https://toarcheio.org To Archeio project site Thu, 30 Apr 2020 12:42:38 +0000 en-GB hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=5.4.1 https://toarcheio.org/items/youth-heterotopias-in-precarious-times-the-students-autonomous-collectivity/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:43 +0000 http://arc.local/items/youth-heterotopias-in-precarious-times-the-students-autonomous-collectivity/ Continued]]> Under the structural restraints of the current financial, social and political crisis, I examine the case of a collectivity of students in Greece as an alternative small-scale form of political and cultural action, and I explore its dynamics and limits. I claim that the ‘collectivity’ is a form of heterotopia, that is, a specific social and cultural space, which somehow reflects and at the same time distorts, unsettles or inverts other spaces. In particular, I seek to uncover the rituals, practices and mentalities produced by the participants of this youth cultural space, and to understand how new subjectivities and collectivities come into being. In this context, I discuss some of the relevant literature on youth political participation. Furthermore, I illustrate the debate about ‘autonomy’ and ‘hegemony’ within social and political theory today.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/european-integration-as-a-moral-economy-greek-technocrats-amidst-capitalism-in-crisis/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:41 +0000 http://arc.local/items/european-integration-as-a-moral-economy-greek-technocrats-amidst-capitalism-in-crisis/ Continued]]> This article engages in the ongoing anthropological discussion on the concept of ‘moral economy’ and opts for its multileveled use. It affirms the concept’s suitability for grasping class-specific sets of moral values and considerations on the economy, as well as universalized moral frameworks through which the economy is commonly addressed by both dominated and dominant classes. In dealing with such universalized moral economies, it is suggested that our analysis should critically address the symbolic construction of the economy as an essentially moral process. The value of such a focus lies in analyzing and historicizing the recurrence of epistemologies that deny the centrality of structural oppositions in capitalism and, rather, place emphasis on moral categories, such as fairness, intentionality, and obligation. This multileveled understanding and use of the concept of moral economy can help us to further comprehend the delineation of neoliberalism in European space and the moral reformulation of the political economy of capitalism-in-crisis. The article is based on ethnographic material addressing the course of action taken by Greek technocrats specialized in the policies and cohesion funds of the European Union.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/the-ambivalence-of-anti-austerity-indignation-in-greece-resistance-hegemony-and-complicity/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:30 +0000 http://arc.local/items/the-ambivalence-of-anti-austerity-indignation-in-greece-resistance-hegemony-and-complicity/ Continued]]> This article engages with a contradiction that can help us appreciate the ambiguity and complexity of indirect resistance as this is articulated in informal everyday contexts: many citizens in Greece boldly challenge the antisocial austerity measures that have plagued their lives, highlighting how these represent a hegemonic imposition led by foreign centres of economic power. Their anti-hegemonic critique, however, often recycles a dislike for foreigners and xenophobia, echoing more pervasive hegemonic narratives (for example, a crypto-colonial identification of Greece with the West). To deal with this contradiction, I stress the need to (1) de-pathologize local indignant discourse (avoiding the orientalization of anti-austerity discourse as emotional or inconsequential) and (2) acknowledge that indirect resistance may represent an astute critique of visible inequalities, but is not isolated from overarching hegemonic ideological influences that shape local interpretations of historical/economic causality.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/athens-in-the-mediterranean-movement-of-the-piazzas-spontaneity-in-material-and-virtual-public-spaces/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:14 +0000 http://arc.local/items/athens-in-the-mediterranean-movement-of-the-piazzas-spontaneity-in-material-and-virtual-public-spaces/ Continued]]> Mediterranean cities are carrying Gramsci’s concept of spontaneity into the 21st century through massive social movements after the ‘Arab Spring’. This paper explores the ways in which the material and virtual cityscape interact with socio-political transformation during the ‘movement of the piazzas’ in Athens, Greece. After a discussion of the importance of urban informality, porosity and land-use mixtures for social cohesion, of creeping ghettoization in some enclaves and of the perils of urbicide, we proceed to an analysis of grassroots action in Athens in comparison with different cities of the Mediterranean and beyond. Social movements are placed in their respective local and global context—their recurrent material landscapes and their cosmopolitan virtual spaces of digital interaction. This analysis leads to reflections on the possible role of popular spontaneity in democratization and in European integration at the grassroots level, against the onslaught of neoliberalism and accumulation by dispossession.

]]>