Samuel Hayat: “The Gilets Jaunes and the Democratic Question”

“A new emancipatory politics, which remains to be invented, should be based on making the ensemble of relations of domination visible, without hierarchy and by remaining open and responsive to new antagonisms which will inevitably come to light. As it is, the Gilets Jaunes movement, anchored in a citizenist conception of politics, does not seem to be taking this path toward the visibilization of these antagonisms, even as it opens up new democratic possibilities. A renewal of an emancipatory politics must therefore think both with and against this movement, for democracy and against oligarchy, but also for the expression of conflict and against consensus – whether it be technocratic or citizenist.”