adds a bit about de-politicisation

4 files changed, 36 insertions, 19 deletions

diff --git a/bibliography.bib b/bibliography.bib
index 076b0c4..6f11807 100644
--- a/bibliography.bib
+++ b/bibliography.bib
@@ -1,3 +1,11 @@
+@book{taskale-2016,
+    title={Post-politics in context},
+    author={Taskale, Ali Riza},
+    publisher={Routledge},
+    address={New York},
+    date={2016},
+}
+
 @book{beuret-2025,
     title={Or Something Worse},
     subtitle={Why We Need to Disrupt the Climate Transition},
diff --git a/chapter2.md b/chapter2.md
index f4eba4e..91441d5 100644
--- a/chapter2.md
+++ b/chapter2.md
@@ -6,8 +6,8 @@ catastrophic language encourages a fatalistic outlook and therefore persuades
 audiences that no proposed solution can be credible. Second, catastrophe is
 supposed to promote business as usual and shut down critical discourses,
 preventing rhetors from proposing truly credible solutions. Third, critics argue
-that catastrophic thinking flattens out power relationships and thus contributes
-to the 'death of politics,' driving rhetors to use the universal 'we' instead of
+that catastrophic thinking flattens out power relationships and thus
+de-politicises green issues, driving rhetors to use the universal 'we' instead of
 identifying an appropriate audience. I will examine each of these complaints in
 turn, but first I will explore where catastrophic language comes from and how it
 ends up featuring in contemporary green rhetoric.
@@ -195,8 +195,7 @@ programme.
 
 But perhaps the most vicious criticism of green catastrophism is that since
 green catastrophism reverberates strongly with 'Anthropocene' discourses, such
-rhetoric flattens out power relationships. This, say the critics, is the 'death
-of politics.'
+rhetoric ignores social structure and therefore de-politicises green issues.
 
 Anthropocene discourse is catastrophic. The arrival of the Anthropocene means
 the end of the Holocene, defined as the time when the climate was hospitable to
@@ -211,16 +210,26 @@ universal human subject, implying that social relations within the human species
 are relatively unimportant, and what matters is some universal, natural trait of
 the biological species, such as greed or the ability to make fire. In reality,
 the climate catastrophe is not the result of a biological trait, but an historical
-process, and therefore an economic structure.
-
-Green catastrophism, because of its Anthropocene tendencies, blinds rhetors to
-social differentiation. Rhetors are therefore driven to use the imaginary
-universal human 'we' and ignore social stratifiers such as class, preventing
-them from identifying an appropriate audience, a fundamental of successful
-rhetoric.
+process, and therefore a social structure.
+
+In the views of political philosophers, the present 'post-political' age
+encourages a process they call 'de-politicisation' [see e.g. @taskale-2016]. In
+this analysis, politics inherently involves contest between interest groups. For
+example, when a landlord seeks to increase the rent, they may face contest from
+their tenants, in the form of legal appeals or rent strikes. At present,
+however, political contests are increasingly de-politicised by means of outside
+technocratic experts employed to generate supposedly objectively ideal solutions
+through scientific, economic measurements. Conflict is replaced with consensus.
+
+Green catastrophism, because of its Anthropocene tendencies, contributes to
+de-politicisation. Anthropocene thinking blinds rhetors to the social
+differentiation which grounds political conflict. Rhetors are therefore driven
+to use the imaginary universal human 'we' and ignore how humans are in fact
+divided into groups with contradictory interests, thus preventing them from
+identifying an appropriate audience, a fundamental of successful rhetoric.
 
 In sum, green catastrophism is accused of encouraging a fatalist outlook,
-disarming radical discourses in favour of business as usual, and deepening the
-'death of politics' by obscuring the importance of power relationships.
-In all these ways, catastrophic language in green rhetoric can help explain
-why green rhetors are getting the fundamentals of successful rhetoric wrong.
+disarming radical discourses in favour of business as usual, and de-politicising
+green issues by obscuring the importance of social structure. In all these ways,
+catastrophic language in green rhetoric can help explain why green rhetors are
+getting the fundamentals of successful rhetoric wrong.
diff --git a/chapter3.md b/chapter3.md
index 41988f3..293a831 100644
--- a/chapter3.md
+++ b/chapter3.md
@@ -20,7 +20,7 @@ might rescue humanity in the nick of time.' [@flannery-2024, pp. 209-210]
 Flannery's critique implies that green rhetors ought to avoid apocalyptic
 language. Her conclusion rests on two key premises: one, that apocalyptic
 language is catastrophic in the same way which leads to fatalism, conservatism
-and the 'death of politics' as described in the previous chapter; and two, that
+and de-politicisation as described in the previous chapter; and two, that
 catastrophe is the dominant effective symbol associated with apocalyptic
 language.
 
@@ -29,7 +29,7 @@ of John, by far the dominant model of apocalyptic literature in the
 post-Christendom West, these criticisms do not bear weight. For John and his historical
 audience, John's visions of catastrophe were essential to his critique of the
 Roman Empire. In contrast to the accusations of fatalism, conservatism and
-death-of-politics levelled against contemporary green catastrophism, John's
+de-politicisation levelled against contemporary green catastrophism, John's
 catastrophism motivated his audience to action, undermined dominant ideologies,
 and exposed economic social structure as a basis for political critique.
 Further, catastrophism only scratches the surface of John's apocalypticism, and
@@ -278,7 +278,7 @@ tribulations.
 
 In summary, the apocalyptic form is crucial to the rhetorical force of John's
 Apocalypse. The catastrophic aspects of his vision work against, not for,
-fatalism, conservatism, and the 'death of politics.' By adopting the form of an
+fatalism, conservatism, and de-politicisation. By adopting the form of an
 apocalyptic prophecy, he defends his cognitive minority community from the
 overwhelming weight of the cognitive majority which surrounds them. Through
 exploring the symbol of tribulations, John steels his audience for suffering,
diff --git a/chapter5.md b/chapter5.md
index 86805b6..0f7b83d 100644
--- a/chapter5.md
+++ b/chapter5.md
@@ -14,7 +14,7 @@ aren't feasible.
 Why are green rhetors failing on the fundamentals? One common suggestion, explored in
 chapter 2, is that green rhetors should avoid the motif of catastrophe, or, in a
 certain sense, 'apocalypse.' Catastrophic rhetoric has been accused of creating
-resignation, despair, apathy, and dismissal, and of killing genuine politics,
+resignation, despair, apathy, and dismissal, and of killing political contest,
 driving the fundamental problems discussed in chapter 1.
 This line of thought, together with the fact that 'apocalypse' is treated as a
 catastrophic symbol in popular culture, leads Frances Flannery to suggest that