The Future of Bad Collectivity

Abstract

This article argues for the value of “bad collectivity” to educate and encourage citizens estranged from democratic practices, traditions, and institutions, to participate in the process of democratic will-formation. Originating in Ben Lerner’s novel 10:04, bad collectivity refer to moments of collective identification with injury that briefly transcend a culture of individualism which identifies freedom in terms of legal rights, rather than association, and a splintered and increasingly privatized public sphere. Considering Black Lives Matter an example of bad collectivity, I show how the movement has made injury rather than a progressive historical narrative the normative basis of participation.