| Posted on behalf of Vicky Habermehl
~~~~ CFP for a session for the Association of American Geographers (AAG) Annual Meeting, March 29-April 2, 2016 in San Francisco
Everyday Politics, In, Against and Beyond Crises: Neighbourhood Struggles Resisting Austerity and Producing Alternatives
Recent studies of neighbourhood struggles taking place in contexts of crisis have demonstrated their relevance for looking into transformations in how contestation to neoliberal austerity is articulated and manifested. In these, the ongoing crisis is often interpreted through a macro-economic perspective. However, this session aims to take the discussion a step further. In particular, we want to focus on interpretations of crises ‘from below’, through emergent forms of contestation (see Featherstone et al 2015), i.e. how crises are understood, narrated, embodied and contested by local communities and groups. Through engaging with examples of ethnographic research from Europe (such as Greece and Spain etc.) and Latin America (such as Argentina), we argue that counter-austerity politics and alternatives to the crisis of neoliberal capitalism are grounded on everyday life contexts (see Petropoulou 2014, Sitrin and Azzelini, 2014, Stavrides 2014, Zibechi, 2012). Moreover, we aim to demonstrate how everyday practices grounded in local contexts of activism (e.g. urban, neighbourhood, community) provide for crucial insights into how austerity is countered through a ‘politics of necessity’ (Chatterton 2005); and how spaces of resistance to austerity serve as laboratories for alternatives to emerge, e.g. solidarity economy, cooperativism, alternative practices and ‘commoning’ etc. Further, we wish to problematize the potential of these in acting as spaces of empowerment and engaging with ‘in-against-(and) beyond’ formal electoral politics and state solutions, e.g. Syriza, Podemos etc. We invite papers from across critical/radical geography scholars that develop conceptions of crisis contexts through forms of contestation and possibilities for resistance to deepening austerity. Further to these, during this session we aim to draw out comparative elements from these different local contexts of activism. In particular, contributions are encouraged (but not restricted) to address one or more of the following issues:
Session Organisers Athina Arampatzi, University of Leeds Victoria Habermehl, University College London Nick Clare, University of Sheffield
Anyone interested in participating in the session should send an abstract of no more than 250 words by October 21, 2015 to Athina Arampatzi (A.Arampatzi@leeds.ac.uk), Victoria Habermehl (vhabermehl@gmail.com) and Nick Clare (n.clare@shef.ac.uk) For more information on the requirements of the AAG see: http://www.aag.org/cs/ |
