this fundamental adherence to the game itself, illusio, involvement, commitment, investment in the game which is the product of the game al the same time as it is the condition of the game being played. So as to avoid excluding themselves from the game and the profits that can be derived from it, whether we are talking about the simple pleasure of playing, or of all the material and symbolic advantages associated with the possession of symbolic capital, all those who have the privilege of investing in the game (instead of being reduced to the indifference and apathy of apoliticism) accept the tacit contract, implied in the fact of participating in the game, of recognizing thereby that it is indeed worth playing. This contract unites them to all the other participants by a sort of initial collusion. one far more powerful than all open or secret agreements. This solidarity between all the initiates, linked together by the same fundamental commitment to the game and its slakes, by the same respect (obsequium) for the game itself and the unwritten laws which define rl. by the same fundamental investment in the game of which they have a monopoly and which they have to perpetuate in order that their own investments are profitable, is never demonstrated so clearly as when the game itself is threatened.
For groups united by some form of collusion (such as sets of colleagues), it is a fundamental imperative to maintain discretion about, to keep secret, everything which concerns the intimate beliefs of the group. They fiercely condemn manifestations of cynicism displayed to the outside world, even though such manifestations are quite acceptable among initiates because they cannot by definition affect Ihe fundamental belief in the value of the group - a certain free-and-easy attitude to values is often experienced as a supplementary proof of their value. (It is well known that politicians and political journalists, normally so zealous lo peddle world-weary rumours and anecdotes about politicians, arc particularly indignant about those who. even for a single moment, make a show of ‘wrecking Ihe game' by bringing into political existence the apoliticism of the working class and petite bourgeoisie which is al once the condition and the product of the monopoly of the politicians.) But groups are hardly less mistrustful of those who. taking proclaimed values loo seriously, refuse the compromises and shady deals which are the condition of the real existence of the group.
The Double Game
The struggle which sets professionals against each other is no doubt
