Everyday utopianism: Lefebvre and his critics

The strategy of sociocultural critique through the ‘problematization’ or ‘defamiliarization’ of the habitualized character of everyday life is one that is well-established in the literature, especially for adherents of various neo-Marxisms. However, in recent years, several prominent critics have taken issue with the concept of defamiliarization, arguing that the habit-bound, ‘distracted’ and routinized character of the everyday cannot be easily contrasted with, or superceded by, the exceptional or the extraordinary. Such a position, it is suggested, both denigrates the integrity of daily life and promotes a kind of incipient transcendentalism. The work of Henri Lefebvre is often taken to be representative in this regard, and various phenomenologies or pragmatisms are promoted in his stead. In this article, I take issue with such critics, by analyzing Lefebvre’s writings on such key points as his treatment of routine in everyday life, as well as his concepts of totality, dialectics and critique. I end up asserting that, contrary to what is often said, Lefebvre does not promote a dualistic transcendentalism in which daily life is denigrated, but rather an ‘everyday utopianism’ in which routine and creativity, the trivial and the extraordinary, are viewed as productively intertwined rather than opposed. As such, I seek to defend the notion of ‘critique’ vis-à-vis the everyday, and to demonstrate the on-going relevance of Lefebvre’s work, as well as that of the ‘counter-tradition’ that is loosely associated with his name.