This book focuses on the ethics , politics, and practices of responsiveness in the context of racism, inequality, difference, and controversy in a globalising world that is deeply fractured and polarised . The election of Donald Trump as US President, the departure of the United Kingdom from the EU, the rise of right-wing populist movements and parties, and the resurgence of the far-right across the âFirstâ world, on the one hand, and the continuing appeal of ultra-nationalisms and religious fundamentalisms in the global âSouthâ on the otherâall of these are symptoms of deep struggles along racial, religious, national, and class lines. The possibilities for debate and negotiation across difference are increasingly shaped by algorithmic logics and the âattention economyâ (Crogan and Kinsley 2012) in which what we hear and see is individually filtered and curated, and our attention is directed towards polarised news streams. This volume foregrounds alternative political possibilities based on ethical responsiveness to others.
Some aspects of this conjuncture are especially germane to the issues and concerns of this volume, threading their wayâeither implicitly or explicitlyâthrough the essays gathered here. Clearly the resurgence and electoral success of far-right nationalisms and authoritarian politics across the globeâfrom Donald Trump in the United States to Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines, and Narendra Modi in India to name a fewâis one such thread. The recent Brexit vote in the United Kingdom, the return to parliament of the One Nation Party in Australia, and the success of far-right parties across much of Europe provide further examples of the mainstreaming of xenophobia. While there are local, national, and regional specificities in each of these contexts, all are also implicated in transnational dynamics of globalised Islamophobia and increasingly securitised migration policies .
Ghassan Hage (2011, 156) identifies a process of the âglobalisation of the Islamic other around the worldâ at the turn of the twenty-first century in which âIslamâ has become homogenised as the global threatening other, even as the category that embodies the Islamic threat differs from one country to another (âAsiansâ in Britain, âTurksâ in Germany, âLebaneseâ in Australia, and so on). During the enduring and increasingly dispersed âwar on terrorâ, Muslims and Islam have been racialised as terrorists , sexual predators, and oppressors of women; an all-encompassing threat to âthe Westâ and its purported values. The globalised âMuslim otherâ is at the centre of militarised border politics focused on restricting migration of refugees, asylum seekers and, in the case of the United States, specifically named Muslim majority countries. Since the Australian government in 2001 refused the MV Tampa permission to bring to the Australian mainland hundreds of asylum seekers rescued at sea from a sinking boat, the threat of terrorism and the concern for security have been mobilised to ensure widespread public support for increasingly punitive practices in response to asylum seekers travelling by boat. Currently, the Australian Navy is deployed to turn back asylum seeker boats, private security companies are paid to run camps on Nauru and Manus Island, and refugees in Australia face strict visa conditions and behaviour regulations. These policies are routinely condemned by the United Nations and human rights groups, finding that some of these practices constitute torture under the UN Convention. Despite, or perhaps because of, these criticisms, resurgent far-right parties in Europe now routinely advocate that their states take the âAustralian solutionâ as inspiration.
First Nations resurgence in settler colonies including Australia, Canada, and the United States marks another key struggle in the contemporary politics of difference. The Idle No More movement in Canada, Dakota Access Pipeline struggle in the United States, and large protests against the celebration of âAustralia Dayâ have all attracted international attention. Since the Zapatistaâs ânetwarâ, Indigenous peoples have mobilised global solidarities to demand justice and assert sovereignties (Dreher et al. 2018). Too often , these vital expressions of Indigenous sovereignties are met with public criticism and state responses which reassert colonial relations. For instance, a central claim of the 2017 Uluru Statement from the Heart issued after an unprecedented process of consultation with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoplesâa proposal for a First Nations Voice to Parliamentâwas dismissed out of hand by the Australian government in a move described as reproducing the colonial logic that Indigenous peoples are incapable of governing themselves. #NODAPL protesters at Standing Rock were met with militarised force.
Against this backdrop, First Nations theorists of resurgence such as Audra Simpson (2014) and Glen Coulthard (2014) foreground the politics of refusal. Coulthard challenges recognition as a politics for managing difference, arguing that acknowledgement and reconciliation offer false promises. Instead, Coulthard examines an alternative politics of self-recognition that seeks to revalue, reconstruct, and redeploy âplace-basedâ Indigenous cultural practices. The theory of First Nations resurgence and Indigenous practices of freedom pose challenging questions for non-Indigenous advocates of recognition. The challenge to analyse non-Indigenous responses to First Nations refusal of the politics of recognition is taken up in several chapters in this collection.
Finally, we approach the recurring âfree speech debatesâ characteristic of many liberal multicultures as a crucial fault line in the contemporary politics of difference. From the publication of Salman Rushdieâs The Satanic Verses to the Danish cartoons controversy and the attacks on Charlie Hebdo in Paris, there is a long history of transnationally mediated debates on the limits of âfree speechâ, usually centred on racialised communities, including Muslims and African-Americans. In the United States, we see high level media and political support for the free speech of alt-right provocateur Milo Yiannopolous, coupled with widespread criticism of footballers who âtake a kneeâ to highlight police brutality targeting African-Americans. In France, the nationalistic identification of âJe Suis Charlieâ has been followed by increasing state surveillance and restrictions on dissenting Arab voices (Titley et al. 2017). In so many âfree speech debatesâ, apparently liberal values have become âweaponisedâ (Liz Feteke quoted in Titley et al. 2017), normalising the vilification of racialised communities as well as policing the voices of those same communities (Dreher and Griffiths 2018). This paradox marks the limits and the violent consequences of a narrow version of âfree speechâ for addressing the contemporary politics of difference, as well as bringing into view the way in which âfree speechâ is performatively deployed in order to mark off and accentuateâand therefore polariseâapparent civilisational and cultural differences between the benighted âWestâ (which values free speech) and the rest (who do not). As a mark or symbol of civilisational identity, therefore, free speech becomes less a means towards achieving mutual understanding across difference and more a means of obstructing communication so that sharp lines of distinction can be drawn between cultures that are perceived to be incompatible and forever compelled to âclashâ.
Re-orienting the Politics of Difference: From âVoiceâ to âResponseâ
Our interest in ethical responsiveness is prompted by the limits of the politics of speech and âvoiceâ in contemporary âfree speech debatesâ as above, and in projects for social justice more broadly. Scholarship and practice around multiculturalism, antiracism , marginalisation, and difference have long mobilised a politics of speaking or representation, yet attention to forms of responsiveness such as listening, reading, and witnessing is underdeveloped. Voice is foregrounded in claims to give âvoice to the voicelessâ or âfind oneâs voiceâ, while contemporary politics and digital media provide proliferating opportunities to âhave your sayâ or to share previously unheard stories. Yet despite the central place of âvoiceâ in democratic theory and practice, and in movements for social justice, remarkably little attention is paid to the question of whether indeed voices are actually heard or valued (Couldry 2010).
There is a growing recognitio...