Abstract
This article explains the disjuncture between formal parliamentary laws and norms of informal economic activities on the basis of a contextual and layered idea of legitimacy. This explanation clarifies a misunderstanding in certain scholarly and policy circles characterising informal economic activities as extra-legal or illegal. The idea of legal legitimacy helps explain divergent normative logics of formal and informal spaces while indicating that informal activities are not performed in a regulatory void. In addition to helping redefine the informal space, the idea also helps clarify the interaction between formal and informal regulation. By employing Jürgen Habermas’ analytical characterisation of society as constitutive of lifeworld(s) and system, and drawing on the empirical literature, the article argues that a cautious interpretation of Habermas’ analytical categorization helps explain the legality of the informal space. If formal laws need to become legitimate for the informal context, they must integrate the contextual standards of legitimacy recognized in the informal space.
Highlights
I examine the idea of legal legitimacy of informal economic activities such as street vending, domestic work, smallholder farming, home-based work, waste
The idea of legal legitimacy acts as a benchmark to clarify the authenticity of legal regulation in the informal domain
The idea of legal legitimacy offers us a benchmark to judge the validity of formal laws for heterogeneous informal activities, and to evaluate the appropriateness of informal laws for specific categories of informal activities
Summary
I examine the idea of legal legitimacy of informal economic activities such as street vending, domestic work, smallholder farming, home-based work, wasteSocial & Legal Studies XX(X)recycling, and a range of other work practices, which have generally been relegated by international institutions and prominent legal scholars to the domain of illegality or, at least, extra-legality because of the ostensible legal void in which these activities are undertaken. In a related study, Mahy et al (2017: 8–16) document the varied sources of non-state informal law as institutions of social identity (gender, religion, caste, class, and ethnicity), patron-client relationships (often centred on debt), kinship and community (including fictive kinship), location-specific self-regulation by businesses, self-regulation by workers (on the basis of multiple identities), and civil society regulating industry through consumer action campaigns.
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