Space hijacking and the anarcho-politics of leisure

Abstract

Political scientists, social movement theorists and cultural geographers have made us aware of forms of micro-political resistance that have challenged the privatisation, corporatisation and securitisation of the city. An increasing tactical feature of such resistance has been the deployment of leisure practices and performances to challenge the dominant norms and ideologies governing the use of urban space. This paper focuses upon a case study of a creative intervention organised by a London-based group of anarchists. We consider the tactics employed by the Space Hijackers – a group of self-styled ‘anarchitects’ who have been prominent in questioning the spatialities of everyday urban life through leisure activity and creative protest opportunities. We assess the deliberately liminal tactics employed by the Space Hijackers, situated betwixt and between the normative social regulation of public space and a ‘pre-figurative’ or utopian vision of its future. Through the case study and a review of some prominent attempts to define the leisure–politics relationship, this essay highlights a need to further interrogate the nature and uses of leisure within micro-political struggle and citizen movements that seek to affect social change, and so continues the dialogue about how we are to understand ‘leisure politics’.