Taking exception to the rule : a poststructural analysis of legitimacy in Fiji’s new legal order

This thesis investigates the nature and conditions of legitimacy established in Fiji’s new legal order between 2009 and 2014. Drawing on the work of Giorgio Agamben, the thesis applies the conceptual framework of ‘the state of exception’ to Fiji’s politico-legal system, examining legitimacy as a function of the relation between sovereignty and governance. The thesis takes account of multiple levels of meaning-making at stake in the crisis of legitimacy and interweaves local narrative with poststructural thought, Continental theory and legal doctrine in order to understand legitimacy as constituted in a distinctly Fijian ‘state of exception’.