Transnational Solidarity as Negative Solidarity
by Dagmar Wilhelm (UWE Bristol)
This paper will examine and outline the possibility of a "negative", Adornian solidarity, which is neither based on identity or identification with a common aim or common values, shared history, nor does it arise from acting together. Rather "negative" solidarity emphasises non-identity. Not-withstanding suspicions Adorno himself might have, the paper will also argue that such a "negative solidarity" might be more promising in a transnational context than alternative conceptions, particularly Habermasian conceptions, as it allows to make sense of a political subject that is characterised by difference. Such a conception can also normatively ground demands for transnational solidarity.
The paper will begin with an outline of Horkheimer’s and Adorno’s critique of “identity thinking” in the Dialectic of Enlightenment and a critical exposition of Adorno’s notion of the relation between identity and non-identity (both in an epistemological and a moral sense) which will also expose an Adornian idea of the “subject”. I will continue with a brief sketch of Adorno’s view of solidarity – mostly based on his remarks in the Negative Dialectic.
After this explication of Adorno’s position, I will analyse the implications, warnings and promises, of Adorno’ approach for contemporary issues surrounding political solidarity, specifically European solidarity. Here I will also briefly address Iris Marion Young’s and Judith Butler’s adaptations of Adornian thought, specifically as found in the conception of inclusive communication and the idea of a solidarity of patience. I will argue that a position that is closer to Adorno’s own view is superior to these accounts in ways that are important especially for a conception of transnational solidarity (including European solidarity).
However, while Adorno’s view seems more apt in some ways to approach problems that haunt various forms of political solidarity, for example the issue of non-identity, than Habermasian or Arendtian approaches, and superior in important ways to Young and Butler, Adorno’s view is itself highly problematic. The very aspects that seem so promising at the same time resist being theorized into the kind of stable and ongoing solidarity required for a “European Solidarity”. The paper concludes by showing that a solution to this problem does not require a modification to Adorno’s account of solidarity and subjecthood, rather it requires that the need for this type of stable, transnational political solidarity be based on a specific normative demand, i.e. the new categorical imperative (NCI) Adorno proposes in the Negative Dialectic. In other words, if stable and ongoing transnational (European) political solidarity is required to protect otherness and particularity then an account of solidarity that arises out of the needs otherness and particularity will extent to such a solidarity.
The paper will begin with an outline of Horkheimer’s and Adorno’s critique of “identity thinking” in the Dialectic of Enlightenment and a critical exposition of Adorno’s notion of the relation between identity and non-identity (both in an epistemological and a moral sense) which will also expose an Adornian idea of the “subject”. I will continue with a brief sketch of Adorno’s view of solidarity – mostly based on his remarks in the Negative Dialectic.
After this explication of Adorno’s position, I will analyse the implications, warnings and promises, of Adorno’ approach for contemporary issues surrounding political solidarity, specifically European solidarity. Here I will also briefly address Iris Marion Young’s and Judith Butler’s adaptations of Adornian thought, specifically as found in the conception of inclusive communication and the idea of a solidarity of patience. I will argue that a position that is closer to Adorno’s own view is superior to these accounts in ways that are important especially for a conception of transnational solidarity (including European solidarity).
However, while Adorno’s view seems more apt in some ways to approach problems that haunt various forms of political solidarity, for example the issue of non-identity, than Habermasian or Arendtian approaches, and superior in important ways to Young and Butler, Adorno’s view is itself highly problematic. The very aspects that seem so promising at the same time resist being theorized into the kind of stable and ongoing solidarity required for a “European Solidarity”. The paper concludes by showing that a solution to this problem does not require a modification to Adorno’s account of solidarity and subjecthood, rather it requires that the need for this type of stable, transnational political solidarity be based on a specific normative demand, i.e. the new categorical imperative (NCI) Adorno proposes in the Negative Dialectic. In other words, if stable and ongoing transnational (European) political solidarity is required to protect otherness and particularity then an account of solidarity that arises out of the needs otherness and particularity will extent to such a solidarity.
