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MIERDA, OR CONCERNING EVIL IN POLITICS.A RHETORICAL ANALYSIS.

By Philippe-Joseph Salazar

y purpose is to outline the question of the diabolical. Toacknowledge something like the diabolical in politics oftransition has a direct bearing on the appreciation by which

in order to achieve a new beginning a traumatised polity treats thediabolical and proceeds to reconciliation, or to vengeance.1

I.

Let me begin with immediate differences and one analogy on thequestion of the diabolical in Argentina and South Africa. Both in theReport by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission2 and in the debateensuing from the republication of the Nunca ms Report by

CONADEP the diabolical makes its presence felt. The TRC Reportnames apartheid evil and in Argentina there is a debate on themysteriously named teora de los dos demonios. Terms vary but fall

within the same paradigm, the diabolical.

However, there are immediate differences in the treatment of thediabolical in public debate. In South Africa, it was a case of a morbidor eroticised fascination for prime evil, Colonel Eugene de Kock.3 In

Argentina (as the English entry in Wikipedia says cleverly) it functions

1 Material is based upon work supported by the National ResearchFoundation of South Africa (GUN: 75930). Any opinions, findings andconclusions or recommendations expressed in these materials are those ofthe author and therefore the NRF does not accept any liability in regardthereto.2 Readers are refered to two compendia of the TRC Report: 1.) Erik

Doxtader and Philippe-Joseph Salazar, Truth and reconciliation in South Africa.The fundamental documents(Cape Town: David Philip, 2007): 2.) French-Englishversion by Philippe-Joseph Salazar, Amnistier lApartheid (Paris: Le Seuil,2004).3 In Doxtader and Salazar, op. cit., Document 35: 210 - 217 and note: 297.

M

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~ Philippe-Joseph Salazar ~

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like (or as) a rhetorical device,4and it refers to the theory wherebycriminalspro and conengaged in acts of violence that were demoniac;in South Africa however the epithet evil has never been applied (to

my knowledge) to crimes committed by Liberation movements.

Further, that apartheid was evil was taken for granted, not only as anidea but as practice. Some perpetrators5 actually staged its exorcismand expressed that theyhad found God again, after they had beendeposed by the TRC; as if, through talking they exorcised the evil inthemselves. An apartheid cabinet minister washed the feet of anopponent (by then also a Cabinet official) whose assassination he had

ordered or covered up, in a gesture of religious atonement at Eastertime.

In addition, whereas Liberation movements were asked by the TRC tojustify their human rights violations, by contrast in Argentina thesuggestion that those who, from anti-junta or security forces,committed crimes were equally demoniac, was not taken for granted.In fact it deeply divides the partisans of criminal tribunals, who won in

the end, and the partisans of a reconciliation akin to South Africaswhereby perpetrators and victims were treated with fair handedness

i.e. not in the same way but with the same recognition that apartheidbeing evil, perpetrators were also its victims. No such considerationseems acceptable to many or even most of the relatives of victims in

Argentina.6

The leader of the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo called the idea of

4 The theory of the two demons (Spanish: Teora de los dos demonios) is arhetorical device used in Argentine political discourse to disqualify argumentsthat appear to morally equate violent political subversion with illegalrepressive activities carried out by the state: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Theory_of_the_two_demons&oldid=422752387.5 For an anthropology of perpetrators, see Philippe-Joseph Salazar,Relato, reconciliacin, reconocimiento, a propsito de losperpetradoresy de la

amnista de Sudfrica, Historia, Antropologa y Fuentes Orales42 (2009): 37 - 53.6 Argenpress.info (20 September 2010): http://www.argenpress.info/2010/09/argentina-cordoba-la-teoria-de-los-dos.html.

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~ Mierda, or concerning evil in politics~

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fair handedness or equally shared evil Mierda, shit. 7

The word is strong. Indeed the diabolical in theology is often in

proximity with vile matters, cold semen and excrement; so, whenvoices of vengeance evoke indirectly the purity or innocence of ourchildren (who were undoubtedly tortured, or raped and killed), thelink between the excremental nature of the diabolical on one sideand the virginal on the other settles in a neat, if somewhat expected,balance of opposites. None of this was prominent in South Africa

where, mostly, pardon granted and remorse expressed equalised painand anger. Victimhood at the hands of evil apartheid was perceived

to be borne both by perpetrators and what we usually and juristicallycall, victims. Some Liberation fighters, who had been tortured refusedfor that reason to appear as victims.

One step back into rhetoric: How common places are turned intoethical arguments, how such arguments have no other truth-value thanthe rhetorical effects they produce as they solidify in objects fortransactions, is the ambit of rhetoric as practical philosophy.

Arguments are commodities. I have called them, elsewhere,rhetoremes. This is in essence a radical, materialist approach.

II.

Thus, if there is a discursive theory of evil, it is found in the TRCReport. I will list the main instances of evil in the Report, and facingeach occurrence, I will offer the prolegomena of a gloss. The sum ofthe glosses structures the rhetoreme evil.

A similar work must be done with regard to the controversy aroundthedemonios and the new, 2006 version ofNunca mswhich rejects

a symmetry between State terrorism and acts of rebellion bearing in mind that the idiom teora de los dos demonios is not to befound in the original Nunca ms and is a rebuttal device used by itsopponent.

7 Olivier Galak, Controversia por el prlogo agregado al informe Nuncams, La Nacion(19 May 2006).

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1. The online presentation onthe TRC website states:

The Mandate (Volume 1,Chapter 4, paragraph 1) iscritical to understanding the

way in which the Commissiongrappled with and interpretedits mandate, and how it dealt

with the complexities thatattended this process. The

chapter explores the origins ofthe Commission and thepolitical processes that broughtit into existence. It providessome background as to howthe Commission approached its

work and takes up some of theimportant debates that

provided the framework withinwhich the Commissionoperated. These include adiscussion on terminology; thedebate on the definition of

victims in an apartheid societyand the necessarily narrowfocus of the Commission(Who were the victims ofgross violations of humanrights?): It can never beforgotten that the system itself

was evil, inhumane anddegrading for the manymillions who became its secondand third class citizens.

Amongst its many crimes,perhaps the greatest was itspower to humiliate, todenigrate and to remove the

self-confidence, self-esteemand dignity of its millions of

victims.1

Gloss: Apartheid as a system isevil, inhumane, degrading.

That is: a theological definitionof evil appears first inconnection with thedegradation of mankind from

its Edenic status to what wecall humanity,2 when deathbecomes an integral part ofhumanity. Apartheid is equated

with the Fall and Death.3

1http://www.justice.gov.za/trc/report/execsum.htm2 Genesis 3.3 Wisdom 2: 24.

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2. A statement about theScriptural basis for theimperative to oppose evil:

Liberation theologists biblicalimperative is to be found inIsaiah Chapter 61, verse 1 4,and is quoted in Luke Chapter4, verse 18 - 19, particularly the

words: To set at liberty thosewho are oppressed. For this

reason a group of Theologiansmet together at that criticaltime of South Africas history,and using the process of wideand in-depth consultation,eventually came up with whatcame to be known as the(Kairos)4 Document, issued as a

challenge to the churches. In itsshort lifetime, the institute hassuffered much at the hands ofthe previous government andfrom rejection by mostchurches who havemisunderstood is vision andmission. Both government andthe churches singled outliberation theology as thedevils theology and thusaccused ICT of serving the

4 Transcript says Carus, atranscription which shows howlittle knowledge the TRC staff hadof Liberation theology in South

Africa (Kairos document, 1985 ; inDoxtader and Salazar, op. cit,Document 9: 50 - 56).

interest of.[TAPE ENDS][inaudible] have a lot incommon between communism,

barring atheism andChristianity than the church

would care to admit.5

Gloss: Apartheid brandedLiberation theology, the devilstheology. What is highlighted

here is the accusatory oradversarial nature of apartheid:again, there is a Scripturalreference, whereby Satan isaccusatory in that sense thathe indicts the innocent usingfalse claims.6

5 Statement by the GeneralSecretary of the Institute forContextual Theology, FaithCommunity Hearings, 17-19 Nov.

1997: http://www.justice.gov.za/trc/special/faith/faith_a.htm).6 Psalms 109: 6.

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3. A statement regarding theuse of violence in opposing

violence:

As we reflect on the past andlook to the future, there areseveral things we would like tosay. Notwithstanding that manyin the White community sawthe evil of apartheid and its out

working, many did not and may

not have chosen to. That standsas a sombre lesson of howwhole communities andcountries can be misled byskilful leaders. It has happenedbefore and no doubt it willhappen again. While we believethat many of the government

officials of the old regime weresincere Christians, nevertheless,we were a witness to how thebible and its message can bemisused to support an evilideology But then so didsome liberation theologians

who finally supported violenceas a means of continuing thestruggle. They argued that thecrucifixion of Jesus sanctioned

violence as a method ofobtaining freedom. 7

7 Statement by the representativeof the Church of England inSouth Africa, Ibid.

Gloss: The question is, what isit to see evil and to choosenot to oppose it? Theologically,

it means that the Whites werepossessed by that evil spiritunless, through sincerity theywitnessed how thepossession operated and howthe victory over evil and of lifeover death (the Crucifixion)

was misused itself a case of

derivative possession. Thetext behind this instantiation ofevil is the story of Christchasing demons from apossessed man into a herd ofpigs.8

8 Luke 8: 22 - 36.

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4. A statement regardingmoral strength in opposingevil:

We are grateful to God that inspite of our shortcomings we

were given strength to resist theevil of apartheid. In spite ofextreme government pressure,

we refused to withdraw ourmembership from the World

Council of Churches. Anumber of our pulpitsfearlessly proclaimed a

wholesome gospel thatprophetically declared that thepeople of South Africa will befree. We constantly focused ourprayers to the cause of justice

and to the discomfort of many,we used sometimes symbolsthat sought to keep the hopealive for a new South Africa todawn. A number of ourministers suffered publichumiliation at the hands of thegovernment and its agents ofevil. A large number ofMethodist families suffered atthe hands of the tyrannicalsystem, as they responded tothe prophetic call to resistapartheid.9

9 Statement by the representativeof the Methodist church, Ibid.

Gloss: Agents of evil is aninteresting artefact as itintroduces, precisely, agency.

The question of the agency ofperpetrators is a key element see below. In opposition to theenergumen possessed (he

who is travailed by evil, inGreek is an energumenos) thereis the agent.

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5. A statement regarding theintrinsic nature of evil:

But from 1947 when theConference was established,the Bishops sought to speak asa Conference on the issues ofthe day and they began toattach the false theological baseon which the ideology ofapartheid was based. In 1951

one of the first Conferencestatements condemned racialdiscrimination but didnt usethe word apartheid, but here

we see the fact that we were achurch community of the day.

We reflected the way issueswere looked at in that day. For

example, it reflected apaternalistic spirit, thestatement in 1952, maintainingthat most non-Europeans (wasthe word commonly used at thetime) were not yet ready for fullparticipation in the social,political and economic life ofthe country, but must beallowed and encouraged toevolve towards suchparticipation. That was an earlystatement, but by 1957, theConference had begun to focusmuch more critically and it in1957 called apartheid what itreally is: intrinsically evil.10

10 Statement by the representative

Gloss: Indeed the CatholicChurch was the first to providea neat definition, and the first

to oppose apartheid on solid,doctrinal grounds. The keyterm is intrinsically. What

would be extrinsic evil? Theproduct or the application of asystem. That will be the exactdefence by F.W. de Klerk, asrepresentative of the apartheid

National Party: that ifapartheid was wrong,11 andits applications weremistaken, apartheid leaders

were however honourablewithin the context of theirtime.12 This distinction setsinto motion a new distinction:

if apartheid was intrinsicallyevil, then some made thechoice to support it (as, bycontrast, if it had been onlyextrinsically i.e. throughapplications, evil, then agentsneeded not choose it; they

would merely have acted, and

of the Roman Catholic Church,Ibid.11 Statement by F.W. de Klerk, 14May 1997 (http://www.justice.gov.za/trc/special/party2/np2.htm); analysis in Salazar, AmnistierlApartheid: 58 - 59.12 Statement by F.W. de Klerk (21

August 1996) in Doxtader andSalazar, op. cit., Document 47: 311- 319.

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then realized the applicationwas evil). What is summonedhere is the temptatory nature

of evil, a commonplace ofChristian theology.13

13 For instance, Luke 11, 4, 22, 40.

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6. What the Report says aboutthe motives for evil actions.

We have sought to carry outour work to the best of ourability, without bias. I cannot,however, be asked to be neutralabout apartheid. It is anintrinsically evil system. But Iam even-handed in that I willlet an apartheid supporter tell

me what he or she sincerelybelieved moved him or her, andwhat his or her insights andperspectives were; and I willtake these seriously intoaccount in making my finding.I do believe that there werethose who supported apartheid

who genuinely believed that itoffered the best solution to thecomplexities of a multiracialland with citizens at verydifferent levels of economic,social and educationaldevelopment I do believesuch people were not driven bymalicious motives.14

14 Report, Foreword by DesmondTutu ; in Doxtader and Salazar, op.cit., Document 17: 85 - 89.

Gloss: Motives were generallynot malicious. That is, agentsacted through temptation, and

lack of resistance to temptationand its persuasiveness.

Theologically congruent withthe persuasive nature of evil

whereby to persuade (to do a

given action in Eves case toaccess the forbidden) (peir, inGreek) is akin to to tempt

(peiraz).15

In short: the temptedis put to a test that he does notsee as a test.16

15 Matthew 4: 1 - 3.16The Hebrew massah translatesas test, or temptation.

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7. The human dignity of evilperpetrators:

At the forum onReconciliation, Reconstructionand Economic Justice in Cape

Town on 19 March 1997, MsNgewu (whose son was killedby the police in the GugulethuSeven incident), was askedhow she saw the notion of

reconciliation. She respondedas follows (to the question onperpetrators serving longprison sentences): In myopinion, I do not agree withthis view. We do not want tosee people suffer in the same

way that we did suffer, and we

did not want our families tohave suffered. We do not wantto return the suffering that wasimposed upon us We do not

want to return the evil thatperpetrators committed to thenation. We want todemonstrate humanenesstowards them, so that they inturn may restore their ownhumanity.17

17 Report V, 9, paragraph 33, inDoxtader and Salazar, op. cit.,Document 58: 389 - 411.

Gloss: This goes to the heartof the redemptive purport thatis within naming apartheid as

evil. It is impossible here notbring to bear Freuds analysisof diabolical neurosis

whereby the Devil is asubstitute for the Father,allowing for the two sides ofthe Father (translation: theState, Society etc.) to play itself

out, both destructively andpositively.18

18 Sigmund Freud, A seventeeth-century demoniological neurosis,in The standard edition of completepsychological works 19, James

Strachey et al. (Eds.) (London:W.W. Norton & Co., 1961): 67 -105.

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8. How to restore from evil:

One of the reasons for this

failure of emphasis is the factthat the greater part of theCommissions focus has beenon what could be regarded as

the exceptional on grossviolations of human rightsrather than the more mundanebut nonetheless traumatising

dimensions of apartheid lifethat affected every single BlackSouth African The mediahas understandably focused on

these events labellingEugene de Kock, the Vlakplaascommander, Prime Evil. The

vast majority of victims who

either made statements to theCommission or who appearedat public hearings of theHuman Rights ViolationsCommittee to tell their storiesof suffering simply did notreceive the same level of publicattention... The result is that

ordinary South Africans do notsee themselves as representedby those the Commissiondefines as perpetrators, failingto recognise the littleperpetrator in each one of us.

To understand the source ofevil is not to condone it. It is

only by recognising thepotential for evil in each one ofus that we can take full

responsibility for ensuring thatsuch evil will never berepeated.19

Gloss: Can evil repeat itself?The Report answers positively.So, the work or reconciliation isto prevent such evil to repeatitself. Oddly, the intent is not toprevent a similar evil, or a

similar process, but to preventthe repetition of this particulartemptation. Question: Canreconciliatory politics also wardoff an iteration of evil, thatis, recognize it as an iterationand treat it before ithappens?

19 Report I, 5, Ubuntu promoting

restorative justice, paragraphs 107 -108, in Doxtader and Salazar, op.cit., Document 18: 90 - 98.

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9. How to differentiatebetween evil and victimhood:

The Act makes a cleardistinction between theperspectives of victims and themotives and perspectives ofthe persons responsible for thecommission of the violations.

This magnitude gap has anumber of features:

a.) The importance of the act isusually far greater for the

victim. Horror of theexperience is usually seen inthe victims terms; for theperpetrator it is often a verysmall thing.

b.) Perpetrators tend to haveless emotions about their actsthan do victims. This may beillustrated in the recent book by

Vlakplaas operative ColonelEugene de Kock, whererepeated acts of violence aredescribed in a matter-of-factmanner

c.) The magnitude gapmanifests in different timeperspectives. The experience of

violence typically fades fasterfor perpetrators than for

victims. For victims, thesuffering may continue longafter the event.

d.) Moral evaluations of theevents may differ: actions mayappear less wrong, less evil, to

the perpetrator than to thevictim. While victims tend torate events in stark categoriesof right and wrong,perpetrators may see large greyareas.20

Gloss: What is this gap andwhat is this magnitude?Mierda, shit. Not todifferentiate between victims(as commonly understood, in ajuristic definition based on

normal penal laws asopposed to their definition ascriminals by emergency orsecurity regulations) andperpetrators (as defined by anon-juristic legalism, South

African style, which dovetailswith their juristic definition assecurity officers performingtheir orders implies 1.) thatthere is a gap, to be filled; and2.) that this closure has toremain open. This is whereshit is, in that gap that has toexist, yet to be filled. Lacan:

Le stade anal se caractrise

20 Report V, 7, Perpetrators, the

problem of perspectives, paragraph 47,in Doxtader and Salazar, op. cit.,Document 43: 266 - 285.

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en ceci, que le sujet ne satisfaitun besoin uniquement pour lasatisfaction dun autre.21 In

sum, shit is the name of theTRCs satisfying a need in orderto satisfy someone else. Thisother is the Mother andultimately the sexual partner

whose demand has to besatisfied for the subject to be. Itis the scene of sado-

masochism. The TRC is asado-masochist scene wherebyit lodges its desire for aredemptive politics in givingsatisfaction to perpetrators. Itembodies the self-eliminatinggesture of the obsessional:

Le fantasme fondamental delobsessionnel en tant quil sedvalorise, en tant quil met hors delui tout le jeu de la dialectiquerotique, quil feint, comme ditlautre, den tre lorganisateur. Cestsur le fondement de sa propreelimination quil fonde tout ce

fantasm

21 Jacques Lacan, Le transfert:http://www.ecole-lacanienne.net/bibliotheque.php?id=13.

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10. A constitutional courtjudgment to a challenge by aLiberation movement

(AZAPO) regarding theamnesty process: 22

Every decent human beingmust feel grave discomfort inliving with a consequence

which might allow theperpetrators of evil acts to

walk the streets of this landwith impunity, protected intheir freedom by an amnesty,immune from constitutionalattack, but the circumstances insupport of this course requirecarefully to be appreciated

The Act seeks to address this

massive problem byencouraging these survivorsand the dependants of thetortured and the wounded, themaimed and the dead tounburden their grief publicly,to receive the collectiverecognition of a new nationthat they were wronged, andcrucially, to help them todiscover what did in truthhappen to their loved ones,

22 Constitutional Court of SouthAfrica, Case CCT 17/96 (25 July1996); in Doxtader and Salazar, op.cit., Document 5: 28 - 35, and note

p. 36.

where and under whatcircumstances it did happen,and who was responsible...

With that incentive, what mightunfold are objectivesfundamental to the ethos of anew constitutional order. Thefamilies of those unlawfullytortured, maimed ortraumatised become moreempowered to discover the

truth, the perpetrators becomeexposed to opportunities toobtain relief from the burdenof a guilt or an anxiety theymight be living with for manylong years, the country beginsthe long and necessary processof healing the wounds of the

past, transforming anger andgrief into a matureunderstanding and creating theemotional and structuralclimate essential for thereconciliation andreconstruction which informsthe very difficult andsometimes painful objectivesof the amnesty articulated inthe Epilogue (of the InterimConstitution of 1993 whichimposed an amnesty and areconciliation process).

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Gloss: Rare is a legal andconstitutional document thatinvokes evil to make an

argument about thefundamental law and the Lawas foundational.23 The Courtinterposes itself between thebefore and the after, and standsat that very point where theConstitution anchors itself notin a procedure of universal

access to sovereignty, but in anethical process. The openingsentence of this landmarkdecision sealed forever thetemptation to re-introduce anew evil into politics, i.e.: anegation of the reconciliationand amnesty which would

result in a diabolical process:that of accusation, calumny,seduction by arguments anddegradation into death (thefigures of the diabolical); orretaliation. However thedramatic nature of the openingsentence, in a judicial andconstitutional judgement, mustbe noted: perpetrators of evilacts to walk the streets of thisland with impunity, protectedin their freedom by an amnesty,immune from constitutional

23 For the Epilogue, see in

Salazar, Amnistier lApartheid: 37 -58; and, Doxtader and Salazar, op.cit., Document 2: 5.

attack. What does that walkmean? What is thephilosophical sense of

walking free?

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III.

To answer this question, I make the following proposal: perpetrators

incarnate what is evil in politics; they are, to use a phenomenologicalapproximation, la chair du monde politique. They represent politicsgone wrong, and the sign of its rectification, in the same way as, inPauline theology, flesh, la chair, is the locale both for death andredemption. Reconciliation is possible when the agency of death andthe agency of humanity redeemed are in the same site, and proceedfrom that site to reconciliation. Paul: He has reconciled you in thebody of his flesh, through death (nunc autem reconciliavit in corpore carnis

eius per mortem/ ).1 The Greek phrase, more than the Latin one, indicates athorough change by which a radical exchange takes place. To let evil

walk among us is to perform an exchange (by which we acknowledgethe deadly nature of their acts, a death of their humanity) and proceedto a change, both in victims and in perpetrators. Of course one hasfirst to reconcile oneself, and ones political ideas with this self-recognition, that politics is in essence diabolical, that it places

individuals in front of choices they do not fully understand, andconfront then with means they do not really, and cannot, comprehend.Perpetrators perpetrate, as I have explained it elsewhere,2 that is theyfulfill thoroughly their (misconceived and unapprehended) contract,and in so doing they embody deliberative politics confronted withpersonal responsibility: like Satan, they were able to argue (for andamong themselves) thepro at the time they committed the act, and theycan argue now the con as they are faced with external, unanticipated

consequences shifting the argument, the iron rule of being inpolitics.

In fact the question of the diabolical in political choice was firstposed by French political philosopher Maurice Duverger (and mycontention is that it is the actual source for the teora de los dos demonios).In 1960, at the height of the National Liberation Front-led revolt in

1 Colossians 1: 21 - 22 (Vulgate/Stephanus).2 Philippe-Joseph Salazar, Perpetrator, ou De la citoyennet criminelle, RueDescartes36 (2002): 167 - 180.

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Algeria, on the cusp of a diabolical choice by the newly-founded DeGaulle rgime to betray its own citizens (Let them suffer was hisrecorded comment), actions which both confronted the French people,

at least those who cared, with a radical choice, Duverger wrote onThe two betrayals.3 Because the Republic was under a double,treacherous or treasonable, attempt to violate its human rights andpolitical charter on one hand by supporters of the use of brutalforce, and torture, by the French army (premise of a treacherous coupdtat), and on the other by supporters of the use of terrorism, andtorture, by the rebels (premise of the treacherous massacre of Frenchand Algerians alike in denial of their rights), Duverger warns of the

simultaneous possibility of two treasons, both made in the name ofjustice, yet both resulting in a denial of justice. Support given, inFrance, to acts of terror committed by French citizens either pro-armymilitiamen and pro-rebellion operatives, are for him equallydiabolical. In my view, they may or may not be treasonous, yetthey both perpetrate politics to its utmost limit, showing, indeed, theinnate diabolism of any political engagement whose stakes are life,death and identity.

PHILIPPE-JOSEPH SALAZAR,University of Cape Town.

3 Maurice Duverger, Les deux trahisons, Le Monde (27 April 1960),reprinted in Anne Simonin, Le droit de la dsobissance(Paris: Minuit, 2012): 61 -63.

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12_AYOR 3,2 Salazar