Markus Miessen
The Nightmare of Participation
(Crossbench Praxis as a Mode of Criticality)
Including an introduction by Eyal Weizman, a conversation with Chantal Mouffe, an interview by Hans Ulrich Obrist, and post-scripts by Bassam El Baroni, Jeremy Beaudry, and
Carson Chan
www.sternberg-press.com
www.archivebooks.org
Sternberg Press and Archive Books are pleased to announce The Nightmare of Participation (Crossbench Praxis as a Mode of Criticality) by Markus Miessen.
Welcome to Harmonistan! Over the last decade, the term “participation” has become increasingly overused. When everyone has been turned into a participant, the often uncritical, innocent, and romantic use of the term has become frightening. Supported by a repeatedly nostalgic veneer of worthiness, phony solidarity, and political correctness, participation has become the default of politicians withdrawing from responsibility. Similar to the notion of an independent politician dissociated from a specific party, this third part of Miessen’s Participation trilogy encourages the role of what he calls the “crossbench practitioner,” an “uninterested outsider” and “uncalled participator” who is not limited by existing protocols, and who enters the arena with nothing but creative intellect and the will to generate change. Miessen argues for an urgent inversion of participation, a model beyond modes of consensus. Instead of reading participation as the charitable savior of political struggle, Miessen candidly reflects on the limits and traps of its real motivations.
“One might quickly sense a potential whiff of Ayn Rand or crypto-fascism here, but as a means of escape, and with the goal of creating critical and productive change, Miessen instead advocates vigorous cross-disciplinary intrusions—a universe of butting in where one isn’t necessarily invited—to willfully generate alien and unexpected new spaces and ideas. He advocates individuals to become crossbench practitioners, ‘uninvited outsiders’ who actively seek out conflict, despising the stillborn texture of today’s culture, a world whose default design mode is one of reflexive consensus.
What could have been a career-trashing minefield of a thesis is instead a strikingly intelligent, profoundly well-considered Way Forward that feels both futuristic and correct. It’s not a simple read, but this book has earned every nuance of its complexity.”
—Douglas Coupland
Markus Miessen (*1978) is an architect, consultant, and writer based in Berlin. He runs the collaborative agency for spatial practice Studio Miessen, is co-founder of the architectural practice nOffice, and has previously taught at the Architectural Association, Columbia, and MIT. He is currently a Harvard Fellow and Visiting Professor at the Hochschule für Gestaltung in Karlsruhe, Germany.
The publication will be launched in Kuwait, Amsterdam, Geneva, New York, Los Angeles, Bucharest, Lisbon, Oslo, London, Frankfurt, Krakow, Turin, Berlin, and Beijing. For further information about the launches, or for press inquiries and orders, please contact mail [at] sternberg-press.com.
Markus Miessen
The Nightmare of Participation
(Crossbench Praxis as a Mode of Criticality)
English edition published by Sternberg Press, Berlin
October 2010, 304 pages, hardcover
ISBN 978-1-934105-07-8
Markus Miessen
L’incubo della partecipazione
(La pratica del “gruppo misto” come modalità critica)
Italian edition published by Archive Books, Torino
Translation by Vincenzo Latronico
