Fissiparous

Fissiparous (pronounced fi-sip-er-uhs)

(1) In biology, reproducing or propagating by fission; propagated by spontaneous fission or self-division (that form of asexual generation in which the parent divides; each part becoming a new individual).

(2) Having a tendency to divide into groups or factions; factious, tending to break into pieces

1825-1835: An adaptation of the New Latin fissiparus, the construct being fissi, from fissus (split, cleft) + parous, from pariō (I bring forth) by mistaken analogy with vīviparus.  Vīviparus was a 1640s adoption from the Late Latin viviparus (bringing forth alive), the construct being vivus (alive, living), from the primitive Indo-European root gwei- (to live) + parire (bring forth, bear) from the primitive Indo-European root pere- (to produce, bring forth).  Outside of physics and biology, fissiparous is rare, the preferred synonyms in general use being  divisive, fractious, fragmenting & unstable; when used it’s often as the collocation "fissiparous tendencies".  Fissiparous & fissipalmate are adjectives, fissiparousness, fissiparity & fissiparism are nouns and fissiparously is an adverb; the most common noun plural is fissiparism.

Outside of the technical use (mostly in physics and biology), fissiparous is used in political science or the study or organizational behavior when discussing the institutions which either inherently posses or are prone to developing factions.  While it’s true that not very helpful in that any institution with more than one member could presumably be vulnerable, the view is that the institutions most at risk are those where ideological differences exist either in objective or the means by which it may be achieved.  However, even if no disputes of this kind may exist, of achieving fissiparousness may manifest simply because of a pursuit for organizational power or authority.  The risk to therefore thought to be greatest in the institutions which (1) exist to pursue some ideological purpose, the parameters of which are variable and (2) the rewards of power are greatest.  That’s why fissiparousness is often displayed in political parties and religions.

Fissiparousness is much associated with the modern Church of England, factions of which some time ago mostly abandoned any interest in God or the message of Christ for the more important matters of championing or decrying gay clergy, getting women into or keeping them out of the priesthood, and talking to or ignoring Rome.  Among those resistant to anything beyond the medieval, there's even an institutional forum, the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) which holds meetings at which there is much intrigue and plotting; it's sort of an anti-Lambeth Conference though the cucumber sandwiches are said to be much the same.  Under the stresses inherent in the late twentieth-century, fissiparousness saw the Anglicans coalesce into three factions, the low & lazy, the broad & hazy and the high & crazy.

The Low & Lazy

Like the high churchers, the low lot still believe in God but, their time not absorbed plotting and scheming or running campaigns to stamp out gay clergy and opposing the ordination of women, they actually have time to pray, which they do, often.  The evangelical types come from among the low and don’t approve of fancy rituals, Romish ways or anything smelling of popery.  Instead, they like services where there’s clapping, dancing and what sounds like country & western music with sermons telling them it’s Godly to buy things like big TVs and surf-skis.

The Broad & Hazy

The broad church is more a club than a church, something like the Tory Party at prayer.  The parishioners will choose the church they (occasionally) attend on the same basis as their golf club, driving miles if need be to find a congregation acceptably free of racial and cultural diversity.  They’re interested not at all in theology or anything too abstract so sermons need to be brief and sufficiently vague to please the bourgeoisie.  The broad church stands for most things in general and nothing in particular; finding most disputes in Anglicanism baffling, they just can't see what all the fuss is about.

The High & Crazy

The high church has clergy who love dressing up like the Spice Girls, burning incense and chanting the medieval liturgy in Latin.  They disapprove of about everything that’s happened since the 1662 edition of the Book of Common Prayer and believe there’d be less sin were there still burnings at the stake.  Most high church clergy wish Pius IX (1792–1878; pope 1846-1878) still sat on the throne of Saint Peter and some act as though he does.

Of human nature

Cady's Map by Janis Ian.

The human race does seem inherently fissiparousness and wherever cultures have formed, history suggests divisions will form and folk will tend to coalesce (or be allocated or otherwise forced) into factions.  Usually, this is attributed to some defined or discernible difference (ethnicity, skin color, language, tribal affiliation, religion et al) but even among homogeneous groups, it's rare to identify one without sub-groups.  It does seem human nature and has long since become institutionalized and labelling theory practitioners can probably now build minor academic careers just by tracking the segregation as it evolves (boomers, gen-X, millennials etc).  The faction names of the cliques at North Shore High School (Mean Girls, Paramount Pictures 2004)) were Actual Human Beings, Anti-Plastics, The Art Freaks, Asexual Band Geeks, Asian Nerds, Burnouts, Cheerleaders, Cool Asians, Desperate Wannabes, Freshmen, Girls Who Eat Their Feelings, J.V. Cheerleaders, J.V. Jocks, Junior Plastics, Preps, ROTC Guys, Sexually Active Band Geeks, The Plastics, Unfriendly Black Hotties, Unnamed Girls Who Don't Eat Anything, and Varsity Jocks.  Given the way sensitivities have evolved, it’s predictable some of those names wouldn’t today be used; the factions' membership rosters would be much the same but some terms are now proscribed in this context, the threshold test for racism now its mere mention, racialism banished to places like epidemiological research papers tracking the distribution of morbidity. 

Situationism

Situationism (pronounced sich-oo-ey-shuh-niz-uhm)

(1) A fork of Marxist political philosophy, a collection of (often abstract) theories used to build critiques of existing structures.  The overt political project emerged from a mid-twentieth century avant-garde art movement.  

(2) A theory in psychology which holds that personality and behavior is influenced more by external, situational factors than internal traits or motivations.

1955: A compound word: situation + ism.  Situation was from the early fifteenth century Middle English situacioun & situacion (place, position, or location), from Middle French situation, from the Old French situacion, from the Medieval Latin situationem (nominative situatio) (position, situation), the construct being situare (to locate, to place), from situs (a site, a position), thus situate +‎ -ion.  The Latin situs was from the primitive Indo-European root tkei (to settle, dwell, be home).  The meaning "state of affairs" was from 1710, extended specifically by 1803 to mean "a post of employment".  The suffix -ion was from the Middle English -ioun, from the the Old French -ion, from the Latin -iō (genitive -iōnis).  It was appended to a perfect passive participle to form a noun of action or process, or the result of an action or process.  The –ism suffix was from the Ancient Greek ισμός (ismós) & -isma noun suffixes, often directly, sometimes through the Latin –ismus & isma (from where English picked up ize) and sometimes through the French –isme or the German –ismus, all ultimately from the Ancient Greek (where it tended more specifically to express a finished act or thing done).  It appeared in loanwords from Greek, where it was used to form abstract nouns of action, state, condition or doctrine from verbs and on this model, was used as a productive suffix in the formation of nouns denoting action or practice, state or condition, principles, doctrines, a usage or characteristic, devotion or adherence (criticism; barbarism; Darwinism; despotism; plagiarism; realism; witticism etc).  The use in political philosophy technically dates from 1955 (as situation ethics) although its origins can be traced to (at least) the nineteenth-century beginnings of sociology.  It was first seen in applied psychology in 1968 (as situational ethics) with publication of a monograph by Walter Mischel (1930-2018) who in later writings displayed some ambivalence.

The Situationist International

SI art: Ralph Rumney (1934-2002), The Change (1957).

Formed in 1957, dissolved in 1972 and eventually more a concept than a movement, the Situationist International (SI) was a trans-European, unstructured collective of artists and political thinkers.  Influenced by the criticism that philosophy had tended increasingly to fail at the moment of its actualization, the SI, although it assumed the inevitability of social revolution, always maintained many (cross-cutting) strands of expectations of the form(s) this might take.  Indeed, just as a world-revolution did not follow the Russian revolutions of 1917, the events of May, 1968 failed to realize the predicted implications; the SI can be said then to have died.  The SI’s discursive output between 1968 and 1972 may be treated either as a lifeless aftermath to an anti-climax or a bunch of bitter intellectuals serving as mourners at their own protracted funeral.

SI art: Constant Niewwenhuys (1920-2005), No Title (1975).

It's wrong to say that when formed the SI had mostly an artistic focus although there was a faction within which certainly preferred the emphasis; indeed, it was the notion of art abstracted from some purpose which was the SI's constant fault-line.  Those most influential in the early days of the SI had been much affected by the physical damage suffered by so many European cities during World War II (1939-1945) and especially the possibilities offered by re-building, thus the interest in concepts like unitary urbanism and psychogeography, essentially a response to the sociological aspects of the re-construction of those cities in the immediate post-war period.  Their work also attracted political theorists, especially those in anti-authoritarian Marxist circles who would come to position themselves as the inheritors of western political liberalism, such as the Lettrist International formed in 1952.  The SI was conceived originally as an even more radical movement which would entirely renounce any connection with high-art and deal instead with the functional business of psychogeography, dissolving rather than exploring the boundaries between life and art.  However, whatever might have been the purity of the founders' intent, the implications of the SI were inherently visual and attracted practitioners from many aspects of art.  Factions formed and any commonality of interest between the utilitarians and the artists proved insufficiently strong to maintain the SI as a unified movement and from formation to extinction, it was always fissiparous.

SI art: Asger Jorn (1914-1973), Letter to my son (1956-1957).

What ultimately coalesced as the core of situationist theory was the concept of the spectacle, an explanation of the mechanism of advanced capitalism’s modern tendency towards expression and mediation of social relations through objects.  It was beyond merely a critique of materialism and used the increasingly layered and complex language of mid-twentieth century Marxist discourse.  The definitive works of the SI were The Society of the Spectacle (1967) by Guy Debord (1931-1994) and The Revolution of Everyday Life (1968) by Raoul Vaneigem (b 1934).  In the riots of 1968, they proved influential, less as entire texts than as sources for phrases, slogans and quotes, widely used on the posters and graffiti which appeared all over French cities during the uprising.  The SI thus proved the primacy of objects in social relations, whether hegemonic or not although the SI generally held that situationism is a meaningless term, a position necessitated by their inherent rejection of ideologies, all of which they dismissed either as useless utopian myths or constructed superstructures existing only to create the social controls required to serve the economic interests of a ruling class.  Much of the history of the SI was one faction rejecting another; indeed, the SI’s transition from artistic to political movement was less organic than disruptive. 

The SI, at least in the more reductionist works, did create some genuinely interesting critiques of the post-war west and some of the early art was, if not exactly new, certainly stark and compelling.  However, it remains hard to identify enough ideas to justify the volume of text produced and phrasing it in what is surely deliberately difficult language does suggest there was an attempt to conceal the poverty and repetition of thought.

SI Propaganda