Page 139 - Critical Theories of Mass Media

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124 Then
more diffuse and more concentrated than its predecessors. While
the former ‘hovered above the surface of society’ allowing areas of
life to escape the spectacle (so providing a space for détournement)
no aspect of culture is outside the purview of the integrated
spectacle. As its name implies, it permeates every strata of society.
This pervasiveness is matched by its concentration, its ‘controlling
centre has now become occult, never to be occupied by a known
leader, or clear ideology’. Thus the integrated spectacle ‘integrates
itself into reality to the same extent that it speaks of it, and that it
reconstructs it as it speaks’, as such it is the ultimate realization of
the society of the spectacle: ‘the unbridled accomplishment of commod-
ity rationality has quickly … shown that the becoming-world of the
falsification was also the falsification of the world’ (1991: s. N4).
Part 2 explores the topical manifestations of the integrated spectacle
in relation to Banality TV and its political consequences.
Debord argues that the integrated spectacle is a combination of
four characteristics, namely:

+ Fusion of state and economy
+ Generalized secrecy
+ Incessant technological renewal
+ A perpetual present.

The fusion of state and economy is the defining feature of the
integrated spectacle. If in its earlier incarnation these two sectors
had enjoyed an uneasy relationship, the new spectacle is character-
ized by a mutually beneficial alliance whose end result is a totally
administered environment. Accordingly ‘it is absurd to oppose them,
or to distinguish between their rationalities and irrationalities’(1991:
s. N5). Indeed, the integrated spectacle is precisely this integration
of economy, state and media. The condition of generalized secrecy is
the direct result and ultimate aim of this integration; in other words,
the successful concealment of the true centre of power. Since
technology is not a driving force in the institution and evolution of
the spectacle, the technological innovations that sustain the inte-
grated spectacle are for Debord simply cosmetic phenomena: ‘Giz-
mos proliferate at unprecedented speeds; commodities out-date
themselves almost every week; nobody can step down the same
supermarket aisle twice’ (Merrifield 2005: 125). This incessant
technological innovation is for Debord largely aimed at consolidat-
ing the grip of the spectacle, and reinforcing the status of various
specialists and technicians. The final characteristic, the institution of
a perpetual present ‘where fashion itself, from clothes to music, has
come to a halt, which wants to forget the past and no longer seems
to believe in a future’ (1991: N5), is a strategy of self-protection, a
deliberate reduction of the world to the scope of the spectacle’s past,

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