The concept of ‘prefiguration’ or ‘prefigurative politics’ has a complex and diverse history. As a term, it has been employed in a variety of contexts since the 1970s and thus has acquired a range of different uses and meanings over time. However, it refers to a particular logic of social and political change that has informed, or even shaped, various radical tendencies and practices since the nineteenth century. In the wake of recent ‘occupy movements’ such as Occupy Wall Street (OWS), the Spanish 15-M movement, Nuit Debout or the Gezi Park protests this concept has received increased attention in academic debates. But it often remains unclear what ‘prefiguration’ exactly is. Some take it to be a revolutionary strategy that is employed in the pursuit of radical change. Others see it as a way to experience political liberation within their everyday lives and environment. My aim is to conceptualise prefigurative democracy as an attempt to change the political institution of society. This yields an understanding of the radical potential of protest and social movements today. In the remaining pages, let me summarise my theory of prefigurative democracy in five theses.

1: Prefigurative Democracy Is Neither Revolutionary Nor Reformist

The purpose of prefigurative democracy is to politically re-institute society –and to do this now, not merely in a distant future. In this sense, it poses an alternative to both reform and revolution as traditional conceptions of radical change. Prefigurative democracy derives from the originally anarchist conception of prefiguration to some degree, and breaks with it in a number of other respects. On the one hand, it aligns with the anarchist notion insofar as it maintains that meaningful change can and must be realised in the ‘here and now’ –and not merely in a distant future. But on the other hand, the anarchist idea of prefiguration as a process of ‘building a new society in the shell of the old’ no longer applies in a discussion of contemporary social movements. The image of a ‘new society’ –which, like a sterile embryo, gradually grows in the womb of the ‘old’ one –evinces the implicit ideal of an organic or post-political society that is essentially devoid of social conflict or antagonism. Even if this is perceived as the ultimate aim rather than a feasible objective of prefigurative democracy, the ideal of a post-political society detracts from its true radical potential.