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Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 317
Abstract
Seeing was written by José Saramago in 2004, and
starts from the assumption that the population can
start a silent backlash by casting blank votes in
local elections, thus disrupting the normality of the
democratic system. Between culpability and action,
free choice and the decline of human rights, this book
questions the authenticity of democracy as it stands
in the present Western societies. Confronted with
the dangers of a biopolitical manipulation, casting
blank votes hints the potency of a state of exception,
in which the population can exercise power based
on conscience. This essay looks into the confronting
positions of the ruling power and of the population
that is governed by that very power.
Keywords: Lucidity. Saramago. Democracy. State
of exception. Elections. Blank votes.
The threshold of democracy in José
Saramago’s Seeing1
Recebido em: 14/02/2018
Aceito em: 0/03/2018
Lígia Bernardinoa
a Agrupamento de Escolas Ferreira de Castro, Portugal; E-mail: ligia.bernardino@gmail.com.
http://dx.doi.org/10.22409/gragoata.2018n45a1099
1 Although I use the
title Seeing, which is
the translation of the
original Portuguese
title Ensaio sobre a
Lucidez, all references
and quotations concern
the Portuguese edition.
Footnote s include all the
quotations I translated
from the source
languages of all the
books us ed in this es say.
Lígia Bernardino
Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 318
Wouldn’t you agree that an important act such as voting should
deserve from every responsible voter a serious, solemn, introspec-
tive countenance, or is it that democracy makes you laugh, Maybe
it makes me cry
Saramago, Ensaio sobre a Lucidez, 2004, p. 49
The wise and the blind
Blank ballots as a metaphor for the state of exception; in
other words, blank ballots as the starting point for a parable
about the present condition of the Western democracies, in
which there is always the possibility of declaring a state of
exception, whenever some sort of danger seems to lie ahead.
Seeing (thus entitled in English, although the literal translation
would be Essay on Lucidity) is a José Saramago novel rst
published in 2004 that depicts a strange event in local elections,
when the voters of the capital city of an unnamed country
massively refuse to cast their votes in any of the eligible
political parties. Hate of democracy, as Jacques Rancière (2006)
has put it, indifference, or merely negation? Perhaps the answer
lies in the supposition that there can actually be hope in the
people’s decisions, in spite of the lack of interest elections may
raise. The fact of the matter, however, is that democracy as
portrayed in Seeing is in crisis.
Slavoj Žižek reads this book as a violent statement to
urge a change in the political status quo. According to this
philosopher, “[t]he voters’s abstention goes further than the
intra-political negation, the vote of no condence: it rejects the
very frame of decision” (ŽIŽEK, 2009, p. 182). This statement is
conrmed in the repetition of the polls: at rst, more than 70
per cent of the ballots were blank; the following week, when
the polls were repeated, it got even worse, as the number
escalated up to 83 per cent, in spite of the huge turnout. The
obvious conclusion regarding such impressive numbers is that
there is a strong mistrust about the present politicians, to the
point of questioning the whole frame of political decision, as
Žižek (2009) has pointed out. However, the people’s choice in
these elections hint the possibility of a reversal in authority: it
is the people that create a state of exception, not the authorities,
who feel rather at a loss when confronted with this reality.
The threshold of democracy in José Saramago’s Seeing
Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 319
Thus, Saramago’s parable ventures the possibility of letting
the people actually choose a different political pathway.
Seeing exposes the fragility of a political system in which
those in power and those who should benet from the decisions
of authority paradoxically cohabit in separate worlds. This
double bind reality creates a zone of undecidability that is the
core of Seeing’s plot. Those in power try to reestablish order as
they know it and rely on, whereas the voters stand for their
beliefs of change, by denying any sort of condence in those
that rule them. The result of the people’s choice, therefore,
enables the hypothesis of establishing a new rule, a new norm,
however utopian it may be.
It is inferred on thesis VIII of Walter Benjamin’s On the
Concept of History that a new form of society can be achieved,
one that diverges from the Marxist dictatorship of the
proletariat as to present a state of exception that will dethrone
fascism and put an end to the history of the oppressed:
The tradition of the oppressed teaches us that the “state of
exception” in which we live is the rule. We have to come
to terms to a concept of history that matches this idea.
Only then will it be possible to set as our task the need to
accomplish the true state of exception; then, our position in
the struggle against fascism will be improved. The chance
it has had to make a stand relies mostly on the fact that
its opponents see it as a historical norm, in the name of
progress.1 (BENJAMIN, 2010, p. 13)
The fact that this fragment was probably written
before or at the beginning of the Second World War (it was
published posthumously in 1944) is of no small importance,
as it hints the possibility of overcoming fascism through the
implementation of a state of exception. Seeing does not portray a
fascist regime, not at least at the time of the election. However,
the consequences of the event, including the implementation
of governmental terrorist measures, suggest that democracy
was just a simulacrum of a veiled frame of dictatorship that
culminated in the blank ballots.
What Benjamin (2010) suggests is that a non-conformist
alternative is possible within a state of exception frame. Only
then redemption will be accomplished. This sort of messianic
message is not distant from Seeing. The fact that the population
of the unnamed capital does not react violently to the siege they
1 “A tradição dos
oprimidos ensina-
nos que o «estado de
excepção» em que
vivemos é a regra.
Temos de chegar a um
conceito de história que
corresp onda a esta ideia.
Só então se perfilará
diante dos n ossos olhos,
como nossa tarefa, a
neces sidade de provocar
o verdadeiro estado
de excepção; e assim
a nossa posição na
luta contra o fascismo
melhorará. A hipótese
de ele se armar reside
em grande parte de
os seus opositores o
verem como uma no rma
histórica, em nome do
progresso”.
Lígia Bernardino
Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 320
have to face as a retaliation for their misbehaviour when casting
blank votes corroborates the idea of a peaceful understanding
within a community, i.e., within a political organization,
despite the hindrances they are or will soon be facing.
The contemporary Western civilizations have the
conviction of living in a democratic society, and elections stand
as the privileged moment to attest it. Yet, as Jacques Rancière
puts it, there is a downsize to it, when
the multitude, freed of the worry of governing, is left to
its private and egotistical passions. Either the individuals
composing it are uninterested in public matters and abstain
from elections; or they approach them uniquely from the
point of view of their interests and consumer whims.
(RANCIÈRE, 2006, p. 75)
This could explain the mass blank ballots of Seeing.
Nevertheless, the following events deny such blunt assumption,
at least in what concerns the inhabitants of the capital. Their
reactions to the government’s severe impositions contradict
both the idea of indifference towards public matters and the
fullment of personal interests. On the contrary, their attitude
is one of resistance, in spite of the threats. When the prime
minister addresses the population, telling them the extreme
measures the Government is forced to undertake so that the
population can “make amends for the perverseness to which
they were drawn, who knows by whom”
2
(SARAMAGO, 2004,
p. 38), the most impressive reactions were:
Some people also just turned off the TV when the prime-
minister ended and then, while waiting to go to bed, spent
their time talking about their daily lives, and others spent the
rest of the evening tearing and burning sheets of paper. They
were not conjurers, they were just scared.3 (SARAMAGO,
2004, p. 40)
Although this happens at the beginning of the state
of exception decreed by the Government, the attitude of
non-violence prevails: there are no riots, no aggressive
demonstrations, no massive claims on the part of the population
anywhere along the book. As such, there is a break of tradition,
as though the oppressed – who in the modern concept of
democracy, as suggested by Rancière (2006), can be understood
as those that do not belong to any sort of oligarchy – have a
growing feeling that progress cannot mean blind submission
2 “[P]ara que se
corrijam da maldade
a que se deixaram
arrastar sabe-se lá por
qu e m ”.
3 “H o uv e ta m b ém
pessoas que se
limitaram a desligar o
aparelho de televisão
quando o primeiro-
ministro terminou e
depois, enquanto não
iam para a cama, se
entretiveram a falar
das suas vidas, e outras
houve que passaram o
resto do serão a rasgar
e a queimar papéis. Não
eram conspiradores,
simplesmente tinham
medo”.
The threshold of democracy in José Saramago’s Seeing
Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 321
to the forces in power. Theirs is denitely a different sort of
state of exception, closer to the one Benjamin (2010) thought in
the above-mentioned thesis on the concept of history.
The Government, on the other hand, progressively
increases oppressive measures, and starts a veiled war against
the unknown enemy who supposedly started the people’s
nonsubmissiveness. What looked like a democratic regime
rapidly turns into a dictatorship; moreover, democracy becomes
a farce, a mere word through which the Government imposes
a state of siege in order to, as the minister of defence clearly
states, make citizens understand that they are “untrustworthy
and as such must be treated”
4
(SARAMAGO, 2004, p. 62). It
is therefore clear not only the severance between authority
and the people, but also the condescending tone that claries
the obedience citizens must observe. As Jacques Derrida
(2008, p. 72) formulates, “‘I protect you’ means, to the State, I
command you, you are my subject, I subjugate you”
5
. However,
the people portrayed in Seeing have other ideas in mind, in
spite of the fear they may feel. Their understanding of the
games of power allows them to disregard authority, without
committing a crime. In other words, they turn the Government
into a supplement to be endured in their daily lives, but not
necessarily to follow blindly.
Such an attitude, however, is not compatible with the
will of power rulers have. According to Derrida (2008, p. 345),
what sovereigns demand is “the excess, the hyperbole, it is an
insatiable excess that will overow any determinable limit”
6
.
Such hidden purposes become apparent at times of crises, such
as the one depicted in Seeing. The rst half of this novel provides
an ironical glance over the techniques of power, which several
dialogues among rulers, such as the following, well represent:
So you believe that the city will not resist much longer, So
I do, besides there is another important detail, perhaps the
most important of all, Which is, No matter how hard it has
and will continue to be tried, never will people think the
same way, It would seem otherwise this time, That would be
too perfect to be true, mister president, What if there really
is, at least you admitted it as probable, a secret organization,
a maa, a camorra, a cosa nostra, a cia or a kgb, Cia is not
secret, mister president, and kgb no longer exists, The
difference can’t be that big, let us just picture something like
that, or worse, if possible, something more Machiavellian,
4 “[N]ão são dignos de
conança e [...] como tal
têm de ser tratados”.
5 “«Je te protège»
veut dire, pour l’État,
je t’oblige, tu est mon
sujet, je t’assujettis”.
6 “[C]’e st l’e xc è s, c ’e st
l’hyperbole, c’est un
excès insatiable pour
déborder toute limite
déterminable”.
Lígia Bernardino
Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 322
made up to create this almost unanimity upon, truthfully
speaking, I don’t even know what, Blank ballots, mister
president, blank ballots7 (SARAMAGO, 2004, p. 88).
Capital letters mark each intervenient’s lines, as it is
common in Saramago’s books. In this specic long dialogue, of
which this is just a small extract, the uency of ideas expressed
by either the president or the prime minister set the background
for the reaction of the state in order to nd the culprits for the
blank ballots. Claiming there actually was a conspiracy against
authority – which was never proven – is argument enough for
a real conspiracy perpetrated by the rulers of the country. The
fact that illegal and governmental organizations are indistinctly
enumerated by the president furthermore stresses the fragility
of the democratic regime. In other words, oligarchies that are
used to keep the power for themselves, as they reach a position
within the state that makes them the only eligible candidates
in national, regional or municipal elections, neither admit
the inexistence of a conspiracy, nor are willing to think of
alternative ways of governance.
Rancière (2006, p. 73) sustains that “[t]he evils of which
our ‘democracies’ suffer are primarily evils related to the
insatiable appetite of oligarchs”. In Seeing, such an appetite
turns into a sort of blindness that reveals itself when the leaders
of the country ee from the sieged city. Then, both president
and prime minister notice that the lights of the city do not fade
away as they leave it. In fact, nobody turns them off. They will
therefore continue to light those who remain. This metaphor
calls upon the original title of the book (Essay on Lucidity),
thus underlining the wisdom of the people as a contrast to the
narrow-mindedness and dangerousness of rulers.
Biopolitical measures
Mister Kraus is one of the books of Gonçalo M. Tavares’s
series The Neighbourhood, and it is structured through a number
of short texts portraying the life of a boss, i.e., a political leader,
and his helpful and laudatory team. The council of ministers
becomes a special moment of blindness: they all seat in a dark
room, as if they were all in a theatre, and are ushered to their
seats by an attendant who is the only person to hold a small
light. Then,
7 “Crê então que
a cidade não poderá
resistir por muito
tempo, Assim é, além
disso há outro factor
importante, talvez o
mais importante
de todos, Qual, Por
muito que se tenha
tentado e continue a
tentar-se, nunca se há-
de conseguir que as
pessoas pensem todas
da mesma maneira,
Desta vez se dirá que
sim, Seria demasiado
perfeito para poder
ser verdadeiro, senhor
presidente, E se existe
realmente por aí, pelo
menos há pouco t inha-o
admit ido como hipóte se,
uma organização
secreta, uma máfia,
uma camorra, uma
cosa nostra, uma
cia ou um kgb, A cia
não é secreta, senhor
presidente, e o kgb já
não existe, A diferença
não será grande, mas
i m a g i n e m o s a l g o
assim, ou ainda pior,
se é possível, mais
maqu iavélico, i nventado
agora para criar esta
quase unanimidade à
volta de, se quer que lhe
diga, nem sei bem de
quê, Do voto em branco,
senhor presidente, do
voto em branco”.
The threshold of democracy in José Saramago’s Seeing
Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 323
As soon as the man of the ashlight left, the room was
completely without light; it became a habit for the Boss to
say, on the spot, calming down his mates with his voice:
– I’m here, I’m here!
After tracing their boss through the sound, the meeting
would begin.8 (TAVARES, 2005, p. 83)
Darkness is not just a metaphor for the blindness of those
who lead, but it also stresses the progressive distance between
the authority and the people it represents. Moreover, clear-
sightedness is not a trait of those in power, but of those who
are commanded by them. Like the people of the city who still
keep their lights turned on in Seeing, also in this small book
by Gonçalo M. Tavares it is the usher who has the power of
seeing. Besides the sarcasm, both books stress the distorted
perception of the real that corrodes the exercise of power. As
a consequence, authority and the common people experience
a distance that puts democracy at risk, precisely because of
the cleavage between the people and the governments, which
rely on the help of assistants and high technicians to make
their decisions.
The place of politics in such a model of democracy
becomes frail and, above all, depending on the will of those
who hold the highest positions within the state hierarchy. That
is why, in the name of common good, the forces of power in
Seeing decide to protect the population by declaring the state
of siege and, little by little, remove some of the basic rights of
citizenship in order to make people realise their mistake and
confess the mischievous act committed when casting blank
ballots. Cynicism blends with oppressive measures to attain
full control of the population, thus reassuring the maintenance
of power:
Actually, it seemed as though most inhabitants of the capital
had made the decision to change their lives, their tastes,
their style. Their biggest blunder, as it will become clearer
and clearer from now on, was that they cast blank ballots.
They wanted to clean things up, they would certainly get it.
That was the rm disposition of the Government and, more
particularly, of the minister of the interior. The choice of
agents, some coming from the intelligence services, others
from public corporations, that would be surreptitiously
planted among the masses, had been swift and effective.9
(SARAMAGO, 2004, p. 47)
8 “Mal o homem da
lanterna saía, a sala
ficava absolutamente
sem luz; e tra nsformara-
se por isso num acto
normal o Chefe dizer,
de imediato, aca lmando
com a voz os seus
companheiros:
– Estou aqui, estou aqui!
Depois de, pelo som,
localizarem o Chefe, a
reunião começava”.
9 “Realmente, parecia
que a maior parte dos
habitantes da capital
estavam decididos
a mudar de vida, de
gostos, de estilo. O
grande equívoco
deles, como a partir
de agora se começará
a ver melhor, foi terem
votado em branco. Já
que tinham querido
limpeza, iriam tê-la.
Essa era a firme
disposição do governo
e, particularmente, do
min istério do interio r. A
escolh a dos agentes, uns
vindos da s ecreta, out ros
de corporações públicas,
que iriam infiltrar-se
sub-repticiamente no
seio das massas, havia
sido rápida e ecaz”.
Lígia Bernardino
Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 324
By adopting the point of view of the minister of the
interior, through this extract, the third person narrator exposes
the hidden will of this particular character, which is to gain
control over the population. It is not merely a Machiavellian
strategy of power; the contours developed in the process of
repressing the citizens involve a biopolitical line of action, as
the measures applied are based on the so-called well-being
of the population, or on the preservation of their bodies. The
aim, however, is the implementation of a state of siege, or, in
other words, a state of exception.
According to Michel Foucault, the assumption of the
biological condition of the body has changed the exercise of
power, which becomes dependent on “a series of interventions
and regulatory controls”
10
(FOUCAULT, 1994, p. 141). The
measures undertaken by the government in Seeing are triggered
by that very perspective, which turn the implementation of the
state of siege as a straightforward example of a biopolitical
decision. Even the terminology used by the Government and
the president show at what extent it is such: the wave of blank
ballots is a disease that has to be stopped as a pandemic would.
The next extract claries it:
the sole crime of these people was to cast blank ballots, it
would be of little importance if only the usual ones had done
it, but there were plenty, there were too much, almost all of
them, what does it matter that it is your inalienable right if
you are told that such a right has to be used in homeostatic
doses, drop by drop, you cannot walk around with a full bowl
overowing with blank ballots11 (SARAMAGO, 2004, p. 56).
Votes are therefore like a medicine to be entirely regulated
by the machine of the state. Governments are there like doctors
to save people’s lives, to safeguard them from diseases that may
become a danger to the sovereigns themselves (Rancière would
call them oligarchies). Blank votes are therefore considered as
a “black death plague” by the president, or rather, as a “white
death plague” (SARAMAGO, 2004, p. 62), as the prime minister
corrects him, which is the reason for the menace against the
“stability of the democratic system, not simply, not merely
in a country, in this country, but throughout the planet”
(SARAMAGO, 2004, p. 63), as the minister for foreign affairs
redundantly puts it
12
.
10 “[U]ma série de
intervenções e de
controlos reguladores”.
11 “[O] único crime
desta gente foi votar
em branco, não teria
importância de maior
se tivessem sido só
os do costume, mas
foram muitos, foram
demasiados, foram
quase todos, que mais
dá que seja um direito
teu inalienável se te
dizem que esse direito
é para usar em doses
homeopáticas, gota a
gora, não podes vir por
aí com um câ ntaro cheio
a transbordar de votos
brancos”.
12 Re s p e c t ively, “pe ste
negra”, “peste branca”
and “a estabilidade do
sistema democrático,
não simplesmente, não
meramente, num país,
neste país, mas em todo
o pl an et a”.
The threshold of democracy in José Saramago’s Seeing
Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 325
In the process, it is the body that becomes a menace, it
is the body that must suffer the consequences of the people’s
so-called bad deeds. In the nineteenth century, Henry David
Thoreau had to spend a night in prison because he refused
to pay a tax that would serve a government that supported
slavery. For him, it was a matter of conscience, which the
Government tried to bend by the use of extreme measures.
Moreover, according to Thoreau (2004, p. 90), it could only
do that because it is “physically the strongest”. Therefore, his
body could be taken to prison; however, his conscience kept
its integrity. He added that “[t]he State never intentionally
confronts a man’s sense, intellectual or moral, but only his
body, his senses” (THOREAU, 2004, p. 103).
What Thoreau perceived in the nineteenth century was
that the only way power had to control citizens was to address
the body, such as putting people in jail, rather than making
decisions based on ethics. Such thought is not far distant
from the measures carried out during a state of exception,
be it in a dictatorial regime or not. Prohibition in the name of
the preservation of life turns into a rule that can potentially
contradict democracy. Seeing goes further on the subject, by
implying the possibility of State manipulation of the masses
allegedly in order to preserve their well-being as citizens of a
democratic country.
The above-mentioned “white death plague” alludes
to another Saramago book, Blindness (the literal translation
would be Essay on Blindness), published in 1995. Seeing can be
considered its sequel, as some of the characters are the same,
and the references to the unexplained pandemic that affected
the population of the city then are constant. Both books are even
structured in a paralleled way: they are atopic and achronic,
characters have no names, in short, as Isabel Pires de Lima
(1999, p. 416) points out, there is a sort of “ontological unsettling
condition”
13
. This comment on Blindness can be extended to
Seeing. The effects of the regulatory governmental measures in
the two books imply not only the suppression of the citizens’
rights, but they also expose the limitless of the authority action,
even though claiming to act on behalf of the population.
Paradoxically, while arguing that they are taking
precautionary measures to sustain a pandemic, the
Governments of both books are in fact exposing the population
13 “[D]esnorte
o nt o l ó g ic o ”.
Lígia Bernardino
Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 326
to a condition of bare life. In Blindness, while conning the
citizens that inexplicably become blind to a deactivated
madhouse in which they are confronted with a new form of
chaotic order, the Government actually deprive citizens from
every right, subject them to the utmost undignied existence,
one in which even the worthiest must kill in order to survive.
That is what happens to the wife of the doctor, who becomes
an important character in the second half of Seeing. She was the
one that helped a group of blind people to survive during the
pandemic in Blindness; she is the most suitable person to put
the blame on as the instigator of the rebellious blank votes in
Seeing. The dialogue between this woman and a commissioner
assigned to investigate the blank ballots is clear enough:
And I am to blame for what happened, That is what I’m trying
to ascertain, And how did I get the capital’s majority of the
population to cast blank ballots, putting yers under their
doors, by midnight prayers and witchcraft, by spreading a
chemical product in the water supply network, by promising
each person the rst prize in the lottery, or by spending what
my husband earns in his ofce to buy votes, You kept your
vision when everybody else was blind and you haven’t been
able till now, or maybe you don’t want to, explain me why,
And that makes me the culprit of a conspiracy against the
world’s democracy, That is what I am trying to nd out14
(SARAMAGO, 2004, p. 237).
The irony of the woman confronts the unrelenting
expertise of the commissioner who, at this point of the story,
is still a lawful ofcer working for the state. By means of a
hyperbolic enumeration, the woman denounces the imbalance
between what happened in the election day and the measures
undertaken by the government, which will now be directed
straight to her: she is the alleged head of a conspiracy that
never existed, and she will be duly punished because of that.
As her words well express, this woman is aware of
the dangers; she sees the scope of the investigation; she
understands the consequences that may befall upon her
because the Government cannot seem to cope with the will
of the people. After all, the state of siege is decreed by the
Government with the allegation that the democratic regime
must be protected. However, if the citizens’ inalienable rights
are denied, and the authority of power forcefully imposed,
14 “E eu sou a culpada
do sucedido, É o que
estou tratando de
averiguar, E como foi
que consegui levar a
maioria da população
da capital a votar
em branco, metendo
panfletos debaixo da
porta, por m eio de rezas
e esconjuros à meia-
noite, lançando um
produto químico no
abastecimento de água,
prometendo o primeiro
prémio da lot aria a cada
pessoa, ou gastando a
comprar votos o que o
meu marido ganha no
consultório, A senhora
conservou a visão
quando toda a gente
estava cega e ainda não
foi capaz ou recusa-se
a explicar-me porquê,
E isso torna-me agora
culpada de conspiração
contra a democracia
mundial, É o que trato
de averiguar”.
The threshold of democracy in José Saramago’s Seeing
Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 327
democracy becomes suspended, which actually happened in
the capital city where Seeing is set.
According to Giorgio Agamben, one of the dangers faced
by today’s democracies is precisely the possibility of declaring
the state of exception, which may turn into an aporetic
condition of denegation of democracy, a condition paradoxically
provided for in the juridical systems of the Western countries.
He refers to the present “unprecedented generalization of the
paradigm of security as the normal technique of government”
(AGAMBEN, 2005, p. 14), which in Seeing justifies the
interrogation of ve hundred citizens, who are locked up for
an undetermined period of time, “increasing when, how, and
how much necessary the physical and psychological pressure
they were submitted to”
15
(SARAMAGO, 2004, p. 52). They
are also submitted to lie detectors, and undercover missions
are carried out. Even panic is tried, when agents perpetrate
a terrorist attack that causes the death of more than twenty
people. Thus, the state of exception becomes an actual moment
of anomy, in which the rule of the state is suspended in order
to keep the population as frightened as to wish for the return
of the sovereigns they had rejected when casting blank votes.
Derrida (2008, p. 71) argues that the law is nothing more
than a contract, a convention; in short, laws are “prostheses”
16
.
As such, the implementation of the state of siege in Saramago’s
Seeing depends on the decisions of the government, i.e., a part
of the country’s population, one that, however, has the power to
change any prosthesis they like because they feel intitled to do
so. Therefore, governments can impose and suspend law, and
still claim to be exercising democracy, as they were elected by the
people. It is in fact so, since the blank ballots at stake happened
during local elections, not national ones. Nevertheless, that does
not straightforwardly mean that the state of siege is a democratic
decision. Giorgio Agamben points out the complexity of what
it means to decree any state of exception:
Far from being a response to a normative lacuna, the state
of exception appears as the opening of a ctitious lacuna in
the order for the purpose of safeguarding the existence of
the norm and its applicability to the normal situation. The
lacuna is not within the law [la legge], but concerns its relation
to reality, the very possibility of its application. It is as if
the juridical order [il diritto] contained an essential fracture
between the position of the norm and its application, which,
15 “[A]umentando
quando, como e quanto
fosse necessário
a pressão física e
psicológica a que
estavam submetidas”
(Saramago, 2005, p. 52).
16 Full quotation, in the
course of De rrida’s close
reading of Hobbes’s
Leviathan: “C e t t e
humanité, ce propre
le l’homme signie ici
que la souveraineté, les
lois, la loi, et donc l’État
ne sont rien de naturel
et sont posé(e)s par
contrat et convention.
Ce sont des prothèses.
S’il Y a une structure
prothét ique du Léviathan
comme animal ou
monstre politique, cela
tient à sa structure
conventionelle, t hétique,
contractuelle”.
Lígia Bernardino
Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 328
in extreme situations, can be lled only by means of the state
of exception, that is, by creating a zone in which application
is suspended, but the law [la legge], as such, remains in force.
(AGAMBEN, 2005, p. 31)
Therefore, the state of exception exposes the fracture
between reality and the law, which becomes clearer whenever
there is a situation of crisis. Then, apart from a normal moment
of bewilderment, when decisions have to be made, it is for
the safeguarding of the norm that arguments can be found
to decree a grey zone in which the state of exception turns
into a possibility. The puzzled government of Seeing after the
elections are an example of such a fracture, and their reaction
implies the application of extreme measures. As a result, the
state of siege is implemented, accompanied by a number
of additional measures comparable to those undertaken by
dictatorial regimes.
The “ctitious lacuna” Agamben refers to in the above
quotation is exposed by the Government claiming to be
acting under the rule of a democratic regime, while imposing
restrictions that deny the free exercise of citizenship. In the
words of this philosopher, “[t]he state of exception is an anomic
space in which what is at stake is a force of law without law”
(AGAMBEN, 2005, p. 37). When the ministers decide to arrest
citizens almost at random to interrogate, when they keep
these citizens in prison for an indeterminate period of time,
when they manipulate public opinion and control the news,
as it happens in Seeing after the second election, then people
live clearly in a state of exception. At this point, democracy
lies in a grey zone of undecidability; moreover, democracy
is suspended, while the decision to go back to a condition of
normality depends on the sovereigns alone, regardless of the
people’s decisions. The limits of democracy are consequently
trespassed by a government that was supposedly elected in
the course of democratic procedures.
A higher stage for democracy
Writing “Civil Disobedience” was to Thoreau a means
to make a stand against the objectication of mankind, as
in his opinion people are mostly ruled by laws that are not
always benecial to the condition of the individual. On the
The threshold of democracy in José Saramago’s Seeing
Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 329
contrary, people become dependent on a blind mechanism
that hinders their free will. He claims not to be “responsible
for the successful working of the machinery of society”
(THOREAU, 2004, p. 103), while imagining a state that “would
prepare the way for a still more perfect and glorious State”
(THOREAU, 2004, p. 110). In Seeing, the growing awareness
the commissioner has of the state of exception decreed by the
Government stands as the liberation of the body into a higher
state of freedom of thought, in other words, of free will. Yet, his
downfall, or rather, his assassination, proves how immature
democracy still is to accept that condition, and how vulnerable
it still is to suspend itself in order to aporetically prevail.
In a dialogue between the president and the prime
minister, they both express the likeness between the blank
votes and the white blindness that had occurred in the capital
four years before, as portrayed in Blindness. The Government’s
ght against these two unexplained epidemics evince how
deceitful the exercise of power within a democracy can be:
“Let us be condent, mister president, condence is crucial, In
what, in whom, tell me, In the democratic institutions, My dear,
keep that speech to television, only the secretaries can hear
us in here, we can speak bluntly.”
17
(SARAMAGO, 2004, p. 89)
The hypocritical comment of the president shows how
power can be authoritarian even in a so-called democratic
regime. In the name of everybody’s well-being, the suspension
of rights becomes an unstoppable machine, involving means
and a whole team of ofcers and bureaucrats working for the
maintenance of the status quo. All the undercover missions
of terrorism that are carried out by the Government’s agents
are a consequence of this mechanism. On the other hand,
they submit the sieged city to a state of suspension, in which
population has to observe restrictions beyond the legitimate
right of a democratic system. In Seeing, the scope of the
Government’s action reaches the blurry zone of nding a
scapegoat: the woman who inexplicably had not gone blind
four years before. As the commissioner tells her, “what cannot
be understood might be despised, but that will never happen
if somehow it can be used as a pretext”
18
(SARAMAGO, 2004,
p. 256), which in this case paradoxically means the imposition
of the established power democratically elected.
17 “Tenhamos
confiança, senhor
presidente, a conança
é fundamental, Em
quê, em quem, diga-
me, Nas instituições
democráticas, Meu caro,
reserve esse discurso
para a televisão, aqui
só nos ouvem os
secretários, podemos
falar com clareza”.
18 “[O] incompree nsível
pode ser desprezado,
mas nunca o será se
houver maneira de o
usarem como pretexto”.
Lígia Bernardino
Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 330
In order to explain the meaning of the state of exception in
modern democracies, Giorgio Agamben (2005) goes back to the
Roman law. He argues that iustitium is the equivalent term, as it
stands for a period of time when all laws are suspended, even
though not necessarily replaced. In other words, at those times,
sovereigns enjoyed limitless power. Therefore, “we might
say that he who acts during the iustitium neither executes nor
transgresses the law, but inexecutes [inesegue] it” (AGAMBEN,
2005, p. 50). There is no transgression nor imposition of new
laws; there is only a condition of indeterminacy.
According to Agamben (2005), in the present, the state
of exception is included in the juridical order. Consequently,
whenever it occurs, there is a coincidence of fact and law.
As such, the terrorist acts perpetrated by the government
in Seeing are not illegal, although they cannot be publicly
admitted; they are merely the result of the suspension of the
law. Nevertheless, they deny the free exercise of human rights,
which proves the aporia of such a democratic regime. The fact
that the Government is aware of it spurs their will of power:
the people will be subdued at no matter what cost. After all,
“the unbridled use of blank votes would turn democracy into
an ungovernable system”
19
(SARAMAGO, 2004, p. 110).
Despite the clear scepticism over the exercise of
democracy, it is not anomy that Seeing advocates. As a matter of
fact, under strict restrictions of freedom, there are no relevant
riots in the sieged city. All demonstrations and protests are
nonviolent; whenever difculties are at sight, the population
acts in solidarity, while neglecting the Government’s
determinations as a sign of indifference in what authority
is concerned. Therefore, no sign of anarchy can be found, as
there is no sign of will of power. Perhaps the utopia is the
transcendence of democracy, by imagining a regime that will
be able to relinquish juridical legitimacy, as the communities
themselves will nd self-regulatory means of organisation
which will enable citizens to know how to live better together.
Apparently, they already can do so in the sieged city. When
part of the population is forbidden to leave, they have to turn
round and come back to their houses. Then, contrarily to what
reporters and the Government expected, those who remain leave
their houses and stand on the sidewalks waiting for the others
to help them put their things back in their houses. The cries of
19 “[U]m uso sem freio
do voto em branco
tornaria ingovernável o
sistema democrático”.
The threshold of democracy in José Saramago’s Seeing
Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 331
a reporter watching the scene from a helicopter could not be
clearer: “It’s now, it’s now, let’s wait for the worse, the reporter
cried with hoarse excitement”
20
(SARAMAGO, 2004, p. 167). At
the same time, the prime minister punches the table. Ridicule
and rage are the answers each of them has to the population’s
higher understanding of what it means to live together.
The verisimilitude of such an attitude has to be
contextualized. As mentioned above, Seeing is a sequel of
Blindness. At the end of this latter book, characters recover their
vision, without ever knowing why they had lost it in the rst
place. Then, the woman who sees and her husband wonder
about what had happened to them. It is the woman that starts
the following dialogue:
Why did we go blind, I don’t know, perhaps one day we’ll get
to know the reason why, Do you want me to tell you what I
think, Say it, I think we have never gone blind, but we are
blind, Blind people that see, Blind people who, seeing, do
not see.21 (SARAMAGO, 1995, p. 310)
The past experience, however, provides people with
understanding enough to try alternatives for their living in
society. Democracy as they have experienced so far is not the
answer, as all the manoeuvres of power portrayed in both books
show. In “Civil disobedience”, Henry David Thoreau refers to
the supremacy of conscience over the law. According to him,
“we should be men rst, and subjects afterward” (THOREAU,
2004, p. 90). On the other hand, Walter Benjamin (2010, p. 60)
writes, on “Critique of violence”, rst published in 1921, that
“[the] non-violent understanding is to be found wherever the
culture of the heart has provided people with the pure means to
understand each other”
22
. Thus, both authors advocate a sort of
social commitment and mutual understanding that transcends
the established law, while pointing out the need of a revolution
that will open new – messianic – horizons to mankind.
Saramago’s interpretation of democracy adopts a similar
point of view. It is not a matter of doubting democracy, but
rather an utter disbelief in those that take power and use
it to keep the machine working, i.e., to maintain a status
quo that perpetuates power in the hands of oligarchies, as
Rancière (2006) would put it. The sheer act of casting blank
votes suggests the need of going beyond the established rule.
20 “É agora, é agora,
preparemo-nos para o
pior, berrou o repórter,
rouco de excitação”.
21 “Por que foi que
cegámos, Não sei,
talvez um dia se chegue
a conhecer a razão,
Queres que te d iga o que
penso, Diz, Penso que
não cegámo s, penso que
estamos cegos, Cegos
que vêem, Cegos que,
vendo, não vêem”.
22 “O entendimento
sem violência encontra-
se por toda a parte onde
a cultura do coração
ofereceu às pessoas
meios puros para se
entenderem”.
Lígia Bernardino
Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 332
Conned to the circumstance of voting continuously in the
same parties, people choose to think otherwise. More than
a political act, it is a state of exception that is implemented,
one in which the power of the authoritas is put on the verge
of collapse. The two main characters the Government chose
as the main and most dangerous opponents to the traditional
mode of governance are assassinated. By doing so, it is not
democracy that triumphs, but deception. As a consequence,
the higher stage for democracy, one that puts people at the core
of political decisions, one that can even dismiss the law and,
therefore, dismiss power, is yet to be accomplished.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
AGAMBEN, Giorgio. State of exception. Trans. Kevin Attell.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005.
BENJAMIN, Walter. O anjo da história. Lisboa: Assírio &
Alvim, 2010.
DERRIDA, Jacques. Séminaire la bête et le souverain. Volume I
(2001-2002). Paris : Galilée, 2008.
FOUCAULT, Michel. A história da sexualidade. I: A vontade de
saber. Trans. Pedro Tamen. Lisboa: Relógio D’Água, 1994.
LIMA, Isabel Pires de. Dos «anjos da História» em dois
romances de Saramago: Ensaio sobre a cegueira e Todos os nomes.
Revista Colóquio/Letras, Lisboa, n. 151/152, p. 415-426, jan. 1999.
RANCIÈRE, Jacques. Hatred of democracy. Trans. Steve Corcoran,
London/New York: Verso, 2006.
SARAMAGO, José. Ensaio sobre a cegueira. Lisboa: Caminho, 1995.
______. Ensaio sobre a lucidez. 2. ed. Lisboa: Caminho, 2004.
TAVARES, Gonçalo M. O senhor Kraus. 2. ed. Lisboa:
Caminho, 2006.
THOREAU, Henry Davis. Civil disobedience. In: ______.
Walden and other writings. New York: Bantam, [1849] 2004.
ŽIŽEK, Slavoj. Violence: six sideways reections. London: Prole
Books, 2009.
The threshold of democracy in José Saramago’s Seeing
Gragoatá, Niterói, v.23, n. 45, p. 317-333, jan.-abr. 2018 333
Resumo
O limiar da democracia em Ensaio sobre a
Lucidez, de José Saramago
Ensaio sobre a Lucidez é uma obra de José
Saramago publicada em 2004 que aponta como
hipótese uma revolta silenciosa por parte da
população ao votar em branco nas eleições
autárquicas e assim desestruturar a normalidade
do sistema democrático. Entre a culpabilidade
e a ação, entre a livre escolha e a sonegação
dos direitos humanos, esta obra questiona a
autenticidade da democracia tal como é exercida
atualmente nas sociedades ocidentais. Face aos
perigos de uma manipulação biopolítica, votar
em branco indicia a potência de um estado de
exceção, em que a população possa exercer um
poder baseado na consciência. Este ensaio indaga
os meandros do confronto de posições entre as
forças do poder instituído e a população que é
governada por essas forças.
Palavras-chave: Lucidez. Saramago.
Democracia. Estado de exceção. Eleições. Voto
em branco.
