Do squatters, pirates, and protesters improve the law? Professor Sonia Katyal, of Fordham Law School, says that they do in her new book, Property Outlaws (Yale University Press, 2010). She and coauthor Eduardo Peñalver, a professor at Cornell Law, contend in the case of both tangible and intellectual property law, particularly copyright law, some forms of disobedience can often lead to an improvement in legal regulation. An important conclusion of the book is that a dynamic between the activities of “property outlaws” and legal innovation should be cultivated in order to maintain this avenue of legal reform.
In this book Julia Kristeva extends the definition of revolt beyond politicsper se . Kristeva sees revolt as a state of permanent questioning and transformation, of change that characterizes psychic life and, in the best cases, art. For her, revolt is not simply about rejection and destruction - it is a necessary process of renewal and regeneration.
This third volume of essays in tactical media (following The Electronic Disturbance and Electronic Civil Disobedience) traces the developing topographies of digital intervention. Indicating that no cultural bunker is ever fully secure, the CAE show the possibilities of trespass, unleashing semiotic shocks that collectively could negate the rising intensity of authoritarian culture. Topics include contestational robotics, the financial advantages of anti-copyright, recombinant theater-as-resistance, and the possible roles of children as tactical media participants. Chapters in this new volume include "Electronic Civil Disobedience and the Public Sphere," "The Mythology of Terrorism on the Net," "The Promissory Rhetoric of Biotechnology," "Observations on Collective Cultural Action," "Recombinant Theater and Digital Resistance," "Contestational Robotics," "Children as Tactical Media Participants," and "The Financial Advantages of Anti-Copyright."
