Sadie Plant

Sadie Plant is a prominent British philosopher, theorist and writer based in Switzerland. For the book accompanying the exhibition The Oracle: On Fantasy and Freedom, published by Sternberg Press, she wrote the essay The Demos and the Demos, in which she explores the relationship between demonstrations and democracy, linking historical protests to modern political dissent. She highlights how demonstrations, while unpredictable and often chaotic, have been crucial in winning political rights, especially for marginalised groups. Using the 1990 poll tax protest as an example, Plant reflects on how such movements, even without clear leadership, disrupt established power and offer a unique form of democratic participation. Despite their uncertainty and lack of measurable impact, protests challenge authority and reaffirm the power of collective action in democratic societies. Plants' thinking revolves around the intersection of technology, culture and social movements, with a particular focus on how these elements challenge established systems of power. Her work often critiques the conventional understanding of progress and modernity, highlighting the disruptive potential of collective actions, especially protests and demonstrations. Plant is critical of the notion that formal democratic systems (like elections) are fully democratic, suggesting they often serve the interests of the privileged.

Sadie Plant currently teaches on the Master of Arts in Contemporary Arts Practice programme at the Bern University of the Arts (HKB) in Switzerland. Her academic career includes previous teaching positions at the University of Birmingham, the University of Warwick – where she co-founded the Cybernetic Culture Research Unit (CCRU) in 1995 alongside Nick Land, a key initiative in the development of cyberfeminist and accelerationist theory – the Birmingham Institute of Art and Design, and the Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK). Her published works include Zeroes + Ones: Digital Women and the New Technoculture (Fourth Estate, 1997); The Most Radical Gesture: The Situationist International in a Postmodern Age (Routledge, 1992); and Writing on Drugs (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2000).