Response to Prolegomenon "We're Tired of Trees"

(yes, I again have a super long post...sorry!)

-In the Beginning-

The prolegomenon “We’re Tired of Trees” for the book The Exploit by Alexander R. Galloway and Eugene Thacker did not appear to be a very fascinating piece of reading to me when I read it for the first time, partially because some paragraphs left me with a “what is he trying to say?” impression. But as I looked closer, such paragraphs proved to be the most interesting parts of the essay. I have to say that while some parts of the essay had I nodding along and agreeing with it, some other parts made me feel that the authors were making invalid claims, and in the end it made me wanting to read the rest of the book, which could potentially dissolve some of the disagreements between my personal opinions and the authors’ opinions outlined in the chapter.

Since I do not have the rest of the book, however, I can only focus on the prolegomenon. During it, the authors claimed to successfully refute four provisional responses, and that since all four proved to be ultimately unsatisfying, they are all wrong. However, after reading through all four parts, I am not fully convinced that the authors had successfully refuted the four responses. This is not to say that I think any of the four responses is correct, nor is it to say that the authors’ claim that all four responses are incorrect is wrong, but I find that how the authors refute these four responses to be unsatisfactory.

-I-

Let’s start with the first provisional response – political atomism (the Nietzschean argument). The authors claim that the Nietzschean argument is too “local”, that it only goes from node to node. But since the Nietzschean argument is about action and reaction, it seems to me that the authors believe that only local points – nodes – are capable of performing an action or reaction. But why can’t a network be performing an action or reaction? Well, I guess they would say that it is because a network is decentralized so it cannot collectively do something. But since there exist “conflicts between networks” (something the authors brought up themselves when they are trying to give examples of what the Nietzschean argument can’t explain) then each network would at least be somewhat a cohesive, collective entity, otherwise there will not be conflicts between networks. This implies that while a network is decentralized, it is a collective in some way and capable of performing actions and receiving reactions. Then why would the Nietzschean argument be too “local”?
As a matter of fact, why can’t the node of a big network be a smaller network? Why does a network have to be made up of individual points – can’t it be made up of networks? Can’t we think of a smaller network inside another network as both a network and a node? Can’t the Nietzschean argument be applied in all cases?
Also, I find the paragraph on U.N. to be poorly argued within itself. The authors point out the flaw of the U.N., which is that its reality is not as romantic as the ideal behind the concept. While an ideal U.N. will be an exemplar of decentralized networks, in reality it does have centers (namely the big five nations with veto powers). As a result, the U.N. is not the opposite of the United States. All such claims are fine with me, but then the authors go on to say that therefore decentralized networks are not opposite to centralized networks. Not that I think this is a wrong claim (I actually agree with it) but the way the author deduced it is very unsatisfactory for me. They deduced that decentralized is not opposite of centralized by proving that the UN is not opposite of the US. In other words, they equate UN to decentralized network and the US to centralized network. See the problem here? The authors had, merely sentences before, been proving how the U.N. is not a decentralized network because of its flaw! I think the ultimate problem here is the ambiguity that the authors gave to the term UN, perhaps very deliberately. The U.N. in reality is not a decentralized network but the U.N. concept is a decentralized network. So the authors should distinguish between which one they are talking about – the real world U.N. or the one in dreamland. But they did not make the distinction when they are drawing their conclusions; they prove that real world UN is not opposite to the US, but they draw a conclusion that must follow from proving the dreamland UN to be not opposite to the US.
But perhaps the most significant problem I have with the authors’ argument under this provisional response 1 part is – why is the U.N. even relevant here? I fail to see how the fact that the U.N. has flaws would help refute the Nietzschean argument. Of course, I may have a wrong understanding of the Nietzschean argument, since I tried my best but did not find a clear definition for it in the passage. I wonder why would the authors not give a clear definition to a concept they are trying to refute. Really.

-II-

Under the provisional response 2 section, the authors conclude that “to ensure the cohesion of American unilateralism, it must forge links outside its domain”. In other words, for a country to be the world’s superpower, it must be networked with other countries. This is an interesting statement and I do not disagree with it. But it seems to me that the authors are trying to use the US to prove that power is more associated with networks than with a single sovereignty, which I would like to question, and I will make a question of “eggs first or chickens first”. Did the US become a superpower before it branched out or did branching make US a superpower? I am inclined towards the first claim. While I will say that to remain a superpower in this age the US needs to branch out, simply branching out and forming links with other countries will not make a country a superpower. A country needs to be powerful first, then it has the ability to form links with other countries, and other countries will want to form links with it. If a country is very insignificant on the world stage, I doubt it can even successfully establish links. In fact, the authors themselves agree that the network formed by the US is a very centralized network – with US as its center. If US were not a single powerful sovereignty first, would it be able to become the network center?

-III-

Under this provisional response, the authors claim to be arguing against determinism, but as I read through this part, I find what they say they are arguing against in the beginning is very different from what they ended up arguing against in the end. In other words, they tried to switch concepts in order to establish their argument. In the beginning, they gave us a claim (and they say that it is the claim they are going to refute) which states that “media have now become a core component of war and political conflict”. In other words, media plays a significant role in war and conflict. Try as I may, I find it difficult to equate this claim to “technology determines politics”. Because being a core component and determining everything seem to be different ideas, at least to me. And while I will agree that “technology determines everything” is a silly claim, I cannot bring myself to say no to claims such as “without technology, some things will be different” or “without technology some things will be more difficult or even impossible to accomplish”.
Other than the switching of concepts, I find it interesting that one of (if not the only one of) the authors’ arguments here is that technology is not universal, since there is a vast difference between the First World nations and the not-so-first-world nations. I wholeheartedly agree with this claim – because it is a fact – but doesn’t it actually contradict what the authors are trying to say? They are trying to argue against the importance of technology, yet doesn’t such a clear correlation between the development of technology and society suggest technology is at least somewhat significant to the development of a society? Of course many may argue that it’s developed society leading to technology development, not the other way around (which I will disagree, I think the relationship between technology and society development is not a one-way cause and effect, but a looping cycle) but that is not my point here. My point is that I find the authors to be constructing poor arguments, their attacks almost incoherent and their own positions not well established or defended.

-IV-

Provisional response 4 – oh, let’s just say that I am very ashamed of myself, because I tried really, really hard to find where exactly did the authors refute the nominalist argument. Well, I failed to find it.

-On the Authors’ Actual Points instead of their Techniques-

As much trouble as I had with the authors’ arguments, I find myself agreeing with some of their points. As I have stated more than once already in this post, I do not disagree with the authors’ conclusions, I just find the way the arrived at such conclusions to be dubious on some occasions. One important claim the authors made is that the US is not (or at least no longer) a centralized sovereignty but a network, and I find it to be a fresh and agreeable take on the structure of power and control in our current world. The authors also made a claim on the relationship between symmetry and resistance. They claim that asymmetry, and asymmetry only, is going to lead to resistance. And since in the current world the “sovereignties” (such as the U.S.) have become networked, a network is not going to create resistance because it is in symmetry with the existing power, and thus a new topology of resistance must be invented.
I would really like to know what the authors propose as this “new topology” but I personally do not think that there needs to be a “new” one. Why won’t we simply have yet again an asymmetry between a network and a centralized power?
The authors looked at the history of the world from the Cold War to the current day, and said there have been three phases – symmetric centralized, asymmetric, and symmetric networked. But if we look at history beyond the Cold War, we can find other, earlier examples of such power and conflict structures. The Soviet Union and the United States are not the first two centralized powers going at war, the guerilla groups of the past decades are not the first examples of rebellions against ruling powers, and the idea of utilizing networks to help ruling a country is not invented by the current United States. I hereby dare to suggest that the most recent change from centralized to decentralized in terms of power structures in the world is not a permanent change, but only part of an ongoing oscillation. When power is too centralized, it will eventually become decentralized (example: the collapse of empires) but for decentralized networks, there will be those who, from within or outside of the network, bend on collecting power and form a centralized sovereignty (example: the formation of empires or even just nations).
Moreover, I find it very difficult, if not impossible, to draw a clear, definitive line between “centralized sovereignty ” and “decentralized network”. If we say that the Cold War era US and Soviet Union are centralized sovereignties, does that mean they had absolutely no network characteristics? (Did they not have diplomatic ties and links with other parts of the world? Did they not have different agencies networked together to function?) And if we say Al-Qeada is a decentralized network, when it is compared to the entire world – it’s a “global” war on terror, so technically Al-Qeada’s opponent is the world – does Al-Qeada not seem more like a single entity within a network? Isn’t the war on terror more like a war between a global network and a single entity within it?
I think, therefore, that the concepts of centralized sovereignty and decentralized network are only relative, not absolute. Power cannot be simply defined as centralized or decentralized; it is always in a state that is a mixture of the two. And the ratio between the two components (centralization and decentralization) is constantly changing and shifting from one end to another.
Throughout history, the extent to which power is centralized – or decentralized if you prefer a longer word, but really it’s the same thing – oscillates from high to low, then from low back to high, over and over again. So really, what has happened since the Cold War may not be something novel, but merely an ordinary process not unlike others that had already happened in the history.

-In the End-

Of course, I may change my opinion if I have the rest of the book to convince me what the new topology could be, and I guess this shows that the authors did a pretty good job – they successfully made me want to read the rest of their book. They just did not make me agree with some of the things they already said. But then maybe that’s just me.