Less rhetoric, more freedom

While it is commonplace to view rhetoric and democracy as interminably, even causally, linked, this essay proposes a reconsideration of this apparently friendly relationship between democracy and rhetoric by theorizing that relationship through the mediating concept of the dēmos—the people. Drawing from the political philosophy of Jacque Rancière, whose work reflects on the logics guiding the dēmos and its opposition, the logic of equality and the logic of the police, respectively, I propose a view of rhetoric that largely positions it as operating by the logic of the police. This suggests that, in moments of crisis, their incommensurable logics compel choosing between rhetoric and democracy.