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Experimental Utopias and Social Change: Examples from Australian Non-Hegemonic Activism by Dr Theresa Petray and Dr Nick Pendergrast
- 1. Experimental Utopias and Social Change: Examples from Australian Non- Hegemonic Activism Dr Theresa Petray, James Cook University Dr Nick Pendergrast, Deakin University
- 2. Background • Social movement studies: • Traditionally recognised distinction between integrationism & radicalism • Integrationism: social movements which seek small, incremental changes to the existing social structures • Antisystemic: social movements which seek to replace the existing system entirely • Both are still oriented towards power holders like states
- 3. Background • Non-hegemonic: movements which are not directed at power structures • Do not seek universal or totalizing change • Create alternatives to the existing structures instead of replacing or reforming the existing structure • Small-scale experiments in alternative societies (Wallerstein 2002) • Refusal of universalization as a concept (Day 2004, Coulthard 2014) • Co-exist with structures, but eventually ‘render them redundant’ (Graeber 2004)
- 5. Constitutional Recognition • Integrationist – inclusion of Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander peoples in the Australian Constitution. • A chance to begin correcting past injustices • Good for health & wellbeing of Indigenous & non-Indigenous Australians • Antisystemic – treaties with Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander nations. • Do not want to be part of a Constitution based on racism & dispossession • An act of refusal which posits sovereignty of Indigenous nations
- 6. Non-hegemonic – • ‘Certainly Constitutional recognition doesn’t mean much to people taking action to emancipate themselves from Australian laws’ (Liddle 2014). • Creating spaces where self-determination can be exercised • (Not necessarily opposed to Constitutional Recognition or Treaties) • Not about replacing an Australia-wide power structure: culturally specific • Examples: Gugu Badhun Research Institute, decision-making about potential dam Self-determination & Nation-building
- 7. Live Export • Integrationist – chilled meat in place of live animals. • 69% of Australians support the campaign. • Animal welfare, humane slaughter (93% of Australians support). • Anti-systemic – direct action. • 2003: Ralph Hahnheuser placed processed pig flesh into the feed of sheep bound for the Middle East = not Halal. • Crossover between integrationist and anti- systemic activism. • ALF - activists pose more of a threat to the financial and physical well-being of its targets than other approaches.
- 8. Non-Hegemonic – Vegan Advocacy • Reject all slaughter, create alternatives. • Withdrawing rather than challenging = less of a threat than direct action, even welfare reforms. • Vegans challenge these industries by rendering them redundant on an individual level, and imaging a society where they are no longer needed or desired.
- 9. Conclusions • Diversity of approaches = strong social movements • Non-hegemonic experimental alternatives can provide meaningful examples of change • Non-hegemonic approaches might be incremental, and might seem similar to integrationist approaches, but closer analysis reveals a difference based on orientation to power structures
Editor's Notes
- Paper in review with Social Movement Studies, brings together our two bodies of work on Aboriginal activism and animal rights activism as examples of this theoretical approach we will discuss.
- Integrationist & anti-systemic comes from world-systems theory, particularly Wallerstein’s look at the position of conservatives, liberals and radicals following the French Revolution.
- We argue that movements which orient themselves towards power structures, whether seeking inclusion or a radical change, are no longer the only, nor even the most effective, way to bring about long-lasting and meaningful social change. Instead, non-hegemonic activism is increasingly popular as an experiment in creating alternatives to power structures, without some of the pitfalls facing activism more oriented towards the hegemonic power structures. One reason for the increasing popularity of this movement strategy is that, in a globalising, neoliberal world, movements realised that ‘state power was more limited than they had thought’ (Wallerstein, 2002, p.32). -Disenchantment by activists with antisystemic movements that successfully gained state power & then didn’t change things -Disenchantment with overly-bureaucratised social movement organisations -Both focus too much on power & hegemony
- Large social movements contain both integrationist and antisystemic elements. For clarity in this paper, we will refer to antisystemic (or integrationist, or non-hegemonic) activism or approaches, rather than movements, because we recognise that multiple approaches are often part of a larger social movement with shared goals. Richard JF Day identifies a ‘politics of demand’: ‘actions oriented to ameliorating the practices of states, corporations and everyday life, through either influencing or using state power’ And a ‘politics of the act’: building and creating of alternatives; direct resistance is not the point, even though these alternatives might challenge power structures merely by existing
- But from the antisystemic approach, ‘the state’s assumed position … is itself what is contested’ by Indigenous peoples (Coulthard, 2014, p.100). In contrast to the Constitution which was written ‘against the backdrop of racism’ (Williams, 2015, p.215), a treaty would necessarily be negotiated between the Australian state and Indigenous peoples (Liddle, 2013).
- Examples: Gugu Badhun, Ngarrindjeri or Gunditjmara. Cornell (2015, p.19), writing on the Ngarrindjeri nation in South Australia, describes their process of nation-building as ‘having clawed back a significant measure of decision-making power in several policy domains’ Instead of demanding sovereignty be recognised by the Australian government, these nations are exercising self-determination without permission. (see Cornell 2015)
- Our examples highlight the coexistence of integrationist and antisystemic, and state-centric and non-hegemonic approaches to the same issue. It is important for the cause to have multiple approaches and in this example the antisystemic approach can use successful non-hegemonic examples to bolster their cause. These prefigurative experiments in self-determination strengthen the case for treaties negotiated with self-determining Aboriginal nations.