The Political Ontology of Enlightenment Materialism: Flat Ontology or Radical Anthropology?

What is the politics of Enlightenment materialism? Or, less ambiguously put, what politics does early modern materialism yield? After examining some misconceptions, including older ideas about the necessary link between materialism and the (French) Revolution, I discuss what one might call the implicit politics of ontology in some examples of thoroughgoing ‘materialist political ontology’. Consideration is given to specific cases, like those of Meslier and Diderot, which articulate an argument for a ‘democracy of matter itself’, according to which, if we are all made of the same matter, there can be no divine right of kings.