Abstract
What is habit? Does it imply constraint or freedom, or perhaps both? And how is it related to the governance over people and exercise of power? These questions are central to Tony Bennett’s theoretically dense and insightful book, Habit’s Pathways. Repetition, Power, Conduct. Taking the reader on a journey through historical intellectual interpretations of habit that have been acted on politically to guide conduct, his purpose is not to provide an answer to these questions, but rather a way of thinking about them.
Setting out with an ambitious task to open up pathways of inquiry that question contested conceptualizations of habit, Bennett succeeds in laying out a convincing multilayered argument on (1) how conceptions of habit have historically been related to ways in which authority has directed the conduct of selected populations; (2) how habit itself has been related to other individual aspects, thus attributing limitations or capacities to selected groups, resulting in subordination; and (3) how the different discourses explored in the book have been reinforced in exercise of power. The book’s stated aim to contribute to the reignited debate on habit by questioning its long-standing conceptions of duality, and, with that, the relations between repetition, power, and conduct, is achieved by the thorough episodical engagement with insights from philosophy, sociology, psychology, theology, and neuroscience. The endeavour results in eight chapters of an extensive critical analysis of habit’s pathways through political and intellectual histories, bringing us to the fore the importance of this concept and its positive and negative interpretations for contemporary burning issues.
The book departs with the understanding that repetition and conduct have been essential parts of the contested understandings of the role of habit and their political outcomes. These contentions are explored in each subsequent chapter from different angles and in a genealogical manner: from the understanding and use of habit across monastic regimens in medieval Europe, through its relation to colonial rule, and its effects on circulation of capital, labour, and plantation slavery, to current debates involving racism, environmental threats, artificial intelligence, and algorithmic governance. Discussing the interpretations in the final part, Bennett presents us with the arbitrariness of habit – its pathways can simultaneously be a means of control over subordinate groups, thus directly involved in questions relating to class, race, gender, and colonialism, and as a means for achieving freedom and power. Each chapter has clearly stated aims and adds to the bridging of contemporary contexts with past debates to show the differently attributed force to habit via discipline, automatism, virtue, plasticity, becoming. The well-rounded, overarching overview includes analysis of some of the most important discussions on habit in Western thought, including Bergson, Deleuze, Foucault, Bourdieu, Dewey, and Malabou. Bennett concludes the journey sharing his take on what best encompasses the varied intellectual and political histories – habit as a form of conditionability (p. 208), underlining its arbitrariness concerning the consequences of how it is used and contested.
There is always a risk for such complex and thorough tasks to lack argumentative clarity. But Bennett remains consistent all throughout the book, guiding the reader through the argument from beginning to end. It is the continuous placing in conversation of past and present perspectives while showing how important earlier histories of the topic are for understanding current discourses related to white supremacy, climate change, colonial relations, and artificial intelligence, among others, that is the great strength of the book.
Overall, the book gives a rich, timely, and multifaceted account of habit’s conceptualizations and raises ever important contested questions on habit’s capacity for action, direction of conduct, the conditions under which conduct is guided, by which authority, and how forms of direction can be challenged (p. 209). Ending with them, this work encourages further, much needed discussion across the scientific community. All in all, Bennett has delivered a book that deserves a wide readership among the sociological community and beyond.
