Las juntas de resolución de disputas en la Ley de Contrataciones del Estado y su Reglamento

The Judeo-Christian conception of the subject is theocentric and loosely corresponds to conceptions of the subject in Medieval Latin Christian Europe (Ibid., 268). Generally speaking, the Judeo-Christian subject presupposes a notion of the existence of the true Christian self (Ibid., 281). The true Christian self can be understood as being “gifted with spirit” and thus blessed by the grace of God. At the same time, not all persons were attributed this position of the true Christian self. Instead, outside of this order of existence, there is a space of Otherness for those who have succumbed to the “ills of fallen flesh,” those who exist outside of the grace of God, and those who are sinful by nature. Specifically, this refers to heretics and “enemies of Christ,”

or pagan-idolaters (Ibid., 266). Of course, within this general order of existence, there is a plan of salvation to cure the ills of those who were enslaved by original sin, insofar as original sin threatened all the subjects of the order (Ibid., 278-279). Interestingly, in this sense, there were degrees of spiritual perfection and imperfection, resulting in a hierarchy of humanness (Ibid., 287).

The general order of existence in Medieval Christian Europe is mapped onto the dichotomy between “Spirit” and “Flesh.” In addition to its production of a dominant conception of the subject operating at the time, the Judeo-Christian order of existence was also projected onto the cosmos. As Wynter states, “This Spirit/Flesh code had then been projected onto the physical cosmos, precisely onto the represented nonhomogeneity of substance between the spiritual perfection of the heavens […] as opposed to the sublunary realm of earth, which […]

had to be at the center of the universe as its dregs” (Ibid., 278). In other words, there was a difference in substance between the heavens (spirit) and the earth (flesh). In addition, the earth was the center of the universe insofar as it lacked the capacity for motion (and motion was a

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divine attribute). This general order of existence has implications not only for the subject that it constituted (or that was attempted to be created, in its most perfect form), but this order also structured the conception of the universe. This order was all encompassing.

In addition, the mapping of the geography of the earth can also be understood in terms of the existing order of Spirit/Flesh. During this period, the Judeo-Christian conception of the world was divided up between realms that were habitable and were in the grace of God (centering on Jerusalem) and regions that were considered uninhabitable because they existed outside the grace of God. Thus, “before the fifteenth-century voyages of the Portuguese and Columbus […] the Torrid Zone beyond the bulge of Cape Bojador on the upper coast of Africa […] had to be known as too hot for habitation, while the Western hemisphere had had to be known as being devoid of land” (Ibid., 279). The Torrid Zone comprised those areas of the world that existed outside of the grace of God and that were therefore uninhabitable.

The theocentric conception of what it meant to be human was produced through the master code of Spirit/Flesh, and further reified through the nonhomogeneity of the heavens and the earth as well as the geography of the earth. However, this descriptive statement of what it meant to be human was unsustainable for a few reasons. First, the fifteenth century voyages

“proved that the earth was homogenously habitable by humans, seeing that the Torrid Zone was indeed inhabited, [and that …] the land of the Western hemisphere […] turned out to be above water (Ibid., 280). In other words, the geography of the theocentric framework described above was proven to be false. Together with Copernicus’s new astronomy, that proposed that the earth moves around the sun, the nonhomogeneity of the heavens and the earth, as well as the previous conception of how the earth was mapped, could no longer be sustained.

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As a result, “an epochal rupture” was set in motion (Ibid., 281). The theocentric conception of the subject as the true Christian self was no longer feasible because the master code upon which it was structured (Spirit/Flesh as evident through the geography of the earth and manifest in the study of the cosmos) had been swept away in favor of a new science and a new mapping of the earth.

It is important to note here that there continue to be some similarities between Badiou and Wynter, given the description of Wynter’s project provided above. First, for both figures a state or world is organized according to particular principles, i.e. what Badiou calls the

“transcendental index” and which Wynter has described as the theocentric framework ordered by the master code of Spirit/Flesh. Second, both figures regard the Copernican Revolution as an event, albeit in different ways. Recall from Chapter Two that an event is a rupture with the current transcendental order through which a new transcendental order takes place. Within this framework, the Copernican Revolution attests to an evental rupture that radically changed the manner in which the universe was ordered. Again, this has serious implications for the sciences, and as a result a new (physical) science emerges. In addition, for both Badiou and Wynter, it follows that the principles that order any particular world are contingent.

There are also notable differences between Wynter and Badiou at this juncture. While it is the case for Wynter that with the Copernican Revolution, and the discovery of inhabited land in the Torrid Zone, result in an epochal rupture and the creation of a new set of ordering principles, it is not the case that the epochal rupture is a totalizing break between the two. While these two ordering principles are different in kind, and the former did not cause the latter, there remains some continuity between them. Recalling the discussion of Badiou’s conception of event in Chapter Two, we know that for him there can be no continuity between the transcendental

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order prior to the event and the transcendental order that follows from the event. For Badiou, a total break is imperative in order to constitute a new political structure. In other words, in order to avoid an adaptation or adjustment of a previous transcendental order, a total break is required.

For Wynter, as I demonstrate below, elements of the Spirit/Flesh master code will reappear in different worldviews, despite the logic of the worldview (including sciences, geography, and subject-formation) being distinct. Finally, for Wynter, a new subject emanates from the rupture of the dominant ordering principles of Spirit/Flesh; it is the rational political subject of the state.