Comments on the Society of the Spectacle - Guy Debord

7/27/2019 Comments on the Society of the Spectacle - Guy Debord

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Coments on theSocie of e Specacle

GUY DEBORD

Tranlated byMalcolm Imrie

VERSO

London' New Yor


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In memo f Grard Lebovci,ambushed and murdered n Paris on

5 March 1984 peons stll unknown


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First published by Edions Grard bov 1988his edion published by Verso 1990 Ediions Grard Lebovic 1988

TransaonMalcom Imrie 1990All ight resered

VoUK 6 Meard Street, London WV 3HR

USA: 29 West 35h Street N York NY 10001-229

Veso i e impnt of N eft Books

Brt Lbrary Cata Pubcao Data

Debord Guy 193-Coments on the soiety of the specle.

1 Soiet

Litle II [a soete du specle, English 1301

ISBN 0860913023ISBN 0860915204 pb

.US Lbrary of Coe Catao-Pubao Data

DebordGuy 1931

Commentaires sur a soct du sptacle English]Coens on the society of the spetale /Guy Debord; ranslated

by Malolm Imiep m

ranslaion o Commentaires sur a socit du spectaleIBN 0860913023 ISBN 0860915204 (pbk)1 Social psyhology 2 Polearat 3 Soal classe

I itle

HM291D38813 1990302d20

ypset i Bebo by eapr&Gard td ristolrinted in Grea rtain by Biddes tdGuildford


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However desperate e stuaton andcrcumstances do not despar When there s

everything to fear, be unaad. When surrounded

by dagers fear none of them. When wthoutresources deped on resourcelness. Whensurprsed, take e enemy elf by surprse.

S TZU T Ar ofWar


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I

TS Comment are sure to be welcomed by f orsixt people; a large number ven e mes in whichwe live nd the gravit of e mtters under discus-sion. But then of cose, in some cicles I amconsidere to bea auorit It must also be bone in

ind at a good hlf of is inteested elite willconsist of people who devote themselves to maintaining e spectacular system of domination an theothe hf of people who persist in doing quite eoposite Hving then, to take ccount of eders whore both attentive and iversely iuenal I obvi

ously cannot speak wih complete feeom Above allI must take care not to give too much information tojust anbody.

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Commen on the Socie fthe Speccle

Our unfortunate mes us comp me, onceagain to write in a new way Some ements l beintentonally omitted; and e plan ll have toremain rather unclear Readerswlencounter certndecoys like e vey hallmark of e era As long ascertain pages are interpolated here and there, theoverall meaning may appear just as ecret clauses havever oen been added to whatever treaties mayopenly spulate; just as some chemical agents onlyrevel eir dden properties when ey arecombined i others. However in is brief workere be only too many things which are, alaseasy to understand

II

IN 1967, in a book ened The Socie the Spe le, I

showed what e mode spectacle was alreadyi

essence: the autocrac reign of e market economywhch ad acceded to an irrsponsible sovereigntand the totalit of new techniques of governmentwhch accompanied s reign The disturbancs of968, which in several countries lted into efollowng years, having nowhere overrown eexisng organisation of e societ om wch itspings appareny sponneously e spectacle has

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Commen on the Socie the Spetacle

s conned to gathe steng; that is to spead toe fest limits on all sides wile inceasing itsdensit in e cente It has even leat new defensivetechniques as powes nde atack always do When Ibegan e ciqe of spectacla societ what waspaticlarly noticed - given e eiod - was e oltiona content that cold be discoveed in atciqe; and it was natally felt to be its most toublesome element As to e spectacle itsel I wassometimes accsed of having invented it ot of inai and was always accsed of indulging myself toexcess in my evalaon o its dep and nit and itseal wokings. I must admit at othes who late

pblished new books on e same subject demonstated that it was qite possible to say less All theyhad to do was to eplace the totalit and its movementby a single static detail on e suface of e phenomenon wi each ao demonsang his oiginalit by choosing a dieent and all e less distbing

one No one wanted to taint e scienc modes ofhis pesonal inteetaon by inteosing ecklessistoical jdgements

onetheless e societ of e seccle has contined to advance It moves qickl fo in 1967 it hadbaely fot yeas behind i ogh it had sed em

to the full. And by i own deveopment, which noone took the oble to invesgate it has since shownwith some astonishing achievements that it was

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Commen on the Socie ofthe Speccle

eecvely just watI

said it was. Provng is pointhas more an academic value because it is undoub-tedly indispensable to have understood the spectacle'sut and arculaon as an active force in order toexamine e direcos in wich is force has sincebeen able to travel These quesons are of reatinterest, for it is under such condions at e nextstage of social conlict will necessarily be played outSince e spectacle todayi certaiy more powerla it was before what is it doing wi is addionalpower? Wat point as it reaced at it ad notreaced preously a in short, are its presentlnsadvance? The vage feeling at ereh been a rapid

ivasion wich as forced people to lead eir lives inan entirely different way is now widespread; but is isexperienced rather like some inexplicable che ine climate or in some oer natural equilibrium achange faced it wich ignorance knows only at ithas noing to say. What is more many see it as a cii-

lising invasion as soeng inevitable, and evenwant to collaborate Such people would raer notknow the precise puose of is conuest and how itis advancing

I am going to ouine certainpractical co nsequenc,stll little ow of e spectacles rapid extensioover te last tent years I ave no intention ofentering into poleics on any aspect of is queston;ese are now too easy and too useless Nor w It

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to convince Te preset commets are not coceedwi moralising. Tey do not propose wat is desir-able, or merely preferable They simply record wat is

il

No O today can reasonably doubt e existence ore power of e spectacle; on te contrar, one migtdoubt wheer it is reasonable to add anthing on aqueson whic experiece as already seted i suc

draonian fasion Le Mondeof 19 September 1987offered a felicitous illusation of e saing, 'If itexists, eres no eed to talk about it a fundamental

law in these spectacular times whic, at least i isrespect, ensure there is no suc ting as a backwardcountr

That modern soietyi a soiety of e spectacle nowgoes without saying. Indeed people will soon only beconspicuous by eir reticence One loses count of allthe books describing a phenoenon which now marksall the industrialised nations yet equally spares none ofthe countries wch has still to catch up What is so

droll hoever, i that all the books which do analysethis phenomenon usually to deplore it cannot but jointhe spectale if they're to get attenon

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Commen on the Socie fthe Spectacle

It is tue at is spectacula citique of the spectacle,which is not oly late but, even wose seeks 'attention on e same level, ineitably scks to vain genealities o ypocitical egets; just as futile as eclowns who paade ei well-maneed disillusion innewspapes.

The empty debate on e spectacle at is, on theactivies of the wolds ownes is thus ogansed bye spectacle itsel eveyting is said about the exensive means at its disposal, to ensue at notng is saidabout ei extensive deployment. Rae an talk ofthe spectacle, people often pefe to use the tem'media. And by this they mean to descibe a mee

instument, a kind of public seice which wiimpaa pofessionalism would facilitate e newwealth of mass commucation ough mass media a fom of communicaon wich has at last attained auateal puit, wheeby decisions aleady taken aepesented fo passive adaon Fo what is commu

icated ae orders; and wi pefect hamony, osewho give em ae aso ose who tel us what theytn of em.

Sectacula powe, wich is so ndamentalyunitay, so concentrated by e ve weiht of ings,and entiely despotic in spiit, equeny ails at eappeaance in its ealm of a spectacula politics, a spectacuajustice, a spectacula medicine and al e oesimilay supising examples of media excess. Thus

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Cmmen n the Scie ofthe Spectacle

the spetace woud be merey the excesses of the media,whose nature, unquestionably good since it facilitatescommunication, is sometimes driven to exemes

Often enough societs bosses declare emselvesill-sered by their media employees: more often theyblame e spectators for e common, almost bestial

manner in which ey indulge in the media's delights.A virtually innite number of supposed differenceswithin e media thus sere to screen what is in factthe resut of a spectacular convergence, pursued wiremarkable tenacit Just as e logic of thecommodit reigns over capitalists competing ambions, and the logic of war always dominates efrequent modications in weaponry, so the harshogic of e spectacle controls the abundant diversitof media extravagances

In al at has happened in e last twnt years,the most important change lies in the ver continuitof e spectacle This has nothing to do i e

perfecting of its media instruments, which hadalready reached a highly advanced stage of developmen it means quite simpy at e spectace'S domination has succeeded in raising a whole generaonmouded to its aws The extraordinar new conditions in which this entire generation has effectively

ived constitute a precise and comprehensivesummary of al that, henceforth, the spectacle wllforbid; and also al that itwlpermit

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Cmmeton the Scie jthe Speccle

wON a eoreca lev I oly need add a single detaito my earlier formulao, abeit one which has farreaching consequences. In 1967 I disngushed toival ad successive oms of speccula poer e

concenated and e diuse Bo o em oatedabove real societ as its goal and is lie. The former,favouring e ideolog condensed around a dictatoalpersonali, had accomplished e totalitarincounter-revoluon fascist as well as Stainist e

latter, driving wageeers to apply eir freedom ofchoce to e vast range of new commodies now onoer, had reprsented the Ameicansaon of eworld, a process which in some respect ightenedbut lso successfully seduced those countries where ithad been possible to matain traditional forms ofborgeois democra Since en a thid form hasbeen esablished, rough e raonal combinaon of

ese o, and on e bsis o a general victo o eform whch had showed ielf stonge: e difse.is is e ingrated seccl which has since tendedto impose iel globally

Wheres Russia and Germany were largy responsible for e ormation of e concentrated spectacle

and e United States for the difse form the integated spectacle has been pioneered by France andItaly. he emergence of is new form is atribuble

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to a number of shared histoical features, namely, eimportant role of e Stalinist part and uions in"polical and intellectal life, a weak democrac adition, e long monopoly of power enjoyed by a singlepart of goveent, and e need to eliminateaunexpected upsurge in revoluonar acvit.

The integrated spectacle shows itself to be simultaneously concenated and diffuse, and ever since euitl union of e to has let to employ bothese qualies on a grander scale Their former modeof applcaon has changed considerably As regardsconcentration, e controlling centre has now becomeoccul never to be occupied by a knon leader, orcear ideology Ad on the diffuse side, e spectaclehas never before put its mark to such a degree onalmost the full range of socialy produced behaviourand objets For e nal sense of e integrated spectacle is s - at it has integrated itself into realit toe same extent as it was describing it, and at it was

reconsucng it as it was describing itA a result, isrealit no longer confronts e integrated spectacle assomeing alien When e spectacle was concentrated, e greater part of surrounding societ escapedi when diffuse, a small part; today, no part Thespectacle has spread itself to the point where it now

permeates all realit. It was easy to predict in eorwhat has been quickly and universally demonstratedby praccal expeience of economic reason's relentless

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accomplishments: at the globalisaton of the falsewas also the alsication of e globe. Beyond a legaof old books and old buildings still of some signicance but desned to contual reducon and, moreover, increasingly iglighted and classied to suit thesectacle's requemen, er remains nothng inculture or in nature which has not been transformed;and polluted, according to the means d interests ofmode indus Even genetcs has become readilyaccessible to e dominant social forces

Spectacular govement which now possesses allthe means necessar to falsi e whole of productionand perception, is the absolute master of memories

just as it is e unettered master of lans wch willshape the most distant future It reigns unchecked itecutes i sum mar ju dgemen.

It is in ese conditions that a arodic end of thedivision of abour suddeny appears, with carnivalesque gaiet all e more welcome because it coin

cides w the generalised disappearance o all realabit A nancier can b a singer, a lawyer a policespy, a baer can arade his literar tastes, an actor can

be president a che can philosohise on cooke techniques as if th were landmar in uversal storAnyone can join e spectacle in order ublicly toadopt or sometmes secrey ractise, an entireldierent activit from whatever secialism rst madetheir name Where media status' has acquired in-

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itely more importance an e value of anyngone might actually be cpble of doing it is normlfor is sttus to be redily nsferble; for anyone,anywhere to hve e same right to e same kind ofstardom. Most often ese accelerted media parclespursue eir own careers i e glow of statutorily

guarnteed admiraon. But it somemes happens atthe ansition to the media prodes e cove forseveral different enterpses, ocially independentbut in fact secrey linked by vrios d hoc networksWi e result at occasionally e social diision oflbour long wi the readily foreseeble unit of itsapplication, reappears in quite nw forms: forexample, one can now publish a novel i order toarrnge an assassination Such picturesque examplesalso go to show that one should never trust someonebecause of their job

Yet e ighest ambion of e integrated spc-tacle is sll to t secret agents into revoluonaries,

and revoluonaries into secret agents

v

T societ whose modesaon has reached estage of e integrated speccle is characterised by thecombined eect of ve principl fetures incessant

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Commnts on the Soie the Spetacle

technologica renewal; integration of state andeconomy generalsed secrey unanswerable les aneterna present.

Tehnooga innovaton has a long histor and isan essential omponent of aptast soet sometimes descrbed as ndustra or post-indusal Butsnce ts most reent aeleration (n the aftermath ofe Second World War) it has greay reinforced spetacuar authorit b surrenderng erybody to themery of specalists to eir cauaons and to thejudgements whh aways depend on em The ntegraon of state and economy is the most evident trendof the century it is at e ver east e motor ofal

reent economc developments The defensve andoensve pact oncluded beeen these to powers,eonomy and state has provded them th e greatest common advantages in every eld: each may bsad to own e other; at any rate it is absurd tooppose them or to disngush beteen ther reasons

and follies Ths union too has prove to be highlfavourable to e deveopment of spectauar domnaon ndeed e to have been indstnguishabefrom the ver start The oer three features are directee of ths domnaton n ts ntegrated stage

Generalised secrec stands behind e spetale as

e desive ompement of al t dsplas and n theast analss as ts most vtal operatonThe simpe fact of beng unanswerable has gven

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what is fase an enrely new qualit. At a stroke it isruth wich has amost everhere ceased to exist or,at besth been reduced to e stats of pure hypo-thesis Unanswerable lies have succeeded in eliminatng public opinion which rst ost e ability tomake itse heard and en ver uickly ssolved

atogeer This evideny has signicant consequences or poics he applied sciences e lalsystem and e arts

The manuactre of a present where fason itselfrom clohes to music has come to a hlt wchwants to orget he past and no longer seems tobeieve in a uture is achieved by e ceaseless circular o informaon aways reng to e sameshor ist o rivaites passionatey proclamed asmor dscoveres Meanwile news o what isgenuiny mportant of what is acty channgcomes rarey and en n ts and star It alwaysconce s wod's apprent condemnaon o its

own exstence he stages n i programmed sef-descon

V

SPEACU domations rst priorit was to eradicate hstorica knowedge in general; beginning i

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just about all raonal informaon and cometaryon e ost recent past. The evidence for s is soarng it hardly needs further explanaion. Wconsumate sll the spectacle organses igorance of

what s aout to hapen and, mmedately afterwardsthe forgetng of whatever h noneeless' beenunderstood. The more impotant soeing is, emore t s hidden Noingn e last ten ears haeen so thoroughly coated n obedient les as ehistor of Ma 1968. oe useful lessons have indeedbeen leat from certn deming studes of osedays; ese, however reain ste secres.

In France ti some ten yeas now snce a presdent

of the republc, long ago forgotten but at e me sillbaskng on the spectacleS surface, naively expresseds delight at nong at hencefo we ll live ina word wout memor, where images ow andmerge like reections on e water Convenentindeed for ose in busnes and who know how to

sy there. The end of histo ves power a welcomebreak uccess is guaranteed n all its undertaings orat least the rumour of success.

How drastcally an absolute power ill suppresshistor depends on e extent of ipeous nter-ests or oblgaons, and especilly o it pracical

capaci to execute ts aims Tsin Che Hoag Ti hadboos bued, but he never managed to get rd of alof em n our own centur tn went furer et

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despite the various accomplices he managed to ndoutside his empire's borders, ere remained a vastarea of the world beyond the reach of his police,where his schemes could be ridiculed With i newtechiques now adopted globally, e integrated speccle has done much better Ineptde compels

universl respect; it is no longer permited to laugh ati In any case it has become impossible to show atone is lauging.

History'S domain was he memorable, the totalitof events whose consequences would be lasinglyapparent And us, inseparably, histor was knowledge at should endure and aid in understanding atleast in part what was to come: an eveas posses-sion according to Thucydides In is way history wasthe meure of genuine novelt It is in e interes ofose who sell novel at any price to eradicate emeans of measuring it When social signicance iatributed oy to what is immediate, an to wha

will be immediate immediately afterards, alwaysreplacing another, idencal immediacy, it can be seenthat the uses of e media guarantee a kind of etetof noisy isicance.

The precious advantage wich the spectacle hacquired rough the outlawng of histor, from

haing driven the recent past into hiding, and fromhaing made everyone forget the spirit of historythin sociey is abovealthe abiliy to cover i own

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tracks - to conceal te ver progress of its recentworld conquest Its power already seems familiar, as ifit ad always been tere All usurpers ave sared tisaim: to mke us forget atth have o nlyjust arrive d.

VI

WITH te destrucon of istory, contemporarevents temselves retreat into a remote and fabulousrealm f unveriable stories, uncheckable statistics,unlikely explanaons and untenable reasoning For

ever imbecilit presented by te spectacle, tere areonly te media's professionals to give an answer, wia few respectful rectications or remonstrations. Andey are hardly extravagant, even wit ese, forbesides teir extreme ignorance, their pero nal a ndprfional olidari with e spectacle's overall

auority and the societ it expresses makes it eirdut, and teir pleasure, never to diverge from tatauorit whose mest must not be treatened Itmust not be forgotten at ever media professional isbound by wages and oer rewards and recompensesto a master, and sometimes to several; and tat everyone of tem knows e is dispensable

All experts sere te state and te media and olyin tat way do tey acieve teir status Ever expert

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follows hs master for all former possbltes forndependence have been gradually reduced to nl bypresent socet's mode of organsaton. The mostuseful expert of course s the one who can le. Wther dfferent motives ose who need experts arefalsers and fools Whenever ndvduals lose the

capact to see thngs for emselves e expert sere to offer an absolute reassurance. Once erewere exprts n Etruscan art and competent ones forEtruscan art was not for sale. But a perod whch foreample nds t protable to fake by checal meansvarous famous wines can oly sell them f t has createdwine experts able to con connosseurs nto admrngther new more dsnctive lavours. Cerantes remarksthat under a poor cloak you commonly nd a gooddrnker' Someone who knows hs wne may oftenunderstand nothng about the rules of e nuclearndustr; but spectacular power calculates at f oneexpert can make a fool of hm wth nuclear energy

anoer can easly do e same wi wine And t swell known, for example that meda meteorologstsforecastng temperature or ranfall for the next fort-eght hours are severely lmted n what ey say bythe oblgation to mantan certan economc toursticand regonal balances when so many people make so

many joueys on so many roads beteen so manyequally desolate places; thus they can only tr to makether names as entertaners.

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Commen on the Socie th Spectacle

One aspect of e disappearance of all objecveistorical owledge canb seen in e way that indiidual reputaons have become maeable and alterable atwl by ose who control all information:informaon which is gathered and also - an enreydfferent matter - informaon wich is broadcastTheir abili to falsi is thus unlimited Histoical

eidence which the spectacle does not need to kowceases to be eidence When e only fame is thatbestowed by the grace and favour of a spectacularCo disgrace may swify follow A anti-spectacular notoriet as become someing extemey rare Imyself am one of the last people to retain one, haing

never h any other But it has also become extaordinarily suspect Societ has ocially declared itself tobe spectacular. To be know outside speccularelations is already to be kow as an enemy ofsociet

A person's past can be enrey rewtte radicly

altered, recreated in e maner of e Moscow tials- ad wiout even haing to boer anyig asumsy as a al Kilg comes cheaper ese aysose who run e spectacle or eir fiends sureyhave no lack of false wiesses ough e maybunsille an how could e spectators ho wisthe exploits of these false wiesses ever recogiseeir blunders? - or false documen, which are alwaysigly eecve Thus it is no loer ssible to

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beeve anyng about anyone that you have notearned for yourse drecty But n fact fase accusaons are rar necessar Once one contros emechansm wch operates the only form of socavercaton to be fuy and unversaly recogsed onecan say what one kes e spectace provs arguments smply by gong round n crces: by comngback to e start, by repeon by consnt rearmaon n the ol space eft where anyng can bepubcy armed, and beeved precsey because thats e oy ng to whch everone s tness Speccuar power can smy deny whatever t kes,once or ree mes over and change the subject;

knowng ful wel ere s no danger of any rposte i o space or any oer

For e agora, the genera comut, has goneaong wi commues rescted to ntermedarbodes or to ndependent nstuons to saons orcafs or to workers n a snge company There s no

pace eft where peope can dscuss e reaes whchconcern em because ey can never asting freeemseves om e crushng presence of medadsourse and of the varous forces organsed to reayt. Nong remans of e reavey ndependent

judgement of those who once made up e word of

earnng; of those for exampe, who used to base ersef-respect on er abt to ver to come cose toan mparta hsto of facts or at east to beleve at

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such a history desered to be known erei

nolonger even any incontestable bibliograpical and e computerised calogues of naonal librariesare well-equipped to remove any residual traces. It isdisorienting to consider what it meant to be a judge adoctor or a historian not so long ago and to recall theobligaos and imperaves ey oen accepted

win e limi of eir competence: men rebletheir m ore tha n their fthe.

en e speccle stops talkng about someingfor ee days it is a if it did not exst For it has thengone on to lk about someing else and it is at

which hencefor, in short, exists The praccal

consequences as we see are enormousWe believe we know at in Greece istory and

democracy entered e word at e same me Wecan prove at their disappearances have also beensimultaneous

o is list of e umphs of power we should

however add one result whichh

proved negaveonce e ring of a state involves a permanent andmassive shortage of historcal knowledge that statecan no longer be led sategically

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Cmmen n the Scie ofthe Spectacle

VI

ONC it attains e stage of the integrated spectace,self-poclaimed democrac socet seems to be generally accepted as e realisaon of afagile pection Sothat it must no longer be exposed to attacks bengfragile; and indeed is no longer open to attack beingperfect as no oer society before it. It is a fragilesociet because it has great dicut managing itsdangerous technolocal epansio. But it is a perfectsociet for governg and e proof is at all thosewho aspire to gove want to govern ts one in esae way chag hardly a ing For the rst mein contemporar Europe no party or fracon of party even tries to pretend at they wish to changeanytng signcant The commodit is beyondcriticism: as a general system and even as the particular forms of junk which heads of indusr choose toput on the market at any given me

Werever te sectacle has its doinon e onlyorgased forces are ose wich want the spectacleThus no one can be te enemy of what eists nor transgress e omerwhich applies to everything. We havedispensed wit that disurbing conception which wasdominant for over to undred years in which a

society was open to criticism or ansformationreform or revolution Not thanks to any new arguments but quite simply because all argument has

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become useless From ts rsult we can esmate notuversa happiness, but the redoubtable strength oftrannys tentacls

Never before has censorship been so perfect Neverbefore have ose who are sl led to beieve in a fewcountries, at ey remain free citens, been essenitled to make eir opinions heard wherever it is amater of choices affecng eir real lives Neverbefore has it been possible to ie to em so brazenyThe spectator is simply supposed to know nong,and desere nothing Those who are always watchingto see what happens nextwlnever act: such must bee spectator's condition People often cite the Unitd

States as an exception because ere Nixon eventuaycame togef with a series of denias whose clumsiness

was tooccal: ut is enrely local excepon forwch there were some old storical causes, clalyno longer holds rue, since Reagan has receny beenable to do e same thing wi impunit Many ing

may be unauthorised; everthing i permited. Tak ofscanda is us archaic The most profound summng-up of e period which the whole wod enteredshory after Italy and e United States, can be foundin e words of a senior Italian stsman a member,simutaneously of both he ocia government and

the paralll gover

ent P2,Pote Due:

Once therewere scandas but not any more

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In The Eighteenth Bmaire


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the part of the secret serices; others would reproachthe terrorists for their total lack of historical under-snding. But a little historical logic shoud rapidlyconvnce u that there is noing contradictor inrecognising at people who understand nothing ofhisto can readily be manipuated even more so thanoers And it is much easier to lead someone to'repent when it can be shown at everthing hethought he did freely was actually known in advanceIt is an inevitable consequence of clandestine, militarforms of orgasaon that a few inltrators canacvate, and eliminate, a lot of people Criticism,hen evaluating armed struggles must sometimes

analyse particular operatio wiout being led astrayby the general resemblance that will nally beimposed on all of them We should expect, as a logicapossibii at the states securi serices intend tuse all e advantages ey nd in the realm of thespectace, which has indeed been organised with at

in mnd for some considele ime: on the contraryit is a difcult in perceiving is which i astonising,and rings fase

Judicial repressionS present objecve here, ofcourse, is to generalise matters as fast as possibleWhat is important in this commodit is the packing,

or e labelling the price codes One enemy of spec-tacular democracy is the same as another, just likespectacular democracies themseves Thus there must

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be no right of asyum for terrorists, and even osewho have not yet been accused of being terrorists cancertainy become them, with extradition swiftyfoowing. In November 1978, deaing with the case ofa young print worker, Gabor Winter, wanted by theWest German government maiy for having printedcertain revouonar eaets, Me Nicoe Pradain,

acting on behaf of e Department of Public Prosecu-tion in e Appeal Court of Paris, quicky showed thate poica moves' which coud be e onlygrounds for resing extradition under the Franco-German agreement of9 November 1951, could notbe invoked:

Gabor Winter is a social criminal not a polical oneHe refuses to accept social constraints A true policalcriminal doesn't reject society. He attacks policalstructures and not, like Gabor Winter, social structures

The notion of acceptabe poitica crime ony becamerecognised in Europe once e bourgeoisie hadsuccessfuy attacked previous socia structures. Thenature of poitical crime could not be separated fromthe varied objectives of socia critique This was truefor Banqui, Varlin, Durruti Nowadays there is apretence of wishing to preserve a purey political

crime, ike some inexpensive luxury, a crime wichdoubtess no one will ever have the occasion to

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commit again since no one is interested in the subjectany more; except for the professional politiciansthemselves whose crimes are rarely pursued nor forthat matter called political All crimes and offences areeffectively social. But of all social crimes none must

be seen as worse than the impertinent claim to sllwant to change something in a societ which has sofar been only too ind and patient; but has had enoughfbeing blamed.

x

ACCORING to the basic interests of the new systemof domination, the dissolution of logic has beenpursued by different but mutually supportive meansSome of these means involve e technology whichthe spectacle has tested and popularised; oers are

more linked to the mass psychology of submission.At the technological level when images chosen

and constructed by someone ee have everwherebecome the individual's principal connection to theworld he formerly obsered for himsel it hascertainly not been forgotten at these images can

tolerate anything and everything; because within esame image all things can be juxtaposed thoutcontradiction. The ow of images carries everying

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before it, and it is similarly someone else who controlsat will this simplied summary of the sensible world;who decides where the ow will lead as well as therhym of what should be shown, like some

perpetual, arbitary surprise, leaving no time forreection, and entirely independent of what e spec-tator might understand or think of it In is concreteexperience of permanent submission lies e psychological origin of such general acceptance of what is; anacceptance which comes to nd in it, ipso fcto , a suf-cient value. Beyond what is strictly secret, spectaculardiscourse obviously silences anying it nds inconve-nient. t isolates al it shows from its context, its past,

its intentions and its consequences It is thuscompletely illogical Since no one may contradict it, ithas e right to contadict itsel to corect its ownpast The arrogant intention of its serants, when theyhave to put foward some new, and perhaps still moredishonest version of certain facts, is to harshly correct

e ignorance and misinterpretations they attibute toeir public, wile e day before they emselves

were busiy disseminag the error, with their habi-tual assurance Thus the spectacle's instrucon andthe spectators ignorance are wongly seen as antagon-istic factors when in fact they give birth to each other

n e same way, the computer's binar language is aniesistible inducement to the continual and unre-seed acceptance of what has been programmed

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simply that e foer display a more intense mani-festaon of e generaised irraonalit, because wileparading their aims and rogrammes ey have actually ied to carry out practical projects even if it isoly to read certain texts and show at ey now

what hey mean They have cotted emselves to

overcoming ogic even at e level of sate whichis precisely the enre operaonal eld of e dialectical logic of conicts; but, like everone else eylack e basic abiliy o orien emseves by the old,imperfect tools of formal logic No one worries aboutem and hardly anyone s about the oers.

The individual who has been more deeply markedby this impoverished spectacular ought an byanyother pet ofhis experienceputs imsef at e service ofhe established order right from the start even oughsubjectively he may have had quite e oppositeintention. He will essentially follow e language ofe spectace for i is the oly one he is familiar wi

e one in which he learned to spe No doubt hewod like to be regarded as an enemy of is rhetoricbut he will use its snta Tis is one of e mostimportant aspects of spectacular dominaton's success

The swift disapearance of our former vocabularyis merely one momen in s process It helps it aong

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XI

TH erasue of the pesonali is the fatal accompaniment to an estence which is concretely submissive tothe spectacle's les, ever moe emoved fom tepossibilit of authenc experience an thus fom tediscover of indiidual preferences. Paadoxcaly,

permanent self-den is e pice e indiidual paysfor e niest bit of social staus Suc an existencedemands a luid delit a succession of continuallyisappoinng comtments to false products It is amatte of running har to keep up w te inaonof devued signs of life Dugs help one to come to

terms is state of aais, hile madness alosone to escape fom it

n all sorts of business in s socie hee e d-tbution of goods is centralised in such a way at itdeternes bo notoriously and secrey e verdeition of hat coul be desale, it sometimes

appens tat cetain people are attribute with knowledge qualis, o even ces all entirey iagina inore to explain the sasfactor development of paticular enterpriss Te only aim is to hide or at least todisguise as far as possible e working of vaousagreemen whch decde evethng.

Yet despite its frequent intentions an tereoubtable means at its disposal to higight the fullstature of supposely remarable pesonaliies

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present societ more often oy succeeds in demon-stating quite the opposite, ad not merely in what hastoday replaced the arts or discussion of e arts. Onetotal icopetent wil colide wi another; panicensues and it is en simply a matter of who will fallapart rst A lawer for exaple forgetng that he is

supposed to represent oe side in a tra will begenuiey swayed by the arguments of is oppositeumber even when ese arguents are as hollow ashis own. It can also happen at an inocent suspecttemporarily coesses to a crime he did not coitsimply because he is impressed by the logic of aninformer who wants hi to believe he is guilt (seee case of Dr Archabeau in Poitiers in 1984)

MacLuhan himse the spectacle's rst apologistwho had seemed to be e most convinced imbele ofe centu, changed his ind when he nallydiscovered in 1976 that e pressure of e assedia leads to irraonai ad at it was beco

urgent to modi their usage The sage of Toronto hadforery spet sveral decades marvelling at enumerous freedoms created by a global illageinstany and efforessly accessible to all Villagesunike towns, hae always been ruled by conformisisolation pett surveilance boredo and repetive

alious gossip about e same falies Wich is aprecise eough descriptio of the global spectacleSresent lgari in which it has become impossibe

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to distinguish e Gialdi-Monaco o BoubonFanco dynasies fo ose who succeeded eSuarts. Howeve, MacLuhan's ungateful odedisciples are now tying to ake people foget ,hoping to establish ei on caees in edia celebaon of all hese new feedos to choose atrando fo epheea. And no doubt ey illetact thei cais even faste the an whoinspied e

XI

TH spectace akes n secret of the fact at certaindangers suround the wondeful ode it has established Ocean polluion and e desucon of uatoial foests eaten oxygen enewal; e easozone laye is enaced by industial gow; nucear

radiaon accuulates ievesibly It eely concludes that none of ese ings atte It will onytak about dates and easues And on these alone, itis successlly reassuring soeing wch a pespectacular mnd would have thought ipossible

Spectacula deocacy appoaches ates Wihgeat subtlety, vey different o e staighoadbutality of the totalitaian di kt t can keep e oiginal nae fo soeng secety changed (bee, beef

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or philosophers) And it can just as easy change thename when the thing itself has been secrey main-tained n England for example the nuclear wastereprocessig pant at Windscale was renamed Sella-eld in order to aay the suspicions which werearoused by a disastrous re in 1957, ough istoponymic reprocessing did nong to limit e risein loca mortalit rates from cancer and leukaemia.The British government as the populaon democrat-ically leed rt yes later had decided to supp-ress a report on e castrophe wch it judgedreasonably enough, would probably she publiccodence in nuclear power

The nuclear industr bot ilitary and civildemands a far higher dose of secrecy an in oerelds wich already have plent as we ow. Tomake life that is to say ying easier for the sageschosen by the system's masters ith been founduseful also to change measurements, to var them

according to a large number of criteria and renethem so as to be able to juggle as necessar wi arge of gures which are hard to convert. Hence tomeasure radioactivit levels one can choose om arange of uni of measuremen curies becquerelsroentgens rads alias cengrays and rems not

forgeting the humble millirads and sieverts which arewort 100 rems It rends one of e old sub-divisions of British currency wich foreigners found so

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confusng, back n the days when elaeld was scalled WndscaeOne can magne the rgour and precson whch

woud have been acheved n the nneteenth centurby mtar hstor, and thus by eorsts of strateg, so as not to gve too much condental nformaton toneutral commentators or enemy historans, campagnswere nvaraby descrbed n the oowng manner:

Te preliminary phase involved a series of engagementsin which, from our side, a strong advance force madeup of four generals and the units under their command,met an enemy force of 13000 bayonets. In the subse-

quent phase a ercely disputed pitched battle developed, in which our enre army advanced, with 290canons and a heay cavalry of 18000 sabres; theconfronng enemy alignment comprised no less than3,600 infantry lieutenants, 40 captains of hussars and 24of cuirassiers Following alternate advances and retreatson both sides, the battle can nally be seen as inconclu

sive Our losses, somewhat lower than the averagegure normally expected in combat of similar durationand intensi, were appreciably superior to those of theGreeks at Marathon, but remained inferior to those ofthe Prussians at Jena.

In ths example, t s not mpossble for a specast togather some vague dea of the forces engaged. But theconduct of operatons remans securely concealed.


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It is indeed unfortunate at human society shodencounter such bung roblems just when it hasbecome materially imossible to make heard the leastobjecon to e language of e commodi just

when ower - quite righy because it is shielded bythe sectace om any response to i iecemea anddelirious decisions and juscaons - believ that it nlnger nee t thnk; and indeed can no longer inkWould not even e staunchest democrat havereferred to have been given more intelligent masters?

At e intetional conference of exerts hed inGeneva in December 196 the uestion was uitesimly wheer to introduce a worldwide ban on e

rduction of chorouorocarbons (CFCs) e gaseswhich have receny and raidly started to destroy et layer of ozone which - as ll be recalled -rotects is lanet against e harmful effec of solarrays Daniel Verilhe, reresenng ElfAuiineschemicals subsidiary and in is capacity art of a

French delegaon rmly oposed to any ban made asensible oin 'It ill take at least ree years todeo substutes and e costswlbe quadruledAs we now this gitive ozone layer, so high ubeongs to no one and has no market vaue This in-dustrial stategist could us show his oonents the

extent of eir inexlicable disregard for economics:'It is highly dangerous to base an ndustrial sategy onenvironmenl imeraves.

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immediately justi everthing that happens As stupidin this eld, which it exploits wi e most ruinousdisregard, as it is everwere else, spectacular domination has cut down e vast tree of scientic knowledgein order to make itself a truncheon. To obey thisultimate social demand for a manifestly impossiblejusticaon, it is better not to be able to tn at all,

but rather to be well trained in e conveniences ofspectacular language. And it is in such a career that theprostituted science of our despicable times has foundits latest specialisation, with goodwill and alacrit

The science of lying justications naturallyappeared wi e rst symptoms of bourgeois

societ's decadence, wi e cancerous proliferationof those pseudo-sciences known as human'; yetmodern medicine, for example, had once been able topass as useful, and those who eradicated smallpox orleprosy were ver different from those who contemptibly capitulated in the face of nuclear radiation or

chemical farming. It can readily be seen, of course,that medicine today no longer has e right to defendpublic health against a pathogenic environment, forthat would be to challenge the state, or at least thepharmaceucals industr But it is not oly by itsobligation to keep quiet that contemporar scienceacknowledges what it has become It is also by itsfrequent and artless outbursts. In November 1985,professors Even and Andrieu at Lannec hospital

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announced that they had perhaps found an effectivecure for Aids, following an experiment on fourpatients which had lasted a week Two days later, epatients having died, several oer doctors, whoseresearch was not so far advanced, or who were perhaps

jealous, expressed certain reserations as to the profes-sors precipitate haste in broadcasting what wasmerely the misleading appearance of victory a fewhours before e patients condition nally deterio-rate. Even and Andrieu defended themselvesnonchalanty, arguing that after all, false hopes are

better than no hope at all' Their ignorance was toogreat for them to recognise this argument as a preciseand complete disavowal of the spirit of science; as eone which had historically always served to endorsethe protable daydreams of charatans and sorcerers,long before such people were put in charge of hospi-tals.

When ocial science has come to such a pass, like

all the rest of the social spectacle that for all itsmaterially modernised and enhanced presentation ismerely reviving the ancient techniques of fairgroundmountebanks illusionis, barkers and stool-peo itis not surprising to see a similar and widespreadreiva of the auorit of seers and sects, of vacuum-

packed Zen or Mormon theology Ignorance, whichhas aways served the authorities well, has aso alwaysbeen exploited by ingenious ventures on the fringes of

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of oer nventons use n e runnng of modestates It s opey empoyed by parcuar powers, orconsequeny, by peope who hod fragments of econ-omc or poca auort, n order to mantan whats estabshed; and aways n a counter-fensive roeWhatever can oppose a sngle oca tru mustnecessary be dsnformaon emanating from hoseor at east rva powers, and woud have been nten-tonay and maevoeny fased Dsnformaonwoud not be smpe negaton of a fact whch suts theauores, or e smpe rmaon of a fact whchdoes not sut em: that s caed psychoss Unke thestraghtforward e dsnformaton must netaby

contan a degree of tru but oe deberatey manp-uated by an artfu enemy That s what makes t soatactve to the defenders of e domnant socetThe power whch speaks of dsnformaon does notbeieve tsef to be absoutey fautess but knows thatt can atbute to any precse crcsm e excessve

nsgncance whch characterses dsnformatonwth e resut at t w never have to admt to anyparcuar faut

n essence dsnformaton woud be a travest ofe truth. Whoever dssemnates t s cupabe

whoever beeves t s stupd But who precsely woud

ths art enemy be? In ths case t cannot be terrorsmwhch s n no danger of 'dsnformng anyonesnce t s charged w ontoogcay represenng

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suspicion on e infomation concened. The conceptof disinfoaon is only valid fo counte-attack. Itmust be kept in esee, then apidly thown into thefay to dive back any u which has managed to getthough

If occasionally a kind of unegulated disinformaon theatens to appea, in e serice of pacula

inteests tempoaily in conlict and eatens to bebelieved getting out of conol and thus clashing withthe conceted wok of a less iresponsible disinfomation, ee is no eason to fea that e fome involvesoe manipulatos who ae moe subte o moesilled: it is simply because disinfomation now

speads in a worl d where there is no room frverfcatn.The consionist concept of disinfomation is

pushed into the limelight immediately to efute by itsvey name, any citicism at has failed to eliinatee divese agencies of e oganisation of silence Foexample it could one day be said, should is seem

desiable, at is text was an attempt to disinfomabout e spectacle; o indeed since it is e samething, at it was a piece of disinfomaon hamful todemocacy.

Contray to its spectacula dention e pacticeof disinfomation can only sere the state hee andnow unde its diect command o at the iniative ofthose who uphold the same values Disinfomation isactually inheent in all esng infomaon and

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XVI

RVIG Hegel's famous maxim, I noted as longago as 1967 at in a wold at has realybeen tuedupside down, tru is a moment of falsehood' In einterening years is principle has encroached uponeach specic domain, wout excepon

Thus in an era when contempora art can nolonger exist it becomes difcult to judge classical artHere as lsehere ignorance is only created in orderto be exploited & e meangs of histo and tasteare lost networks of falsicaon are organised It isoy necessar to control the experts and auconeers

which is easy enough to arrange everyhi since ints kind of business - and at e end of e day ineve other knd - it is the sale which authenticatese value Afteards it is he collectors and museumsparculaly in America who gorged on falsehoodwill have an interest in upholng its good reputaon

justa

e Inteaional Monetar Fund maintains econ of a positve value in e huge debts of dozensof counties

Wha is false creates taste and reinforces itself bynongly eliminating any possible reference to theauthentic And what is genuine is recontructed aquckly as possible to resemble e false. Being erichest and the most mode the Ameicans havebeen the main dupes of ths trac in false art And

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becaue it is hidden by e ponderos stag-managment of diversionary ogh os who are noneeless responsible for its srveillanc and in e end forits deal can now mploy tradional meods foroperaons in clandestine mliex: provocation iltration and varios forms of eiminaon of athenticcritiqe in favor of a false on wich whave beenated for is prpose. When e spctacle's generalimposture is eiched with recorse to a osandindiidal impostures ncertain grows at everturnA nexplained crime can also be calld sicidein prison as elsewhere e collapse of loc allowstrias and inqiries which soar into irraonalit and

which are qeny falsied right om e startrogh absrd atopsis prformed b extraordinarexperts

We have long been accstomed to smmarexecons ofalkinds of people Known terrorists, orthose considered as sc ar opey foght ith

terrost meods Mossad can arrange e killing ofAbo Jihad, the SAS can do the same with rishpeople and the parallel police ofGA with BasqesThose whose killis are arraged by spposed terrorists are not chosn wiot rason; bt it is gnerallyimpossible to b sre of ndrstanding these reasons

One can be aware that Bologna railway staon wasblown p to nsr that Italy contined to b wellgoved; or of the identit of e de sqads' i

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Brazil; o that the Maa can bum down a hotl in eUnited States to facilitat a acket But how can weknow what purpos was ultatly serd by 'adkllers of Babant? It is hard to apply e principl uird? where so any acve interests are so wellconceald. The esult is that undr e ul of theintgrated spectacle, we live and die at the conuenceof iuerable ysteris

Media/polic uours acquie instany - or atworst after thee or four repons - the indisputalestatus of agold hstorical evidnce By e lgndaryauthot of sectacle of th day odd chaactersliinated in silenc can eappear a ctve surivors

whose et can always e conjured up o coutedand vd by ee sayso of secialists They xistsoewhere betwen e Acheon and e Le, thesdead who th spectacl has not popey buidsuposedly sluering whil awaing the suonswhich will awake th all: hoe is the pirate ho

o th sea, and terrorist hoe o e hllhoe too, the ief who no longer needs to stal

hus is uncrtaint organised everh Oftendoinaon wll otect itself by ak whoseedia covrage covers up e tu opeaon Suchwas th cas th the bizare assault on e Spanish

Cotes by Tjero and hs civl guads in 198, whosfailur had to hide ano o odem that is tosay o disguisd nuniieno, whch succdd

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The equally shoy failure of e French secretserces sabotage attempt in New Zealand in 98 hassomemes been seen as a satagem pehaps designedto divert attenon from the numeous new uses ofese secret serces, by persuading people of theircarcatral clumsiness both in their choice of targetand in ei mode of opeaon It has most certainly

been almost universaly accepted at e geologicalexplaons fo oil-beds in e subso of the i oP ar, so noisily conducted in e autumn of 198, hadno other serious puose than to measure the ihabitan' curent levl of stpefacon and submission; byshowng em supposed reseach so absolutely devoid

of economic eason.So mysterous has power become at after theaffair of the illegal ams sales to Iran by e US pesidency one might onder who was really rnni eUnited States the leading power in e so-calleddemocrac wold And us who e he was runninge democac wold?

More profoundly, in is orld whch is ofciallyso respecl of economc necessites, no one everknows e real cost of anythng which is produced Infact e mor pat of the real cost is never c alulate d;and the rest kept sere

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X

AT e begnnng of 1988, cetn Gener Noregsuddeny becme world fmous. He ws te unocdcttor of Pnma country witout n rmy werehe commnded te Ntonl Gurd Pnm s notely soveegn stte: t ws dug out for ts cnther tn e reverse Its curren s e dor, nde rmy which uns t s smry foregn Noriegd us doted s ene ceer precsely keJruzesk i Pond to seng e occupyng powes ts cief of police. He mported drugs nto teUnited Sttes snce Pnm ws not bringng im

sucent revenue nd exported s 'Pnmnncptl to Sitzerlnd He d woked wt te CAgnst Cub nd to prode dequte cover for hs

busness ctives d also denounced some of hisvls n the mport trde to e US uoritiesobsessed a they re wi s probem To e envy of

Wsington is cef securit disor ws the best onthe mket Mche Hr, former ofcer thMossd, the sre secret service When e Ameri-cns naly decded to get d of ts crcte someof e courts vng celessy condemned mNoeg procmed tht e ws redy to defend

imsef for ousnd yers gnst foregners ndgnst hs own ebellous peope; n e nme of n-mpersm he qucy eceved publc support from

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evering is clear. The demi-elite is content to knowthat almost evering is obscure ambivalent, 'constructed by unown codes A more exclusive elitewould like to know whati true, hard as it is to distnguish in each partcular case despite all their acess tospcial knowledge and condenes Which is whyey would like to get to know the method of truth

ough their love usually remains unrequited

X

SECdoinates is world and rst and foremostas the secret of doination Acording to the spetale secrec would only be a neessar excepon toe rule of eely available, abundant informaon justas dominaon in the ntegrated spetacleS free worldwould be restricted to a mere exeutive body in e

serce of democrac But no one really believes thespectacle How then do spectators accept e estenceof secre wich alone rules out any hane of theirrung a word of whose prinipal realies theyow non, in the ulikely event that ey were tobe asked how to set about it? The fat is at almostno one sees secrec in its inaccessible purt and itsnconal universalit Everone acepts at ereare inetably lite areas of secrec reseed for

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throughout Italy: 'When youve got money andfrends, you can laugh at e law In the integratedspectace, the laws are ale; because ey were notmade for e new producton teciques, and becauseey are evaded in distribution by new tpes of agreement. What the public inks or prefers, is of noimportance is is what is hidden by the spectace of

all ese opion polls, electons, modesing restructurngs No mater who e inners are, the faithfulcustomers wi l get the w ot i because at is exactywhat has been produced for em

The despread talk of a legal state only datesfrom e moment when e mode so-calle demo

crac state generay ceased to be one he fact ate expression was only popularsed shory aer 19and, appropriately, in Italy is far from accidenta Imany elds, laws are even made precisely so that thmay be evaded, by ose who have the means to doso. Illegalit in some circumstances for example,around the wold trade in all sots of weaponry,especially the most technoogicaly sopisicatedproducts is simply a kind of back-up for e economic operation, wich will be all the more protablebecause of it. Today many business deals are necessarily as dishonest as the centu and not like those oncemade within a strictly limited range by people who

had chosen the paths of dishonestWith the growth of promotiocontol netorks

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XVII

IN book VIII, chapter 5 of The Peloponnesian War,Thucdides wrote somet about e operaons ofanoer oligarchic conspiracy which closel relates toe situaoniwhich we nd ourselves:

Nevertheess the Assembly and the Counci chosen ylot st continued to hold eengs. However, heytook no decisions that were not approved by e partof e revouon; in fact a the speakers were fro thispat d what e were going to say had beenconsidered y the pary beforehand Peope were a&aidwhen they saw eir numbers and no one now dared to

speak in opposition to them If anyone did venture todo so some appropriate meod was soon found forhaving m kied and no one ted to invesgate suchcrimes or take action againt ose suspected of eLInstead the peope kept qe and were in such a stateof terror t ey thought hemseves ucky enough tobe eft unoested even if ey had said nog at a

They imaned that e revoluona par was muchbigger han it rey was and they ost al condence iemselves being unable to nd out the fact ecauseof he size of the city and ecause they had insucientknowedge of each other For the sae reason it wasimpossibe for anyone who fet hmsef -eated tocompain of it to someone ese so as to ke measures inhis own defence he woud eier have had to speak tosomeone he did not know or to someone he knew but

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could no rely upon. Tougou e democratic parypeople approaced eac oer suspiciously everyonenng a e nex man ad someing o o wa was going on. Ad ere were in fac among therevoluonaries some people wom no one could everae imagined would ave joine in an oligarcy Iwas ese wo were mainly responsible for making e

general mass of people so srusul of eac oer andwo were of te greaes elp i eeping e minorisafe, since ey made muual suspicion an esablisedhing i e popular assemblies

If hstory should retu to us after s eclpse some-

ng whch depends on factors sll n play and thuson an outcome wch no one can dentely excludethese Comment may one day sere n e wrng ofahistor of the spectacle; without y doubt e mostmportant event to have occurred s centur. andthe one for wch e fewest eplanatons have been

ventured In oer crcumstances I thnk I could haveconsdered myself altogether sased wth my rst

work on this subject, and left others to consder turedevelopments But n e present stuaon, t seemedulkely that anyone else would do t

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critique of rearinghas also been arranged, somethingwhich is no longer entrusted to academics or mediaprofessionals whom it is now preferable to keep apartfrom ecessively tradiional lies in tis debate: a newcrique is required, advanced and eploited a new

way controlled by another better trned, sort ofprofessional In a relatively condential maner, lucidtexts are begining to appear anonymously, or signedby unwn auors - a tacc helped by everyone'sconcenraon on e owns of e spectacle which intrmakes unowsjusy seem e most admirable- texts not oly on subjec never touched on in thespectale but also containing arguments whose force

is made more sting by a calculable originalitderiving from the fact at however evident, th areneer used. This practice may sere as at least a rststage in intaon to recruit more alert intellects who

wll later be told more about the possible consequences should ey seem suitable Wat for some

will be e rst step in a career ill be for others -i lower grades - the rst step into e trapprepared for them.

In some cases, issues that threaten to becomecontroversial another pseudocriique can be created;and beteen e to opiions which wll us be put

forard - both outside the impoverished convenoof the spectacle - unsopiscated judgement canoscillate idetely wile discussion around hem

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can be renewed whenever necessar. Mos oen hisconcerns a genera discussion of wha is hidden b hemedia and is discussion can be strongy crtica andon some poins quie evideny ineligen, ye alwayscuriousy decenred Topics and words ve been arciay chosen, wi e aid of compuers programmed in crica hough These exts alwaconain cerain gaps which are quie hard o spo bunoneheess remarkabe: he vanisng poin ofperspecive is aways abnormay absen Theyresemble ose fimil of famous weapons wchony ack e ring-pin Ts is inevibly a latelcritique, wch perceives many hings wi consider

abe candour and accuracy bu places ief o oneside No because i affecs some sor of impariaity,for on e conrary i mus seem o nd much fauye wiou ever appareny feeing he need o revealits cause o sae, even impiciy, where i is comingom and where i wan o go

To is nd of counerjouaisc fase cquecan be added he organised practice of mourwchwe know o be originaly a sor of unconoabe byproduc of specacuar information since everyonehowever vaguey perceives someng miseadingabou he ater and rus i as ite as i deserves.Rumour began a somehng supersous nave selfdeuding More recenty however sureiance hasbegun inroducing ino e popuation peope capabe

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of tarting rumour whch uit it at te very rtgnal It has been decided here to apply in pracce eoberations of a eory formuated some rty yeasago, whose origin lie n American ociology of adverting e teory of individual known a 'pacemakers, that i, thoe whom oers n ther mleu

come to follow and imtate but i time movngfrom pontaneit to contro. Budgetary, or extrabudgetary mean have alo been releaed to fundnumerou auliaries; beside te foer pecal ofthe recent past, academics and media profeional,ocologt and police To beleve n e contnungmecancal applcaon of pat model leads to jut amany error a e general gnorance of the patRome no onger in Rome, and e Maa are nolonger eve And the sureillance and diinformaton erice are a far removed om the polce andformer of former time for example, from erouins and mouchard of the Second Empire a the

present pecal erce i al countre are from theofcer of the army general taffs Deuxime Bureauin 914.

Since art s dead it ha evdeny become exemyeay to dgue police a artit Wen e latet imitaon of a recuperated neo-dadm are allowed to

pontcate proudy n e media, and us alo totnker with the dcor of ofcal palace, lie courtjesters to e kgs of juk, t is evdent that by e

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same process a cultural cover is guaranteed for everyagent or auliary of the ste's netors of persuasion Emp pseudo-museums, or pseudo-researchcetres on e work of nonexistent persoalies canbe opened just as fast as reputatons are made forournalistcops, historiancops, or novelistcops. Nodoubt Aur Cravan foresaw s world when hewrote in Maintenant: Soon we wloy see artiss inthe streets, an it will take no end of eort to nd asingle ma s is indeed e sense of the reviveform of an old qui of Parisia loafers: Hello ereasts! Too bad if Ive got it wrong

Tngs haing become what they are we can now

witness e use of collecve auorship by e mostmode publis houses that is to sa e oes e bst commercial disuto Since eir pseuonyms are oly auencated e newspapers c swop em around colaborate replace eachoer take o new articial brains Their task is to

express e ideas and lifestles of e epoch otbecause of eir personalies but because e areordered to Those who elieve at e are rulidepenent, iniual literary entrepreeurs canowingly vouch for e fact at Ducasse has had arow wi e Comte de Lauamo at Dumas

isnt Mauet, at we must never confuse Ercannw Chatrian; at Censier an Daubenton are nolonger o speaing terms It might be est to say at

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x

SUVILAC woud be much more dangerous hadit not been led by its ambion for absolute control ofeveg to a point where it encountered dicultiescreated by i on progress. There is a contradictionbeteen e mass of information collected on agrowing number of indiiduals, and e time andintelligence available to anyse it, not to mention itsactual interest. The quant of data demands constantsummarising: much of it il be lost, and whatremains is sll too long to be read Management ofsureillance and manipulaon is uncoordinatedIndeed there is a widespread struggle for a share of epro, and us also for favouring e deelopmentof is or that potential in e exisng societ, to edetriment of the oer potentials, which nonetheless,so long as ey are all tarred with e same brush, areconsidered equally respectable.

Thi strglei ao a gae. Each conol comes toover-value his agents, a well a his opponents Eachcountr, not to menon e numerous supranaonalalliances, curreny possesses an indeite number ofpolice and counterespionage serices, along withsecret services, both ste and paraste There are

also many private companies dealing in surveillance,securit and invtigaon e large multinationalsnaturally have their own services; but so do nationaised

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companies even ose of modest scae, which ws pursue independent poicies at a naona andsomemes an inteaona eve A nuclear powergroup i ght against an oi group, even thoughboth are oned by e same state and what is moreare diaectcay united by eir interest in main-taig high oil prices on the word market Each

partcuar industr's securit serice combats thethreat of sabotage, whie organising it when neces-sary, against eir rivas: a company wth importantinteres in undersea tnnes wl be favourabydisposed to e hazards of feres and may bribe news-papers in nancia troube to ensure ey spot these

hazards iout delay and out too much reec-ton; a company competng w Sandoz be indif-ferent to underground spngs in e Rine vaeySecrets are subject to secret sureilance Thus each ofthese organsatons, a subtly united around e exec-uves of raion d E t aspires to its own prvate

hegemony of meaing For meanng has been ostaong wth identiabe centreGoing from success to success unt 196 mode

societ was convinced it was oved It has since had toabandon ese dreams; it prefers to be feared. It knowsfu we that its innocent air has gone forever

So it is that thousands of pots in favour of e

estabished order tange and ash amost everwhere,as the overap of secret netorks and secret issues or

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acvties grows ever more dense along w eirrapid integraon into ever sectr of economics, polics and culture. In alareas of social le e degree ofinteringling in surelance disinformation andsecuri acies gets greater and greater The plothavng ickened to the point where it is almost out ine open each part of it now starts to interfere wior worr the oers for all ese professional conspirators are spng on each oer wiout reallyknowing why are colliding by chance et not identing each other any certain Who is obseringwhom? On whose behal appareny? And actally?The real inuences remain hidden and e ultimate

aims can barely be suspected and almost never understood. So that wile no one can be sure he is not beingricked or manipulated it is rare for e string-pullerto know he has succeeded And in an case to be onthe wing side of manipulaon does not mean thatone has chosen e right sategic perspecve Tactical

successes can us lead great powers down dangerousroads.

In e same netork and apparently pursuingsilar goals ose who are only a part of e netorkare necessarily ignorant of the hpoeses and conclusions of the other parts and above all of their

conolling nueus The reasonably well known factthat all iformaon on whatever subject under observaon may well be enrely imaginar or seriously

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falsied, o ve inadequately intepeted compicatesand undemines to a geat degee the caculaons ofthe inquisitos Fo what is sufcient to condemnsomeone is fa less sue when it comes to ecogsingo using im Since souces of infoation ae incompeon, so ae fasications

It is in these cicumstances that we can speak of

dominaion's faling ate of pot, as it speads toalmost the whole of social space and consequentlyinceases both its pesonnel and i means Fo noweach means aspies and abous, to become an endSueilance spies on itsel and plots against itsel

Its pincipa pesent contadiction nay is at it

is spying on intating and pessuising an absntnt: at which is supposed to be ting to subvetthe social ode. But whee can it actually be seen atwok? Cetainly conditions have neve been so sei-ously evolutiona but it is ony govemen whotink so Negaon s been so thooughly depved of

i thought that it was dispesed long ago Because ofthis it emains only a vague, yet higy distubingtheat, and sueilance in itstm has been depivedof its pefeed eld of acvit Sueillance andinterention ae thus ighy led by the pesentexigencies detemining thei tems of engagement toopeate on the ve teain of ts theat in ode tocobat it n advan. is is why surveilance has aninteest in oganising poles of negaon itse which it

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can insruc i more han e discredied means ofhe specacle, so as o manipulae, no erroriss sime, bu eories

X

BALTASA Gracin, a grea auori on socalme, ells us i considerable prinency in TeCouier: 'Be i ords or acion, all mus be measuredby time We mus choose hen e are able; for imeand tide ai on no man Bu Omar Khayym asless of an opimis We are he puppes and he rmamen is he puppe-maser/In actual fac and no as ameaphorFor a ime e aced on is sageeen back one by one ino e box of oblivion

XI

French Revoluon brough grea chaes in ear of ar I as from a experience ha Clausecould dra e disnction beween cics as e use

of forces in bae o obain cory, and sraeg as heuse of vicories in bae o atn he goals of a ar.Europe as subjugaed quickly and lasingly, by e

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order, ring at will as ey advanced on the enemyNow in fact independent re was shown to be eoly effective ind, a genuinely destructive use ofmusketr which proved the most decisive factor inmilitar engagements of the period. Yet militarthinking had universally rejected this conclusion in

the centur that was ending, and indeed debate on theissue continued through most of e new century,despite constant practical demonstraon in bate, andthe ceaseless progress in range and rate of re

Similarly, the establishment of spectacular domi-nation is such a profound social transformation hat ithas radically altered the art of goveent Thissimplication, which has quickly boe such fruit inpracce, has yet to be fully comprehended in eoryOld prejudices everwhere belied, precauons nowuseless, and even the residues of scruples from anearlier age, still clog up e inking of quite anumber of rulers, preventing em om recogising

something which pracce demonsates and provesever single day. Not oly are e subjected led tobelieve that to all intents and purposes ey are stillliving in a world which in fact has been eliminated,but the rulers themselves sometimes suffer from eabsurd belief at in some respects ey do too hey

coe to believe in a part of what ey havesuppressed, as if it remained a reality and had sll tobe included in their calculations. This backwardness

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X

TH same Sardou aso wrote:

Vainly rlts t th sbjc in vain t bjc use-lsly siply ns ith n s fr nn. On hsrk vainly hn nh n s it sccss, stht n hs st n's ti n rt: n hsrk in vainhn n hs n s itht chivingth intn rst, bcs f th fcvnss f thrk. If I cnnt scc in cplting pic frk, I rng vainly; I usssy sng ti n ffrt If th rk I hv n s nt hv

th rsult I s xpcng, if I hv nt ttin g, I hv rk in vain tht is t s I hv nstng slss

It is ls si t sn hs rk vainly hnh hs nt bn rr fr his rk, r hn thisrk s nt bn pprv; fr in this cs th rkrhs st his ti ffrt, it ths prjing

in n y th vl fhis rk, hich in y bv g

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TRNSLATOR'S NOS

The French edition ofCommethas no footnotes andit would have been inappropriate to add any to stranslation. However wi the auor's approval, Ihave included these brief notes on certain referencesand allusios that might otherise remain unnec-

obscure to English readers.

Page vi Sun Tzu Guy Debord's epigrap is aken from ers European translaion of The Art o War, by e JesuiJL Amo (1 782) Te bes available Englis anslaon bySamuel B. Grf (Oxford 1 963) does no ncude hspassage so I ave a o translae from e renc

Page 1 7 '. wine expers abe o con connosseurs noadirng eir new, more dsncive avours Te Frencere is des eperts en vins qu enraneron les cavs a

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aimer leurs nouveaux parfums, plus recoaissablesDebord's pu o the to meaigs of caves - wie-ellars(e.) and hopeless dupes or suckers (masc - is uortuately lost i English The words uderword etymolo isinstructive It originally referred to ayoe who worked i alegimate job; hence to someone who did ot kow how tolive and hence to any ind of dupe

Pa 1 7 ' under a poor cloak you commoly d a gooddriker e proverb is rom Don Quixote, quoted by theDuchess in her conversation with Sacho Paa (vol Iook ch 1). e Spanish is Debajo de ala capa suelehaber ue ebedor I have used the Samuel Putam traslation

Page 20 men reemble heir tim more than their fther' AArab proverb dating from the ourtee century

Page 2 They are jeering at us and we know whom thsprogrammes are for The Frech here i, O nous sie etlon sait pour qui sont ces structures Debord is playing o afamous line from Racines Andromahe ActV, Scee : Pourqui sot ces serpets qui siet sur vos tts?

Page Dr Archambeau In 1984, seemigly motivated byproessional jealousy certai colleagues o a Dr Archambeau

at a hospital i Poiers caused the death o some of hispaents in e operatingtheae by reersig the oygenand itrogen supplies during resuscio Archambeau wasevetually acquitted of any blame but the real culpts werenever discovered

Page 39 t was Marx who deed political ecoomy as eal deial of humaity

Page 4 . illusionis barke and stool-p

eo The Frechhere is illusionnistes aboyeurs et baros Baron, a word sllin commo use refers to a icksters accomplice plated in

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the crowd, who heps to dupe others eier by raising objections which the tickster can easily refute or by pretendingto bu whatever is on offer. Ts was also the nineteenthcentuy meaning of 'stoo-pigeon athough the wor isnow use in a different sense I cannot n a modeEnlish equivaent though some Ameican meaings ofstooe miht be adequate

Page42 '

raer in the way that the one who was waiinfor Gouchy instead saw Blcher oin the battle it wassimply a matter of caling in the Guard of experts hebatte is Waterloo e one Napoleon The ausion is toVictor Hugos descipon of Waterloo in his poem 'Lxpiation: seeing e bate was going bady for the FrenchNapoeon summoned e Imperial Guard to enter the fray

Page 4 'GA Grupo AntiTerorista e iberacinPage "the mad kilers of Brabant L tueursfu de Brbant

waS the medias name for the perpetators of a series ofmures in Belgium in the 1 980s The murders were carrieout during a number of raids o supermarkets on eachoccasion the gang armed w military weapons shot six orseven peope apparenty at random and stole very smalamounts of money Recent newspaper revelations havesuggested that the choice of victims may not have beenenirey random and that the murderers may have beeniked to rightwing organisaons

Page 55 ' home is the pirate home from the sea healusion is to Robert ouis tevensons Requiem But someof the references here are more spec Debord has pointedout that 'te thief who no oner neest steal or example

was ranois Besse e former accompice of JacquesMesrin who has isappeared without tace

Pages 67-8 aurs was assassinated in the Chope du Croissnt

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COMENTS ON THE SOCITY OF THE SPECTACLE

GUY DBD

Translate by Malcom Imrie

h mp db o pcc - i, o h civii of h

worl' own - i ogzd b h pcc f; vhig i id

bo h xniv i dpo o u ohg i idbo hr xnv po. R k o h pcc, pop

of pf o h "di Ad b h h dcb

in of pubic vic whic wi pi poioi woud fcii h w w of couicio hogh di fo o comnico whch h d ui

pui whb dcion lrd pd fo pivdiio Fo wh i comncd orders; d wih pc

ho ho who gv h lo o who iof

Gu Dbod ciq of h pcc h podcd vi ofpo I 1968 hi fi boo, The Society of te Spetale, w g

ohg hocg i i i vi, oig vid d ub o og i pic o mvo

pc w c id h igi if i hd bco bo

u coc bod h ic pod o i w o hi boo wo

ig hd chgd, bu wod H h id h vw ih w Comments on the Soety o the Setle.

Guy Debord w bo 93. Af dig jo Intetionle

stutonste h pbid L Soit d Setle 967 988 h

ddd ommets o ubjc

Comments on the Society of the Spectacle - Guy Debord

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Transcript of Comments on the Society of the Spectacle - Guy Debord