ABSTRACT
This chapter sets up the project of Part I of the book, arguing that understanding the impact of social acceleration on politics means understanding not just its technical and material effects but also its affective consequences.
It begins by looking at two of the major political responses to social acceleration. It first investigates the neoliberal valorization of speed, critiquing its indifference to the violence and inequalities of social acceleration. It then turns to the rise of reactionary political responses to social acceleration, looking at the ways in which anxiety over a perceived loss of control over global flows can give rise to anti-immigration movements.
This discussion is used to introduce the major theoretical concept of this chapter: ressentiment against speed. Here, an in-depth reading of Nietzsche is used to theorize how experiences of powerlessness and insecurity in a world of accelerating global flows can crystallize into a desire for revenge against constituencies viewed as representative of those global flows. The chapter ends with a call for greater analysis of the affects produced by global acceleration, arguing that without properly understanding them, we will be hampered in our ability to respond effectively to these reactionary political movements and dispositions.
