Emancipating ethics: an autonomist reading of Islamic forms of life in Russia

This article advances a framework aimed at capturing the political life of ethical intensity by putting autonomist theory in resonance with ethnographic material pertaining to quietist Muslim milieus post-Soviet Russia. The emancipatory and prefigurative potential collective projects self-legislation – this case, ‘halal living’ are explored through notions form Rule/Law. It will be argued that (a) is helpful conceptualizing friction between (however quietist) dominant moral/political orders; (b) has broaden anthropological conversations on virtue beyond existing fault lines (notably what I call ‘traditionist’ ‘liberal’ theoretical families) as well conceptual silos (‘religion', ‘secularity’); (c) can help us envision radical, politically engaged anthropology ethics. L'éthique émancipatrice : une lecture autonomiste des formes de vie islamiques en Russie Résumé Cet propose un cadre visant à comprendre la politique l'intensité éthique mettant théorie résonance avec le matériel ethnographique relatif aux milieux musulmans quiétistes au sein post-soviétique. Le potentiel émancipateur et préfiguratif projets collectifs d'auto-législation, « style halal » dans ce cas, est exploré travers les forme règle/loi. Il sera argumenté que utile pour conceptualiser entre éthiques (même quiétistes) ordres moraux/politiques dominants ; d'élargir anthropologiques sur vertu au-delà lignes fracture existantes (notamment l'auteur appelle familles traditionistes libérales ») ainsi spectres conceptuels (« religion », sécularité peut nous aider envisager anthropologie l'éthique radicale politiquement engagée. How do we talk about virtue? articulates possible answer departs from currently assumptions orientations discourse. Though discussion Sunni piety movement Russia, invite readers explore perspectives avant-garde Marxist thought specifically, expand canon ‘ethical turn’ positive analytically actionable engagement themes emancipation, autonomy, intensity. Questions politics have long been circulating within field ethics related post-Asadian (Mahmood 2005). Yet several issues remain hard account for. make sense seeming contradiction that, while predicated individuals’ freedom, demand latter's curtailment subjection often severe discipline (Laidlaw 2014: 154)? Many accounts describe fraught relationship their ‘outside’ it state, lay mainstream, or market economy. There appears something ‘unsettling’ (Fernando 2014) especially, but not exclusively, religious type. But where does unsettling emanate from? Does oft-assumed congenital exclusivity secularity (Hallaq 2012) exhaust issue's complexity? Lastly: unprecedented surge trends revivals, reform movements, self-betterment characterizing late modernity (Feher 2009; Sloterdijk 2009) seems, paradoxically, produced docile, vulnerable, exploitable (Rudnyckyj 2010) person, sometimes known ‘neoliberal subject’. reconcile picture neo-Aristotelian portrait self-possessed virtuous subject all its potential? In grappling these questions, recent literature come dominated rivalrous intertwinement ‘traditionist/communitarian’ dispositions inclinations ones. These cross-fertilized dialogue each other, an exchange equipped formidable toolkit: Asadian notion discursive tradition (Asad 2009 [1986]) courageous critique secularism (Ahmad 2017), one hand, compelling reflections liberty 2014), morality personal self-cultivation (Faubion 2011), everyday (Das 2015), other. Their seminal character notwithstanding, dominance limited range imagination field. Of course, am suggesting variety exhausted two positions, nor consider internally homogeneous ‘camps’.11 intellectual-political ‘fault line’ should seen running across (and animating) even oeuvres individual scholars. For purposes article, Cavellian ‘everyday’ approaches sharing common sensibilities post-Foucauldian (Deutscher 2016). However, tension traditionist liberal which less openly discussed than other lines’ partly overlaps, such ‘ordinary ethics’ ‘morality vs debates 2018) ought recognized order cast fresh light culs-de-sac contemplate alternative analytical possibilities. Both characterized with, scepticism towards, ideas emancipation which, analytically, translates into risk misrecognizing on-the-ground manifestations. Communitarianism's suspicion originates legitimate scrutiny models agency. This, however, incurs danger altogether rejecting possibilities emancipation. Here, co-ordinates orientate meaningful action spring straight past ‘weighs in’ present (Yadgar 2015: 10). problem framework, besides insular past-bound moral pockets implicated, risks foreclosing viable prospects for engaged/progressive social analysis renouncing any openness potentiality (Zigon 2017; 2018). By contrast, more resonant Berlinian (negative) freedom plurality agency, prospect finding emic versions thereof (‘the role given choice various cultures’ Robbins 2007: 295). ill capture experiences heightened either foregrounding impossibilities torments commitment, shifting focus onto ‘ordinary’ routines compromises life, scholars who share orientation minimizing extent ethicalists succeed creating spaces extra-ordinary coherence. As observed (Fadil & Fernando run depicting intensities mere variations hegemonic norm premised upon liberal-secular personhood society. follows, attempt autonomy framed political-philosophical autonomism.22 Autonomism elaborates both capitalist/(neo)liberal bureaucratic organization based Marxian orthodoxy (Virno Hardt 1996). sits intersection communist anarchist thought. initiator ‘heresy’, Antonio Negri (1991: 190), goal ‘rich, independent multilaterality’ subjects. Related formulations include ‘coincides’ (Agamben 2013a: 99), ‘ownness’ (Newman fidelity ‘the line along power grows’ (Tiqqun 2010: 25). Building trajectory, frames meta-individual cultivation affirmative, discerning, enduringly fidelious subjectivities. sociological abstraction philosophical ideal realization an(y) difference irreducible heteronomous status quo. Although orientated towards universal truths, experience always linked concrete, historically specific endowed disorganize arrangements prefigure alternatives (Badiou 2002: 60). Autonomism's take negative cognate emphasizing agency availability options. also turns idea head asking practices vistas traditions may unlock. rather standing opposition, framing conceptually productive positions turn. My argument particularly indebted Giorgio Agamben (2000; 2013a) French situationist Tiqqun (2010; 2012).33 must point out authors compact club, disagreements them intense. Furthermore, some question my post-(?)Maoist Badiou autonomist. grounds structural analogy, pedigree. adopt set concepts elaborated authors: namely, attendant dialectic Rule Law. argue perform powerful function respect dimensions deserve added toolbox our discipline. true since, throughout work, many disrupts reassuring compartmentalizations secular religious, traditional modern, progressive conservative. They look phenomena divides medieval cloisters, squats, conventicles, underground repositories potentiality, generative intractability, immanentized prefigurations emancipated communities. lens engage case: Muslim-majority Russian republic. Before discussing how resonates though, points clarified. First: autonomism comes own normativities, no means assume anyone automatically find it/them appealing. regardless thinks politics, deserves heeded pertinence vis-à-vis certain forms persistent Second: alone pursuing progressive, religion. Didier Fassin perhaps most successful advocate ‘intimately … dimensions’ (2015: 176). While Fassin's analyses charged humanitarianism policing masterful, attempting elaborate here is, sense, mirror image his stance: tools suitable unearthing project milieu. Another voice boldly advanced Jarrett Zigon (2017; 2018), whom interest incipiencies manifested ‘worlds duration potential’ (2018: 12). Zigon's applied study drug users activists, straddles traditionist/liberal divide: progress reliance Heidegger appear chime sensibilities, ‘openness letting be’ (2017: 107) suggests existentially denser re-elaboration ideal. addition, influences thinkers Alain 2007; His partial: Rule-following commitment truth, crucial thinkers’ understanding political, framework. might because lend themselves ethnography; fundamental level, moreover, phenomenology-inspired work operates under (2013b: 119) would ‘ontology being’, commitment-based having-to-be’ autonomists foreground. Caroline Humphrey's event subjectivity builds Badiousian draw on, utilizing Badiou's terminology changes ordinary human subjectivities vicissitudes. Humphrey (2018) deliberately dials down radical aspects philosophy: fidelity, compositions subjectivity. focuses (‘extra-ordinary’) intensities. Ultimately, despite seemingly vast distance case studies, closest offer pages Naisargi Dave's perceptive queer communities India. Her observations ‘radical worlds process, shared existence possibility’ (2012: 12) aspirations emergent worlds’ 208 n. 4) aptly prefiguratively always-already high-intensity projects, matter quietist. setting introduce you following section point. article's formulations, intellectual from, formulation term encountered during fieldwork pietists conducted research multi-ethnic republic Tatarstan, investigated growing success Islamic movements half years. Tatarstan home Russia's largest ethnic group, Volga Tatars, population predominantly Turkic stock historical cultural ties Central Eurasian Sunni-Persianate-Chingisid landscape (Ross 2020). Despite Region's history, institutions region today secular, largely result centuries rule topped aggressive Soviet-era anti-religious campaigns. Against backdrop, mushrooming surprised onlookers including irreligious media. Piety took hold particular among emerging urban middle classes youth. groups’ Islam described local iteration global ‘revival’ (Schielke 2015). after real socialism, proving misleading invites contemporary religious-ethical developments terms ‘re-emergence’ ‘traditional’ faiths. long-term continuities course identified, differ sources suggest pre-revolutionary Soviet times (Benussi 2021a). particular, pious flourish without relying civilizational institutes Islamicate Eurasia pedagogical, juridical, administrative, pastoral apparatuses regulated domain before Soviet-led modernization attract followers customary ethno-confessional boundaries. respects post-civilizational, unmoored (albeit nostalgic towards) organic capillary orders yore 2012). Observing broader myself agreement Peter Sloterdijk's sceptical very language revival: commentators see ‘mere’ return religion, discerns new, blossoming ‘anthropotechnics’ codes living necessarily defined (2009: 5-6). relevant because, disrupting clear-cut dividing analysts notice resemblances ready-made late-modern formation classified. We shall moment pertinent thesis hand. researched Russia (‘post-Islamist’) place heavy emphasis correct ritual practice, (ranging strict strict), pursuit knowledge, universality message. refer them, collectively, milieu’ defines otherwise nameless, loose galaxy encompassing groups divergent theological united same ethical-theological discernment Islamically permissible conduct. At time visit (2014-15), milieu had tense was bent surveilling domestic grassroots Islam. State apparatuses, security agencies, official organizations, media actors, dim view milieu, quietism, perceived jarring, unruly element society Large portions public, too, regard observant Muslims apprehension. non-pious ethnic-minded Tatars approvingly boom proof post-atheist vitality Tatars’ ‘national religion’ (a reading pietists, uncomfortable), halalists branded ‘fanatical’, ‘ugly’, ‘strange’, ‘obscurantist’ so-called ‘ethnic’ (i.e. heritage ‘essence’, not, only minimally, practise). What striking number people enjoy bad press. they conscious incurred those fall foul state repressive anti-‘extremism’ apparatus. friend told me, ‘Our country little patience pursue ways living’. there gleeful friend's awareness being ‘alternative’. part, doctrinal gharib: estranged (otchuzdennye) things sinful, drawing scripturally informed orthodox rest. apartness cherished some: interlocutor phrased it, ‘buffer (osteregat'sya) (okruzhayuschee)’. alongside reasoning, sort defiant jouissance stemming cultivated difference, dare say coolness animating innovation-orientated, cosmopolitan, aspirational use (peppered expressions Arabic, ‘old-fashioned’ Tatar), attire (trimmed beards, headscarves, overt sartorial statements), diet, countless conduct-related details mark difference. People banned disapproved of, pray diverge recommendations state-controlled secretly gather university's dusty basements salah classes, surreptitiously empty liquor bottles drain parties, (on rare occasions) enter polygamous frowned majority. acts piety, transgressions mainstream norms, participants apart conformism ‘grey mass’, prominent incarnations ‘Muslim cool’ (Alyautdinov 2013: 30). Some interlocutors circles subkul'tura: ‘something (osoznanno) choose’, born into. worth noting previously involved (gangsta rap, metal, hardcore punk, etc.). Others oppositional experimented movements. first generation active informal/criminal 1990s. least ‘coolness’ knowingly embraced, important frame subordinate milieu's main pursuit, perfecting one's comportment accordance standards divinely ordained permissibility (halal). intriguing problematic attempts interconnections sociality, cultures, (Bayat Herrera 2010; Herding 2013; Khabeer That approach, however promising, leading flat, horizontal comparisons, awkwardly mixing incommensurable domains ethics/religion pop culture/style doing injustice process. Instead, theory, proposes meta-framework throws new family ‘incomparable’ milieus. interlocutors’ positionality, ‘coolness’, self-willed, rich, put steeped ‘living according plan (zhit’ po-planu)’ against imperatives. Pietists’ authorities, knee-jerk rebelliousness, detachment norms interfere ‘plan’. To adapt famous Althusserian metaphor, tend react worldly sovereign policeman's ‘Hey you!’ sceptically raising eyebrow, falling knees disposition reserve God alone. Unsurprisingly, top-down command structure ‘vertical power’ tended symptom ‘disloyalty’ ‘separatism’. Its intractability remains immersed ways. did root until respondent observed, ‘All converts’, meaning raised moral, cultural, political-economic landscapes counterparts. all-Russian Tatar biopolitical lifeworlds. cannot partake habituses memories large. When policeman moves closer, exposed workings apparatuses. marked analogous detachment, antagonism, inescapable intertwinement. On strong investment ‘halal’ economic environment devoid ills (Russian) capitalism, experimenting business practices, cultivating brotherliness partners, avoiding financial (official ‘informal’, i.e. graft) habits (speculation, wheel-greasing, haggling) greatest extent. actors subjected constraints organization, entirely elude relations undergirding postsocialist environment. profit, entrepreneurs adhere logic, taxation, protection, and/or wheel-greasing impossible said, transformative effect practice community level underestimated (Kaliszewska Consider defining traits: fidelity; truth transcends doxic transforms adherents’ subjectivities; members’ willed subjective composition held together incongruous yet nested within, field; combination antagonism indifference to, mainstream. elements define (2002) calls ‘truth-processes’, he claims pertain four domains: aesthetic (artistic, arguably style-based, milieus), (scientific schools thought), amorous (romantic conjugal commitments), (revolutionary militant groups). Developing (2003) (contradictory) add another, spiritual domain. belong. multi-domain, higher-order conceptualization truth-based directs gaze ‘silo’ traditions, inviting truth-driven codable ‘religious’, paraphrase Talal Asad (2009 [1986]), behind just choosing right comparative parameters, formulating meta-concepts: Law concepts. project, emerged, ethnographically, category. Obraz zhizni (Rus., literally ‘image/shape’ life) tormış räveşe (Tat.) used po-planu: ‘The whole wisely halal. Halal mental activity, nutrition, professional sphere, fitness self-care’; ‘Halal complex rules (zhiznennye pravila) encompasses life. like Constitution believer’; axis (sterzhen), core (yadro) existence’. Can mapped theories life? Lebensform made immensely popular Ludwig Wittgenstein (Wittgenstein 1986 [1953]: 226e; Kishik 2008; Tonner 2017). over decades, contours remained vague declinations near-endless, including: living; modes discourse; worldviews; practices; biological realities; cognitive styles; fields possibility; problem-solving mechanisms; extraordinarily different types ranging ‘primitive/alien organized faiths West. justice manifold developed philosophers theorists via sustained relativism, rationality, science (Lukes 1982; Nielsen Phillips 2005; Salazar Bestard purpose suffice rivalry called Wittgensteinian ‘fideism’ humanist critics (Nielsen former Lebensformen essentially coherent, resting internal criteria appropriateness, unanswerable external ‘rational’ parameters (Gier 1980; Taylor 1989; Winch 2003 [1958]). latter position includes sociohistorical formations could critically rational-humanist meta-standpoint (Gellner 1960; 1986; Jaeggi 2018; An analogy detected diatribe opposing fideists humanists, separating traditionist/communitarian orientations, Wittgenstein's influence wide-ranging disciplinary divides. (like Foucauldian ones), example, discerned sides ‘everyday debate’, having contributed, Alasdair MacIntyre, ‘exceptionalist’ 2020; Viersen 2019) Stanley Cavell 2012; 2015; Tayob Deutscher thus proved fruitfully open-ended, frustratingly blunt tool manipulable Given elusiveness associations controversies seeks transcend, follows ‘form life’ concept. another reason so: commandment ‘leave world is’,