Does anarchy imply lawlessness? Or can it be reconciled with constitutionalism? What would an anarchist constitution look like? And how might it reverse the degradation of democracy?

In their important new book, Constitutionalising Anarchy, Ruth Kinna and Alex Prichard reconstruct 150 years of anarchist constitutional theory. They argue that anarchy is the rejection of arbitrary power, not the absence of any constitutional or legal order. In fact, anarchists have had a great deal to say about constitutional power. In conversation with a rich tradition of anarchist constitutional thought, Constitutionalising Anarchy forges the theoretical tools to reconceptualise constitutional power as a decentralised, bottom-up, everyday practice of non-domination.

Ruth Kinna is Professor of Political Theory at the University of Loughborough. Alex Prichard is Professor of International Political Theory at the University of Exeter. They were ISRF Mid-Career Fellows 2023-24 for their joint project Constitutionalising Anarchy: an Anarchist Constitutional Politics for the 21st Century.

Ruth and Alex will be joined by Simon Choat, Associate Professor of Economics at Kingston University London, co-editor of Rethinking Political Thinkers (OUP, 2023); and Kimberly Hutchings, Professor of Politics and International Relations at Queen Mary University of London, co-editor of Women’s International Thought: towards a new canon(CUP, 2022). A Q&A will follow, moderated by ISRF Director of Research Chris Newfield.