Paper short abstract:

In this paper, we will show that over the years Latour’s thinking on science has increasingly moved away from politics and closer to ontology

Paper long abstract:

In his book on Bruno Latour's political philosophy, Graham Harman argues that Latour's early period is characterized by an ontologization of politics, that is, "politics is simply a metaphor for reality". In the present paper, we will put forward the opposite hypothesis.

In our view, Harman's analysis is due to his giving too much attention to Irreductions at the expense of The Pateurization of France. This excessive focus is noticeable in his omission of the paper Latour published before Pasteurization came out, which should be read in conjunction with the book.

Through a rereading of these two key texts and Latour's other major political work, Politics of Nature, we will try and show that over the years Latour's thinking on science has increasingly moved away from politics and closer to ontology.

Pasteurization offers a remarkable political theory of science. With its focus on the role of non humans in the social (dis)order, this theory can be interpreted as a way to overcome THE shortcoming of modern political theory: the conceptualization of the state as the only operator of politics. In contrast, in Politics of Nature all political actors are drawn on the turf of science, and democracy is equated with the negotiated definition of what reality is made of. Hence, the parliament of things appears as a reduction of politics to ontology.