Agamben’s negativity-based theory is anachronistic for achievement society.

Evidence

Agamben’s theory of homo sacer holds to the scheme of negativity. Accordingly, perpetrators and victims, sovereign and homo sacer, are clearly distinguished—and topologically, too. Sovereignty and the bare life of homo sacer, Agamben writes, stand “at the two extreme limits of the [same] order.” Agamben’s state of exception is a state of negativity. In contrast, the homines sacri of achievement society inhabit a totalized state of normality; this is a state of positivity. Agamben utterly fails to notice the topological change of power that lies at the basis of the society of sovereignty’s transformation into achievement society. From a standpoint at the middle of the society of achievement, Agamben describes the society of sovereignty. Therein lies the anachronism of his thinking. — Byung-Chul Han, The Burnout Society, 130

Categorization

• XREF: Directly parallels Han’s critique of Foucault: both Foucault and Agamben still think in terms of negativity, exclusion, and prohibition, missing the positivity of achievement society.
• QUESTION: The ‘topological change of power’ claim — power no longer sits at the limit (sovereign) but is diffused into the subject — is worth testing against contemporary surveillance/algorithmic control.

Related

• The dominant social regime has shifted from discipline to achievement, rendering Foucault obsolete. (similarity 0.79)