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The Anarchist In The Coffee House: A Brief Consideration Of Local Culture, The Free Culture Movement, And Prospects For A Global Public Sphere, Siva Vaidhyanathan

Law and Contemporary Problems

Jürgen Habermas' influential historical work, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere, describes a moment in the social and political history of Europe in which a rising bourgeoisie was able to gather in salons and cafes to discuss matters of public concern. The public sphere represented a set of sites and conventions in the eighteenth century in which (almost exclusively male) members of the bourgeoisie could forge a third space to mediate between domestic concerns and matters of state. Here, Vaidhyanathan examines one particular Public Sphere experiment--the rise of a global Free Culture Movement that aims to limit the spread …