Professor of History of Consciousness at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
Areas of research specialization include contemporary social and political philosophy (esp. Critical Theory); the history of social and political thought (esp. pertaining to imperialism and colonialism in the 19th century); and the contemporary politics of settler colonialism and indigeneity in the Anglo-American world.
Basándose en las luchas de los pueblos indígenas contra el colonialismo, ¡El robo es la propiedad... more Basándose en las luchas de los pueblos indígenas contra el colonialismo, ¡El robo es la propiedad! reconstruye las distintas formas que ha adoptado la desposesión para explicar cómo las diversas configuraciones de la ley, la propiedad, la raza y los derechos, han funcionado como modos de gobierno a través de la historia. Mediante un análisis minucioso de los argumentos de académicos y activistas indígenas desde el siglo XIX hasta la actualidad, Robert Nichols sostiene que la desposesión es un proceso recursivo peculiar, el cual convierte el robo sistemático en el mecanismo que genera las relaciones de propiedad.
Theft is Property! Dispossession and Critical Theory, 2020
Drawing on Indigenous peoples' struggles against settler colonialism, Theft Is Property! reconstr... more Drawing on Indigenous peoples' struggles against settler colonialism, Theft Is Property! reconstructs the concept of dispossession as a means of explaining how shifting configurations of law, property, race, and rights have functioned as modes of governance, both historically and in the present. Through close analysis of arguments by Indigenous scholars and activists from the nineteenth century to the present, Robert Nichols argues that dispossession has come to name a unique recursive process whereby systematic theft is the mechanism by which property relations are generated. In so doing, Nichols also brings long-standing debates in anarchist, Black radical, feminist, Marxist, and postcolonial thought into direct conversation with the frequently overlooked intellectual contributions of Indigenous peoples.
Martin Heidegger and Michel Foucault are two of the most important and influential thinkers of th... more Martin Heidegger and Michel Foucault are two of the most important and influential thinkers of the twentieth century. Each has spawned volumes of secondary literature and sparked fierce, polarizing debates, particularly about the relationship between philosophy and politics. And yet, to date there exists almost no work that presents a systematic and comprehensive engagement of the two in relation to one another. The World of Freedom addresses this lacuna.
Neither apology nor polemic, the book demonstrates that it is not merely interesting but necessary to read Heidegger and Foucault alongside one another if we are to properly understand the shape of twentieth-century Continental thought. Through close, scholarly engagement with primary texts, Robert Nichols develops original and demanding insights into the relationship between fundamental and historical ontology, modes of objectification and subjectification, and an ethopoetic conception of freedom. In the process, his book also reveals the role that Heidegger's reception in France played in Foucault's intellectual development—the first major work to do so while taking full advantage of the recent publication of Foucault's last Collège de France lectures of the 1980s, which mark a return to classical Greek and Roman philosophy, and thus to familiar Heideggerian loci of concern.
An analysis of the varied conceptions of "land" at work in classical political economy and their ... more An analysis of the varied conceptions of "land" at work in classical political economy and their relations to British colonization schemes of this period (c. 1776- 1848).
A reply to "Instituting Thought" by Roberto Esposito, examining approaches to the concept of "pol... more A reply to "Instituting Thought" by Roberto Esposito, examining approaches to the concept of "political ontology" and its relationship to totalitarianism and democracy.
Symposium on "Theft is Property!", with contributions by Kelly Aguirre, Phil Henderson, Cressida ... more Symposium on "Theft is Property!", with contributions by Kelly Aguirre, Phil Henderson, Cressida Heyes, Alana Lentin, Corey Snelgrove, and a response essay by Robert Nichols.
Critical exchange on empire and political theory with Jennifer Pitts, Timothy Bowers Vasko, Onur ... more Critical exchange on empire and political theory with Jennifer Pitts, Timothy Bowers Vasko, Onur Ulas Ince and Robert Nichols.
This article offers a preliminary critical-historical reconstruction of the concept of dispossess... more This article offers a preliminary critical-historical reconstruction of the concept of dispossession. Part I examines its role in eighteenth and nineteenth century struggles against European feudal land tenure. Drawing upon Marx's critique of French anarchism in particular, I identify a persistent limitation at the heart of the concept. Since dispossession presupposes prior possession, recourse to it appears conservative and tends to reinforce the very proprietary and commoditized models of social relations that radical critics generally seek to undermine. Part II turns to use of the term in Indigenous struggles against colonization, both in order to better grasp the stakes of the above problematic and suggest a way beyond it. Through a reconstruction of arguments by Indigenous scholars and activists, I seek to show the coherence and novelty of their formulation by suggesting that dispossession has come to name a unique historical process, one in which property is generated under conditions that require divestment and alienation from those who appear, only retroactively, as its original owners. In this way, theft and property are related in a recursive, rather than strictly unilinear, manner. Part III provides a specific historical example in the form of nineteenth-century US property law concerning squatters and homesteaders.
This essay attends to the specificity of indigenous peoples’ political critique of state power an... more This essay attends to the specificity of indigenous peoples’ political critique of state power and territorialized sovereignty in the North American context as an indispensible resource for realizing the decolonizing potential latent within the field of critical prison studies. I argue that although the incarceration of indigenous peoples is closely related to the experience of other racialized populations with regard to its causes, it is importantly distinct with respect to the normative foundation of its critique. Indigenous sovereignty calls forth an alternative normativity that challenges the very existence of the carceral system, let alone its racialized organization and operation.
This chapter examines the relationship between critical race theory and the critique of coloniali... more This chapter examines the relationship between critical race theory and the critique of colonialism as it is refracted through contemporary debates on the legacy of social contract theory. The chapter critiques the metaphor of a 'racial contract' as a vehicle for apprehending the production of racial difference in colonial contexts, arguing that it functions to performatively reproduce key features of colonialism insofar as it comprehends the problem of white-supremacist rule to be one of ‘failed universality’. The 'compulsory enfranchisement' of Indigenous peoples in North America is discussed as a case in point.
This paper examines the application of social contract theorizing to questions pertaining to the ... more This paper examines the application of social contract theorizing to questions pertaining to the rights of indigenous peoples today, with particular reference to recent work by Jeremy Waldron. It is argued that such theorizing must be examined with reference not only to the content of its claims, but also with respect to its general mode of argumentation and its political function in specific contexts. Read in this light, social contract theory may function to unduly deny the claims of indigenous peoples, oftentimes by shifting the register of debate to a relatively abstract and counter-factual level and relieving settler-colonial societies of the burden of proof. Insofar as social contract theory operates to this effect, it is analyzed in terms of a ‘Settler Contract’.
This paper presents a critical survey of the use and interpretation of the work of Michel Foucaul... more This paper presents a critical survey of the use and interpretation of the work of Michel Foucault in the field of postcolonial studies. The paper uses debates about Foucault’s legacy and his contributions (or lack thereof) to postcolonialism as a means of parsing out the main lines of contestation within the field—that is, as a means of tracing the contours of the space of questioning or field of problematization, in part to foreground what has been at stake and, more to the point, what has not been at stake. Part I provides a general survey of what “Postcolonial Studies” is: what its major questions and debates have been. Part II examines the ways in which Foucault has been taken up, interpreted and used within the field, and Part III comments on what aspects of Foucault’s work have not been taken up, suggesting that this is most revealing about the state of postcolonial studies today.
Thinkers heavily indebted to Foucault—such as Wendy Brown, Judith Butler, Jodi Melamed and Jasbir... more Thinkers heavily indebted to Foucault—such as Wendy Brown, Judith Butler, Jodi Melamed and Jasbir Puar—are at the fore of a contemporary interrogation of queerness and racialized empire. This paper critically surveys this terrain, differentiates several strands of it, and attempts a theoretical reframing such that we may be better equipped to gain new vantage on the central problematic. I argue that the current conviviality of queerness and empire is best understood not only through a univocal ‘homonationist’ lens, but also requires situating in the context of multiple languages of civilizational superiority and liberal tolerance. In particular, it requires the deployment of arguments about the ‘benchmark of civilization’, in which whole societies are ranked along a unilinear trajectory of development according to standards set by the most powerful among them. One relatively recent addition to the criteria of civilizational adjudication is the capacity of societies to ‘tolerate’ new forms of societal difference. In this case, I argue, the most important of these are the strange pairing of sexual and religious dispositifs.
This chapter critically assesses the utility of Michel Foucault’s lectures on contract theory for... more This chapter critically assesses the utility of Michel Foucault’s lectures on contract theory for developing a complete understanding of the relationship between Euro-American imperialism and historical narration. A secondary aim is to complicate and complete our understanding of the resources available to Anglo-American political theory of empire and imperialism from 20th century French philosophy. To the extent that Anglo-American theorists have drawn upon contemporary French philosophy in their analyses of European imperialism, they have done so predominately as a means of interrupting and deconstructing ‘universal history’ narratives of developmental progress which have historically served an important legitimating function in relation to modern empire. While this work may be valuable in its own right, it commonly fails to consider forms of imperial legitimation which do not depend centrally on this model of historical narrative, what I call here ‘colonial historicality’. In contrast to the ‘universal history’ model of colonial historicality, contractualism represents time as punctuated by extraordinary moments in which history is ‘reset’ or ‘begun anew’ in some radical manner through an intentional refounding by human agents, frequently obscuring the colonial function of such moments. Since settler colonial polities have frequently relied upon such colonial historicality, developing the philosophical resources of Foucault’s lectures on contract and conquest is useful to developing a more comprehensive account of these dynamics.
From 1922 to 1924, the Iroquois Confederacy — a federal union of six aboriginal nations — sought ... more From 1922 to 1924, the Iroquois Confederacy — a federal union of six aboriginal nations — sought resolution of a dispute between themselves and Canada at the League of Nations. In this paper, the historical events of the 1920s League are employed as a case study to explore the development of the international society of states in the early 20th century as it relates to the indigenous peoples of North America. Specifically, it will be argued that the early modern practice of excluding Amerindians from international political forums is related to the negative representation of indigenous peoples in the dominant theoretical discourse of the time: social contract theory. The diplomatic activities of the Iroquois, and the members of the League during this time period, demonstrate exactly how social contract theory has relied on presenting indigenous peoples as residing in a non- political and non-sovereign form, thus denying them the right to participate at the international level on par with other peoples.
Basándose en las luchas de los pueblos indígenas contra el colonialismo, ¡El robo es la propiedad... more Basándose en las luchas de los pueblos indígenas contra el colonialismo, ¡El robo es la propiedad! reconstruye las distintas formas que ha adoptado la desposesión para explicar cómo las diversas configuraciones de la ley, la propiedad, la raza y los derechos, han funcionado como modos de gobierno a través de la historia. Mediante un análisis minucioso de los argumentos de académicos y activistas indígenas desde el siglo XIX hasta la actualidad, Robert Nichols sostiene que la desposesión es un proceso recursivo peculiar, el cual convierte el robo sistemático en el mecanismo que genera las relaciones de propiedad.
Theft is Property! Dispossession and Critical Theory, 2020
Drawing on Indigenous peoples' struggles against settler colonialism, Theft Is Property! reconstr... more Drawing on Indigenous peoples' struggles against settler colonialism, Theft Is Property! reconstructs the concept of dispossession as a means of explaining how shifting configurations of law, property, race, and rights have functioned as modes of governance, both historically and in the present. Through close analysis of arguments by Indigenous scholars and activists from the nineteenth century to the present, Robert Nichols argues that dispossession has come to name a unique recursive process whereby systematic theft is the mechanism by which property relations are generated. In so doing, Nichols also brings long-standing debates in anarchist, Black radical, feminist, Marxist, and postcolonial thought into direct conversation with the frequently overlooked intellectual contributions of Indigenous peoples.
Martin Heidegger and Michel Foucault are two of the most important and influential thinkers of th... more Martin Heidegger and Michel Foucault are two of the most important and influential thinkers of the twentieth century. Each has spawned volumes of secondary literature and sparked fierce, polarizing debates, particularly about the relationship between philosophy and politics. And yet, to date there exists almost no work that presents a systematic and comprehensive engagement of the two in relation to one another. The World of Freedom addresses this lacuna.
Neither apology nor polemic, the book demonstrates that it is not merely interesting but necessary to read Heidegger and Foucault alongside one another if we are to properly understand the shape of twentieth-century Continental thought. Through close, scholarly engagement with primary texts, Robert Nichols develops original and demanding insights into the relationship between fundamental and historical ontology, modes of objectification and subjectification, and an ethopoetic conception of freedom. In the process, his book also reveals the role that Heidegger's reception in France played in Foucault's intellectual development—the first major work to do so while taking full advantage of the recent publication of Foucault's last Collège de France lectures of the 1980s, which mark a return to classical Greek and Roman philosophy, and thus to familiar Heideggerian loci of concern.
An analysis of the varied conceptions of "land" at work in classical political economy and their ... more An analysis of the varied conceptions of "land" at work in classical political economy and their relations to British colonization schemes of this period (c. 1776- 1848).
A reply to "Instituting Thought" by Roberto Esposito, examining approaches to the concept of "pol... more A reply to "Instituting Thought" by Roberto Esposito, examining approaches to the concept of "political ontology" and its relationship to totalitarianism and democracy.
Symposium on "Theft is Property!", with contributions by Kelly Aguirre, Phil Henderson, Cressida ... more Symposium on "Theft is Property!", with contributions by Kelly Aguirre, Phil Henderson, Cressida Heyes, Alana Lentin, Corey Snelgrove, and a response essay by Robert Nichols.
Critical exchange on empire and political theory with Jennifer Pitts, Timothy Bowers Vasko, Onur ... more Critical exchange on empire and political theory with Jennifer Pitts, Timothy Bowers Vasko, Onur Ulas Ince and Robert Nichols.
This article offers a preliminary critical-historical reconstruction of the concept of dispossess... more This article offers a preliminary critical-historical reconstruction of the concept of dispossession. Part I examines its role in eighteenth and nineteenth century struggles against European feudal land tenure. Drawing upon Marx's critique of French anarchism in particular, I identify a persistent limitation at the heart of the concept. Since dispossession presupposes prior possession, recourse to it appears conservative and tends to reinforce the very proprietary and commoditized models of social relations that radical critics generally seek to undermine. Part II turns to use of the term in Indigenous struggles against colonization, both in order to better grasp the stakes of the above problematic and suggest a way beyond it. Through a reconstruction of arguments by Indigenous scholars and activists, I seek to show the coherence and novelty of their formulation by suggesting that dispossession has come to name a unique historical process, one in which property is generated under conditions that require divestment and alienation from those who appear, only retroactively, as its original owners. In this way, theft and property are related in a recursive, rather than strictly unilinear, manner. Part III provides a specific historical example in the form of nineteenth-century US property law concerning squatters and homesteaders.
This essay attends to the specificity of indigenous peoples’ political critique of state power an... more This essay attends to the specificity of indigenous peoples’ political critique of state power and territorialized sovereignty in the North American context as an indispensible resource for realizing the decolonizing potential latent within the field of critical prison studies. I argue that although the incarceration of indigenous peoples is closely related to the experience of other racialized populations with regard to its causes, it is importantly distinct with respect to the normative foundation of its critique. Indigenous sovereignty calls forth an alternative normativity that challenges the very existence of the carceral system, let alone its racialized organization and operation.
This chapter examines the relationship between critical race theory and the critique of coloniali... more This chapter examines the relationship between critical race theory and the critique of colonialism as it is refracted through contemporary debates on the legacy of social contract theory. The chapter critiques the metaphor of a 'racial contract' as a vehicle for apprehending the production of racial difference in colonial contexts, arguing that it functions to performatively reproduce key features of colonialism insofar as it comprehends the problem of white-supremacist rule to be one of ‘failed universality’. The 'compulsory enfranchisement' of Indigenous peoples in North America is discussed as a case in point.
This paper examines the application of social contract theorizing to questions pertaining to the ... more This paper examines the application of social contract theorizing to questions pertaining to the rights of indigenous peoples today, with particular reference to recent work by Jeremy Waldron. It is argued that such theorizing must be examined with reference not only to the content of its claims, but also with respect to its general mode of argumentation and its political function in specific contexts. Read in this light, social contract theory may function to unduly deny the claims of indigenous peoples, oftentimes by shifting the register of debate to a relatively abstract and counter-factual level and relieving settler-colonial societies of the burden of proof. Insofar as social contract theory operates to this effect, it is analyzed in terms of a ‘Settler Contract’.
This paper presents a critical survey of the use and interpretation of the work of Michel Foucaul... more This paper presents a critical survey of the use and interpretation of the work of Michel Foucault in the field of postcolonial studies. The paper uses debates about Foucault’s legacy and his contributions (or lack thereof) to postcolonialism as a means of parsing out the main lines of contestation within the field—that is, as a means of tracing the contours of the space of questioning or field of problematization, in part to foreground what has been at stake and, more to the point, what has not been at stake. Part I provides a general survey of what “Postcolonial Studies” is: what its major questions and debates have been. Part II examines the ways in which Foucault has been taken up, interpreted and used within the field, and Part III comments on what aspects of Foucault’s work have not been taken up, suggesting that this is most revealing about the state of postcolonial studies today.
Thinkers heavily indebted to Foucault—such as Wendy Brown, Judith Butler, Jodi Melamed and Jasbir... more Thinkers heavily indebted to Foucault—such as Wendy Brown, Judith Butler, Jodi Melamed and Jasbir Puar—are at the fore of a contemporary interrogation of queerness and racialized empire. This paper critically surveys this terrain, differentiates several strands of it, and attempts a theoretical reframing such that we may be better equipped to gain new vantage on the central problematic. I argue that the current conviviality of queerness and empire is best understood not only through a univocal ‘homonationist’ lens, but also requires situating in the context of multiple languages of civilizational superiority and liberal tolerance. In particular, it requires the deployment of arguments about the ‘benchmark of civilization’, in which whole societies are ranked along a unilinear trajectory of development according to standards set by the most powerful among them. One relatively recent addition to the criteria of civilizational adjudication is the capacity of societies to ‘tolerate’ new forms of societal difference. In this case, I argue, the most important of these are the strange pairing of sexual and religious dispositifs.
This chapter critically assesses the utility of Michel Foucault’s lectures on contract theory for... more This chapter critically assesses the utility of Michel Foucault’s lectures on contract theory for developing a complete understanding of the relationship between Euro-American imperialism and historical narration. A secondary aim is to complicate and complete our understanding of the resources available to Anglo-American political theory of empire and imperialism from 20th century French philosophy. To the extent that Anglo-American theorists have drawn upon contemporary French philosophy in their analyses of European imperialism, they have done so predominately as a means of interrupting and deconstructing ‘universal history’ narratives of developmental progress which have historically served an important legitimating function in relation to modern empire. While this work may be valuable in its own right, it commonly fails to consider forms of imperial legitimation which do not depend centrally on this model of historical narrative, what I call here ‘colonial historicality’. In contrast to the ‘universal history’ model of colonial historicality, contractualism represents time as punctuated by extraordinary moments in which history is ‘reset’ or ‘begun anew’ in some radical manner through an intentional refounding by human agents, frequently obscuring the colonial function of such moments. Since settler colonial polities have frequently relied upon such colonial historicality, developing the philosophical resources of Foucault’s lectures on contract and conquest is useful to developing a more comprehensive account of these dynamics.
From 1922 to 1924, the Iroquois Confederacy — a federal union of six aboriginal nations — sought ... more From 1922 to 1924, the Iroquois Confederacy — a federal union of six aboriginal nations — sought resolution of a dispute between themselves and Canada at the League of Nations. In this paper, the historical events of the 1920s League are employed as a case study to explore the development of the international society of states in the early 20th century as it relates to the indigenous peoples of North America. Specifically, it will be argued that the early modern practice of excluding Amerindians from international political forums is related to the negative representation of indigenous peoples in the dominant theoretical discourse of the time: social contract theory. The diplomatic activities of the Iroquois, and the members of the League during this time period, demonstrate exactly how social contract theory has relied on presenting indigenous peoples as residing in a non- political and non-sovereign form, thus denying them the right to participate at the international level on par with other peoples.
A review of "Prairie Rising: Indigenous Youth, Decolonization, and the Politics of Intervention" ... more A review of "Prairie Rising: Indigenous Youth, Decolonization, and the Politics of Intervention" by Jaskiran Dhillon.
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Books by Robert Nichols
Neither apology nor polemic, the book demonstrates that it is not merely interesting but necessary to read Heidegger and Foucault alongside one another if we are to properly understand the shape of twentieth-century Continental thought. Through close, scholarly engagement with primary texts, Robert Nichols develops original and demanding insights into the relationship between fundamental and historical ontology, modes of objectification and subjectification, and an ethopoetic conception of freedom. In the process, his book also reveals the role that Heidegger's reception in France played in Foucault's intellectual development—the first major work to do so while taking full advantage of the recent publication of Foucault's last Collège de France lectures of the 1980s, which mark a return to classical Greek and Roman philosophy, and thus to familiar Heideggerian loci of concern.
Papers by Robert Nichols
Book Reviews by Robert Nichols
Neither apology nor polemic, the book demonstrates that it is not merely interesting but necessary to read Heidegger and Foucault alongside one another if we are to properly understand the shape of twentieth-century Continental thought. Through close, scholarly engagement with primary texts, Robert Nichols develops original and demanding insights into the relationship between fundamental and historical ontology, modes of objectification and subjectification, and an ethopoetic conception of freedom. In the process, his book also reveals the role that Heidegger's reception in France played in Foucault's intellectual development—the first major work to do so while taking full advantage of the recent publication of Foucault's last Collège de France lectures of the 1980s, which mark a return to classical Greek and Roman philosophy, and thus to familiar Heideggerian loci of concern.