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Title | Author(s) | Publishing Date | Keywords | |
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Crafting the good citizen, streaming the good king: Notes on press freedom, hegemony and social contention in King Abdallah II’s Jordan | Rossana Tufaro | July, 2021 |
During the mandate of King Abdallah II, press freedom in Jordan has undergone a significant contraction. This has progressively endowed the Hashemite monarchy and its organic incumbents with an unprecedented directive control over the circulation and the framing of events in the country – hence over the capacity to strategically filter from above the diffusion of politically sensitive news, silence voices of political challengers, and orient domestic and international opinion. This paper aims to provide a preliminary assessment of the role played by the enforcement and the strategic application of restrictions on media freedom in consolidating King Abdallah II’s rule, by scrutinizing how the cumulative strategic application of press restrictions succeeded or failed to validate King Abdallah II's international reputation of a moderate and progressive leader, and legitimize the neoliberal upgrading of the authoritarian bargain with his domestic constituencies. |
Right to Information, Press Freedom, Civic Space, Jordan, Social Movements |
المراكز البحثية ودورها في صنع السياسة الخارجية المغربية | Rachid El-Bazzim, Amal El Houasni | April, 2021 |
نسعى في هذه الدراسة إلى بلورة مقارَبة تأخذ بالمنهج الوظيفي من خلال دراسة وظائف المراكز البحثية وأدوارها في صنع السياسة الخارجية المغربية، إضافة إلى قدرات الوصف والتحليل لمعالجة هذا الموضوع، وذلك انطلاقاً من رصد السياقات التي عرفت نشأة المراكز البحثية المذكورة وتكاثرها، مرتكزين على محاور الاقتصاد السياسي للبحث وتحولات الأبحاث في مجال العلوم الاجتماعية |
Research Centers, Think Tanks, Foreign Policy, Knowledge, Scientific Research, Universities |
Beyond Humanitarian Relief: Social Networks and the Role of Shared Identity in Refugee Belonging and Support in Turkey | Michael Kaplan | August, 2020 |
A considerable body of research explores the ways in which refugees exert agency and establish belonging in exile. This scholarship challenges popular tropes that reduce the varied experiences of displacement to generalized themes of crisis, uprootedness, and suffering. Through exploring refugee involvement in Islamic communities in Turkey, this paper considers the role played by informal social networks and actors in both helping Syrian refugees to secure their basic needs, as well as in fostering subjectivities of belonging. Drawing on secondary research as well as on participant observation and interviews conducted with Syrians living in Turkey, it argues that attention to social networks built upon shared modes of identification, such as being devoutly religious, can offer generative insight into processes of emplacement among refugees. These networks not only make visible some of the problematic aspects of humanitarianism associated with non-governmental organizations, but also present alternative models built upon mutual support and care. At the same time, while recognizing the benefits of informal social networks, this paper also considers the potential for new boundaries and exclusions to emerge where others recede. |
refugees, Humanitarianism, Turkey, Belonging, Syrians, social networks, Anthropology |
The October 2019 Protests in Lebanon: Between Contention and Reproduction | Marie-Noëlle AbiYaghi, Léa Yammine | July, 2020 |
The Lebanese power sharing consociational system has structurally engendered recurring protest cycles: student mobilisations, labour and union mobilising, left-wing collectives, as well as a more routinised associative sector. In a long temporality, and looking at these movements in a longitudinal approach, changes they appear to be seeking appear to be marginal or quite limited, which may lead to the observation that contentious movements play the role of mere relief outlet within the system they are challenging, hence, contributing to the permanence of the social and political structures they are challenging. |
Social Movements, Civil Society, October Protests, Civic Space, Lebanon |
Government (non-)formation in contemporary Lebanon: sectarianism, power-sharing, and economic immobilism. | Catherine Batruni, Marcus Hallinan | September, 2018 |
Four months after the parliamentary elections, the Lebanese state is still without a government. Politicians have been hindering the configuration of a new cabinet in order to maximise their own personal gains. This paper probes the positions of the most prominent political parties in the country, namely the Lebanese Forces, Free Patriotic Movement, Progressive Socialist Party, Lebanese Democratic Party, Future Movement, and Hezbollah, and examines the repercussions of this political vacuum on the economy. We raise the question: why does Lebanon continually find itself in this recurring situation where it is incapable of forming a timely government after elections? We argue that the political structure and sectarian arrangement of the Lebanese government allow such dysfunction to flourish through an absence of accountability measures in the constitution and a prioritizing of sectarian equilibrium as the primary factor in electing a government. |
Lebanese Sectarian System, Power Dynamics, Lebanese Politics |
The Robustness of Sectarian Politics in Lebanon: Reflections on the 2018 Elections | Maguy Arnous | August, 2018 |
Nine years after the last parliamentary elections, almost half of Lebanese voters cast their ballots on 6 May 2018, against expectations of a much higher turnout. The results of the elections marked a shift in the weight of coalitions among established political parties within a robust political system that is divided along sectarian lines, at the expense of new independent voices from civil society actors, that a proportional law should have advanced. This article attempts to analyse the results of the elections with regard to traditional parties, as well as the new so-called “civil society” candidates, while drawing inferences on the behaviour of the Lebanese voter. |
2018 parliamentary elections, Lebanese Elections, Lebanese Politics |
De la pérennisation d'un statut précaire à la lutte pour la titularisation : un regard rétrospectif sur la mobilisation des journaliers de l'Électricité du Liban (EDL). | Louis Mandarino | June, 2016 |
Entre 2012 et 2015, les travailleurs journaliers de l’Électricité du Liban (EDL) entament ce qui sera considéré comme la plus longue mobilisation de l’histoire moderne du Liban. Leur mouvement éclate lorsque l’EDL annonce l’externalisation du secteur de la distribution à trois soumissionnaires privés. En rationnalisant les dépenses, ces derniers auraient licencié 70% de la force de travail journalière. A partir de la description du quotidien du travail avant l’événement contestataire ainsi que des relations sociales, professionnelles et clientélistes qui le caractérisaient, cet article s’efforce de montrer que la mobilisation n’a pas été une réaction « spasmodique » au risque imminent de la perte d’emploi. En effet, les travailleurs percevaient le travail journalier comme un tremplin vers la titularisation. L’externalisation du secteur de la distribution ne mettait donc pas seulement en danger le travail « du jour d’après », mais faisait aussi disparaitre la perspective d’accéder à l’emploi stable « un jour ou l’autre » qui leur permettait de supporter au quotidien leur position subalterne. |
Collective Action, Workers, Economic & Social Rights |
France and Eastern Christians: beneath a controversial mobilisation | Camille Lons | June, 2016 |
This paper explores the relationship between France and Eastern Christians while analysing how the rise of the Islamic State in 2014 has prompted French mobilisation in favor of Christian communities within the areas. Viewing Christians communities as the roots of their culture, French politicians and civil society organisations have come to the rescue of Eastern Christians. Despite this, the policies favoring Eastern Christians do not come without their own political agenda and ideological foundations. In turn, this challenges the neutrality of French humanitarianism. |
Eastern Christians, France, Mobilisation, Refugee Crises |
The Peaceful Settlement of Syrian Refugees in the Eastern suburbs of Beirut: Understanding the causes of social stability | Marianne Madoré | March, 2016 |
This article focuses on the densely populated municipality of Bourj Hammoud, where the proportion of registered Syrian refugees has reached a fifth of the local population without leading to any major violent episodes. Based on extensive ethnographic study, this article reveals how, combined, Bourj Hammoud’s residents’ specific religious or historical ties with Syrian refugees, lenient municipal regulation of refugees movement, and the abilities of the refugees to navigate the city, has allowed peace to prevail through out the city, despite its high number of refugees. |
Syrian Refugees, Borj Hammoud, Peace & Security |
Prisms of Political Violence, ‘Jihads’ and Survival in Lebanon’s Tripoli | Estella Carpi | December, 2015 |
This paper aims to question the mainstream linear processes according to which individual ordinary life is disrupted by engagement with Islamist armed groups. It is based on ten in-depth interviews conducted in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli with Syrian and Lebanese ex-fighters, and with sympathisers of the so-called "Jihadi ideology" who never took up weapons. It shows the cyclic and changing nature of life choices and circumstances which influence Jihadist fighters and supporters. |
Tripoli, Radicalization, Political Violence |