This paper considers the relationship between litigants in person (LiPs) and conspiracy theories and seeks to answer two questions: how, and why, do some LiPs come to be conspiracy theorists? The majority of LiPs, of course, do not become conspiracy-minded. There is also no evidence that LiPs are more likely than anyone else in legal proceedings to be conspiracists, only, perhaps, that it is more obvious when they are. But there continue to be individuals who have conspiracist explanations for difficulties or failures they experience throughout legal proceedings. And while it is widely held that some LiPs hold eccentric beliefs about the law, there has been little attempt to understand how and why LiPs may come to acquire or articulate these beliefs. This is presumably because it has not been considered important to interrogate the views of people already often assumed to be ‘difficult’ or eccentric. This paper contends, however, that trying to understand how and why these conspiracist beliefs are acquired matters very much. This is because conspiracy theories can give us a critical insight into how negative experiences of litigation can result in a loss of faith or trust in legal institutions.

Negative attitudes towards litigants in person (LiPs) are long-standing. But despite their persistence, no study has ever considered: how did we get here? This is what this article sets out to do, analysing when the term LiP first appears, and the context in which this occurs. I argue this moment is a by-product of broader changes taking place for the legal profession in the nineteenth century. Drawing on Larson's “professional project” I argue the new county courts become a battleground for attorneys to distinguish themselves, and it is the introduction of certain kinds of distinction that undermines the self-represented party. This article ultimately argues that the LiP role is not simply self-representation, but is rather self-representation that can only occur in the latter stages of the professional project. This means, perversely, that the creation of the term LiP does not indicate the facilitation of lay participation in legal forums; it marks instead the moment when they are displaced. As I conclude, this displacement has profound consequences for LiPs to this day.