Summary
Dominique Pagani approaches war through its silence. He takes up Freud's phrase, "the death drives progress in silence," to point out the media's indifference to the deaths in the Sahel. He links the chief of staff's announcement of a high-intensity conflict to NATO's military build-up around Russia1. He rejects the opposition between warmongers and pacifists and reads a letter by Rimbaud against "patrouillotisme." He connects this silence with amnesia, drawing on Halbwachs, Thomas Mann and Jacques Pauwels's "The Myth of the Good War." Through the Spanish Civil War and Munich, he shows that a pacifism can let things happen. In his view, "bad divisions" drawn along societal lines hide the preparation for war. In 2024, he makes the opposition between peace and war the only political divide that has real content. He sees Bardella's rallying to NATO as proof that the far right is joining the camp of war2. In 2026, he judges the war at our doorstep more urgent than any other threat. He then links antifascism to activism for peace, against Russophobia and Sinophobia3.
- 1#10.6 War and peace: “The death drives advance in silence…” (Freud)8 Dec 2021
- 2For a “fresh and joyful” apocalypse?24 Jun 2024
- 3The return of fascism4 Feb 2026
Introduction produced automatically from the 3 sessions on this theme, to be reviewed; the numbers link to the sessions.
The 3 videos
Cycle 14The return of fascism
4 Feb 2026What is rightly called fascism, and how can we recognize its return today?
Cycle 12For a “fresh and joyful” apocalypse?
24 Jun 2024What is this far right whose rise surprises everyone, and what political divide must be set against it in the face of the danger of war?
Cycle 10#10.6 War and peace: “The death drives advance in silence…” (Freud)
8 Dec 2021Why is the danger of war, from the Sahel to the Russian-Ukrainian border, wrapped in silence, and what does this silence reveal, in the sense that "the death drives progress in silence"?