Crack-Up Capitalism: Market Radicals and the Dream of a World Without Democracy
by Quinn Slobodian · 4 Apr 2023 · 360pp · 107,124 words
older working class.53 The GLC saw the neighborhood as a place where small versions of the future could be made, what are sometimes called prefigurative politics. An early success came on Coin Street, across the Thames from the financial district of the City, where they were able to block the plans
Inventing the Future: Postcapitalism and a World Without Work
by Nick Srnicek and Alex Williams · 1 Oct 2015 · 357pp · 95,986 words
major commitments: 1.A rejection of all forms of domination 2.An adherence to direct democracy and/or consensus decision-making6 3.A commitment to prefigurative politics 4.An emphasis on direct action Embedded within this set of commitments is a series of problems that constrain and limit their potential in the
…
placed above strategic objectives. Direct democracy, consensus and inclusivity all form part of horizontalism’s commitments to prefigurative politics, which aims to create in the here-and-now the world they would like to see. Prefigurative politics is a longstanding tradition on the left, from the anarchism of Kropotkin and Bakunin onwards, but it
…
consolation to the women and people of colour whose concerns were ignored by yet another white male leader. Rather than wait for a purported revolution, prefigurative politics attempts to instantiate a new world immediately – again relying on an implicit sense that immediacy is inherently superior to more mediated approaches. At its best
…
, prefigurative politics attempts to embody utopian impulses in bringing the future into concrete existence today.16 Yet at its worst, an insistence on prefiguration becomes a dogmatic
…
often remains insufficient to secure longstanding change, and in isolation, is typically only a temporary impediment to the powers of state and capital. Direct democracy, prefigurative politics and direct action are not, we hasten to add, intrinsically flawed.19 Rather than being denounced in themselves, their utility needs to be judged relative
…
in garnering public attention – the moves necessary to transform the social fabric were never taken. More fundamentally, though, Occupy constrained itself by enforcing a rigidly prefigurative politics. The basic prefigurative gesture is to embody the future world immediately – to change our ways of relating to each other in order to live the
…
a prefigurative space becomes a threat is the moment when repression weighs down on it, and when its fetishisation of horizontalism becomes a serious liability. Prefigurative politics, at its worst, therefore ignores the forces aligned against the creation and expansion of a new world. The simple positing and practising of a new
…
world is insufficient to overcome these forces, as the repression faced by Occupy demonstrated.54 The immediate question that must be asked of any prefigurative politics is therefore: How can it be expanded and scaled up?55 Even granting the problematic assumption that most people would want to live as the
…
to provide small-scale support to communities and to temporarily disrupt certain exploitative practices, the commitment to fetishised versions of consensus, direct action, and particularly prefigurative politics, constrains the possibilities of expanding and overtaking existing social systems. LOCALISM Less politically radical than horizontalism, though no less ubiquitous, is localism. As an ideology
…
‘inflame the imaginations of others’ and revise what people thought production was for.95 Notably, the Lucas Plan refused to remain a temporary space of prefigurative politics, and instead aimed to mobilise the resources of unions and governments in an effort to create a new hegemonic order. In this endeavour, the plan
…
Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, 2013), pdf available at fes-globalization.org. 35.Michael Albert, Parecon: Life After Capitalism (London: Verso, 2004). 36.Samuel Farber, ‘Reflections on “Prefigurative Politics”’, International Socialist Review 92 (March 2011), at isreview.org. 37.Jane McAlevey, Raising Expectations (and Raising Hell): My Decade Fighting for the Labor Movement (London
…
of the Social: A Philosophical Account of the Constitution of Social Life and Change (University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University, 2002). 53.Farber, ‘Reflections on “Prefigurative Politics”’. 54.Bruno Bosteels, ‘The Mexican Commune’, at academia.edu, p. 12. 55.This is an old question, often invoked in debates between anarchism and Marxism
…
, Everyday Revolutions, p. 130; Juan Alcorta, ‘Solidarity Economies in Argentina and Japan’, Studies of Modern Society 40: 12 (2007), p. 270. 65.Farber, ‘Reflections on “Prefigurative Politics”’. 66.Estimates are that the barter economy went from between 1 and 2.5 million people to just 100,000 people once the economy recovered
Care: The Highest Stage of Capitalism
by Premilla Nadasen · 10 Oct 2023 · 288pp · 82,972 words
goes beyond care as social service or a “good deed”—and is outside the dominant individualist and profit-making structures. It is an example of prefigurative politics, which Harsha Walia defines as “envisioning and actualizing egalitarian social relations.”8 Although these models may seem small-scale in the context of an invasive
Utopia or Bust: A Guide to the Present Crisis
by Benjamin Kunkel · 11 Mar 2014 · 142pp · 45,733 words
what Graeber, in Direct Action: An Ethnography (2009), described as the—mainly anarchist—theory and practice of “direct action,” or what is now often called “prefigurative politics.” In this ethos, “means and ends become, effectively, indistinguishable; a way of actively engaging with the world to bring about change, in which the form
The Refusal of Work: The Theory and Practice of Resistance to Work
by David Frayne · 15 Nov 2015 · 336pp · 83,903 words
, 49–50 potentiality, endless, sense of, 77 poverty, 159; culturalisation of, 100; self-management of, 205; viewed as deserved result, 100 see also poor, the prefigurative politics, 208 presents, buying of, 186–7 Primark, 167 productive forces, development of, 36 productivity, 36, 39; defines status of persons, 191; growth of, 40, 84
The Democracy Project: A History, a Crisis, a Movement
by David Graeber · 13 Aug 2012 · 284pp · 92,387 words
old days of steering committees and the like were basically over. Pretty much everyone in the activist community had come around to the idea of prefigurative politics: the idea that the organizational form that an activist group takes should embody the kind of society we wish to create. The problem was breaking
…
century it was called “building the new society in the shell of the old,” in the 1980s and 1990s it came to be known as “prefigurative politics.” But when Greek anarchists declare “we are a message from the future,” or American ones claim to be creating an “insurgent civilization,” these are really
IRL: Finding Realness, Meaning, and Belonging in Our Digital Lives
by Chris Stedman · 19 Oct 2020 · 307pp · 101,998 words
reimagine the world together—one way digital play can cause us to feel more real. “Memes help us envision another world, a practice known as prefigurative politics,” writes An Xiao Mina in Memes to Movements. In other words, playfulness lets us experiment with and build narratives that we can then use to
…
“can help motivate action.” Like memes or tabletop RPGs, our digital games are often about collaboratively reimagining the world. By enabling us to enter into prefigurative politics together, play can help us become who we want to be. On the one hand, it’s true for some that games are a space
Worn: A People's History of Clothing
by Sofi Thanhauser · 25 Jan 2022 · 592pp · 133,460 words
in protests where knitters are present, they serve to remind us of the intrinsic value of building a cooperative project. Scholars describe this as a “ ‘prefigurative politics,’ one that creates collaborative relations now as if the world to come has already arrived.” The labels on the goods for sale in the stalls
…
REFERENCE IN TEXT In the 1980s and 1990s: Hmong Cultural Center and the Hmong Archives in Saint Paul, Minnesota. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT “ ‘prefigurative politics’ ”: Bratich and Brush, “Fabricating Activism,” 249. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT The wall, which: “The Sheep,” Orkney Sheep Foundation. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN
No Shortcuts: Organizing for Power in the New Gilded Age
by Jane F. McAlevey · 14 Apr 2016 · 423pp · 92,798 words
deliberative and participatory organizational style—referred to internally as a “high-touch” process. This is similar to Francesca Polletta’s analysis of participatory democracy and prefigurative politics.11 Polletta and MRNY emphasize the importance of process in strengthening internal solidarity and enhancing the political impact of social movements. Efforts to win and