IAS Book Launch: The Politics of Crisis-Making

In The Politics of Crisis-Making, by shedding light on how humanitarian practice becomes enmeshed with diverse forms of welfare and development, Estella Carpi exposes how the politics of defining crises affect the social and political membership of the displaced. Her ethnographic research in Lebanon brings to light interactions among aid workers, government officials, internally displaced citizens, migrants and refugees after the 2006 war in Beirut's southern suburbs and during the 2011-2013 arrival of refugees from Syria to the Akkar District (northern Lebanon). By documenting different cultures, modalities and traditions of assistance, Carpi offers a full account of how the politics of crisis-making play out in Lebanon.

An important read, The Politics of Crisis-Making shows that it is not crisis per se, but rather the crisis as official discourse and management that are able to reshuffle societies, while engendering unequal political, moral, and nationality-based economies.

The event will be chaired by Prof. Camillo Boano (UCL The Bartlett Development Planning Unit). The author Dr Estella Carpi (UCL Institute of Risk and Disaster Reduction) will be in conversation with Dr Yulia Ioffe (UCL Institute of Risk and Disaster Reduction), Hanadi Samhan (UCL The Bartlett Development Planning Unit) and Dr Samar Maqusi (UCL Civil, Environmental & Geomatic Engineering-PEARL).

The event is organised in collaboration by the Institute of Advanced Studies, the Middle East Research Centre and the Institute of Risk and Disaster Reduction.