ABSTRACT
Difference was the bridge concept that spanned the waters to assemblage theory. Assemblages are characterized along two dimensions: along the first dimension are specified the variable roles which component parts may play, from a purely material role to a purely expressive one, as well as mixtures of the two. A second dimension characterizes processes in which these components are involved: processes which stabilize or destabilize the identity of the assemblage. The earliest notable instance when a new assemblage in the Civil Rights Movement began to form for the purpose of direct action protests against segregation was the 1955–56 Montgomery, Alabama year long bus boycott. For Manuel DeLanda, the local and the structural are not oppositive elements of social process but part and parcel of a societal assemblage. Yet, of the several ideas and their tangents associated with assemblage theories, there is sufficient congruence to encourage a radical rethinking of received notions as to what capitalism has become.
