"Epistemic Disobedience": the de-colonial option and the meaning of identity in politics

Abstract

Two interrelated theses sustain the argu­ment. First, identity IN politics (rather than identity politics) is a necessary course of thought and action in view of the iron cage of modern (e.g., European from Ma­chiavelli on) political theory. Insofar as modern political theory is—knowingly or not—racist and patriarchal by denying political agency to people classified as in­ferior (in terms of race, gender, sexuality, etc.), and insofar as they have been denied epistemic agency for the same reason (the second thesis), all de-colonial political moves (non-racist and non-heterosexually patriarchal) must engage in epistemic and political disobedience. “Civil disobedien­ce,” as predicated by Mahatma Ghandi and Martin Luther King, Jr. were great moves indeed. But, civil without epistemic diso­bedience will remain caught in games ruled by Eurocentric political economy and poli­tical theory. Both theses are pillars of the de-colonial option. Thus, the de-colonial option allows us to think in terms of the variegated spectrum of the Marxist left and — on the other hand — of the variegated spectrum of the de-colonial left.

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Original in English