Lyotard libidinal economy, an inaccessible "principle" of excess and disorder; not a second machinery, but a machine whose velocity can be displaced towards positive infinity, bringing it to a halt. It is this plasticity or viscosity that traces everywhere and nowhere the difference between political economy and libidinal economy, and owing to which in particular, a great savage configuration (a great apparatus)-for example-can be disinvested, pipes and fIlters can fall into obsolescence and the libido can b e distributed differently in another configuration: it is thus in this viscosity that all revolutionary potential lies.
translated by James Leigh
NOlES 1. In Lyotard's words: \'Desarroi de la "gauche", non gauchiste 1) et gauchiste 2) ", i.e. 1) Traditional leftist organisations such as the communist and socialist parties. 2) Organisations more "radical" and "unconventional" in their ideologies and methods than the communist party, which include Leninists, Trotskyites, Maoists, some of the anarchist trends, etc.. [Translator's note) .
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