Lebanon’s 17 October Uprising marked a watershed moment in the country’s history as it challenged the very foundation of the political system: sectarian power-sharing. It was the largest and most...Show moreLebanon’s 17 October Uprising marked a watershed moment in the country’s history as it challenged the very foundation of the political system: sectarian power-sharing. It was the largest and most diverse protest movement in decades and its anti-sectarian stature was entirely unprecedented. For the first time, many Lebanese called on their confessional leaders to resign. This thesis examines firstly why the uprising directed its focus toward political sectarianism as a primary cause of Lebanon’s political and economic plight. The inability or unwillingness of sectarian leaders to deliver basic services to their constituents created a situation in which Lebanese across all sects were more united than ever before in their collective plight. Second, it explores the timing of the uprising in the fall of 2019. It argues that the uprising was the culmination of simmering resentments that finally erupted as a result of deteriorating economic conditions, political corruption, and a series of disasters that the government failed to prevent or address. Lastly, the thesis investigates how the uprising helped propel anti-sectarian ideas that were previously taboo into mainstream political discourse. While the 17 October Uprising ultimately failed to achieve its objective of establishing a secular rather than sectarian political order, it stands as the most significant challenge to political sectarianism in the country’s history and could pave the way for future mobilizations in the same vein. This thesis will contribute to the nascent body of literature on the 17 October Uprising and the broader scholarship on sectarian power-sharing as a system of governance.Show less
Research master thesis | Middle Eastern Studies (research) (MA)
open access
The present thesis investigates the relationship between Italian and Lebanese left during the years between 1967 and 1975, uncovering the development of a special relationship between the Italian...Show moreThe present thesis investigates the relationship between Italian and Lebanese left during the years between 1967 and 1975, uncovering the development of a special relationship between the Italian Communist Party (PCI) and the Lebanese Communist Party (LCP). This was a transformative period for both countries' leftist groups, following the 1967 June War and the 1968 global protests. This was reflected in the Italian approach towards the Middle East and the Palestinian cause, as public opinion and the Italian Socialist Party (PSI) moved from a pro-Israel position to support the Palestinian struggle. I argue that this shift was influenced by the close relationship between the PCI and the LCP, which evolved from preferential contact to a special relationship. The LCP was the PCI’s preferred interlocutor in the region, and as the 1975 Civil War approached the PCI began supporting the Lebanese comrades with first humanitarian and then financial aid. This close relationship in turn provided the PCI with information on regional politics and direct access to the Palestinian groups. By the early 1980s, the Italian position completed the shift in favour of Palestine, and both the PCI and PSI abandoned their traditional pacifism to support an Italian military intervention in Lebanon to stop the Israeli invasion in 1982. I investigate this shift mainly through PCI and PSI archives, which show the increasing contact with Lebanese groups and the growing involvement in the country. Looking at the evolving relationship between the Italian and Lebanese Left, this thesis highlights the transnational nature of the leftist movement and connects Italian and Lebanese local politics to the global context of the Cold War and the Long-Sixties.Show less
This thesis investigates the processes of repression and exclusion of the Palestinian refugee in the Arab host-state. A theoretical framework using theories from Michel Foucault, Hannah Arendt,...Show moreThis thesis investigates the processes of repression and exclusion of the Palestinian refugee in the Arab host-state. A theoretical framework using theories from Michel Foucault, Hannah Arendt, Giorgio Agamben, Michael Hardt, and Antonio Negri, is used to analyse the situation of the refugee in the three case studies of Lebanon, Syria, and Jordan. It is argued that biopolitics are employed to control and exclude the Palestinian refugee. The host-state excuses this exclusion through the retoric of the incommensurability of the right of return to Palestine with citizenship of the host-state. Gaining citizenship of the host-state supposedly cancels the right of return to Palestine. This discourse is a tool that is employed by the host-states when he refugee proses a threat to their status quo. This thesis disagrees with this supposed incommensurability argueing that the two can co-exist. Furthermore, an analysis of the situation of the Palestinian refugee in the case studies leads to the conclusion that Hannah Arendt and Giorgio Agamben were right when argueing that the nation-state is the only institution capable of upholding human rights and that without citizenship the refugee is vulnerable and without protection. Because of this, serious steps need to be taken towards citizenship for the Palestinian refugee.Show less
Because contemporary network science is predicated on the assumption that similarity breeds connection, it transforms what seems to be an open web into poorly gated communities that propagate...Show moreBecause contemporary network science is predicated on the assumption that similarity breeds connection, it transforms what seems to be an open web into poorly gated communities that propagate already-existing forms of prejudice and discrimination. If the algorithmic fabric of social media platforms pushes people with the same views and interests towards each other, what does this mean for queer individuals in Beirut inhabiting a city whose very urban fabric segregates and limits their interaction in public space? What possibilities can the digital realm provide queer lives in a cyberspace unhinged by the geography of residence and the materiality of the body? I attempt to answer those research questions by relying on Sara Ahmed’s Queer phenomenology (2006) and on Wendy Hui Kyong Chun’s (2016) concept of “homophily”. Those theoretical lenses will guide my use of auto-ethnography and close visual analysis to explore the outputs and social media strategies of two case studies of visual activism in Lebanon: Beirut By Dyke and Kikafilmadina. My personal experience as a member of civil society groups in Beirut and my positionality as the creator of Beirut By Dyke orient me, to borrow Sara Ahmed’s term, towards these pages as cultural objects. The concept of the social media accounts, which revolves around the narrativization of queer inhabitance in space, propels me toward Sara Ahmed’s theory around sexuality as residence. Conversely, the social impact generated by both social media accounts on collective imaginations and social participation in cyber and physical space leads to me to question how “homophily” (Chun 2016) can be used to challenge the neoliberal assumptions it was built on. My aim is to counter existing literature around gender and digital culture whose understandable focus on the capitalistic and behaviorally predictive valence of social platforms is grim and dystopic (Goldberg 2016). Instead, I suggest that the study of platforms like Instagram offers a resource for queer studies insofar as it “emphasizes the importance of lived experience, the intentionality of consciousness, the significance of newness, or the role of repeated habitual action in shaping bodies and the world” (Ahmed 57). It is specifically the power of repeated habitual actions that I want to focus on in exploring digital possibilities. In a context where systemic oppression is difficult to dismantle and social change impossible to imagine, the creation of new paths is, after all, a labor of repetition.Show less
Recently, scholarly debate on peacebuilding and reconciliation is making a “local-turn”, pointing towards local actors, such as civil society organizations, to achieve inclusive and locally...Show moreRecently, scholarly debate on peacebuilding and reconciliation is making a “local-turn”, pointing towards local actors, such as civil society organizations, to achieve inclusive and locally grounded peace and reconciliation. Despite this interest, little studies have examined if, and how, these local actors make a contribution to these goals. Such a case is Lebanon, characterized by protracted, sectarian conflict, but where a group of CSOs is active within this contentious nexus between conflict and peace. How does the work of these CSOs fit in the paradigm of reconciliation? Can they contribute to reconciliation in Lebanon? Following these questions, this research suggests that these CSOs can be understood through the framework of political reconciliation of Schaap (2005). Furthermore, they exhibit various functions to a reconciliation process: They advocate new narratives on identity, conflict and history, and the rights of victims. It arises that participatory and grassroot approaches are most conducive to successes of the CSOs. At the same time, the strategy and goals of the CSOs are negotiated by constraining factors. In what I call a ‘negotiated reconciliation process’ sectarian and corrupt structures on the one hand, and resource-based problems and international donor wishes on the other, mitigate the level of success of the CSOs.Show less
The overwhelming majority of the more than five and a half million Syrians have fled to neighboring countries in the Middle East without their civil documents. Particularly in a refugee context, it...Show moreThe overwhelming majority of the more than five and a half million Syrians have fled to neighboring countries in the Middle East without their civil documents. Particularly in a refugee context, it is crucial for the standard of living for Syrian refugees and eventual return to Syria to be adequately documented. Complex civil registration systems in the host countries, however, often prevent Syrian refugees from obtaining civil documentation, thereby expanding the problem of the lack and loss of civil documentation of Syrian refugees. This thesis examines the different civil registration systems and their consequences for Syrian refugees in Jordan, Turkey, and Lebanon through an in-depth analysis focusing on legal status, marriage and birth registration. This thesis argues that the difference in implemented civil registration systems is determined by each host country’s social, political, and economic situation before and during the Syrian refugee influx and the extent to which the Syrian refugees have impacted the country, positively and negatively. In Turkey, the government has adopted a temporary protection regime, which includes refugee-sensitive civil registration systems. However, in Lebanon and to a lesser extent Jordan, Syrian refugees are still facing many challenges trying to obtain civil documentation due to the complex civil registration systems. As the eight years of hosting refugees has turned out more harmful than beneficial for the host countries, discussions on the return of Syrian refugees has increasingly become louder. However, a lot of change is still required to ensure that Syrian refugees are adequately documented.Show less
Research master thesis | Middle Eastern Studies (research) (MA)
open access
The thesis is based within the theories of constructivism and looks for the connection between the identity construction and the foreign policy decision-making process. The research question posed...Show moreThe thesis is based within the theories of constructivism and looks for the connection between the identity construction and the foreign policy decision-making process. The research question posed is: why is Hezbollah stepping in the Syrian civil war? What is the relation between this decision and the group’s identity that has been continuously constructed and re-constructed in the past 30 years? Moreover, is the relationship between the decision to go to war and Hezbollah identity construction linear? Can the conflict in Syria affect, or even re-shape the construction of Hezbollah’s identity? How does this comply (or disconnect) with Hezbollah’s own ideas about self and role in the serves in the region? The paper analyses the relation between the identity construction and the decision to go to the Syrian war, and based on this example draws a conclusion that the relationship between the two is rather reciprocal than linear.Show less
Starting out from the background of contemporary art practices in post-civil war Lebanon, this thesis investigates the complex negotations and deconstructions of the archive that Walid Raad´s...Show moreStarting out from the background of contemporary art practices in post-civil war Lebanon, this thesis investigates the complex negotations and deconstructions of the archive that Walid Raad´s project The Atlas Group is undertaking. The first chapter looks into the specific agency of montage that is being used in the work Let ́s be honest the weather helped. A transformative relationship between hiding and affirming is established here, which produces 'potentiality'. In a second step, I will analyse how the subjective nature of history writing is revealed by works in The Atlas Group. The theories of Hayden White will serve as a basis for this chapter. Jalal Toufic ́s concept of the withdrawal of tradition will provide a fundament the second section of this chapter as White and Toufic are going to be put in dialogue. Toufic argues that objects and documents happen to be 'withdrawn' after traumatic events - a unconventional notion that also is reverberating in some pieces by Walid Raad. Thirdly, authority and authorship will serve as two anchor points for further observations as these two are interdependent and integral to the questions, which The Atlas Group is raising. Fourthly, I will analyse how not only the incapability of the document to record 'the decisive' moment is revealed, but also how allusions to this imperceptible instance are being made - an interview Jean Francois Lyotard and Alain Pomarède will enable deeper understanding of these observations.Show less
“In a region beset with chronic and widespread problems, ranging from poor governance, war, violent extremism, and resource scarcity, one threat stands above the rest in terms of potential for...Show more“In a region beset with chronic and widespread problems, ranging from poor governance, war, violent extremism, and resource scarcity, one threat stands above the rest in terms of potential for destruction and cost in opportunity: the use of sectarianism as a geopolitical weapon. Sectarianism encourages extremist rhetoric and violence and serves to distract a populations from economic and social concerns by providing a convenient enemy on which to focus.” This quote by the Soufan group, a strategic security consulting group, displays an opinion that is shared by mainstream media across the globe. The Middle East has apparently fallen into a state of religious extremism where violent sectarianism is every day’s business. Current day Syria seems to be the focal point of all this sectarian violence. This paper tries to analyse what exactly that sectarian violence entails in the SYrian Civil War, and whether we should indeed look at it as a sectarian conflict, or rather a conflict with sectarian aspects.Show less
