Prefiguring Utopia

Intentional communities around the world are experimenting with new paradigms for human society, including participatory political practices, cooperative economic arrangements and holistic educational modalities. As such, they are perhaps the most compelling contemporary exercise of utopianism and certainly have something to teach us about attempting to foster positive societal change. This book examines Auroville, the largest, most diverse and long-standing intentional community in the world, internationally recognized for its holistic, progressive and inclusive ideals and practices. Located in Tamil Nadu, South India, Auroville uniquely draws on spiritual ideals to enact a prefigurative utopian practice applicable to all aspects of human society; the author, a scholar native to Auroville, offers an in-depth autoethnographic analysis of how its ideals have been, and continue to be, articulated, embodied and developed in realms as wide-ranging as the community’s political and economic organization, as well as various cultural practices. Responding to critiques that spirituality discourages activism, this work is revelatory of the strategic role and influence of spirituality in inspiring, informing and sustaining prefigurative political practice, while providing an honest analysis of the challenges of direct democracy, as well as prefiguring an alternative form of economic organization within a mainstream capitalist context. It raises important considerations pertaining to the perpetuation of prefigurative experiments, drawn from Auroville’s singular longevity and development trajectory, providing both theoretical and pragmatic insights into how communal utopian practice is enabled, challenged and sustained that are relevant for scholars and activists of prefigurative and utopian experiments alike.