Following his piece in the latest issue of the LRB, William Davies talks to Thomas Jones about the new political polarisation, and what it owes to the online culture of instant feedback. What does politics look like, Davies asks, once the provocation of reaction, positive or negative, precedes the slow work of excavation, research, reporting and administration?
They discuss the anticipation of this modern politics in the ideas of the Nazi theorist Carl Schmitt, the seductive appeal of referendums as relief from the quagmire of parliamentary liberalism, and the way that demanding people take sides in the ‘culture wars’ inhibits meaningful discussion where it’s most needed.
