Jodi Dean: Four Theses on the Comrade

The 2018 Phyllis Clarke Memorial Lecture, "Four Theses on the Comrade," was delivered by Dr. Jodi Dean, the Donald R. Harter '39 Professor of Humanities and Social Sciences at Hobart and William Smith Colleges in Geneva, New York. Jodi Dean is former co-editor, Theory and Event, author or editor of 12 books, including Crowds and Party (2016), The Communist Horizon (2010) and Democracy and Other Neoliberal Fantasies (2009). Crucial to the global excitement generated by the October Revolution was the promise and possibility of new forms of relationship, new ways of being human. The Revolution heralded an end to relations of hierarchy and domination and the beginning of new relations of comradeship and solidarity. This paper focuses on the comrade as a term of address, figure of political relation, and carrier of expectations for action. It presents four theses on the comrade, emphasizing the genericity and interchangeability of the comrade. It argues that this genericity, the sameness of those on the same side, provides a way through the impasse of systems and survivors prominent on the contemporary left. Moderated by Bryan Evans. Introduction by Leo Panitch. https://www.ryerson.ca/politics/news-events/archives/phyllis-clarke-memorial-lecture/ Recorded in Toronto, 16 February 2018.