A Thousand Plateaus V, The State Apparatus and the War Machine, Lecture 4, 27 November 1979

<p><em>The Deleuze Seminars</em> is a collection of audio recordings, transcriptions, and English translations of, and supplemental materials from, the lectures French philosopher Gilles Deleuze gave during his career at the University of Paris 8.</p>

<p>Following publication of <em>Anti-Oedipus</em> in 1972, Deleuze continues to develop the proliferation of concepts that his collaboration with Guattari had yielded. As part of this process of expanding concepts in order to produce the sequel of <em>Capitalism & Schizophrenia</em>, <em>A Thousand Plateaus</em>, this series of 13 lectures on “The State Apparatus and War Machines” constitutes the major seminar of 1979-80 and Deleuze’s penultimate consideration of these concepts. Deleuze first considers material begun during the previous year’s seminar, material corresponding to plateaus 12 (1227: Treatise on Nomadology – The War Machine), 13 (7000 B.C.: Apparatus of Capture), and 14 (1440: The Smooth and the Striated). [The final consideration of these concepts will take place in the May-June 1980 two-session seminar on “Anti-Oedipus and Other Reflections”.</p>

<p>In session 4, 27 November 1979, building from the previous session, on the possibility of coexistence within a social field of extremely diverse social formations and of defining these through the commodity of "machinic processes," Deleuze emphasizes the importance of Braudel’s research on relations of city and State form. He recalls the different processes coming into play (e.g., warding off-anticipation), and continuing to explore the possibilities of exchange between primitive groups, he cautions against including certain elements (e.g., stockpiling, currency, markets, regime of labor) not yet available to these groups, proper only to the State form. Deleuze proposes to consider the development of the concept of labor and labor-time, distinct from the primitive formations of exchange, in the State formation of exchange. In this process, he develops the concept of “the utility of the last object” from economic marginalist theory, with distinctions between the “limit” and “thresholds”, and the concept of “the last” provides a means of understanding the movement within social groups to maintain or be required to transform the group “assemblage” in relation to the “last object” obtained in the exchange. Seeking additional proof of this series of exchange, Deleuze turns to a student in accountancy to speak about these issues from the perspective of that discipline, and the recording ends as the student’s inaudible presentation begins.</p>

<p>This dataset includes four files: an aggregate version of the audio recordings into a single mp3, the complete French transcription and English translation of the recorded lecture in odt format, and the original Web Deleuze French transcription. [WebDeleuze was founded by Richard Pinhas -- a student in Deleuze's seminars -- who, with the Deleuze family's support, developed transcripts and translations of many of the seminars.]</p>

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<p><em>Les Séminaires de Deleuze</em> sont une collection d'enregistrements audio, de transcriptions et de traductions en anglais et de documents complémentaires des conférences que le philosophe français Gilles Deleuze a donné lors de sa carrière à l'Université de Paris 8.</p>

<p>A la suite de la publication de <em>L’Anti-Œdipe</em> en 1972, Deleuze continue de développer la prolifération de concepts que sa collaboration avec Guattari avait fait naître. Dans le cadre de ce processus d’élargissement des concepts en vue de produire la suite de <em>Capitalisme et schizophrénie</em>, <em>Mille plateaux</em>, ce séminaire de 13 séance sur « L’appareil d’État et les machines de guerre » constitue le séminaire majeur de 1979-80 et l’avant-dernière réflexion de Deleuze sur ces concepts. La dernière réflexion aura lieu en mai-juin 1980, un mini-séminaire de deux séances sur « L’Anti-Œdipe et d’autres réflexions ».</p>

<p>S’appuyant sur les travaux de la séance précédente, sur la possibilité de faire coexister au sein d’un champ social des formations sociales extrêmement diverses et de les définir à travers la marchandise des « processus machiniques », Deleuze propose d’envisager l’évolution du concept de travail et de temps de travail depuis les formations primitives de l’échange jusqu’à la formation étatique de l’échange.</p>