Journal articles by Camila Vergara
STUDIA POLITICÆ, 2023
Las definiciones de populismo más usadas en la literatura especializada han surgido desde un marc... more Las definiciones de populismo más usadas en la literatura especializada han surgido desde un marco académico predominantemente europeo y tienden a la abstracción, separando el concepto de las condiciones históricas y materiales en las que este se ha sido utilizado. Las teorías formales que tratan de explicar el populismo han llevado a un “estiramiento conceptual” que ha disminuido la capacidad explicativa del concepto. Aunque la teoría populista de Ernesto Laclau hunde sus raíces en la experiencia populista argentina, esta no escapa a las abstracciones que han profundizado en la ambigüedad del concepto. En este ensayo destacaré dos problemas de la concepción discursiva del populismo expuesta en La razón populista (2005): que no nos permite distinguir entre populismo y etnonacionalismo, ni determinar si la política populista es emancipadora u opresiva. Estas distinciones no son solo semánticas, sino que son de central importancia para entender a cabalidad el fenómeno populista contemporáneo en sus distintas variaciones. A través de un enfoque republicano radical, doy un fundamento teórico para separar efectivamente al sujeto popular del populismo de las concepciones del pueblo basadas en la etnicidad. Apoyándome en la teoría de la política como desacuerdo emancipatorio de Jacques Rancière y en la teoría del sujeto plebeyo como ciudadano de segunda clase de Jeffrey Green, argumento que, visto desde una perspectiva histórica y material, el pueblo del populismo se construye a partir de una identidad plebeya basada en la clase, que es igualitaria e inclusiva, construida desde una posición de no-gobierno, en resistencia al orden oligárquico opresor. Esta concepción plebeya del pueblo contrasta con la concepción étnico-nacionalista articulada por movimientos y partidos de extrema derecha, enfocada en restaurar valores tradicionales, asignar membresía y defender fronteras, excluyendo a los “otros,” quienes no pertenecen al pueblo-nación, de sus derechos.
LENIN: The Heritage We (Don’t) Renounce, 2024
According to Lenin, the legal codification of labour relations that rest on unequal bargaining po... more According to Lenin, the legal codification of labour relations that rest on unequal bargaining power brings about a new form of public exploitation, in which domination is exerted not only through the power of the employer, but also by the police and the administrative and juridical branches of the State that act as enforcers of the law. Even provisions designed to improve working conditions and empower workers tend to maintain the subordination of workers to employers, and create other forms of dependence and servility, in addition to opportunities for political corruption.
This brief essay is part of Lenin: The Heritage We (Don’t) Renounce, an edited volume that brings together 100+ authors and visual artists from 50+ countries across the world – from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe – in order to critically commemorate the hundredth anniversary of the death of Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, aka Lenin, on 21 January 1924.
History of Political Thought, 2022
Even if republicanism is one of the oldest traditions of political thought, it has defied interna... more Even if republicanism is one of the oldest traditions of political thought, it has defied internal classifications other than divisions between ancients and moderns, or by region or country. Republican thought has remained a broad tradition that has brought together diverse thinkers who, although appear to have opposing views regarding who should rule in a free republic, have been interpreted as endorsing an idealized republican order that stems from Cicero and the ‘civic humanism’ that developed in the early quattrocento in Florence. Following recent plebeian reinterpretations of Machiavelli, which put into question this cohesion within the tradition, this article offers a classification of republicanism based on the division between elitist and plebeian approaches to the political order. It first engages with the development of the dominant ‘elitist-proceduralist’ interpretation of the republican constitution from Cicero to Montesquieu and James Madison, and then maps out the plebeian republican tradition in the works of Machiavelli, Condorcet and Jefferson. The third and fourth sections focus on contemporary republicanism, reviewing the reinterpretations of the mixed constitution offered by Philip Pettit and John McCormick, as two major exponents of the current elitist and plebeian strands of republican thought.
https://www.ingentaconnect.com/contentone/imp/hpt/2022/00000043/00000005/art00003
NACLA, 2022
As Chile navigates its path to a new constitution, political elites seek
to limit structural chan... more As Chile navigates its path to a new constitution, political elites seek
to limit structural change. Can the revolutionary spirit that sparked the
process return to the fore?
Pléyade, Revista de Humanidades y Ciencias Sociales, 2022
Este artículo ofrece recursos modernos y contemporáneos para repensar la democracia de... more Este artículo ofrece recursos modernos y contemporáneos para repensar la democracia desde el punto de vista del poder popular y la necesidad de prevenir el desastre ecológico. Primero proporciona un diagnóstico del estado actual de la democracia representativa como un tipo de régimen que se ha corrompido en democracia oligárquica, y luego explora las innovaciones institucionales ofrecidas por el secretario florentino Niccolò Machiavelli y por el revolucionario francés Nicolas de Condorcet para hacer frente a la corrupción sistémica. Luego, centrándose en la superposición del poder oligárquico y la destrucción ambiental, el artículo destaca los nuevos mecanismos e instituciones que han intentado dar poder a los pueblos y proteger el planeta en Canadá, Estados Unidos, Ecuador y Francia. Concluye argumentando que la única forma efectiva de detener el colapso climático es repensar la democracia y darles a las personas, a nivel local, las herramientas político-legales necesarias para defender los ecosistemas que habitan.
Theoria. A Journal of Social and Political Theory, 2022
The article presents a plebeian strand of republican constitutional thought that recognises the i... more The article presents a plebeian strand of republican constitutional thought that recognises the influence of inequality on political power, embraces conflict as the effective cause of free government, and channels its anti-oligarchic energy through the constitutional structure. First it engages with two modern plebeian thinkers-Niccolò Machiavelli and Nicolas de Condorcet-focusing on the institutional role of the common people to resist oppression through ordinary and extraordinary political action. Then it discusses the work of two contemporary republican thinkers-Philip Pettit and John McCormick-and contrasts their models of 'contestatory' and 'tribunician' democracy. Finally, I incorporate a political economy lens and propose as part of republican constitutionalism not only contestatory and tribunician institutions but also anti-oligarchic basic rules to keep inequality and corruption under control.
REVUS. Journal for Constitutional Theory and Philosophy of Law, 2022
Constitutional democracies have allowed for patterns of accumulation of wealth at the top, leadin... more Constitutional democracies have allowed for patterns of accumulation of wealth at the top, leading to acute inequality and dangerous oligarchization of power. Moreover, the theoretical tools that liberal constitutionalism offers are inadequate to recognize systemic corruption and structural forms of domination that are enabled by law or its absence. As an alternative, the article proposes a material methodological approach to the study of constitutions. In the first section, it offers a critical analysis of the intellectual foundations of liberal constitutionalism, engaging with the right to property, political representation, and separation of powers. In the second section, it presents the intellectual foundations of plebeian constitutionalism in the works of Machiavelli, Condorcet, and Marx. Finally, it proposes a material approach to assessing constitutions, identifying the shortcomings of contemporary legal frameworks to materialize social rights, as well as new avenues for institutional anti-oligarchic innovation.
NACLA Report, 2022
Facing a divided Congress and an empowered far right, the delegates drafting a new constitution m... more Facing a divided Congress and an empowered far right, the delegates drafting a new constitution must champion grassroots demands.
Revue européenne des sciences sociales/ European Journal of Social Sciences , 2020
Mainstream definitions of populism have detached the concept from the historical and material con... more Mainstream definitions of populism have detached the concept from the historical and material conditions in which it arises. Perhaps the most pernicious of these abstractions is the conception of the people. According to most definitions, any politics appealing to “the people” against “the elites” is populist, regardless of their different conceptions of the people, platforms, and relations to liberal democracy, which has led to the conflation of populism with ethnonationalism. Through a radical republican approach, in this article I give theoretical ground to effectively separate the people of populism from conceptions of the people based on ethnicity. Relying on Jacques Rancière’s theory of politics as disagreement and Jeffrey Green’s theory of the plebeian subject as second-class citizen, I argue that, seen from a historical and material perspective, the people of populism is constructed from a plebeian identity based on class that is egalitarian and inclusive, constructed from a position of no-rule, in resistance to the oppressive oligarchic order.
http://journals.openedition.org/ress/6813
Journal of Political Philosophy, 2020
One of the most challenging aspects of the mainstream definitions of populism is that they do not... more One of the most challenging aspects of the mainstream definitions of populism is that they do not help us distinguish between populist and supremacist politics. This article critically engages with the latest rebranding of populism as an anti-pluralist, exclusionary form of politics, and offers an alternative interpretation that conceives of populism through the lens of radical republican thought. After critically engaging with the recent theories that have contributed to a “totalitarian turn” in the conception of populism, the paper presents populism as a form of plebeian politics that springs from the politicization of inequality. Finally, it analyzes this republican interpretation of populism in opposition to Hannah Arendt’s conception of totalitarianism to point to the differences that set apart populism from supremacist politics such as ethnonationalism.
Philosophy & Social Criticism, 2019
By offering an analysis of different conceptions of corruption connected to the political regime ... more By offering an analysis of different conceptions of corruption connected to the political regime and contingency in which they developed, the article retrieves a systemic meaning of political corruption. Through the works of Plato, Aristotle, Polybius, and Machiavelli it reconstructs a dimension of political corruption particular to popular governments, and also engages with recent neo-republican and institutionalist attempts at redefining political corruption. The article concludes that we still lack a proper conception of systemic corruption comparable to the one of the Ancients because we are yet unable to account for the role procedures and institutions play in fostering corruption through their normal functioning, and what this means for liberal democratic regimes.
Books by Camila Vergara
University of Chicago Press, 2017
More than five hundred years after Machiavelli wrote The Prince, his landmark treatise on the pra... more More than five hundred years after Machiavelli wrote The Prince, his landmark treatise on the pragmatic application of power remains a pivot point for debates on political thought. While scholars continue to investigate interpretations of The Prince in different contexts throughout history, from the Renaissance to the Risorgimento and Italian unification, other fruitful lines of research explore how Machiavelli’s ideas about power and leadership can further our understanding of contemporary political circumstances.
With Machiavelli on Liberty and Conflict, David Johnston, Nadia Urbinati, and Camila Vergara have brought together the most recent research on The Prince, with contributions from many of the leading scholars of Machiavelli, including Quentin Skinner, Harvey Mansfield, Erica Benner, John McCormick, and Giovanni Giorgini. Organized into four sections, the book focuses first on Machiavelli’s place in the history of political thought: Is he the last of the ancients or the creator of a new, distinctly modern conception of politics? And what might the answer to this question reveal about the impact of these disparate traditions on the founding of modern political philosophy? The second section contrasts current understandings of Machiavelli’s view of virtues in The Prince. The relationship between political leaders, popular power, and liberty is another perennial problem in studies of Machiavelli, and the third section develops several claims about that relationship. Finally, the fourth section explores the legacy of Machiavelli within the republican tradition of political thought and his relevance to enduring political issues.
Introduction
Princeton University Press, 2020
Table of Contents
Introduction
Chapter 9
Epilogue
Book Chapters by Camila Vergara
LENIN: The Heritage We (Don’t) Renounce, 2024
According to Lenin, the legal codification of labour relations that rest on unequal bargaining po... more According to Lenin, the legal codification of labour relations that rest on unequal bargaining power brings about a new form of public exploitation, in which domination is exerted not only through the power of the employer, but also by the police and the administrative and juridical branches of the State that act as enforcers of the law. Even provisions designed to improve working conditions and empower workers tend to maintain the subordination of workers to employers, and create other forms of dependence and servility, in addition to opportunities for political corruption.
How Democracy Survives. Global Challenges in the Anthropocene. Michael Holm, R. S. Deese, eds. , 2022
This chapter offers modern and contemporary approaches for how to save democracy by rethinking it... more This chapter offers modern and contemporary approaches for how to save democracy by rethinking it from the point of view of popular power and the need to avert ecological disaster. In what follows, I first provide a diagnosis of the current state of representative democracy as a regime type that has corrupted into oligarchic democracy, followed by explorations of the institutional innovations offered by Niccolò Machiavelli and Nicolas de Condorcet to deal with the systemic corruption plaguing popular modern republics. Focusing on the overlap of oligarchic power and environmental destruction, I then highlight the new mechanisms and institutions that have attempted to protect the planet by giving power to the people in Canada, the United States, Ecuador, and France. I conclude by arguing that the only effective way to stop climate collapse is to give the common people at the local level the necessary political and juridical mechanisms to defend the ecosystems they inhabit. Organized communities are the first line of defense for the protection of nature against extractivist states and corporations that mine natural resources with little regard to the damage done to the ecosystems and the human communities that are part of them.
Machiavelli's Discourses on Livy: New Readings, 2021
The Future of Lenin: Power, Politics, and Revolution in the Twenty‑First Century, 2022
Karl Dietz Verlag, 2021
Rosa Luxemburg. Two Volumes. Edited by Frank Jacob, Albert Scharenberg & Jorn Schutrumpf
In thi... more Rosa Luxemburg. Two Volumes. Edited by Frank Jacob, Albert Scharenberg & Jorn Schutrumpf
In this chapter I analyze Rosa Luxemburg’s ideas on the foundational character of political action, the role of the revolutionary party in enabling the workers’ council system, and the necessary conditions to transition from a capitalist to a socialist society. I argue Luxemburg presents us with a constitutional scheme in which democratic rights such as free speech and association have strong protections, and there is a dual structure of
power, in which two sources of authority – the liberal democratic order and its proceduralist justifications, and the proletarian order based on the collective activity of the councils – compete for power. This hybrid model of representative government and workers’ councils, moreover, seems to be temporal and short-lived since, according to Luxemburg, oligarchs are not likely to give up their power and be ruled over by proletarian law without bloodshed. Through Luxemburg’s materialist approach to the organization of power, the establishment and development of proletarian organs of power, far from being an idealist position, appears as the necessary material ground from which the new socialist society can begin to be collectively conceived.The politics of collective power, organized and deliberative, comes into focus through the lens of Luxemburg’s thought as the only one able to guarantee emancipation, being able not only to break with the current legal expression of society but to create a new socialist one, based on the political activity of workers’ councils.
Routledge, 2020
Mapping Populism. Approaches and Methods, Edited by Amit Ron and Majia Nadesan
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Journal articles by Camila Vergara
This brief essay is part of Lenin: The Heritage We (Don’t) Renounce, an edited volume that brings together 100+ authors and visual artists from 50+ countries across the world – from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe – in order to critically commemorate the hundredth anniversary of the death of Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, aka Lenin, on 21 January 1924.
https://www.ingentaconnect.com/contentone/imp/hpt/2022/00000043/00000005/art00003
to limit structural change. Can the revolutionary spirit that sparked the
process return to the fore?
http://journals.openedition.org/ress/6813
Books by Camila Vergara
With Machiavelli on Liberty and Conflict, David Johnston, Nadia Urbinati, and Camila Vergara have brought together the most recent research on The Prince, with contributions from many of the leading scholars of Machiavelli, including Quentin Skinner, Harvey Mansfield, Erica Benner, John McCormick, and Giovanni Giorgini. Organized into four sections, the book focuses first on Machiavelli’s place in the history of political thought: Is he the last of the ancients or the creator of a new, distinctly modern conception of politics? And what might the answer to this question reveal about the impact of these disparate traditions on the founding of modern political philosophy? The second section contrasts current understandings of Machiavelli’s view of virtues in The Prince. The relationship between political leaders, popular power, and liberty is another perennial problem in studies of Machiavelli, and the third section develops several claims about that relationship. Finally, the fourth section explores the legacy of Machiavelli within the republican tradition of political thought and his relevance to enduring political issues.
Introduction
Book Chapters by Camila Vergara
In this chapter I analyze Rosa Luxemburg’s ideas on the foundational character of political action, the role of the revolutionary party in enabling the workers’ council system, and the necessary conditions to transition from a capitalist to a socialist society. I argue Luxemburg presents us with a constitutional scheme in which democratic rights such as free speech and association have strong protections, and there is a dual structure of
power, in which two sources of authority – the liberal democratic order and its proceduralist justifications, and the proletarian order based on the collective activity of the councils – compete for power. This hybrid model of representative government and workers’ councils, moreover, seems to be temporal and short-lived since, according to Luxemburg, oligarchs are not likely to give up their power and be ruled over by proletarian law without bloodshed. Through Luxemburg’s materialist approach to the organization of power, the establishment and development of proletarian organs of power, far from being an idealist position, appears as the necessary material ground from which the new socialist society can begin to be collectively conceived.The politics of collective power, organized and deliberative, comes into focus through the lens of Luxemburg’s thought as the only one able to guarantee emancipation, being able not only to break with the current legal expression of society but to create a new socialist one, based on the political activity of workers’ councils.
This brief essay is part of Lenin: The Heritage We (Don’t) Renounce, an edited volume that brings together 100+ authors and visual artists from 50+ countries across the world – from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe – in order to critically commemorate the hundredth anniversary of the death of Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, aka Lenin, on 21 January 1924.
https://www.ingentaconnect.com/contentone/imp/hpt/2022/00000043/00000005/art00003
to limit structural change. Can the revolutionary spirit that sparked the
process return to the fore?
http://journals.openedition.org/ress/6813
With Machiavelli on Liberty and Conflict, David Johnston, Nadia Urbinati, and Camila Vergara have brought together the most recent research on The Prince, with contributions from many of the leading scholars of Machiavelli, including Quentin Skinner, Harvey Mansfield, Erica Benner, John McCormick, and Giovanni Giorgini. Organized into four sections, the book focuses first on Machiavelli’s place in the history of political thought: Is he the last of the ancients or the creator of a new, distinctly modern conception of politics? And what might the answer to this question reveal about the impact of these disparate traditions on the founding of modern political philosophy? The second section contrasts current understandings of Machiavelli’s view of virtues in The Prince. The relationship between political leaders, popular power, and liberty is another perennial problem in studies of Machiavelli, and the third section develops several claims about that relationship. Finally, the fourth section explores the legacy of Machiavelli within the republican tradition of political thought and his relevance to enduring political issues.
Introduction
In this chapter I analyze Rosa Luxemburg’s ideas on the foundational character of political action, the role of the revolutionary party in enabling the workers’ council system, and the necessary conditions to transition from a capitalist to a socialist society. I argue Luxemburg presents us with a constitutional scheme in which democratic rights such as free speech and association have strong protections, and there is a dual structure of
power, in which two sources of authority – the liberal democratic order and its proceduralist justifications, and the proletarian order based on the collective activity of the councils – compete for power. This hybrid model of representative government and workers’ councils, moreover, seems to be temporal and short-lived since, according to Luxemburg, oligarchs are not likely to give up their power and be ruled over by proletarian law without bloodshed. Through Luxemburg’s materialist approach to the organization of power, the establishment and development of proletarian organs of power, far from being an idealist position, appears as the necessary material ground from which the new socialist society can begin to be collectively conceived.The politics of collective power, organized and deliberative, comes into focus through the lens of Luxemburg’s thought as the only one able to guarantee emancipation, being able not only to break with the current legal expression of society but to create a new socialist one, based on the political activity of workers’ councils.
https://edinburghuniversitypress.com/book-constituent-power.html
In times of crisis it is necessary to revisit the theorization of radical change and the mechanisms through which it can be realized in a peaceful and orderly manner. Joel Colón-Ríos's Constituent Power and the Law is a timely book that promotes our understanding of the concept of constituent power as well as of its juridical application. Despite its contributions, in this critical review I claim that, because the book is thought through an elitist democratic theory framework that presupposes the unitary nation-state, it excludes the republican theory tradition that is premised on the socioontological division between the powerful few and the many, and that conceives the periodic exercise of constituent power by the people as necessary to keep a republic uncorrupted. In addition, I take issue with Colón-Ríos’s interpretation of Rousseau as a supporter of the direct exercise of foundational constituent power by the people in (silent) primary assemblies, and the resulting reduction of the people’s exercise of constituent power to mere authorization and ratification—to the detriment of processes involving popular deliberative decisionmaking that lead to a mandate. Finally, I critically engage with his conceptualization of the ‘material constitution,’ arguing that the definition he applies is too broad to be useful. Including formal and substantive ordering rules and principles as part of the strictly material interpretation of the constitution, which emerges from power relations, conceals the specific contributions that the material framework brings to the study of constitutions and the law.
http://bostonreview.net/politics-philosophy-religion/camila-vergara-our-machiavellian-moment
https://www.landclimate.org/sacrificing-life-in-the-salt-flats-for-a-greener-future/
Dans ce texte, la juriste chilienne Camila Vergara dresse un constat critique de la stratégie de modération de Gabriel Boric, dans laquelle elle voit le risque d’un divorce avec le potentiel transformateur des mobilisations populaires et d’une reconduction des fondements de l’ordre néolibéral.
Son analyse diffère sensiblement de celle de René Rojas, que nous publions en parallèle, qui met l’accent sur la dynamique politique unitaire Gabriel Boric et sa formation politique ont su créer. Nous publions également un entretien avec l’universitaire chilien Sergio Grez, qui décortique les résultats du premier tour de l’élection et met en garde contre que les demi-mesures proposées par le candidat Gabriel Boric, incapables de résoudre les problèmes structurels du pays. Contretemps propose ainsi un large éventail des débats qui traversent les gauches chiliennes dans ce moment clef du cycle politique ouvert en 2019.
One of the most problematic aspects of the mainstream definitions of populism is that they do not help us distinguish between populist and supremacist politics. This article critically engages with the latest rebranding of populism as an anti-pluralist, exclusionary form of politics, and offers an alternative interpretation that conceives of populism through the lens of radical republican thought.
First I critically engage with Ernesto Laclau’s theory of the populist logic as an identity-formation process that appears disjointed from material conditions. I argue Laclau’s abstraction of populism from the historical instances of plebeian, popular, and proletarian emancipation he explicitly recognizes as populist, allowed his theory to accommodate any kind of ideology —even ideologies that aim at the oppression of the masses instead of their emancipation.
As the most prominent theorist of populism on the Left, Laclau’s theory has contributed to disable adequate critique by enabling the attachment of oligarchic, nationalist, and racist ideologies to a concept that was originally associated with peasant self-government and egalitarian principles in Russia and the United States during the second half of the 19th century, and then with workers rights, redistribution, and the expansion of social services for the popular sectors in Latin America in the mid-20th century and the early 2000s.
The abstraction of the concept from material and historical conditions eliminated the normative basis of the populist movement: the emancipation of the popular sectors. I propose to re-ground Laclau’s theory of populism by conceiving the construction of the people through the post-foundational political philosophy of Jacques Rancière. I argue we should understand the construction of ‘the people’ of populism as analogous to the subjectification process of what Rancière calls the “part of no part,” as the inchoate subject that becomes a full-fledge political actor by, on the one hand recognizing its unequal status and its “no part” within the order of police, and on the other, by actively disrupting the scene through radically performing equality and taking part in politics.
ISSN 2735-6191
https://interferencia.cl/articulos/construyendo-un-mandato-popular-distintos-modelos-de-participacion-ciudadana-para-el
https://interferencia.cl/articulos/camila-vergara-politologa-en-chile-vivimos-rasgos-fascistas-y-son-los-moderados-los-que
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