The Pro-Space Movement and Political Organization

Abstract

The organization of the movement relates to the way in which fantasy is managed within the movement. Some general principles common to all social movements hold here, as already discussed. First and foremost is the way in which the movement fantasy of a spacefaring civilization is kept at a critical distance from the ideology of the movement. And then, at another level, the way in which individual activists’ fantasies are held at a distance from this more general fantasy in turn. As I will discuss towards the end of this chapter, the management of this is central to understanding the evolution of the pro-space movement over time. But to begin with I want to explore some of the ways in which the pro-space movement currently manages fantasy through more specific features of its organization, and, crucially, how these features allow for the production of enjoyment within the movement (recalling some of the discussion of Stavrakakis’s work in Chapter 3).