Return to Saussure

I. The Cargo-Cult Error An aircraft arrives on a small island in the Pacific carrying goods. For the inhabitants of the village watching from the ground, the most remarkable facts are immediately visible: the aircraft, the cargo, and the sudden appearance of objects that had previously been unavailable. They therefore begin constructing a runway of their own, hoping that aircraft will return and bring them the same kind of cargo. What they reproduce is the most visible feature associated with the arrival, while what they do not see is everything that made the arrival possible—the systems of production, labour, organization, transportation, and distribution connecting the cargo to its distant point of origin. All of this remains outside the scene, in the background. Jean Baudrillard used the image of the cargo cult to illuminate a similar confusion in consumer society. What attracts attention are the visible signs of abundance, while the conditions that produced them recede from vi...