Recovering Relationality
Andrew Benjamin, Towards a Relational Ontology: Philosophy's Other Possibility
SUNY Press, 240pp, £17.75, ISBN 9781438456348
reviewed by Joel White
In 1966 Gilles Deleuze wrote a review of a work by the French philosopher Gilbert Simondon. The opening to this review stated that, until now, the principle of individuation had been largely avoided by modern philosophy; that although the accomplishment of physics, of biology and of psychology had relativised and attenuated the concept, individuation had remained, until Simondon, un-interpreted. The purpose of Deleuze’s review was to highlight the force of Simondon’s philosophy, a philosophy that, as Deleuze saw it, set forth an ‘original theory of individuation’ for contemporary philosophy. Why such an opening to a review of a book, then, that neither directly concerns Deleuze nor Simondon? Because what was once said about the principle of individuation can now be said of relationality. Relationality, as an important philosophical category, has been largely overlooked by modern philosophy. That although the accomplishments of science, namely theories of special relativity and of quantum mechanics, have placed relationality as central to their physical claims, relationality itself has remained largely un-interpreted. The work of Andrew Benjamin in his current book Towards a Relational Ontology should therefore be regarded as the major intervention in the recovery of relationality as a term for contemporary philosophy.
To write a review of Benjamin’s book is in many ways to write a review about the potential inherent in the philosophical process of recovery. Recovery presupposes a set of precedent relations that are to be the subject of recovery. Or if you will, it presupposes an engagement with the tradition that is based on a form of recuperation, a recuperation that likewise permits the arrival of the new. The cry is indeed a mix between a Rimbaudian affirmation of the new and a Benjaminian respect for the remembrance of the dead. Given that recuperation or recovery is therefore at the heart of any claim made about relationality as a philosophical category, it would be implausible to talk of the miraculous originality of Benjamin’s project – as one sees erroneously written on the back of the book sleeve. I suggest that this would be essentially counter to the author’s argument. Again, what we understand by originality has to be rethought. It has to be rethought in terms of relationality. We should instead talk of the anoriginality of Benjamin’s work, an anoriginality founded on claims made about the ontological status of relationality. But what does this all mean?
In order to grasp the nature of Benjamin’s ontological argument one is faced with the daunting task of understanding a set of terms that pertain to his argument and that function nominally. This review will attempt to lay out these terms as clearly as possible in the space given – again a daunting task. What I mean by functioning nominally is that the system, insomuch as it is a system of thought, functions via a set of related terms that have been named by Benjamin. The system is equally held in place by the stability of these terms (a mischievous opening presents itself here for any critic). The function of naming is therefore foregrounded. I have hesitated before both publicly and privately about the status of naming in Benjamin’s work as I believe it to be central to his overall thought. I once even rashly called him a nominalist to a colleague and a former student of his. But why nominalism, and is this unfair? To put it simply, the relational ontology that is systematised in this book deals with the problem of universals, and as such discards strict realist claims about abstract universality and underlines the importance of names. (This is seen most cogently in the chapter on Romeo and Juliet and in the chapter ‘Conflict naming’ from a previous work, 1993’s The Plural Event.) Names, and the conflictual construction of names, play their role in the subsequent construction of abstract universality.
This is my argument. Benjamin rejects both the platonic set-up as ‘implicitly causal’ as well as deeming empiricism’s obsession ‘with particulars as ends in themselves,’ as likewise absurd. Instead, and to avoid the childish oscillation between idealism and empiricism, abstraction is retained as fictional and therefore reconsidered in terms of a founding relationality. The fictional and relational status of abstraction as having to be posited recalls naming and naming in turn recalls writing. That is to say, and again this is my argument, it recalls a writing conceived of as différance and différance conceived of as ultimately relational. If Form is thought of in Platonic terms as an abstract universal, then what comes immediately to mind is Derrida’s rarely quoted but incredibly important line from Of Grammatology, that différance (writing) constitutes the ‘formation of Form.’ If form is formed, then it follows that form can be subject to a process of deformation or as it is otherwise known, deconstruction. Benjamin’s proximity to the deconstructive project is patent in the following:
But what does it mean for abstract universality if it is posited ‘after the event of a founding relationality?’ It means, succinctly, that ‘singularity is an after-effect’ of a set of relations. It means, as indicated above, that the founding event (singularity, abstract universality) is formed, posited and subject to a relationality that is a priori to its formation. All this, whilst at the same time operating as a point of singularity (hence the aporia in the above paragraph). To add another term to the list, singularities act as if ‘without-relation’; that is, they act as if they are original. This means that although they are founded relationally they act as though they are original singular points.
The talk of relational singularities acting as ‘without-relation’ makes perfect sense in terms of actually experiencing abstraction. I know that the chair next door is not just some poor imitation of the universal concept of chairness of which it partakes. And, I can fetch the chair without each time panicking about its exact empirical makeup and the multitude of differences between this chair and that chair. Abstraction always operates on some level, even if that universal is in some ways ‘contentless,’ as Benjamin said in his 2007 essay, 'Perception, Judgment and Individuation: Towards a Metaphysics of Particularity.’ This ‘double ontological register’ is what Benjamin names ‘the plural event,’ it likewise constitutes the anoriginal: a set of relations that operate regardless of their relational status as an origin. Benjamin writes:
The site of the already acting set of relations is named as ‘the fabric of existence’ by Benjamin and designates a form of materiality that cannot be reduced to empiricism, as it so often is. The fabric of existence, insomuch as it is stable, constitutes the pre-given realm that makes relationality possible. The fabric of existence therefore provides a material stage for relations, or relationality. This stage, however, is, and already has been, subject to the transmutation of the relations that constitute it; to the anoriginality of relationality. In other words, the plural event as founding event is comprised of relations that although foundational are in no sense singular. The event is not an event of singularity. It is plural and retains what Benjamin calls ‘the yet-to-be-determined.’ This plural and non-determinate status is conditioned by its relational status. This is why singularities are the affect-effects of a set of relations and not the other way around, and why they hold open the potential for difference. This process gives rise to being as ‘being-in-relation,’ which likewise necessitates placement in the fabric of existence. Any claim, whether that claim is about the temporal or spatial nature of being is a claim that finds relationality as foundational. Beyond the inundation of the necessary neologisms that I’ve just listed, Benjamin’s argument is clear: if one could only say anything at all about the being of being, one can say that it is relational. And relationality holds open the yet-to-be determined.
Whilst reading this book, I couldn’t help but notice this structure of relationality as present in a good number of things, both banal (such as the chair example above) and otherwise. In particular, I saw it at play in the plot of the recent film by Yorgos Lanthimos, The Lobster. Here we find an alternate world whereby those who live without relations are sent to a hotel to find relations. The without-relations are banned from the city that is, in essence, just a shopping mall. In the hotel we see a number of characters trying desperately and at all costs to find a partner. If one does not find a partner then you are turned into the animal of your choice – hence the lobster of the protagonist. To find a partner the guests must find something in common. They must relate to each other through a singularity that binds them and that is supposed to pre-exist in both characters. One of the examples given is bleeding from the nose. I can fall in love with you because we both bleed from the nose, we both share or partake in the same singularity – nosebleeds.
What is crucial about the example given is that the two characters who pair off because of their nosebleeds only pair because one of them induces his nosebleeds through smashing his nose against a wall. The other, although she likewise has a backstory, is deemed an authentic nose bleeder and does not need to prove why she bleeds. The singularity that they share in is therefore constructed and anoriginal. It is a constructed and anoriginal because it is only a singularity due to the violence that one of them does to their nose. This violence is induced by the need to produce a shared singularity. Where in fact this violence produces the singularity itself. The struggle to produce the singularity is therefore relational – relationality satisfies the universal’s demand to exist. Furthermore, once the singularity is ‘determined’ it attempts to efface the relational operation that produced it. They go to the city. In the city they then operate as if the relational process that brought them together and that had taken place through a produced violence, never took place. What is crucial is that each time we are presented with a story about this or that singularity the event that produces the singularity is always plural, in other words, it is subject to a founding relationality.
One concept that is lacking in this book, that is brought to the foreground in The Lobster and that is the very concept that was so excitingly thought out in The Plural Event, is conflict. The Plural Event opens with a quote from Heraclitus fragment 80: ‘It must be recognised that war is common to all and conflict is justice and that the all comes to be in accordance with conflict and is necessitated by it.’ If Towards a Relational Ontology’s claim is that being is relational, which I likewise affirm, then I would like to further Benjamin’s recovery of relationality by saying that relationality is conflictual. Conflictual in the sense that nothing can be reduced to a singularity. That the without-relation is violent and produced by a conflict inherent in the aporia of universality. Sameness, identity, does not exist and we live the minimal difference of that aporia. That minimal difference is conflictual. This conflictuality is being.
To write a review of Benjamin’s book is in many ways to write a review about the potential inherent in the philosophical process of recovery. Recovery presupposes a set of precedent relations that are to be the subject of recovery. Or if you will, it presupposes an engagement with the tradition that is based on a form of recuperation, a recuperation that likewise permits the arrival of the new. The cry is indeed a mix between a Rimbaudian affirmation of the new and a Benjaminian respect for the remembrance of the dead. Given that recuperation or recovery is therefore at the heart of any claim made about relationality as a philosophical category, it would be implausible to talk of the miraculous originality of Benjamin’s project – as one sees erroneously written on the back of the book sleeve. I suggest that this would be essentially counter to the author’s argument. Again, what we understand by originality has to be rethought. It has to be rethought in terms of relationality. We should instead talk of the anoriginality of Benjamin’s work, an anoriginality founded on claims made about the ontological status of relationality. But what does this all mean?
In order to grasp the nature of Benjamin’s ontological argument one is faced with the daunting task of understanding a set of terms that pertain to his argument and that function nominally. This review will attempt to lay out these terms as clearly as possible in the space given – again a daunting task. What I mean by functioning nominally is that the system, insomuch as it is a system of thought, functions via a set of related terms that have been named by Benjamin. The system is equally held in place by the stability of these terms (a mischievous opening presents itself here for any critic). The function of naming is therefore foregrounded. I have hesitated before both publicly and privately about the status of naming in Benjamin’s work as I believe it to be central to his overall thought. I once even rashly called him a nominalist to a colleague and a former student of his. But why nominalism, and is this unfair? To put it simply, the relational ontology that is systematised in this book deals with the problem of universals, and as such discards strict realist claims about abstract universality and underlines the importance of names. (This is seen most cogently in the chapter on Romeo and Juliet and in the chapter ‘Conflict naming’ from a previous work, 1993’s The Plural Event.) Names, and the conflictual construction of names, play their role in the subsequent construction of abstract universality.
This is my argument. Benjamin rejects both the platonic set-up as ‘implicitly causal’ as well as deeming empiricism’s obsession ‘with particulars as ends in themselves,’ as likewise absurd. Instead, and to avoid the childish oscillation between idealism and empiricism, abstraction is retained as fictional and therefore reconsidered in terms of a founding relationality. The fictional and relational status of abstraction as having to be posited recalls naming and naming in turn recalls writing. That is to say, and again this is my argument, it recalls a writing conceived of as différance and différance conceived of as ultimately relational. If Form is thought of in Platonic terms as an abstract universal, then what comes immediately to mind is Derrida’s rarely quoted but incredibly important line from Of Grammatology, that différance (writing) constitutes the ‘formation of Form.’ If form is formed, then it follows that form can be subject to a process of deformation or as it is otherwise known, deconstruction. Benjamin’s proximity to the deconstructive project is patent in the following:
Moreover, within universality as it is generally understood, there is an inherent aporia (…) The consequence of this aporia is that it gives rise to the necessity to think the relational. In other words, what arises here in terms of the impossible possibility of abstract universality indicates that it (abstract universality) is also posited after the event of a founding relationality, and in addition, the presence of that limitation delimits a different mode of philosophical thinking.
But what does it mean for abstract universality if it is posited ‘after the event of a founding relationality?’ It means, succinctly, that ‘singularity is an after-effect’ of a set of relations. It means, as indicated above, that the founding event (singularity, abstract universality) is formed, posited and subject to a relationality that is a priori to its formation. All this, whilst at the same time operating as a point of singularity (hence the aporia in the above paragraph). To add another term to the list, singularities act as if ‘without-relation’; that is, they act as if they are original. This means that although they are founded relationally they act as though they are original singular points.
The talk of relational singularities acting as ‘without-relation’ makes perfect sense in terms of actually experiencing abstraction. I know that the chair next door is not just some poor imitation of the universal concept of chairness of which it partakes. And, I can fetch the chair without each time panicking about its exact empirical makeup and the multitude of differences between this chair and that chair. Abstraction always operates on some level, even if that universal is in some ways ‘contentless,’ as Benjamin said in his 2007 essay, 'Perception, Judgment and Individuation: Towards a Metaphysics of Particularity.’ This ‘double ontological register’ is what Benjamin names ‘the plural event,’ it likewise constitutes the anoriginal: a set of relations that operate regardless of their relational status as an origin. Benjamin writes:
In the first instance, [the double ontological register of the plural event] identifies the presence of a founding ontological irreducibility. Secondly and consequently, that register marks the place of a founding set-up that needs to be explicated in terms of a relational ontology precisely because it is the site of already present and irreducible relations.
The site of the already acting set of relations is named as ‘the fabric of existence’ by Benjamin and designates a form of materiality that cannot be reduced to empiricism, as it so often is. The fabric of existence, insomuch as it is stable, constitutes the pre-given realm that makes relationality possible. The fabric of existence therefore provides a material stage for relations, or relationality. This stage, however, is, and already has been, subject to the transmutation of the relations that constitute it; to the anoriginality of relationality. In other words, the plural event as founding event is comprised of relations that although foundational are in no sense singular. The event is not an event of singularity. It is plural and retains what Benjamin calls ‘the yet-to-be-determined.’ This plural and non-determinate status is conditioned by its relational status. This is why singularities are the affect-effects of a set of relations and not the other way around, and why they hold open the potential for difference. This process gives rise to being as ‘being-in-relation,’ which likewise necessitates placement in the fabric of existence. Any claim, whether that claim is about the temporal or spatial nature of being is a claim that finds relationality as foundational. Beyond the inundation of the necessary neologisms that I’ve just listed, Benjamin’s argument is clear: if one could only say anything at all about the being of being, one can say that it is relational. And relationality holds open the yet-to-be determined.
Whilst reading this book, I couldn’t help but notice this structure of relationality as present in a good number of things, both banal (such as the chair example above) and otherwise. In particular, I saw it at play in the plot of the recent film by Yorgos Lanthimos, The Lobster. Here we find an alternate world whereby those who live without relations are sent to a hotel to find relations. The without-relations are banned from the city that is, in essence, just a shopping mall. In the hotel we see a number of characters trying desperately and at all costs to find a partner. If one does not find a partner then you are turned into the animal of your choice – hence the lobster of the protagonist. To find a partner the guests must find something in common. They must relate to each other through a singularity that binds them and that is supposed to pre-exist in both characters. One of the examples given is bleeding from the nose. I can fall in love with you because we both bleed from the nose, we both share or partake in the same singularity – nosebleeds.
What is crucial about the example given is that the two characters who pair off because of their nosebleeds only pair because one of them induces his nosebleeds through smashing his nose against a wall. The other, although she likewise has a backstory, is deemed an authentic nose bleeder and does not need to prove why she bleeds. The singularity that they share in is therefore constructed and anoriginal. It is a constructed and anoriginal because it is only a singularity due to the violence that one of them does to their nose. This violence is induced by the need to produce a shared singularity. Where in fact this violence produces the singularity itself. The struggle to produce the singularity is therefore relational – relationality satisfies the universal’s demand to exist. Furthermore, once the singularity is ‘determined’ it attempts to efface the relational operation that produced it. They go to the city. In the city they then operate as if the relational process that brought them together and that had taken place through a produced violence, never took place. What is crucial is that each time we are presented with a story about this or that singularity the event that produces the singularity is always plural, in other words, it is subject to a founding relationality.
One concept that is lacking in this book, that is brought to the foreground in The Lobster and that is the very concept that was so excitingly thought out in The Plural Event, is conflict. The Plural Event opens with a quote from Heraclitus fragment 80: ‘It must be recognised that war is common to all and conflict is justice and that the all comes to be in accordance with conflict and is necessitated by it.’ If Towards a Relational Ontology’s claim is that being is relational, which I likewise affirm, then I would like to further Benjamin’s recovery of relationality by saying that relationality is conflictual. Conflictual in the sense that nothing can be reduced to a singularity. That the without-relation is violent and produced by a conflict inherent in the aporia of universality. Sameness, identity, does not exist and we live the minimal difference of that aporia. That minimal difference is conflictual. This conflictuality is being.