Cronopolitica dell'eccezione: pandemia e tardo capitalismo

The debate over the Sars-CoV-2 pandemic developed in the early months of 2020 set a contrast between those claiming the emergency measures to be extraordinary but justified and legally grounded and those who inscribed them in a process of normalization of the state of exception. After noting shortcomings of both positions, the paper argues that the state of exception that is being imposed is based on a peculiar ontology and anticipatory politics. The first, contrary to what is assumed by plenty of social theory, builds not on the affirmation but on a denial of the distinction between nature and society; the second relies on a temporal structure that is no longer the linear one typical of modernity, but is rather akin to Pauline messianism. To understand today’s dynamics of domination and assess the social forces opposing them, an accurate analysis of the politics of time established by late capitalism is indispensable.