Bulldozing Basic Structures: Legal– Spatial Dimensions of Constituent Power

Abstract

Using the lens of critical legal geography, this article examines the spatial consequences of legal interpretation and doctrine alongside the legal effects of spatial practices. It argues that spatial practices in the form of protests often constitute the exercise of ‘constituent power’ with an actual people inscribing themselves into the virtual realm of ‘we the people’. This performative exercise of constituent power often comes into conflict with the legal horizons of constituted power. The article looks at Section 144 of the Criminal Procedure Code (‘prohibitory orders’) as well as the use of bulldozers as a part of extra-legal mechanisms to control social protest and suggests that they collectively constitute a new ‘nomosphere’ that threatens to redefine constitutional rights and limits.

Keywords

Constituent power bulldozers legal geography nomosphere dissent

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