Prefigurative Politics and Social Movement Strategy: The Roles of Prefiguration in the Reproduction, Mobilisation and Coordination of Movements
| Published date | 01 November 2021 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0032321720936046 |
| Date | 01 November 2021 |
| Author | Luke Yates |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/0032321720936046
Political Studies
2021, Vol. 69(4) 1033 –1052
© The Author(s) 2020
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DOI: 10.1177/0032321720936046
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Prefigurative Politics and Social
Movement Strategy: The
Roles of Prefiguration in the
Reproduction, Mobilisation and
Coordination of Movements
Luke Yates
Abstract
Recent work historicises and theoretically refines the concept of prefigurative politics. Yet
disagreements over the question of whether or how it is politically effective remain. What roles
does prefiguration play in strategies of transformation, and what implications does it have for
understandings of strategy? The article begins to answer this question by tracking the concept’s use,
from discussions of left strategy in the 1960s, a qualifier of new social movements in the 1980s–
1990s, its application to protest events in the 2000s, to its contemporary proliferation of meanings.
This contextualises reflections on the changing arguments about the roles of prefiguration in
social movement strategy. Based on literature about strategy, three essential categories of applied
movement strategy are identified: reproduction, mobilisation and coordination. Prefigurative dynamics
are part of all three, showing that the reproduction of movements is strategically significant, while
the coordination of movements can take various ‘prefigurative’ forms.
Keywords
prefigurative politics, strategy, reproduction, coordination
Accepted: 27 May 2020
Introduction
The concepts of prefigurative politics and prefiguration refer to the future-oriented con-
struction of political alternatives, or of attempts to reflect political goals or values in
social movement processes. Increasingly, the term animates discussion of political action
and is part of debates and theories around anarchism, utopia, social change and imagined
futures. Recent work has made progress in reviewing the theoretical claims and contexts
of prefiguration and applying it to diverse empirical phenomena. Yet fundamental disa-
greements over the question of whether or how prefiguration is politically effective have
Department of Sociology and the Sustainable Consumption Institute, The University of Manchester,
Manchester, UK
Corresponding author:
Luke Yates, Department of Sociology, Arthur Lewis Building, The University of Manchester, Oxford Road,
Manchester, M13 9PL, UK.
Email: luke.s.yates@manchester.ac.uk
936046PSX0010.1177/0032321720936046Political StudiesYates
research-article2020
Article
1034 Political Studies 69(4)
long accompanied the concept. Sidestepping this either/or question, what roles does pre-
figuration play in strategies of social and political transformation, and what might analys-
ing the term mean for wider understandings of movement strategy?
Prefigurative politics is a concept that has come to capture important political tenden-
cies. A shift towards broadly anti-authoritarian, horizontal, participatory style of organis-
ing in the Left is often understood as prefigurative: network-based, informally organised
mobilisations have become normal (Flesher Fominaya, 2014; Srnicek and Williams,
2015). Major recent social movements are regularly labelled as prefigurative: the alter-
globalisation movement, the Social Forums and the anti-austerity and new democracy
movements of 2010–2013, where micro-societies in city squares comprising complex
divisions of labour and consensus-based participation ‘prefigured’ the alternatives sought
(see Flesher Fominaya, 2014). An upswell of social and solidarity economy initiatives,
consumer movements, sustainable communities and other ‘everyday political’ practices
and projects are also regularly called prefigurative (e.g. Forno and Graziano, 2014;
Schlosberg and Craven, 2019). None of the practices of these groups or projects are new,
but prefiguration refers to a set of processes that appear increasingly important that are
poorly accounted for literature on political participation and social movements. Each of
these tendencies has been critiqued by academics or activists as being politically naïve,
ineffective, apolitical or non-strategic.
The debates reach far beyond the term itself and are fundamental for political stud-
ies. Influential work from scholars as diverse as John Holloway (2010), Erik Olin
Wright (2010) and J.K. Gibson-Graham (2006) identify economic arrangements and
social practices that supplant dominant capitalist forms as part of a Left political strat-
egy. Academic interest in alternative projects links to interests in new types of political
action, the possibility for sustainable transformations and their potential foreshadowing
of new social forms. Thus, a substantial vocabulary signals preoccupation with similar
phenomena across several disciplines, including terms such as ‘urban laboratories’;
‘socio-technical niches’; ‘real’, ‘everyday’ and ‘working’ utopias; and interest in free,
‘safe’ and alternative spaces. A very broad and generative set of debates identify dynam-
ics, which are sometimes labelled prefiguration, as important politically; but asking
how and in what circumstances is to ask the question of what prefigurative strategy
might look like.
Beyond its new empirical and theoretical purchase and resonances with other major
debates in political studies, it is clear that for some activists and critical scholars, prefigu-
rative politics holds strategic promise. Slogans about ‘being the change’ are strikingly
ubiquitous in popular culture. Prefiguration is presented as an approach to political strat-
egy that simultaneously offers hope, political efficacy and moral legitimacy (e.g.
Wainwright, 2016), even while its detractors have persistently contrasted prefiguration
with strategy and effectiveness. The medium-term political context for these critical
scholars and activists – a crisis of legitimacy in neoliberalism, and mass uncertainty about
prospects characterised by increased risk, forecasts of environmental or public health
apocalypse, the normalisation of precarious labour and personal debt and the rise of the
far-right – makes the notion of prefiguration, rooted in a rhetorically compelling orienta-
tion towards political futures, appealing. Yet, despite this, and the variety of claims about
what prefiguration is for, there has been little sustained discussion of the roles prefigura-
tion plays in strategy, or how they vary from, complement or detract from more institu-
tionalised forms of political action. Given the regularity with which it is invoked in
contemporary discussions of politics, it is time that claims and critiques about strategy
were systematically addressed.
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