.m:2

2. Nietzsche: from efficient power to an ethics of exteriority

In order to appreciate Deleuze's work on Nietzsche we have to

situate it in the context of the development of Deleuze's own project.

Nietzsche and Philosophy is the concrete result of the "trou de huit

ans" in Deleuze's intellectual life, the longest gap in his prolific

career. According to Deleuze, though, such a gap is not indicative

of inactivity; on the contrary, "c'est peut-ˆtre dans ces trous que

se fait le mouvement." [Signes et ‚v‚nements 18] The work on

Nietzsche, then, will perhaps give us a key to reading the movement

that animates Deleuze's early work. This study of Nietzsche is the

intervention which gives rise to the important differences between the

two phases of Bergson study that we discussed in the previous chapter.

We can summarize this re-orientation by saying that Bergson's positive

logical dynamism has entered a new horizon, a field of forces, where

all the logical issues are posed now in terms of sense and value. On

this new terrain, all kinds of new figures immediately spring up: most

importantly, the heart of the Bergsonian logical discussion is

transformed into an analysis of the nature of power. The analysis of

power provides the basis for the fundamental passage in Deleuze's

study of Nietzsche: from the ontological foundation of power to the

ethical creation of being. Finally, we should refer the study of

Nietzsche not only back to the previous work on Bergson, but also

forward to the Spinoza. We will find that Deleuze's construction of

an ethical horizon within the framework of Nietzsche's thought bring

to light the questions which make possible (or indeed necessary) his

subsequent investigation of Spinozian practice.

2.1 The paradox of enemies

In the study of Nietzsche, as in that of Bergson, Deleuze's

analysis is driven by an antagonism against Hegel. Here, however,

Deleuze's strategy of triangulation becomes more complicated and more

ambiguous. While Nietzsche and Philosophy contains some of Deleuze's

harshest rhetoric against Hegel, the polemical focus is already moving

away from Hegel in important ways. As in the Bergson studies, Deleuze

brings in other antagonists which are closer to Nietzsche's position

and who share some of his concerns in order to maintain the vast

distance from Hegel and not descend to struggle on Hegel's own

terrain. Once again, we find that Hegel inherits the faults of the

proximate antagonists and takes them to their extreme, as a sort of

negative raising to the n-th power. The ambiguities in Deleuze's

position, however, are all those related to his developing conceptions

of antagonism and opposition. Deleuze gives seemingly contradictory

indications about the best way to choose and relate to one's enemy.

In several passages, we find that Deleuze views the fundamental

antagonism and opposition to Hegel as an urgent and central element of

his reading of Nietzsche. "We will misunderstand the whole of

Nietzsche's work if we do not see 'against whom' its principle

concepts are directed. Hegelian themes are present in this work as

the enemy against which it fights." [162] "Anti-Hegelianism runs

through Nietzsche's work as its cutting edge." [8] And finally,

Nietzsche's philosophy forms "an absolute anti-dialectics." [195] In

these passages the need for a direct confrontation with Hegel seems

very clear. In a other passages, though, Deleuze tries to displace

the relationship to Hegel, to destroy its binary character with the

same type of triangular configuration we found in the Bergson studies.

"Nietzsche's relation to Kant is like Marx's to Hegel: Nietzsche

stands critique on its feet, just as Marx does with the dialectic.

... dialectic comes from the original Kantian form of the critique.

There would have been no need to put the dialectic back on its feet,

nor 'to do' any form of dialectics if critique itself had not been

standing on its head from the start." [89] In this passage it seems

that Hegel is not of real concern to Nietzsche; the dialectic

constitutes a false problem. Instead, Nietzsche addresses Kant as his

proximate enemy. These two stances form a paradox: is Nietzsche's

primary antagonism with Kant, the proximate enemy, or with Hegel, the

ultimate enemy? Deleuze has to navigate between Scylla and Charybdis.

Posing Nietzsche as the ultimate anti-Hegel presents a real danger:

Nietzsche appears in the position of negation, of reaction, of

ressentiment. And furthermore, absolute opposition seems (in an

Hegelian framework) to imply the initiation of a new dialectical

process. However, if we try instead to focus only on a proximate

enemy (such as Kant) and do not recognize anti-Hegelianism as the

fundamental driving force "we will misunderstand the whole of

Nietzsche's work."

We can get a preliminary idea of Deleuze's treatment of this

problem of enemies by looking at his reading of The Birth of Tragedy.

Deleuze finds that this early text presents a "semi-dialectical"

argument based on the Dionysus/Apollo antithesis. [13] Deleuze gives

a very elegant explanation of this problem in terms of an evolution of

Nietzsche's thought which resolves the antinomic couple in two

directions: on one hand, toward a more profound opposition

(Dionysus/Socrates or later Dionysus/Christ) and, on the other hand,

toward a complementarity (Dionysus/Ariadne). [14] In the second

couple, that of complementarity, the enemy has completely disappeared

and the relationship is one of mutual affirmation; this couple is

productive but cannot suffice on its own because it does not provide

Nietzsche a weapon with which to attack his enemies. The first couple

does constitute a weapon, but in a problematical fashion. According

to Deleuze, Nietzsche first shifts from Apollo to Socrates as the real

enemy of Dionysus, but this proves insufficient because "Socrates is

too Greek, a little too Apollonian at the outset because of his

clarity, a little too Dionysian in the end ...." [14] When Socrates

proves to be merely a proximate enemy, Nietzsche discovers the

fundamental enemy in Christ. Here, however, with the anti-Christ and

the opposition and contradiction it implies, we seem to run the risk

of initiating a new dialectic. Deleuze claims this is not the case:

"The opposition of Dionysus or Zarathustra to Christ is not a

dialectical opposition, but opposition to the dialectic itself ...."

[17] What exactly is this non-dialectical opposition and what marks

its difference from dialectical opposition? We do not have the means

to give the answer yet, but the question itself sets the tone and the

task for Deleuze's reading. The answer will have to be found in

Nietzsche's total critique; it must constitute an absolutely

destructive opposition which spares nothing from its force and

recuperates nothing from its enemy; it must be an absolute aggression

which offers no pardons, takes no prisoners, pillages no goods; it

must mark is the death of the enemy with no resurrection. This is the

radical, non-dialectical opposition which Deleuze's reading of

Nietzsche must develop.

2.2 The transcendental method and the partial critique

Kant's enormous contribution to philosophy is to conceive of an

immanent critique which is both total and positive. Kant, however,

fails to carry out this project, and thus Nietzsche's role according

to Deleuze is to correct Kant's errors and salvage the project. [89]

The principal fault of the Kantian critique is that of transcendental

philosophy itself. In other words, Kant's discovery of a domain

beyond the sensible is the creation of a region outside the bounds of

the critique which effectively functions as a refuge against critical

forces, as a limitation on critical powers. A total critique, on the

contrary, requires a materialistic, monistic perspective in which the

entire unified horizon is open and vulnerable to the critique's

destabilizing inquiry. Therefore, it is the transcendental method

itself which requires (or allows) that the critique remain partial.

With the ideal values safely protected in the supra-sensible, the

Kantian critique can proceed to treat claims to truth and morality

without endangering truth and morality themselves. Kant effectively

grants immunity to the established values of the ruling order and

"thus total critique turns into a politics of compromise". [89]

Kant's critical reason functions to reinforce the established values

and to make us obedient to them: "when we stop obeying God, the State,

our parents, reason appears and persuades us to continue being docile

...." [92] The very positing of the transcendental plane and the

consequent partiality of the critique, then, is what allows Kantianism

to be conservative. Under the cloak of disinterest, Kant appears as a

passive State functionary, legitimating the values of the ruling

powers and protecting them from the forces of critique. (1) Finally,

Kant's critique is too polite, restrained by the "humble recognition

of the rights of the criticised." [89] Kant is too genteel, too well-

mannered, too timid to seriously question the fundamental established

values. In contrast, the total critique recognizes no restraints, no

limits on its power, and therefore it is necessarily insurrectional; a

total critique must be an all-out attack on the established values and

the ruling powers they support. Critique is always violence--this not

the real issue. The issue is the extent of and the limits on the

reign of critique's destructive force.

The Kantian critique not only fails to be total but it also fails

to be positive; in effect, the failure to be total obstructs the

possibility of being positive. The negative, destructive moment of

the critique (pars destruens) which draws the total horizon into

question and destabilizes previously existing powers must clear the

terrain to allow the productive moment (pars construens) to release or

create new powers: destruction opens the way for creation. Therefore,

Kant's double failure is really one. This conclusion follows directly

from Nietzsche's focus on values: "One of the principal motifs of

Nietzsche's work is that Kant had not carried out a true critique

because he was not able to pose the problem of critique in terms of

values." [1] The partiality of the first destructive moment of the

critique allows the essential established values to endure and

therefore fails to clear the ground necessary for the the value-

creating, constructive power. The "active instance" [89] which the

Kantian critique lacks is precisely that which truly legislates: to

legislate is not to legitimate order and preserve values, but

precisely the opposite, to create new values. [91] This critique of

values forces us to consider the question of interest and perspective.

Since we can accept no transcendental standpoint external to the plane

of forces which determines and legitimates absolute knowledge and

universal values we must locate the perspective on the immanent plane

and identify the interests it serves. Therefore, the only possible

principle of a total critique is "perspectivism". [90]

This attack on Kant's transcendental method, invoking

perspectivism, goes hand in hand with the Nietzschean attack on

Platonic idealism. Deleuze approaches this issue by considering "the

form of the question" which animates philosophical inquiry. The

central question for Platonic inquiry, Deleuze claims, is "qu'est-ce

que?": "what is beauty, what is justice, etc?" [76] Nietzsche,

though, wants to change the central question to "qui?": "who is

beautiful?" or rather "which one is beautiful?" Once again, the focus

of the attack is the transcendental method. "Qu'est-ce que?" is the

transcendental question par excellence which seeks an ideal which

stands above, as a supra-sensible principle ordering the various

material instantiations. "Qui?" is a materialist question which looks

to the movement of real forces from a specific perspective. In

effect, the two questions point to different worlds for their answers.

Deleuze will later call the materialist question "the method of

dramatization" and insist that it is the primary form of inquiry

throughout the history of philosophy (except perhaps in the work of

Hegel). (2) The method of dramatization, then, is an elaboration of

perspectivism as part of a critique of interest and value: "il ne

suffit pas de poser la question abstraite ®qu'est-ce que le vrai?¯";

rather, we must ask "qui veut le vrai, quand et o—, comment et

combien?" ["La m‚thode de dramatisation" 95] The object of the attack

on the question "qu'est-ce que?" is the transcendental space which it

implies, and which provides a sanctuary for established values from

the destructive power of inquiry and critique. This transcendental

space immune from the critique is the locus of order. We can

certainly detect a Bergsonian inspiration in this argument. The

question "Qu'est-ce que?" remains abstract because it implies two

errors: a) it seeks essence in a static quidditas rather than in a

dynamic of movement (and thus can only reveal differences of degree

not differences of nature) and b) it assumes either a formal or final

cause (the form of justice of the Just) as the ordering principle of

reality. The question "Qui?" which brings us to the terrain of will

and value asks for an immanent dynamic of being, an internal,

efficient force of differentiation.

Remark: Deleuze's selection of the "impersonal" Nietzsche

We must be careful with the question "qui?", however, because in

Deleuze's Nietzsche the answer it seeks will never be found in an

individual or collective subject, but rather in a pre-subjective force

or will. The difficulties presented for the English translation of

this passage serves to highlight the problem: Hugh Tomlinson notes

that "who" cannot function as a translation of "qui" because it

directs inquiry toward a person; therefore upon Deleuze's suggestion

he translates "qui" as "which one". [207 n.3] Deleuze's tries to

explain this nuance further in his preface to the English translation.

"Here we must rid ourselves of all 'personalist' references. The one

that ... does not refer to an individual, to a person, but rather to

an event, that is, to the forces in their various relationships in a

proposition or a phenomenon, and the the genetic relationship which

determines these forces (power)." [xi] This insistence on the

impersonal nature of the question "qui" casts a different light on

Deleuze's charge that the question "qu'est-ce que" is abstract: the

impersonal "qui" is not more concrete because it locates specific

subjects or agents, but because it operates on the materialist terrain

of an efficient causality.

It is often a strain to read Nietzsche without adopting

personalist references. Not only is there a long tradition of

reading Nietzsche in this way, but also it would not be difficult to

cite several passages in which we cannot help but read Nietzsche

"personally". Here we have a very clear example of Deleuze's

selection. In effect, Deleuze brings a Bergsonian approach to

Nietzsche so as to read him in logical terms as a logic of the will

and value which animates the field of pre-subjective forces. Whenever

we ask the question "Qui?" we are going to look to a certain will to

power for the response. [cf. 53] Deleuze's research moves from a

Bergsonian logic of being to a Nietzschean logic of the will. It is

clear, then, how Deleuze's selection fits in with scope of his

project. The "impersonal" interpretative strategy can also be seen as

a political selection. In fact, Deleuze's reading has made such a

profound impression on Nietzsche studies partly because it succeeds in

making so much of Nietzsche's thought while avoiding or effectively

diffusing the force of arguments about Nietzsche's individualism and

reactionary politics, nearly all of which are centered around a

"personalist" interpretation and selection. I will argue below,

however, that while this selection may be necessary for Deleuze, it is

effectively this "impersonal" aspect which marks the limit of

Deleuze's development of ethical and political veins in Nietzsche.

2.3 Slave logic and efficient power

Thus far we have considered Deleuze's Nietzschean attacks on the

proximate enemies, Kant and Plato. The direct Nietzschean attack on

Hegel, the fundamental enemy, appears first in Bergsonian form. As in

the works on Bergson, Deleuze's initial charge against the dialectic

is once again that it is driven by a negative movement which cannot

arrive at a concrete, singular conception of being. Contradiction and

opposition can only give abstract results [157] and can only lead to

an abstract determination of being, blind to its subtle nuances, to

its singularity. "The being of Hegelian logic is merely 'thought'

being, pure and empty, which affirms itself by passing into its own

opposite. But this being was never different from its opposite, it

never had to pass into what it already was. Hegelian being is pure

and simple nothingness ...." [183] The core of this attack is that

Hegelian being is abstract, not really different from its opposite.

Deleuze, however, provides no substantial foundation for these claims

here and therefore they can sound rather hollow unless we read

Bergson's critique of determination into them. We have seen above

that Bergson argues that difference is only conceived as opposition

through an abstraction from real differences, by an imprecise view of

reality; real difference does not go "all the way" to opposition.

Secondly, the movement implied by this Hegelian being "passing into

its opposite" is a completely external and thus false movement which

can never move closer to a real, concrete affirmation. Hence,

Hegelian ontological movement remains abstract and accidental. In

effect, Deleuze's Nietzsche takes this Bergsonian analysis of the

abstract character of the negative ontological movement of

determination for granted. Once we recognize that Bergsonian

arguments are functioning as the foundation for this discussion, then,

it should be no surprise that Deleuze finds a Bergsonian alternative

in Nietzsche: "For the speculative element of negation, opposition or

contradiction, Nietzsche substitutes the practical element of

difference ...." [9] This is very reminiscent of Bergson, except

that we can note that the terms of the conflict have become more

concrete: now the "speculative element" is contrasted with the

"practical element". In fact, the advent of Nietzsche in Deleuze's

thought transforms the Bergsonian theoretical scene with a very

important contribution. We no longer have purely logical categories

(external vs. internal difference and negative vs. positive

ontological movement), but now the logic is presented in terms of

volition and value (negation vs. affirmation and interiority vs.

exteriority). This shift to the horizon of forces marks the tendency

in Deleuze's thought which we noted above in the second phase of

Bergson study: the transposition to the terrain of values marks the

beginning of our trajectory from ontology to ethics and politics.

The complexity of this new terrain and the importance of

Nietzsche's transformation becomes evident as Deleuze treats

Nietzsche's polemic against slave logic and thereby develops a new

attack on the Hegelian dialectic: "Nietzsche presents the dialectic as

the speculation of the pleb, as the way of thinking of the slave: the

abstract thought of contradiction then prevails over the concrete

feeling of positive difference." [10] On this new terrain we have

dramatic personae representing the two philosophical methods: the

slave of abstract speculation versus the master of concrete pathos and

practice. We are entering a very difficult passage, though, and we

should be careful to recognize from the outset the specific focus and

polemical content of Deleuze's argument. Clearly Deleuze is reading

The Genealogy of Morals as a harsh attack against Hegel: but against

which Hegel? Since we are dealing with the master and the slave it

seems obvious that Deleuze's target is the Phenomenology of Spirit, or

perhaps KojŠve's popularized version of it. However, if we posit this

as the focus, Deleuze's attack seems somewhat misdirected. In a very

careful and intelligent study of Nietzsche and Philosophy, Jean Wahl

notes the shortcomings of this attack: "n'y a-t-il pas dans les

passages de la Ph‚nom‚nologie de l'Esprit quelque chose de plus

profond qui est susceptible de r‚sister … la critique nietzsch‚enne?"

[364] Wahl is undoubtedly correct in noting that Deleuze's Nietzsche

does not directly confront Hegel's central focus in the Phenomenology;

but this should indicate to us that perhaps we have misinterpreted the

primary target. Here we need to refine our first methodological

principle: it is necessary not only to recognize "against whom" the

polemic is directed, but against which specific argument.

We gain a more adequate view of the Nietzschean attack presented

here if we read it as a continuation of the polemic against Hegel's

logic. In effect, Deleuze has taken the logical attack developed in

Bergson and added the question of will--"who wills a negative

ontological movement?" This is the method of dramatisation: in

Bergson, Deleuze asks the Platonic question "what is the negative

logic of being?", but now with Nietzsche he can make the discussion

more concrete by dramatizing the investigation in terms of will. We

should be careful to keep in mind, though, that the question "qui?"

does not find its answer in an individual, a group or even a social

class; rather, "qui?" leads us to identify a kind of force or a

specific quality of will. In this dramatization, then, the slave is

the persona who plays the will to a negative movement. Nietzsche

presents the slave syllogism as the false attempt to arrive at self-

affirmation. Once again, even though we are dealing with the question

of self-affirmation, the discussion has nothing to do with the subject

of consciousness, but rather it deals strictly with a logic of

valuation dramatized in terms of two personae. The slave plays the

negative logic of valuation: "You are evil therefore I am good." The

master's syllogism is simply the inverse: "I am good, therefore you

are evil." [119] Deleuze brilliantly brings this back to the question

of logical movement by focusing on the different function of

"therefore" in the two cases. In the master's syllogism, the first

clause is independent, carrying the essential, positive statement;

"therefore" merely introduces a negative correlate. Master logic

appears in Deleuze's description as a sort of efficient causality of

valuation--the effect is completely internal to the cause and comes

forth through a logical emanation. "Therefore" marks the necessity of

an internal movement. In the slave's syllogism, however, "therefore"

plays a completely different role; it attempts to reverse the negative

first clause to arrive at a positive conclusion. Slave logic tries to

operate a completely external movement by using the logical operator

"therefore" to relate the two opposite clauses. If we try to pose

this logic in causal terms, we find that the slave's "therefore" can

only mark a causa per accidens. Furthermore, the slave's second

clause cannot be a real affirmation because the effect ("I am good")

cannot contain more perfection or reality than is cause ("You are

evil"). "This is the strange syllogism of the slave: he needs two

negations in order to produce an appearance of affirmation." [121]

Deleuze is clearly drawing on the Bergsonian logical charges against

the negative movement of the dialectic: the affirmation of the slave,

like the determination of the dialectic, is a false movement which

merely produces a "subsistent exteriority."

While this first Nietzschean attack on slave logic is looking

back to Bergson for its foundation, since will and force have come

into play Deleuze is also able to develop a further and more powerful

accusation, which looks forward to Spinoza. Negation takes on a

different form in the field of forces: while the second negation

(contained in "therefore") is a purely logical negation, the first

negation ("You are evil") is a negative evaluation. Deleuze explains

that the negative value given to the other from the slave perspective

is not attributed because the other is strong, but because the other

does not restrain that strength. This is where Deleuze locates the

primary slave paralogism: the initial evaluative negation is based on

"the fiction of a force separated from what it can do." [123] The

slave logic negates the force of the strong not by opposing it with

another force but by the "fiction" of dividing it in two parts. This

fictitious division creates the space for the imputation of evil: it

is not evil to be strong, but it is evil to carry that strength into

action. The slave's evaluative negation is based on a false conception

of the nature of power. The slave maintains that power is a capacity,

exterior or transcendent to the field of forces, which can be manifest

in action or not. This separation of power into two parts allows for

the creation of a "fictitious" causal relationship: "the manifestation

is turned into an effect which is referred to the force as if it were

a distinct and separated cause." [123] The slave sets up a

relationship in which force appears as merely a formal cause--force

represents a possible manifestation. (3) Nietzsche's master, however,

insists that power exists only en acte and cannot be separated from

its manifestation: "concrete force is that which goes to its ultimate

consequences, to the limit of power or desire." [53] The master

conceives an internal, necessary relationship between a force and its

manifestation.

What is the reasoning behind Deleuze's claim here? By what logic

is slave power merely a "fiction" and master power more real or

concrete? Obviously this cannot be read as simply an empirical

observation because Nietzsche would be the first to say that slave

power is very real and indeed it is the more prevalent conception in

history, to such an extent that "the strong always have to be defended

against the weak." [58] To understand this argument we have to bring

it back once again to the ontological plane. (4) As we noted earlier,

in Scholastic ontologies the essence of being is its "productivity",

or in Spinozian terms, power is the essence of being. [Ethics 1P34]

Therefore, the slave conception is a "fiction" precisely because it

introduces an accidental quality into the power of being by setting up

an external causal relation. The master logic provides a more

substantial conception of power by posing the effect, the

manifestation internal to the cause, that is, internal to being. This

evaluation follows clearly from a materialist conception of being, and

William Ockham, one of the strictest materialists in the Western

tradition, expresses this point very clearly: "The distinction between

potential existence [ens in potentia] and actual existence [ens in

actu] ... does not mean that something which is not in the universe,

but can exist in the universe, is truly a being, or that something

else which is in the universe is also a being. Rather, when Aristotle

divides 'being' into potentiality and actuality ... he has in mind

that the name 'being' is predicated of some thing by means of the verb

'is', in a proposition which merely states a fact concerning a thing

and is not equivalent to a proposition containing the mode of

possibility. ... Hence, Aristotle declares in the same place that

'being is divisible into potential and actual, as knowledge and rest

are'; but nothing is knowing or resting unless it is actually knowing

or resting." [92] Ockham's insight leads us directly to the nucleus

of Deleuze's Nietzschean distinction between master power and slave

power. To say that "the name 'being' is predicated of some thing by

means of the verb 'is'" is to say that the power of being is

necessarily, efficiently linked to its manifestation, that the force

of being is inseparable from "what it can do". The slave's conception

of power is a "fiction" because it fails to recognizes the real

substantial nature of being and tries to maintain a separation between

the potential and the actual through a notion of possibility: slave

power is real and certainly it does exist, but it cannot exist as a

real expression of substance. The master conception of power reveals

being in its actual productivity; in other words, it expresses the

essence of being as the actual and efficient (not merely possible or

formal) power of being. Framing the discussion in these terms we can

see that Nietzsche's argument has to do, not with the quantity of

power, but with its quality. "What Nietzsche calls weak or slavish is

not the least strong but that which, whatever its strength, is

separated from what it can do." [61] The entire discussion of power

has little to do with strength or capacity, but with the relation

between essence and manifestation, between power and what it can do.

What Nietzsche contributes to this discourse on power is an

evaluation: he judges the power internal to its manifestation as

noble. (5)

This analysis of the nature of power is already very suggestive

of an ethics. Deleuze brings out the ethical and political

implications of the two types of power with an interesting comparison

between Nietzsche and Callicles. "Callicles strives to distinguish

nature and law. Everything that separates a force from what it can do

he calls law. Law, in this sense, expresses the triumph of the weak

over the strong. Nietzsche adds: the triumph of reaction over action.

Indeed, everything which separates a force is reactive as is the state

of a force separated from what it can do. Every force which goes to

the limit of its power is, on the contrary, active. It is not a law

that every force goes to the limit, it is even the opposite of a law."

[58-9] This passage presents a terrain which is very close to that of

Spinoza's political writings. First Spinoza affirms that

power=virtue=right, and then he opposes jus to lex. When we consider

Negri's treatment of Spinoza's political treatises below, we will see

how this formulation can serve for Spinoza as an extension of his

ethics and as the foundation for a viable, democratic politics. Here,

however, at this point in our reading of Deleuze's Nietzsche, we do

not yet have the practical, constructive elements necessary to

elaborate this ethical and political terrain. We have a substantial

theory of power which can serve as an attack on juridicism (based on

the conception of power it implies), but we do yet not have any

positive alternative to complement this attack: to fill out this

alternative we will have to wait until we can elaborate a conception

of ethical practice. For the moment, then, we can only read the

Nietzschean analysis of power as suggestive of a future ethics and

politics.

We have made great progress fleshing out the logic and value of

Nietzsche's distinction between master power and slave power.

However, it is certainly clear that Hegel's master and slave do not

tread directly on this same terrain. Hegel's slave is interested in

consciousness and independence; he is too preoccupied with his death

and too busy thinking about his work to pose the question of value.

(6) Evidently, the preceding discussion has not been dealing with the

Phenomenology: Deleuze directs the Nietzschean attack not against

Hegel's master and slave, but against an extrapolation from Hegel's

logic. We no longer ask the question "What is the dialectical logic

of being?" but "Who wills this logic?" This is the line of reasoning

which leads us to master and slave valuation and to the two

conceptions of power. Thus, Deleuze conducts a second order critique

of Hegel which builds on Bergsonian logic and looks forward to

Spinozian politics. We should note that Deleuze's tactics for

attacking Hegel have changed somewhat. Even if the rhetoric has

intensified, the polemic no longer applies directly to Hegel's

argument, it addresses a derivation from Hegel, an implication of his

dialectic. This new tactic affords Deleuze a greater autonomy from

Hegelian terminology and in effect it transports the dialectic to

Deleuze's terrain (in this case, of sense and value) so that he can

carry out the combat there.

Remark: The resurgence of negativity

A parenthesis about a recent response to Deleuze charges against

slave logic in Stephen Houlgate's Hegel, Nietzsche and the criticism

of metaphysics can help us frame the importance of the arguments we

have presented above. Houlgate makes two central counter-attacks

against Deleuze's Nietzscheanism: 1) it fails to appreciate that

Hegel's negative logic is required for determination and 2) its

conception of self does not meet the requirements to achieve genuine

interiority. Our reading of the evolution of Deleuze's work and the

development of his project clearly shows that these two points are

well off the mark. "Hegel's dialectic is not in fact based upon an

initial external negation of the specific differences between things,

and does not therefore constitute a flight into an abstract world of

fictional concepts as Deleuze asserts. ... According to Hegel's

Science of Logic, a thing must be in itself the negation of something

else ... if it is to have any determinate characteristics ... at all.

The notion of something real or specific which is not negatively

determined, or mediated, is precisely what dialectical philosophy

shows up to be an impossibility. However, Deleuze fails to see

Hegel's point." [7] Omnis determinatio negatio est. Houlgate reminds

us that if we want determination we must have negation. Deleuze has

shown us in his studies on Bergson that he agrees with this point: but

Deleuze is not the one who wants determination. We have seen above

that the negative movement of determination which founds Hegelian

being is a completely external movement, by definition. Further, when

we considered this movement in a causal framework, we found that this

external foundation cannot adequately support being as substance,

causa sui. We must admit that Deleuze does not repeat this argument

in Nietzsche and Philosophy; as we have said, he takes the Bergsonian

point for granted and builds on it. However, we have come back to

this argument so many times now that it can only appear as comical

when Houlgate claims that, like Nietzsche, Deleuze does not have an

adequate familiarity with Hegel the logician, doctor subtilis: "What

are the consequences of Deleuze's failure to appreciate Hegel's

somewhat rarefied point of logic?" [8] Jean Wahl is much closer to

the mark when he claims that Deleuze at times falls into rhetorical

exaggerations giving in to his unbridled hatred for Hegel. (7)

Houlgate's second charge shows a similar confusion of Deleuze's

project. He reads Deleuze's Nietzschean critique as if it remained a

reformist endeavor, content to criticize Hegel's means not his ends.

Thus, just as Houlgate assumes Deleuze is striving for determination,

which implies negation, so too he assumes as another goal the

interiority of self-consciousness, which likewise proves to require

negation. "Deleuze thus rules out the possibility that true, concrete

selfhood is to be understood in terms of the negation of, or mediation

by, the other." [7] And further, "in contrast to Hegel, Deleuze does

not believe that genuine self-consciousness requires consciousness of

the other's recognition of oneself...." [8] Houlgate is assuming that

Deleuze's project is to refine or complete Hegel's argument; Deleuze,

on the contrary, wants to have nothing to do with self-consciousness

and the self it gives rise to. [cf 39,41-2,80] Along with Nietzsche,

he views it as a sickness, a ressentiment caused by the reflection of

a force back into itself. What Deleuze is searching for, instead, is

a productive exteriority which is based on affirmation. [36] We can

see this point clearly if we keep in mind the implications of

Nietzsche's the two types of power. Finally, Houlgate shows us one

reason why Deleuze might choose not to address directly the master and

slave of Hegel's Phenomenology: the entire terrain is oriented towards

promoting the sickness of interiority and self-consciousness.