"Küresel sonlara" karşı yeni anlatılara ve gösterenlere doğru: Şili'nin büyük reddi

This doctoral thesis is an inquiry into "cognitive mapping" in a desperately fragmented world. The study treats the 2019 Chilean popular uprising, known as the estallido social (social explosion or outbreak), as a paradigmatic and historical turning point, born from the discontent with the global capitalist order and its accompanying political, cultural, and economic frameworks in today's changing era of post-political struggles. This rebellion is considered not only a moment of rupture in Chile's national history but also as part of a global moment where the promises and limits of neoliberal globalization are being questioned. Drawing upon critical theory, psychoanalysis, and the politico-philosophical space, this work offers an investigation into a subject frequently discussed by scholars in the field of systemic critical-narrative—the possibility of counter-hegemonic reproduction on the periphery and radical social and political transformation. The principal problematic of the thesis is how political subjectivity can be reconstituted and what forms radical objection to the system can take in an era (the post-political) where grand narratives such as Francis Fukuyama's "end of history" and Daniel Bell's "end of ideology" have collapsed. In this context, following the critical theory literature that develops along the "primacy of the subject or primacy of the act?" axis, the analysis focuses on "cognitive" and "end" narratives. This focus aims to reveal that the protests were not merely a reaction to existing policies, but also a profound intervention into the horizon of time and meaning imposed by hegemony. Deep structural contradictions in the global capitalist structure triggered the protests, preparing the ground in Chile for a violent explosion against the pervasive and obscene logic of "advanced neoliberalism"—or the "completeness of neoliberalism"—which encompasses not only economic domination but also cultural and subjective dimensions. Chile, as a "laboratory" where neoliberal policies were implemented in their earliest and purest form, demonstrates that this model is not just an economic program but also a symptomatic project that profoundly shapes social relations, cultural codes, and individual subjectivities. In this context, to comprehend the conditions under which such complexity has formed, it is essential to question the subjective and ideological positioning of the narratives constructed under advanced neoliberalism. The protests, beyond being a reaction to economic hardships, are also a critical response to the deep alienation experienced by the neoliberal subject, who is devoid of meaningful connections through counter-narratives. This alienation should be understood as the loss of individuals' ability to make sense of their position within their own social reality and to place themselves within a horizon of collective action. Within the scope of Fredric Jameson's concept of "cognitive mapping" (or Hegel's Weltgeist), by identifying the absence of relationships that would allow alienated subjects to form meaningful alliances, the study resorts to critical theory and psychoanalysis to produce new narratives and signifiers that can intervene in hegemonic national and global narratives. The estallido can be read precisely as an effort to fill this cognitive map void, to unite fragmented experiences within a common framework of meaning, and to create a new collective subject. The thesis conceptualizes the Chilean protests as an "Act of Great Refusal," drawing on the thought of Marcuse and Žižek. Thus, it is argued that the protests are a profound rejection of the logic of "advanced neoliberalism," which includes not only economic grievances but also cultural and subjective dimensions. Herbert Marcuse's concept of the "Great Refusal" is based on the thesis that modern industrial society (advanced capitalism) suppresses its liberating potential by trapping opposition within false needs and a one-dimensional existence. This refusal entails a search for an authentic existence and the imagination of a qualitatively different society by rejecting the false satisfactions offered by the system. Žižek's concept of the "Act," derived from Lacanian psychoanalysis, signifies an unpredictable, traumatic, and impossible moment of rupture that radically alters the coordinates of the existing symbolic order. The Act is not a simple "acting out" but a moment of contact with the "Real" beyond the symbolic order, through which the subject reconstitutes both itself and reality. The proposed theoretical framework aims to integrate Žižek's analysis of ideology and radical rupture (the "Act") with Marcuse's critique of one-dimensionality and post-industrial society, and his concept of the "Great Refusal" as a project of egress from this condition. This synthesis provides the possibility of analyzing the estallido as both an immanent, continuous resistance to the system and a moment of radical rupture that shakes the system to its foundations. This argument is developed within a structure consisting of six main chapters. The introductory chapter defines the problem and presents the theoretical and historical context. The second chapter examines in detail the intellectual trajectories and fundamental concepts of Marcuse and Žižek, who form the theoretical basis of the thesis. The third chapter constructs the analytical framework of the thesis by establishing the relationship between psychoanalysis, ideology, and narrative, and critically filters the traditional approaches of social movement theory. The fourth chapter deciphers the role of "end" narratives in Chile's historical trajectory through Hegel's open-ended holistic understanding of history and Benjamin's concept of the "materialist historian," and situates the phenomenon within the Latin American context. The fifth chapter details the methodology, while the sixth chapter applies this framework to the Chilean case, analyzing the narrative and counter-hegemonic dynamics of the estallido as a limit-juncture of "end" narratives. The qualitative-interpretive methodology, based on field research conducted between November 2023 and November 2024, combines semi-structured interviews, analysis of protest narratives, a "retroactive historicism" analytical approach to the Chilean refusal, and secondary sources such as graffiti and slogans, as well as field notes. The methodological originality of the study lies in its treatment of the protest not only as a sociological and political phenomenon but also as a psychoanalytic space of the philosophical and political. Semi-structured interviews were used as the main dataset to examine the transformation of the symbolic order. The narrative inquiry and the psychoanalytic "traumatic kernel" approach conceptualize these transformations as reflections of changes in the "Master's desire." This Lacanian formulation emphasizes that social changes are shaped not only by rational demands but also by the unconscious dynamics of desire, enjoyment (jouissance), and trauma. The analysis assumes that language and discourse do not merely reflect reality but actively constitute it. Thus, the analysis reveals a process that, rather than definitively rejecting the existing order (one-dimensional thought, society, and man as a form of the impossible), allows for the matching of signifiers and narratives within ideological frameworks. It examines how the protests, along with the rejection of the neoliberal order inherent to advanced capitalism, also entail a search for new meanings, new symbols, and a new collective identity. This process shows that ideology is not merely "false consciousness" but also a mechanism that structures the fantasmatic relationship subjects have with reality. In accordance with Lacan's concept of the "subject supposed to know," the study, which transforms the inquiry itself into a narrative, examines how intellectuals and academics who have written about the estallido construct cognitive narratives and articulate their subjective feelings about the protests; it thereby reveals how these narratives are articulated into an ideological mission or how they deviate from it. These intellectual subjects are treated both as actors who produce the meaning of the protest and as narrators who bear the symptoms of their own ideological positions. Their narratives are not just factual reporting but also an expression of their own desires, fears, and fantasies. The thesis, which considers retroactive historiography—a topic insufficiently explored in the critical literature—as a manifestation of contemporary anxieties and the traumatic nature of the Chilean refusal, analyzes symbolic signifiers such as "the people" (el pueblo), "dignity" (dignidad), and "violence" (violencia) within the traumatic kernel and libidinal economy of the protest. These signifiers express not only political demands but also the deep layers of the collective psyche. The concepts of nostalgia for the past, melancholy situated in the present, and fantasy extending into the future are deployed to interpret the complex temporal dimensions of political resistance. Thus, the functions of these signifiers in producing collective power and negating the one-dimensional social order (or late capitalism) guided by the neoliberal logic seen in the Chilean case are demonstrated. Nostalgia represents a desire for a lost totality and solidarity; melancholy, a pathological identification with an insurmountable trauma and loss; and fantasy, a radical projection of desire towards the future in the face of these impossibilities. The thesis positions the Chilean case (a) as an "Act of Great Refusal" in the Marcuse-Žižek lineage; (b) as an intervention into "end" narratives such as democracy, dictatorship, transition, and neoliberalism; and (c) simultaneously as the reproduction of antagonisms and new forms of contradiction. The estallido, by retroactively re-signifying the "end" narratives that have shaped Chile's modern history, also establishes the possibilities of transformation it has opened for Chilean society and politics through efforts to construct counter-hegemonic narratives. In this way, the thesis sheds light on the unique character of the 2019 Chilean protest's refusal by focusing on the political-cognitive narratives and symbols of protests in the post-political neoliberal era, where master-hegemonic narratives about the "end of history" and "end of ideology" have collapsed. In doing so, it positions the concepts of "the fantasy of the end," "the melancholy of failure," and "nostalgia for the past" as forms of counter-narrative within a multipolar global capitalist order, locating them in the context of post-neoliberal struggle. These psychoanalytic-political concepts show that the rebellion was not merely a rational action but also a complex expression of collective desire, trauma, and hope. Thus, on the grounds of the continuity of "end" narratives and historical retroactivity, accumulation, and repetition in a Hegelian-Benjaminian sense, the thesis argues that the Chilean case symbolizes the emergence of a powerful "post-neoliberal desire" born from the internal contradictions of the ongoing neoliberal experiment. This desire involves more than material deprivation; it encompasses the desire to re-imagine a collective future. The political imaginary and traumatic kernel of the 2019 Chilean popular uprising are read as the critical event in which the expression of this desire is sought with the aim of "reinventing history." The protests not only commemorated the traumas of the past (especially the Pinochet dictatorship) but also put Walter Benjamin's understanding of history into practice by re-signifying that past within the struggle of the present. Benjamin's concept of "now-time" (Jetztzeit) refers to a "tiger's leap" in which a specific moment of the past is charged with revolutionary potential in the present. The estallido did precisely this, uniting the dictatorship and the subsequent period into a single narrative of oppression with the slogan "It's not about 30 pesos, it's about 30 years," thereby summoning the ghosts of the past into the struggle of the present. Consequently, the study concludes that Chile, as part of the Global South, exists in a "neoliberal future time" and that the signals emanating from it reflect one of the final stages of the post-neoliberal subject. This refusal by social mobilization, despite all its complexity, has made visible the cracks in the symbolic order of the global capitalist discourse. This act of refusal, consistent with the idea of "reinventing history," reveals itself as a political act operating on the nostalgia-melancholy-fantasy axis through symptomatic links that intersect with established narratives, such as Chile's own unique "end" narratives, and thus through the junctures of changing desire, the president, the system, and society. Such junctures have emerged at the intersection of two seemingly contradictory forces: the death drive of the subject, supposedly liberating but appearing to vanish amidst global crises (or perceived global ends), and the resurgence of Eros, which allows for the re-emergence of this drive. Therefore, the act of this refusal is not only a political strategy but also a process of collective psychic restructuring. Based on this process, the tension between the subject's liberating orientation toward the impossible and the possible—its death drive (Thanatos)—and the return of Eros has shaken Chile's unique position in neoliberal narratives in a period defined by multiple crises, giving rise to a new field of ideological struggle. With this dynamic, it is concluded that Chile has transformed from a "neoliberal laboratory" into a "laboratory of resistance" or an "anti-neoliberal laboratory" that actively produces imaginary possibilities for the future. The thesis fills a gap in the literature by analyzing the Chilean protests as both a continuous resistance against the established order and a moment of radical rupture, focusing on "cognitive" and "end" narratives, retroactive historiography, and the traumatic kernel of the Chilean refusal. The theoretical contribution of the thesis is its synthesis of critical theory and psychoanalysis in the context of social movements, and its application not only to the Global North but also in the context of the Global South. The concepts of "radical rupture" and "cognitive mapping," often discussed in the literature through examples centered on Europe or North America, are substantiated in this study with the Chilean case, showing how a local historical context can be articulated into global debates. In this respect, the thesis offers both a theoretical and methodological foundation for future research. Whether the end has not actually ended and whether similar waves of protest serve the function of filling similar cognitive mapping voids are proposed as a fertile research area for future comparative studies. In conclusion, this study claims that the Chilean case carries important clues about the beginning of the end of the post-political era and offers a critical ground for understanding the possibilities and impasses (aporias) of a global re-politicization. The estallido is a critical turning point not only in Chile's history but also in the global history of neoliberalism. Secondarily, the thesis posits that the estallido represents a "failure of failure": although it may not have achieved its institutional goals, it has achieved a historical success by permanently shattering the ideological hegemony of the neoliberal consensus and opening up a new space for political desire and subjectivity. This thesis ultimately seeks to demonstrate how an act of refusal can, in a way that transcends failures and seizes the impossible, create the symbolic and narrative space necessary for a new beginning. Chile's refusal, in this sense, offers a powerful theoretical and political (praxis) lesson that hope can be born from melancholy, and the fantasy of the future from the trauma of the past.