Deleuze and Guattari view the world as being an open system, with a tendency towards self-organization (Holland, 2013). The single field of interaction (as proposed by the idea of the continuous) is called the plane of consistency, which is where all the virtual potential (in the past) exists, and is actualized in the present. Self-organization on this plane is brought about by abstract machines, which appropriate matter-energy flow from the world, and the desiring-machines or concrete assemblages which effectuate
these abstract machines (Bonta & Protevi, 2004). The abstract machine lays out the conditions, the set of relations within which concrete assemblages appear and are arranged. The concrete assemblage, in turn, is “the productive intersection of a form of
content (actions, bodies and things) and a form of expression (affects, words and ideas)”
(Buchanan, 2015, p. 390). Together, the abstract machine and desiring-machine work to form strata, systems which are actualized systems (made real in the present) with homogenized components operating at near stability, giving the illusion of whole and stable structures. Deleuze and Guattari identify three major sectors on the plane of consistency, or mega-strata: “the inorganic, the organic, and the alloplastic” (Holland, 2013, l. 437). These three sectors approximately correspond to the abiotic, the biotic and the cultural respectively. The inorganic stratum refers to the non-living chemical and physical components, the organic stratum refers to living beings and the biological processes that govern them, while the alloplastic stratum refers to the created or built environment, referring to the capacity of mostly humans and some other animals to actively shape their environments (comprising organic and inorganic factors). Within these strata, we see the self-organizing effect of assemblages that first deterritorialize and decode existing structures and then reterritorialize and recode giving rise to coherent structures we are familiar with, like sedimentary rocks, trees and languages, but which are no more than statistical aggregates for the moment which will be broken down eventually. While these three mega-strata are subject to a principle of parity, they are different because they each have different capacities to self-organize. In the inorganic stratum, self-organization is predictable and replicable (i.e. same conditions lead to same outcomes) and occurs over larger periods of time. Tectonic plates drift, slowly applying pressure in places, renting and rupturing in others. Diamonds and fossil fuels form, materials with the same content but different forms of expression (Holland, 2013). In the organic stratum, self-organization is less predictable, with biological reproduction guided by DNA sequences adding a layer of complexity that makes changes harder to predict. The abstract machine of the need to survive in different environments (called milieus) gives rise to countless variations of possibilities through the self-organizing processes of random and/or induced mutation and ecological selection which operate at the genotype and phenotype level. We see a fundamental difference from the inorganic stratum, insofar content and expression are independent
of each other. It is in the alloplastic stratum, however, that the need to distinguish between content and expression becomes most apparent. Self-organization on this stratum involves the use of tools and symbols (primarily language) that shape expression. The question of survival is addressed through the formation of markets, through defining sovereignty, through delineating territory, or by responding to the environment (milieu). These solutions may be “false (illusory, or ‘ideological’), but they are nonetheless effective in organizing production and exchange relations to address the Problem of survival in a distinctively human way” (Holland, 2013, l. 536). This “distinctively human way” is what is commonly referred to as governance, a topic that will be addressed at length in following sections. This governance extends to agents both human and non-human (from the inorganic and organic strata) although it cannot govern these agents fully; it can only give rise to and control only certain aspects, what Thomas Nail refers to as personae (Nail, 2017). Working together, tools and language enable humans to not only self-organize on the alloplastic stratum but to also reach out to the inorganic and organic strata and re-organize them (Holland, 2013). One of the forms of expression, language, allows us to overcode the other strata, the application of a new code on top of something already existing. It allows for incorporeal
transformations, where a change in a machinic assemblage is wrought without changing
the bodies (form of content) involved. Examples include court sentencings (guilty verdicts), marriage vows and demonetization (Adkins, 2015; Bonta & Protevi, 2004), or something as simple as labelling a plant a weed and thus rendering it a nuisance. These transformations are in a relation with corporeal transformations, resulting in a change in the machinic assemblage under certain circumstances (Adkins, 2015). This ability gives rise to three illusions: The illusion of hierarchy within the three strata, the illusion of the necessity (as opposed to the possibility) of language to mediate knowledge, and the illusion of an anthropocentric world, where human superiority is assumed through the ability to perceive the world scientifically (Adkins, 2015). Together, these illusions end up dampening the feedback loop between Humans (alloplastic) and Nature (organic and inorganic), prioritizing ideas and expression over the very real and tangible material content. This mistake may have the effect of setting the assemblage on a path of change to an unintended new assemblage, aided either by the refusal to consider corporeal ramifications (labelling them externalities or unintended consequences) or a
profound lack of imagination as everything is made to fit in a particular ideological framework. The two aspects of content and expression are held together by the assemblage in a dialectical relationship, and the two planes must be adequate to each other. If they are not adequate to each other, they start to drift apart, making the job of keeping the assemblage together more difficult. When the efforts to keep the two aspects yoked together, the forces of deterritorialization and decoding are set in motion, leading to a change in the nature of the assemblage. The trigger for this change is known as an assemblage converter, a move that triggers a bifurcation. This change sets the various heterogeneous components of the assemblage onto their lines of flight, whether to a previous state or to a new, unknown goal that fundamentally transforms the assemblage. Lines of flight are “those parts of the assemblage that escape the structure of which they are part and serve to connect such an assemblage to that which is outside itself” (Thornton, 2018, p. 12). The fact that the goal is unknown means that no one knows before experimentation whether the outcome will be “good or bad, fascist or liberating” (Adkins, 2015, p. 33). Deleuze and Guattari do not claim however, that the line of flight will necessarily lead to a better outcome. Creating something new is risky, and requires leaving behind the security afforded by conventional thought.
2.3.2.1 Four Ways of Arranging Through Assemblages
Returning to the Problem of Survival as addressed through governance described in the previous sentences, Thomas Nail identifies “four major types or ways of arrangement” in which assemblages are laid out: territorial, state, capitalist and nomadic (Nail, 2017, p. 28). The first type, Territorial assemblages are “arranged in such a way that the concrete elements are coded according to a natural and proper usage” (Nail, 2017, p. 28). The idea of what constitutes proper or natural is arbitrarily decided within the assemblage (expression) and acts as an artificial limitation on the concrete elements (content). These arbitrary delineations are necessary to make sense of the world, but at the same time differ according to context, just as cultural norms differ from country to country. Indeed, territorial assemblages are limited by cultural memory and privilege things that already exist: “this is how things are done, how they have always been done” (Nail, 2017, p. 29). Change is gradual, as each boundary is tested and limits are crossed to make place for the constant overflow of surpluses, the things that do not fit. The
second type, state assemblages employ a hierarchical mode of organizing power, operating on the logics of centralization of power and resources, and homogenization by forcing conformity to the provided codes (prescribed ways of being). The freedom to express other personae and to thus assemble and participate in other assemblages is curtailed as the state imposes a monopoly on the ability to overcode (Hennings, 2018). The third type, capitalist assemblages, work through the processes of privatization and marketization. Rather than working to code or to overcode, it works through the medium of money to replace codes of the terrestrial and state assemblages with “a strictly economic general equivalence between purely unqualified (decoded) elements” (Nail, 2017, p. 32). This gives the capitalist assemblage potential positive attributes like “freedom, ingenuity, permanent revolution”(Holland, 2002, p. 17) which help overcome the feudal and despotic nature of the territorial and state assemblages. However, capitalism occurring through the axiom of privatization allows for the removal of qualitative relations (codes) to render everything globally exchangeable as products on the market. Deleuze and Guattari rely on Marx’s general formula of capital, M-C-M’ to identify the unique role of money in producing more money. This understanding helps illustrate the main drive of capitalist assemblages as the “need to maintain the rate of profit” (Buchanan, 2008, p. 110) . This characteristic makes capitalist assemblages ultimately conservative in outlook, only embracing innovation and change when it is profitable to do so (Buchanan, 2008). In the fourth type, the nomadic assemblage, “the assemblages are arranged in such a way that the conditions, elements and agencies of the assemblage are able to change and enter into new combinations without arbitrary limit or so-called “natural” or “ hierarchical” uses and meanings” (Nail, 2017, p. 32). Instead of applying one-size-fits-all solutions to Procrustean problems, solutions and problems in nomadic assemblages are “transformed directly by those who effectuate them and who are affected by them” (Nail, 2017, p. 33). In other words, this mode of assemblage relies on participation and self-governance to create fitting responses to the specific problems faced (Briassoulis, 2017a). The problem, however, is clear: “It requires too much care, too much attention, too much time, too much diplomacy” (Latour, 2018, p. 91). The success of this arrangement hinges on the ability to make possible alliances and negotiations that are unthinkable under territorial, state and capitalist assemblages (Hennings, 2018; Latour, 2018; Tsing, 2015). It challenges us to imagine other personae
for the bodies that may already be antagonistic because of the current ways in which they are coded or overcoded. It challenges us all to acknowledge the uses of minor or nomad science that seeks to open up new possibilities and thus show new lines of flight. Nomad science outlines a problem-solving approach that makes the best use of available resources: a good example is jugaad innovation, a colloquial Hindi word that can be translated as “the art of overcoming harsh constraints by improvising effective solutions using limited resources” (Prabhu & Jain, 2015, p. 847). Nomad science requires us to start reimagining farmers not just as food producers but also as nomad scientists, capable of experimentation and coming up with locally suitable solutions (Doerksen, 2018). An important caveat to keep in mind is that none of these four types can be found in a pure state; any real situation will contain a mixture of the four types to different degrees (Nail, 2017). An important implication of this understanding is that all assemblages are inherently political, as they have a distinct mode of organization deriving from the four different types of assembling.