Prefigurative Neoliberalism: A Provisional Analysis of the Global Pseudolaw Movement

Much contemporary research on prefigurative legality turns to left-leaning activists for ethnographic insights into practices that call forward an alternative legal world. We turn instead to a right-leaning movement commonly known as the Pseudolaw movement or sovereign citizen movement, filled with loosely affiliated groups that share a common ideological approach to law. We discuss the underlying logics motivating pseudolaw adherents’ practices, discussing how a nostalgically based form of prefiguration shapes pseudolaw adherents’ responses to contemporary neoliberal dilemmas. We then compare this right-leaning movement’s approach to prefigurative legality with left-leaning activists’.

Presenters:

Amy J. Cohen is the Robert J Reinstein Chair in law at Temple University Beasley School of Law. She writes about how people construct alternatives to dominant legal systems.

Ilana Gershon is professor of anthropology at RIce University with broad ranging projects on neoliberalism and the anthropology of work. Her forthcoming book is The Pandemic Workplace: How We Learn to Be Citizens in the Office.