Class conflict, state of exception and radical justice in Machuca by Andrés WoodFootnote1

 1 We would like to thank Kimberly Vinall for her invaluable help in editing our essay.

 1 We would like to thank Kimberly Vinall for her invaluable help in editing our essay.

 2 As CitationFoucault writes in Discipline and punish (1997), we are interested in the past not ‘if one means by that writing a history of the past in terms of the present. Yes, if one means writing the history of the present’ (31).

 3 For an example of this comfortable approach to the question of memory in Chile see, for instance, CitationZerán et al. (eds) Encuentros con la memoria.

 4 This ‘illegal but legal’ situation can be also seen when Patricio and his son go ‘shopping’ to a grocery store that is closed. The owner opens when Patricio says his name, and offers him a variety of comestible goods. When they leave the store we notice that there are multiple signs hanging outside it, where we can read: ‘There're no cigarettes’, ‘There's no meat’, etc. This, of course, alludes to the hoarding of goods that happened during the UP years, which helped to give a stronger sensation of shortage of supplies.

 5 In Stato di Eccezione, Agamben begins his analysis commenting on Carl CitationSchmitt's views in the Politische Theologie (1922). There, Schmitt gives his famous definition of the sovereign as the one who decides on the state of exception: ‘Sovereign is who decides on the State of Exception’ (Schmitt, Citation1996, 13). It is interesting to note that Schmitt argues that ‘in exception the norm is destroyed’ (19) and that ‘there is no norm which can be applicable during chaos’ (19). This opens the path to Walter Benjamin's eighth thesis on the concept of history where he turns Schmitt's logic upside down, affirming that ‘the state of exception in which we live is not the exception but the rule’ (254).

 6 This paradox can also be phrased as follows: ‘If the suspension – total or partial – of the juridical order is what characterizes the state of exception, how is it possible that this suspension be part of legality?’ (Agamben, Citation2003: 33–4).

 7 The difference between dictatorship and state of exception must be emphasized for, as Agamben explains, they are not the same thing: ‘The State of Exception is not a dictatorship (constitutional or unconstitutional); it is a space void of right, a zone of anomy in which all the juridical determinations – and, before all, the very distinction between public and private – are deactivated’ (2003: 66).

 8 It is worth noting the religious undertones that come with the establishment of the state of exception, an aspect that can be developed more in depth in the film (the priest occupies a position in between the never existing rule and the exception, he attempts a third way that fails…). Let us remember that every concept used to describe the modern state relates to a secularized theological concept; the ‘state of exception’, in particular, ‘has for jurisprudence a similar meaning than miracles for Theology’) (Schmitt, Citation1996: 43).

 9 Perhaps, if we follow the distinction between zoê and bios as Agamben does, it would be more accurate to talk about ‘zoo-politics’, as CitationDegener explains in his introduction to Virilio's Negative horizon (Citation2005: 17).

10 Against Žižek's critique of the notion of biopolitics, i.e. the ‘ontological trap’ and the idea that by identifying ‘sovereign power with biopolitics … [Agamben] prevents the possibility of the emergence of a political subjectivity’ (198), we state that resistance itself always finds a political way of expression, i.e. even considering the notion of biopolitics totalizing it is possible (and a duty!) to elaborate political subjectivities – individual and collective – that will resist and overcome the state of exception in which we live (something that CitationŽižek does not deny).

11 As briefly noted in a previous footnote, the social-religious aspect must not be overlooked. The Catholic's school experience can only be understood in the context of a post-Concilio Vaticano II ideological environment, which had a strong impact worldwide, particularly in Latin America (Teología de la liberación is perhaps the most famous exponent of this socially committed attitude that the Catholic Church adopted).

12 A debate on political strategy is clearly beyond the scope of this essay. However, it is relevant to note that, regardless of the means to achieve it, Marx realized that for a revolution to be successful the proletariat needed not only to take over the state but also to transform it: ‘They [the proletarians] have understood that it is their imperious duty and their absolute right to render themselves masters of their own destinies, by seizing upon the governmental power. But the working class cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes’ (Citation1996c: 181).

13 See CitationLenin's State and revolution.

14 We might add another layer of meaning to our argument by remembering Marx's words to Engels toward the end of his life: ‘You know very well where we found our idea of class struggle; we found it in the work of French historians who talked about the race struggle’ (in Foucault, Citation1997: 79).

15 This truism is important, as it locates the problematic of justice not only outside the realm of the juridical, but within a wholly different epistemological order. As Daniel Bensaïd has shown, ‘What is at stake [in Marx's works] is not a theory of justice, but a different idea of justice, which assumes the overthrow of the existing order…. Thus, Marx does not regard capitalist exploitation as just or unjust. He merely observes that it cannot be deemed unjust from the standpoint of the capitalist mode of production, its logic and ideological values. Any judgment about justice involves a partisan stance’ (2002: 134).