A Programme of Absolute Disorder : Decolonizing the Museum

A complete overhaul of the Western museum tradition’ – Publishers WeeklyThe Western museum is a battleground – a terrain of ideological, political and economic contestation. Almost everyone today wants to rethink the museum, but how many have the audacity to question the idea of the universal museum itself?In A Programme of Absolute Disorder, Françoise Vergès puts the museum in its place. Exploring the Louvre’s history, she uncovers the context in which the universal museum emerged: as a product of colonialism, and of Europe’s self-appointed claim to be the guardian of global heritage.
Vergès outlines a radical horizon: to truly decolonize the museum is to implement a ‘programme of absolute disorder’, inventing other ways of apprehending the human and non-human world that nourish collective creativity and bring justice and dignity to the dispossessed.