From Representation to Indignation: A Theoretical Reflection on Politics and Affect

"It is no longer time for charts. It is time for emotions; it is time for courage (Roger Hallam, co-founder of Extinction Rebellion, World Web Forum 2020, 20 January 2020)" Relations between people and political representatives are rhythmed, amongst others, by moments of rupture and contestation. In recent years, a number of movements have emerged - from the Indignados in 2011 to the Yellow Vests or Extinction Rebellion today – to explicitly reject “representation as usual”. This has coincided with a constructivist turn in theories of representation (Saward, 2010) which allowed scholars to approach not only its electoral forms, but also the performance of representation by the very actors rejecting it. Yet, despite these innovations, scholars have remained ill-equipped to understand the rift between people and those speaking on their behalf. By staying close to the classic language of “interests” and “needs”, they have turned a blind eye to the other objects that populate representation: affects and emotions. In an age of increasing affective explicitness and polarization (Wahl-Jorgensen, 2019), I argue that a profound affective turn is necessary in theories of representation to understand people’s relation to politics today. Drawing on ongoing doctoral research, I focus my attention on indignation specifically to approach representational relationship from an affective point of view. Often described as “the political affect par excellence” (Lordon, 2016), indignation is what triggers “his or her desire to resists illegitimate political authority” (Stolze, 2014). It is the name for the “natural impulse of subjects to coalesce against their sovereign” (Matheron, 1994). But more than just the affect of “revolt and rebellion” (Hardt & Negri, 2009), in this article I demonstrate how indignation intervenes, conceptually, at critical points in people’s relation to politics. By bringing into conversation contemporary theories of representation (Saward, 2010; Severs 2012; Rosanvallon 2011, Urbinati 2006) with affect theories of a Spinozist tradition (Lordon, 2016; Williams, 2007; Ruddick, 2010, Slaby & von Scheve 2019), I argue that indignation allows us to revisit foundational elements of politics, in particular: materiality, relationality and morality, through attention to the semantic field of dignity. I also show how indignation articulates another political temporality than the one imposed by representative politics; one made of tipping points and affective bifurcations in the collective affects of society. With my paper, I seek to demonstrate that the language of affect, and indignation specifically, is necessary to move beyond the theoretical constraints imposed by the logic of representation and better apprehend the political reality of the 21st century.