Research Article


DOI :10.26650/SJ.2019.39.1.0029   IUP :10.26650/SJ.2019.39.1.0029    Full Text (PDF)

You Only Get What You Give? A New Radical Durkheimian Political Economy of Sacrifice

Ronjon Paul Datta

Recognizing the convergence of renewed scholarly interest in the sacred, and debates about fiscal sacrifices in recent economic history, this rethinking of Durkheim develops a symptomatic reading of his theory of sacrifice in The Elementary Forms of Religious Life. The paper argues that Durkheim’s suppression of political economic sensibilities in The Forms leads him to generate a fetishistic account of sacrifice as a moral activity that renews existing bases of rule. His analysis does so because it inadequately accounts for the role of structured inequalities in the production of the rite. A radical Durkheimian political economy of sacrifice is reclaimed by critically synthesizing it with the Foucauldian concept of dispositifs, one better able to account for the combined impact of knowledge control, inequality, and exclusion on moral life. The critical theoretical work is then applied to the axiological implications of neoliberal individualism, highlighting that it depends on and disavows sacrifice, specifically the sacrificing of people’s capacity for altruism (or, the sacrifice of sacrifice). Finally, Durkheim’s heterological sensibilities about the constitutive potential of the sacred in moments of collective effervescence are used to put the politics back in this political economy of sacrifice.


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APA

Datta, R. (2019). You Only Get What You Give? A New Radical Durkheimian Political Economy of Sacrifice. İstanbul University Journal of Sociology, 39(1), 85-108. https://doi.org/10.26650/SJ.2019.39.1.0029


AMA

Datta R. You Only Get What You Give? A New Radical Durkheimian Political Economy of Sacrifice. İstanbul University Journal of Sociology. 2019;39(1):85-108. https://doi.org/10.26650/SJ.2019.39.1.0029


ABNT

Datta, R. You Only Get What You Give? A New Radical Durkheimian Political Economy of Sacrifice. İstanbul University Journal of Sociology, [Publisher Location], v. 39, n. 1, p. 85-108, 2019.


Chicago: Author-Date Style

Datta, Ronjon Paul,. 2019. “You Only Get What You Give? A New Radical Durkheimian Political Economy of Sacrifice.” İstanbul University Journal of Sociology 39, no. 1: 85-108. https://doi.org/10.26650/SJ.2019.39.1.0029


Chicago: Humanities Style

Datta, Ronjon Paul,. You Only Get What You Give? A New Radical Durkheimian Political Economy of Sacrifice.” İstanbul University Journal of Sociology 39, no. 1 (May. 2024): 85-108. https://doi.org/10.26650/SJ.2019.39.1.0029


Harvard: Australian Style

Datta, R 2019, 'You Only Get What You Give? A New Radical Durkheimian Political Economy of Sacrifice', İstanbul University Journal of Sociology, vol. 39, no. 1, pp. 85-108, viewed 17 May. 2024, https://doi.org/10.26650/SJ.2019.39.1.0029


Harvard: Author-Date Style

Datta, R. (2019) ‘You Only Get What You Give? A New Radical Durkheimian Political Economy of Sacrifice’, İstanbul University Journal of Sociology, 39(1), pp. 85-108. https://doi.org/10.26650/SJ.2019.39.1.0029 (17 May. 2024).


MLA

Datta, Ronjon Paul,. You Only Get What You Give? A New Radical Durkheimian Political Economy of Sacrifice.” İstanbul University Journal of Sociology, vol. 39, no. 1, 2019, pp. 85-108. [Database Container], https://doi.org/10.26650/SJ.2019.39.1.0029


Vancouver

Datta R. You Only Get What You Give? A New Radical Durkheimian Political Economy of Sacrifice. İstanbul University Journal of Sociology [Internet]. 17 May. 2024 [cited 17 May. 2024];39(1):85-108. Available from: https://doi.org/10.26650/SJ.2019.39.1.0029 doi: 10.26650/SJ.2019.39.1.0029


ISNAD

Datta, Ronjon Paul. You Only Get What You Give? A New Radical Durkheimian Political Economy of Sacrifice”. İstanbul University Journal of Sociology 39/1 (May. 2024): 85-108. https://doi.org/10.26650/SJ.2019.39.1.0029



TIMELINE


Submitted14.08.2018
Last Revision11.11.2018
Accepted01.12.2018

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