ABSTRACT
The metastructural approach proposed here differs considerably from that of common Marxism, insofar as it argues that the ruling class has two components, that of (capitalist) property and that of “competence” (in Bourdieu’s sense: i.e. not knowledge, but “competent authority” as attributed by institutions). This couple derives from the market/organisation dyad, two primary forms which are intertwined in modern society. The government by speech [la parole] to which this society lays claim is relayed in this alternative, and each of its two terms becomes a class factor. The constitutive unity of the popular (or fundamental) class, that of common people, is defined by the same matrix, which refers to the primordial order of (shared) “discourse”, the focus of politics. Its power is measured by its ability to control the market through organisation and to control organisation through democratic discourse.
This has a twofold ecological dimension. I emphasise Marx’s radically ecological analysis of capital, which demonstrates that the logic of surplus-value is entirely indifferent to the fate of nature. As for “competence”, I show that it plays a major role in both productivism and consumerism. This is something which “common Marxism” – and even more so “vulgar Marxism” – is unable to conceive of.
