The multitude and localized protest: the example of the Quebec student strike

Abstract

The financial crisis and the ensuing budgetary cuts that have been imposed in many countries have sparked anti-austerity protests. One of the striking features of movements that self-identify as progressive is that they have directed the best part of their claims, efforts and discontent at state authorities. The reality of protest on the ground then seems to diverge from influential accounts of resistance such as Hardt and Negri’s, who point to its necessarily diffuse, transnational character. Although it suggests helpful ways to think about power, resistance and ethics on a transnational scale, Hardt and Negri’s theoretical construction partly fails to capture the antagonisms and organizational forms that have emerged in the recent protest cycle. In order to remedy some of these weaknesses, the article borrows from social movement theory. It argues that the combination of Hardt and Negri’s broader philosophical claims, themselves largely inspired by Italian autonomism, with a more sociological take on protest, can help us better identify the antagonisms and social forms pertaining to contemporary anti-austerity movements but also the organizational and strategic possibilities within local and national contexts. The results of this conversation are then applied to a specific struggle, the Quebec student strike.

Keywords:

• Hardt and Negri
• Empire
• multitude
• social movements
• Quebec student strike
• Italian autonomism

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the editor and one anonymous reviewer for her/his comments and suggestions. Thanks are also due to the Chaire de recherche du Canada en mondialisation, citoyenneté et démocratie for funding part of this research.

Notes

1. Hardt and Negri rely on Foucault’s definition of power as a creative and productive force that ‘traverses and produces things, induces pleasure, forms knowledge, produces discourse’ (Foucault 1980, 119). They also follow Foucault in his depiction of resistance: ‘where there is power, there is resistance, and yet, or rather consequently, this resistance is never in a position of exteriority in relation to power’ (Foucault 1976, 95).

2. Here we follow Deleuze who defines the left as ‘the aggregate of processes of minoritarian becomings’ (quoted in Tampio (2009, 393). As Tampio argues, this definition ‘expresses the way the left maintains a tension between the ideal of unity (“an aggregate of processes”) and plurality (“of minoritarian becomings”)’ (Tampio 2009, 393). The left is thus a broad tendency to strive for equality, justice, and openness through participatory and inclusive social forms, coupled with varying degrees of skepticism about capitalism's ability to bring about these goods.