I’ve posted on two occasions about Keith Windschuttle’s allegations about Antonio Negri. Negri wrote to The Australian rebutting Windschuttle’s column, but the editors have not yet published his piece. You can now read Toni Negri’s letter here, courtesy of my friend and colleague Dr Craig Browne of Sydney University’s Department of Sociology and Social Policy, a member of the organising committee for the conference at which Negri hoped to speak.
A Letter from Toni Negri
Negri isolates nine points in Windschuttle’s article that he claims are totally false. He is angered by the need to rebut a series of scandalous accusations that contradict the truths established by Italian judges who convicted him of some crimes but found him totally innocent - and therefore definitively absolved - of another series of charges.
The nine points are as follows:
1. I never had anything to do with the Red Brigades, neither as leader, member, nor sympathiser. These charges were dropped after some months (in late 1979/early 1980). Even Cossiga, who put me in jail at the time, has now repeatedly rejected these allegations. I have been totally absolved of these charges. As a matter of fact, when I was in prison the Red Brigades even condemned me to death for disassociating myself from ‘armed struggle,’ along with many other friends in Rebibbia prison.
2. I never had anything to do with the kidnapping and murder of the Hon. Moro by the Red Brigades. The court records hold me completely innocent of this accusation.
3. The murders for which I was initially accused were all revealed to be false accusations. I was absolved of all 17! I was convicted for ‘crimes of association’ and never for ‘crimes of blood.’
4. I was initially accused of being the person who telephoned the Moro family. The first expert declared my voice to be 80% compatible with the voice of the caller. Another expert demonstrated the contrary, since the voice of the caller had an accent from Marche. Subsequent trials - and the role of the penitents from the Red Brigades - revealed the truth; it was Mario Moretti who made the call (he is in fact from Marche). I was completely absolved because I had nothing to do with this. When Espresso published the disk about which The Australian article speaks (with my voice from a lesson, and the voice of the caller during the days of the kidnapping-a way of inviting public opinion to judge by itself), I should have taken them to court for defamation. Unfortunately I was in a high security prison. But I was absolved nonetheless.
5. I was elected a member of parliament of the Radical Party of Marco Pannella, which, contrary to what The Australian article says, is not an extremist neo-marxist party but a party that has become ever more liberal. It was already liberal in those days (although more in the ‘libertarian’ mode) and today tends almost to the position of Bush. In any case, the party fought for civil liberties and due process in an era of emergency laws, which is nothing to be ashamed about either yesterday or today.
6. I did not use my liberty as a member of parliament to escape to France. I escaped only when they decided to remove my parliamentary immunity (by a majority of only 4 votes in the lower house … the votes of the Radical Party). I had already served four and a half years in a maximum security prison. My conviction of 30 years (1983) was reduced by appeal to 13.5 years (1986), only for ‘crimes of association.’ The judges removed the charge of ‘insurrection against the state,’ contrary to what The Australian article affirms. When I returned to Italy in 1997, I did in no way bargain for a reduction of the sentence. In fact, after my return to Rebibbia, a sentence of 3 years and 4 months was added for ‘fatti di piazza’ (protests in Milan during the 1970s). The total sentence was 17 years and I served it all.
7. The publication of Empire in the USA does not seem to me a phenomenon of ‘radical glamour’ and the mention of my imprisonment in Rebibbia on the book cover was simply the truth. Empire was published by Harvard University Press and cited among the seven ‘next big ideas’ by Time. Neither Harvard nor Time seem to me suspects of ‘radical glamour’ or to have sympathies for political extremism.
8. I am not in my sixties. I am 71 - almost 72 - years old. I was 64 when I returned to prison in 1997. I was not put under house arrest. I did one year of full imprisonment (with common inmates), two years of ‘external work’ (permission to exit only for work, with interdictions against change of plans and not respecting the required hours, constant surveillance, and return to jail after work); two years of semi-liberty (nights in jail, days at home for studying with interdictions against leaving the vicinity of the house and constant surveillance); and one year of ‘guarded liberty’ (days and nights at home with interdictions against leaving the vicinity and going out between 10pm and 7am, with regular surveillance). I was definitively released - after having served all of my sentence - on 25 April 2003. I am free to travel and to hold courses, conferences, and seminars throughout the world. This is precisely what I have done for the past two years in major world universities (Cambridge, London, Berlin, Frankfurt, Madrid, Barcelona, Beijing, Shanghai, Buenos Aries, Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo, and Paris, where I teach now).
9. I do not need an entry visa for Australia since the process has been simplified to require the issue of an electronic travel authority at the time of purchase of the ticket. If a visa was necessary I don’t see why I should not obtain one, given that I have never been convicted of terrorism.
Conclusion: the article is false from beginning to end. It is a scandalous and vulgar act of historical revisionism.
Toni Negri
Elsewhere: Ken Parish has some thoughts on Negri and Windschuttle at Troppo. Niall blogs on this at Whom Gods Destroy.
Some context: I’m also grateful to Don Arthur for drawing my attention to this article from Le Monde which gives some context on the Italian “Years of Lead”. Via Glen Fuller, here’s an article by Negri himself on Italian politics in the 1970s.
Cop that, Keith Windshuttle. Well done, Mark!
It seems that Negri’s terrorist qualifications are somewhat lacking. I hope that Signor Negri adopts KW’s approach to settling such disputes.
yo, I need to update my ‘negri’ post again. lol!
I have just been chatting to a dude from Radio National who may make contact with you, Mark. I had just forwarded him the above email from Brett and I raised your blog as a good example of someone he should speak to about such blogging things. It was classic timing!
Thanks, Glen - he just got in touch.
So Negri says he was never a terrorist? Well, that settles it then. Who could doubt the word of a convicted criminal?
No idea why I’m bothering EP, but clearly Negri believes that the records of the Italian courts will back him up.
slam-dunk, Kim
So you’re saying Negri believes the fact that Italian courts only jailed him for seventeen years in maximum security for terrorism-related offences will vindicate him?
Negri was convicted of “crimes of association” not of terrorism - in other words for his political opinions. It’s also clear from what he writes that the conditions under which he was imprisoned varied.
Unless you’re going to cite the Italian Court records to the contrary, EP, I can’t see that your dismissive and uninformed comments are worth anything at all.
I think the criminal concept of “association” goes a little further than merely having similar political opinions. I expect that frequent contact with, and active assistance of, terrorists would likely be involved.
You’re an expert on Italian criminal law, I suppose, EP.
I’m not an expert on Italian criminal law, but I suspect the judges who jailed Negri for 17 years might have known something about it.
The fact as I see it are:
1) As Mark says he was imprisoned for his political opinions. That ‘anni di piombo’ period in Italy were terrible and anyone seen as even remotely sympathising with terrorism was cought in the net.
2) Cossiga is the most pro-US president you can find. A staunch Christian Democrat he devised a secret plan with the agreement of the USA to protect Italy against communism in the cold war (Gladio) If he now says that Negri was not connected with terrorism I would vertainly believe him.
3) Despite all this, Negri did his time. So there should not be any limits on a men in his 70’s for his ideas. What he’s going to do in Australia, create terrorist cells? It’s laughable.
4) All this is a very poor attempt from Windschuttle to play his silly ‘culture war’ games. Probably out of spite as an ex-Marxist himself. His ignorance of the Italian political system is embarrassing and I hope that no Italian media gets hold of his article so obvious are his mistakes as it would reflect very poorly on Australian political analysis.
‘Terrorism related’,—’I expect that frequent contact with…’ –’active assistance of’–Sounds like the subject is David Hicks and EP is a pseudonym for a certain Attorney General?
An intriguing hypothesis, Peter!
“Despite all this, Negri did his time. So there should not be any limits on a men in his 70‚Äôs for his ideas. What he‚Äôs going to do in Australia, create terrorist cells? It‚Äôs laughable.”
Exactly, Guido - the issue is freedom of speech.
Freedom of speech includes freedom to criticise the speaker. And my criticism is that Negri’s near-unreadable prose masks the heart of a wannabe killer-in-the-name-of-ideology.
Dodgy bloke says “I didn’t do it.” Heard in prisons the world over.
C.L. I might have to think twice about my blog crush on you.
I like you when yr thoughtful, but you do yrself no credit when you play the RWDB.
Aren’t you a historian? Shouldn’t you be concerned about the accuracy of Windschuttle’s claims?
Let’s not forget that the lovely Miranda Devine did the Negri smear a couple of weeks before Windshuttle, though not as well.
And by the way I figure that Mamdouh Habib was probably incarcerated for the same kind of ‘associative’ tendencies as Negri.
I can hardly wait for his version of Empire to come out.
Yes, I would think that training with al-Qaeda in Afghanistan does count as association.
“a wannabe killer-in-the-name-of-ideology” Judas Priest! That could finger anyone who writes expressing a political opinion. Wake up and smell the facts, EP. The poor attempt at skewing the loss of argument onto the Hicks issue does you no credit either. That issue is all conjecture and supposition without evidence. Best you quit while your foot is still extractable.
As usual, Niall, you are laughably wrong.
Not everyone who expresses a political opinion is a wannabe killer in the name of ideology. That label applies to the supporters of terrorists and murderous political regimes such as Communism and Nazism.
I didn’t bring up Hicks — that was Peter Kemp.
And you aren’t the one to talk about quitting while your foot is still extractable.
Ooooh, the Camry episode again. If that’s the best you’ve got EP, you’ve already conceded
By the way, that’s off topic and bordering on a comment policy infringement if I’m not mistaken, but I’ll leave that one to Mark.
I didn’t claim that anyone who expresses a political opinion IS a wannabe killer……I wrote COULD BE. There’s a vast difference in the inference but I suspect you know that already. You did indirectly infer the Hicks scenario off the back of Peter Kemps comment, so my comment there remains valid. Tell me…..EP…..you tell me I’m laughably wrong, but you fail to explain why. Want to elucidate?
Yes, try and play nice, EP. And it really would help if you actually read what people say.
I did elucidate, but you contrived to ignore the message. There is no need to repeat my post; it’s all in there.
So anyone want to actually discuss Negri and Windschuttle? You never know your luck in the blogosphere!
Funny how a lot of people here are bitching about others not doing their homework, and making a lot of confident assertions about the political situation in Italy in the 1970’s, when they appear to have done little research on the issue at all, aside from reading some things that Negri has written, and a few other one-sided accounts.
I suggest readers start with this NYRB discussion; letters page here.
While Negri probably wasn’t involved in any murders, and was credited with too much by the Italian police, he was involved in Italian Marxist terrorist movements, and deliberately provided much of the intellectual inspiration for them, with his calls for violence. He later decided that violence was a bad idea, not in itself, but because it wasn’t achieving what was desired.
He avoids questions about whether he engaged in violence in the 70’s, while making it clear that whatever he did get up to, he doesn’t regret it. He renounces nothing. This can be seen, for example, in this interview with Johann Hari.
The chances of Negri suing? Nil. Too much would come out. The Australian would fly over old colleagues who would come out with embarrassing revelations about Negri’s 70’s activities. So, unless Negri decides that he wants to play up the “I was a violent radical” bit after all (which he won’t, because that will mean the end of his cushy academic/conference life), this talk of defamation proceedings is hot air.
P.S. I find the claims that the right is shutting down debate laughable. Two columnists quite rightly raise the issue in (the second half of) their columns, and the brave conference organiser wets his pants. Has the left lost its nerve?
That’s not shutting down debate. This — pulls home-made bomb, or perhaps dead Italian PM, from car boot — is how you shut down debate.
Scott,
The NYRB articles are very good. However, the two columnists did not merely raise the issue, they right-eously offered one-sided accounts of Negri’s personal history in an attempt to create enough of a shit storm that he would not come to Australia. They did, they succeeded, and he isn’t coming. And it annoys the hell out of me.
Why should his now-aborted trip matter to those who are not interested in his books?
Who has made the claim that the right is shutting down debate? Debate has not started. If debate had started, then a number of letters damning windschuttle would’ve already appeared in the australian.
Why didn’t you write them, Glen?
Mark wrote:
“Negri was convicted of “crimes of association” not of terrorism - in other words for his political opinions. ”
How does that follow? The phrase suggests to me the kind of crime Ronald Ryan, the last man haged in Australia, was convicted of. He was in the company of someone who committed murder, and was therefore adjudged to have shared in the deed. Lacking the legal wisdom of Ken P., I don’t know if that is still the case in Victoria (I think the law has been repealed).
But you’re stretching a long bow, Mark. If your reading is right, why aren’t half the academics in Italy in jail?
Glen probably did, Rob. The most significant thing IMO is that The Australian has not published Negri’s reply to Windschuttle. Whatever you think of Negri, or his politics, surely someone who has been painted as a terrorist in a major paper of record ought to have the opportunity to rebut those allegations on the same pages. It’s hard to see, contra Scott, how The Australian’s failure to publish his rebuttal, whether as an op/ed or as a letter to the Editor can’t be interpreted as shutting down debate.
The only option Negri has seemingly to correct the record is to sue.
My understanding is that The Australian has had Negri’s letter for some time.
The point I’d make with regard to the NRB articles is that they were published in 1980. Scott has linked to the discussion where some challenge Thomas Sheehan’s view. The NRB isn’t always right - for instance a lot of Mark Lilla’s articles about a related topic - the politics of French intellectuals - contain basic misreadings of thinkers like Derrida and Foucault. The other significant thing here is that those articles were published in 1980. It’s very clear that all the evidence had not yet come out or been sifted.
Negri was held without trial from 1979 to 1983. That’s directly analogous - since the accusations related to terrorism - to the situation of people like Mamdouh Habib, as Peter noted above. That’s also something that should concern us.
Rob, if you read some of the links, it’s clear that a large number of people were gaoled.
I think we need to make some distinctions here. If someone is associating with others who hold certain political beliefs, does this make them a criminal? Surely the issue is the same as with the attempt to ban the Communist Party in Australia in the 1950s. The CPA too was accused of wanting to overthrow the State, and of fomenting violence. Obviously the CPA wasn’t doing the sort of things the Red Brigades were. But a similar question of principle arises - how does a liberal democratic state respond to those whose political beliefs challenge its legitimacy? (Similar issues have arisen in Germany - in the 70s with the Left and more recently with the Far Right - and this was the nub of the problem with Weimar). The answer, I’d suggest, can’t be to imprison people for their beliefs but only for their acts. Had Negri indeed been involved with conspiracy to commit crimes or committed crimes, then he ought to have been imprisoned after due judicial process. If it was shown that all he had done was hold unpopular political views, then he should not have been.
In any event, a liberal democracy gains nothing by throwing the fundamentals of freedom of speech and due process in criminal matters out the window in the name of combatting terror.
I don’t pretend in the slightest to know much about Italian politics. What I am doing is raising some questions, and trying to contextualise this issue with reference to questions of principle that arise. Negri’s answer to Windschuttle may not be the final word on these matters, but it ought to be aired publicly.
I still maintain that no-one has demonstrated that Negri posed any danger whatever, and his ideas, as Andrew Norton suggested earlier, can circulate freely in his publications. So why not let him speak? If Windschuttle believes his ideas are dangerous, he could have taken Negri on and interested people could judge for themselves. It seems to me that the actions of Dr Philip Jones in this matter are pathetic, but the question remains - why would a senior academic at Sydney University be so intimidated by newspaper columns? Where are the defences of academic freedom?
I think Ken got it right in his post at Troppo where he argued that Negri ought to be allowed to speak and that there was a certain irony in Windschuttle’s apparent failure to do elementary research in his column given Windschuttle’s previous claims about sundry historians.
I don’t have a problem with Negri being allowed to speak because, as I said over at Troppo, he strikes me (admitedly! on the limited basis of Ken’s post and some other passages) as a complete nitwit. Let him come along and speak, and we’ll all laugh. Good fun for the kids, and the cats if you can get ‘em to come along. (Not likely.)
Nor do I have a problem with the government determining in accordance with established and well-debated laws and prescriptions that individuals with criminal records need to be looked at good and hard before they are allowed to enter Australia.
Where I do have a problem, both with yourself and Ken, is in accepting on its face the self-exculpatory account of a convicted criminal. Of coursae Negri is going to give the world the best account he can of himself. He’s had decades to think it over. Any prisoner in the clink will tell you he/she didn’t do it, the police set them up, and even if both the above are not true it wasn’t their fault anyway, and also they were terribly misunderstood.
Like you, I’m no expert on Italian law, but before I ventured a judgement in this case I would like to know what the police and the prosecutors thought, and what the defence had to say by way of rebuttal or refutation. The last person I would take at his own estimation of innocence or guilt is Negri himself. No doubt Baader and Meinhof were similarly persuasive.
That said, if the Oz refused to print Negri’s rebuttal, they deserve to be caned for it.
Rob, I’d like to know more about the legal issues in Negri’s case as well. I’ve just done a google search and haven’t turned up much more than the links people have already posted. I suspect the problem here is that we don’t speak Italian! Perhaps Guido might find something.
However, I think the assumption that Ken and I are both proceeding on is that Negri’s trial and the reasons for his acquittal on the murder charges would be matters of public record in Italy. Of course, Negri is likely to put the most exculpatory interpretation on his legal history but he surely knows as well that anyone with access to the decisions of the Italian courts could verify the facts of the matter. Presumably, as he accuses Windschuttle of not having checked the facts, he’s confident that the public records would back him up.
That’s the reason for my confidence in believing his side of the story. Make sense?
Rob’s right about The Australian - they should be ashamed for not publishing Negri’s response!
I had no problem using Google on “toni negri” to pull up lots of links Also “toni negri” terrorist.
Discarding the conspicuous indignation of the RWDB debate framing junta I settled on a wacky mob that follow this Guerra character, apparently famous for his icecreams.
seems he was an exponent of the “disobbedienti” and “exalts the figure of the “criminal worker”, justifies the recourse to sabotage and armed struggle, but always within a Marxist-leninist vision of the social conflict.”
After some time in jail he “suggests to the state that it concede judiciary benefits to those political prisoners that publicly repudiate the use of violence and declare that the war against the state is objectively ended.”
Clever bugger eh?
http://www.guerrasociale.org/waiting_for_the_barbarians.htm
http://www.guerrasociale.org (you can translate easily using Altavista babel fish)
Odd, rog! But isn’t Guerra some sort of far-left mob attacking Negri for being capitalist? As far as I could make any sense out of what they were saying that seemed to be the general drift…
Much of a muchness Mark - they all seem to be wrestling with phantoms.
It would appear that time spent in jail appears to have tempered Negri’s thoughts. If he spent more time he might be OK.
I would place no confidence in his assertions.
If anything, rog, the fact that Negri is being attacked by ultra-left loonies gives me more confidence in his assertions.
But I think unless someone can produce the Italian court records and they contradict his story, then as I’ve argued above, the presumption must strongly be in his favour.
>Who has made the claim that the right is shutting down debate?
Mark Bahnisch did, and still does. I think it’s very hypocritical of the left to take this line (although I exclude Mark from this, as he’s never been frightened of airing contrary views).
>They did, they succeeded, and he isn’t coming. And it annoys the hell out of me.
Here’s an idea. You take his place. He links up to you by some sort of web/radio transmitter. He feeds you the lines, and you stand up at the lectern being the “virtual Negri”. The po-mos will love that (although it would be better if Stelarc could do it). Then you can write a book called I am/am not the virtual/non-virtual Negri-space: Contextualizations in the hegemony of media representations.
>The only option Negri has seemingly to correct the record is to sue.
Which he won’t due, for the reasons I’ve explained.
I’m actually surprised to see a blogger talking as though there’s no other option than the courts. Isn’t this blog an example of an alternative?
Anyway, Negri’s response isn’t that strong. The fact that he’s in his 70’s, not his 60’s, is trivial. The fact that he thinks that the mention of his imprisonment on the front cover of his book is not an instance of “radical glamour” is also not something the courts will have any interest in. (It clearly is radical chic, anyway. And why does he think it’s truth has anything to do with whether it’s radical chic?). The claim that “Neither Harvard nor Time seem to me suspects of ‘radical glamour‚Äô or to have sympathies for political extremism” had me in stitches. Harvard? No sympathies to radicals? Where’s he been? In jail?
As for the more serious claims about the trials, etc., in the 70’s, he can perhaps complain justly that Windschuttle created a worse impression of him than was warranted, by omitting some relevant facts, but a court would be hard-pressed to find that Windschuttle has said anything major that is wrong. If you re-read Windschuttle’s column you’ll find that he doesn’t say that much about this stuff. What he mainly talks about is the release by that newspaper of the record with Negri’s voice on it, which did happen.
As for Negri’s claim that he never had *anything* to do with the Red Brigades, that’s frankly dubious.
As for Negri’s complaint about Windshcuttle’s mention of his membership of the Radical Party, well, Windschuttle just says that it was “Marxist-led”. Nergri’s point about it being closer to Bush these days is irrelevant. What was it like then? Was it led by Marxists? I’d be very surprised if the answer wasn’t yes.
Windscuttle says: “Claiming parliamentary immunity, he was temporarily released and used his freedom to escape to France.”
Negri says: “I did not use my liberty as a member of parliament to escape to France. I escaped only when they decided to remove my parliamentary immunity…”
So Negri says that he escaped, using his parliamentary immunity, when his immunity was jeopardized. So how exactly does this differ from what Windschuttle says?
Negri also says: “When I returned to Italy in 1997, I did in no way bargain for a reduction of the sentence”.
But what Windscuttle says was not that Negri plea-bargained anything when he returned to Italy in 1997, but that he had plea-bargained the sentence down by 1997, the time he returned. And Negri himself confirms that his appeals had managed to reduce the sentence by 1997 (well before, in fact).
“The total sentence was 17 years and I served it all” - yes, once you’d decided to return after twenty-odd years on the run.
“I was not put under house arrest… two years of semi-liberty (nights in jail, days at home for studying with interdictions against leaving the vicinity of the house and constant surveillance); and one year of ‘guarded liberty‚Äô (days and nights at home with interdictions against leaving the vicinity and going out between 10pm and 7am, with regular surveillance).
Hmmm, sounds like house arrest to me. (Windscuttle did say “Negri is reportedly still under house arrest”, but although this is wrong, it had been reported. Anyway, there’s nothing particularly libellous about getting the date it ended wrong).
Negri’s comments about the entry visa are also not very interesting. Windschuttle asked whether he deserved one. Why is that in itself libellous? (Should everyone who said that about David Irving be sued?) Negri responds that (a) he doesn’t need one, given the current system; and (b) even if he did, he should be entitled to one. Fair enough, but where’s the scandal? Where’s the basis for court action?
So the only genuine complaint that Negri may have is that Windschuttle has created the impression that he was involved in some Red Brigade terrorist murders, when the courts ultimately decided that he was only guilty of association with the Red Brigades (which Negri denies but which is probably true).
If I was The Australian I would have published an edited version of Negri’s letter, with all the irrelevant bluster about his book not being radical chic cut out, and just the important bits left in (if only for his own sake - better for him that the important bits stand out from the sea of waffle). I suspect that the fact that they didn’t publish anything is reason to think that their lawyers believed there was no basis for a court challenge, but I agree that the decent thing to do was to give the man a chance to respond.
One more thing:
>The NRB isn’t always right
No kidding!
Thanks for the comment and acknowledgement, Scott. I won’t respond point by point because I’m happy to let Negri’s statement stand by itself and I want also to empathise that I don’t have any particular sympathy for his work as I’ve said here and in other fora. My concern is the academic freedom issue, Philip Jones’ cowardice, and the climate created by columns such as Devine’s and Windschuttle’s - as well as the lack of ethics on the part of The Australian. I agree they didn’t have to publish the whole letter - but it is surely fair play to let him respond in some form.
I will make one quick comment - even from my slight acquaintance of Italian politics - and it’s really only from reading I’ve done in comparative politics more generally - I’m aware that the Radical Party has never been anything of the sort - like its namesake in France it was a Liberal or Libertarian party concerned largely with human rights issues - the Liberal tradition generally never having been prominent in West European politics it wasn’t a very important electoral force. I’m certain it was never led by Marxists - though the Christian Democrats in Italy at one stage contemplated a “historic compromise” with the PCI (itself one of the least Leninist European communist parties and the original type of “Eurocommunism”) so there may have been some interchange/liaison - but mainstream Italian Marxists were a very mild mob - one of the reasons why the Red Brigades and the (I believe separate) groups with which Negri was associated gained traction.
But I believe that if you wanted to take the time, it would be much easier to check on the history and politics of the Radical Party than Negri’s legal and judicial travails.
And I emphasise again I’m not defending Negri and least of all, all his works. I just think that Windschuttle ought to research his articles carefully, that columns in the paper shouldn’t have the effect of intimidating universities into closing down conferences, that people shouldn’t go to jail for their political beliefs only for their proved actions, and that the general climate at the moment in terms of expressing heteredox opinions is worrying.
I forgot to add I can’t stand Stelarc. If I never see another course outline on “the sociology of the body” or whatever that focusses on Stelarc, I’ll be a happy man. I can’t stand Komminos either. Beware performance artists bearing only one name!
That’s not an unreasonable defence of Windschuttle, Scott, but I think that in defamation law courts also look at imputations and what a reader would reasonably infer and whether such inferences would damage the esteem the reader would otherwise hold the person in. The thrust of Windschuttle’s article seemed to me to be that it was outrageous that the University would allow Negri to speak, and the question regarding the visa (which seems moot - as I think Negri is right about the procedures now - another failing of elementary research on Windschuttle’s part if that’s so) clearly implies the Government should prevent his entry, an inference strengthened by Windschuttle’s conclusion. Since those denied entry by the Government are normally not harmless Italian academics with unpopular politics, but rather people whose actions might be damaging to Australians and Australia’s security, then I think that Windschuttle’s rhetorical question - with its imputation that an affirmative answer is expected by reasonable people - implies that Negri is the latter sort of person.
However, as I believe that Windschuttle has experience with defamation law, perhaps he framed his article carefully with that in mind.
We would really benefit from a lawyer’s opinion. Ken P, are you reading?
It still seems to me the issues Mark raised remain:
1. What is it in the prevailing climate of opinion that expressing heterodox views is perceived as so dangerous?
2. What is it in the prevailing climate of opinion that makes people in Universities cow before columnists?
3. What is it in the prevailing climate of opinion that inhibits the expected defence of academic freedom from people in universities?
Those are the issues - what we think of Negri as an academic or as a political activist is really irrelevant if, as seems uncontested now, he was not convicted of violent crimes. Even had he been, there’s a reasonable argument that having served his sentence, and as a 71 year old man who’s hardly likely to murder Australian citizens and indeed do anything other than deliver a probably obscure address of interest to a few academics, there is no problem in his speaking.
That’s extremely tightly argued, Kim. I’ve forwarded your comment on to Ken because I’d also like to hear from someone who knows defamation law.
Couldn’t the same be said of David Irving? A creepy man who talks rubbish, but one who was probably harmless. Or was he harmless? What about his influence… gullible minds misinterpreting… etc. It isn’t always so clear-cut. Negri is still stirring up anti-capitalist radicalism (he isn’t the harmless old man that some of you are making him out to be), and it could be argued is indirectly responsible for some part of the continuation of anti-globalization violence.
Nevertheless, I don’t think there’s enough warrant to keep him out of the country.
>the question regarding the visa (which seems moot - as I think Negri is right about the procedures now - another failing of elementary research on Windschuttle’s part if that’s so)
I find this outrage puzzling. Damn that Windschuttle! He didn’t research the latest visa entry procedures before expressing the desire that someone should not be allowed in the country. Hmmm. Aren’t we pushing a bit now?
As for why academics are now “cowering before columnists” (a bit of an overstatement), it’s because postmodernists are more interested in holding onto their cushy positions and their grants than actually making a stand on anything that looks, however vaguely, like it might threaten their positions - even though their positions really aren’t under threat (and all this is pretty consistent with what some postmodernists say). In fact, it seems to me that this organiser has blown a golden opportunity for some free publicity.
The basic difference I think between Irving and Negri is that Negri is seriously respected by many scholars as a scholar.
Kim’s point I think regarding the visa issue (although I thought that people did require one as well - perhaps because I imagined Windschuttle would know what he was on about on it) is that Windschuttle in his writing has criticised historians for what they say are minor errors of fact.
I should also clarify for the record since as noted in the post a friend of mine (no postmodernist - a dreaded Habermasian!) is on the organising committee that Dr Jones is not a member of the committee but rather the Director of the Research Institute under whose auspices several academics from different departments came together to organise the conference. The distinction may seem technical but I imagine (I don’t know) there are a lot of people at Sydney who are angry at him. It also clarifies the point that I am not directing my criticism at members of the organising committee.
>The basic difference I think between Irving and Negri is that Negri is seriously respected by many scholars as a scholar.
I don’t think there’s much in this distinction. Irving had the respect of some scholars in the 1960’s and 70’s (although even then some serious historians thought he was dodgy). It became totally clear in the 1980’s that he was just a Nazi-lover. But you can still find bookish people who regard themselves as scholars who think Irving is a scholar as well.
Negri, on the other hand, is also widely regarded by many serious scholars as a bullshit-artist and as someone more interested in political activism than truth. But like Irving, you can also find some bookish people who would would consider themselves schoalrs who would regard him as a scholar.
The main difference here is that the latter bunch of self-professed scholars are employed in cultural studies (and similar) departments, whereas the former are employed in Universities. And I don’t think that banning A but not B can be justified merely on the basis that one set of political activists or bullshit artists have got themselves employed by cultural studies departments and the others haven’t.
>Kim’s point I think regarding the visa issue (although I thought that people did require one as well - perhaps because I imagined Windschuttle would know what he was on about on it) is that Windschuttle in his writing has criticised historians for what they say are minor errors of fact.
For what they say are minor errors of fact but which are actually serious. That’s the claim. But I don’t see how this point about visas is serious.
In fact, I don’t think Negri has a leg to stand on here. First of all, according to this Australian government page, you do need an entry visa to visit Australia. Whether or not the procedure has been streamlined, it’s still an entry visa. So Windshuttle was correct.
Secondly, even if a “visa entry” was not the terminology any more, the principle would still have remained that the government has the legal right to bar the entry of anyone into the country. What exactly the term was would not be important (although in fact Windschuttle was correct, and Negri wasn’t).
Thirdly, I can’t take seriously the idea that you can sue someone because they have said that you shouldn’t be allowed into the country. As I said before, the only grounds for complaint that Negri may have is that Windschuttle gave the impression that he was convicted for murder when in fact he was cleared. That may be libel. But saying that he shouldn’t be allowed into the country isn’t libellous (or shouldn’t be). That would be an intolerable restriction on free speech. You should be free to say “A shouldn’t be allowed into the country”. That of course doesn’t entitle you to say “A shouldn’t be allowed ino the country because he did x” if the claim that he did x is a libel. But in that case it’s the claim that A did X that’s libellous, not the claim that A shouldn’t be allowed into the country.
By the way, if you want independent scholarship, you should have an independent University that can pay its own way. A University that is dependent on the State for it’s money is always going to be beholden to the State to some degree, and to some extent that’s fair enough if they’re paying the bills. Of course a University that pays its way entirely or mostly out of student fees may be just as cautious, if not more so, but that’s life. You can’t expect to have a career for life funded where those who pay you have no say at all over what you do, much as we academics would like that to be so. This, after all, is the sort of way that the left talks when it comes to “scholarship” that they don’t approve of (although they phrase it in terms of “responsibility to the community”).
Scott, I think you have the rights of it, mate. Excellent comments.
Scott, I’m not in the least opposed to private universities. Given that some very prominent people in this country think it’s worthwhile to send their kids to places such as Harvard and Yale to do liberal arts degrees, there may even be demand for a liberal arts university in this country. The trick is finding ways to ensure that access isn’t just based on ability to pay. Universities would benefit generally from the absence of political and bureaucratic interference that began under Dawkins and has accelerated under Nelson.
>The main difference here is that the latter bunch of self-professed scholars are employed in cultural studies (and similar) departments, whereas the former are employed in Universities.
That should have read
>The main difference here is that the latter bunch of self-professed scholars are employed in cultural studies (and similar) departments, whereas the former are *not* employed in Universities.
The Australian would fly over old colleagues who would come out with embarrassing revelations about Negri’s 70’s activities. So, unless Negri decides that he wants to play up the “I was a violent radical� bit after all (which he won’t, because that will mean the end of his cushy academic/conference life), this talk of defamation proceedings is hot air.
The thrust of Windschuttle’s article seemed to me to be that it was outrageous that the University would allow Negri to speak, and the question regarding the visa clearly implies the Government should prevent his entry, an inference strengthened by Windschuttle’s conclusion.
I think the assumption that Ken and I are both proceeding on is that Negri’s trial and the reasons for his acquittal on the murder charges would be matters of public record in Italy. Of course, Negri is likely to put the most exculpatory interpretation on his legal history but he surely knows as well that anyone with access to the decisions of the Italian courts could verify the facts of the matter.
A staunch Christian Democrat he devised a secret plan with the agreement of the USA to protect Italy against communism in the cold war If he now says that Negri was not connected with terrorism I would vertainly believe him.
How nice to see Mark Bahnisch defending free speech. I am all for defending free speech, especially to those I disagree with. Even if the speaker happens to be a totalitarian revolutionary and convicted terrorist accomplice.
So I am not happy that Antonio Negri’s rights of free expression have been compromised and possibly violated by political pressure on University of Sydney. He should be given free passage and a platform to express his reprehensible views. The public should be made aware of the contaminated thoughts escaping from the “badly leaking nuclear reactors” that pass for Arts faculties these days. Their taxes at “work”.
This little episode illustrates the hypocritical attitude of ideological intellectuals to fringe thinkers illustrates the soul brotherhood of the New Left and New Right. Both adopt the convenient view that freedom is divisible, drawing the chilling line facing the other side of the partisan alignment.
Keith Windschuttle, prominent New Rightist, did not join the chorus of “free thinkers” demanding that Drew Fraser be silenced for voicing unpopular or unpalatable views. Good for him.
Fraser, readers of this blog will recall, was guilty of the “thought crime” of expressing political sympathy for the now-discredited “White Australia” policy. A policy, BTW, that was once supported by left wing ikons such as John Curtin and Ben Chiffley. Although he is happy to see Negri barred from speaking.
Mark Bahnisch, sometime New Leftist, wants Negri free to speak and delivers a ringing endorsement of the Millian principle. Good for him.
So on which side of the free speech barricade did Mark Bahnisch stand when the (non-totalitarian non-terrorist) Drew Fraser was hounded off campus for freely expressing his views?
Eh tu, mark?
Mark on 30 March 2005 at 5:48 pm
A distinction without a difference in this case. He was basically in charge of agit-prop for Red Brigade types. An ideological accomplice to terrorists who believed in the power of ideology ala Gramsci.
Of course it is a travesty to put Negri in the same intellectual class as Gramsci. And it is silly to imagine the current Italian state is even more hostile to free speech than Mussolini.
Mark is on solid ground in defending Negri’s right to free speech. He is on shaky ground when he tries to pretend that Negri was jailed for being some iconoclastic radical. The guy was a cheer-leader for mass-murdering totalitarians.
Mark on 1 April 2005 at 2:07 am
Putting an relentless extruder of pseudo-marxist clap-trap like Negri in the same intellectual class as Irving is a sign that standards of scholarship have collapsed. It is also doubtful that Irving is guilty of moral enormities on a par with Negri’s crimes.
Who would these “scholars” who think well of Negri scholarship be? Wild-eyed hippies suffering LSD flashbacks? Aging Trots with white-hairs growing out of their nostrils? Incomprehensible po-mos churning out their smelly little heterodoxies?
In the area of scholarship Irving has a chequered history. Irving made some terrible errors of scholarship and said some wicked thing defaming Jews. He certainly made a biased blunder in trying to minimise the extent and deny the intent of the Holocaust in “Hitler’s War”. He deserves to be ostracised and condemned.
But in most areas of his speciality - the history of the Second World War’s contending leadership groups - he is the probably the best. Future historians who try to investigate this pivotal period in world history will be forever indebted to Irving’s immense labours in accumulating a vast primary archive from original sources.
Irving’s scholarly skill was proved when he was the first to correctly debunk the bogus Hitler Diaries. He has received the acclaim of real scholars like John Keegan, Gordon Craig and Mommsen. Plus those well known diletantes AJP Taylor and Trevor-Roper.
Irving’s racist political views are nasty. But turning up to a few neo-Nazi rallies and occasionally engaging in Jew-baiting mean he has no right to acceptance in polite society. It should not make him a criminal.
Negri was an active associate of totalitarian terrorist organisations that were actively engaged in a fairly successful attempt to overthrow a modern European state. The guy was a sworn enemy of the state and deserved to be chucked into jail.
Let me just point out, Jack, that the three new comments on this thread which have prompted you to re-enter this debate are spam. If you read them carefully, they’re all grabs of text from previous comments on the thread made last year which have been posted just to allow a link to healthcare sites.
Fair go Mark, Jack’s only recycling old points as well.
There is that, Nabs.
Does Nabs have an EWS that flashes when Jack posts anywhere on the internets?
Spooky…
Mark on 7 December 2006 at 11:57 am
No. That was the first time I have entered the debate. What prompted me to initially comment was your previous postings on the matter which I read when I followed your own links above. Surely you do not classify your own output as spam? Even I would draw the line at that.
Subsequent comments I made in response to your specific comments, as proved by the pasted quotes.
So far your response contains no facts or logic relating to my substantive point(s). Neither does Nabakov’s. No surprises there.
I could not resist the temptation for a “gotcha” comment when I spotted the yawning gap between your straight philosophical committments and crooked political alignments. This was exposed when you deserted liberalism on Fraser and defended it for Negri.
Freedom is supposed to be indivisible. Political correctness deforms the ideological postures of both the New Left and New Right. I reccommend shrugging off these confining garments if you want to avoid these embarrassing deshabilles. Man, be a free thinker!
Nabakov on 7 December 2006 at 12:24 pm
Of course I am am recycling old points. To illustrate a recurrent pattern. Recognition of such things proves intelligence in primates. Perhaps Nabakov has some evolving to do?
Not everyone who expresses a political opinion is a wannabe killer in the name of ideology. That label applies to the supporters of terrorists and murderous political regimes such as Communism and Nazism.
Antonio Negri is finest thinker of our generation, and developed his ideas by working through struggles that are complex and messy. He has never pretended to be anything that he isn’t and his account of his ridiculous trial is entirely accurate. In terms of understanding our world, Toni is the Shane Warne of modern thought. Any idiot can come out with the kind of illiterate nonsense Windschuttle seems to have been spouting. Who cares what he thinks?