The agent's realizing the fundamental contradictions in her individual circumstance 47 :

This comes from the realization of the arbitrariness of existing divisions within humanity and the impossibility of justifying them. As a result, the subject rejects these divisions, and aims to overcome them. But while rejecting them, the agent realizes that, no matter what, they have already been taking part in these injustices.

Either because they were at a disadvantage and had no other way to claim their due, but to fight. And since the powerful has taken all the precautions to destitute him from any legal or even moral means to fight, he resorts to violence. Or by virtue of their accident of birth, which makes any privileges they may have acquired as a result of this accident unjustified, and how these are not deserved any more than for the majority of humanity that actually lacks them. But since they are these privileges, they cannot renounce them unless they renounce life.

Hardly possible, when the instinct to live is so profound in human beings.

A theoretician of multiculturalism for instance feels the contradiction between the universal principles of freedom and equality she seeks and the neoliberal situation that has effectively decimated them. Between the universal principle that every human being -particularly in a democracy, every denizen- has an equal right to be heard and to be recognized and to find a place in society. That who she is has no effect whatsoever on evaluating the coherence or veracity of her argument. And the fact that such universal principles are almost never applied in practice. In fact, your voice, your argument are not only affected by who you are (which approximately means what you own), but pretty much determined by it. You could be the most idiotic, least articulate person, and even lie all the time. But if you are rich, your opinion will be heard and will have an influence even on policy. You could even become the president of the most powerful country in history, and have the largest megaphone to voice more obscenities. However, if you are a Muslim refugee escaping Syria to survive. Then no matter your goodness of character, intelligence or knowledge, and your ability to articulate your views, you are likely to have no influence whatsoever. In fact, your argument will hardly be heard at all; you may just as well be singing the national anthem of Andorra.

Furthermore, our political theorist lives not only discovers these contradictions -between the universal principles and the neoliberal structures- outside, but also within herself. Since that refugee -who is most affected if her argument for the universal principles of freedom, equality and democracy are successful- is unlikely to ever read her. While those who actually read her arguments are precisely those who have no personal stake in it. And those who already have an influential voice in practical politics; who can resolve the

contradictions she feels are unlikely to take the time to read and think and debate her contribution. And even if they did, her arguments may be sound, logical, coherent, and moral. But they may not be good electoral arguments. They are not ambiguous to help a politician win different constituencies that believe different 47.By fundamental contradiction in an individual's circumstance, I mean the contradiction between the universality of love, human rights, UN charter, morality, and of scientific laws...etc. on one hand and the arbitrary divisions and sectarianism of human into classes, ethnicities, nationalities, religions...etc. on the other hand.

things.⁴⁸ not the empty and easy slogans that will help win an election in a western democracy. Thus the very universal principles she defends and which are supposed to be the basis⁴⁹ of a modern western democracy are precisely why it is impossible for them to be concretized, to become policy.

In short, her work will reach neither those in power, nor those whose life is on the line, on the border, in a concentration camp⁵⁰ somewhere or in a Libyan torture cell. It will remain behind the paywalls of professional journals. And the chasm in the contradictions between the universality of the principles she argues and the neoliberal maelstrom will remain as vast as ever. How she deals with this contradiction, however, may open a way for freedom. So let us now take a concrete case of how one could use these contradictions, making them the source of freedom as a commitment.

Sartre's life exemplifies the commitment of an intellectual. We will take his discussion of it since this

dimension of freedom is something political theorists, philosophers, students and professors must reckon with.

Sartre defines the intellectual as a technician of practical knowledge that originated from the needs of the bourgeoisie. This includes teachers, writers, engineers, doctors, scientists, professors, and so on. The practice of one of these professions is a necessary but not sufficient condition to be an intellectual. The technician

becomes an intellectual when she discovers outside herself, suffers within herself, and contests the contradictions between the universality she seeks in her work and the laws governing the structures of a

neoliberal world. These technicians learn, think, experiment, write and create in universal terms then stumbles in a world where such universality remains a fiction. For her research has universal methods and leads to a universal knowledge (i.e. A physical law or a theorem applies universally, to everyone equally. The truth that all human life is equally precious. A vaccine or a drug is makes no distinction between humans on the basis of their particular identity...etc.). But her situation as a privileged as well as the effective use of her discovery is not universal. It is restricted to those who can afford it: '' En bien des cas, avec la complicité du technicien du savoir pratique, les couches sociales privilégiées volent l'utilité sociale de leurs découvertes et la transforment en utilité pour le petit nombre aux dépens du grand. Pour cette raison, les inventions nouvelles demeurent longtemps des instruments de frustration pour la majorité : c'est ce qu'on nomme paupérisation relative. Ainsi le technicien qui invente pour tous n'est finalement — au moins pour une durée rarement prévisible — qu'un agent de

paupérisation pour les classes travailleuses. C'est ce qu'on comprend mieux encore lorsqu'il s'agit d'une amélioration notable d'un produit industriel : celle-ci, en effet, n'est utilisée par la bourgeoisie que pour

accroître son profit.'' (Sartre, 1972. p.35). When the technician realizes, furthermore, that they contribute to this 48. The politician argument, being ambiguous, helps him win a maximum of votes because people can interpret it in different ways, compatible with their goals, and vote for him accordingly.

49. The multiculturalist lives this contradiction more so because, in fact, no such universal principles are even possible within the (unquestioned) statist framework of political theory and practical politics. Because governing a contemporary society (again within this framework) requires a bureaucracy. Now, as personal experience and many of the works cited here (and beyond) show, nothing is democratic or egalitarian in an administration. A state bureaucracy is inherently hierarchical and authoritarian. Furthermore, it is not accurate that pluralism or tolerance is found in the West (though it is even worse elsewhere –Eastern Europe, Russia, the Middle East). Because mostly people tolerate others as long as they are just like them. Real tolerance requires difference. Tolerant people would not be having the discourse of integration but rather mutual recognition towards those who are different from them, like Muslims in the West. Plurality through recognition of the other is still extremely rare. Because to recognize the other in this way, I must recognize in her something universal that I share. Otherwise, my pluralism would not be a universal value but an irreducible difference. No society was more pluralistic (in this latter sense) than the Apartheid state in Palestine or the former apartheid South Africa; for them, Arabs and blacks are difference, otherness..

50. What American politicians and mainstream media call detention centers.

situation and that the universal ethics of bourgeois humanism that has been inculcated to them is not universal but remains a form of class humanism; she is constantly struck by the contradictions in the world. If she denounces these contradictions, she becomes an intellectual. It is only through her work that she discovers these contradictions, and so as long as she continues doing this work, she goes on living these contradictions.

Thus she is constantly torn apart inside by her own contradictions; seeing herself as a monster which is to say a being created by societies to serve purposes other than their own:

''Ainsi les techniciens du savoir sont produits par la classe dominante avec une contradiction qui les déchire : d'une part, en tant que salariés et fonctionnaires mineurs des superstructures, ils dépendent directement des dirigeants (organismes « privés » ou État) et se situent nécessairement dans la particularité, comme un certain groupe de secteur tertiaire, d'autre part en tant que leur spécialité est toujours l'universel, ces spécialistes sont la contestation même des particularismes qu'on leur a injectés et qu'ils ne peuvent contester sans se contester eux-mêmes. Ils affirment qu'il n'y a pas de « science bourgeoise » et pourtant leur science est bourgeoise par ses limites et ils le savent. Il est vrai, cependant, qu'au moment précis de la recherche, ils travaillent dans la liberté, ce qui rend plus amer encore le retour à leur condition réelle.'' (Sartre, 1972. p35-36).

Sartre gives the example of nuclear scientists whose work has been used or abused by politicians to make the atomic and hydrogen bombs, and use it to annihilate the populations of entire cities. As scientists, the practice of universality is everyday in nuclear physics, and in its discoveries. As scientists, they create, but do not reflect on the use of their creation. However, when these very scientists, horrified by the destructive power of what they have made, get together and sign a manifesto to warn the public against the use of the bomb, they become intellectuals. This is an instance of freedom as commitment. They feel the contradictions between the universality of knowledge and the sectarianism of ideology inside them and realize these contradictions are their world. They overstep all the limits of their profession by taking a moral position on the use of their work;

creating nuclear technology is one thing, deciding how to use is another. They even use their notoriety or their skill to steer and violent the public opinion; as if their political intervention on the use of the discovery was not separated by an unbridgeable chasm from scientific knowledge. Third, they do not contest the use of the bomb because of any technical defects in it, but rather ''au nom d'un système de valeurs éminemment contestable qui prend pour norme suprême la vie humaine.'' ⁵¹ (Sartre, 1972. p.13-14).

51. Is Sartre right that human life is so contestable a norm? Certainly in wars and at the height of the cold war when intellectuals, worried about the prospects of nuclear Armageddon, have gathered to sign the Russell-Einstein Manifesto. But is it the supreme value in today's 'peace'? We think it still is not, because we do not consider our times peaceful, if peace is not merely the absence of world embracing conflicts, though there is that too for instance in the 1% war against the 99%. The point is that even outside of war zones, and beyond intense social and political upheavals in (materially) poorer countries, there is extreme violence: ''L'ordre humain n'est qu'un désordre encore, il est injuste, précaire, on y tue, on y meurt de faim'' (Sartre, 1964. p.128) Even in the ordered, relatively peaceful societies, their very fabric is torn apart by their inability to attend to the needs of the many inside and outside them, and to reach out across -class, ethnic, gender, religious, national and supranational- dividing lines. Their 'peace' has been and still is the result of the subjugation and oppression of the worldwide 'énorme masse des démunis' through colonialism and the 'nouvelles pratiques impériales' (Badiou, 2016b. p.25-29) including the dispossessed within these western societies: 'les ouvries de provenance étrangère, leurs enfants, les réfugiés, les habitants des sombres cités, les musulmans fanatiques.' (Badiou, 2016b. p.41) This is a major operation of the ruling elites in Western states which has always been a winning electoral strategy since the National Socialists have perfected it in Germany nine decades ago. It consists at acknowledging the problems and worries of the middle class, the basis of 'democracy' in these states. But then instead of taking responsibility that these problems result from their policies, they create an enemy onto which to shift the fear of destitution of the middle class. That enemy must be so weak and undefended and so it is found in the most vulnerable strata of the population, and promise that, if elected, they will do all they can (more violence, police, prisons, surveillance, military, deportations, deals with dictators...etc.) to stop these dangerous masses. Conservative thinks tanks, a collection of identity obsessed public figures, and the 'free' corporate media follow with a commentary that parrots these arguments

Such a norm should be not be so contestable, but it is. We think that this particular norm belongs to an important categories of norms that are ''doubly universal'' in that it is ''virtually always professed'', but simultaneously ''almost universally rejected in practice''. (Chomsky, 2015. p. 60)

For in setting public policies, -whether for nuclear disarmament, gun control, healthcare, the environment, you name it- states have shown it. That not only for non-citizens, but even for their own disenfranchised majority, the supreme values remain profit and love of power.

We have seen in the situation of the intellectual freedom as commitment unfolding from the motive of contradictions. The realization of grave injustice, and her participation in it, powerless to stop it but

nevertheless revolting against this abuse of her work, contesting authority, affirming the universality by claiming the freedom of all in order to be herself free. That is not being alienated from the product of her work that is used to ends contrary to the universality she pursues and through which she explores and discovers.

“That Man is the product of causes which had no prevision of the end they were achieving; that his origin, his growth, his hopes and fears, his loves and his beliefs, are but the outcome of accidental collocations of atoms;

that no fire, no heroism, no intensity of thought and feeling, can preserve an individual life beyond the grave;

that all the labours of the ages, all the devotion, all the inspiration, all the noonday brightness of human genius, are destined to extinction in the vast death of the solar system, and that the whole temple of Man’s achievement must inevitably be buried beneath the debris of a universe in ruins—all these things, if not quite beyond dispute, are yet so nearly certain, that no philosophy which rejects them can hope to stand. Only within the scaffolding of these truths, only on the firm foundation of unyielding despair, can the soul’s habitation henceforth be safely built.” (Russell, 1993. P.67)