CSGR

This information is current as of

February 2013

Contemporary Sociological Global Review (eISSN 2027-7431)

Sortir de la grande nuit, by Achille Mbembe. Paris: La Dcouverte,

2010, 246p, ISBN: 978-2707166-70-8, U$20.00

Luis Martnez Andrade

cole des hautes tudes en sciences sociales
Paris - France
Email address: luisma_andrade@hotmail.com

Contemp. Sociol. Glob. Rev. 3(3): 72-74 (2013)

ID: csgr00019
doi: 10.6040/s2027-7431.38122x

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Book Review

Sortir de la grande nuit, by Achille Mbembe.

Paris: La Dcouverte, 2010, 246p, ISBN: 9782707166-70-8, U$20.00

Luis Martnez Andrade

cole des hautes tudes en sciences sociales, France

Address correspondence to:

Luis Martnez Andrade
cole des hautes tudes en sciences sociales
Paris - France
Email address: luisma_andrade@hotmail.com

Contemporary Sociological Global Review - CSGR

Volume 3 Number 3 (February 2013)

Achille Mbembes contribution provides for social scientists

and critical theorists many benefits. After his last book, On the Postcolony, where he shows the main atavisms, complexes and desires of
the contemporary African societies, this Cameroonian thinker presents interesting hermeneutics about the decolonizing process in the
periphery. In this sense, Mbembe calls for a new dialogue between
political thought and utopian pragmatism. It is not farfetched, remembering the title borrowed from Fanon who used it to claim to
shake off the great mantle of night which has enveloped us, and
reach for the light (Fanon, 2004:235).
Even if Mbembe continues his critical work -in the way of
Frantz Fanon, Jean Franois Bayart or Fabien Eboussi Boulaga- in
this text, the reference to authors such as Ernst Bloch or Walter
Benjamin is evident. Thus for Mbembe, the theological and political
moment is crucial in the construction of the universal community.
The cultural, religious and ontological phenomena are present in
the largest part of the book.
Organized in six chapters, this contribution explains the principal challenge in the re-foundation of the critical world-thought.
The first chapter, A partir du crne dun mort is in fact a brief
summary of Mbembes backgrounds. Having studied in Paris and
New York, the author testifies the European provincialism in the
academic field. To support this argument, Mbembe underlines the
narcissistic sense of universal concepts in the French academic
world. Within this chapter, Mbembe explains the influence of one
liberation theologian Gustavo Gutierrezs works in a new approach
to the Christian tradition. Although the potential of the Christian
tradition was studied in On the Postcolony, here the author
comments on the power of Christianity in the configuration of memory and the insubordination process. Reconsidering the corpses
without tombs, the skull represents, for Mbembe, the pseudoliberation in the African context.
Chapter 2, Dclosion du monde et monte en humanit devotes itself to detailing the consequences of the colonization period.
Thus colonial domination must be considered as a State of excep-

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Sortir de la grande nuit, by Achille Mbembe. Paris: La Dcouverte

tion, where the colonized represent not only a non-being

(nothingness) but also a dying-thing; for that reason, this
dying-thing has as a metaphysical prerogative of obedience to his Master (the colonizer). Mbembe then proceeds to describe the three steps in the birth of a worldthought. Firstly, the anti-colonialist struggles within the
liberation project; secondly, the rise of the high theory
represented in traditions of E. Said, A. Nandy, G. Spivak,
H. Bhabha, E. Glissant; and last but not least, the
Postcolony critics who have reinterpreted the meanings
of death, power, race, divine libido, and enjoyment in Sub
-Saharan Africa. Following Fanons calling, the author
makes up a world eclosion, and therefore, coming up in
humanity is fundamental to the new liberation process.
Socit franaise: proximit sans rciprocit and
Le long hiver imperial franais, chapters 3-4 are concentrated upon French space. Throughout these chapters,
the author analyses the creation of the Republic concept
in France, where the idea of race plays (and used to play)
an important role not only in the notion of the citizen
(citoyennet) but also in subjectivities. To support his argument, the author studied the relationships between the
Republic and language that shows the weakness and the
limits of fraternitys Eurocentric notion. The perverse
preconceptions about Islam, immigrants (sans-papiers),
or outsiders/others, appear as the ideological and colonial
core of the Republic identity. Another interesting point
refers to the Gayssot Law (1990) which recognized the
responsibility of France in the Holocaust and the French
law on colonialism (23 February, 2005), which defended
the positive values of colonialism; consequently, these
events were showing the difference between the worthy
victims and the non-worthy victims.
Chapter 5, Afrique: la case sans cls discusses the
contemporary transformations in the African space. Turning to African History, the author underlines race as a
structural element in the configuration of identities, territories and, of course, power. However, in the final
years of the 20th century, petrol emerged as a factor in
determining borders. The extractive economy is an
expression of the neocolonialism dynamics. In addition,
the ethics of masculinity presents itself as the advent of
militarism culture that configures several forms of violence. In the same way, Mbembe develops his reflections on
the male-centered society (phallocratic), for example, the
manu militari, the banality of power and the virile universe in the postcolony. Consequently, the capitalist system has stimulated the logic of enjoyment and its different expressions or deprivations.
The sixth concluding chapter, Circulation des
mondes: lexprience africain calls attention to the will
of lifes community, in other words, the act of a people
standing up and confronting death. For that reason,
Mbembe is interested in two constitutive moments of the
Afropolitanism (one represented in the postcolonial turn
in the 70s, the second one that refers to the new wages of
73

African Diasporas). In this section, the author emphasizes the deep relationship between politics and violence
that establishes the phallus commandment; this implies
that brutality, cruelty and obscenity are the main components in the postcolonial context. Thus, the author also
makes appropriate reference to the Sony Labou Tansi
novels to illustrate this praxis of enjoyment.
Despite the deep knowledge in the subaltern and
postcolonial literature, the author dodges the concept of
coloniality of power. This concept by the Peruvian sociologist Anibal Quijano proposes a reference to the mechanism of domination that sustains itself through the following three notions: race, word and gender. According to
Quijano, the pattern of the domination system established between the colonizers (settlers) and the colonized
were organized upon notions of race. This classification
implied a despoliation, of not only indigenous lands, but
also their identities; that is to say, Aztecs, Incas, Mayan,
Araucanos, Aymaras, simply became Indians. The notion of race in the new colonies was at the heart of social and cultural relations based on biological differences.
In this sense, the modern world-system and colonialism
were born together in Latin America.
Throughout the course of these racial classifications, social practices of domination, control, and ethnosocial exploitation developed. Poorly paid and unpaid labor conditions had completely exterminated the
Caribbean natives; hence, the Castilian monarchy decided to go from slavery to indebted servitude since one of
its most valuable possessions, the indigenous workforce,
was in danger. Spaniards established new forms of forced
labor known as the encomienda system that was a production mode that could be articulated within a capitalism system; according to Anbal Quijano, by doing so: a
systematic racial division of the work was imposed.
Racial labor organization articulated capital dynamics and the index of indigenous mortality obliged Europeans to import a work force, thus engaging in the slave
trade. The workforce (both indigenous and an enslaved
black population) aimed to serve in an export economy
whose production was then exported to the European
market and thus, had registered in the world-system logic. Thus, it did not echo in the producer's economic workforce as they were considered sub-humans, therefore unable to receive a living-wage much less a privileged position in the colony. Nevertheless, it was as much the Spanish as the Portuguese dominant ruling class who were
deserving of that right. A social pyramid differentiated by
race was emerging that would condition the future perspectives of the indigenous and afro-Caribbean groups in
Latin America. The dynamics of capital are essential
components of colonial phenomena that manifest themselves on both cultural and political levels.
The omission of the importance to the coloniality
of power as an analytical tool leads Mbembe to the realization of a weak critique of the capitalism system. Some-

Contemp. Sociol. Glob. Rev. 3(3): 72-74 (2013) ID: csgr00019 - doi: http://dx.doi.syllabapress.us/10.6040/s2027-7431.38122x

Sortir de la grande nuit, by Achille Mbembe. Paris: La Dcouverte

times, his approach seems to be in the way of a nave deconstruction discourse in capitalisms form. If critical
thought needs a radical reformulation, we cannot leave
behind the Marxist categories of class struggles and the
law of value. Of course, the Eurocentric Marxist perspective does not adequately address the racism problem and,
therefore, a dialogue with the critical thinkers from Latin
-America or Asia is necessarily urgent.
Globally, the book is an interesting and illuminating interpretation on the most important challenge for
African societies. Nevertheless, I would like to underline
that all the arguments in it are dependent upon the idea
of the decolonizing process as a bifurcated period. This
notion of the period is attractive because it presents an
open perspective on social facts. I really hope for a future
translation of this book for Spanish and Portuguese languages as it would allow for further dialogue with other
academic communities.
Fanon F (2004) The wretched of the Earth. Translated from the French by Richard Philcox. New York: Grove
Press.
About the Author
Luis Martnez Andrade, Socilogo por la Benemrita
Universidad Autnoma de Puebla. Actualmente estudia el
Doctorado en Sociologa en la cole des Hautes tudes en
Sciences Sociales de Pars. Su inters se inscribe en la relacin
entre la ecologa y la religin en Amrica Latina, tema sobre el
cual ha publicado diversos artculos en distintas revistas
cientficas de Europa y Amrica Latina. En 2009 recibi el
Primer Premio del concurso Internacional de Ensayo Pensar
a Contracorriente.

Contemp. Sociol. Glob. Rev. 3(3): 72-74 (2013) ID: csgr00019 - doi: http://dx.doi.syllabapress.us/10.6040/s2027-7431.38122x

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