Book Description

"A sophisticated, yet accessible, exposition and development of Deleuze & Guattari's legal theory. Although there has been considerable interest in Deleuze & Guattari in critical legal studies, as well as considerable interest in legality in Deleuze & Guattari studies, this is the first book to focus exclusively on Deleuze & Guattari and law. In Deleuze & Guattari's ontology there are two fundamental operations in the organisation of nature and the social: molecular and molar. Molecular processes of genesis and organisation draw upon the forces of the virtual, creating molecular emergent dissipative structures. By contrast, molar organisation draws upon the differentiating operation of a boundary that constitutes a division. After introducing and explaining this ontology, Jamie Murray situates Deleuze & Guattari's engagement with social organisation and legality in the context of their theory of 'abstract machines' and 'intensive assemblages'. He then presents their theory of law: as that of a two-fold conception of, first, a transcendent molar law and, second, an immanent molecular emergent law. Transcendent molar legality is the traditional object of legal theory. And, as explicated here, immanent molecular emergent law is the novel juridical object that Deleuze & Guattari identify. Developing this conception, Deleuze & Guattari: Emergent Law also draw out its implications for current and for future legal theory; arguing that it provides the basis for a new jurisprudence capable of creating new concepts of legality"--Page 4 of cover