10.6092/issn.2038-3460/17353
application/pdf
2038-3460
17353
1
en
Roberta Raffaetà
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/
Tecnoscienza – Italian Journal of Science & Technology Studies
Luigi Pellizzoni, Ontological Politics in a Disposable World: The New Mastery of Nature, Ashgate, 2015
Text.Serial.Journal
https://tecnoscienza.unibo.it/
8
Book Reviews
2017-07-20
2023-06-22
2017-07-20
2023-08-21
162-167
TS
Roberta Raffaetà
2017/07/20
10.6092/issn.2038-3460/17353
162
Free University of Bozen-Bolzano
2038-3460
1
en
167
Luigi Pellizzoni, Ontological Politics in a Disposable World: The New Mastery of Nature, Ashgate, 2015
https://tecnoscienza.unibo.it/article/download/17353/16202
8
162                                                           Tecnoscienza – 8 (1)

towards “a more adequate interpretation of the world we live in”, by
identifying new forms of domination while combatting “the hubristic in-
clination of considering human beings as actually capable of mastering all
aspects of their existence on this earth” (Wagner 2015). In this respect,
there is something that, according to Tsing, we, as social scientists, can do
for a start: practice the art of noticing in our research. This means “to
look around rather than ahead”, to cultivate the vulnerability to unex-
pected encounters (with entities, objects, disciplines); to pay attention to
the margins, with no rush to adhere to a pre-formatted narrative.

References
Federici S. (2012) Revolution at Point Zero. Housework, Reproduction, and Fem-
       inist Struggle, Oakland, PM Press.
Laclau E. (2005) On Populist Reason, London and New York, Verso.
Tsing, A. (2012) On Nonscalability: The Living World Is Not Amenable to Preci-
       sion-Nested Scales, in “Common Knowledge”, 18 (3), pp. 505-524.
Wagner P. (2015) Progress: A Reconstruction, Cambridge, Polity Press.



                                      ***


   Luigi Pellizzoni
Ontological Politics in a Disposable World: The New Mastery of Nature,
Farnham, Ashgate, 2015, pp. 259

Roberta Raffaetà Free University of Bozen-Bolzano

    Since roughly the 1990s, the “ontological turn” has been one of the
most thrilling “turns” within social sciences. It has been a breath of fresh
air beyond the limits and impasses of either constructionism and positiv-
ism. However, its thrill stems also from the controversies it raised, as STS
scholars know (see, for instance, the debate in a recent issue of Social
Studies of Science, 3/45 of 2015, spurred by a previous issue of SSS, 3/43
of 2013, dedicated to the issue).
    Luigi Pellizzoni, in his book, brings such turn under deep scrutiny. Is
it really the case, he asks, that the ontological turn has emancipatory im-
plications? Can the conflation of the epistemological under the ontologi-
cal liberate humans and non-humans from a dominative, hierarchical and
exploitative logic which is based on dichotomies (of nature/culture,
thing/thought etc.)? His answer is substantially negative. Pellizzoni, in-
deed, argues that the ontological turn is paradoxically nourishing neolib-
Book Review                                                              163
eral values and very consistent with them by celebrating flexibility, con-
tingency and precariousness together with the “ever-green” capitalistic
value of endless growth.
     His critique is illuminating and, even if not always totally convincing,
it is an engaging contribution, which encourage critical thinking. Through
an unprecedented broad and very analytical examination, this book is al-
so an impressive work of erudition, an exciting journey that connects an-
cient Greeks to most recent approaches in philosophy, social sciences and
anthropology. For this reason, it can be read as a good – even if not short
– introduction to the ontological turn, as well as a critical in-depth analy-
sis of it. By drawing together the apparently unconnected threads of the
ontological turn, it allows to grasp a broad intellectual landscape.
The book starts with four cases, which have gained salience since the ‘90s
and which exemplify the commodification of fields of material reality
previously unaffected by market dynamics: 1) Carbon markets: each
company has the right to pollute up to a certain amount, but can always
buy quota from companies that pollute less; connected to this exchange
of pollution permits there are “weather derivatives”, i.e. financial instru-
ments transforming environmental risks into investment opportunities;
2) Geoengineering: it consists in the manipulation of the planetary envi-
ronment to counteract climate change, through, for example, carbon di-
oxide removal or solar radiation management; 3) Biosciences and bio-
technology patenting; 4) Human enhancement: i.e. techniques applied to
the human body to enhance indefinitely its potentiality and efficiency.
     The blurring of the distinction between matter and information, living
and non-living, identity and difference is what these four cases have in
common. In this way they legitimize an ecological politics based on the
value of unlimited growth and ideas of mitigation of risks and adaptation,
instead of one based on limits and equilibrium, thus weakening precau-
tion as policy framework.
     In the second chapter, Pellizzoni grounds these cases in the “ontology
of the present”, marked by the imbrication of humans things, nature, en-
vironment. Neoliberalism is seen as an intensification of liberalism,
which, differently from the latter is not concerned by limits.
Chapter 3 is the core of the book, the one in which Pellizzoni confronts
himself with scholars linked to the ontological turn – the “post-
constructionists”, as he calls them. The main hypothesis of the book is the
existence of a “subterranean complicity of social theory with neoliberal-
ism” (69), defined by him not as simple subservience to capitalist inter-
ests, but “the sharing of a framing and sense-making which constitute the
condition of possibility for certain problems to emerge and certain an-
swers to these problems to become conceivable” (70). In the first part of
the chapter he discusses the main features of the ontological turn: an ex-
acerbation of constructionism, as an attempt to reconcile constructivism
and realism. As everything is constructed, it is also real. This brings to 1)
164                                                          Tecnoscienza – 8 (1)

the rejection of dualisms, hierarchies and identities, these replaced by flu-
id, emergent and contingent ontologies; 2) taking techno-scientific ad-
vancements as inspiration for innovation in social sciences; 3) connection
of the “real” and the “political”. In the second part of the chapter Pelliz-
zoni analyses selected strands in the ontological turn: Marx and post
structural-marxism; Actor-Network Theory; feminist new materialism;
Paolo Virno; multinaturalism; speculative realist philosophers. There is
no space to account for the detailed ways in which Pellizzoni examines
these approaches. In general, he observes that indeterminacy is not a
means for emancipation but a perspective of the world in contiguity with
Neoliberalism, thus not a real alternative to it. Pellizzoni defines post-
constructionism as just another analytics of truth (as positivism, for ex-
ample), which defines what is right and true (contingency, fluidity, etc.)
against what is not (stability, identities, etc.) (see also Laidlaw and Hey-
wood 2013) and, as such, it is intolerant of other perspectives (see also
Scott 2013).
    In the fourth chapter, Pellizzoni analyses the limits of both post-
constructionist theories and neoliberalism. He illustrates the metaphysical
underpinning of modern science and technology, which, through Darwin-
ism, conceive life as a general force, exceeding the life of singular living
beings and thus establishing an ontological symmetry and continuity be-
tween humans and non-humans, where difference and variation are the
base for contingent ontological outcomes. By assuming the Darwinian
continuity between humans and animals, modern technology conflates
nature into culture making ontology and epistemology overlap, thus justi-
fying an unlimited exploitation of nature. Against this backdrop which
characterizes both the a-priori of neoliberalism and of post-
constructionism, Pellizzoni proposes Heideggerian theories: for
Heidegger, technology is positive as long as it is used to dis-conceal na-
ture through “bestowing”, which is “listening to and respecting the poie-
sis of nature, its self-giving” (154). According to Pellizzoni’s reading of
Heidegger, humans and non-humans can never fully overlap and the ac-
knowledgment of this gap, this “remainder” is key to respect nature’s
mystery. Thus, Pellizzoni, building on Heidegger, proposes a critical hu-
manism which is critical because builds on the conditions specific to hu-
mans without drawing any hierarchical implication from it. I consider this
call to a re-evaluation of a certain kind of humanism, as a solution to an
increasing trend of exploitations, the most innovative contribution of this
book.
    In the final chapter, Pellizzoni, on one hand questions the way politics
is addressed by these ontological approaches, transfiguring politics into
ethics, on the other hand he introduces other possible approaches. By re-
considering biopolitics, Pellizzoni not only states the impossibility to de-
activate biopower through desubjectivation, but also brings attention to
how, through desubjectivation, biopower is enhanced: “the more deper-
Book Review                                                               165
sonalized one is, we could say, the more one can personalize itself in
whatever direction” (183). Pellizzoni identifies a link between this process
and current forms of self-capitalization, political consumerism, and – re-
ferring to the digital revolution – the coexistence of new monopolies
thanks to “open” and ideological communities of commons. According to
Pellizzoni, the current focus on ethics results in apolitical consequences
because it prompts an ideal of fulfilment, expression and expansion of
oneself, a move toward internalizing the world within oneself and, there-
fore, moulding and exploiting it in line with the capitalistic values of op-
timization, growth and expansion.
    As alternatives, Pellizzoni considers Theodore Adorno and Giorgio
Agamben. The German philosopher emphasizes the always present re-
mainder out of the encounter between epistemology and ontology, the
necessary violence (contrasted by Pellizzoni with the pacification of as-
semblages) necessary for change and critique. For Pellizzoni, the subtle
but crucial difference between Adorno and post-constructionists is that
for the former things are neither cultural nor natural, while for the latter
things are both cultural and natural. The most recent work on Francis-
canism of Agamben inspires, on the other hand, Pellizzoni’s proposal for
an alternative to both post-constructionism and realism or construction-
ism. It is to encourage a form of life based on our impotentialities, de-
fined as “our possibility of not willing = doing = being” (215), against ne-
oliberal understanding of “being” as consequence of the capacity to act,
based on ideas of duty and will. Choose to not choose is, for Agamben-
Pellizzoni, the crucial feature making us truly “human”, as the capacity to
deactivate the paradigm of operativity. This can be obtained granting
primacy to acting over being (as according to the monastic rule) and es-
tablishing “use” as an alternative to property or right. This conclusion is
somehow evocative and intriguing but it is not very clear how this alterna-
tive can be applied in real life and also intruding the doubt that the acting
which should ground this new form of life is, at the end, very similar to
“practice”.
    In general, Pellizzoni’s critique of the ontological turn being not polit-
ical is not a totally new observation but while similar critiques are mostly
based on ideological and weak underpinnings easily deconstructed (Can-
dea 2011; 2014; Holbraad and Pedersen 2014; Holbraad, Pedersen and
De Castro 2013), Pellizzoni’s argument is theoretically very solid and he
deals with an in-depth and careful analysis of what he criticizes. There-
fore, Pellizzoni’s work cannot simply be dismissed as trivial “non-
common-sense” (Pedersen 2012) but it provides food for thought for the
critical assessment of the limits and threats of the ontological turn.
    Still, I have two main remarks: I do not totally agree that post-
constructionists draw a complete overlap between the epistemological
and the ontological: in the work of Barad (2007) “what is left” is often
reminded and in the work of other scholars (see for example Abra-
166                                                             Tecnoscienza – 8 (1)

hamsson, Bertoni, Mol and Ibáñez Martín 2015; Greco 2004) is the main
topic. Secondly, and related, I am not sure that Pellizzoni’s theoretical
alternative is not in the order of an analytics of truth. Pellizzoni advances
a privative ethics, a negative modality of knowledge based on what is not
accessible because out of human limits, while post-constructionists pro-
pose an ethics of excess (see for example, de la Cadena 2015), this result-
ing, similarly, in the incapability to access a final truth, because there are
too many truths and only one is realizable at a time. Both define truth as
something beyond the human – and this is a statement of reality. Thus, I
would find more appropriate to define both as analytics of truth: Pelliz-
zoni’s negative modality is a step in the dialectical construction of identi-
ty, therefore within a logic of identity. The difference is that one has af-
firmative connotations, while the other has critical tones. Probably, it is
impossible for humans to escape an analytics of truth exactly because the
constitutive gap between ontology and epistemology condemns us to stick
to the epistemic side, these being critical or affirmative. Thought, these
two options are fairly different, and with potential for supporting or criti-
cizing very different applications, as they define the ethical and political
posture in accessing and relating to reality.
    To conclude, Pellizzoni seems guilty of the same sin he accuses post-
constructionists: to exaggerate the differences among them. But after all, I
do not see this as sin but as a skill, necessary for developing critique,
which is to make visible some hidden or potential risky trends allowing us
to reflect always deeper about who we are and what we are doing in this
world.

References
Abrahamsson, S., Bertoni, F., Mol, A. and Ibáñez Martín, R. (2015) Living with
      Omega-3: New Materialism and Enduring Concerns, in “Environment
      and Planning D: Society and Space”, 33 (1), pp. 4-19.
Barad, K. (2007) Meeting the Universe Halfway. Quantum Physics and the En-
       tanglement of Matter and Meaning, Durham, Duke University Press.
Candea, M. (2011) “Our Division of the Universe”: Making a Space for the Non-
      Political in the Anthropology of Politics, in “Current Anthropology”, 52
      (3), pp. 309-334.
Candea, M. (2014) The Ontology of the Political Turn, in “Cultural Anthropolo-
      gy Online”, https://culanth.org/fieldsights/469-the-ontology-of-the-politi-
      cal-turn.
de la Cadena, M. (2015) Earth Beings: Ecologies of Practice across Andean
       Worlds, Durham, Duke University Press.
Greco, M. (2004) The Politics of Indeterminacy and the Right to Health, in
       “Theory, Culture and Society”, 21 (6), pp. 1-22.
Holbraad, M. and Pedersen, M.A. (2014) The Politics of Ontology. Fieldsights -
Book Review                                                               167
        Theorizing the Contemporary, in “Cultural Anthropology Online”,
        http://www.culanth.org/fieldsights/461-the-politics-of-ontology.
Holbraad, M., Pedersen, M.A. and De Castro, E.V. (2013) The Politics of Ontol-
      ogy: Anthropological Positions Position paper for roundtable discussion,
      paper presented at the American Anthropological Association annual
      meeting, Chicago.
Laidlaw, J. and Heywood, P. (2013) One More Turn and You're There, in “An-
       thropology of this century”, 7 (http://aotcpress.com/articles/turn/).
Pedersen, M.A. (2012) Common Nonsense: A Review of Certain Recent Reviews
       of the "Ontological Turn", in “Anthropology of this century”, 5
       (http://aotcpress.com/articles/common_nonsense/).
Scott, M.W. (2013) The Anthropology of Ontology (Religious Science?), in
       “Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute”, 19 (4), pp. 859-872.




                                      ***


    David Pontille
Signer ensemble. Contribution et évaluation en sciences [Signing Togeth-
er. Contribution and Evaluation in Sciences], Paris, Economica, 2016,
pp. 206

Barbara Pentimalli Università Sapienza di Roma

    Since the 1980s we have seen the rise – if not the obsession – of evalu-
ation policies of the academic production through the proliferation of
performance indicators and devices to judge and measure contribution in
sciences (bibliometric indicators, journal classification, and peer review).
The translation of new public management theories into the academic
field with the aim of tracing and measuring the individual contribution
becomes problematic since every scientific activity – as Laboratory Stud-
ies had proved – implies the participation of human teams and the use of
many instruments, artefacts and techniques. So the question is: how to
distinguish the contribution of each one? How to decide who is legiti-
mated to acquire the status of author signing the publication of research
results? How to establish, without any doubt, what a scientific contribu-
tion is? The book Signer Ensemble. Contribution et évaluation en scienc-
es, by David Pontille, analyses scientific contribution by simultaneously
taking into account the issues linked to the knowledge production, the
work organization and the evaluation policies for different historical peri-
