Negative potency, the power to say no, is what keeps the self sovereign.

Evidence

There are two forms of potency. Positive potency is the power to do something. Negative potency, in contrast, is the power not to do—to adopt Nietzsche’s phrasing, the power to say no. However, this negative potency differs from simple impotence, the inability to act. Impotence is merely the opposite of positive potency. It is positive itself insofar as it connects with something, which it cannot do. Negative potency reaches beyond such positivity, which is tied to something else. If one only possessed the positive ability to perceive (something) and not the negative ability not to perceive (something), one’s senses would stand utterly at the mercy of rushing, intrusive stimuli and impulses. — Byung-Chul Han, The Burnout Society, 59

Categorization

• DEFINE: Cleanly defines the chapter’s key distinction between positive and negative potency (Agamben’s terms, filtered through Nietzsche) — the conceptual tool for diagnosing the achievement-subject’s helplessness before stimuli.