The neuropolitical habitus of resonant receptive democracy

Abstract

In this paper, I argue that the recent work on mirror neurons illuminates the character of our capacities for a politics of resonant receptivity in ways that both help us to comprehend the damages of our contemporary order and suggest indispensable alternative ethical-strategic registers and possible directions for organising a powerful movement towards radical democracy. In doing so, neuroscience simultaneously contributes to our understanding of the possibility and importance of a more durable (less fugitive) radically democratic habitus. While the trope, ‘radically democratic habitus’, may seem oxymoronic in light of Bourdieu’s extensive rendering of ‘habitus’, I suggest that research on mirror neurons discloses ways in which iterated practices and dispositional structures are crucial for democratic freedom.

Keywords: radical democracy; mirror neurons; receptivity; political resonance; habitus; resonance machine; mimesis; affect

(Published: 23 December 2011)

Citation: Ethics & Global Politics, Vol. 4, No. 4, 2011, pp. 273-293. DOI: 10.3402/egp.v4i4.14447