurgency, Law, Networks, Pirates, Power, Spectacle, The State, Violence | 5 Comments

¡General Strike! Oakland Walks

Posted on November 2, 2011 by Teo Ballvé

Today. A General Strike. Oakland will become liberated territory. I will be in Oakland with many many people. I read a great post this morning on what a “General Strike” actually means. The post draws on Walter Benjamin and Rosa … Continue reading →

Posted in #Occupy, City, Dialectics, Elites, Everyday Life, Insurgency/Counterinsurgency, Pirates, Power, Violence | Comments Off on ¡General Strike! Oakland Walks

Against Spectacle? “Crises” and the Infographic

Posted on October 24, 2011 by Teo Ballvé

So there’s been a lot of interesting infographics published recently that help visually represent a host of contemporary issue and crises: from Euro Debt, U.S. income inequality, and the increasingly consolidated power of corporations and banks, to the Afghan quagmire … Continue reading →

Posted in #Occupy, Bandits, Critique, Elites, Everyday Life, Guy Debord, Insurgency/Counterinsurgency, Networks, Political Economy, Power, Spectacle, Violence | 2 Comments

Violence in Developing Countries

Posted on October 12, 2011 by Teo Ballvé

Cramer, Christopher. 2007. Violence in Developing Countries: War, Memory, Progress. Indiana University Press. Cramer’s book is a strident polemic and methodical critique against widely accepted explanations for contemporary violence. His critique is mainly geared at liberal interpretations of war in … Continue reading →

Posted in Frontiers, Historical Materialism, Insurgency/Counterinsurgency, Marxism, Political Economy, Violence | Comments Off on Violence in Developing Countries

Geographies of the Outlaw

Posted on October 3, 2011 by Teo Ballvé

The word “outlaw”—outside of the law—implicitly articulates the intimate relationship between geography and the law. From the perspective of state-makers and capitalists, the groups of outlaws I’m collectively labeling “Motley Crews” (as a shorthand) pose a grave ideological and spatial … Continue reading →

Posted in Bandits, Carl Schmitt, Drugs, Elites, Forests, Frontiers, Gender, Historical-Geographies, Illegality, Insurgency/Counterinsurgency, Karl Marx, Land, Law, Michel Foucault, Networks, Pirates, Post-Colonial, Power, Primitive Accumulation, Sovereignty, Spatiality, Territory, Terror, The Body, The Sea, The State, Violence | Comments Off on Geographies of the Outlaw

Agrarian Political Economy & Ecology

Posted on September 19, 2011 by Teo Ballvé

  My path into agrarian political economy and ecology partly picks up where Marx left off. In culminating his magnum opus, Marx departs from his more dualistic model of the capitalist mode of production, which emphasizes the dialectic of labor-and-capital, … Continue reading →

Posted in Agriculture, Antonio Gramsci, David Harvey, Forests, Frontiers, Gender, Karl Marx, Land, Political Ecology, Political Economy, Primitive Accumulation, Race & Ethnicity, Spatiality, Territory, Violence | 1 Comment