Titled, “J’Accuse: A Critical Theory of Radical Legal Praxis," Harcourt elaborated a new model for political and legal intervention that would not be merely defensive in orientation, but could also be effective offensively. 

Harcourt had in mind the example of Emile Zola, who published a scathing editorial on January 13, 1898, denouncing the verdict in the treason case against a Jewish officer, Alfred Dreyfus, for allegedly selling military secrets to the Germans. Zola believed Dreyfus was made a scapegoat. Publicly accusing the army of a coverup, Zola invited a libel action in order to prosecute allegations of corruption and antisemitism against the French military and society at large. Zola succeeded in generating a public outcry on Dreyfus’s behalf, leading to a new court martial and eventual presidential pardon.

In a sweeping and arresting lecture, Harcourt drew from a range of political and legal interventions, from Simon Weil’s immersion into the exploitative conditions of industrial society and her decision to participate in armed struggle against Fascism, to Harcourt’s own legal advocacy to try to save the lives of people with intellectual disabilities on Alabama’s death row. In articulating a different form of socio-legal change, Harcourt hoped that “j’accuse” could be replicated in the future, believing it to be radical in its demand for structural transformation of society, its unique capacity to turn the tables on oppressors, yet not be driven by the narrow goals of particular movements. 

View the lecture here.