Nothing is more foreign to public intelligence than the systematic disqualification of anger. We must reject both the triviality of the adage “anger is bad counsel” and the idea that it opens the doors to violence and irrationality.
Aristotle, the founder of political thought, was aware of this. Far from being a blind impulse, opposed to reason, anger is the immediate reaction to a public act of depreciation and unjustified contempt that affects and reaches us. It is the reaction of an individual or group whose existence and dignity have been publicly contested and violated. The same goes for indignation felt in the face of undeserved “misfortunes.”
So, anger and indignation reflect a vivid experience of injustice. Indignation presupposes the absence of any personal interest, as it is felt by those who, without suffering themselves from the injustice, do not accept that their fellow beings are its victims.
The sense of justice (and injustice) does not stem from personal injury but from attention and sensitivity to others. Anger thus demonstrates a fundamental relationship with alterity and reacts to the inability of the law to ensure justice within a political community. In this case, as Aristotle pointed out, it is not contrary to reason but involves the mutual recognition of beings who share a common world.
The relevance of these remarks and the complexity of the problem are evident: most of the collective protest movements that have emerged recently are linked to expressions of anger in the face of experienced injustice, lack of recognition, or denial of equal dignity.
Whether it is the Yellow Vests, Black Lives Matter, or #MeToo (among others), the question is how to transition from “just anger” to citizen involvement in the city so that it does not turn into violence. In other words, how to politically develop demands and claims arising from collective anger and indignation? Because, under certain conditions, they are only a prerequisite.
The failure of the Yellow Vests movement
The Yellow Vests movement is emblematic of a wave that failed, lacking structured organization and coherence, to find a political solution. The confusion and lack of precise expression have placed the movement in an indefinable gray area where the exacerbation of the sense of injustice, impotent anger, turned into violent resentment.
“The sense of justice (and injustice) does not stem from personal injury but from attention and sensitivity to others.”
It has also led to initiatives (lists of grievances, grand debate, Citizens’ Convention for Climate) which fell short, due to a condescending power that suffocated anything that could have integrated these initiatives into public life. This has increased frustrations and impotent anger, fueling populist capture.
The success of #MeToo
A different case is #MeToo: lived testimonies, life stories multiplied and spread unexpectedly, succeeding in weaving a common “we.” Stemming from the sharing of sensitive experiences, it also managed to generalize as it highlighted, beyond violence against women, a major political issue: that of male dominance.
The trial of the rapes in Mazan would not have had such an impact if #MeToo had not placed it within the realm of public discourse. This does not mean that the problem of male dominance is solved, but it politically demands to be addressed in all its aspects (sexual, social, economic, educational, etc.).
The risk of capture by populism
There is an immense reservoir of anger everywhere, not just in France, which, failing to transform into political energy, is instrumentalized by populism and transformed into a conglomerate of anxieties, frustrations, hatreds, and rages.
Transformed into anti-political fury, they aggregate and crystallize to the point of endangering not only public debate but democracy as an ethos, the foundation of certain shared values: concern for justice, equal dignity, recognition of the other as a “similar” (who is not necessarily someone who resembles us).
The world according to Donald Trump has taken the capture of fear, anger, and resentment to its extreme. The brutalization and violence of power sought to make hatred – which is not anger – an essential spring of confrontations and polarizations that have nothing to do with democratic conflict.
The success of horizontal resistance
It seemed, until recently, that the violence carried by the Trumpist power had no limits, especially those that could be opposed by the norms of public debate. The recent events in Minneapolis showed this was not the case and that there were forms of indignation capable of obstructing it. citizens’ refusal to accept violence and injustice against others enabled them to resist the brutality and inhumane practices of ICE agents (immigration police).
It is interesting to note that the forms initiated by citizens did not aim to counter violence with more violence or face it in a completely ineffective manner through rational debate or discussion. As Spinoza wrote, one only fights against a passion with a stronger passion. In this case, it was an “expansive” passion, one that increased the collective power of citizens to act, that triumphed over hatred.
Furthermore, human solidarity – this form of political friendship (philia) – has managed to invent unprecedented ways of horizontal resistance, organized and relayed by citizen networks. These methods are also the heirs of a political culture and an exercise of collective action rooted in history, in proven social and political practices. That is why they were able to overturn the power dynamics and push back the violence of the authorities. This gives perhaps some reasons not to despair of the potential democratic resistance arising from anger and indignation.
