105. Civil Disobedience with Noëlle McAfee

Episode 105

Do political subjects have a default obligation to obey the law? In episode 105 of Overthink, Ellie and David discuss civil disobedience in the present context of university activism for divestment from genocide in Gaza. They chart the genealogy of the concept of disobedience in political theory, from Thoreau and MLK through to today. Together with guest Noëlle McAfee, Chair of the Philosophy Department at Emory University, they reflect on the relation of activist disobedience to negotiation and dialogue, and think through its key role as part of a healthy democracy. Focusing on the psychoanalytic concept of ‘breakdown’, McAfee describes the logic behind the disproportionate administrative and militarized crackdown on this disobedience today.

Overthink is a philosophy podcast hosted by your new favorite professors, Ellie Anderson (Pomona College) and David Peña-Guzmán (San Francisco State University). Check out our episodes for deep dives into concepts such as existential anxiety, empathy, and gaslighting.

Martin Luther King, Jr., Letter from Birmingham Jail
Julia Kristeva, Powers of Horror
Noëlle McAfee, Fear of Breakdown: Politics and Psychoanalysis
Noëlle McAfee, Democracy and the Political Unconscious
John Rawls, A Theory of Justice
Henry David Thoreau, Resistance to Civil Government
Donald Winnicott, “Fear of Breakdown”
Iris Marion Young, “Activist Challenges to Deliberative Democracy”

Find us on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok at @overthink_pod

[addammadd]

10:33 Chris Cutrone brings MLKj into conversation with respect to Donald Trump’s recent conviction on the basis of an unjust application of a law. Nobody who knows his writing thinks this is a defense of Trump qua defense of Trumpism; but instead a defense of the guilty against the overwhelming application of state power in service to politics to the detriment of justice.

This was on the Sublation media podcast.

I’m not sure what I think precisely on this subject but I do roughly agree with Cutrone in his stance against unjust prosecution at all.

[kylestevensanders]

got my gf to start listening to overthink :)

[crowboggs]

Does the collective paranoia (referenced early in the conversation with Dr. McAfee) necessarily manifest due to a latent collective trauma, or is it possible that the paranoia is created by a structural lack within the symbolic order? Tend to see the latter as a more accurate point of constructive political activity within social desire, though recognize the former as an effect of the latter through history.