Dimitar Vatsov | New Bulgarian University (original) (raw)
Papers by Dimitar Vatsov
Critique & Humanism, 2024
According to data from the IAEA and UNSCEAR, among countries in Europe after the Chernobyl accide... more According to data from the IAEA and UNSCEAR, among countries in Europe after the Chernobyl accident in 1986, Bulgaria it is eighth in the degree of radioactive contamination on its territory. Although it is not the most severely affected, in the measurements of population exposure (of the so-called equivalent dose), Bulgarian citizens are the most severely affected. This disparity is due to the lack of adequate protective measures. Measures that the communist authorities at the time demonstrably took for themselves, but not for the Bulgarian population.
Based on the analysis of numerous and different archival documents, I try to describe the behaviour of the Bulgarian authorities at that time under the concept of "banality of evil". However changing the context of application of this concept, as well as other important concepts - for example, Foucault's "state racism" - also requires significant revisions of the concepts themselves. Because, although the Bulgarian population is massively exposed to the risk of disease and death, it is still not treated by the authorities as an enemy destined for extermination. Moreover, the behaviour of the authorities cannot be explained as "following orders", because what they fail to do is to follow the imperative to preserve the health of the population: and this is the official biopolitical imperative, including for the then socialist state. Ultimately, what happened in Bulgaria after Chernobyl is presented as an implosion of biopolitics. And to explain this implosion, as additions to Arendt's and Foucault's concepts, two new concepts are experimentally developed: "moral debilism" and "class racism”.
The article is based on the large-scale collective research on the topic "Anti-democratic propaga... more The article is based on the large-scale collective research on the topic "Anti-democratic propaganda in Bulgaria", within which an analysis of the national populist and (pro) Russian propaganda in the Bulgarian online media for 2013-2022 was made.
Summary of Report "Russian Propaganda in Bulgarian Media Online (01.01-31.12.2022), 2023
In the last year (2022), Russian propaganda has spread virulently in Bulgarian online space. Comp... more In the last year (2022), Russian propaganda has spread virulently in Bulgarian online space. Compared to the previous year, 2021, by the end of 2022 it had increased by almost 20 times.
The narratives of Russian propaganda have not changed significantly since they were introduced and began to be disseminated in Bulgarian-language online media in 2013. In this report, we show the slight transformations of the propaganda narrative compared to the previous studies of the Human and Social Studies Foundation – Sofia.
At the beginning of the year, Russian propaganda clichés entered Bulgarian online space literally as direct translations of reports in Russian media or as statements of official spokespersons of the Russian Federation.
It must be noted that there was a radical change in the dissemination of propaganda in the summer of 2021 1 – that was when Russian propaganda finally merged with Russian politics, i.e., the official spokespersons of the Russian Federation became the disseminators of propaganda. This approach has led to a broadening of the scope of propaganda (it entered Bulgarian mainstream media, which inevitably quote Russian spokespersons) and to an increase in the number of propaganda articles. It is also noteworthy, however, that Bulgarian speakers and signed articles have become lost in the overall ϑlow of propaganda.
New technological solutions have also contributed to the spread of propaganda. At the beginning of 2022, a network of aggregators was formed to amplify the Russian perspective on events of the day. At the end of the year, Russian propaganda began to use a new technological means of influencing social media – a powerful Machine of Mushroom Websites that amplifies the dissemination of messages with absolutely identical content, which are generally unrelated to reality, by up to about 400 times.
Russian propaganda also influences public opinion in Bulgaria. Of course, objective information sets the pillars of public perception: since the start of the war of aggression against Ukraine, Putin’s approval rating in Bulgaria has fallen by three times, while his disapproval rating has risen by three times. Approval of Russia has declined as well, albeit not so sharply – Bulgarians seem to lay the blame on the master of the Kremlin. After Russia’s losses on the front, confidence in the power of Russian weapons is also decreasing – the majority of Bulgarians either do not believe in, or are undecided about, their power. Still, Russian propaganda has had its breakthroughs:
The pro-Kremlin propaganda messages identified in this study that can be said to have achieved their purpose are:
that Bulgaria is siding with Ukraine because those in power in Bulgaria are dependent on the Euro-Atlantic partners (and not because Ukraine is the country under attack);
the claim that the West has dragged Russia into war, and
that providing military aid to Ukraine means involving Bulgaria in the war.
The present study builds on the large-scale collective study on “Anti-Democratic Propaganda in Bulgaria” within which an analysis was conducted of national-populist and (pro)Russian propaganda in Bulgarian online media for the 2013–2017 period. 2 It focuses on the year of the hot war against Ukraine (2022), but it also covers the years before it (2018–2022). Thus, it cumulatively operates with data for a ten-year period (2013–2022) and analyzes all Bulgarian-language online media and blogs. The quantitative measurements were conducted with the SENSIKA automated media monitoring system. 3 Additional measurements of the spread of propaganda on Facebook in 2022 were conducted with CrowdTangle. The social reception of propaganda narratives was tested in early 2023 through face-to-face structured interviews.
Руската пропаганда в българските медии онлайн (01.01-31.12.2022), 2023
In the last year (2022), Russian propaganda has spread virulently in Bulgarian online space. Comp... more In the last year (2022), Russian propaganda has spread virulently in Bulgarian online space. Compared to the previous year, 2021, by the end of 2022 it had increased by almost 20 times.
The narratives of Russian propaganda have not changed significantly since they were introduced and began to be disseminated in Bulgarian-language online media in 2013. In this report, we show the slight transformations of the propaganda narrative compared to the previous studies of the Human and Social Studies Foundation – Sofia.
At the beginning of the year, Russian propaganda clichés entered Bulgarian online space literally as direct translations of reports in Russian media or as statements of official spokespersons of the Russian Federation.
It must be noted that there was a radical change in the dissemination of propaganda in the summer of 2021 1 – that was when Russian propaganda finally merged with Russian politics, i.e., the official spokespersons of the Russian Federation became the disseminators of propaganda. This approach has led to a broadening of the scope of propaganda (it entered Bulgarian mainstream media, which inevitably quote Russian spokespersons) and to an increase in the number of propaganda articles. It is also noteworthy, however, that Bulgarian speakers and signed articles have become lost in the overall ϑlow of propaganda.
New technological solutions have also contributed to the spread of propaganda. At the beginning of 2022, a network of aggregators was formed to amplify the Russian perspective on events of the day. At the end of the year, Russian propaganda began to use a new technological means of influencing social media – a powerful Machine of Mushroom Websites that amplifies the dissemination of messages with absolutely identical content, which are generally unrelated to reality, by up to about 400 times.
Russian propaganda also influences public opinion in Bulgaria. Of course, objective information sets the pillars of public perception: since the start of the war of aggression against Ukraine, Putin’s approval rating in Bulgaria has fallen by three times, while his disapproval rating has risen by three times. Approval of Russia has declined as well, albeit not so sharply – Bulgarians seem to lay the blame on the master of the Kremlin. After Russia’s losses on the front, confidence in the power of Russian weapons is also decreasing – the majority of Bulgarians either do not believe in, or are undecided about, their power. Still, Russian propaganda has had its breakthroughs:
The pro-Kremlin propaganda messages identified in this study that can be said to have achieved their purpose are:
that Bulgaria is siding with Ukraine because those in power in Bulgaria are dependent on the Euro-Atlantic partners (and not because Ukraine is the country under attack);
the claim that the West has dragged Russia into war, and
that providing military aid to Ukraine means involving Bulgaria in the war.
The present study builds on the large-scale collective study on “Anti-Democratic Propaganda in Bulgaria” within which an analysis was conducted of national-populist and (pro)Russian propaganda in Bulgarian online media for the 2013–2017 period. 2 It focuses on the year of the hot war against Ukraine (2022), but it also covers the years before it (2018–2022). Thus, it cumulatively operates with data for a ten-year period (2013–2022) and analyzes all Bulgarian-language online media and blogs. The quantitative measurements were conducted with the SENSIKA automated media monitoring system. 3 Additional measurements of the spread of propaganda on Facebook in 2022 were conducted with CrowdTangle. The social reception of propaganda narratives was tested in early 2023 through face-to-face structured interviews.
Критика и хуманизъм, 2010
Критика и хуманизъм, 2012
Социологически проблеми, 2002
Критика и хуманизъм, 2015
International Critical Thought, Apr 3, 2017
This essay reexamines "the paradox of the subject" as one of the main traps for critical theory t... more This essay reexamines "the paradox of the subject" as one of the main traps for critical theory today. I attempt to demonstrate that this famous paradox is an effect of the ambivalence of the power/ freedom relationship in Foucault and it may be resolved by recourse to Nietzsche. Following Paul Patton I argue that in a Nietzschean context "power" and "freedom" are not in opposition: freedom is power to act. But this synonymy creates a risk that "freedom" will become indistinguishable from "subjection" and "subordination." Turning once again to Nietzsche's perspectivism, I attempt to demonstrate how immanent evaluative confrontations are made between "freedom" and "power"-how, when, and why they function as antonyms. Freedom is not every power, but only the one we exercise from "our" actual perspective, in "the first person." With every performance we inevitably make strong evaluations-including distinctions between freedom and domination-in an entirely immanent way, without resorting to justification. Finally, I attempt to focus on the strategic possibilities for critique today, which can enable us to practice-while keeping reflexive "modesty"-freedom of evaluation, including the freedom of making strong evaluations, which are not based upon pre-given normative models.
Przestrzenie Teorii, Nov 24, 2015
In contrast to Derrida and Butler, who overemphasized the subversive force of performatives, here... more In contrast to Derrida and Butler, who overemphasized the subversive force of performatives, here the focus is on the immanent (micro-)sovereign power of performative utterances. Hence, what is proposed here is a search for the basic concept of power at the micro-level of speech acts. Before being codified with reference to certain stable power relations or contexts and before being objectified in different forms of domination and/or violence, power must be analyzed at the level of immediate performatives, where the struggle for power-codification could be followed in vivo. A task like this requires a conceptual shift: the illocutionary force of speech acts must be reinterpreted as their immediate evaluative force, i.e. as illocutionary power. Taking into account Derrida's critique of Austin's theory of speech acts, we should recognize that performatives are not singular or atomistic speech acts, nor are they predetermined by certain already given contexts or procedures. They are embedded in a citation and trace signs, without any final or autonomous signification. And yet, performatives have a specific kind of sovereignty. It is not the sovereignty of the 'act' itself but of the act's performance. The actual (in the sense of 'ongoing') performance has an immediate force that is irreversible and also non-citable. Even in the case of a direct citation, a citing performance sediments into an irreversible arrow, thus immediately reordering and re-evaluating all points in its trajectory. This performance does not fulfill a perspective, but it irreversibly forms a perspective. This effect of the virtuosity of an immediate performance could be called the power effect since it not only demonstrates how we make things with words, but also how we re-evaluate the things that were made through words. If an ongoing performance is such an immediate source of micro-power, then its role is not only to be ironically subversive and resistant to the already existing macro-codifications of power and domination. Performatives have their own sovereign power and are therefore capable of a direct affirmation and re-affirmation of the intersubjective frames of our experience. Ogólne zadanie tego tekstu to ponowne postawienie pytania o szansę postanalitycznej filozofii języka (w szczególności teorii aktów mowy Johna Austina) na sformułowanie perspektywy dla teorii krytycznej. Główne pytanie jest zatem następujące: czy performatywy mo gą gra ć rolę immanentnej instancji krytycznej w praktyce społecznej i j ęzykowej, a jeśli tak, to w ja ki sposób ? Istnieje już wzorcowa propozycja odpowiedzi na to pytanie. Powstała dzięki resygnifikacji "performatywu" Austina przeprowadzonej śladami Derridy i znajdziemy ją w pracach Judith Butler. Jej koncepcja ________________________
Критика и хуманизъм, 2009
Критика и хуманизъм, 2002
Критика и хуманизъм, 2011
Revolution and/or Sovereignty? Critique of the Uses of ‘Exception’ in the Radical Political Discourses, 2023
Here I deconstruct the terms ‘exception’ and ‘state of exception’ – as well as some of their subs... more Here I deconstruct the terms ‘exception’ and ‘state of exception’ – as well as some of their substitutes - in the far right and far left discourses. In the line of Jacques Derrida and Giorgio Agamben I show that Carl Schmitt defining 1) ‘the dictatorship’ and later 2) ‘the sovereignty’ through ‘exception’ revisits the revolutionary Marxism of his time. But it is not just Walter Benjamin who plays the part of his left adversary in their nearly direct intellectual exchange. More than that Schmitt inherits the exceptionalism and inverts the meanings of the Marxist terms ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’ and ‘revolutionary situation’ as they are reworked by Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky in the second decade of 20th century. Schmitt shares wilt Lenin and Trotsky their anti-legalist and decisionist attitude presupposing ‘lawless power’ – a power eliminating the existing law and constituting a new law ex nihilo, in an exceptional situation. But Schmitt makes a dramatic change replacing the source of that power: no more the revolutionary masses illegally subverting the law from below but the sovereign legally reestablishing the law from above is the one who exercises ‘lawless power’.
More generaly and despite of the important differences both the far right and far left discourses are akin to use ‘exception’ as a totalized metaphor (as an empty signifier) justifying some kind of ‘lawless power’, i.e. terror. The revolutionary terror and the state terror (in its strict sense: as an exercise of power/violence beyond the law) are mirror concepts. Only as a hypothesis we can suggest that they are interconnected vessels in practice: the more the terror increases the more the exceptional measures fighting ‘against the terror’ increase; and vice versa.
Революция и/или суверенитет. Критика на употребите на "извънредността" в радикалните политически дискурси, 2021
Here I deconstruct the terms ‘exception’ and ‘state of exception’ – as well as some of their subs... more Here I deconstruct the terms ‘exception’ and ‘state of exception’ – as well as some of their substitutes - in the far right and far left discourses. In the line of Jacques Derrida and Giorgio Agamben I show that Carl Schmitt defining 1) ‘the dictatorship’ and later 2) ‘the sovereignty’ through ‘exception’ revisits the revolutionary Marxism of his time. But it is not just Walter Benjamin who plays the part of his left adversary in their nearly direct intellectual exchange. More than that Schmitt inherits the exceptionalism and inverts the meanings of the Marxist terms ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’ and ‘revolutionary situation’ as they are reworked by Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky in the second decade of 20th century. Schmitt shares wilt Lenin and Trotsky their anti-legalist and decisionist attitude presupposing ‘lawless power’ – a power eliminating the existing law and constituting a new law ex nihilo, in an exceptional situation. But Schmitt makes a dramatic change replacing the source of that power: no more the revolutionary masses illegally subverting the law from below but the sovereign legally reestablishing the law from above is the one who exercises ‘lawless power’.
More generaly and despite of the important differences both the far right and far left discourses are akin to use ‘exception’ as a totalized metaphor (as an empty signifier) justifying some kind of ‘lawless power’, i.e. terror. The revolutionary terror and the state terror (in its strict sense: as an exercise of power/violence beyond the law) are mirror concepts. Only as a hypothesis we can suggest that they are interconnected vessels in practice: the more the terror increases the more the exceptional measures fighting ‘against the terror’ increase; and vice versa.
Критика и хуманизъм, 2012
Critique & Humanism, 2024
According to data from the IAEA and UNSCEAR, among countries in Europe after the Chernobyl accide... more According to data from the IAEA and UNSCEAR, among countries in Europe after the Chernobyl accident in 1986, Bulgaria it is eighth in the degree of radioactive contamination on its territory. Although it is not the most severely affected, in the measurements of population exposure (of the so-called equivalent dose), Bulgarian citizens are the most severely affected. This disparity is due to the lack of adequate protective measures. Measures that the communist authorities at the time demonstrably took for themselves, but not for the Bulgarian population.
Based on the analysis of numerous and different archival documents, I try to describe the behaviour of the Bulgarian authorities at that time under the concept of "banality of evil". However changing the context of application of this concept, as well as other important concepts - for example, Foucault's "state racism" - also requires significant revisions of the concepts themselves. Because, although the Bulgarian population is massively exposed to the risk of disease and death, it is still not treated by the authorities as an enemy destined for extermination. Moreover, the behaviour of the authorities cannot be explained as "following orders", because what they fail to do is to follow the imperative to preserve the health of the population: and this is the official biopolitical imperative, including for the then socialist state. Ultimately, what happened in Bulgaria after Chernobyl is presented as an implosion of biopolitics. And to explain this implosion, as additions to Arendt's and Foucault's concepts, two new concepts are experimentally developed: "moral debilism" and "class racism”.
The article is based on the large-scale collective research on the topic "Anti-democratic propaga... more The article is based on the large-scale collective research on the topic "Anti-democratic propaganda in Bulgaria", within which an analysis of the national populist and (pro) Russian propaganda in the Bulgarian online media for 2013-2022 was made.
Summary of Report "Russian Propaganda in Bulgarian Media Online (01.01-31.12.2022), 2023
In the last year (2022), Russian propaganda has spread virulently in Bulgarian online space. Comp... more In the last year (2022), Russian propaganda has spread virulently in Bulgarian online space. Compared to the previous year, 2021, by the end of 2022 it had increased by almost 20 times.
The narratives of Russian propaganda have not changed significantly since they were introduced and began to be disseminated in Bulgarian-language online media in 2013. In this report, we show the slight transformations of the propaganda narrative compared to the previous studies of the Human and Social Studies Foundation – Sofia.
At the beginning of the year, Russian propaganda clichés entered Bulgarian online space literally as direct translations of reports in Russian media or as statements of official spokespersons of the Russian Federation.
It must be noted that there was a radical change in the dissemination of propaganda in the summer of 2021 1 – that was when Russian propaganda finally merged with Russian politics, i.e., the official spokespersons of the Russian Federation became the disseminators of propaganda. This approach has led to a broadening of the scope of propaganda (it entered Bulgarian mainstream media, which inevitably quote Russian spokespersons) and to an increase in the number of propaganda articles. It is also noteworthy, however, that Bulgarian speakers and signed articles have become lost in the overall ϑlow of propaganda.
New technological solutions have also contributed to the spread of propaganda. At the beginning of 2022, a network of aggregators was formed to amplify the Russian perspective on events of the day. At the end of the year, Russian propaganda began to use a new technological means of influencing social media – a powerful Machine of Mushroom Websites that amplifies the dissemination of messages with absolutely identical content, which are generally unrelated to reality, by up to about 400 times.
Russian propaganda also influences public opinion in Bulgaria. Of course, objective information sets the pillars of public perception: since the start of the war of aggression against Ukraine, Putin’s approval rating in Bulgaria has fallen by three times, while his disapproval rating has risen by three times. Approval of Russia has declined as well, albeit not so sharply – Bulgarians seem to lay the blame on the master of the Kremlin. After Russia’s losses on the front, confidence in the power of Russian weapons is also decreasing – the majority of Bulgarians either do not believe in, or are undecided about, their power. Still, Russian propaganda has had its breakthroughs:
The pro-Kremlin propaganda messages identified in this study that can be said to have achieved their purpose are:
that Bulgaria is siding with Ukraine because those in power in Bulgaria are dependent on the Euro-Atlantic partners (and not because Ukraine is the country under attack);
the claim that the West has dragged Russia into war, and
that providing military aid to Ukraine means involving Bulgaria in the war.
The present study builds on the large-scale collective study on “Anti-Democratic Propaganda in Bulgaria” within which an analysis was conducted of national-populist and (pro)Russian propaganda in Bulgarian online media for the 2013–2017 period. 2 It focuses on the year of the hot war against Ukraine (2022), but it also covers the years before it (2018–2022). Thus, it cumulatively operates with data for a ten-year period (2013–2022) and analyzes all Bulgarian-language online media and blogs. The quantitative measurements were conducted with the SENSIKA automated media monitoring system. 3 Additional measurements of the spread of propaganda on Facebook in 2022 were conducted with CrowdTangle. The social reception of propaganda narratives was tested in early 2023 through face-to-face structured interviews.
Руската пропаганда в българските медии онлайн (01.01-31.12.2022), 2023
In the last year (2022), Russian propaganda has spread virulently in Bulgarian online space. Comp... more In the last year (2022), Russian propaganda has spread virulently in Bulgarian online space. Compared to the previous year, 2021, by the end of 2022 it had increased by almost 20 times.
The narratives of Russian propaganda have not changed significantly since they were introduced and began to be disseminated in Bulgarian-language online media in 2013. In this report, we show the slight transformations of the propaganda narrative compared to the previous studies of the Human and Social Studies Foundation – Sofia.
At the beginning of the year, Russian propaganda clichés entered Bulgarian online space literally as direct translations of reports in Russian media or as statements of official spokespersons of the Russian Federation.
It must be noted that there was a radical change in the dissemination of propaganda in the summer of 2021 1 – that was when Russian propaganda finally merged with Russian politics, i.e., the official spokespersons of the Russian Federation became the disseminators of propaganda. This approach has led to a broadening of the scope of propaganda (it entered Bulgarian mainstream media, which inevitably quote Russian spokespersons) and to an increase in the number of propaganda articles. It is also noteworthy, however, that Bulgarian speakers and signed articles have become lost in the overall ϑlow of propaganda.
New technological solutions have also contributed to the spread of propaganda. At the beginning of 2022, a network of aggregators was formed to amplify the Russian perspective on events of the day. At the end of the year, Russian propaganda began to use a new technological means of influencing social media – a powerful Machine of Mushroom Websites that amplifies the dissemination of messages with absolutely identical content, which are generally unrelated to reality, by up to about 400 times.
Russian propaganda also influences public opinion in Bulgaria. Of course, objective information sets the pillars of public perception: since the start of the war of aggression against Ukraine, Putin’s approval rating in Bulgaria has fallen by three times, while his disapproval rating has risen by three times. Approval of Russia has declined as well, albeit not so sharply – Bulgarians seem to lay the blame on the master of the Kremlin. After Russia’s losses on the front, confidence in the power of Russian weapons is also decreasing – the majority of Bulgarians either do not believe in, or are undecided about, their power. Still, Russian propaganda has had its breakthroughs:
The pro-Kremlin propaganda messages identified in this study that can be said to have achieved their purpose are:
that Bulgaria is siding with Ukraine because those in power in Bulgaria are dependent on the Euro-Atlantic partners (and not because Ukraine is the country under attack);
the claim that the West has dragged Russia into war, and
that providing military aid to Ukraine means involving Bulgaria in the war.
The present study builds on the large-scale collective study on “Anti-Democratic Propaganda in Bulgaria” within which an analysis was conducted of national-populist and (pro)Russian propaganda in Bulgarian online media for the 2013–2017 period. 2 It focuses on the year of the hot war against Ukraine (2022), but it also covers the years before it (2018–2022). Thus, it cumulatively operates with data for a ten-year period (2013–2022) and analyzes all Bulgarian-language online media and blogs. The quantitative measurements were conducted with the SENSIKA automated media monitoring system. 3 Additional measurements of the spread of propaganda on Facebook in 2022 were conducted with CrowdTangle. The social reception of propaganda narratives was tested in early 2023 through face-to-face structured interviews.
Критика и хуманизъм, 2010
Критика и хуманизъм, 2012
Социологически проблеми, 2002
Критика и хуманизъм, 2015
International Critical Thought, Apr 3, 2017
This essay reexamines "the paradox of the subject" as one of the main traps for critical theory t... more This essay reexamines "the paradox of the subject" as one of the main traps for critical theory today. I attempt to demonstrate that this famous paradox is an effect of the ambivalence of the power/ freedom relationship in Foucault and it may be resolved by recourse to Nietzsche. Following Paul Patton I argue that in a Nietzschean context "power" and "freedom" are not in opposition: freedom is power to act. But this synonymy creates a risk that "freedom" will become indistinguishable from "subjection" and "subordination." Turning once again to Nietzsche's perspectivism, I attempt to demonstrate how immanent evaluative confrontations are made between "freedom" and "power"-how, when, and why they function as antonyms. Freedom is not every power, but only the one we exercise from "our" actual perspective, in "the first person." With every performance we inevitably make strong evaluations-including distinctions between freedom and domination-in an entirely immanent way, without resorting to justification. Finally, I attempt to focus on the strategic possibilities for critique today, which can enable us to practice-while keeping reflexive "modesty"-freedom of evaluation, including the freedom of making strong evaluations, which are not based upon pre-given normative models.
Przestrzenie Teorii, Nov 24, 2015
In contrast to Derrida and Butler, who overemphasized the subversive force of performatives, here... more In contrast to Derrida and Butler, who overemphasized the subversive force of performatives, here the focus is on the immanent (micro-)sovereign power of performative utterances. Hence, what is proposed here is a search for the basic concept of power at the micro-level of speech acts. Before being codified with reference to certain stable power relations or contexts and before being objectified in different forms of domination and/or violence, power must be analyzed at the level of immediate performatives, where the struggle for power-codification could be followed in vivo. A task like this requires a conceptual shift: the illocutionary force of speech acts must be reinterpreted as their immediate evaluative force, i.e. as illocutionary power. Taking into account Derrida's critique of Austin's theory of speech acts, we should recognize that performatives are not singular or atomistic speech acts, nor are they predetermined by certain already given contexts or procedures. They are embedded in a citation and trace signs, without any final or autonomous signification. And yet, performatives have a specific kind of sovereignty. It is not the sovereignty of the 'act' itself but of the act's performance. The actual (in the sense of 'ongoing') performance has an immediate force that is irreversible and also non-citable. Even in the case of a direct citation, a citing performance sediments into an irreversible arrow, thus immediately reordering and re-evaluating all points in its trajectory. This performance does not fulfill a perspective, but it irreversibly forms a perspective. This effect of the virtuosity of an immediate performance could be called the power effect since it not only demonstrates how we make things with words, but also how we re-evaluate the things that were made through words. If an ongoing performance is such an immediate source of micro-power, then its role is not only to be ironically subversive and resistant to the already existing macro-codifications of power and domination. Performatives have their own sovereign power and are therefore capable of a direct affirmation and re-affirmation of the intersubjective frames of our experience. Ogólne zadanie tego tekstu to ponowne postawienie pytania o szansę postanalitycznej filozofii języka (w szczególności teorii aktów mowy Johna Austina) na sformułowanie perspektywy dla teorii krytycznej. Główne pytanie jest zatem następujące: czy performatywy mo gą gra ć rolę immanentnej instancji krytycznej w praktyce społecznej i j ęzykowej, a jeśli tak, to w ja ki sposób ? Istnieje już wzorcowa propozycja odpowiedzi na to pytanie. Powstała dzięki resygnifikacji "performatywu" Austina przeprowadzonej śladami Derridy i znajdziemy ją w pracach Judith Butler. Jej koncepcja ________________________
Критика и хуманизъм, 2009
Критика и хуманизъм, 2002
Критика и хуманизъм, 2011
Revolution and/or Sovereignty? Critique of the Uses of ‘Exception’ in the Radical Political Discourses, 2023
Here I deconstruct the terms ‘exception’ and ‘state of exception’ – as well as some of their subs... more Here I deconstruct the terms ‘exception’ and ‘state of exception’ – as well as some of their substitutes - in the far right and far left discourses. In the line of Jacques Derrida and Giorgio Agamben I show that Carl Schmitt defining 1) ‘the dictatorship’ and later 2) ‘the sovereignty’ through ‘exception’ revisits the revolutionary Marxism of his time. But it is not just Walter Benjamin who plays the part of his left adversary in their nearly direct intellectual exchange. More than that Schmitt inherits the exceptionalism and inverts the meanings of the Marxist terms ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’ and ‘revolutionary situation’ as they are reworked by Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky in the second decade of 20th century. Schmitt shares wilt Lenin and Trotsky their anti-legalist and decisionist attitude presupposing ‘lawless power’ – a power eliminating the existing law and constituting a new law ex nihilo, in an exceptional situation. But Schmitt makes a dramatic change replacing the source of that power: no more the revolutionary masses illegally subverting the law from below but the sovereign legally reestablishing the law from above is the one who exercises ‘lawless power’.
More generaly and despite of the important differences both the far right and far left discourses are akin to use ‘exception’ as a totalized metaphor (as an empty signifier) justifying some kind of ‘lawless power’, i.e. terror. The revolutionary terror and the state terror (in its strict sense: as an exercise of power/violence beyond the law) are mirror concepts. Only as a hypothesis we can suggest that they are interconnected vessels in practice: the more the terror increases the more the exceptional measures fighting ‘against the terror’ increase; and vice versa.
Революция и/или суверенитет. Критика на употребите на "извънредността" в радикалните политически дискурси, 2021
Here I deconstruct the terms ‘exception’ and ‘state of exception’ – as well as some of their subs... more Here I deconstruct the terms ‘exception’ and ‘state of exception’ – as well as some of their substitutes - in the far right and far left discourses. In the line of Jacques Derrida and Giorgio Agamben I show that Carl Schmitt defining 1) ‘the dictatorship’ and later 2) ‘the sovereignty’ through ‘exception’ revisits the revolutionary Marxism of his time. But it is not just Walter Benjamin who plays the part of his left adversary in their nearly direct intellectual exchange. More than that Schmitt inherits the exceptionalism and inverts the meanings of the Marxist terms ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’ and ‘revolutionary situation’ as they are reworked by Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky in the second decade of 20th century. Schmitt shares wilt Lenin and Trotsky their anti-legalist and decisionist attitude presupposing ‘lawless power’ – a power eliminating the existing law and constituting a new law ex nihilo, in an exceptional situation. But Schmitt makes a dramatic change replacing the source of that power: no more the revolutionary masses illegally subverting the law from below but the sovereign legally reestablishing the law from above is the one who exercises ‘lawless power’.
More generaly and despite of the important differences both the far right and far left discourses are akin to use ‘exception’ as a totalized metaphor (as an empty signifier) justifying some kind of ‘lawless power’, i.e. terror. The revolutionary terror and the state terror (in its strict sense: as an exercise of power/violence beyond the law) are mirror concepts. Only as a hypothesis we can suggest that they are interconnected vessels in practice: the more the terror increases the more the exceptional measures fighting ‘against the terror’ increase; and vice versa.
Критика и хуманизъм, 2012
Essays on Power and Truth (Опити върху властта и истината), 2009
Freedom and Recognition: The Interactive Sources of Identity (Свобода и признаване: Интерактивните извори на идентичността), 2006
Ontology of Affirmation. Nietzsche as a Task ((, 2003
![Research paper thumbnail of ТОВА Е ИСТИНА [This is True!]](https://attachments.academia-assets.com/55160813/thumbnails/1.jpg)
](Dimitar Vatsov This Is True! Summary: This book examines truth-telling as a specific type of per... more Dimitar Vatsov
This Is True!
Summary:
This book examines truth-telling as a specific type of performative. It answers two main questions: (1) What do we actually do when we say “This is true!”? To answer this question, Parts One and Two of the book present a specific theory of truth – a theory that takes into account the basic pragmatic function of the performative “This is true!”, which is to raise what is declared to be true as a model that must be followed. Not less important, though, is the question: (2) Under what circumstances do we recognize that “something declared to be true” is true? In response, Part Three of the book presents an ontological post-pragmatist theory of speech that takes into account how, when, and for how long already declared “truths” can remain relevant to actual experience.
NB! Find an enlarged summary in English in the end of the book!
Contents
On philosophy today, and acknowledgements
INTRODUCTION:
How do we tell the truth about truth?
1. The asymmetry between institutional significance and rare everyday uses of “truth”
2. Everyday life, giving accounts, and truths
3. Truth-telling as an ultimate account, and the wide field of its actual uses
4. The performative “This is true!” after Austin and Wittgenstein
4.1 Why “performative”?
4.2 Truth-telling and commands
4.3 Truth-telling as a liminal performative
5. Why are cases not “data”?
6. How do we tell the truth about “truth”? Giving examples
7. The inevitability of ultimate generalizations
PART I:
The performative “This is true!” and its primitive meaning
1. “Agrippa’s trilemma” instead of an introduction
2. Performative analysis: Methodological limitations
3. Minimalist theories
3.1 The trap of the T-schema
3.2 Generalization as a performative purpose
3.3 The transformed “vehicle” of truth
4. Truth – a means of banalization beyond banality: “Take as a model!”
5. The primitive meaning of the performative “This is true!”
5.1 Cancellation of doubt
5.2 Assurance
5.3 De-actualization
5.4 Fragmentation and abstraction of fragments
5.5 De-metaphorization
5.6 De-indexicalization
5.6.1 De-indexicalization 1 (cancellation of reference)
5.6.2 De-indexicalization 2 (cancellation of shifts of focus)
5.7 De-personalization
6. Summary
PART II:
The performative “This is true!” and logical truths
1. Introduction: The temporary “eternity” of logical truths
2. The imperativeness of the performative “This is true!” and the “inexorability” of truths
3. The fragile inexorability of logical truths
4. The materiality of meaning and the materiality of truths
5. Conclusions on the status of logical truths
6. The error of correspondence theories
7. The materiality of speech and the impossible analyticity
8. Material tautologies and the truths about them
9. On the formality of literal repetitions
PART III:
Ontology of truth: The thing, the fact, the rule
1. Ontological tasks
2. Preliminary ontological hypotheses
3. Dual indexicality – from forces to words and from words to forces
4. The analytic-synthetic distinction as indexical difference
5. The thing in speech
6. General “objects” and “names”
7. The thing, and substance as a hyperbole of the thing
8. Paradigmatic articulations: Essences and facts
9. Do we need essential truths? (Towards the history of the present-day conundrum)
10. Naming and practical essentialization: Beyond Kripke
11. Twin Earth, indexicality, and belated essentialism
12. The Twin Earth experiment revised: Alternative ways of “actual” construction of “reality”
13. Lessons learned: The technique of “resolving” contradictions, or, “Divide and rule!”
14. Actuality and indexicality. Summary
15. Truth: Reverse “adaequatio” as indexical relevance
16. The fact, the thing, and the rule. Modes of truth as indexical modalities
First “closed” ending:
General summary
Second “open” ending:
Todor Hristov, A few questions about truth
References
Index of terms and authors