Education as a pharmakon : Action art as political pedagogic device for enacting radical democracy

Abstract

By considering the position of education as a pharmakon, highlighting its potential positive and negative effects on societies by its technical unfolding, the article proposes to explore the political and pedagogical role that public and collective performances can have within the public sphere as political devices for promoting and enacting radical democracy. To this end, it analyzes a contemporary collaborative artistic practice, the performance ‘Un Violador en Tu Camino’ (‘A rapist in your path’) by the feminist collective LASTESIS from Chile, through two main philosophical perspectives: Bernard Stiegler (1952 – 2020), and his approach to technology, to art, and education in human societies; and Oliver Marchart, coming from his conceptualization of art and activism through the notion of conflictual aesthetics.