Revolt and Revolution: Reaching for the Possible 9781848883475

Table of contents :
Revolt and Revolution: Reaching for the Possible
Table of Contents
Revolt and Revolution: Reaching for the Possible
Revolt and Revolution: Reaching for the Possible
‘We are the 99 per cent!’ 150 Years of Battling Wall Street
Demanding the Impossible: The Truth of the Occupy Movement
Reshaping the Everyday in Cairo
‘The Revolution Will Not Be Televised’ (But There Will Be a Soundtrack): Exploring 20th and 21st Century Revolt through Popular
Revolutionizing Terrorism: Al Qaeda’s Transformation from a Centralised Group to a Franchise and from a Militant Ideology to ‘Ar
New Movements and the Question of the Lack of Organization: A Study of the ‘Indignant Movement’ in Spain
The Palestinian Non-Governmental Organisations in the Arab Spring (2010-2013)
Unity in Street-Militancy: Athenian Anarchists and Anti-Authoritarians
Varieties of Sacrifice in States of Exception
The Politics of Contention in Post-Reformasi Indonesia
The Egyptian Revolutions of 1952 and 2011: Identification and Repetition

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Revolt and Revolution

Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

Probing the Boundaries Series Editors Dr Robert Fisher Lisa Howard Dr Ken Monteith Advisory Board Simon Bacon Katarzyna Bronk John L. Hochheimer Stephen Morris Peter Twohig

S Ram Vemuri

Ana Borlescu Ann-Marie Cook Peter Mario Kreuter John Parry Karl Spracklen

A Probing the Boundaries research and publications project. http://www.inter-disciplinary.net/probing-the-boundaries/ The Hostility and Violence Hub ‘Revolt and Revolution’

2014

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Revolt and Revolution: Reaching for the Possible

Edited by

Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis

Inter-Disciplinary Press Oxford, United Kingdom

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© Inter-Disciplinary Press 2014 http://www.inter-disciplinary.net/publishing/id-press/

The Inter-Disciplinary Press is part of Inter-Disciplinary.Net – a global network for research and publishing. The Inter-Disciplinary Press aims to promote and encourage the kind of work which is collaborative, innovative, imaginative, and which provides an exemplar for inter-disciplinary and multi-disciplinary publishing.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior permission of Inter-Disciplinary Press.

Inter-Disciplinary Press, Priory House, 149B Wroslyn Road, Freeland, Oxfordshire. OX29 8HR, United Kingdom. +44 (0)1993 882087

ISBN: 978-1-84888-347-5 First published in the United Kingdom in eBook format in 2014. First Edition.

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Table of Contents Revolt and Revolution: Reaching for the Possible Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis ‘We are the 99 per cent!’ 150 Years of Battling Wall Street Rob Allen

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Demanding the Impossible: The Truth of the Occupy Movement Milo Sweedler

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Reshaping the Everyday in Cairo Sandra A Fernandez

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‘The Revolution Will Not Be Televised’ (But There Will Be a Soundtrack): Exploring 20th and 21st Century Revolt through Popular Music Erin R. McCoy

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Revolutionizing Terrorism: Al Qaeda’s Transformation from a Centralised Group to a Franchise and from a Militant Ideology to ‘Armies of One’ Kleanthis Kyriakidis and Petros Siousiouras

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New Movements and the Question of the Lack of Organization: A Study of the ‘Indignant Movement’ in Spain Mehrdad Emami and Mahrouz Rezaei

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The Palestinian Non-Governmental Organisations in the Arab Spring (2010-2013) Ibrahim Natil

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Unity in Street-Militancy: Athenian Anarchists and Anti-Authoritarians Nicholas Apoifis

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Varieties of Sacrifice in States of Exception Athanasios Christacopoulos

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The Politics of Contention in Post-Reformasi Indonesia Michael Hatherell

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The Egyptian Revolutions of 1952 and 2011: Identification and Repetition Amal Treacher Kabesh

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Revolt and Revolution: Reaching for the Possible Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis At the beginning of November 2013, a group of scholars met in Athens to engage with understanding and exploring revolutions and political activism. Such a meeting may not sound unique, but these scholars where also joined by another group who could best be described as ‘academic-activists’: that is, scholars who do not only study political activism, but are active themselves. The three days were memorable due to the level of engagement and discussion, respect given to diverse and divergent viewpoints, and the general good humour that marked our time together. Overlooking ancient temples and the Ancient Greek Agora and other symbols of democracy, we could also see an area of Athens known to be the suburbs that anarchists and political activists live and congregate, we mulled over the socio-political matters of social justice, neo-liberalism, the repetitions involved in values and activism, gender, class, race and the role of the State in perpetuating the status quo characterised by injustice and inequity. This particular collection of chapters arises from that conference and covers many of the pertinent issues considered and debated. Talk, Noise, Silence This collection begins with Rob Allen’s exploration of the Occupy Movement that he situates across 150 years of political activity confronting the advantages of the financial sector, the role of the banks and inequality. 1 Importantly, the Occupy Movement has confronted and brought to public attention the role of Governments in supporting the financial sector and social inequality. The slogan of ‘Wall Street Kills’ is a potent reminder of the effects of inequality on the majority of the population. Allen’s chapter is a salutary exploration of the persistence of inequality and the importance of socio-political activism in confronting inequity. While Allen is equivocal on the strength, or not, of the various strands, Milo Sweedler’s analysis of the Occupy Movement argues that it is precisely the diversity of voices and the refusal to make ‘reasonable’ demands that is at the core of the Occupy Movement’s political resistance and potential disruption. 2 Drawing from Slavoj Žižek’s arguments that it is precisely in refusing coherence and pragmatic solutions that radical possibilities are possible, as ‘being reasonable’ and articulate inevitably involves capitulation to the status quo. For Sweedler the accuracy, or not, of the slogan 99% is immaterial as it acts as a signifier for an important political claim. More importantly, for Sweedler the slogan ‘we are the 99%’ institutes a new political subject that is synonymous with ‘the people’. Taking on Jacque Ranciere’s claim that we ‘live in States of oligarchy’, Sweedler explores simultaneously the importance of socio-political movements such as Occupy and the various understandings of such movements that arise from the work of Alain Badiou and Ranciere. 3 Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ While Allen and Sweedler explore movements that are noisy and insistent, Sandra A. Fernandez and Erin R. McCoy take on silence and absence. 4 In brief, Fernandez explores the activity of an anti-sexual harassment movement in Cairo and McCoy laments the absence of musical protest in America. Fernandez explores the socio-political activism of an organisation committed to challenging the prevalent sexual harassment currently endemic in Egypt. This movement believes in both non-violent intervention and dialogue as effective forms of engagement. Tackling gender inequality, and entrenched views of gender roles, this particular socio-political movement intervenes through educating and socialising differently young people. Fernandez is clearly committed to non-violent interventions and to dialogue as the most effective way towards building a more effective future based on equality. Significantly, the movement’s starting place is tackle sexual harassment while working towards a more ambitious intention of alleviating the social ills of Egyptian society. A crucial aspect of this value system, both for Fernandez and the socio-political movement that she discusses is the emphasis on dialogue and talk as a way through various challenges and obstacles. Erin R. McCoy is driven to understand: what has happened to music as political protest? McCoy’s frustration is clear and drives this chapter as she questions, persistently in the best possible way, the changes in the expression of political discontent. For McCoy, the decline in political protest from the era of the Vietnam war unlike the protests against the U.S’s actions in many areas of the world which have not garnered the political protests, use of popular culture or indeed the noise generated by political music. Tracing through the changes in political slogans – for example, for the American government to ‘blow kisses, not bombs’ (with all the resonances of the slogans of the 1960s) – McCoy explores political engagements and the various nuances that the protests have taken. Her fundamental exasperation lies with the lack of insistence on being heard despite any hardships that might befall the protester….to believe in a cause enough to stand up the established order and make sure your voice was heard? The New? Concern should be mobilised in relation to the seeming absence of political activity while there appears to be increasing noise and talk in relation to the apparent growth of Islamic militancy. While many Western governments present Islamic militants as part of an insidiously powerful, aggressive and ever growing movement/s Kleanthis Kyriakidis and Petros Siousiouras argue that terrorist movements are now decentralised. 5 Rather, Kyriakidis and Siousiouras assert that terrorism continues to be political, rational and mainly local. They refute the widely adhered to notions of terrorism as global, religious and as wanting to conquer the world. They suggest powerfully that it is political ideology that drives Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ these diverse factions as Kyriakidis and Siousiouras point to the fractures that exist among the various groups. Moreover, while these groups want media attention (after all we all inhabit a media saturated society) the actions are local and directed largely at establishing a united Islamic world that is united through Shari’a law. Indeed, armies of one are the new structural formations leading to fragmentation a lack of leadership and hierarchy. For Kyriakidis and Siousiouras understanding and bolstering democracy through grass roots organisations and effort has to be put into alleviating poverty, inequality and humiliation. Kyriakidis and Siousiouras are concerned with global patterns while Mehrdad Emami and Mahrouz Rezaei focus our attention on the new movements in Spain. 6 Whereas Sweedler perceives the lack of coherence as a point of hope, fragmentation is a cause of concern for Emami and Rezaei. They draw out two new features of socio-political activity the first, is the role of social media in the formation of networks and second, the increasing presence of previously marginalised groups such as migrants, refugees, women and the poor. Despite these shifts it is the lack of organisation, binding ideology and lack of a coherent framework that bothers Emami and Rezaei as they argue that when a protest movement lacks unity it can only be short term and can only have limited impact. They span various socio-political movements that range across time and place to put forward their argument that until unity and coherence is achieved these important movements will remain temporary thereby leaving the status quo untouched. Resisting and/or Working the State The State is clearly omnipresent and clearly omnipotent. There is persistently a dilemma for many, but not by no means all, socio-political organisations as to whether or not work with the State or to stringently resist the State with all its overt and covert operations. Ibrahim Natil explores the role of NGOs in Palestine and their involvement in the Arab Spring. 7 For Natil, NGOs are crucial stakeholders as they mobilise and empower as they work to mobilise certain sectors of society. Natil is optimistic in relation to the role of NGOs in the political activity that took place during the Arab Spring (2010-2013) and he asserts that these organisations must be reactivated as a move to revitalise the political activity that took place during that time. He provides a helpful historical description of NGOs under Israeli occupation in relation to the various activities that were undertaken and the belief system underpinning these activities. Natil describes the political activity that took place by Palestinian young people and their challenge to Israel and as important as a confrontation to Hamas and Fatah. While Natil describes organisations working through the State, Nicholas Apoifis describes the anarchist movement in Athens – the very movements whose home suburbs we could glance from the conference venue. A radical aspect of Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Apoifis’s work is his use of militant ethnography that as Apoifis writes ‘deliberately blurs the distinction between research and political activism’. 8 Militant ethnography requires intense political involvement and Apoifis’s vivid account is a testimony to the requirements incumbent on those who undertake this method. The differences between the various anarchist and anti-authoritarian groups are portrayed and Apoifis lifts off from his account to theorise the various divergences and disagreements between these groups. While, Apoifis describes the divergences the narrative does not stop there as he goes onto highlight the ways in which unity is achieved through street protests and the expression of grievances. Anarchism and anti-authoritarian politics and ideologies are a necessary counterpoint to those theorists described by Allen as dismissing so much political activity as paranoid and immature. While the activity of the State is overt in oppressing militant political activity Athanasios Christacopoulos’ chapter describes the subtle manoeuvres of the State. In this chapter, Christacopoulos is preoccupied with the ethical matter of whether or not a human being should obey the law when no observer or indeed lawenforcer is present. 9 He opens with a prescient example of a man is in an emergency and the dilemmas that arise in relation to breaking the law or not. In short, why do we obey the law? The reference to Agamben is clear but Christacopoulos’ range of theorists is wide ranging taking in Kant, Schmitt, Plato and so on. Through this chapter Christacopoulos explores the following: sacrifice, ideology, ritual and the state of exception. Resistance and Repetition Michael Hatherell and Amal Treacher Kabesh are preoccupied with the repetition of history in two different geo-political regions – Indonesia and Egypt – and both chapters challenge the simplistic resort to resistance as a moment of celebration. 10 Hatherell explores the nature of political resistance in Indonesia and traces through three individual events to highlight that emphasis on macro definitions of success or failure can obscure the insights that can be gained through a close concentration on particular events. The three dissimilar events highlight the complex and nuanced nature of political engagement in Indonesia. As with many of the chapters in this collection, Hatherell focuses on social media as a tool in political engagement. While McCoy bemoans the lack of popular culture in the US, Hatherell describes how music has been used in Indonesia to capture the emotion and the grievances experienced. For Hatherell, the use of banners, chants, drums and the symbolic acts undertaken in protests draw on established repertoires and he lifts off from this insight to ask a number of important questions: how do repertoires change over time and why? Which repertoires are acceptable to the State and again why? In short, Hatherell explores the all too important question posed by Grossberg: what is new, what is the same, and what has been re-articulated. Likewise, Kabesh Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ is concerned with the repetition of political structures in Egypt that have led to the perpetuation of inequality, poverty and the entrenchment of the deep state. History within this account cannot be sloughed and too easy a celebration of the Arab Spring has led to a paralysis of thinking and confronting the challenges in relation to building societies anew that are based on social justice. We only have to witness the disastrous events that are currently taking place (summer of 2014) in Syria, Iraq, and while under-reported but still in chaos – Libya to be confronted by the question: how do we think and judge these events? Hatherell is concerned with the past 15 years in Indonesia and Kabesh is preoccupied with Egypt from 1952 onwards and the persistent legacy of a colonised and postcolonial history. It is the way that the past operates inexorably in the present that is the underlying disquiet of this contribution and the central theme is that judgement and thought following Hannah Arendt has to be undertaken for a more effective society to be made. Together these chapters are an important contribution to the broad area of social justice, political activism and social change. Under the broad banner of ‘revolt and revolution’, they remind us of the socially constructed nature of injustice: and if we, as social beings, created these injustices, together we can revolt against them and demand the seeming impossible. This should not just be the focus of academic activists, but of all scholars. It was a pleasure to meet the scholars represented in this volume and work together to bring their work together.

Notes Rob Allen, ‘“We are the 99 per cent!” 150 Years of Battling Wall Street’, in this volume. 2 Milo Sweedler, ‘Demanding the Impossible: The Truth of the Occupy Movement’, in this volume. 3 Ibid. 4 Sandra A. Fernandez, ‘Reshaping the Everyday in Cairo’, in this volume; Erin R. McCoy, ‘“The Revolution Will Not Be Televised” (But There Will Be a Soundtrack): Exploring 20th and 21st Century Revolt through Popular Music’, in this volume. 5 Kleanthis Kyriakidis and Petros Siousiouras, ‘Revolutionizing Terrorism: Al Qaeda’s Transformation from a Centralised Group to a Franchise and from a Militant Ideology to “Armies of One”’, in this volume. 6 Mehrdad Emami and Mahrouz Rezaei, ‘New Movements and the Question of the Lack of Organization: Study of the “Indignant Movement” in Spain’, in this volume. 7 Ibrahim Natil, ‘The Palestinian Non-Governmental Organisations in the Arab Spring (2010-2013)’, in this volume. 1

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__________________________________________________________________ Nicholas Apoifis, ‘Unity in Street-Militancy: Athenian Anarchists and AntiAuthoritarians’, in this volume. 9 Athanasios Christacopoulos, ‘Varieties of Sacrifice in States of Exception’, in this volume. 10 Michael Hatherell, ‘The Politics of Contention in Post-Reformasi Indonesia’, this volume; Amal Treacher Kabesh, ‘The Egyptian Revolutions of 1952 and 2011: Identification and Repetition’, in this volume. 8

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Revolt and Revolution: Reaching for the Possible

Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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‘We are the 99 per cent!’ 150 Years of Battling Wall Street Rob Allen Abstract For over 150 years, Wall Street has provided a focus for protest. In the late 19th century, populists, under the banners of the ‘Greenbacker’ and ‘Free Silver’ movements, sought to attack the ‘monopolists’ of an emergent capitalist economy, looking outside of the two-party system to represent the views and needs of the 99 per cent. A contemporary song plaintively pointed to ‘The ninety-nine in their hovels bare, The one in a palace in riches rare’. Over a century later, the ‘Occupying Wall Street’ (OWS) movement again focussed attention on New York financiers and their role in recent economic disaster in the US and globally. While short-lived, it sought to represent the 99 per cent of Americans against concentrated wealth. Again, the protesters looked outside of the formal political system for answers. Such populist movements have often received either scant or contemptuous attention. Fifty years ago the US historian Richard Hofstadter dismissed populists for their ‘paranoid style of politics’. This chapter looks at whether the idea of a ‘paranoid style’, or more recent notions based around ‘conspiracy’, can help to understand the longstanding search of Americans for alternatives outside of the two-party structure to remedy the ills of capitalism. More broadly it looks, in these terms, at the standing of modern populists as well as their historical predecessors. It concludes that populism is better seen through an understanding of the continuing tensions in democratic structures rather than the paranoid or conspiratorial mindsets of protestors. In particular it looks at what Canovan calls the ‘democratic pretensions’ of populists, who see themselves as true democrats, wishing ‘to cash in democracy’s promise of power to the people’, claiming that they speak for the ’common people’. As such, she argues, ‘populism accompanies democracy like a shadow’, rather than being other than, or antagonistic towards, democracy. Key Words: Occupy, populism, democracy, Wall Street, conspiracy. ***** 1. The 99 per Cent The ‘Occupy Wall Street’ (OWS) movement brought together an eclectic group of activists with a wide range of grievances. It centred its resentment on the role of banks and the financial sector in the recent economic turbulence and its’ agitation on Zuccotti Park just north of Wall Street, from mid-September to mid-November 2011. The financial system, it was argued, had been very quickly bailed out by the taxpayers in the crash of 2008, without anything being done to change disparities of wealth among private citizens and without anyone being punished. The Occupy movement claimed to represent the 99 per cent of Americans against the 1 per cent Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ of concentrated wealth-owners who, it was argued, largely control the government and are able to influence laws and regulations in their favour, and who neither of the two main political parties seems able to rein in. 1 The movement had some clear parallels with an earlier populist movement in the US in the late 19th century which focussed around an attack on ‘monopolists’, and which railed against corporate ‘robber barons’, financiers, labour conditions, the manipulation of currency, and the inadequacies of the two-party system in constraining them. Both Wall Street and the 99 per cent also featured in that period with the suffragist agitator Mary Elisabeth Lease claiming at the beginning of the 1890s that: We wiped out slavery and then our tariff laws and national banks began a system of white wage slavery worse than the first. Wall Street owns the country. It is no longer a government of the people, by the people, and for the people, but a government of Wall Street, by Wall Street, and for Wall Street. The great common people of this country are slaves, and monopoly is the master....The [political] parties lie to us and the political speakers mislead us. 2 At the same time there was a highly popular song, ‘Labour’s Ninety and Nine’, which went along the lines of: There are ninety-and-nine who live and die In want and hunger and cold, That one may live in luxury And be lapped in its silken fold; The ninety-and-nine in their hovels bare, The one in a palace in riches rare. 3 In the 1960s, the renowned US historian Richard Hofstadter criticised these 19th century populists for their ‘paranoid style of politics’ and he would undoubtedly have taken a similar view of the Occupy movement. 4 This chapter considers the usefulness of the idea of a ‘paranoid style’ of politics, and whether it illuminates the outbreaks of anti-monopolist/anti-capitalist populism over the last century or so, represented by continuing agitation over Wall Street and the recurrent search by Americans for alternatives to the mainstream Democrat/Republican party structure, particularly when it is in crisis. It concludes that the progressive populism that underpinned both the populist movements of the last two decades of the 19th century and the Occupy Wall Street Movement of 2011 are better seen through an understanding of the inherent tensions in the democratic structures of the United States rather than the paranoid or conspiratorial mindsets of the agitators.

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__________________________________________________________________ 2. The Battle against Wall Street The record of Wall Street demonstrations and riots dates back over 200 years. As Weidner noted, ‘Wall Street and the New York Stock Exchange are the nation's town square, second only to the National Mall in Washington’, and Wall Street protests are something of an American institution. While the influence and effect of such protests has been highly variable, the themes have been generally consistent: ‘greed run amok, inequality of income and a government beholden to financial interests’. 5 In the late 19th century, antagonism centred on the idea of ‘anti-monopoly’, led by the Greenback Labor Party, which was formed in the late 1870s. The party opposed a shift from paper money - greenbacks - to a bullion coin-based monetary system which, it was feared, would put too much power back into the hands of privately-owned banks and corporations. It later broadened its platform to include support for an income tax, an eight hour day, and votes for women, drawing in people from other fringe parties such as the Socialistic Labor Party, as well as trade unions, the Knights of Labor, and single interest groups, notably the Irish Land League. As such it embraced ‘every variety of opinion, from respectable conservatism to the wildest Communism’. 6 It was to last for less than a decade, though many of its members moved on to become activists within the populist People’s Party of the 1890s. This party, which grew out of agrarian unrest in the South and West but later embraced labor unions and elements of the Democratic party, saw its enemies as ‘corporate owners of railroads, telegraphs and warehouses, and the eastern bankers dominating the financial and monetary system’ 7 with Wall Street and railroads as the ‘symbols of tyranny’. 8 Of particular interest to these later populists was the issue of ‘free silver’, an inflationary monetary policy using the ‘free coinage of silver’ as opposed to the Gold Standard that was seen as benefitting the wealthy alone. The movement reached its peak in 1896 when the populists and the democrats came together in support of the presidential candidate, William Jennings Bryan, who in his memorable ‘Cross of Gold’ speech talked of ‘the struggle between the idle holders of idle capital and the struggling masses who produce the wealth and pay the taxes’. The Free Silver movement drew together the populists, unions and ‘ordinary American citizens’ in the fight against the ‘robber barons’ of laissez-faire capitalism. 9 In 1900, as this populist movement lost its momentum, L Frank Baum wrote the book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz which is, it has been argued, a parable of the populism of that era. 10 Quentin Taylor has claimed of the Wicked Witch of the East that: The witch represents eastern financial-industrial interests and their political allies, the main targets of populist venom. Midwestern farmers often blamed their woes on the nefarious practices of Wall Street bankers and the captains of industry whom they believed Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ were engaged in a conspiracy to “enslave” the “little people” just as the Witch had enslaved the Munchkins. Populists viewed establishment politicians, including presidents, as helpless pawns or willing accomplices. The death of the Wicked Witch, however, is a just cause for rejoicing – the little people, owing to the destruction of eastern power, are now free. 11 During the 20th century, with the populist movement gone, there were occasional confrontations around Wall Street: an anarchist bomb was exploded outside the offices of J. P. Morgan, killing 38 people in 1920; in 1970, in the shadow of Vietnam and the killing of students at Kent State University, the Hard Hat Riot took place on Wall Street with anti-war rioters confronted by construction workers and Wall Street brokers and traders acting to break up the fights; and in 1990, protesters, including groups such as Earth Day Wall Street, Earth First!, the Clamshell Alliance and the Youth Greens, marched on the New York Stock Exchange calling for corporate environmental responsibility under the banner ‘Wall Street Kills’. 12 A pamphlet from that latter protest summarised the situation: ‘Wall Street is the symbolic center for an economy based on limitless greed and speculation’. 13 Moving into the 21st century, the Occupy Wall Street movement contained not just those who were angry at Wall St (as the symbol of much that was wrong with finance and the economy), but also those who had more general concerns about the political manoeuvrings of Washington, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and a myriad of other grievances. As with similar and concurrent movements around the world, the OWS agitators, as Calhoun notes: …came with different analyses and ideologies, passions and emphases. Some were anarchists, some came from more conventional Left political parties. Some were participants in efforts to build a new economy through cooperatives, barter and alternative currencies. Some were employees of corporations shedding jobs. Some were students facing the future fearful there would be no jobs. 14 This diversity is shared with the populists and anti-monopolists of the late 19th century which brought together not just farmers and workers, but many brands of reformers. As Kazin notes: …Populist organizers reached out to….the middle-class, antisaloon crusaders…to the urban workers…to the salon utopians… [to] the mostly working class advocates of Henry George’s single land tax…and to Christian socialists… 15

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__________________________________________________________________ Both movements looked, in general, to the non-violent transformation of the political and economic system, but believed that it could not be done through the traditional structures of democratic politics, and specifically the main political parties. The late Stéphane Hessel, arguably the ‘inspiration behind the Occupy Movement’ and for global non-violent protest, through his book Time for Outrage! Indignez-Vous! (!), claimed that the Occupy movement is: 16 not an ideological revolution. It is driven by an authentic desire to get what you need…the present generation is not asking governments to disappear but to change the way they deal with people’s needs. 17 Calhoun has written that ‘OWS was…a populist mobilization. It tapped into a widespread sense of being the people, being the legitimate basis of society, and being ignored’. 18 Both of these are sentiments that would have been pertinent a century or so earlier. In both eras, the argument was for the disruption of existing economic and political structures, though not necessarily for revolution, so that the great majority - the ‘people’ in their multitude of interests and ideas - might have a meaningful impact on the status quo. 3. Paranoid Protestors History, particularly in the 20th century, has generally given populists a rough ride. Despite their wide range of interests and activities, they were, until relatively recently, normally written off as reactive and reactionary. Michael Roe, writing in the 1960s of England in the 1870s, noted that the key characteristics of a populist were that they were: ill at ease in this world, tending to become desperate, even hysterical; veered towards doom and destruction; fated to fail; emotional and religious rather than intellectual and scientific; generally averse to learning and logic; and also hostile to liberal beliefs. He also noted ‘a lust for discovering conspiracy and corruption as the key characteristic of populism’ with the populists themselves ‘open to fear, despair, hate’. Populists were therefore, by definition, marginal, counterproductive and potentially dangerous. 19 Similarly, 19th century US populism had an equally difficult time at the hands of mid-20th century US historians, acquiring, through Richard Hofstadter’s work, the burden of being deemed to be of a ‘paranoid style’ of politics. 20 This style, he claimed, ‘evokes the sense of heated exaggeration, suspiciousness, and conspiratorial fantasy’ with its ‘angry’ and ‘agitational’ mind; the pervasive framework of ‘suspicious discontent’; and the impossible demands and millennial dreams of victory. Why, Robert Collins asks, did Hofstadter and his colleagues take such a ‘uniformly and exaggeratedly bleak view of the Populists’ reducing them to ‘a horde of xenophobic, anti-Semitic, delusional cranks’? 21 As Hogeland notes, it is relatively Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ easy to view the populism of the late 19th century US in quite the opposite way, not as the reactionary force it was made out to be, but as a progressive movement that sought radical social change, favoured labour over capital, with a goal of economic and political equality. The populists wanted the abolition of national banks, a progressive income tax, the eight hour workday and the nationalisation of railroads and telegraphs. They sought to use state power to regulate commerce and restrain the abuses they saw as inherent in corporate wealth. 22 Collins argues that Hofstadter ‘sketched too starkly’ the dark side of the movement, rather than these progressive inclinations. He depended on a concept of status anxiety that led to the view that populists were fundamentally ‘psychopathological and irrational’. This exaggerated the outsider, reactionary and conspiratorial themes underpinning discussion of the phenomenon. 23 But, as Kazin has shown more recently, populist ideas – in the US at least - can appear at one moment to be conservative (in the anti-communism of the 1950s and early 1960s and the Tea Party of recent years), liberal at another time (in the New Deal of the 1930s) and thoroughly independent at other times (in the populist campaigns of the late nineteenth century or the Occupying Wall Street movement). 24 As Taggart notes: Populism serves many masters and mistresses…it has been a force for change, a force against change, a creature of progressive politics of the left….and a companion of the extreme right. Populists have been portrayed as dupes, democrats and demons. 25 Historians of the early 21st century have sought to present a more helpful (though not necessarily sympathetic) picture. They have returned to the discussion of 19th century US populism, not just on its own terms, but in the context of a contemporary resurgence (or perhaps insurgence) of debates around so-called ‘conspiracy theory’. Fenster, for example, has argued that conspiracy theorising is not necessarily marginal or pathological, and can suggest often justifiable discontent with institutional democracy and governance. 26 While overarching conspiracy theories may be wrong or overly simplistic, they may sometimes, he says, be on to something. Specifically, they may well address real structural inequities, albeit ideologically, and they may well constitute a response, albeit in a simplistic and unpragmatic form, to an unjust political order, a barren or dysfunctional civil society, and/or an exploitative economic system. While conspiracy thinking did saturate much of the 19th populist press, most of it was in fact neither irrational nor hateful. Nugent concluded that populists - and much the same would apply to ‘Occupiers’ - were more likely to be ‘bound together not by common neuroses but by common indebtedness, common price squeezes, common democratic and humanitarian ideals, and common wrath at the infringement of them’. 27 Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Under various banners, the 19th century populists attacked establishment forces and sought to extend and improve the franchise while limiting and decentralising government. Avoiding revolution or violence, they were reformers who believed that labour and capital could work together. The ‘people’ were producers; the unproductive were the enemy; the working class (the proletariat) was replaced by the working classes (the usefully productive 99 per cent). They wanted a framework of a more direct democracy, not hidebound by caucus or machine. Established parties served only, in their view, to diminish the independence of both their members and their representatives. Alternatives were needed to act as the conscience of the mainstream parties. What was needed was for the people, and that included women, to have a voice in what happened to them and their country. This bears much resemblance to the Occupy movement with its left-oriented ‘ultra-egalitarian and scrupulously non-violent’ beliefs in ‘direct, participatory and transparent democracy; a consensus based decision-making process; valuing people before profits; and eliminating the exploitation of labour’. In its anti-authoritarianism it, like its 19th century predecessors, seeks to be a useful corrective to authorities who have lost the confidence of the citizenry. 28 4. True Democrats We probably, therefore, need first to bring activists out of what McWilliam has called ‘the dustbin of populism’, which still remains, although more favourably presented, the place to which people or movements are generally consigned if they do not fit within a two party structure and a political dichotomy of left and right. 29 Instead, we should look at where populists sit within a more holistic view of democratic systems. ‘Populism’ and ‘conspiracy’ (and even ‘paranoia’) do have something to say about such activists. They identify elements of style, rhetoric and persuasion which allow protestors to represent and articulate their painful experience of democratic systems that do not live up to expectations. However, such terms, while having some utility, distort and undermine the significance and intentions of the people they caricature. The picture they capture is neither full nor fair. Underpinning much of the activity of so-called populists, though sometimes masked, are what Canovan calls the ‘democratic pretensions’ of the activists, who actually see themselves as true democrats, wishing ‘to cash in democracy’s promise of power to the people’ and claiming that they speak for the ’common people’. Developing Oakeshott’s contrast between ‘the politics of faith’ and ‘the politics of scepticism’, Canovan seeks to understand ‘populism’ and ‘the people’ (and, by implication, ‘paranoia’) by first looking to, and within, democracy itself in terms of two opposing, but interdependent, faces; one ‘pragmatic’ and the other ‘redemptive’. Democracy’s pragmatic face, she says, can be caricatured with the slogan ‘ballots not bullets’. A corresponding caricature of its redemptive face might be Vox populi Vox dei or ‘government of the people, by the people, for the people’.

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__________________________________________________________________ Some degree of redemptive democracy’s promise of salvation is actually necessary to lubricate the machinery of pragmatic democracy, and if it is not present - cannot clearly be seen or heard within the mainstream political system - it may well assert itself in the form of a populist challenge of some sort. As such, she says, ‘populism accompanies democracy like a shadow’, integral to it rather than existing as something other than, or in opposition... 30 Working in a similar way, Panizza, noting that populism has ‘traditionally been regarded as a threat to democracy’ concludes that ‘attempts to enact the will of the people are an intrinsic part of the democratic struggles which have always involved a great deal more than parliamentary procedures’. Rather than being contrary to democracy, they are ‘profoundly compatible with democracy’. They may not be the ‘highest form of democracy’ but nor are they its enemy. Instead populism is a ‘mirror in which democracy can contemplate itself, warts and all, and find what it is about and what is lacking’. 31 By marginalising, or even dismissing, ‘populist’ activity and seeking to make it an aberration or exception, critics have failed to grasp the complexity of democratic structures and processes. Whether we are looking at the anti-monopolists of the 19th century or the Occupiers of the 21st, it is not too difficult to see populists, as ‘paranoid’ or conspiratorial as they might appear, uncomfortably straddling the redemptive and the pragmatic sides of democracy, living in, and battling from, that ever-present shadow, while confronting democracy with all its flaws and inadequacies.

Notes Craig Calhoun, ‘Occupy Wall Street in Perspective’, in The British Journal of Sociology 64.1 (2013): 36, /doi/10.1111/bjos.2013.64.issue-1/issuetoc. For the story of the Occupy movement, see Todd Gitlin, Occupy Nation: The Roots, the Spirit, and the Promise of Occupy Wall Street (New York: Harper Collins, 2012). For a contemporary analysis of the 1 per cent see Joseph E. Stiglitz, ‘Of the 1%, by the 1%, for the 1%’, in Vanity Fair, May 2011. 2 Mary Elisabeth Lease, ‘Wall Street Owns the Country’, in Voices of a People’s History of the United States, eds. Howard Zinn, and Anthony Arnove (New York: Seven Stories Press, 2011), 226. 3 The earliest version appears to have been penned by Mrs S. M. Smith for Greenbacker Peter Cooper’s 1876 presidential bid. Leopold Vincent, ‘Labor’s Ninety and Nine’, in The Alliance and Labour Songster: A Collection of Labour Songs, for the Use of Alliances, Grange Debating Clubs, and Political Gatherings (Indianapolis: Vincent Bros., 1891). 4 Richard Hofstadter, ‘The Paranoid Style in American Politics’, in Harper’s Magazine, November 1964, 77-86. 1

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__________________________________________________________________ David Weidner, ‘Occupy Wall Street Has History on Its Side’, in Wall Street Journal, 20 October 2012. Viewed 6 September 2013, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203752604576641902694217730 .html. 6 Mark A. Lause, The Civil War’s Last Campaign: James B. Weaver, the GreenbackLabor Party and the Politics of Race and Section (Maryland: University Press of America, 2001), 170. 7 Charles Postel, The Populist Vision (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), 17. 8 Postel, The Populist Vision, 142. 9 Michael Kazin, A Godly Hero: The Life of William Jennings Bryan (New York: Random House, 2006), 61-64. 10 L. Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Chicago: George M. Hill, 1900); David B. Parker, ‘The Rise and Fall of the Wonderful Wizard of Oz as a “Parable on Populism”’, Journal of the Georgia Association of Historians 15 (1994): 49-63. 11 Quentin Taylor, ‘Money and Politics in the Land of Oz’, Viewed 14 November 2011, http://www.usagold.com. 12 Weidner, ‘Occupy Wall Street’. 13 Lance Ignon and Jim Herron Zamara, ‘Protests Wall Street; Hundreds Are Arrested’, in Los Angeles Times, 24 April 1990, Viewed 8 September 2013, http://articles.latimes.com/1990-04-24/business/fi-251_1_earth-day 14 Calhoun, ‘Occupy Wall Street in Perspective’, 28. 15 Michael Kazin, The Populist Persuasion: An American History (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1995), 29. 16 Stéphane Hessel, Time for Outrage! Indignez-Vous (New York: Hachette, 2011) 17 Kim Willsher, ‘Stephane Hessel, Writer and Inspiration behind Occupy Movement, Dies at 95’, in Guardian, 27 February 2013, Viewed 27 February 2013, http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/feb/27/writer-activist-stephane-hesseldies-aged-95 18 Calhoun, ‘Occupy Wall Street in Perspective’, 34. 19 Michael Roe, Kenealy and the Tichborne Cause: A Study in Mid-Victorian Populism (Melbourne: University of Melbourne Press, 1974), 165-167. 20 Hofstadter, ‘The Paranoid Style’, 77. 21 Robert Collins, ‘The Originality Trap: Richard Hofstadter on Populism’, in The Journal of American History 76 (1989): 150-167. 22 William Hogeland, ‘Real Americans’, Boston Review, September/October 2010. 23 Collins, ‘The Originality Trap’, 154. 24 Kazin, The Populist Persuasion. 25 Paul Taggart, Populism (Buckingham: Open University Press, 2000). 26 Mark Fenster, Conspiracy Theory: Secrecy and Power in American Culture (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2008). 27 Walter K. Nugent, Tolerant Populists: Kansas Populism and Nativism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1963), 242. 5

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__________________________________________________________________ Michael Kazin, ‘Anarchism Now: Occupy Wall Street Revives an Ideology’, New Republic, November 7, 2011. 29 Rohan McWilliam, Popular Politics in Nineteenth Century England (London: Routledge, 1998). 30 Margaret Canovan, ‘Trust the People! Populism and the Two Faces of Democracy’, Political Studies 47 (1999): 2-16. 31 Francisco Panizza, ‘Populism and the Mirror of Democracy’, Conference on Democracy and Diversity (University of Leicester, April 2003). 28

Bibliography Baum, Frank L. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Chicago: George M. Hill, 1900. Calhoun, Craig. ‘Occupy Wall Street in Perspective’. The British Journal of Sociology 64.1 (2013): 26-38. Canovan, Margaret. ‘Trust the People! Populism and the Two Faces of Democracy’. Political Studies 47 (1999): 2-16. Collins, Robert. ‘The Originality Trap: Richard Hofstadter on Populism’. The Journal of American History 76 (1989): 150-167. Fenster, Mark. Conspiracy Theory: Secrecy and Power in American Culture. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2008. Hessel, Stéphane. Time for Outrage! Indignez-Vous. New York: Hachette, 2011. Hofstadter, Richard. ‘The Paranoid Style in American Politics’. Harper’s Magazine November 1964, 77-86. Hogeland, William. ‘Real Americans’. Boston Review, September/October 2010. Ignon, Lance and Jim Herron Zamara. ‘Protests Wall Street; Hundreds Are Arrested’. Los Angeles Times, 24 April 1990. Viewed 8 September 2013. http://articles.latimes.com/1990-04-24/business/fi-251_1_earth-day. Kazin, Michael. The Populist Persuasion: An American History. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1995. Kazin, Michael. A Godly Hero: The Life of William Jennings Bryan. New York: Random House, 2006. Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Kazin, Michael. ‘Anarchism Now: Occupy Wall Street Revives an Ideology’. New Republic, 7 November 2011. Lause, Mark A. The Civil War’s Last Campaign: James B. Weaver, the GreenbackLabor Party and the Politics of Race and Section. Maryland: University Press of America, 2001. Nugent, Walter K. Tolerant Populists: Kansas Populism and Nativism. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1963. Panizza, Francisco. ‘Populism and the Mirror of Democracy’. Conference on Democracy and Diversity, University of Leicester, April 2003. Parker, David B. ‘The Rise and Fall of the Wonderful Wizard of Oz as a “Parable on Populism”’. Journal of the Georgia Association of Historians 15 (1994): 49-63. Postel, Charles. The Populist Vision. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007. Roe, Michael. Kenealy and the Tichborne Cause: A Study in Mid-Victorian Populism. Melbourne: University of Melbourne Press, 1974. Taggart, Paul. Populism. Buckingham: Open University Press, 2000. Taylor, Quentin. ‘Money and Politics in the Land of Oz’. Accessed 14 November 2011. http://www.usagold.com. Vincent, Leopold. ‘Labor’s Ninety and Nine’. In The Alliance and Labour Songster: A Collection of Labour Songs, for the Use of Alliances, Grange Debating Clubs, and Political Gatherings. Indianapolis: Vincent Bros., 1891. Weidner, David. ‘Occupy Wall Street Has History on Its Side’. Wall Street Journal, 20 October 2012. Viewed 6 September 2013. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203752604576641902694217730 .html. Willsher, Kim. ‘Stephane Hessel, Writer and Inspiration behind Occupy Movement, Dies at 95’. Guardian, 27 February 2013. Viewed 27 February 2013. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/feb/27/writer-activist-stephane-hesseldies-aged-95. Zinn, Howard and Anthony Arnove. Voices of a People’s History of the United States. New York: Seven Stories Press, 2011. Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Rob Allen originally trained as a social anthropologist, but now researches radicals of the late 19th century in the US and the UK. Based at Auckland University of Technology in New Zealand, he is currently writing a book: ‘Agitation and Indignation – A radical life in London and New York in the late 19th century’.

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Demanding the Impossible: The Truth of the Occupy Movement Milo Sweedler Abstract The Occupy movement of 2011-12 was widely criticized for lacking a coherent message and a clear set of demands. Rather than considering the movement’s lack of focus to be a limitation, this chapter proposes that the ‘kernel of truth’ to be retained from the Occupy movement is precisely the protestors’ refusal to speak in a unified voice or to articulate a set of ‘realistic’ demands. To do so, I argue, would have been to accept from the get-go the parameters established by the ruling oligarchs, who have arrogated to themselves the power to decide what is feasible and what is not. The occupiers’ insistence that things must change coupled with their steadfast refusal to make ‘reasonable’ demands recalls the famous slogan from the streets of Paris in May 1968, ‘Soyez réaliste, demandez l’impossible’. This slogan has become something of a watchword for the contemporary left, used in recent years to describe political positions as diverse as Marxism and neocommunism to anarchism and radical democracy. The present chapter explores the political potentials implicit in this and related slogans in the works of a number of contemporary political theorists – some writing specifically on the Occupy movement, others on politics more generally – in order to insist the importance of ‘demanding the impossible’ at a time when to demand what is ‘possible’ is tantamount to a tacit acceptance of the terms and conditions of what Mark Fisher calls ‘capitalist realism’. Key Words: Anarchism, Alain Badiou, democracy, communism, May 1968, Occupy, political theory, politics, Jacques Rancière, social movements. ***** In the fall and winter months of 2011-12, as the spontaneous protests that erupted in lower Manhattan spread to more than a thousand cities in nearly a hundred countries, the Occupy movement was widely criticized for lacking a coherent message and a clear set of demands. 1 While such criticisms accurately characterize the diversity and open-endedness of the movement, they also represent either a profound misunderstanding of the protests or, more likely, a calculated attempt to defuse their disruptive potential. For what underlies the oft-cited concerns about the movement’s lack of focus or its unclear demands is, in effect, the idea that business should continue as usual, with a few modifications to an otherwise healthy system. Politicians and pundits who voice such concerns ask that a heterogeneous group voicing generalized discontent with the current state of the world from a variety of perspectives articulate a homogeneous message and a delimited set of grievances, presumably presented by a legitimate spokesperson or Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ two, who would in turn leave the ‘real work’ of drafting policy to those who have expertise in such matters. A fine example of such a position would be former British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s affirmation – pronounced, appropriately enough, at a conference organized by Charles Schwab for financial managers – that ‘a protest is not the same as a policy. Someone who’s demonstrating will often make demands, but they don’t necessarily have answers’. 2 Blair’s position here is perfectly clear: unless you have a ready-made answer to the world’s problems, keep your mouth shut. Only those in a position to enact policy should intervene in the political arena. And who, one might ask, is in a position to make policy? The people who, by virtue of their birth, upbringing, education, training, expertise or ambition are deemed qualified to lead. In the face of a position such as Blair’s, which asks that we refrain from involving ourselves in matters that are beyond our expertise if not our comprehension, this chapter argues that the power of movements like Occupy reside in their refusal to accept the power structure that authorizes some people to lead while others have no such qualification, their concomitant refusal to articulate a set of ‘realistic’ demands that fit within the parameters defined by legitimate leaders and their simultaneous affirmation that things must nonetheless change. The refusal to articulate a clear set of ‘reasonable’ demands is essentially the position put forth by Slavoj Žižek in his article in the Guardian, ‘Occupy First. Demands Come Later’: ‘What one should resist at this stage’, he writes in October 2011, ‘is precisely [...] a quick translation of the energy of the protest into a set of concrete pragmatic demands’. Making demands is important, Žižek proposes – especially demands that are de facto impossible (he offers universal healthcare in the US as an example of such a purportedly ‘impossible’ demand) – but, he insists, ‘it is no less important to simultaneously remain subtracted from the pragmatic field of negotiations and “realist” proposals’. 3 Žižek’s refusal of ‘pragmatic’ proposals and ‘realistic’ solutions – i.e., solutions that the oligarchs in power deem to be realistic from their positions of knowledge and power (in other words, from the perspective of those directly responsible for the massive consolidation of wealth and influence into their own hands) – is echoed by Judith Butler’s similar refusal to make concrete demands, addressed to occupiers in Washington Square Park on October 23, 2011 via human microphone: So what are the demands that all these people are making? Either they say there are no demands and that leaves your critics confused. Or they say that demands for social equality, that demands for economic justice are impossible demands and impossible demands are just not practical. But we disagree. If hope is an impossible demand then we demand the impossible. 4 Butler is implicitly evoking here the famous slogan from Paris in May 1968, Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ ‘Soyez réaliste, demandez l’impossible’ (Be realistic, demand the impossible). This slogan has become something of a watchword for the contemporary left. One sees it on the cover of both Peter Marshall’s comprehensive history of anarchism, Demanding the Impossible, and Žižek’s 2103 book bearing the same title. 5 It is how Terry Eagleton characterizes Marx’s project in his recent book, Why Marx Was Right, and it is how Alain Badiou typifies what he calls ‘the event’ in Philosophy and the Event. 6 Why has the slogan of demanding the impossible become such a watchword in contemporary political theory? Because, I would argue, to demand what is considered ‘possible’ in the current context is, in effect, to throw in the towel in advance. It is to accept from the get-go the parameters of possibility established by those whose interests are served by the rules they set in place. It is tacitly to support the agenda of the oligarchs in power and their socio-economic ‘experts’ who are able to ‘see beyond’ the immediate needs of the disenfranchised, the disadvantaged, the poor, the exploited, the homeless, the unemployed or underemployed and so forth, in order to make the ‘tough decisions’ that will enable unbridled capitalism to continue on its trajectory of maximum profits for the 1% and minimum responsibility for the common good. These enlightened ‘experts’, whom Marx derisively dubbed ‘Capital’s executives’ and who, according to Badiou, have only come into full force in our current conjuncture, are making decisions for all of us. 7 They are crafting our world, at our expense, whether we like it or not. Critics might object that those in power are elected officials, democratically chosen by us to represent us. However, here I follow Jacques Rancière, who claims that what we generally call ‘democracy’, in reference to a type of society or a form of government, is a misnomer. The so-called democratic system, according to Rancière, is in fact an oligarchy, which etymologically means ‘rule by a few’ and has been used since Aristotle as a synonym for ‘rule by the rich’. ‘We do not live in democracies’, Rancière flatly states; ‘we live in States of oligarchic rule’. 8 In a similar vein, what we typically call ‘politics’ Rancière proposes to call ‘the police’, which he defines as ‘the set of procedures whereby the aggregation and consent of collectivities is achieved, the organization of powers, the distribution of places and roles, and the system for legitimizing this distribution’. 9 The immediate problem with the police order, as Rancière conceives it, is, of course, that it is hierarchical, with some people at the top and others at the bottom, some whose prerogative it is to lead and others whose lot it is to be led. The function of what Rancière calls the police is therefore ultimately to uphold the principle of governing that has been known at least since Plato as arkhê, meaning, according to the interpretation Rancière borrows from Hannah Arendt, both ‘commencement’ and ‘commandment’. If, as Rancière writes in his ‘Ten Theses on Politics’, ‘the logic of the arkhê [...] presupposes that a determinate superiority is exercised over an equally determinate inferiority’, policing would be the process by which such a Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ hierarchy is established and maintained. 10 In opposition to the police order, in which everyone has her proper place, politics, in Rancière’s lexicon, is the action that disrupts the logic of the arkhê by displacing individuals from their assigned places. Its presupposition is the equality of anyone with everyone, and its mode of action is declassification. In its bold affirmation of the equality of anyone with anyone else and its concomitant refusal of the police hierarchy, politics constitutes an assault on the governing principle of arkhê. Politics, as Rancière conceives it, is therefore, strictly speaking, anarchic, in the sense that it subverts the police logic according to which those who have the propensity to lead, lead; and those who are destined to follow, follow. 11 The subversion of the logic of the arkhê occurs in a wide range of contexts in Rancière’s work, by diverse agents. One could cite the example of Rosa Parks, the African American woman who, in 1955, refused to give her bus seat to a white passenger, thereby demonstrating, in Rancière’s reading, that as an American citizen she had civil rights that Alabama, her state of residence, refused her. 12 One could evoke Olympe de Gouges, who, in her Déclaration des droits de la femme et de la citoyenne (Declaration of the rights of woman and [female] citizen) of 1791, called into question the distinction between domestic life and public life upon which the exclusion of women from the political arena was based. 13 The list goes on. Rancière’s touchstone example is the birth of democracy in ancient Greece, which Žižek famously characterizes as follows: What, for Rancière, is politics proper? A phenomenon which, for the first time, appeared in Ancient Greece when the members of the demos (those with no firmly determined place in the hierarchical social edifice) not only demanded that their voice be heard against those in power, to be recognized as included in the public sphere, on an equal footing with the ruling oligarchy and aristocracy – even more, they, the excluded, those with no fixed place in the social edifice, presented themselves as the representatives, the stand-ins, for the Whole of Society, for the true Universality. 14 Although I have one or two minor quibbles with this presentation of Rancière’s account of politics, which I will not get into here, what Žižek’s presentation foregrounds nicely is the universality inherent in Rancière’s conception of politics. As Saul Newman insists, the universal political dimension of Rancièrian politics is ‘not based on any pre-given, essentialist identity or set of interests: rather, it only emerges in a contingent way when a particular group claims to embody this universality’. 15 Rancière calls this group the ‘singular universal’ (universel singulier), thereby differentiating it from other forms of universalism, which could and often do entail the imposition of a set of values or universal laws on others. Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ The ‘singular universal’, by contrast, comes into existence when a politically marginalized group of people speaks and acts as though it were a member of a class to which it does not belong, laying claim to a universal right or a political existence it has been denied. Basing itself on the scandalous assumption that the members of this group, who have been denied a political existence that members of other, privileged groups enjoy, are people too and should therefore be recognized as such, with all the rights to which ‘people’, however defined in a particular context, are entitled, this political non-entity comes to embody the people, whose particular interests are identical with those of the community as a whole. I would propose that the Occupy movement constitutes a prime example of the anarchic power of the people embodied in the singular universal. Its slogan, ‘We are the 99%’, institutes a new political subject, synonymous with ‘the people’. I should clarify here that the accuracy of the percentage is immaterial. The occupiers are making a political claim, not offering an accurate statistic. The power of the slogan lies more in its performative power to bring into existence a new political subject than it is does in the veracity of its constative assertion. As Jodi Dean points out, the 99% slogan also plays nicely on the dominant police order’s obsession with statistics, numbers and percentages, which the occupiers use to their full advantage, both to claim a division and to name a wrong: The assertion of a numerical difference as a political difference, that is to say, the politicization of a statistic, expresses capitalism’s reliance on fundamental inequality – “we” can never all be counted as the top 1%. 16 The Occupy movement has all of the hallmarks of what Alain Badiou calls a ‘historical riot’, with one possible exception, which I will address momentarily. In contrast to what Badiou calls an ‘immediate riot’, which is characterized by a weak localization (in other words, an inability to move beyond its immediate geographical, socio-political and demographic context) and a limited extension (by which Badiou means the inability of the riot to transform from one type of protest, often limited to breaking windows, burning cars and looting stores, to a substantially different form of protest), a ‘historical riot’, which is the preliminary stage of what Badiou calls an event, requires that three conditions be fulfilled: 1. ‘a transition from limited localization [...] to the construction of an enduring central site’ (Badiou’s prime example of such a site is Tahrir Square; the Occupy movement’s site would initially be Zuccotti Park, but, as we know, the movement rapidly spread to nearly a thousand sites around the world); 2. ‘a transition from extension by imitation to qualitative extension’, in which people of diverse ages, sexes, races, ethnicities, employment and citizenship statuses, from different social milieus, with different levels of education, from different family situations, practicing different religions and so forth, come together as a unified group in Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ common cause; and 3. ‘a transition from the nihilistic din of riotous attacks to the invention of a single slogan that envelops all the disparate voices’. 17 Of these three conditions, it is the last one that poses a problem for me. For what Badiou has in mind is less a slogan like ‘We are the 99%’ than the crystallization of the riot into a unifying Idea (with a capital I), which he calls communism. Here we enter into the aspect of Badiou’s work that always sets off alarm bells for me: his steadfast commitment to a form of politics dependent on a small group of militants, who, Badiou says, must form a ‘transitional dictatorship’. 18 Rather than crystallizing around a single idea, least of all one bent on setting up a popular dictatorship, I would argue for an anarchic power of the people like the one put forth by Rancière, in which everyone and anyone is qualified to engage in political action. This is not necessarily ‘anarchism’ in its classical form, one dedicated to the overthrow of the State and the institution of a stateless society, but, rather, an endless an-archy entailing the perpetual staging of scenes of dissensus. The Occupy movement is the most powerful and far-reaching staging of this sort that the West has seen since the 1960s. What is required at this point is a multiplication and intensification of similar scenes of dissensus, to the point that they overwhelm the dominant culture and the powers that be like a tidal wave. Rather than organizing around a single idea, even a communist one, what we need to do is enact a power that is given to us in name but not in fact: the power of the people evoked in the word democracy (demos = people; kratein = power). I by no means intend by this appeal to democracy to legitimate or endorse the so-called ‘democratic system’, which, as indicated above, is really an oligarchy in democratic clothing. Rather, what is called for is an enactment of the power that, if left up to the ruling oligarchs, would be ours in name alone. I write this panegyric in hindsight, more than a year after the Occupy movement came to an end, not with a bang but a whimper. However, if the Occupy movement as such is now a thing of the past, I remain convinced that the discontent that gave rise to the protests remains alive. ‘After the bank bail-outs neoliberalism has, in every sense, been discredited’, Mark Fisher writes in his 2009 Capitalist Realism. 19 ‘That is not to say that neoliberalism has disappeared overnight’, Fisher clarifies; ‘on the contrary, its assumptions continue to dominate political economy, but they do so no longer as part of an ideological project that has a confident forward momentum, but as inertial, undead defaults’. 20 What I would urge at this point is developing something on the order of what one might call, borrowing a phrase from Badiou, the ‘truth procedures’ of the Occupy event. ‘Truth’ in Badiou’s lexicon has nothing to do with veracity or the empirical meaning of an event. Truth for Badiou is always subjective. The truth of an event is always the truth of that event for a particular subject. One recognizes a certain occurrence as an event (the emergence of something radically new, which breaks with the established order and redefines what is possible) and becomes a subject of Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ that event. Truth therefore has a retrospective character. One remains true to an event by drawing out its consequences and keeping it alive in one’s thoughts and actions. Simon Critchley helpfully links the idea of ‘truth’ in Badiou’s work to the notion of ‘being true to’ or ‘troth’, which, Critchley notes, is retained in the German treu, meaning ‘loyal’ or ‘faithful’. 21 The fundamental event to which Badiou remains true is the so-called ‘events’ of May 1968, which produced the slogan that gives my chapter its title, ‘Demanding the Impossible’. 22 I would go so far as to propose that what is arguably the key term in Badiou’s mature philosophy, that of the event, may well come from the name given to the protests that occurred in Paris during the spring of 1968, ‘les événements de mai 68’. At a time when the Occupy movement as such is dead, what is required is a fidelity to the events of fall and winter 2011-12, when a wave of protests shook the consensual order by demanding the impossible.

Notes 1 ‘Occupy Movement’, Wikipedia, Viewed 8 December 2014, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupy_movement. 2 Halah Touryalai, ‘Tony Blair Criticizes Occupy Wall Street’, Forbes, November 2, 2011, Viewed 8 December 2014, http://www.forbes.com/sites/halahtouryalai/2011/11/02/tony-blair-criticizesoccupy-wall-street. 3 Slavoj Žižek, ‘Occupy First. Demands Come Later’, Guardian, October 26, 2011, Viewed 8 December 2014, http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/oct/26/occupy-protesters-billclinton. 4 Judith Butler, ‘Judith Butler at Occupy WSP’, YouTube, October 23, 2011, Viewed 8 December 2014, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rYfLZsb9by4. 5 Peter Marshall, Demanding the Impossible: A History of Anarchism (Oakland: PM Press, 2010); Slavoj Žižek, Demanding the Impossible (Cambridge, UK: Polity, 2013). 6 Terry Eagleton, Why Marx Was Right (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012), 78; Alain Badiou, with Fabien Tarby, Philosophy and the Event, trans. Louise Burchill (Cambridge, UK: Polity, 2013), 11. 7 Alain Badiou, The Rebirth of History: Times of Riots and Uprisings, trans. Gregory Elliott (London: Verso, 2012), 14. 8 Jacques Rancière, Hatred of Democracy, trans. Steve Corcoran (London: Verso, 2009), 73. 9 Jacques Rancière, Disagreement: Politics and Philosophy, trans. Julie Rose (Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, 2004), 28.

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__________________________________________________________________ Jacques Rancière, Dissensus: On Politics and Aesthetics, trans. Steven Corcoran (London: Continuum, 2010), 30. 11 For a spirited reading of the relation of Rancière’s political thought to the anarchist tradition, see Todd May, The Political Thought of Jacques Rancière (University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2008). For an application of the theories developed in the latter book to a wide array of social and political movements, see Todd May, Contemporary Politics and the Thought of Jacques Rancière (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2010). 12 Rancière, Hatred of Democracy, 61. 13 Jacques Rancière, ‘Who Is the Subject of the Rights of Man?’ South Atlantic Quarterly 103.2/3 (Spring/Summer 2004): 303-04. 14 Slavoj Žižek, The Ticklish Subject: The Absent Centre of Political Ontology (London: Verso, 1999), 188. 15 Saul Newman, Unstable Universalities: Poststructuralism and Radical Politics (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2007), 91. 16 Jodi Dean, ‘Claiming Division, Naming a Wrong’, Theory & Event 14.4 (2011). 17 Badiou, The Birth of History, 33-35. 18 Ibid., 45. 19 Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism: Is There No Alternative? (Winchester, UK: Zero Books, 2009), 78. 20 Ibid. 21 Simon Critchley, Infinitely Demanding: Ethics of Commitment, Politics of Resistance (London: Verso, 2007), 43. 22 See Alain Badiou, ‘We Are Still the Contemporaries of May ’68’, in The Communist Hypothesis, trans. David Macey and Steve Corcoran (London: Verso, 2010), 41-100. 10

Bibliography Badiou, Alain. The Communist Hypothesis. Translated by David Macey and Steve Corcoran. London: Verso, 2010. ———. The Rebirth of History: Times of Riots and Uprisings. Translated by Gregory Elliott. London: Verso, 2012. Badiou, Alain, with Fabien Tarby. Philosophy and the Event. Translated by Louise Burchill. Cambridge, UK: Polity, 2013. Butler, Judith. ‘Judith Butler at Occupy WSP’. YouTube, October 23, 2011. Viewed 8 December 2014. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rYfLZsb9by4. Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Critchley, Simon. Infinitely Demanding: Ethics of Commitment, Politics of Resistance. London: Verso, 2007. Dean, Jodi. ‘Claiming Division, Naming a Wrong’. Theory & Event 14.4 (2011). Eagleton, Terry. Why Marx Was Right. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012. Fisher, Mark. Capitalist Realism: Is There No Alternative? Winchester, UK: Zero Books, 2009. Marshall, Peter. Demanding the Impossible: A History of Anarchism. Oakland: PM Press, 2010. May, Todd. Contemporary Politics and the Thought of Jacques Rancière. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2010. ———. The Political Thought of Jacques Rancière. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2008. Newman, Saul. Unstable Universalities: Poststructuralism and Radical Politics. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2007. ‘Occupy Movement’. Wikipedia. Viewed 8 December 2014. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupy_movement. Rancière, Jacques. Disagreement: Politics and Philosophy. Translated by Julie Rose. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2004. ———. Dissensus: On Politics and Aesthetics. Translated by Steven Corcoran. London: Continuum, 2010. ———. Hatred of Democracy. Translated by Steve Corcoran. London: Verso, 2009. ———. ‘Who Is the Subject of the Rights of Man?’ South Atlantic Quarterly 103.2/3 (Spring/Summer 2004): 297-310. Touryalai, Halah. ‘Tony Blair Criticizes Occupy Wall Street’. Forbes, November 2, 2011. Viewed 8 December 2014.

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__________________________________________________________________ http://www.forbes.com/sites/halahtouryalai/2011/11/02/tony-blair-criticizesoccupy-wall-street. Žižek, Slavoj. Demanding the Impossible. Cambridge, UK: Polity, 2013. ———. ‘Occupy First. Demands Come Later’. Guardian, October 26, 2011. Viewed 8 December 2014. http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/oct/26/occupy-protesters-billclinton. ———. The Ticklish Subject: The Absent Centre of Political Ontology. London: Verso, 1999. Milo Sweedler is Associate Professor of French and Cultural Analysis & Social Theory at Wilfrid Laurier University, Canada. His research interests include continental political theory, theories of representation, film history and criticism, and the French avant-garde. He is currently working on a book-length manuscript on allegories of the end of capitalism in contemporary cinema.

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Reshaping the Everyday in Cairo Sandra A. Fernandez Abstract This chapter uses the work of a specific social movement based in Cairo to examine individual’s relationships with sound. This is done through theoretical approaches linked to and revolving around listening practises. It is exemplified using an anti-sexual harassment campaign that involves raising awareness and patrolling public spaces in Cairo, Egypt. What is central to the efficacy of the social movement’s work and what links it to the suggested theoretical framework is a policy of non-violent intervention and belief in the power of dialogue to effect the desired changes in the social landscape. In addition to exerting influence on the wider population, it becomes apparent that those acted upon by the movement may find ways to react against suggested changes in behaviour and in so doing rework the spaces they occupy. Key Words: Everyday, social movement, Cairo, sexual harassment, revolution, affect, listening. ***** 1. Introduction This chapter focuses on a specific social movement as a space for knowledge production. In this space, people aim to rework ideologies into which they have been socialised to form new ideas concerning social acceptability through their relationships with sound. 1 I aim to use the work of the social movement to demonstrate how individuals both affect and are affected through the listening practices they have cultivated and developed as a result of a specific social setting. Because of discrepancies and contradictions in media reports regarding the current situation in Egypt, I have chosen to withhold the name of the social movement but suffice to say that it is based in Cairo. I begin by describing the movement in question followed by a condensed review of the Egyptian revolutionary process which began in late January/early February 2011 in order to set the backdrop against which the movement is working. The theory that informs my approach is explained before I elaborate upon the movement’s anti-sexual harassment campaigns, which will detail how both the movement and the people in Cairo they come into contact with are reworking social space. So far the movement has focussed on gender inequality and how Cairenes think about gender but they are expanding to target education and how youth are socialised. Their focus on modes of thought and how it translates into action has led me to these particular questions: How do social movements as sites of knowledge production function in the context of the state of flux created by the Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Egyptian revolutionary process? How do people adopt, reject or rework what they internalise through contact with the social movement? How is this reflected in people’s specific listening practices and the movements ‘power of dialogue’ policy? How are members of the movement affected by other groups they come into contact with and how does their position as listeners rather than speakers affect the goals and policies of the movement? How does each party involved in the listener/speaker dynamic incorporate the effects of such dialogues into their daily lives? I can begin to explore some of these questions here, bearing in mind the bulk of material will be generated upon arrival in Cairo. The goal is not to examine gender issues and sexual harassment in Cairo, it is to understand individuals changing relationships with sound with a specific social movement serving as a vehicle for this process. 2. The Movement The social movement I am focussing on was founded in 2012 after one of the founders witnessed the sexual assault of friends in Tahrir square. The long-term goal of the group is to alleviate the social ills of Egyptian society, beginning with sexual harassment. Members have expressed frustration at what they call people’s inhumanity and lack of kindness towards each other. It is the movement’s wish to for Egyptian society to accept the existence of differences between people and come to see them as sources of strength for the society as a whole. During Eid festivals (celebrations held post Ramadan and Eid Al Adha) and certain demonstrations the movement has set up patrols to prevent and peacefully intervene in instances of harassment and/or assault. There is also a campaign geared towards raising awareness among primary, secondary and university students and explaining the problems created by gender discrimination. The movement has also been working on implementing self-defence classes for women living in low-income areas of Cairo. I became part of the movement in November of 2012 and have been working for one of their departments since. Mainly a voluntary organisation, the movement makes a point of avoiding political and religious association because they aim to cross boundaries and ensure their actions benefit all Egyptians. The social movement has almost 60 members, over 300 volunteers and works in conjunction with groups such as Harassmap and Women Living under Muslim Laws. Online presence consists of Facebook, YouTube and a Twitter account. 3. Context: The Revolutionary Process There continues to be debate regarding whether the revolution is over. The media talk of the revolution being hijacked, betrayed and in need of defence reflects the way the Egyptian nation has been personified over centuries (see the work of Beth Baron). 2 In late January of 2011, a series of demonstrations culminated in the removal of then President Hosni Mubarak. 3 The Supreme Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Council of the Armed Forces took control of the government and this was followed by the trials of demonstrators for the revolution and the release of the doctor involved in the subjugation of women protestors to ‘virginity tests’. 4 The months that followed revealed that all groups and political parties involved had very different ideas of what the revolutionary process should involve and what they expected from it. This can be seen in the vast number and range of candidates who ran in the presidential elections in May of 2012. 5 Candidates were eliminated until only Ahmed Shafik (former Prime Minister under Mubarak) and Mohamed Morsi (Muslim Brotherhood) remained. 6 For many the options were equally unappealing but it was Morsi who became Egypt’s next president by a narrow margin. 7 At the same time, female demonstrators struggled both to be present at events and against backlash from men seeking to limit their activity in the political sphere. For example, on 25 May 2012, a demonstration against a presidential law referendum ended violently when thugs sexually assaulted and beat female protestors. Police made no attempt to intervene. 8 Amidst mounting discontent, men and women gathered on International Women’s Day (8 March) and demanded that women formed 50% of the constituent assembly. 9 This push for greater women’s representation was unsuccessful. During Morsi’s time in office the Muslim Brotherhood were brought to centre stage while other groups found their needs increasingly marginalized. The Muslim Brotherhood rejected the United Nations declaration draft against all forms of violence against women stating it ‘would lead to complete disintegration of society’. 10 This act cemented the idea that the Muslim Brotherhood, via Morsi, had little to no intention of addressing the issues of gender inequality, sexual assault and sexual harassment. Morsi was also accused of neglecting Egypt’s economy as exemplified by the gas shortage and serious devaluation of Egyptian currency. Later in June of 2012, a group of women organised a stand that marked one of the earlier appearances of safety patrols and intervention teams. According to men I worked with, harassers targeted this stand as they moved from one location to another. From August 2012 to November of 2012, Mohamed Morsi gave himself broadsweeping executive powers that undercut a significant part of the governmental system. 11 Eight months afterwards, demonstrators once again gathered at Tahrir and Rabaa Al Adeweya Mosque (in Nasr city): some demanded the removal of the president, while others gathered to show him support. The army stepped in and removed President Morsi on the 3 July and an interim government was formed headed by Adly Mansour, but the voice that has pervaded the media has been that of General Abdel Fattah Al Sisi, Minister of Defence. At the end of August 2013 Pro-Morsi supporters were violently removed from their spaces of demonstration in Nasr City and Al Naqla square. It has been argued that the removal of Morsi constituted a coup and the removal of his supporters a

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__________________________________________________________________ prelude to Civil War but what could follow many would consider much worse: a persistent turbulence surpassing but resembling the days of the old regime. The polarization visualized by the Western world comes in the form of a dichotomy between the military and the Muslim Brotherhood. In this particular case the argument was that it would be preferable to have the military do away with the Muslim Brotherhood than have to face an enemy on multiple fronts. A third voice has emerged, however, one that supported neither the army nor the Muslim Brotherhood and is seeking dialogue to construct an Egypt that is allinclusive. 12 Egypt (as of the writing of this chapter) was in a state of turbulent fluctuation but in the pockets of disruption people have found ways to return to their everyday lives. 4. Building Theory My goal is to create a sonic representation of the ebb and flow of how individual’s ideas, goals and reactions change based upon their contact with this specific social movement. This begins with the collection of seemingly minute and fleeting elements that form the everyday and the ordinary: how people physically constitute their daily lives that include objects, gestures and conversations that constitute one’s normal routine. 13 This is demonstrated by the work of Kathleen Stewart and Clare Hemmings that I use to draw out these elements. 14 These examples combine the visual and aural but I want to draw more attention to sound as an equal method of measurement. Charles Hirschkind uses an Islamic understanding of the role of listening in his work on the role of sermon tapes in the constitution of whole and politically active citizens. 15 The emphasis is on how one listens; it is not the responsibility of the speaker to convince the listener as the listener’s heart should have already been conditioned through other listening habits to be swayed by what it hears. Hirschkind also draws from Enlightenment theory and the relationship between sound and modernity to demonstrate that listening is indeed an active rather than passive action. Vice and virtue are contained in the act of listening itself and thus people must be very discerning in what they consume aurally. This is also coded in the visual, as appropriate physical and facial responses have been cultivated to indicate effective and acceptable forms of listening. Here Hirschkind points out a dissolution of the barrier between subject and object; there is no longer a difference between speaking and listening. Inability to be swayed by what one hears is also considered to be the result of an impairment in hearing. This impairment results specifically from Islamic debate over the role of the listener as the Qur’an is held to be of such ‘sublime beauty’ as to move anyone who hears it verses. What pours into the everyday is this sense of ease and unease as the revolutionary process continues. The daily headlines of Al Jazeera English read ‘Egypt in Turmoil’ and yet in many parts of the city people continue about their daily lives. 16 This is where Michael Taussig’s work becomes important: the Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ nervous system as being the network which controls the human body but also the process by which human bodies are regulated. 17 ‘Terror as Usual’ as he puts it. I hesitate to use the term ‘terror’ as it decidedly puts the situation in Egypt in a specific box. Previously I would have been more inclined to draw on Foucault’s refashioning of the self to describe the situation, but Taussig asks how much people are willing to overlook the violence of their daily lives – suggesting what he is branding as ‘terror’ does not solely apply to situations traditionally defined as ‘unstable’, ‘turbulent’, ‘rebellious’, or ‘lawless’. 18 As such, we may all be living in a state of ‘chronic emergency’. I suggest this is an example of how the idea of ‘terror’/the ‘unstable’ as flux is normalized. Within this normalization lies another point subject to continuous flux itself: the idea of normal as composed by the everyday. As a constant, however, this comes and goes in many cases unnoticed which re-emphasizes the work of Kathleen Stewart in re-orienting our focus towards what we normally refer to as ‘the little things’. 19 I focus on a social movement as a mechanism for producing changes in how individuals construct their everyday concept of ‘normal’. Social movements in theory have been marked as sites where both the maintenance and production of knowledge and social meaning occur. 20 Taking the understandings learned and absorbed through personal social practise, members question, engage with and rework these elements, in this case in order to produce and diffuse modes of knowledge and being which lend themselves to a more mutually harmonious existence. 21 As part of the regular process of location, perception, identification and labelling, individuals enter into a dialogue concerning something they consider to be a problem in society that requires rectification, and this identification enables members of a social movement to focus on a goal to achieve. 22 It has also been argued that because of this process a social movement can be considered a liminal space. With the specific movement with whom I work however, members are drawing directly from their ongoing experiences and interactions with people affected by that which they wish to change. My work with the social movement has been heretofore mostly online. Future work will include participation in anti-sexual harassment patrols, aiding with free self-defence classes for women who could not otherwise afford them, and participating in an awareness campaign involving schools and universities. I will examine the relationship between speech/listening, how messages are internalised and the actions that are produced. At the same time I am looking at how the social movement as a mechanism for change is in itself moving: how its goals and policies change with experience and interaction with other groups, agencies and the Egyptian government. What I am presenting here is information gathered through weekly and later by-monthly meetings of the Finance Team, e-mail exchanges, training via Skype, and research in preparation for fieldwork. The social movement in question is fully aware of my research, its intentions and my position with the university. Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ 5. Reworking the Boundaries of ‘Acceptable’ in Public Space I will now briefly explore the anti-sexual harassment patrols as mechanisms for reshaping public space and acceptable conduct. The social movement operates around two main interrelated policies: the power of dialogue and non-violent intervention. It is believed that these policies incorporated into interpersonal engagement will result in the changes the movement seeks. It is also possible to see a parallel between non-violent interventions and affect while another parallel may exist between belief in the power of dialogue and theories of listening. The movement has been running safety patrols during both Eid el Fitr and Eid el Adha holidays since its founding in 2012. In the summer of 2013, the social movement launched a campaign in conjunction with another movement entitled ‘Eid without Harassment’ which occupied Midan Talaat Harb in downtown Cairo from 4pm to 10pm on the 9and 10 August. The most recent patrol occurred from the 15-17 October 2013. Members and volunteers are divided amongst four points of operation: control room, booth headquarters, awareness groups and civil security patrols. The control room acts as an information hub; volunteers and members receive text messages from women in distress and alert their counterparts on patrol through the booth headquarters. Volunteers in the control room also keep followers on social media up to date. Awareness groups deploy dialogue as a strategy in causing those who pass by to rethink their position regarding gender inequality. People are given information on laws regarding sexual harassment and the 'blame the victim' mentality of seeing women as the cause of harassment confronted. Volunteers are taught never to force others to adopt their point of view but to negotiate their point as far as possible. Taking from Hirschkind, it can be argued that while the art of delivery is important, the fact that the message is heard is even more so. 23 To this end it could also be argued that the ways in which members and volunteers are trained to engage in dialogue is such that it aims to remove distractions (such as anger or aggression) from the message itself. Finally volunteers and members patrol designated areas of down town Cairo looking to interrupt and prevent harassment or assault. This is non-violent intervention at work; when an incident is identified, a volunteer/member distracts the harasser while members and volunteers surround the intended target forming a barrier between them and their would-be harasser. If harassment has already occurred the target is asked if they would like to report the case and if they choose to do so. Are accompanied to the nearest police office or station. This method is designed to prevent violence while safeguarding the individual. At the same time as discouraging harassment, it also discourages violence, and in doing so, changes the limits of acceptable behaviour in that given space. This rejection of violence is also, according to Springer, part of the acceptance of complete freedom (as described by anarchists). 24 This would make the social movement the mediator between the ‘people’ and their governing body with regards to acting upon public Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ space – drawing on Ranciere’s definition of ‘the people’ as ‘that empty space which exceeds any social qualification’. While I have yet to participate in a patrol, I have been able to ask members about their experiences. So far, there has been a very positive response to the presence of patrollers in public spaces. According to one member, people claim to feel safer when the movement was present. The movement has been patrolling areas of downtown Cairo since the organisation’s founding and as a result has developed relationships with local shopkeepers and store owners. Harassment decreases with the presence of patrollers, but members noted that they are only effective as a deterrent when present. Following the 15-17 October patrols, members and volunteers noted a marked decrease in harassment but also a serious decrease in the number of women present. This may simply be the result of the recent demonstrations and violence in Cairo, but members are worried that women are choosing to stay at home because of harassment, marking another active change in space. Conversely, volunteers patrolling and raising awareness in the metro have been told that people feel more proactive once armed with the correct information on their rights and the laws in place regarding sexual harassment. 6. Conclusion The social movement as a mechanism for reshaping the everyday, people and through it the boundaries of public space has only begun what will be a very slow process. Members, beneficiaries and harassers appear to be engaged in the process of remaking their environments from their specific positions within the space. While their work shows that sexual harassment as a behaviour that must cease is yet to be universally accepted, it also shows that the movement has gained a position of authority in public spaces and their enforcement of harassment as ‘unacceptable’ now carries some authority. What is also apparent is how harassers have also attempted to rework the spaces they occupy. In lieu of asking harassers themselves, it can be argued that their return to the spaces patrolled upon departure of movement members is an attempt to ‘push back’. Regardless, the reshaping of public space occurs as harassers actively change their behaviour in the presence of patrollers. Rather than effecting change overnight, this is exemplary of a gradual reconstructing of areas of down town/central Cairo through.

Notes 1 This chapter is based on work and preliminary research done in preparation for PhD fieldwork. 2 Beth Baron, Egypt as a Woman: Nationalism, Gender, Politics (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005). 3 ‘Timeline: Egypt’s Revolution’, Al Jazeera English, 14 February 2011, Viewed 4 September 2013, Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2011/01/201112515334871490.html. 4 Ibtisam Talaab, ‘Thousands Participate in Online Protest Demanding End to Military Trials’, Egypt Independent, Viewed 4 September 2013, http://www.egyptindependent.com/news/thousands-participate-online-protestdemanding-end-military-trials; ‘Hundreds in Cairo Protest against Acquittal of Virginity Tests Defendant’, Egypt Independent, 16 March 2012, Viewed 4 September 2013, http://www.egyptindependent.com/news/hundreds-cairo-protestagainst-acquittal-virginity-tests-defendant. 5 ‘Egypt’s Presidential Candidates: A Look at the Leading Candidates and Disqualified Runners after Egypt Announces Final List for May’s Crucial Vote’, Al Jazeera English, 26 April 2012, Viewed 4 September 2013, http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2012/04/201242614439402525.html. 6 Gregg Carlstrom, ‘Meet the Candidates: Morsi vs Shafiq’, Al Jazeera English, 24 June 2012, viewed 4 September 2013, http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/spotlight/egypt/2012/06/201261482158653237. html. 7 Marwa Awad and Yasmine Saleh, ‘Islamist Joy as Morsy Elected Egypt President’, Reuters, 24 June 2012, Viewed 4 September 2013, http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/06/24/us-egypt-electionidUSBRE85G01U20120624; Thailia Beaty, ‘One Year Later: The Choice between Ahmed Shafiq and Mohamed Morsi’, Muftah, 25 May 2013, Viewed 4 September 2013, http://muftah.org/looking-back-to-shafiq-vs-morsi/. 8 ‘Hundreds of Egyptians March to Parliament on International Women’s Day’, Ahram Online, 8 March 2012, Viewed 23 October 2014, http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/1/64/36334/Egypt/Politics-/Hundreds-ofEgyptians-march-to-parliament-on-Inter.aspx. 9 ‘Women at the Forefront of Egypt’s Revolutionary Wave’, Al Monitor, 22 July 2013, Viewed 23 October 2014, http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2013/07/women-lead-egyptrevolution.html#. 10 ‘Women at the Forefront of Egypt’s Revolutionary Wave’, Al Monitor. 11 Nouran El Behairy and Salma Hamed, ‘Timeline of Morsi and the Judiciary: One Year in Power’, Daily News Egypt, 29 June 2013, Viewed 4 September 2013, http://www.dailynewsegypt.com/2013/06/29/timeline-of-morsi-and-the-judiciaryone-year-in-power/. 12 Khalid Abdalla, ‘Masmou3: Audible/Heard/Listened to’, MadaMasr, 3 September 2013, Viewed 4 September 2013, http://madamasr.com/content/masmou3-audible-heard-listened. 13 Kathleen Stewart, Ordinary Affects (USA: Duke University Press, 2007). 14 Stewart, Ordinary Affects; Clare Hemmings, ‘Invoking Affect: Cultural Theory and the Ontological Turn’, Cultural Studies 19 (2005): 548-567. Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Charles Hirschkind, The Ethical Soundscape: Cassette Sermons and Islamic Counterpublics (New York: Columbia University Press, 2006) 16 Al Jazeera television station but also found on their website: Viewed 4 September 2013, http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/spotlight/egypt/. 17 Michael Taussig, The Nervous System (New York: Routledge, 1992) 18 Foucault’s technologies refers to his work in Huck Gutman, Patrick H. Hutton and Luther H. Martin, ‘Technologies of the Self’ in Technologies of the Self: A Seminar with Michel Foucault (University of Massachusetts Press, 1988) 16-49; Taussig, The Nervous System. 19 Stewart, Ordinary Affects. 20 Robert D. Benford and David A. Snow, ‘Framing Processes and Social Movements: An Overview and Assessment’, Annual Review of Sociology 26 (2000): 611-639; Maria I Casas-Cortes, Michal Osterweil and Dana E. Powell, ‘Blurring Boundaries: Recognizing Knowledge-Practices in the Study of Social Movements’, Anthropological Quarterly 81 (2008): 17-58. 21 Casas-Cortes, ‘Study of Social Movements’, 17-58. 22 Benford, ‘An Overview and Assessment’, 611-639 23 Hirschkind, The Ethical Soundscape. 24 Simon Springer, ‘Public Space as Emancipation: Meditations on Anarchism, Radical Democracy, Neoliberalism and Violence’, Antipode 43 (2010): 525-562. 15

Bibliography Abdalla, Khalid. ‘Masmou3: Audible/Heard/Listened to’. MadaMasr, 3 September 2013. Viewed 4 September 2013. http://madamasr.com/content/masmou3-audibleheard-listened. Abu Lughod, Laila. ‘Living the “Revolution” in an Egyptian Village: Moral Action in a National Space’. American Ethnologist: Journal of the American Ethnological Society39 (2012): 22-25. Abu-Rish, Ziad. ‘From Revolution to War on Terror: Reflections on Post-3 July Egypt’. Jadaliyya, 21 August 2013. Viewed 4 September 2013. http://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/13737/from-revolution-to-war-onterror_reflections-on-po. Ali Agrama, Hussein. ‘Reflections on Secularism, Democracy and Politics in Egypt’. American Ethnologist: Journal of the American Ethnological Society 39 (2012): 26-31.

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__________________________________________________________________ Awad, Marwa and Yasmine Saleh. ‘Islamist Joy as Morsy Elected Egypt President’. Reuters, 24 June 2012. Viewed 4 September 2013. http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/06/24/us-egypt-electionidUSBRE85G01U20120624. Baron, Beth. Egypt as a Woman: Nationalism, Gender, Politics. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005. Bayat, Asef. Life as Politics: How Ordinary People Change the Middle East. Cairo: American University in Cairo Press, 2009. Beaty, Thailia. ‘One Year Later: The Choice between Ahmed Shafiq and Mohamed Morsi’. Muftah, 25 May 2013. Viewed 4 September 2013. http://muftah.org/looking-back-to-shafiq-vs-morsi/. Benford, Robert D. and David A. Snow. ‘Framing Processes and Social Movements: An Overview and Assessment’. Annual Review of Sociology 26 (2000): 611-639. Carlstrom, Gregg. ‘Meet the Candidates: Morsi vs. Shafiq’. Al Jazeera English, 24 June 2012. Viewed 4 September 2013. http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/spotlight/egypt/2012/06/201261482158653237. html. Casas-Cortez, Maria I., Michal Osterweil and Dana E. Powell. ‘Blurring Boundaries: Recognizing Knowledge-Practises in the Study of Social Movements’. Anthropological Quarterly 81 (2008): 17-58. Chuluv, Martin and Patrick Kingsley. ‘Mohamed Morsi Ousted in Egypt’s Second Revolution in Two Years’. The Guardian, 4 July 2013. Viewed 4 September 2013. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/03/mohamed-morsi-egypt-secondrevolution. Corsin Jimenez, Alberto, Adolfo Estrella. ‘#Spanishrevolution’. Anthropology Today 27 (2011): 19-22. ‘Egypt’s Liberals Quit Constitutional Meeting’. Al Jazeera English, 10 June 2012. Viewed 4 September 2013. http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2012/06/2012610223323444568.html.

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__________________________________________________________________ ‘Egypt’s Presidential Candidates: A Look at the Leading Candidates and Disqualified Runners after Egypt Announces Final List for May’s Crucial Vote’. Al Jazeera English, 26 April 2012. Viewed 4 September 2013. http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2012/04/201242614439402525.html. El Behairy, Nouran and Salma Hamed. ‘Timeline of Morsi and the Judiciary: One Year in Power’. Daily News Egypt, 29 June 2013. Viewed 4 September 2013. http://www.dailynewsegypt.com/2013/06/29/timeline-of-morsi-and-the-judiciaryone-year-in-power/. Elyachar, Julia. Markets of Dispossession: NGO’s, Economic Development and the State in Cairo. USA: Duke University Press, 2005. ‘Facts and Figures’. The American University in Cairo. Viewed 11 September 2013. http://www.aucegypt.edu/about/Facts/Pages/default.aspx. Fanon, Frantz. Les Damnes de la Terre. Paris: Editions La Decouverte & Syros, 2002. Ghannam, Farha. ‘Meanings and Feelings: Local Interpretations of the Use of Violence in the Egyptian Revolution’. American Ethnologist: Journal of the American Ethnological Society 39 (2012): 33-36. Ghannam, Farha. Remaking the Modern: Space, Relocation and the Politics of Identity in a Global Cairo. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002. Gutman, Huck, Patrick H. Hutton, Luther H. Martin. Technologies of the Self: A Seminar with Michel Foucault. University of Massachusetts Press, 1988. Hafez, Sherine. ‘No Longer a Bargain: Women, Masculinity and the Egyptian Uprising’. American Ethnologist: Journal of the American Ethnological Society 39 (2012): 38-42. Hamdy, Sherine. ‘Strength and Vulnerability after Egypt’s Arab Spring Uprisings’. American Ethnologist: Journal of the American Ethnological Society 39 (2012): 43-48. Hellyer, Dr H. A. ‘Morsi’s Best Contribution to Egypt Would Be to Make Peace’. Daily News Egypt, 7 July 2013. Viewed 4 September 2013. http://www.dailynewsegypt.com/2013/07/07/morsis-best-contribution-to-egyptwould-be-to-make-peace/. Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Hemmings, Clare. ‘Invoking Affect: Cultural Theory and the Ontological Turn’. Cultural Studies 19 (2005): 548-567. Hirschkind, Charles. ‘Beyond Secular and Religious’. American Ethnologist: Journal of the American Ethnological Society 39 (2012): 49-53. Hirschkind, Charles. The Ethical Soundscape: Cassette Sermons and Islamic Counterpublics. New York: Columbia University Press, 2006. ‘History’. The American University in Cairo. Viewed 11 September 2013. http://www.aucegypt.edu/about/History/Pages/history.aspx. ‘Hundreds in Cairo Protest against Acquittal of Virginity Tests Defendant’. Egypt Independent, 16 March 2012. Viewed 4 September 2013. http://www.egyptindependent.com/news/hundreds-cairo-protest-against-acquittalvirginity-tests-defendant. Mahmood, Saba. ‘Sectarian Conflict and Family Law in Contemporary Egypt’. American Ethnologist: Journal of the American Ethnological Society 39 (2012): 54-62. ‘Mass Pro and Anti Morsi Protests Dominate Cairo on Friday’. Al Ahram Online, 20 July 2013. Viewed 4 September 2013. http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/76866.aspx. Saad, Reem. ‘The Egyptian Revolution: A Triumph of Poetry’. American Ethnologist: Journal of the American Ethnological Society 39 (2012): 63-66. Springer, Simon. ‘Public Space as Emancipation: Meditations on Anarchism, Radical Democracy, Neoliberalism and Violence’. Antipode 43 (2010): 525-562. Stewart, Kathleen, Ordinary Affect. Duke University Press, 2007. Talaab, Ibtisam. ‘Thousands Participate in Online Protest Demanding End to Military Trials’. Egypt Independent. Viewed 4 September 2013. http://www.egyptindependent.com/news/thousands-participate-online-protestdemanding-end-military-trials. Taussig, Michael. The Nervous System. New York: Routledge, 1992. ‘Timeline: Egypt’s Revolution’. Al Jazeera English, 14 February 2011. Viewed 4 September 2013. Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2011/01/201112515334871490.html. Winegar, Jessica. ‘The Privilege of Revolution: Gender, Class, Space, and Affect in Egypt’. American Ethnologist: Journal of the American Ethnological Society 39 (2012): 67-70. Sandra A. Fernandez is a Social Anthropology student in the doctoral programme at the University of St Andrews.

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Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

‘The Revolution Will Not Be Televised’ (But There Will Be a Soundtrack): Exploring 20th and 21st Century Revolt through Popular Music Erin R. McCoy Abstract As a cultural historian of Vietnam War-era American culture, it can be extraordinarily frustrating to watch contemporary America struggle with issues that appear only as updates on cultural dialogues that have been going on for over forty years, among them civil rights, race relations, war, women’s rights, veteran’s rights, and foreign policy, but, most importantly: war. Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) President Paul Potter spoke of ‘naming the systems’ that wilfully ‘[allowed] good men’ to make awful decisions in the name of the Vietnam War. Paul’s 1965 speech for the ‘March on Washington to End the War in Vietnam’ challenged the Anti-Vietnam War movement to ‘name that system [that allows for worldwide destruction]. We must name it, describe it, analyze it, understand it, and change it’. The Vietnam War marked the United States’ most visible and sizable social revolt in history; protests against the U.S.’s actions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, etc. have not elicited a response as abundant or visible as that garnered by the Vietnam War. Examining popular music lyrics as rhetoric that ‘names these systems’ challenged by American anti-war moments, however, allows us to see the legacy of discourse and language of revolutionary eras. Music lyrics such as Jefferson Airplane’s ‘Volunteers of America’ implored the public ‘to revolution!’ in order to stop the war in Vietnam, but there are no comparable ‘call to arms’ lyrics in recent U.S. history. Even though popular artists like the Dixie Chicks, Pearl Jam, and Nine Inch Nails spoke openly against the Bush Administration’s decision to engage in conflicts in the Middle East, these artists’ lyrical impact was not a forceful as the Vietnam era’s lyrical calls to arms against ‘closed systems’ of political and social injustice. Key Words: Vietnam War, Iraq War, Afghanistan, American protest, anti-war music, American music, Occupy Wall Street. ***** As a cultural historian of Vietnam War-era American culture, it can be extraordinarily frustrating to watch contemporary America struggle with issues that appear only as updates on cultural dialogues that have been going on for over forty years, among them civil rights, race relations, war, women’s rights, veteran’s rights, and foreign policy, but, most importantly: war. As I write this manuscript, U.S. President Barack Obama is giving a speech that essentially outlines the current position of the United States regarding Syria. Behind the President’s Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ rhetoric, which implored Americans to seek out online videos of Syrian children dying of poisonous gas, history reminds us that the United States used chemical weapons – such as white phosphorus – a short time ago, during the U.S.’s second invasion of Iraq. 1 The United States prefers to depict itself as a peacekeeping nation, but it – like its ‘special relationship’ partner Great Britain – continues to mire itself in war after war. Boston Globe columnist Alex Beam noted the ironic circularity of America’s perpetual relationship with war on September 5th, observing that the United States appears to suffer from a severe case of memory loss in regard to its military history: It is hard not to dwell on the irony of [Secretary of State] John Kerry, who burst onto the national stage in 1971 as a 28-year-old anti-war Vietnam veteran testifying against a questionably motivated foreign war, now storming Capitol Hill to make the case for a hermetic little military action in the Middle East. The Vietnam War began as a series of hermetic little military actions and quickly ballooned into a conflagration that claimed 58,000 American lives. How quickly they forget. 2 While the ultimate actions and decisions regarding the United States, its military, and Syria have yet to be seen, it is worth noting that the majority of the American people (and wisely its House and Senate) remain steadfastly against intervention in Syria. President Obama’s request for a Congressional vote on military action only occurred only ten days ago, but Americans have been quite vocal that they have not forgotten the ‘hermetic little military actions’ of history. Students at Penn State and Brown University held protests against the possibility of military action in Syria during the first week of September 2013, holding signs deploring the American government to ‘Blow Kisses, Not Bombs: No War on Syria’. 3 Requests for the U.S. to choose peace over war are nothing new; not only do they echo Vietnam protest signs imploring the U.S. to ‘Make Love, Not War’, but also these pleas for peace remain a permanent part of American cultural fabric. International calls to peace in Syria – including a day of prayer from the Vatican and demonstrations in Poland, Jordan, and Syria – are now easier for U.S. citizens to see, thanks to the a combination of the internet, social media, and a war-weariness that is now culturally palpable. 4 Somewhat buoyed by the Arab Spring, many young Americans cultivate sincere interest in world affairs, particularly the actions of their own country. But American youth today – armed with Twitter accounts, Facebook pages, and mobile devices that allow them to stay connected to global affairs at all times – appear to be less motivated to protest in the same ardent and public manners of those who set the bar for social protest in the United States: the anti-Vietnam War and Civil Rights Movements. Sit-Ins, Be-

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__________________________________________________________________ Ins, Teach-Ins, marches – all common counterculture and 1960s Civil Rights movement protest tactics – keep repeating, but not improving. America’s trending – or stagnating – practice of half-heartedly reiterating methods of social protest established during the 1960s was noted by journalist David Bauder, who lamented the unfocused nature of the Occupy Wall Street protests in 2011. These protests, which took part in the US, Australia, and Europe, called for government transparency, fiscal reform, equal rights and, particularly in America, an end to wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Exploring the central site of Zucotti Park in New York City, Bauder reported that, while familiar ‘defining anthem[s]’ of social protest in the 1960s appeared in the Occupy Wall Street event, there was little new musical material to punctuate the event: Music and musicians are woven into the fabric of the Occupy Wall Street protest, much as they were in movements, confrontations, and protests of the past, from the American Revolution to slavery to the Civil War, suffrage movement, labor movement, civil rights movement, and Vietnam War. But no defining anthem such as “We Shall Overcome” or “Which Side Are You On” has yet emerged for the protesters who have taken on corporate America. 5 Part of this problem, Bauder explains, comes from the wide variety of music available to protesters of today compared to those of the Civil Rights and antiVietnam War protestors. While many musicians performed for the crowds in Zuccotti Park, including anti-Vietnam War voices like Crosby, Stills, and Nash, the insistent call for change and peace was missing. In a telling anecdote, Crosby and Nash’s manager sent an email to Occupy Wall Street’s website asking if the musicians could perform. Crosby quietly came a few days earlier to check out the scene, worried that cold weather would make it difficult for him to play guitar. 6 Asking permission via email? Worrying about the cold weather? Wasn’t part of the revolutionary movements of Americans against various social injustices its revolutionary nature? Its insistence on being heard despite any hardships that might befall the protester – wasn’t that the point of revolt and revolution in America, to believe in a cause enough to stand up to the established order and make sure your voice was heard? One of the reasons the revolt and revolution has become so denigrated in the U.S., Bauder suggests, is the way music is heard and consumed has changed. The millennial generation

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__________________________________________________________________ rarely gather[s] at each other's homes and pump up the volume on their stereos for a shared listen of a hot album. Instead, friends might burn a CD for a buddy or share a download of a tune. 7 This point has been brought to my attention at several conferences where my research on protest music of the Vietnam War era in American history inevitably provoked comparisons to current anti-war activity, or the perceived lack thereof. One of my colleagues pointed out that the television turned off by midnight in the 1960s – there was no cable, no internet – so people actually hung out, listened to music, and talked about things. Today there exists a shortage of musicians willing to take loud, public anti-war stances. Gone are the Arlo Guthries, Bob Dylans, and Bruce Springsteens. Anthems against America’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan surfaced as the wars dragged on, and usual suspects like Neil Young, Peete Seeger, and Bruce Springsteen, but their songs didn’t take off in any popular or cathartic way; these new songs by reliable lyrical activists didn’t make it to Zucotti Park. Similar efforts by the rock band Pearl Jam, hip-hop artists Eminem and Talib Kweli, as well as country ‘outlaw’ Steve Earle went largely unnoticed. The poppunk band Green Day’s Grammy-winning album American Idiot boasted angry diatribes directed toward President George W. Bush’s aggressive foreign policies and personal idiosyncrasies. Pointed lyrics – ‘I’m not a part of a redneck agenda/ Now everybody do the propaganda’ – questioned Bush’s leadership and accused the President of creating an ‘information age of hysteria’. 8 The album was later developed into a ‘rock opera’ similar to The Who’s Tommy, but the masses weren’t motivated to protest Bush’s war in Iraq in a way significant enough to compare to that of anti-Vietnam War protest songs. There are a large array of songs from the Vietnam War era that remain eternally connected to the Vietnam War and a collective national identity of sadness. The variety of opinions on the Vietnam War – President Regan repackaged the experience as a ‘noble cause’; Walter Cronkite dismissed the conflict as a ‘stalemate’; many veterans’ lamentations over the ‘lost’ war – resound in the variety of music that surrounded, supported, and vehemently protested it. Musical and social theorists have long commented on music’s role in the community or society; even Nietzsche, though probably not foreseeing the Dionysian ecstasy of Woodstock, commented on the magnitude of folk music in his seminal work The Birth of Tragedy in 1872. 9 Nietzsche believed that even if music is simply arranged or sophomoric in construction; these factors only heightened the raw truth contained in it: It is true that such musical representations can neither instruct us much concerning Dionysiac content of music nor yet lay claim to any distinctive value as images. But once we study this discharge of music through images in a youthful milieu, among a people Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ whose linguistic creativity is unimpaired, we can form some idea of how strophic folk song must have arisen and how a nation’s entire store of verbal resources might be mobilized by means of that novel principle, imitation of the language of music. 10 Nietzsche’s notion that replication of folk messages could mobilize people is not a radical construct today. Due to the kinetic nature of protest marches, anti-war cadence calls naturally developed during anti-Vietnam War protests; a mass of people marching is much more effective if it is making noise. 1965’s popular protest chant ‘One-two-three-four/ We don’t want your fucking war’, provides evidence of the mobilization created by the ‘imitation of the language of music’. A group of anti-war protesters marching and chanting, albeit not the most organized group, remains a mobilized collective, a group of ‘people whose linguistic creativity is unimpaired’. 11 That music allows us to better see the world, at least see it ‘illuminated from within’ underscores the importance of music in times of revolution; it not only lets us see more of the world around us, but it also allows for insight into the events that mark its times. 12 In his book Antiwarriors, historian Melvin Small contends, ‘no other antiwar movement was as complex as that which aimed to stop American military involvement in the wars in Southeast Asia’ 13 which finds support through a sweeping study of popular music lyrics of music from other wars. 14 Moreover, Small’s account of the small size of historic anti-war protests and the majority of America’s citizens’ fleeting, marginal interest in the history of previous anti-war movements underscore the enormity of the anti-Vietnam War movement. The rhetoric of music lyrics based on America’s wars shapes and has shaped the country’s cultural experience, and in the 1960s, it was up to the youth to step into the role of those who questioned the authority that placed the U.S. in the Vietnam War. Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) President Paul Potter spoke of ‘naming the systems’ that wilfully ‘allowed] good men’ to make awful decisions in the name of the Vietnam War. Paul’s 1965 speech for the ‘March on Washington to End the War in Vietnam’ challenged the Anti-Vietnam War movement to ‘name that system [that allows for worldwide destruction]. We must name it, describe it, analyze it, understand it, and change it’. 15 The Vietnam War marked the United States’ most visible and sizable social revolt in history; protests against the U.S.’s actions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, etc. have not elicited a response as abundant or visible as that garnered by the Vietnam War. Examining popular music lyrics as rhetoric that ‘names these systems’ challenged by American anti-war moments, however, allows us to see the legacy of discourse and language of revolutionary eras. Music lyrics in popular rock songs like Jefferson Airplane’s ‘Volunteers’ (1969) implored the public ‘to revolution!’ in order to stop the war in Vietnam. 16 Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ ‘Volunteers’ was only one of several songs on the band’s sixth album that was staunchly anti-war, and the album’s use of profanity resulted in some flack from RCA Records. Controversy aside, the album was later certified gold and the ‘Volunteers’ single reached #65 on the Billboard Charts. 17 The song’s title – a play on the slogan of the Salvation Army – and lyrics represent a rollicking call for the necessity of revolution in America. The speaker begins the song by asking the listener to ‘look what’s happening out in the streets’; the phrase ‘got to revolution’ is repeated after each imperative issued by the speaker, underscoring the energy and urgency of the need for revolt against the ‘closed systems’ of the Vietnam War era. One must participate in ‘what’s going on’ in the world and join the ‘amazing [revolution] down in the streets’. This revolution – a cry for cultural, political, and racial awareness, is necessary; change has come to America because ‘one generation got old/ one generation got soul/ This generation got no destination to hold’. So who will step up and make the changes necessary? Who will lead the revolution that the speaker so fervently calls us to? The speaker, as America’s youth, answers: ‘We will and who are we/ We are volunteers of America!’ The sort of ‘volunteers’ addressed and speaking in Jefferson Airplane’s song are, unfortunately, not the type of volunteers that American national and cultural identity really respects. The ‘underdogs’ or the ‘antiwarriors’ remain the minority voices in American culture; despite how visual they may be or how many records they sell. The fact that these voices – sure in ‘who we are’ and their ‘will’ to forge a destination for their generation – are often marginalized is an undeniable part of the United States’ cultural fabric. The hopeful futures of social protest contain more calls to revolt and revolutionize systems that perpetuate violence and war. Many in the United States are aware of the sick cyclical cycle of the country’s history in war, and they gladly volunteer their opinions in social protest, but also in song lyrics. Lyrics from all eras of American anti-war music educate listeners that there is always a choice – peace – while simultaneously pointing out that citizens could and can always be a conduit for challenging existing systems of power. While these citizens have been somewhat quiet Americans, they are never silenced. The source of these protest movements comes from dissatisfaction with America, and often comes from a youth armed with a musical arsenal and an education in basic American politics. Let us all remain optimistic that antiwarriors in America – in music, art, politics, etc. – will continue to insist that we ‘got to revolution’ in several areas of American society that remain stagnant – gay rights, civil rights, etc. – but at the very least, the U.S. has ‘got to revolution’ its incessant proclivity toward war and its habitual exploitation of its military. Protests today show that the modern protestor has learned the methods of social protest from the anti-Vietnam War era, but until future revolutionaries build upon the foundation laid over 50 years ago, their cry to ‘revolution’ pales in comparison to those of the 1960s. Perhaps, if enough people start to ‘look what’s happening on the streets’, a resurgence – a wave of social protest bigger than that of the 1960s – will occur, Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ and many of us will join, as ‘volunteers of America’. The patriotic energy that a call to revolution creates in a society desperate for change is a siren song we cannot continue to ignore.

Notes The Truth You Don’t See, dir. Adam Lowry and John Pilger, written by John Pilger. Dartmouth Films, UK. 2010. 2 Alex Beam, ‘John Kerry’s Bad Idea’, The Boston Globe, 5 September 2013, Viewed 20 January 2015, http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2013/09/04/johnkerry-bad-idea/8XNDwNcHTACj7stnaDqAjO/story.html. 3 Cara Newlon, ‘Students Protest U.S. Strike on Syria’, USA Today, 10 September 2013, Viewed 20 January 2015, http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2013/09/10/student-protest-us-syriaobama/2796005/. 4 Oliver Darcy, ‘Photos: Scenes from Demonstrations around the World Protesting Possible Strike on Syria’, TheBlaze.com, 31 August 2013, Viewed on 20 January 2015, http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/08/31/photos-scenes-from-demonstrationsaround-the-world-protesting-possible-strike-on-syria/. 5 David Bauder, ‘Occupy Wall Street: Music Essential to Protest’, The Huffington Post, 13 November 2011, Viewed 20 January 2015, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/13/occupy-wall-streetmusic_n_1091176.html. 6 Ibid. 7 Ibid. 8 Green Day, American Idiot, prod. Rob Cavallo. Reprise, 2004, MP3. 9 Frederich Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy and the Genealogy of Morals (New York: Anchor Books, 1956). 44. 10 Ibid., 45. 11 Ibid. 12 Ibid., 129. 13 Melvin Small, Antiwarriors: The Vietnam War and the Battle for America's Hearts and Minds (Vietnam: America in the War Years) (New York: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 2002). 3. 14 Ibid., 129. 15 Paul Potter, ‘Naming the System Speech’, (April 17, 1965). Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) Document Library, Next Left Notes, 1, Viewed 30 January 2015, http://www.antiauthoritarian.net/sds_wuo/sds_documents/paul_potter.html. 16 Jefferson Airplane, Volunteers, prod. Al Schmitt. RCA, Victor, 1969, MP3. 1

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__________________________________________________________________ Jim Newsom, ‘Jefferson Airplane: Volunteers Review’, AllMusic.com, 2013, Viewed 20 January 2015, http://www.allmusic.com/album/volunteers-mw0000201928.

17

Bibliography Bauder, David. ‘Occupy Wall Street: Music Essential to Protest’. The Huffington Post, November 13, 2011. Viewed 20 January 2015. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/13/occupy-wall-streetmusic_n_1091176.html. Beam, Alex. ‘John Kerry’s Bad Idea’. The Boston Globe, September 5, 2013. Viewed 20 January 2015. http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2013/09/04/johnkerry-bad-idea/8XNDwNcHTACj7stnaDqAjO/story.html. Darcy, Oliver. ‘Photos: Scenes from Demonstrations around the World Protesting Possible Strike on Syria’. TheBlaze.com, 31 August 2013. Viewed 20 January 2015. http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/08/31/photos-scenes-from-demonstrationsaround-the-world-protesting-possible-strike-on-syria/. Green Day. American Idiot. Produced by Rob Cavallo. Reprise, 2004, MP3. Jefferson Airplane. Volunteers. Produced by Al Schmitt. RCA Victor, 1969, MP3. Newlon, Cara. ‘Students Protest U.S. Strike on Syria’. USA Today, September 10, 2013. Viewed 20 January 2015. http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2013/09/10/student-protest-us-syriaobama/2796005/. Newsom, Jim. ‘Jefferson Airplane: Volunteers Review’. AllMusic.com, 2013. Viewed 20 January 2015. http://www.allmusic.com/album/volunteers-mw0000201928. Nietzsche, Frederich. The Birth of Tragedy and the Genealogy of Morals. New York: Doubleday Books. Anchor Books ed. 1956. Small, Melvin. Antiwarriors: The Vietnam War and the Battle for America’s Hearts and Minds (Vietnam: America in the War Years). New York: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2002. Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Erin R. McCoy is an Assistant Professor of English & Liberal Studies at the University of South Carolina Beaufort. Her research interests include popular music and global cultural history of the Vietnam War era (hence the urge ‘to revolution’).

Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

Revolutionizing Terrorism: Al Qaeda’s Transformation from a Centralised Group to a Franchise and from a Militant Ideology to ‘Armies of One’ Kleanthis Kyriakidis and Petros Siousiouras Abstract Conventional wisdom presents 21st Century terrorism as entirely transformed, but for all the wrong reasons. What is the perceived friction, discontinuity or even cataclysmic change in comparison to the past? Firstly, terrorism is allegedly religious and not political. Secondly, it is allegedly irrational and seeks for as many victims as possible, which means that terrorists are unpredictable. Thirdly, it is allegedly global and the Islamists want to conquer the world or at least its Muslim part. This chapter challenges the aforementioned widely accepted theory and suggests that terrorism continues to be political, rational and mainly local. However, there is a true revolution concerning terrorism: the destruction of its hierarchy and structures. The most dangerous and effective terrorist group, namely Al Qaeda, in the beginning decentralised; transformed itself to a franchise. Later on it was transformed to mere ideology, which inspires ‘lone wolves’ or ‘armies of one’, the latest trend pertaining to terrorism. Key Words: Terrorism, Al Qaeda, Islamist, ‘lone wolves’, misconceptions regarding terrorism, policy recommendations. ***** 1. Introduction Conventional wisdom presents 21st Century terrorism as entirely transformed, but for all the wrong reasons. There has been a true revolution as regards terrorism, but not the one hailed by academic circles and political analysts. What is the perceived friction, discontinuity or even cataclysmic change in comparison to the past? Firstly, terrorism is allegedly religious and not political. Undoubtedly, ‘religion has provided the motivation, the justification, the organisation and the world view’ 1 for public acts of violence; hence the way to counter it should be completely novel. Secondly, it is allegedly irrational and seeks for as many victims as possible, which means that terrorists are unpredictable. Thirdly, it is allegedly global and the Islamists want to conquer the world or at least its Muslim part. This chapter challenges the aforementioned widely accepted theory and suggests that terrorism continues to be political, rational and mainly local. 2 However, there is a true revolution concerning terrorism: the destruction of its hierarchy and structures. The most dangerous and effective terrorist group, against which the global war on terror was declared, namely Al Qaeda, in the beginning decentralised; then it transformed itself to a franchise. Later on it was transformed to mere ideology, Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ which inspires ‘lone wolves’ or ‘armies of one’, the latest trend pertaining to terrorism. 2. Misconceptions about Terrorism Starting from the misconceptions and the perceived revolution vis-à-vis terrorism, the so-called ‘Islamic terrorism’ seeks political power and the establishment of theocracy, as a political system. Olivier Roy in his book ‘Globalized Islam: The Search for a New Ummah’ explains that ‘Islamic terrorism’ is anything but religious. ...Al Qaeda did not target St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, but the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. It targeted modern imperialism, as the ultra-leftists of the late 1960s and 1970s did with less success… The umma now plays the same role as did the proletariat for Troskyist and leftist groups in the 1960s... 3 Even the way that Islamic terrorist group interpret religion is different. Not surprisingly, Shi’a Hezbollah and Sunni Al Qaeda cannot easily agree. Even in Kashmir, supposed allies, the terrorist group Lashkar e Tayyiba (LeT), an Ahl-eHadith Sunni organisation, has differences with Harakat ul Mujahidin (HUM) and Jaish e Mohammed (JeM), which are Deobandi Sunni groups. Their goal is the ‘liberation’ of Kashmir, which is political by definition. In Palestine we witness the religiously strange phenomenon of Hamas being supported by Shiite countries and groups. 4 As such, all the notorious Islamist terrorist groups are mainly driven by political motives and seek political outcomes. One of the foremost experts on terrorism, Walter Laqueur, stated that ‘the trend now seems to be away from attacking specific targets like the other side’s officials and toward more indiscriminate killing’. 5 This tendency is seemingly illogical. Has the famous Brian Jenkins maxim that terrorists wanted ‘a lot of people watching and a lot of people listening and not a lot of people dead’, 6 lost its value? The answer is that the aforementioned trend is present, but not out of paranoia or excessive fanaticism, as Paul Wilkinson suggests. 7 Nowadays terrorists appear to strive for maximum casualties or extremely cruel assassinations and torture, to garner the media’s attention. We seem to live in a blood lusting era and spectacular terrorist actions consider it a sine qua non to have many victims, since only with true bloodbaths they can ensure visibility and recognition. The worse the crime and the more the victims, the better: an aim that is not unique and has been developing for more than two decades. For instance in 1993 Livingstone noted: As the nations of the globe learn to live with routine low-level violence, it can be expected that there will be a movement by terrorists toward more dramatic and increasingly destructive acts Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ of terrorism designed to ensure that the public does not forget about them and their causes. 8 Lastly, having sympathisers around the globe or the possibility to strike outside one’s borders does not make terrorism global, since this has always been the case. Still, the vast majority of the terrorist organisations have a very limited area of operations. Only one tenth of the foreign terrorist groups have ever acted outside their ‘borders’ and only the original Al Qaeda had a global political agenda. AlQaeda seemed to seek the ‘toppling [of] existing Muslim governments and establishing a new caliphate, an undivided Islamic realm ruled by sharia’. 9 Even for Al Qaeda this is the expansion of its initial goal that unmistakably was to force the United States out of Saudi Arabia. Nowadays Al Qaeda’s independent cells are as local as any group in the history of terrorism. Hence, there is no revolution in modern terrorism in this regard, too. 3. The True ‘Revolution’ However, there is a true revolution as regards terrorism and Al Qaeda is the essential case study. Terrorist organisations have been highly hierarchical throughout history. Groups have been named after their leader, like Abu Nidal Organisation, and have been linked with their founder so tightly, that their existence was meaningless if he perished. For example, PKK and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, which have been posing little or no threat after the arrest of Abdullah Ocalan and the death of Velupillai Prabhakaran respectively. The original Al Qaeda, with the cadre of mainly Arab veterans of the Afghan war (Egyptians and Saudis) had bases and safe havens, operational teams, procedures and training centres under the clear leadership of Osama Bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman Al-Zawahri. 10 There was an operational branch, almost unconcealed financing and ties with governments or other groups. We have to highlight that hierarchical structure can coexist with a cellular modus operandi or even with networking: If the cells are not independent and get their financial aid, coordination, operational planning and orders from the leadership, then the group can be considered highly hierarchical. The more conventional the hierarchy, the more efficient and the less secure the organisation. The steadfast American response to 9/11 led to the first phase of Al Qaeda’s status change from a well-structured group to a decentralised organisation, and then to a ‘franchise’. As Stephen Sloan explained such a group is a ...Stand-alone, mini-terrorist group (which) may operate within an environment of racial, ethnic and anti-government hatred for example, but it does not have specific organizational ties to a larger organization, nor is dependent on some level of support

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__________________________________________________________________ from a larger organization, a front group or a sector of the community. 11 Osama Bin Laden had lost his significance years before losing his life, since he was cut off in mountainous terrain and living in absolute secrecy in Pakistan. The franchise phenomenon was something radically novel that deviates from the typical command and control hierarchy of terrorist groups in the past. Groups with similar – Islamic – ideology used the ‘Al Qaeda’ brand in order to recruit young fanatics and also attract the local and global mass media. In the beginning, it was thought to be just decentralisation. Hence, we witnessed remote attacks (some of them fairly deadly like the ones in London or Madrid), by alleged Al Qaeda cells or an imaginary Al Qaeda network. Nowadays it seems that most attacks have been carried out by groups who had little or nothing to do with Al Qaeda, except using its ‘franchise’ name. Fareeed Zakaria highlighted this just a few days after the London metro bombing in April 2004: The authorities see no involvement by Al Qaeda. In fact, not one of the suspects is foreign-born or had spent any time in Afghan training camps. These are British, middle-class Muslim suburbanites who the authorities say became terrorists… They are inspired, not directed by Al Qaeda. 12 Let us first see which groups use the ‘brand name’. 13 Al Qaeda in Arabic Peninsula based in Yemen is very active, considered to be the group who publishes the infamous magazine ‘Inspire’, which is the voice of Al Qaeda. A suicide bombing in Sanna last May led to almost 100 people dead and numerous wounded. The geographic proximity can support the actual ties between the original Al Qaeda and this affiliated group, which was formed from Saudi and Yemeni Islamists, some of whom might have been members of the original group. Nevertheless, Al Qaeda in Islamic Maghreb is an example of clear ‘bandwagoning’. The former Algerian Salafist Group for Call and Combat merged with other Western African terrorist groups like the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group and expanded its area of operations to include Mali, Niger and Mauritania. 14 By using the Al Qaeda brand, it gained world attention and a new wave of operatives, young jihadists fascinated in the idea of being part of the almighty group. Jemaah Islamiya (partly renamed ‘Al Qaeda in Malayan Archipelago’) is also considered to be part of the Al Qaeda franchise, because it successfully used the brand name. Jemaah Islamiya is a group whose history dates before the foundation of Al Qaeda. Last but not least, most analysts focus on Al Qaeda in Iraq. It is an extremely dangerous group and Jabhat Al Nusrah, the Al Qaeda affiliate that participates in the Syrian civil war, is thought to be its offshoot. 15 The attacks from these stand-

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__________________________________________________________________ alone groups in the name of Al Qaeda signalled the first ‘franchise’ phase of a true revolution in terrorism. The second phase was the formation of independent groups, whose only link to Al Qaeda is their ideological connection. The new trend included a very loose affiliation with Al Qaeda, without any use of the brand name, but with clear ideological similarity. Various authors identified this trend as early as 2004: Jason Burke, for example, wrote ‘what we have currently is a broad and diverse movement of radical Islamic militancy’, highlighting despite Bin Laden being alive that we already were in a ‘post-Bin Laden’ phase of Islamic militancy. 16 Hence, Al Qaeda was transformed to an ‘ideology’. Al Shabaab in Somalia, Aby Sayyaf group in the Philippines, Asbat al Ansar in Lebanon and the main Islamist militant groups in Central Asia, namely, Islamic Jihad Union and the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan are such examples. Al Shabaab is considered by the US Department of State as an Al Qaeda affiliate, just because one of its leaders, Ahmed Abdi aw Mohamed pledged obedience to Ayman al Zawahiri. The truth is that al Shabaab has resulted from the ousted of the Somali Islamic Courts Council from power with the help of foreign troops and its agenda has little to do with Al Qaeda. 17 Al Shabaab as well as the other groups that have a clear Islamic flavour, desire to overthrow the local governments, which they consider either as foreign occupation collaborators or as un-Islamic. They also want to punish the neighbouring countries which ‘attacked’ them. Nonetheless, their take on who is a true Muslim differ in most cases from the Al Qaeda Wahabbi school of thought, as a development of the Hanbali school of thought, the strictest in Islamic Sunni theology. Further fragmentation of the Al Qaeda branches or associated organisations seem to lead to a new kind of terrorism: the ‘armies of one’. Isolated radicals may decide to sacrifice themselves for their ‘cause’, without any instruction from any group and without any extensive training. The last phase of the revolutionized terrorism is personal jihad and mainly from Westernized jihadists. One of the reasons for this final stage of transformation is the successful hunting and assassination of Al Qaeda franchise leaders or operatives, like Ilyas Kashmiri, Abu Yahya al Libi, Abu Zaid al Kuwaiti and Atiya Abdul Rahman. There are many examples of Islamist ‘lone wolves’. Last March, Mohammed Merah assassinated seven people, including three children, in Toulouse and Montauban, France with no apparent reason. Two months later Michael Adebowale hacked to death a British soldier. Of course, the foremost example of how dangerous these ‘armies of one’ can be was the Boston Marathon bombing last April, by two Chechen immigrants, with three people killed and more than 250 wounded. Someone can argue that since Timothy McVeigh, the notorious Oklahoma City bomber and up to Norwegian Anders Breivik and the Utoya massacre with 77 innocent people dead, ‘lone wolves’ are neither new nor Islamic in nature. The counter argument is that for the first time in history this trend seems

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__________________________________________________________________ to becoming the official strategy, as explicitly and continuously mentioned in Al Qaeda’s newspaper, ‘Inspire’. 18 ‘Lone wolves’ lack the support, training and expertise to carry on sophisticated attacks like 9/11; nevertheless, they can prove devastating. As such, attacks like the Boston Marathon horrendous act might be considered the forerunner of even more spectacular crimes. Obviously, the current and possibly last phase of the transformation of Al Qaeda, the ‘fanatical lone wolf’, is the most difficult to confront as it is difficult to detect and deter as there appears to be no apparent link to any organisation. 4. Conclusion: Policy Recommendations Understanding the changing face of terrorism is a prerequisite in our effort to counter it. Traditionally, there were two tactics applied to eliminate the terrorist threat: the decapitation of leadership as well as targeting the sponsors (individual and state) who backed terrorist groups. Decapitation of leadership sometimes did not work even against organisations with highly hierarchical structures. Hamas, IRA or ETA are such examples. Further, the more autonomous a group, the harder to curtail its funding. The ‘franchise’ structure has local chiefs but the ‘lone wolves’ cannot be traced. What is more important is that the more local the franchise, the more difficult to identify and isolate its financing as well as the actions of ‘armies of one’ who put at stake their lives. We should also try to understand the Muslim world, the Middle East and address their complex array of grievances. Most of our analyses are too ‘orientalist’, dominated by imperatives, perspectives, stereotypes and ideological biases. Edward Said’s ground-breaking work highlighted the long-held, often taken-for-granted Western ideological colonialist way of thinking regarding the ‘other’. 19 Hence, we need to see the Middle East through oriental eyes: understanding perceptions of discrimination and double standards. We have seen meagre antipathy transformed to outright hatred and rage. The leading example of western policies that drive such rage is the Palestinian issue. Filiu gives us an excellent description of the situation: Being a promising professional in Tunis; a seasonal laborer in the Nile valley; a street peddler in Casablanca; a trendy urbanite in Dubai; a frustrated unemployed person in Beirut; an aspiring real estate dealer in Jeddah; a perpetual student in Oran; a disgruntled clerk in Benghazi; or a dedicated teacher in Zarqa. She or he can be married, still at her/his parents’ home, already divorced, hardened bachelor, in between partners, in between countries or job prospects. He or she can be pious or atheist, secular or born-again, sectarian or tolerant, proselyte or indifferent. But [only] one thing is sure about him or her: for the Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ past twenty to twenty-five years, she or he has lived on a highly politicized diet of constant news, where Palestine was and still is the mantra… 20 As long such policies continue, terrorism will grow ever stronger. Senior military analysts like Anthony Cordesman, have pointed out that Israel is a ‘strategic liability for the US’. 21 Established academics and political analysts attack the unconditional support of the Israelis and the influence of the Israeli lobby. The foremost example is John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt’s book ‘The Israeli lobby and US Foreign Policy’ which attempts to undercut this powerful political instrument that shapes American policies. 22 Libya, Egypt and Syria provide us with further example. In Libya the West actively supported the overthrow of a tyrant, in Syria reluctantly helps the Opposition, despite the huge humanitarian crisis and in Egypt was comfortable to see a democratically elected president being expelled. 23 In a 2004 paper, Kyriakidis’ main policy recommendation was to assist grass root democratisation of the Middle East: ‘the support of authoritarian regimes in the Middle East, an unsuccessful model which is also applied to Central Asia, is bound to provoke sooner or later a massive response…’ 24 Ten years later we have witnessed this massive response in what is often called ‘Arab Spring’. It was also pointed out that Islamic fundamentalism should be fought as a theory; in the same way that Communism was fought and beaten on political, economic and moral grounds. The leftist terrorism lost its popular support when the true nature of Communism was realised. In that sense we should leave the Arab world experiment with Political Islam. 25 With moderate Islamists in power, we keep extremists at large and we can practically eliminate the so-called ‘Islamic terrorism’. To conclude, the revolution in terrorism is mainly structural. Hence in order to counter it we need not respond in new ways. We should address the main issues that cause terrorism, not simply undertake military responses. The double standard policies that young Arabs identify as an inspiration, and making them excellent recruits for terrorist groups or desperate ‘lone wolf’ actors. Only by waging an ideological fight against Political Islam and Fundamentalism w will prevail over terrorism.

Notes 1 Mark Juergensmeyer, Terror in the Mind of God (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003), 7. 2 Charles Kegley Jr.’s, ed., The New Global Terrorism (New York: Prentice Hall, 2003).

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__________________________________________________________________ Mahmood Mamdani, ‘Whither Political Islam?’, Foreign Affairs 1.2 (2005): 152. For Iran’s support towards Hamas, see Aaron Kalman, ‘Gaza Leader Haniyeh Thanks Iran for Helping Make Israel “Scream with Pain”‘, The Times of Israel, 22 November 2012, viewed 1 November 2013, http://www.timesofisrael.com/gazaleader-haniyeh-thanks-iran-for-helping-make-israel-scream-with-pain/. 5 Walter Laqueur, ‘Postmodern Terrorism’, Foreign Affairs Journal 75 (September/ October 1996): 25. 6 Brian Michael Jenkins, ‘International Terrorism: A New Mode of Conflict’, International Terrorism and World Security, ed. David Carlton and Carlo Schaerf (London: Croom Helm, 1975), 15. 7 ‘Where the perpetrators are motivated by religious fanaticism this also contributes to the increased propensity for mass-lethality indiscriminate attacks, because a bomber who believes he is carrying out the will of God, or Allah, in waging a “Holy War” or Jihad against an evil enemy is unlikely to be inhibited by the prospect of causing large-scale carnage’. See Paul Wilkinson, Terrorism vs. Democracy: The Liberal State Response (London: Frank Class, 2001), 50. 8 N.C. Livingstone. ‘Taming Terrorism: In Search of a New US Policy’, International Security Review 8.1 (Spring 1993): 17. 9 Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon, The Age of Sacred Terror (New York: Random House, 2002), 103. 10 For the original Al Qaeda see Jane Corbin, Al-Qaeda (New York: Thunder’s Mouth Press/ Nation Books, 2002). 11 Stephen Sloan, ‘The Changing Nature of Terrorism’, The Terrorism Threat and US Government Response: Operational and Organizational Factors, ed. James M. Smith and William C. Thomas (Colorado: USAF Institute of National Security Studies, 2001), 63. 12 Fareed Zakaria, ‘The Best Ways to Beat Terror’, Newsweek, 12 April 2004, 35. 13 For the affiliate groups that use the ‘brand name’, see John Rollins, ‘Al Qaeda and Affiliates: Historical Perspective, Global Presence, and Implications for U.S. Policy’, CRS Report for Congress R41070, 25 January 2011. 14 United States Department of State Publication Bureau of Counterterrorism, Country Reports on Terrorism 2012 (Washington DC, May 2013), 282. 15 ‘The leader of Jabhat al-Nusra, Abu Mohammed al-Joulani, has recently publicly sworn allegiance to Al-Qaida leader Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri and the group has been blacklisted as a branch of Al-Qaida in Iraq by the United States government’. See Aaron Zelin, Evan Kohlman and Laith Al-Khouri, ‘Convoy of Martyrs in the Levant’, Flashpoint Global Partners Study (June 2013), 6. 16 Jason Burke, Al Qaeda, The True Story of Radical Islam (New York: I. B. Tauris, 2004), xxv, 21. 3 4

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__________________________________________________________________ Kleanthis Kyriakidis, ‘Somalia’s Only Solution: Proactive Strategy to Replace Reactive Tactics’, NMIOTC Maritime Interdiction Operations Journal 5 (June 2012): 22 18 Yigal Carmon and H. Migron, ‘New Trend in Al-Qaeda’s Recruitment Efforts: American Muslims Should Carry the Burden of Jihad in U.S’. Inquiry & Analysis Series Report No.639 (Middle East Media Research Institute, 19 October 2010). More details can be found in Steven Stalinsky, ‘AQAP Releases Issues VIII and IX of Its English-Language Magazine “Inspire”, Calling for Lone-Wolf Jihad Attacks Targeting “Populations”, Permitting Chemical and Biological Weapons’, Inquiry & Analysis Series Report No.831 (Middle East Media Research Institute, 7 May, 2012). 19 Edward W. Said, Orientalism (New York: Vintage, 1979). 20 Jean-Pierre Filiu, The Arab Revolution (London: Hurst & Company, 2011), 121. 21 Anthony Cordesman, ‘The Fighting in Gaza: How Does It End? (And, Will It?)’, Center for Strategic and International Studies, 5 January 2009, viewed 1 November 2013, http://csis.org/files/media/csis/pubs/090105_cordesman_gaza_how_does_it_end.pdf. 22 John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt, The Israeli Lobby and US Foreign Policy (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux), 2008. 23 An excellent analysis provided in Florence Gaub, ‘NATO and Libya: Reviewing Operation Unified Protector’, Letort Paper (Strategic Studies Institute US Army War College, June 2013); For Syria see Erica D. Borghard, ‘Arms and Influence in Syria: The Pitfalls of Greater U.S. Involvement’, CATO Policy Analysis 734 (7 August 2013); Mary Casey and Joshua Haber, ‘Kerry Said Egypt’s Army Was Restoring Democracy in Removing Morsi’, Foreign Policy, 2 August 2013. 24 Kyriakidis Kleanthis, Terrorism and Lessons Learned from a Wrong Diagnosis, (Middle East Studies Association 2004 38th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, 22 November 2004). 25 The truth is that ‘when free from government repression, Islamic candidates and organizations have worked within the political system and participated in elections in Tunisia, Turkey, Jordan, Egypt, Lebanon, Kuwait, Yemen, Pakistan, Indonesia and Malaysia; activists have even held cabinet-level positions in Sudan, Pakistan, Kuwait, Jordan, Yemen and Malaysia’. See John L. Esposito, The Islamic Threat: Myth or Reality (New York, Oxford, 1999), 267-268. 17

Bibliography Benjamin, Daniel and Steven Simon. The Age of Sacred Terror. New York: Random House, 2002. Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Borghard, Erica D. ‘Arms and Influence in Syria: The Pitfalls of Greater U.S. Involvement’. CATO Policy Analysis 734, 7 August 2013. Burke, Jason. Al Qaeda, the True Story of Radical Islam. New York: I. B. Tauris, 2004. Carmon, Yigal and H. Migron. ‘New Trend in Al-Qaeda’s Recruitment Efforts: American Muslims Should Carry the Burden of Jihad in U.S’. Inquiry & Analysis Series Report No.639. Middle East Media Research Institute, 19 October 2010. Casey, Mary and Joshua Haber. ‘Kerry Said Egypt’s Army Was Restoring Democracy in Removing Morsi’. Foreign Policy, 2 August 2013. Corbin, Jane. Al-Qaeda. New York: Thunder’s Mouth Press/ Nation Books, 2002. Cordesman, Anthony. ‘The Fighting in Gaza: How Does It End? (And, Will It?)’. Center for Strategic and International Studies. January 5, 2009. Viewed 1 November 2013. http://csis.org/files/media/csis/pubs/090105_cordesman_gaza_how_does_it_end.pdf. Esposito, John L. The Islamic Threat: Myth or Reality. New York, Oxford, 1999. Filiu, Jean-Pierre. The Arab Revolution. London: Hurst & Company, 2011. Gaub, Florence. ‘NATO and Libya: Reviewing Operation Unified Protector’. Letort Paper. Strategic Studies Institute US Army War College, June 2013. Jenkins, Brian Michael. ‘International Terrorism: A New Mode of Conflict’. International Terrorism and World Security, edited by David Carlton and Carlo Schaerf, 13-49. London: Croom Helm, 1975. Juergensmeyer, Mark. Terror in the Mind of God. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003. Kalman, Aaron. ‘Gaza Leader Haniyeh Thanks Iran for Helping Make Israel “Scream with Pain”‘. The Times of Israel, 22 November 2012. Viewed 1 November 2013. http://www.timesofisrael.com/gaza-leader-haniyeh-thanks-iran-for-helping-makeisrael-scream-with-pain/.

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Kegley, Charles Jr.’s, ed. The New Global Terrorism. New York: Prentice Hall, 2003. Kyriakidis, Kleanthis. Terrorism and Lessons Learned from a Wrong Diagnosis. Middle East Studies Association 2004 38th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, 22 November 2004. ———. ‘Somalia’s Only Solution: Proactive Strategy to Replace Reactive Tactics’. NMIOTC Maritime Interdiction Operations Journal 5 (June 2012): 20-24. Livingstone, N.C. ‘Taming Terrorism: In Search of a New US Policy’. International Security Review 8.1 (Spring 1993). Mamdani, Mahmood. ‘Whither Political Islam?’. Foreign Affairs 1.2 (2005). Viewed on 20 January 2015. http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/60445/mahmood-mamdani/whitherpolitical-islam. Mearsheimer, John J. and Stephen M. Walt. The Israeli Lobby and US Foreign Policy. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008. Rollins, John. ‘Al Qaeda and Affiliates: Historical Perspective, Global Presence, and Implications for U.S. Policy’. CRS Report for Congress R41070. 25 January 2011. Said, Edward W. Orientalism. New York: Vintage, 1979. Sloan, Stephen. ‘The Changing Nature of Terrorism’. The Terrorism Threat and US Government Response: Operational and Organizational Factors, edited by James M. Smith and William C. Thomas, 51-68. Colorado: USAF Institute of National Security Studies, 2001. Stalinsky, Steven. ‘AQAP Releases Issues VIII and IX of Its English-Language Magazine “Inspire”, Calling for Lone-Wolf Jihad Attacks Targeting “Populations”; Permitting Chemical and Biological Weapons’. Inquiry & Analysis Series Report No.831. Middle East Media Research Institute, 7 May 2012. United States Department of State Publication Bureau of Counterterrorism. Country Reports on Terrorism 2012. Washington DC: May 2013.

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__________________________________________________________________ Wilkinson, Paul. Terrorism vs. Democracy: The Liberal State Response. London: Frank Class, 2001. Zakaria, Fareed. ‘The Best Ways to Beat Terror’. Newsweek. 12 April, 2004. Zelin, Aaron, Evan Kohlman, and Laith Al-Khouri. ‘Convoy of Martyrs in the Levant’. Flashpoint Global Partners Study, June 2013. Viewed 20 January 2015. http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/view/convoy-of-martyrs-inthe-levant. Kleanthis Kyriakidis is a PhDc at the University of the Aegean. He holds a MPA from Harvard Kennedy School (Lucius Littauer Award), a MA in NSA (Middle East Studies) with distinction and a MS in Physical Oceanography, both from the Naval Postgraduate School. Petros Siousiouras is an Associate Professor at the University of the Aegean.

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New Movements and the Question of the Lack of Organization: A Study of the ‘Indignant Movement’ in Spain Mehrdad Emami and Mahrouz Rezaei Abstract In the 21st century, the world has experienced events that have invalidated dominant political notion: notions of liberalism and neo-liberalism as the most advanced forms of social, political and economic evolution of human life. Such events include the occupying of urban places, the Arab Spring in Northern Africa and the Indignant Movement in Spain which has in common mass movements demanding radical economic reform. These movements have two central characteristics: their reliance on communication technologies and a high level of diversity. Focussing on the Indignant Movement of Spain, to understand its links to past protests including the 1968 uprising as well as its operation and goals. Finally, we conclude that the new movements in the 21st century have not yet concretized their aims and demands, and shortly after their initiation they have led to adjust themselves to the status quo. This was due to a lack of organization and somehow disbelief in joining the preestablished parallel movements opposing governments and also their focus on the spontaneity of the masses. Key Words: Indignant movement, May 1968, spontaneity, organisation, marginal groups. ***** 1. Unrest Nature of the World in 21st Century Since the end of the 20th century, we have seen dramatic change in the social, political and economic systems of the world. We have seen the fall of the USSR and increasing global economic integration through the hegemonic Neoliberalism. Theories such as ‘The End of History’ suggested that the new world order of liberal/neoliberal democracy had triumphed over other discourses. The popularisation of such terms as ‘post-political age’ and ‘post-ideological era’ indicated that any collective dreams or demands were likely to end in types of totalitarian experiences. Ongoing antagonism of the political sphere in the name of so-called ‘liberal/neoliberal democracy’ at once has become to a dialogue-based personal space in which the confrontation between ‘us’ (it means any subject who forms collective politics) and ‘them’ (defenders of any status quo) was quashed and everything was reduced to individual identities and life choices. But this ‘end of history’ theory collapsed with the emergence of ongoing campaigns in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan following terroristic attacks on Twin Towers in 9/11. We see what appears to be the emergence of a new wave of

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__________________________________________________________________ imperialistic policies by the United States and its various allies in the name of ‘war on terror’. Such conflicts have resulted in a sense of crisis that has been compounded by the global economic crisis which was turned into a deadly phase during 2007-2008, intensified. But it was not limited to the United States and shortly after, it diffused through all parts of Europe. At the same time, Governments have responded with austerity measures including reducing budget deficits, spending cuts, tax increases and quite targeted labour market reforms. This has been coupled with the mass unrest: from Occupy Wall Street movement in the United States, the Indignant movement in Spain, to the protests in Greece, Taqsim Square movement in Turkey. Such mass movements have formed collective struggles and demanding alternatives to status quo. However, these recent events were not merely limited to the economic unrest: we also witnessed a great wave of political revolts in North African and the Middle East. 2. Urbanisation and the Right to the City Although most of the 20th centuries’ revolutions, from 1917 Russia, 1959 Cuba to 1979 Iran initiated by the militant minorities in both urban and rural areas, revolutionary movements in the 21st century lead by the Northern African, have taken place in the cities or urban areas. The urban area as the main background of these events stems from this fact that urbanisation continues to increase significantly. According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), less than 40% of the world population were living in cities until 1990: by 2010, we see over 50% of the population now in urban areas. 1 On this problematic, we apply the notion of ‘The Right to the City’ which was proposed by David Harvey. Harvey argues that a city is a place where people from different backgrounds (included classes) are mixed together and willingly or unwillingly seek to create a shared life. This includes efforts to establish a shared experience. Harvey argues that ‘the right to the city’ in the contemporary world prioritises the right to private property and profit at the expense of other subordinate rights including human rights. 3. Rise and Fall of Indignant Movement On 15 May 2011, millions of people across Europe answered a call to ‘take the streets’ against neoliberal economic measures that were being implemented in Spain in the aftermath of the financial crisis. According to Instituto de Investigación de Mercados, up to 8.5 million people participated in protests and marches. In their surveys, they found that 76% of those surveyed believed that the demands made by the ‘indignados’ were reasonable. 2 Most of these movements practiced non-violent ways of struggle and formed large gatherings in the main public spaces of cities such

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__________________________________________________________________ as squares, parks and boulevards. These groups began to ‘occupy’ – and this became the most significant tactic used. The Indignant Movement was a protest against economic policies of European Union (EU) and other international financial institutions such as International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank. Objecting to rising levels of unemployment, inflation and austerity measures, Spaniards took the streets and shouted anti-austerity slogans. One of the most repeated slogans was aimed at parliament representatives – claiming that ‘You do not represent us!’ This highlighted that when economic crisis emerges from decision-makers and financial institutions, it is the general population that are asked to shoulder the burden through austerity measures. For example, according to 2013 report of European Commission, total unemployment rate of Spain reached 25% and for those under 25, the rate was a staggering of 56%. 3 David Marty, a participator in the Indignant Movement writes well in his article, The Indignant and Organized, the formation and structure of the movement is shaped by a cross section of communities including students and virtual groups. These have shaped the networks have played an important role in the genesis of uprising. 4 According to Marty, a few hours after the first encampments of the indignant people, committees were established to ensure the basic needs of participators were met including water and food, health, cleaning public spaces and ensuring clear communication. Each of these committees was composed of voluntary members who had particular responsibilities according to their different abilities. These committees dealt with both camp affairs and the movement as a whole. In fact, 15 committees formed with 12 of them playing a key role as they focussed on legal, infirmary, infrastructure, respect, cleaning, library, arts, day-nursery, archives, communication, extensions and information. Local assemblies also emerged to duplicate these centralised groups though they have their own ways of decision-making. As Marty says, these assemblies have not been ‘centralist’. When committees complete their work, working groups commence their task and explore proposals seeking consensus. As well as the committees and working groups, one of distinctive features of the movement was its inclusiveness: Feminists, LGBT members, unemployed workers, immigrants and refugees, the homeless, students, conservatives and even tourists have played an important role in the uprising. 4. Established Organisation as the Main Basis for Social Movements In understanding this movement, it is important to move beyond organisation and understand strategies: we must ask what gives the contemporary movements a distinguishing feature? One view is that we can substitute ‘class’ for ‘multitude’ (as Antonio Negri and Michael Hardt appear to do in Multitude). This highlights that contemporary movements can be understood as ‘trans-class’ as they include various socioAmal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ economic elements. As such, contemporary protest movements include an amalgamation of different classes with different political orientations. The very presence of conservatives standing with radicals highlights this and truly represents ‘civil society’. Since recent movements have diverged from class-based movements, there has emerged an incongruity in strategy and tactics from a class-based sense. In other words, movements that put most of their concentration on creativity and spontaneity of their members prefer to move through the contingent order of things. As Georg Lukács notes in his book History and Class Consciousness (1976): …In so far as they [proletariat’s reactions to the crisis] limit themselves at most to spontaneous mass actions, they exhibit a structure that is in many ways like that of movements of prerevolutionary ages. However, such outbreaks come to a halt no less spontaneously; they peter out when their immediate goals are achieved or seem unattainable. It appears, therefore, as if they have run their ‘natural’ course. 5 Lukács is referring to the cessation of these movements because of a lack of strategy as the cornerstone of such movements. It is not a mere accident that the movements raised in recent years, are completely faded nowadays or their remainders have changed to elements of civil society by other nongovernmental organizations, syndicates etc… As other problems of the lack of strategy and tactic in recent protest movements, especially indignant movement, lack of consensus with formerly raised parallel movements and not promulgating an alliance with simultaneous and later movements can be pointed out. Although the composition of indignant movement included feminists, workers, LGTB activists etc, we actually saw that after the movement’s entrance to post-street level, most of parallel movements (worker, feminist etc movements) were reduced to workings of Indignants’ working-groups. 4.1. Short-Term Organization For Lukács, organisation is the mediation between theory and praxis. But when a protest movement considers itself free of any specific theory, it has limited organisation. As long as the streets are the only scenes for demonstration, urban protest movements have the ability to organise the protests. But when the streets are evacuated of protesters and the movement loses its concrete body, we must reflect on what is left? Although these new movements attempted to present a new structure of nonparty collective activities through forming assemblies, working-groups and committees, there is no on-going political outcome. This means that in fact, a social Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ movement reduced to set pathologies, and built up with a cross section of society with little to keep them together beyond the rallying call of crisis. As long as the movements are at street level, the plural essence of them is a feature representing the inclusiveness and diversity. But once the movements move beyond this, this diversity becomes its Achilles’ heel for it avoids more radical options. To highlight this issue, we now turn to the events of May ‘68. 5. From Spontaneity to Organisation: Radical Legacy of May 68 Events of May 68, in spite of the many criticisms, show the potential for a more radical outcome. Sharing new patterns of self-management, the possibility of participation in serious decision-making processes for everyone including workers requires the adopting of specific strategies around class struggle. This was the pattern of self-managed student committees aligning with workers from different factories that surpassed existing structures of unions. These common students-workers committees paralysed the French economy. According to Patrick Seal, author of French Revolution 1968 (1968), it was the first time in post WWII history that intellectuals and workers contributed to each other, and this contribution in spite of its internal contradictions, was remarkable. These affiliations allowed the movements to criticise the unequal structures of capitalism from different positions simultaneously. There is no doubt that May 68 presented a new pattern for radical social movements seeing the convergence of potential revolutionary forces. But we cannot adopt the approach of May 68 directly – the world has changed. But we can learn by asking about the strategies and tactics by which we can increasingly converge potential revolutionary forces so that their abilities focus on the long-term and do not merely rely on ‘spontaneity’. 6. Conclusion As argued throughout this chapter, recent protest movements have failed to connect to any kind of class struggle – often replacing ‘classes with ‘multitude’. This has highlighted the organisational weakness of these movements as we have seen a lack of specific strategy and tactic based on the fundamental inequalities of capitalism. Although Indignant Movement of Spain appeared successful, it no longer exists or has any profile apart from the activities of a small number of NGOs. It failed to challenged and resist the neoliberal structure of Spanish government that resulted in the crisis. Today, the economic status of Spain does not significantly differ from the past as great income gaps, unstable status of housing, continuation of austerity measures and high unemployment continue. As noted by the European Centre of Statistics (2013), Spain continued to have the second highest unemployment rates across EU member states. Such statistics echoed 2011 and 2012 results. But no sustained protests that confront the status quo remain. Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Today, more than ever, we are facing contradictions of class societies stemmed from neo-liberalism across the world. It is more important than ever to adopt ‘class politics’ as this will have a significant role in success or failure of social movements. Further, we should adopt the radical slogan of May 68: ‘Be realistic, demand the impossible!’

Notes Global Health Observatory, ‘Urban Population Growth’, viewed 2 September 2013, http://www.who.int/gho/urban_health/situation_trends/urban_population_growth_t ext/en/. 2 Pablo Ouziel, ‘Spain’s “Indignados” at the Vanguard of a Global Nonviolent Revolt’, 6 August 2011, viewed 2 August 2013, http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/2539:spains-indignados-at-the-vanguard-of-aglobal-nonviolent-revolt. 3 Eurostat Commission – STAT, ‘Euro Area Unemployment Rate at 12.1%’, August 2013, viewed 20 January 2015, http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_STAT-13-140_en.htm?locale=FR. 4 David Marty, ‘Indignant and Organized: From 15-M to 19-J’, 25 June 2011, viewed 4 August 2013, http://revista-amauta.org/2011/06/indignant-and-organized-from15-m-to-19-j. 5 Georg Lukács, History and Class Consciousness (Paris: Minuit, 1976), viewed 7 August 2013, http://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/history/ch08.htm. 1

Bibliography Eurostat Commission – STAT. ‘Euro Area Unemployment Rate at 12.1%’. August 2013. Viewed 20 January 2015. http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_STAT-13-140_en.htm?locale=FR. Global Health Observatory. ‘Urban Population Growth’. Viewed 2 September 2013. http://www.who.int/gho/urban_health/situation_trends/urban_population_growth_t ext/en/. Harvy, David. Rebel Cities: From the Right to the City to the Urban Revolution. London and New York: Verso. 2012. Harvy, David. A Brief History of Neoliberalism. Oxford & New York: Oxford. 2005. Lukács, Georg. History and Class Consciousness. Paris: Minuit, 1976. Viewed 7 August 2013. http://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/history/ch08.htm. Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Marty, David. ‘Indignant and Organized: From 15-M to 19-J’. 25 June 2011. Viewed 4 August 2013. http://revista-amauta.org/2011/06/indignant-and-organized-from15-m-to-19-j/. Negri, Antonio and Michael Hardt. Multitude: War and Democracy in the Age of Empire. New York: Penguin Books, 2006. Ouziel, Pablo. ‘Spain’s “Indignados” at the Vanguard of a Global Nonviolent Revolt’. 6 August 2011. Viewed 2 August 2013. http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/2539:spains-indignados-at-the-vanguard-of-aglobal-nonviolent-revolt. Rees, John. Strategy and Tactics: How the Left Can Organize to Transform Society. Counterfire, 2011, eBook. Seale, Patrick and Maureen McConville. French Revolution, 1968. New York: Heinemann, Penguin Books, 1968. Mehrdad Emami is an Iranian independent researcher and translator who studied Anthropology in the Tehran University. He is one of the authors of the project called ‘Cultural History of Tehran’. Mahrouz Rezaei is an Iranian independent researcher, studied Law in University of Tehran and Political Science at University of Warsaw.

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The Palestinian Non-Governmental Organisations in the Arab Spring (2010-2013) Ibrahim Natil Abstract The purpose of this chapter is to study the Palestinian Non-Governmental Organisations in responding to the Arab Spring (2010-2012) in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT). By focussing on various youth organisations in the OPT, this chapter will examine the established interests, reactions and responses to the Arab Spring. It includes how these organisations shaped and contributed to establish new conventional power structures. The chapter will consider a number of social, economic and political factors, circumstances and changes that have influenced the Palestinian NGOs in responding to the Arab Spring in the OPT. To examine the role of these organisations in the Arab Spring, the chapter will examine the efforts and activities delivered by these local organisations who participated in the regional forums and conferences to support the changes and democratic transformation in Egypt, Tunisia and Libya. Key Words: Palestinian NGOs, Arab Spring, activism. ***** 1. Palestinian NGOs Historical Overview Palestinian society started establishing non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in the early of 20th century to promote national struggles and serve community interests in different fields. These NGOs became charities that started their activities and operations in accordance with Ottoman law. These organisations, though very few, were active in different fields of education, sport, culture and social life. NGOs delivered services to the Arab Palestinian communities during the British mandate in Palestine before 1948. 1 The Palestinian NGOs, along other stakeholders, played a national role in promoting the Palestinian struggle against the establishment of the state of Israel in an area that was historically Palestine. The defeat of the Arab forces by the Israeli military on 15 May 1948 resulted in over 78 per cent of historical Palestine being subsumed by Israeli. The few Palestinian NGOs, already paralyzed due to the war, had to confront the new state structure of Israel. The creation of Israel redefined the map of the Middle East, following the forced expulsion by Israel of more than 750,000 Palestinians from their homes and land. These Palestinians became refugees in different places: West Bank, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon and Gaza Strip. In 1949, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) was established to provide social welfare (including education, health, financial and shelter) to the Palestinian refugees who had been forced or expelled Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ from their homes after the establishment of Israel in 1948. UNRWA was the backbone for the survival of the Palestinian population in the midst of political and civil conflict and economic hardship, exasperated by the lack of natural resources in the Gaza Strip. UNRWA, however, did not provide services for one third of the population who were recorded as ‘non-refugees’. These non-refugees, estimated at 60,000–80,000 people before the war, where the indigenous people who lived in the Gaza Strip before the flood of refugees arrived as the result of the creation of Israel. 2 The task of managing this humanitarian crisis was overwhelming, and the three different authorities that governed the Gaza Strip – the Egyptian Administration, the Israeli Military Administration and the Palestinian National Authority – all faced difficulties in satisfying the needs of refugees and nonrefugees alike, due to the on-going conflict and to high levels of poverty and unemployment. 3 This opened the way for community groups and political factions to function as an alternative to the existing authorities, delivering services to the community at large. 2. NGOs under the Israeli Occupation The various political and economic hardships that followed encouraged the different political factions to become involved in social, education and health activities to both represent and also seek the support of their constituencies. During the late 1970s and 1980s, various NGOs registered under the Israeli military occupation in Gaza Strip and the West Bank – many of which were registered under the Ottoman Law before the British mandate in Palestine. The Israeli occupation imposed additional requirements and constraints on registration process of NGOs. Constraints on registration and security surveillance negatively impacted their functioning and ability to connect with grassroots organisations. The NGOs where force to work out of the established Israeli system whose priorities often contradicted those of the populations where attempting to represent. As such, twin goals emerged that increased the tensions with Israel: not only did they attempt to deliver different social, educational, sport and financial services to respond to the growing needs of the society under the occupation, but They also participated in the national struggle against the Israeli occupation. 4 One example was the Palestinian Red Crescent in the Gaza Strip, led by prominent national leftist figure, Dr Haider Abed Shafai, which provided social contributions and health work before the first uprising in 1987. The Red Crescent was established in 1969, and was active in different social and health fields for many years. But the health and social conditions of the population had deteriorated by the outbreak of the first Intifada in 1987, due to both the high level of conflictrelated injuries as well as the very low capacity of the public hospital run by the Israeli military administration. This encouraged the Union of Palestinian Medical Relief Committees to take the initiative to supplement eight mobile teams (three in the Gaza Strip and five in the West Bank) with a number of permanent emergency Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ first aid centres in the densely populated areas, where clashes with the Israeli military were almost daily occurrences. 5 The Islamist figure, Sheikh Ahmed also established a number of NGOs registered by the Israeli civil administration. These NGOs were a social network of schools, sport clubs, kindergartens, women’s centres, medical centres and charitable associations, serving thousands of Palestinians. Later, the social welfare networks of Islamic NGOs were directed and managed by Hamas’ Dawa (Outreach). This social welfare work, based on its Islamic ideology and social change theory, was had a greater level of sophistication that the various Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO) factions which existed in competition. 6 The Palestinian NGOs expanded and increased prior the Oslo Agreement (1993) operated 60% of all health care facilities in 1992. Palestinian NGOs managed 100% of all pre-schools and rehabilitation facilities. NGOs also implemented 78% of all new development projects between 1984 and 1992. 7 3. NGOs Post Oslo Agreement In 1994, the PLO established the Palestinian Authority (PA) to administrate the civil and security affairs of the occupied Palestinian Territories in accordance with the Oslo Agreement. The PA inherited the ineffective social, educational and health delivery services from the Israeli Civil Administration. In contrast, the Palestinian NGOs mostly affiliated to the different political factions and movements were functionally and effectively stronger. Another trend that emerged at this stage was the sharp increase in the number of registered NGOs by the PA. This followed the increase in funding that emerged for nation building as part of the Oslo Agreement. The PA established a Ministry for NGOs to respond to this rapid growth and expansion of this sector and in January 2000, enforced a new NGO law in an attempt to better manage the process. A number of existed NGOs participated in enriching this new law in cooperation with the Ministry of NGOs. Following further conflict with Israel as well as a failure to deliver any sustained benefits, a few years later this ministry was dissolved. These NGOs, however, funded mainly by international donors, cooperated and continued to deliver services. This was despite a dramatic drop in foreign aid: from US$220 million in 1993, to a mere US$74 million in 1997, a drop of 66%. 8 4. NGOs and the Failure of Oslo (Peace Process) Despite the hopes associated with the Oslo Agreement, the majority of NGOs were affiliated to leftist and Islamic groups and factions that did not support the actual Oslo process. In October 2000, the Palestinian NGOs witnessed the collapse of Oslo peace process and the failure of negotiations between PLO and Israel. During this period, the function of NGOs to contributing to state building and promotion of community development, peace building, democracy, human rights, Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ rule of law essentially collapsed as violence spread in the Palestinian streets. The Palestinian population faced a new challenge of violence, the absence rule of law, the weakness of the PA’s security and civil institutions; all which accompanied by highly levels of civilian casualties amongst young people as a new conflict flared. The PA could not control the street and satisfy the needs of the society. The social, economic, political, health and community security of the Palestinian citizenship deteriorated. Worst still, Palestinian NGOs had little ability to respond was hampered as they were mainly dependent on foreign donors. Despite this, the NGOs response to the humanitarian crisis was rapid due to the unfortunate lessons of history. Due to the level of conflict, the cross section of NGOs delivered various services including counselling, psychological support and home visits of vulnerable groups. These groups were most badly affected by the high level of violence. This destruction aggravated the already poor infrastructure of the Gaza Strip and West Bank. The Islamic organisations including Al Salah Association were much more visible in responding to grassroots needs by providing economic and financial support to the most vulnerable families. 9 During the second uprising, Islamic NGOs took advantage of their connection to the grassroots to promote their own agenda particularly as an alternative to the PA. Islamic charities took the initiative in setting up a number of local sub-committees to expand their social relief facilities and financial support, increasing their political credibility. 10 As such, the Islamic NGOs network worked with Hamas, enabling them to move from an opposition to having representative authority when it succeeded the PA’s in the municipal and legislative elections across the Gaza Strip and West Bank between 2004 and 2006. The Islamic NGOs provided Hamas with the political weight to lead the PA’s government and some municipalities before the Palestinian division between Fatah and Hamas in 2007. The local NGOs also increased their cooperation with international Islamic organisations to support Hamas governance by organising humanitarian initiatives to Gaza Strip after the Israeli military attacked in 2009. These initiatives also increased particularly following the assault on the ‘freedom flotilla’ and the killing of nine Turkish activists on 31 May 2010. Furthermore, cooperation amongst this loose network increased during the Arab Spring that shook the Middle East. 11 5. Arab Spring In the early 2011, the world witness peaceful revolutions in North Africa and the Middle East that ousted the dictators of Egypt and Tunisia. 12 These brought new hope and optimism for Palestinian society. In these countries, young people played a major role in the non-violent protests labelled as the ‘Arab Spring’. Young Palestinians aged 15-24 old who were affiliated to NGOs watched the events of the Arab Spring and hoped that the revolutions in the Arab world would reflect positively on the Palestinian cause. Palestinians aged 15-24 years are a significant proportion of the population, compromises 22% according to the Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics. 13 Many NGOs have large youth and women target groups that have been educated on the values of democracy, human rights and peace building. Despite this education, Palestinian youth have been stuck in a deadlock of division between Hamas and Fatah on the one side, and the Israeli occupation forces on the other. Motivated by the Arab Spring, they felt social change was suddenly possible. Using the tools and techniques of social media and networking to express their views, they promoted an alternative to the suppression and violence of the security agencies. The achievements and strategies of the young people behind the Arab Spring acted as a guide to the Palestinian activists. Many Palestinian NGOs participants attended several activities and regional meeting in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya to learn of the experiences of those involved in the Arab spring. Inspired by what they heard, many Palestinian young people began to organise themselves under different initiatives to challenge the status quo. 6. Youth Initiatives During the Arab Spring, four different youth initiatives emerged in the Occupied Palestinian Territories to protest against the status quo. The first one was Gaza Youth Breaks Out (GYBO). This initiative of young bloggers aimed to rally against the difficult situations that exist in the Gaza Strip. 14 The second initiative of protest appeared on 15 March 2011. Social movements and youth groups organised large-scale peaceful marches and non-violent protests to make a stand against the division and conflict between Hamas and Fatah in the Gaza Strip and West Bank. Known as the March 15 Movement, they also employed different tools of social media to organise the first well-organised rally in the Gaza Strip and West Bank since 2007. The Youth March 15 Movement posed a real challenge for Hamas and Fatah, with the hope that it could become a similar phenomenon to Egyptian youth revolution. It is clear that the March 15 Movement was inspired by the regional changes. However, it was has an interesting history, as the youth movement had emerged previously as part of a series of peaceful efforts against the Israeli occupation during the last few years. Learning the lessons of non-violent resistance from Gandhi and Martin Luther King, members of the March 15 Movement continued their efforts against the Israeli wall in the West Bank, as well as against the security fence in the Gaza Strip. The March 15 Movement found it difficult to force Fatah and Hamas towards unity or a reconciliation. Ultimately it did not succeed in bringing the genuine change similar to Tunisia or Egypt: there are many differences between Palestine and other Arab countries, from society to politics to culture. More importantly, those countries have experienced peace and stability for more than thirty years at least, unlike Palestine. A third youth initiative that saw youth actively participate actively and peacefully protest was aimed at the Israeli settlement and separation wall. This Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ initiative started before the Arab Spring and continues to this day as a way of ‘popular resistance’. The Palestinian NGOs continue to play a role in understanding the views and desires both the general population as well as the high proportion of young people. The on-going violence and the failure of the Arab Spring to achieve sustained change resulted in a loss of hope that change is possible. This was confirmed in the middle of 2013 through the AWRAD public poll. The poll found that 57% of Palestinian youth (18-30 years old) believe regional events (including the Arab Spring) will negatively affect the Palestinian situation. The poll also shows the differences between views and positions of youth in the West Bank under the PA rule and Gaza Strip under Hamas' rule: 45% of youth in Gaza believe an uprising similar to those in Egypt and Tunisia could occur against the Hamas government, and 48 percent would support such an event. In contrast, only 26% of youth in the West Bank state that an uprising similar to those that have occurred in Egypt and Tunisia could occur against the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, and with a mere 15% would support it. Further, 57% believe Morsi’s ousting will have a negative effect on reconciliation between Fateh and Hamas, and 50% believe the removal of Morsi will have a negative impact on the peace process. A fourth initiative called ‘Tamrod’ started shortly after ousting the Egyptian President, Mohamed Morsi, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Palestinian Tamarod movement was inspired by the Egyptian groups that protested against President Morsi. The Palestinian Tamarod protests against Hamas’ rule in Gaza. A number of Tamrod’s members appeared masked, calling on the Palestinian youth to go to streets and protest Hamas’ rule. Tamrod issued and uploaded videos on YouTube that circulated rapidly through social networks. The members of the movement remain unknown however. Hamas has taken steps to limit the protests. Some Hamas leaders accused the PA, Egypt and Israel of being behind this movement with the aim to topple its rule in Gaza Strip. Hamas questioned and detained a number of writers and journalists who wrote about this movement and demanded that they avoid participation or contribution to Tamrod. This movement failed to achieve whether youth groups in the Gaza Strip would participate peacefully and demand greater levels of democracy and respect for human rights. 7. Way Forward The Palestinian NGOs have not only played an essential role in national struggle against the Israel occupation, but have also delivered community development and relief process, as well as having documented human rights violations by different authorities. They also responded effectively and rapidly to a population who are in need of social, health, cultural and educational services. These groups have contributed to different efforts of change with the hope of making the ‘Palestinian Spring’. Actions include moves to solve the Palestinian division between Hamas Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ and Fatah though there success has been limited. To move forward, thee Palestinian NGOs need to strengthen their networks, coordination and cooperation to undertake effective actions and campaigns to make progressive change a reality.

Notes Haneen Abu Nahla, ‘Role of Palestinian NGOS in Utilizing the International Fund to Promote Entrepreneurs and Create Sustainable Job Opportunities, Case Study: Gaza Strip’ (Thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirement for the degree of MBA, The Islamic University, 2008), 38. 2 Jamil Hilal, ‘West Bank and Gaza Strip Social Formation under Jordanian and Egyptian Rule 1948-1967’, Review of the Middle East Studies 5 (1992): 33-74. 3 Tariq Mukhimer, ‘State Building Process: The Case of Palestine’ (Der Philosophischen Fakultät III der Humboldt - Universität zu Berlin, 13 July 2005). 4 Allam Jarrar, ‘The Palestinian NGO Sector: Development Perspectives’, Palestine-Israel Journal of Politics, Economics and Culture 12.1 (2005), accessed on 1 October 2014, http://www.pij.org/details.php?id=324. 5 Andrew Rigby, Living the Intifada (London: Zed Books Ltd., 1991), 89. 6 Azzam Tamimi, Hamas Unwritten Chapters (London: C. Hurst and Co. Publishers Ltd., 2007), 52-55. 7 Mustafa Barghouthi, ‘The Palestinian NGOs and the Challenges Ahead’, Arab Thought Forum, February 11, 2006, accessed on 23 October 2014, http://www.multaqa.org/etemplate.php?id=333. 8 Ibid. 9 Kim Murphy, ‘Hamas Victory Is Built on Social Work’, Los Angeles Times. March 2, 2006. 10 Neve Gordon, ‘Why Hamas Won and What It Means’, Counter Punch, February 7, 2006, accessed 28 January 2015, http://www.counterpunch.org/2006/02/07/whyhamas-won/. 11 Ibrahim Natil, ‘Turkey’s Human Security Agenda in the Gaza Strip’, Human Security in Turkey Challenges for 21 Century, ed. Alpaslan Ozerdem and Fusun Ozerdem (London and New York: Routledge Press, 2013), 180. 12 Ibrahim Natil, ‘Hamas: Between Militarism and Governance’, Peacebuilding and Reconciliation. Contemporary Themes and Challenges, ed. Marwan Darweish and Carol Rank (London: Pluto Press, 2012), 180. 13 The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, ‘A Special Bulletin on the Palestinians on the Occasion of World Population Reaching 7 Billion’, October 2011, 69, accessed 25 September 2014, http://www.pcbs.gov.ps/Portals/_PCBS/Downloads/book1794.pdf. 1

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__________________________________________________________________ Mona Christophersen, Jacob Høigilt and Åge A. Tiltnes, Palestinian Youth and the Arab Spring, Norwegian Peace Building Centre, February 2012, accessed 28 January 2015, http://www.peacebuilding.no/var/ezflow_site/storage/original/application/562d62c cb49d92227b6865a8b2d11e1a.pdf. 14

Bibliography Abu Nahla, Haneen. ‘Role of Palestinian NGOS in Utilizing the International Fund to Promote Entrepreneurs and Create Sustainable Job Opportunities, Case Study: Gaza Strip’. Thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirement for the degree of MBA, The Islamic University, 2008. Barghouthi, Mustafa. ‘The Palestinian NGOs and the Challenges Ahead’. Arab Thought Forum, February 11, 2006. Accessed on 23 October 2014. http://www.multaqa.org/etemplate.php?id=333. Christophersen, Mona, Jacob Høigilt and Åge A. Tiltnes. Palestinian Youth and the Arab Spring. Norwegian Peace Building Centre, February 2012. Accessed 28 January 2015. http://www.peacebuilding.no/var/ezflow_site/storage/original/application/562d62c cb49d92227b6865a8b2d11e1a.pdf. Gordon, Neve. ‘Why Hamas Won and What It Means’. Counter Punch, February 7, 2006. Accessed 28 January 2015. http://www.counterpunch.org/2006/02/07/why-hamas-won/. Hilal Jamil. ‘West Bank and Gaza Strip Social Formation under Jordanian and Egyptian Rule 1948–1967’. Review of the Middle East Studies 5 (1992): 33-74. Jarrar, Allam. ‘The Palestinian NGO Sector: Development Perspectives’. Palestine-Israel Journal of Politics, Economics and Culture 12.1 (2005). Accessed on 1 October 2014. http://www.pij.org/details.php?id=324. Khosrokhavar, Farhad. The New Arab Revolutions that Shook the World. London: Paradigm Publisher, 2012. Levy, Gideon. The Punishment of Gaza. London: Verso, 2010.

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__________________________________________________________________ Milton, Beverley–Edwards and Stephen Farrell. Hamas. London: Polity Press, 2010. Mukhimer, Tariq. ‘State Building Process: The Case of Palestine’. Der Philosophischen Fakultät III der Humboldt - Universität zu Berlin, 13 July 2005. Murphy, Kim. ‘Hamas Victory Is Built on Social Work’. Los Angeles Times. March 2, 2006. Natil, Ibrahim. ‘Hamas: Between Militarism and Governance’. Peacebuilding and Reconciliation Contemporary Themes and Challenges, edited by Marwan Darweish and Carol Rank, 166-182. London: Pluto Press, 2012. Natil, Ibrahim. ‘Turkey’s Human Security Agenda in the Gaza Strip’. Human Security in Turkey Challenges for 21 Century, edited by Alpaslan Ozerdem and Fusun Ozerdem, 198-211. London and New York: Routledge Press, 2013. Rigby, Andrew. Palestinian Resistance and Non-Violence. Jerusalem: PASSIA Publications, 2010. Rigby, Andrew. Living the Intifada. London: Zed Books Ltd, 1991. Roy, Sarah. Hamas and Civil Society in Gaza: Engaging the Islamist Social Sector. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2011. Schanzer, Jonathan. Hamas vs. Fatah: The Struggle for Palestine. New York: Palgrave and Macmillan, 2008. Tamimi, Azzam. Hamas Unwritten Chapters. London: C. Hurst and Co. Publishers Ltd., 2007. The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, ‘A Special Bulletin on the Palestinians on the Occasion of World Population Reaching 7 Billion’. October 2011. Accessed 25 September 2014. http://www.pcbs.gov.ps/Portals/_PCBS/Downloads/book1794.pdf. Ibrahim Natil holds a PhD from Coventry and an MA from Westminster Universities, UK. He is an independent scholar and development consultant worked for many international NGOs. He presented in over 15 different conferences and has authored several articles and book chapters on a wide range of

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__________________________________________________________________ topics including Hamas. He has recently received an offer from a publisher to publish a book on Hamas.

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Unity in Street-Militancy: Athenian Anarchists and Anti-Authoritarians Nicholas Apoifis Abstract The re-emergence of anarchist and anti-authoritarian politics in the last 2 decades has sparked renewed intellectual interest in radical social movements – their form, composition and internal processes. The Athenian anarchist and anti-authoritarian milieu, its hub a stone throw away from the Greek parliament, is a fertile environment to pursue such research. Yet, most contemporary academic research on this vibrant movement does not engage with the activists themselves, in their struggles against capitalism, parliament, and the rise of fascism. By contrast, this chapter is based on extensive militant ethnographic fieldwork, conducted amongst the Athenian anarchist and anti-authoritarian movement in 2011. That is, it is premised on a fieldwork method emphasising an intense reflexive collaboration between the ethnographer and activists where, as far as possible, the researcher assumes the role of political activist. With the New Social Movement theoretical paradigm as my point of departure, I argue that the embrace of militant streetprotests, as an identity and tactic, helps account for the movement’s relative unity. Varying shades of anarchic tendencies and ensuing ideological and practical disagreements are, for the most part, overcome in often violent street-protests. Thus militant protest action is more than an expression of collective grievance, desire for retaliation against police injustice, and a manifestation of anarchist praxis; rather, these actions are an important process in the ongoing construction and reconstruction of Athenian anarchist and anti-authoritarian collective identity, the main conclusion of the chapter. Key Words: Anarchism, anti-authoritarian, militant ethnography, movements, new social movement theory, Athens, Greece.

social

***** 1. Athens 2011 In January 2011, as part of militant ethnographic research in Athens, I participated in a protest march from the metro stop at Πανεπιστήμιο towards the park at Παντελεημων, Athens. Leading the charge, were anarchists and antiauthoritarians, armed with flags, chants and backpacks full of protection from the inevitable onslaught of tear gas. True to form, the onslaught began in earnest. Instinctively, I wanted to run and escape the fast-forming dense plumes. But, as the tear-gas canisters bombarded the pavement, a paradoxical calm breezed through the anarchists and anti-authoritarians around me. Like veterans, activists efficiently covered their faces with protection, and lit small fires to counter the noxious gas. Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Betrayed by my facial expressions, Penelope had discerned my uneasiness; ‘[I]t is important we don’t panic’, she instructed, ‘this is our space and we are defending it, there is nothing to fear, we are together, united and we are strong!’ 1 In the streets, tensions are put to the side, as solidarity prevails. In this chapter, I suggest that despite the various anarchist and antiauthoritarian tendencies in Athens, when it comes time to hit the streets and participate in protests and riots, an ardent cohesiveness binds the movement. The terms anarchist and anti-authoritarian are umbrella terms for radical leftist tendencies and currents that share three critical characteristics. First, there is the struggle against all forms of domination in society, be they based on gender, ethnicity, capitalism, sexuality, the state or other hierarchical systems. Second, anarchist and anti-authoritarian politics is committed to an ethos of pre-figurative politics. Finally, anarchist and anti-authoritarian ideas do not constitute a closed system of thought. They are diverse and open-ended, in a state of perpetual development. From my experiences though, there are significant differences and points of contention, and even physical tensions, that spring from the practical application of these shared political understandings. Nonetheless, while a myriad of tensions exist in the Athenian anarchist horos (space), solidarity reigns during street protests; be they attacks on capitalist and consumerist institutions and symbols; or militant confrontations with police, and/or fascists. Incorporating the insights developed in New Social Movement (NSM) theory, I suggest that this often violent, direct-action militancy, is not merely a deployed tactic; it is also a compelling element informing Athenian anarchist and anti-authoritarian processes of collective identity, that also binds groups together. 2 2. Militant Ethnography I was in Athens from the beginning of January through to late March of 2011, during which time I participated in countless political events and actions with Athenian anti-authoritarians and anarchists; a militant ethnographic approach guided this research project. Developed by Jeffrey Juris, militant ethnography is a fieldwork method premised on intense reflexive collaboration between ethnographers and activists where, as much as possible, researchers assume the role of active political practitioners. 3 As with more general ethnographies, this fieldwork method encourages greater openness on the part of activists, because of the bonds forged through constant interactions between researcher and respondents. This helps produce an insider’s perspective on the emotions and insights of activists within the Athenian anarchist and anti-authoritarian milieu. Going beyond this more traditional element of ethnography, militant ethnography deliberately blurs the distinction between research and political activism. Broadly, it encourages researchers to demonstrate political solidarity with their subjects. In doing so, it more adequately reflects the way contemporary activists, particularly within anti-corporate and anti-capitalist movements around the world, procure Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ relevant knowledge; as insiders producing politically applicable work. 4 Maribel Casas-Cortés and Sebastián Cobarrubias extol this approach, where ‘[r]esearch becomes a political tool to intervene in the processes that are moving us towards a neo-liberal world’. 5 Militant ethnography requires an intense political commitment. I achieved this by getting involved in as many political actions as possible, like protests, squatting, participating in assemblies, postering and dumpster-diving. 6 Once a degree of trust was established, and this certainly took some time, I was gradually invited to watch less publicised direct actions, like targeted property attacks on large capitalist and consumerist institutions. 3. Tensions Evident during my time in Athens, the anarchist and anti-authoritarian space is full of a range of tensions and disagreements; in the absence of a manifesto directing praxis, this is hardly surprising. Fearful of the authoritarian consequences of defining ‘anarchism’ and locking down sets of beliefs and social interactions, most if not all anarchists and anti-authoritarian – as Uri Gordon points out – have little time for detailed blueprints and designs for a free society. 7 In fact, the embodiment of an authoritarian structure is a system where beliefs are passed down and imposed involuntarily and without modification. In order to challenge this involuntary imposition, anarchist ideas and practices are enraptured with encouragement to alter and radically redefine directions at will; its exponents demand it. For George Woodcock, this constant redirection presents: the appearance, not of a swelling stream flowing on to its sea of destiny (an image that might well be appropriate to Marxism), but rather of water percolating through porous ground – here forming for a time a strong undercurrent, there gathering into a swirling pool, trickling through crevices, disappearing from sight, and then re-emerging where the cracks in the social structure may offer it a course to run. 8 In this absence of doctrine, the Athenian anarchist and anti-authoritarian space is rife with the practical consequences of this freedom; disagreements are as common as daybreak. One of the more overt sources of tension stems from frictions between different Athenian anarchist and anti-authoritarian practices. Each tendency has particular, and often divergent approaches to: ways of organising; what it means to be anarchist; how to interact with other groups; and what tactics are best suited for the movement, or for that matter, whether we can even speak of a movement. The Athenian anarchist and anti-authoritarian space is a catalogue of tendencies, a

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__________________________________________________________________ scene described by the editors of a recent collection of stories from the 2008 Greek insurrection as: [a]narcho-junkies hanging out in that square, the nihilists hanging out in this corner, the libertarians hanging out in that bar, the hippies hanging out in that park, the Situationists hanging out in that squat, the classical anarcho-communists in that café and the insurrectionists in this one. 9 While anti-authoritarian and anarchic currents underscore these tendencies, differences can be pronounced. Take for example collective members from the Anti-Authoritarian Current (AK) (Aντιεξουσιαστικη Kινηση), and insurrectionist anarchists. 10 Combined, individuals within these categories make up most of the Athenian anarchist and anti-authoritarian space. They share similar attitudes on the state, prisons, police and capitalism, but their anarchist praxis – the practical implementation of their particular styles of anarchism, can be very different. AK, formed in 2002, is a political network of anti-authoritarian assemblies diffused throughout Greece, based on direct democracy and horizontal organisational principles. AK is an influential component of the anarchist space, whose members are more inclined to create permanent spaces and organisational networks, forming solid foundations that slowly build towards revolution. Their strategies have included supporting the creation of social spaces, the occupation of factories by workers, or supporting base unions – Greek grass-roots workers’ unions organised on anarchist and anti-authoritarian principles of non-hierarchy and direct democracy. Advocates of AK, like Tony, described this approach to me as, ‘building tangible anarchism piece by piece’. However, this style is in contrast to the kind of small affinity-groups preferred by the insurrectionist current in Athens. The insurrectionist participants of my ethnography advocated informal ephemeral networks of organisations, rather than the overt permanent organisational frameworks of AK. Further, most supported constant attacks on capitalist, state and consumerist institutions as the preferred choice of action; like raiding supermarkets and then distributing the food to the poor; or fire-bombing banks or police stations. Indeed, one insurrectionist anarchist described the AK as, ‘mainstream anarchists, content with their petty organisations and social spaces and lethargic attacks on capitalism’; while a response I heard a number of times, was that the insurrectionists were ‘wannabe vanguardists’; the suggestion being that insurrectionists see themselves as the most pure form of anarchism, at the forefront of the revolutionary movement. Significantly, the tensions are not limited to the practical manifestation of a particular current, nor are they limited to name-calling. There have been a number of hostile disputes in general assemblies, as well as a few physical encounters between these two groups. As a consequence of these different approaches to antiAmal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ authoritarian and anarchist politics, there are observable disagreements and tensions within the anarchist and anti-authoritarian space in Athens. Wrapped up in tensions surrounding praxis, another example revolves around attitudes to the media. During the height of the Greek revolt in December 2008, a proposal was put forward at an anti-authoritarian and anarchist assembly in Exarcheia, Athens: to interrupt a major news broadcast by storming the studio, unfurl political banners, and then escape triumphantly into the streets. But, the proposal was generally not supported. Some, raised fears that this protest would ultimately serve the advertisers whose product appeared after the political action. Others, as if channelling Guy Debord, were concerned that such an action would contribute to the spectacle of the mass media – where, instead of living actual experiences, viewers watch representations of their life on TVs, and in doing so become politically neutralised spectators. 11 A final sentiment conveyed fury that comrades would want anything to do with the corporate media – what one of my interviewees called the ‘dogs of the mass media’. This contingent argued that any engagement with the mass media signalled nothing less than complicity with capitalism, the state, and corporate media. Regardless, the next week a different collective went ahead with the proposed action targeting N.E.T, one of Greece’s largest TV. Stations. On December 16th, 2008, after manoeuvres reminiscent of an Ian Fleming novel, the 3pm live national news broadcast on N.E.T. was hijacked, as activists stormed the studio. For two or so minutes, political banners were unfurled by a group of anarchists, antiauthoritarians and fellow non-defined activists. They read: Everyone get out in the streets, Freedom to the Prisoners of the Insurrection and Freedom to Everyone. In conversations regarding this and other interactions with the mainstream media, many Athenian anarchists and anti-authoritarians detested the notion; indeed, one respondent referred to it as ‘putrid politics, selling out anarchism’. Athens Indymedia, or alternative sources of Do It Yourself (DIY) media were preferred, offering a more sympathetic portrayal of intended messages. Plainly, however, this is not the attitude for all; another respondent saw a diversity of media tactics as, ‘pragmatic, where we maximise our exposure, always of course mindful to assess the benefits and flaws in each action’. 4. Unity in the Streets For all the tensions, when it comes time to participate in protests, marches and riots, these tensions are put on hold. The streets become full of anarchists and antiauthoritarians unified in a temporal solidarity, to protect the very existence of anarchist and anti-authoritarian praxis in Athens. For Emma and many of her comrades ‘when a debate ends [we] meet in the streets’. In the streets, the disagreements over the subtleties of anarchist and anti-authoritarian politics are peripheral, in comparison to the violent threats confronting the anarchist space more broadly. As Stavro passionately explained: Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ As they close our squats, as the fascists hit our migrant brothers and sisters, as they murder our kids, shove capitalism down our face, make slaves of us, beat us for our sexuality [and] our choices, well these are enemies we fight together. After all, they want nothing more than to disable us. 12 Not surprisingly, there is a plethora of ancillary reasons for why anarchists and anti-authoritarians participate in this militant activity. Beyond the whole gamut of important emotions that fuel political actions in Athens, there is also the desire to defend physical ‘liberated urban spaces’, 13 like squats, parks and even a huge chunk of a suburb (Exarcheia). 14 Willingly then, on a weekly basis, there are marches and violent protests. These actions take on a familiar repertoire, where anarchists and anti-authoritarians engage in violent confrontations with the police and/or fascists, often leaving police and activists with blood percolating from wounds; the windows of capitalist and consumerist institutions, like banks, hotels, and luxury car dealers, are shattered; and accompanying this, there is often an occupation of a particular building, be it in the universities, or a trade union building, like the Confederation of Greek Workers (GSSE). 15 On show, appears a repetitive tactical routine, part of the anarchist and anti-authoritarian struggle against capitalism and the authority of the state. However, this often violent repertoire is more than just tactical; it plays a significant role in informing anarchist and anti-authoritarian processes of collective identity. 5. Collective Identity New Social Movement theorist Alberto Melucci, presents the idea of collective identity, not as a fixed conglomeration of individual identities, but a process, whereby political actors themselves produce meanings and negotiate decisions on action. 16 It is a dynamic and reflexive process, constantly negotiated and constructed within groups. Therefore, the factors that inform the processes of identity construction can tell us a lot about social movements and collectives. One aspect involves ‘cognitive definitions concerning the ends, means, and field of action’. 17 In this sense, collective action is in part defined by a ‘language’ that is encoded within sets of rituals and practices that are perpetually constructed, through negotiation, conflict and compromise. 18 Take for example the rituals associated with militant street protests, steeped in their historical significance. Since 1984, when Black Bloc tactics appeared in Athens at a conference for Europe’s far right, violent militancy has been the preferred suite of protest styles; a product of constant and relentless negotiations between activists. As the nature of these rituals are negotiated and discussed by contemporary activists, they continue to inform the process of collective identity. In Athens then, militant protesting is an informative influence on the anarchist and anti-authoritarian space, as opposed to

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__________________________________________________________________ the more carnivalized protest actions in other parts of anti-authoritarian movements, the likes of which Graham St John refers to as ‘protestivals’. 19 Another aspect of the collective identity process recognises the importance of the dynamic ‘network of active relationships between’ actors. 20 The organisational structure and form, and the avenues and methods for group communication, are all encompassed within this component. This is an important process contributing to the temporal unity of the Athenian movement. Returning to the protests, as activist hit the streets, they share a space that requires social relationships. In that space, negotiations unfold about violence, actions, solidarity and unity. For Dino, ‘you have to engage with your comrades [in the protest]. Help them. Work together. Otherwise you’ll get fucked over by the pigs’. Along the same lines, Pari talked of the strong relationships developed during protests: ‘we might disagree on many things, but there, together we fight as brothers and sisters’. In Athens, the combative intensity of the street-protest builds solidarity amongst activists. A final aspect to consider is emotional investment, ‘which enables individuals to feel like part of a common unity’. 21 Militant protests can be deeply emotional events. As these emotions are shared and negotiated within wider collectives and affinity groups, they shape and inform the movement itself. Briefly, I focus on one of the myriad of emotions, to demonstrate the effect; that of pride. Many times, I heard of pride in the anarchist and anti-authoritarian space – Kyriako called it a ‘sort of arrogance in our adventure’. From my experience in Athens, it plays a formative role in the degree of militancy on display during protests; mostly, because of the intense desire to protect anarchist and anti-authoritarian spaces and ideas. As this pride is shared and negotiated within the protest, manifesting in physical and violent displays, it informs anarchist and anti-authoritarian collective unity. 6. The Militant Glue Militant, violent and combative street protests are a decisive component of the Athenian anarchist and anti-authoritarian milieu. The extent of their influence is so feverish, Christos Boukalas talks of a revolutionary fetishism amongst contemporary activists, where ‘“more violent” equals “more revolutionary”’. 22 Violent protest-militancy pervades the space. Of course, numerous other factors help inform the milieu’s processes of collective identity, like development of anarchist ideas, and insurrectionary events such as December 2008. However, this chapter has focussed on street protests. Tactically, they are a crucial outlet for anarchist and anti-authoritarian direct-action. They are a regular example of a praxis challenging all forms of hierarchy and domination in society. At the same time, street-protests are a significant part of the processes of collective identity construction. Street-protest rituals like performative violence, act as forms of communication between activists, strengthening the bonds that bind networks within the space. The combative ferocity of street-protests also builds Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ solidarity, as activists engage in negotiations about violence and direct action, all the while confronting antagonistic enemies. The street-protest also acts as a menagerie of emotional confluence, where anarchists and anti-authoritarians share intense feelings like pride, as well as hatred, trust, revenge and rage. The effect of this interplay allows people to be part of a common unity, further contributing to solidarity within the space. Even though there are significant tensions and sources of disagreement in the Athenian anarchist and anti-authoritarian space, it appears that a temporary solidarity is produced as a consequence of the ritualised streetprotest form, tangibly informing the movement’s processes of collective identity.

Notes I have used pseudonyms for all my respondents, throughout this chapter. Alberto Melucci, ‘The Process of Collective Identity’, Social Movements and Culture, eds. Hank Johnston and Bert Klandermans (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1995), 41-63; Alberto Melucci, Challenging Codes: Collective Action in the Information Age (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996). 3 Jeffrey S. Juris, ‘Practicing Militant Ethnography with the Movement for Global Resistance in Barcelona’, Constituent Imagination: Militant Investigations. Collective Theorization, eds. Stevphen Shukaitis, David Graeber and Erika Biddle (Oakland: AK Press, 2007), 164-178 4 Juris, ‘Practicing Militant Ethnography’, 164-165, 172. 5 Maribel Casas-Cortés and Sebastián Cobarrubias, ‘Drifting through the Knowledge Machine’, Constituent Imagination: Militant Investigations. Collective Theorization, eds. Stevphen Shukaitis, David Graeber and Erika Biddle (Oakland: AK Press, 2007), 114. 6 Dumpster-diving: Rummaging through bins outside of supermarkets and shops, looking for things discarded by the shop, but still usable. 7 Uri Gordon, Anarchy Alive! Anti-Authoritarian Politics from Practice to Theory (London: Pluto Press, 2008), 7. 8 George Woodcock, Anarchism (Ontario: Broadview, 2004 [1962]), 18. 9 A.G Schwarz, Tasos Sagris and Void Network, ‘Glossary’, We Are an Image from the Future: The Greek Revolt of December 2008, eds. A.G Schwarz, Tasos Sagris and Void Network (Oakland: AK Press, 2010), 368. 10 The literal translation of Kινηση, is closer to the English word movement, but I use current to reflect the way respondents’ translate the word. However, I note that in an interview with two members of Thessaloniki’s AK – Malamas Sotiriou and Grigoris Tsilimandos, the word movement is preferred. See Mark Bray, Chris Spannos and Preeti Kaur, ‘The Future of Greece: A Society of Barbarism or of Social Spaces for Freedom’, The New Significance (2013): np, viewed on 5 May 2013, 1 2

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__________________________________________________________________ http://www.thenewsignificance.com/2013/02/13/the-future-of-greece-a-society-ofbarbarism-or-of-social-spaces-for-freedom/. 11 Guy Debord, The Society of the Spectacle, trans. Ken Knabb (Bureau of Public Secrets, [1967] 2014), e-book. 12 Research interview with Stavro, 12 January 2011. 13 Gordon, Anarchy Alive!, 100. 14 See Craig Calhoun, ‘Putting Emotions in Their Place’, Passionate Politics. Emotions and Social Movements, eds. Jeff Goodwin, James Jasper and Francesca Polletta (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001), 45-57; Jeff Goodwin, James Jasper and Francesca Polletta, ‘Introduction: Why Emotions Matter’, Passionate Politics. Emotions and Social Movements, eds. Jeff Goodwin, James Jasper and Francesca Polletta (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001). 15 Γενική Συνομοσπονδία Εργατών Ελλάδας 16 Melucci, ‘The Process of Collective Identity’. 17 Ibid., 44. 18 Cristina Flesher Fominaya, ‘Collective Identity in Social Movements: Central Concepts and Debates’, Sociology Compass 4.6 (2010): 393-404. 19 Graham St John, ‘Protestival: Global Days of Action and Carnivalized Politics in the Present’, Social Movement Studies 7.2 (2008): 169 20 Melucci, ‘The Process of Collective Identity’, 44. 21 Ibid., 44. 22 Christos Boukalas, ‘No One Is Revolutionary until the Revolution! A Long, Hard Reflection on Athenian Anarchy through the Prism of a Burning Bank.’, Revolt and Crisis in Greece: Between a Present Yet to Pass and a Future Still to Come, eds. Antonis Vradis and Dimitris Dalakoglou (London: AK Press, 2011), 279-297.

Bibliography Boukalas, Christos. ‘No One Is Revolutionary until the Revolution! A Long, Hard Reflection on Athenian Anarchy through the Prism of a Burning Bank’. Revolt and Crisis in Greece: Between a Present Yet to Pass and a Future Still to Come, edited by Antonis Vradis and Dimitris Dalakoglou, 279-297. London: AK Press, 2011. Bray, Mark, Chris Spannos and Preeti Kaur. ‘The Future of Greece: A Society of Barbarism or of Social Spaces for Freedom’. The New Significance (2013). Viewed on 5 May 2013. http://www.thenewsignificance.com/2013/02/13/the-future-ofgreece-a-society-of-barbarism-or-of-social-spaces-for-freedom/.

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__________________________________________________________________ Calhoun, Craig. ‘Putting Emotions in Their Place’. Passionate Politics. Emotions and Social Movements, edited by Jeff Goodwin, James Jasper and Francesca Polletta, 45-57. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001. Casas-Cortés, Maribel and Sebastián Cobarrubias. ‘Drifting through the Knowledge Machine’. Constituent Imagination: Militant Investigations. Collective Theorization, edited by Stevphen Shukaitis, David Graeber and Erika Biddle, 112126. Oakland: AK Press, 2007. Clough, Nathan. L. ‘Emotion at the Center of Radical Politics: On the Affective Structures of Rebellion and Control’. Antipode 44.5 (2012): 1667-1686. Debord, Guy. The Society of the Spectacle. Translated by Ken Knabb. Bureau of Public Secrets, [1967] 2014, e-book. Dixon, Chris. ‘Building “Another Politics”: The Contemporary Anti-Authoritarian Current in the US and Canada’. Anarchist Studies 20.1 (2012): 32-60. Fominaya, Cristina Flesher. ‘Collective Identity in Social Movements: Central Concepts and Debates’. Sociology Compass 4.6 (2010): 393-404. Goodwin, Jeff, James Jasper and Francesca Polletta. ‘Introduction: Why Emotions Matter’. Passionate Politics. Emotions and Social Movements, edited by Jeff Goodwin, James Jasper and Francesca Polletta, 1-26. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001. Gordon, Uri. Anarchy Alive! Anti-Authoritarian Politics from Practice to Theory. London: Pluto Press, 2008. Juris, Jeffrey. S. ‘Violence Performed and Imagined. Militant Action, the Black Bloc and the Mass Media in Genoa’. Critique of Anthropology 25.4 (2005): 413432. ———. ‘Practicing Militant Ethnography with the Movement for Global Resistance in Barcelona’. Constituent Imagination: Militant Investigations. Collective Theorization, edited by Stevphen Shukaitis, David Graeber and Erika Biddle, 164-178. Oakland: AK Press, 2007. Melucci, Alberto. ‘The Symbolic Challenge of Contemporary Movements’. Social Research 52.4 (1985): 789-815.

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__________________________________________________________________ ———. Nomads of the Present: Social Movements and Individual Needs in Contemporary Society. Philadelphia: Temple University, 1989. ———. ‘The Process of Collective Identity’. Social Movements and Culture, edited by Hank Johnston and Bert Klandermans, 41-63. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1995. ———. Challenging Codes: Collective Action in the Information Age. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. Schwarz, A.G., Tasos Sagris and The Void Network. ‘Glossary’. We Are an Image from the Future: The Greek Revolt of December 2008, edited by A.G. Schwarz, Tasos Sagris and The Void Network, 368-371. Oakland: AK Press, 2010. St John, Graham. ‘Protestival: Global Days of Action and Carnivalized Politics in the Present’. Social Movement Studies 7. 2 (2008): 167–190. Nicholas Apoifis works as a researcher at UNSW, Australia, and the University of Western Sydney. His current research engages with radical environmental, anarchist and anti-authoritarian social movements.

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Varieties of Sacrifice in States of Exception Athanasios Christacopoulos Abstract The strong connection between exceptions and sacrifices is examined in the bellow lines. From the philosophical point of view the passage from mythos to logos is based on the rationalization of sacrificational practices and the introduced by the author sacrificational theorem plays the crucial role in this threshold. In the scientific level of examination, in social and natural sciences, the problem of revolutionary changes is examined, taking the notion of exception as a guiding concept combined with the problem of sacrifice, in its various facets. In social sciences it is founded on the connection between ritual theory and sacrificational practices combined with the exceptional states that exist in revolts or revolutions. In the natural sciences, sacrificational theorem acts as the ‘nuclear reactor’ of the rationalized abstractive process, being the main cause for the emergence of new categories, having the form of the particular relations between theory- experiment-measurement process of every discipline. Key Words: Exception, emergency, sacrifice, categoriogenesis, ritual, sacrification theorem. ***** 1. Introduction: A Dilemma of Ontological Emergency 1 A man is in attempting to go somewhere in a hurry with his car. He reaches the crossroads where the lantern (or traffic signal) is red. There is nobody around and there are no cameras. For some reason he is in an ‘emergency’; should he violate the red light or not? A complex range of questions follow: For example, does the violation of the (traffic) rule rest on the inexistence of an observer? Is there an illegal act when there is no observer for it? Who sees the unobserved violation of the rule: the ethical consciousness inside us (the tradition from Socrates to Kant): or a God (theological traditions)? Is the mind as a self-correcting natural process (the tradition from PreSocratics to Spinoza)? Is there a difference between the violation of a traffic rule and the violation of the whole set of traffic norms and rules which consist the traffic law? My argument here is that the state of exception creates the need for an observer (local or universal). The illegal act does not, however differentiate from the ‘normal situation’ that demands the man wait until the light becomes green! And what about the unconstrained violation of the red light when the man is not in a hurry? We can say that we have a solipsistic foundation on an emergency situation when there is no interaction between the two parts. Here the man considers the system of light signals as a convention which can be dismissed under emergency situations. Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Conventionalism does not always give the more conventional and simple excuse: that is the inexistence of emergency does not legitimize the states of exception. It seems that the concept of the observer combined with the emergency differentiates the normal states from the states of exception. The lanterns are the tools of the surrounding legal net and we can easily replace them by the executive power of the state forces. Here solipsism is present: the vision of the executive power does not have any functional/operational difference from the vision of people in revolt against the state apparatus, ‘in a hurry to meet with their historical needs ‘. It is a (statistical level) collective solipsism founded in a state of exception. Each part claims to act according to its empirical needs or rights that are the flags of their needs under emergency. The people in revolt are in the position of the man at the crossroads: The forces of the executive power in front of them are the light signals with their interior logic (of the Petri network), but with no observer. These people claim they can violate the ‘red signals’ because of their emergency situation. The violation of the (here social) law rests on the inexistence of an observer, who could justify the state of exception The introduction/construction of an observer in the scene of the crossroads changes the whole representation of the dilemma, from the two foreign domains of sovereignty and their undecidable mutual solipsism. The observer mixes the different reigns of sovereignty and gives a preferred direction to the emergency situation even if the observer is not the sovereign. 2. Categoriogenesis What creates the need for a category? If someone researches this question, you will inevitably end up amongst the Ancient Greeks - particularly Categories by Aristotle. The same happens with dialectics that as a concept appears in the works of Plato, referring to Socrates, being a kind of conversation with arguments that have oppositional character and tend to the exposition of the facets of the thing examined. The first question about Aristotle is how he reached his way of systematizing concepts and phenomena giving rise to a system of basic categories. Aristotle gives a four-fold classification about the things that are said or not, and the things that are present or not. Afterwards he gives a ten-fold classification exposing his categories as a secondary higher logic system, introducing the concepts of substance, quality, quantity, relatives and so on. Today we can break this down in four broad categories: 1. Categories are kinds of answers to certain questions he posed; 2. Categories as predicates that helped Aristotle to think in a linguistic way; 3. Categories as a system of modalities in which to express sensible particulars; and, 4. Categories as a priori concepts.

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__________________________________________________________________ Categorical distinctions existed before Aristotle, in Isocrates (from the school of Hippocrates), in Xenophon, in Anaximenes. This historical view helps us also conceive the conception of categories in the social place of social praxis that emerged among the Greeks. Category means accusation (κατηγορία) and is a product of the public sphere speeches (logos), which emerged only after the Solon era of social transformation. It is a substantiation of the accusations which should be examined openly by the people and be judged on the basis of things that were presented to the public courts and the things that were said in them. Thus we have a natural generalization of the rational rhetoric of the public sphere of the only civilization in which it emerged. The second problem, that of Categoriogenesis in the ontological and the gnosiological level is not only of philosophical nature but also of scientific one. Aristotle’s system remained unchanged, even though there was an emancipation from scholasticism in the renaissance and afterwards, until Kant decided to examine it. The a priori solution of a new system of Categories in the gnosiological level that was given by Kant fell dead some decades latter. Even his a priori concept of space had lead him to the conclusion that the human mind with its a priori concepts would never conceive systems of geometry different from Euclid’s or Euclidean motions in time different from Newton’s. What begins with Kant is the rule: most philosophers after him, like Hegel and Comte, Marx and Heidegger, Hartmann and Brentano, Sartre and Lefebvre, are considering as a presupposition of all philosophical systems to have their own Category system classification In addition to the enrichment of the number of Categories, is the increasing interconnection between them. The challenge that follows is whether relations categorize concrete entities. I defend this thesis because it is the way we can accept concrete entities as constitutive invariants in society or in nature. Such historically constitutive invariants are concepts about gods, energy, value, law, physical interactions and fields, which follow the process of creation, conservation and destruction in the collective thought of the human societies. Here wholeness or totality must not be considered as an extended region of things natural or logical, but as the union of the mappings between entities, concrete or pseudo-concrete. New combinations of theoryexperiment relations act as exceptions in these fields of knowledge, and the above dilemma helps us understand that the abstractive process does not act in vacuum after passing the borders of the normative forms of science. If in the position of man we place humanity and in the place of the lanterns the nature surrounding us, we are examining the creation of human civilization engaged to an emergency situation up against with the forces of nature (both cosmological and bio - spherical). The observer can belong to either realms or there exists the possibility of introducing a third state of observability. The status of the observer of the state of exception, presupposes something deeper: a measurement process. We can have a measurement process without the Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ need for a third observer’s justification: if the violation of the red lanterns leads to a successful outcome then the illegal acts can be justified Every measurement process introduced in this dilemma must include two ontologically separate facts: the emergency situation of the man and his needs, and the state of exception implied by his act to violate the red lanterns. Emergency is not always connected causally with the state of exception as in the above dilemma where we can have an emergency as a whole but no exceptions in its parts and vice versa, we can have exceptions in the parts but no emergency as a whole. In the passage between the decision to break the traffic rules or not, all philosophical and epistemological status is transformed creating new logical space. Either we have a violation of the lights - or not - , the concept of sacrifice emerges. For the emergency situation includes the notion of sacrifice – which is present, both in the state of exception as well the normal situations. The sacrificial ritual, from the primordial societies to the contemporary life of surveillance – based contemporary societies has the observer present. The observable(s) legitimizes the legal or illegal acts. 3. Conclusion The exception is not placed topologically, but categorically: what helps us escape from the mutual solipsism is sacrifice. This is the strict conclusion of every exanimation of the problem of exception in terms of the closed body of knowledge as a self-referential thesis: the exception of an exception of a rule, must always the rule.

Notes I had the opportunity to address this dilemma to Wolfgang Pallaver while we were walking to the roads of L’ Aquila, in September 2012 on our way to attend the TELOS Journal International Conference. I would like also to thank James Arvanitakis, Amal Treacher Kabesh, Lisa Howard and Ana Borlescu for useful suggestions on the revision of the first draft.

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Bibliography Christacopoulos, Thanos. ‘From Sacrifice to Science, Servetus between Joseph de Maistre and Francis Bacon’. In Michael Servetus Heartfelt, edited by J. Naya, M. Hillar, 69-85. Lanham, Maryland: University Press of America, 2011. . ‘The Sacrification Theorem’. In TELOS in Europe, The L’Aquila Conference, and the West: It’s Legacy and Future, 7-9 September 2012.

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__________________________________________________________________ De Maistre, Joseph. Eclaircissement Sur Les Sacrifices. Translated by Constantinos Lazaris, edited by Thanos Christacopoulos, Athens: Polytropon Editions, [1821] 2006. Drobak, John. Norms and the Law. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Kuhn, Thomas. The Road since Structure, Philosophical Essays 1970-1993. With an Autobiographical Interview, edited by James Conant, and John Haugeland. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2000. Malia, Martin. History’s Locomotives, Revolutions and the Making of the Modern World, edited and forward by Terence Emmons. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006. Maniates, Michael and John Meyer, eds. The Environmental Politics of Sacrifice. Cambridge Mass.: The MIT Press, 2010. McIntyre, .Lee. Laws and Explanation in the Social Sciences, Defending a Science of Human Behavior. Oxford: Westview Press, 1996. Milgram, Stanley. Obedience to Authority. An Experimental View. New York: Harper and Row, 1974. Pan, David. Sacrifice in the Modern World: On the Particularity and Generality of Nazi Myth. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 2012. Schenerman, William. Between the Norm and the Exception: The Frankfurt School and the Rule of Law. Cambridge Mass.: The MIT Press, 1994. Athanasios Christacopoulos was born in Patras Greece, in 1965 and has studied physics, informatics and philosophy of science. He is collaborator of the Hellenic Open University, author of research articles in social and natural sciences and translator of twenty-five books.

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The Politics of Contention in Post-Reformasi Indonesia Michael Hatherell Abstract This chapter seeks to explore the nature of political resistance in Indonesia following 15 years of democratisation. For some time, political scientists, commentators and individual citizens have debated the progress of democratisation in Indonesia, with their perspectives ranging from viewing the transition as a complete failure to seeing it as a model for other developing democracies to follow. For the sceptics, the ability of old elites to dominate reformed institutions signals an insufficient break with the past. For optimists, the reduced role of the military, successful electoral processes and peaceful transitions of power at local and national levels demonstrates considerable development. Yet this chapter argues that focusing on macro definitions of success or failure can obstruct our recognition of the significance of individual political events. This chapter seeks to highlight the importance of considering individual cases of revolt, or episodes of contention, in studying the politics of democratising Indonesia. These episodes of contention can provide important detail about who is involved in revolt and the repertoires that these political actors rely on. Ultimately, the goal of this chapter is to highlight important gaps in our knowledge of contemporary Indonesian political revolt following the revolution of 1998. Key Words: Indonesia, reformasi, democratisation, contentious politics, repertoires of contention, protest, social media. ***** 1. Introduction Following 33 years of Authoritarian government under President Suharto, Indonesia entered a period of democratisation in 1998 known locally as reformasi (reformation). The nature of revolt, or contentious politics, in Indonesia post-1998 has led to a range of accounts seeking to characterise the quality of democracy in Indonesia, with recent versions generally being more pessimistic. As Fealy notes, ‘The majority of commentators have argued that the rapid democratisation following Soeharto’s downfall in 1998 has now stalled and in some important areas has been sliding backwards’. 1 For the optimists, structural and institutional reforms and the strengthening of the parliament have led to a political system that is markedly more democratic. 2 Yet for critics, the continuation of practices of patronage and corruption, ongoing human rights abuses and social and economic inequality point to an Indonesia experiencing, at best, a flawed democratic transition. 3 While such accounts are important, this chapter argues that our understanding of contemporary Indonesian politics can be enriched by examining the way in which Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ contention is expressed by citizens individually and collectively and the response of the regime. 4 Such an approach requires a focus on episodes of contentious politics. McAdam et al define contentious politics as …episodic, public, collective interaction among makers of claims and their objects when (a) at least one government is a claimant, an object of claims, or a party to the claims and (b) the claims would, if realized, affect the interests of at least one of the claimants. 5 Focusing on contentious politics means not only considering the results of such events, but how they develop, who is involved, and the connection between different episodes. While critics of Indonesia’s democratisation are interested in the continued existence of corruption and patronage, this chapter is more interested in how such practices affect or are affected by contentious episodes. In understanding these episodes, this chapter also sees immense value in adopting the concept of ‘repertoires of contention’. Repertoires of contention, according to Tilly, are collections of performances, which: …clump into repertoires of claim-making routines that apply to the same claimant-object pairs…The theatrical metaphor calls attention to the clustered, learned, yet improvisational character of people’s interactions as they make and receive each other’s claims. Claim-making usually more resembles jazz and commedia dell’arte than the ritual reading of scripture. Like a jazz trio or an improvisatory theatre group, people who participate in contentious politics normally can play several pieces, but not an infinity. 6 This concept brings to our attention the way in which practices are experienced, shared and developed, and how previous experiences shape future expectations and practices. This chapter provides several examples of such episodes and repertoires, and argues that they demonstrate several key trends in contemporary Indonesian politics. Firstly, the legacy of reformasi is still felt in Indonesia, through shared traditions (or repertoires) of contention that influence the relationship between society and state. Secondly, new repertoires have formed in this period, including the use of digital technology, social media and art. These new repertoires compete and complement existing repertoires of contention. Finally, this chapter argues that understanding these repertoires, their relationship to each other and their influence over both those who express dissent (commonly citizens or social organisations) as well as the regime (police, military, national and local governments) should form a future focus for research that would add value to the debate over political reform in Indonesia. Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ 2. Episodes of Contention The first episode of contention described here emerged from the arrest of two commissioners of the popular anti-corruption commission (Komisi Pemberantasan Korupsi – KPK) on charges of abuse of power and extortion in late 2009. 7 The two men, Bibit Samad Riyanto and Chandra M. Hamzah, claimed that they were innocent, and there were widespread suspicions that they were being framed due to their involvement in investigations at the KPK. 8 Their arrest and subsequent media attention led to intense social media activity, to the extent that ‘…within forty-eight hours 110,000 persons had joined a Facebook group defending the pair, with a million signing up within nine days’, and news of their situation also spread quickly via twitter. 9 The social media campaign led directly to physical street protests in Jakarta and several other large cities, demanding that the President intervene to free the two commissioners. In the media, cartoons were used to mock the case, while opinion pieces asked what the case meant for the future of the KPK and democracy in Indonesia. 10 One political party, Partai Hanura, protested the arrests within the parliament, while other parties demanded that the police produce evidence in the case. 11 The pressure eventually had the desired result, with President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono ordering their release. In time, wiretap recordings sensationally appeared to prove that the pair had indeed been setup by a businessman and government officials. 12 A second episode of contentious politics also involved the KPK and anticorruption measures in Indonesia. One prominent corruption case drew unusually high levels of public interest – the arrest of Gayus Tambunan, a tax official who had allegedly assisted companies to avoid company tax, making significant profits for himself in the process. The case drew public anger when Gayus was found watching an international tennis tournament in Bali, when he should have been in a prison cell awaiting trial. 13 The case exposed the extent of bribery and corruption within the judiciary, police force and prison system, and finally led to government attempts to crack down on these areas. The case also inspired intense media scrutiny and several social media campaigns. Most famously, the case inspired a song, entitled ‘Andai Aku Gayus Tambunan’ (If only I was Gayus Tambunan). The song is a satirical attack on the nature of bribery and corruption within the Indonesian regime, particularly the judicial system. One line from the song reads ‘Lucunya di negeri ini, hukuman bisa dibeli, Kita orang yang lemah, Pasrah akan keadaan’ (It’s funny that in this country, the law can be bought, we are weak, just accepting the situation). The song was extremely popular online, with millions of hits on youtube for the original plus remixes (including a SpongeBob square pants version). It was also played continuously on radio and television stations, first as the subject of reports, and subsequently as a backing song to the continuous reporting of the case. Being in Indonesia at the time, I witnessed on several occasions children singing the chorus while playing in the street, demonstrating the far reach of the song and its lyrics.

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__________________________________________________________________ The final episode of contentious politics examined here relates to an episode initiated by the regime – the recent campaign to regulate civil society organisations. Indonesia possesses one of the world’s most vibrant civil society sectors, with very high participation rates. 14 According to Nugroho, there are at least 83,727 formal civil society organisations operating in Indonesia, while the Home Ministry records 139,894 organisations. 15 These organisations have often played an important role in contentious politics in the post-Reformasi period. In 2010 the government began drafting a new set of laws to regulate civil society organisations (RUU Ormas). These laws would create conditions for the registration of civil society groups, placing authority in the hands of the Minister of Home Affairs to reject registrations and declare organisations illegal. As Nugroho states: …the Bill on Societal Organizations envisions the continuing authority of the Ministry of Home Affairs (MoHA), and the Directorate General of National Unity and Politics (Direktorat Jenderal Kesatuan Bangsa dan Politik) in particular. The approach of the MoHA, and especially the Directorate General of National Unity and Politics, is always grounded in the perspective of politics and security. Such a regulatory approach is not likely to lead to a healthy and strong civic sector in Indonesia. 16 The regulation of organisations has been justified on the grounds of preventing the violence caused by groups like the Front Pembela Islam (FPI – Islamic Defenders Front), as well as overseeing the activities of foreign organisations. 17 But many Indonesians fear that the laws are a step towards restrictions on freedom of association. As a result, resistance to the laws has been expressed in varying forms. Local communities in many parts of Indonesia expressed their concern directly during a series of community consultations with politicians. Facebook and online discussion groups have emerged rejecting the new regulations, including a change.org campaign featuring photos of people around Indonesia of all ages holding a sign that reads ‘Tolak RUU Ormas’ (Reject the law on organisations). 18 Ongoing protests have also occurred in many parts of Indonesia. On the 19th of February, for example, a group of workers from the coalition of struggle for civil rights and workers’ rights protested outside the parliament building. 19 On the 2nd of July, 2013, a group of protesters calling themselves the ‘Community movement against the RUU Ormas’ tied a large banner to the front gates of the parliament building, listing the parliamentary members who were part of the working group designing the laws, and asking voters not to select them in the upcoming 2014 elections. 20 These protests, and many hundreds of other similar incidents which made up this episode of contentious politics, finally led to some changes to the draft laws, though the laws still passed the parliament in July 2013. 21

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__________________________________________________________________ 3. Episodes, Repertoires and Implications These three cases of contentious politics in Indonesia present a very limited snapshot. There are, of course, thousands of other examples of contentious political activity in Indonesia. These examples are also focused largely on the national political arena – the dynamics of contentious politics in Indonesia’s many regions are arguably just as important and informative. Yet, through an examination of the cases presented here, we can form some preliminary conclusions about the nature of contentious politics in Indonesia. Firstly, it is clear that the events of 1997-1999 still influence the conduct of political actors in Indonesia. In each of the episodes considered above, the street protest is a common repertoire. Street protests did occur under Suharto but were relatively rare (and almost always heavily controlled) during the Suharto era. 22 In contrast, in the Post-reformasi period news of protest rallies emerges almost daily, with various groups within Indonesian society presenting claims to government institutions or the public. 23 These groups include labor organisations, religious groups, minority ethnic and regional groups, advocacy organisations for children, the disabled or veterans, and those affected by natural disasters. As was the case during the reformasi period, protesters often target locations of symbolic importance, such as the central Jakarta roundabout, the parliament building, Monas (The national monument) or the offices of involved government institutions. Protests also occur in provincial cities, though usually on a smaller scale and without the same media attention. These protests range in size from a couple of citizens to thousands, and while police are often called in to protect protests or to separate competing groups of protesters, violence is relatively rare. 24 In each of the cases presented above, protests played a significant role, and significant repression of protests did not occur in any of these episodes. From this we can draw conclusions about both the regime and dissenters. In the case of dissenters, the use of protest has become a common pattern of expressing dissent or contention. Importantly, a whole generation of student protestors from 1997-98 have often remained politically active in Indonesia, and their shared experiences and knowledge of protest strategies and practice from that time has undoubtedly influenced contemporary protest. 25 The use of banners, chants, drums, loud speakers and symbolic acts that make up these protests are rarely created impromptu, but instead draw on established repertoires. For the regime, the experience of 1997-98 has also influenced established ways of dealing with a street protest. Now, just as then, security forces generally occupy positions protecting key institutions or buildings, or separating competing groups of protestors. Largely the security forces do not intervene unless protests turn violent or involve destruction of property. Just as importantly though, state authorities, including the judiciary, legislative and executive branches of government, have responded to the pressure of protests on numerous occasions – for example the intervention of the President in the BibitChandra episode, investigations into the police and prison system in the Gayus Tambanan episode and the watering down of legislation in the case of the RUU Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ Ormas. 26 As such, the street protest has formed a well-known repertoire for both dissenters and authorities. Secondly, existing repertoires emerging from the Suharto era and reformasi period have been supplemented by new and emerging repertoires of contention. The use of modern technologies, especially social media, has become increasingly influential. There are few restrictions on the use of the internet in Indonesia, 27 and hence social media has emerged as a vibrant and often critical avenue for expression. In all three cases, social media has assisted in the coordination of street protests, in the pressuring of public officials, and in informing and influencing public opinion. Facebook, twitter, websites such as change.org and discussion boards are a vibrant and growing space for sharing ideas and organising political contention. In many cases, repertoires of contention based on the use of technology also compliment more traditional repertoires, such as the use of social media to publicise and organise street protests. The use of critical forms of art is also important. In the Gayus Tambunan case, the use of music to capture the emotion of the episode demonstrates the powerful nature of this form of contentious performance. The use of street art, film and literature have also emerged as sources of expressing contention. The use of artistic street posters by Andrew Lumban Gaol in the city of Yogyakarta, for example, demonstrate how the creative arts can become an influential contentious performance. 28 Artistic performances, as repertoires of contention, deserve more attention, as they arguably draw on but contrast to the subtle use of protest art during the Suharto era. The role of the media in the three cases mentioned above has been important, with critical editorials, letters from readers and satirical cartoons serving to influence public sentiment. While the self-censorship practiced during the Suharto era was never complete, the adoption of these repertoires is more direct and open. 29 Lastly, combining our analysis of different repertoires of contention and those who perform them can provide new opportunities for analysis and understanding. The way in which existing repertoires of contention are adopted, manipulated and shared can be used to understand how revolt emerges in Indonesia. Repertoires differ in who is involved in organising and carrying out the contentious performance, and the role played by different individuals and groups. A protest, for example, may rely on a critical mass of protestors, while a contentious performance expressed through art may be effective despite emerging from an individual artist. The resistance to or acceptance of particular repertoires can also provide important detail about the nature of civil and political rights – for example, it can indicate which repertoires are accepted by the regime and which are not. The increased acceptance of (peaceful) protest as a valid repertoire of contention in post-reformasi Indonesia is significant, as is the ongoing restriction of some repertoires that would be considered acceptable in other societies (such as the free expression of separatist sentiments in Papua and West Papua). The repertoires of contention that are allowed by the regime can additionally provide further understanding about the effects of these repertoires - an Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ acceptance of a particular repertoires does not necessarily mean that the regime is responsive, but instead may indicate that they are simply allowing an outlet of energy and tension. 4. Conclusion This chapter does not aim to provide definitive answers, but instead to prompt different questions. While many observers of Indonesia have focused on the conduct of national elections and the decisions of political elites, focusing on episodes of political contention can provide a more detailed understanding of the nature of resistance, the environment in which that resistance takes place, and the response of the objects of that contention. Even from a limited set of contentious episodes we can make some preliminary observations. The reformasi period in Indonesia has provided a legacy of repertoires of contention that are now frequently performed. Traditional forms of contention, such as street protests, have become common, but have also combined with new forms of contention such as social media campaigns, online petitions and the critical use of art. Contemporary Indonesian politics features a vibrant and growing collection of contentious performances that are a potentially rich source of analysis regarding political contention and the future of democratisation.

Notes Greg Fealy, ‘Indonesian Politics in 2012: Graft, Intolerance, and Hope of Change in the Late Yudhoyono Period’, South East Asian Affairs 1 (2013): 103. 2 See, for example, Ed Aspinall, ‘Popular Agency and Interests in Indonesia’s Democratic Transition and Consolidation’, Indonesia 1 (2013): 96, DOI: 10.5728/indonesia.96.0011; Marcus Mietzner, ‘Indonesia’s 2009 Elections: Populism, Dynasties and the Consolidation of the Party System and Consolidation’, (Sydney: Lowy Institute for International Policy, 2009), Viewed 10 August 2013, http://www.isn.ethz.ch/DigitalLibrary/Publications/Detail/?ots591=0c54e3b31e9c-be1e-2c24-a6a8c7060233&lng=en&id=100187. 3 See, for example, Vedi R. Hadiz and Richard Robison, ‘The Political Economy of Oligarchy and the Reorganization of Power in Indonesia’, Indonesia 1 (2013): 96, DOI: 10.5728/indonesia.96.0033. 4 It should be noted that the regime is not a unified actor – indeed the regime in Indonesia itself is a competitive space and also encompasses unique vertical levels of government (national, regional and local) as well horizontal competition between institutions (for example legislatures and executive leaders, as well as security forces and the policy). 5 Doug McAdam et al., Dynamics of Contention (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 5. 1

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__________________________________________________________________ Charles Tilly, Regimes and Repertoires (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006), 35. 7 ‘KPK’s Chandra Bibit Arrested’, Jakarta Globe, 30 October 2009, Viewed 12 September 2013, http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/archive/kpks-chandra-bibit-arrested. 8 Ed Aspinall, ‘Indonesian in 2009: Democratic Triumphs and Trials’, South East Asian Affairs (2010): 103-125. 9 Ibid., 117. 10 Ibid. 11 ‘Fraksi DPR Protes Penahanan Bibit-Chandra’, SuaraMerdeka, 31 October 2009, Viewed 13 September 2013, http://www.suaramerdeka.com/v1/index.php/read/news/2009/10/31/39168/FraksiDPR-Protes-Penahanan-Bibit-Chandra. 12 Patrick Guntensperger, ‘Corruption Bomb Explodes in Indonesia’, Asia Times Online, 7 November 2009, Viewed 12 December 2009, http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/KK07Ae04.html. 13 Nadya Natahadibrata, ‘Former Taxman Gayus to Serve 30 Years in Prison’, The Jakarta Post, 3 August 2013, Viewed 13 September 2013, http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2013/08/03/former-taxman-gayus-serve-30years-prison.html. 14 Rustam Ibrahim, Indonesian Civil Society 2006 (Jakarta: Civicus Report Yappika, 2006), 29. 15 Eryanto Nugroho, ‘Bill on Societal Organizations (RUU Ormas) and Freedom of Association in Indonesia’, The International Journal of Not-for-Profit Law 15.1 (2013): 13-37; Margareth S. Aritonang, ‘Foreign Groups Wary of “Ormas” Law’, The Jakarta Post, 4 July 2013, Viewed 11 September 2013, http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2013/07/04/foreign-groups-wary-ormaslaw.html. 16 Nugroho, ‘Bill on Societal Organizations (RUU Ormas) and Freedom of Association in Indonesia’. 17 Aritonang, ‘Foreign Groups Wary of “Ormas” Law’. 18 Kristina Viri, ‘Batalkan Pengesahan RUU Ormas!’, Change.org, Viewed 11 September 2013, http://www.change.org/id/petisi/batalkan-pengesahan-ruu-ormas. 19 Inggried Dwi Wedhaswary, ‘RUU Ormas Disahkan, Delapan Pasal Alami Perubahan’, Kompas, 2 July 2013, Viewed 12 September 2013, http://nasional.kompas.com/read/2013/07/02/1425557/RUU.Ormas.Disahkan.Dela pan.Pasal.Alami.Perubahan. 20 Ibid. 21 ‘RUU Ormas Disahkan, Ini Delapan Pasal yang Berubah’, Tempo.co, 2 July 2013, Viewed 9 September 2013, http://www.tempo.co/read/news/2013/07/02/078492975/RUU-Ormas-DisahkanIni-Delapan-Pasal-yang-Berubah. 6

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__________________________________________________________________ Ed Aspinall, ‘Student Dissent in Indonesia in the 1980s’, Working Papers, Centre of Southeast Asian Studies (Clayton, Vic.: Monash University, 1993), Viewed 10 September 2013, http://search.informit.com.au/documentSummary;dn=708806468866938;res=IELH SS. 23 Ibid. 24 This is true for most of Indonesia, though in provinces with sensitive political contexts (such as Papua) protests are less accepted as contentious performances, and in many cases the regime has responded in a brutal fashion. 25 The legacy of this generation of student protestors deserves further attention in research. 26 Other examples include the Jakarta police cancelling a Lady Gaga concert following protests from Islamic groups and protests influencing the verdicts of judges in criminal cases. 27 While this is true, some recent cases of social media users being bullied or even charged with crimes for their comments on social media are alarming. 28 ‘Posters of Protest’, Tempo.co, 12 August 2013, Viewed 12 September 2013, http://en.tempo.co/read/news/2013/08/12/114503889/Posters-of-Protest. 29 Ibid. 22

Bibliography Aritonang, Margareth S. ‘Foreign Groups Wary of “Ormas” Law’. The Jakarta Post, 4 July 2013. Viewed 11 September 2013. http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2013/07/04/foreign-groups-wary-ormaslaw.html. Aspinall, Ed. ‘Student Dissent in Indonesia in the 1980s’. Working Papers, Centre of Southeast Asian Studies. Clayton, Vic.: Monash University, 1993. Viewed 10 September 2013. http://search.informit.com.au/documentSummary;dn=708806468866938;res=IELH SS. Aspinall. Ed. ‘Indonesian in 2009: Democratic Triumphs and Trials’. South East Asian Affairs, (2010): 103-125. Aspinall, Ed. ‘Popular Agency and Interests in Indonesia’s Democratic Transition and Consolidation’. Indonesia 1 (2013) DOI: 10.5728/indonesia.96.0011. Fealy, Greg. ‘Indonesian Politics in 2012: Graft, Intolerance, and Hope of Change in the Late Yudhoyono Period’. South East Asian Affairs 1 (2013): 101-120. Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ ‘Fraksi DPR Protes Penahanan Bibit-Chandra’. Suara Merdeka, 31 October 2009. Viewed 13 September 2013. http://www.suaramerdeka.com/v1/index.php/read/news/2009/10/31/39168/FraksiDPR-Protes-Penahanan-Bibit-Chandra. Guntensperger, Patrick. ‘Corruption Bomb Explodes in Indonesia’. Asia Times Online, 7 November 2009. Viewed 12 December 2009. http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/KK07Ae04.html. Hadiz, Vedi and Richard Robison. ‘The Political Economy of Oligarchy and the Reorganization of Power in Indonesia’. Indonesia 1 (2013) DOI: 10.5728/indonesia.96.0033. Ibrahim, Rustam. Indonesian Civil Society 2006. Jakarta: Civicus Report Yappika, 2006. ‘KPK’s Chandra, Bibit Arrested’. Jakarta Globe, 30 October 2009. Viewed 12 September 2013. http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/archive/kpks-chandra-bibit-arrested. McAdam, Doug, Charles Tilly and Sidney G. Tarrow. Dynamics of Contention. New York: Cambridge University Press. 2001. Mietzner, Marcus. ‘Indonesia’s 2009 Elections: Populism, Dynasties and the Consolidation of the Party System and Consolidation’. Sydney: Lowy Institute for International Policy, 2009. Viewed 10 August 2013. http://www.isn.ethz.ch/DigitalLibrary/Publications/Detail/?ots591=0c54e3b31e9c-be1e-2c24-a6a8c7060233&lng=en&id=100187. Natahadibrata, Nadya. ‘Former Taxman Gayus to Serve 30 Years in Prison’. The Jakarta Post, 3 August 2013. Viewed 13 September 2013. http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2013/08/03/former-taxman-gayus-serve-30years-prison.html. Nugroho, Eryanto. ‘Bill on Societal Organizations (RUU Ormas) and Freedom of Association in Indonesia’. The International Journal of Not-for-Profit Law 15.1 (2013): 13-37. ‘Posters of Protest’. Tempo.co, 12 August 2013. Viewed 12 September 2013. http://en.tempo.co/read/news/2013/08/12/114503889/Posters-of-Protest.

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__________________________________________________________________ ‘RUU Ormas Disahkan, Ini Delapan Pasal yang Berubah’. Tempo.co, 2 July 2013. Viewed 9 September 2013. http://www.tempo.co/read/news/2013/07/02/078492975/RUU-Ormas-DisahkanIni-Delapan-Pasal-yang-Berubah. Tilly, Charles. Regimes and Repertoires. Chicago. Chicago University Press. 2006. Viri, Kristina. ‘Batalkan Pengesahan RUU Ormas!’. Change.org, Viewed 11 September 2013. http://www.change.org/id/petisi/batalkan-pengesahan-ruu-ormas. Wedhaswary, Inggried Dwi. ‘RUU Ormas Disahkan, Delapan Pasal Alami Perubahan’. Kompas, 2 July 2013. Viewed 12 September 2013. http://nasional.kompas.com/read/2013/07/02/1425557/RUU.Ormas.Disahkan.Dela pan.Pasal.Alami.Perubahan. Michael Hatherell is a PhD Candidate at Deakin University in Victoria, Australia. His research explores the dynamics of political representation within Indonesia’s political party system and society more broadly. He can be contacted via email at [email protected].

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The Egyptian Revolutions of 1952 and 2011: Identification and Repetition Amal Treacher Kabesh Abstract Silences, spectres and shards are aspects of masculine subjectivity which work to conceal and disavow the damage done by socio-political orders. The present sociopolitical context of Egypt is full of the affectual burdens of history. Egypt was colonised for centuries and the 1952 Revolution led to the overthrow of the then corrupt regime including British administration. Following the political revolutions of 1952 and 2011 there was a short period of optimism which evaporated quickly. Both revolutions are marked by a belief that a colonial and oppressive past has been overthrown decisively. There has, however, been relentless repetition in relation to oppression, the role of the ‘deep state’ and economic inequality. Egypt is marked by an adherence to perpetuating injustice and oppression. Repetition, should cause anxiety as unconscious identification and mimicry of past regimes leads to perpetuation of bankrupt (emotionally, morally, economically) societies. There are resounding silences, within current political analysis on Egypt that insist that the Arab Spring has overthrown vestiges of colonialism, I argue, however, that colonialism remains dominant due to identifications with previous regimes. The problem with identification is that it locks human beings into the past and into connections that should be refused for a different socio-political order to be imagined and worked towards. Arendt focuses on thinking, willing and judging as three aspects of human functioning for an effective socio-political society (1978). 1 Following Arendt, I am proposing that political authority is gained through persistent thought, judgement and that it is only through a stringent exploration of public life that a polity based on social justice can be created and sustained. Key Words: Colonialism and postcolonialism, identification, repetition, resistance, responsibility, unconscious. ***** 1. The Burdens of History Silences, secrets and shards are fundamental features of subjectivity and they work within and through flesh and blood human beings to conceal, ameliorate and disavow the damage done to, and perpetuated by, the socio-political orders and in turn the destruction inflicted on human beings by other human beings. Through this chapter I want to explore the textures and affectual burdens of history and hauntings for two reasons – first, to understand how the past impacts profoundly on the present and second, to move towards an ethical relatedness based on responsibility to the other. Malathi Dealwis’s phrase ‘absent presences’ offers an Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ important understanding of the way that events, histories, memories, narratives – subjectivity itself – are replete with traces that are inescapable and simultaneously enigmatic. 2 For Dealwis the trace is undecipherable as it is neither fully present nor fully absent. These absent presences, I argue, are silent but omnipresent shards that persist, unbidden and unwanted, in beleaguered psyches and in socio-political formations. I am preoccupied in this chapter with exploring how the past endures and haunts the present in a particular postcolonial society – Egypt. The endurance of the past, I argue, paralysis effective political activity and the endeavour to forge socio-political conditions based on social justice and inequality. A contemporary move to perceive and celebrate resistance bypasses the troubling issue of the repetition of history. The initial impulse that propelled me to start this endeavour of understanding masculinities, emotions and political authority was ignited when I witnessed my father weeping copiously over the failures of the 1952 revolution. Witnessing my father, who I had never seen crying, I was startled and puzzled by his tears and the way he was torn apart by his overwhelming feelings of responsibility and disappointment. There is an irony that I am here from the place where I began as I find myself in a similar emotional and political place and space as my father. My generation, like my father’s generation, is responsible and accountable for the persistent inability to make a future replete with effective possibilities. Needless to say if I supported the Freedom and Justice Party (the political organisation of the Muslim Brotherhood) I would be in a different state of mind. My friends and family are insecure and worried. Our states of mind range from sadness to disappointment. While many are angry at the way the Revolution of 2011 has evolved – it is now called by many the Anger or the Stolen Revolution – my generation is dominated by despair and disappointment. The conversations with others and the internal dialogue focuses on the following question – how have we come to this? There is in my judgement much to be disappointed about – the continual tenacity of the deep state in Egypt, civil society in Egypt at this period of time is fractured as unemployment and inflation is rocketing, drug abuse is rising, alongside an escalation of theft and relentless poverty. People are frayed leading to a corrosion of manners which in turn leads to more irritability. This is the second revolution my generation has witnessed and the second time we have had to encounter intense feelings of disappointment. Hannah Arendt uses ‘wordlessness’ to describe poignantly the accurate feeling that words can conceal as much as they reveal as language can ‘estrange us from an immediacy we may not be able to bear’ as Mendelsohn points out. 3 I am preoccupied with what story do we tell ourselves? Why do we focus on that narrative and not another? Who is the object/s of our narratives? What and who haunts our narratives? The question of how to write a narrative persists and this requires perpetual judgement in relation to which thoughts, ideas, emotions and events to incorporate and which to exclude in order to make it coherent. This coherence is necessary in Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ order to produce a narrative and it is of course challenging and impossible to convey the jaggedness and complexity of human beings. Thinking always involves emotions and fantasies as we can all reach, too fast and too easily, for that which is known and reassuring and thereby resisting that which can surprise and throw the self off balance. A haunt has many meanings but for now I want to focus on a haunt as a meeting place which is known and familiar. Haunt as place can reassure and console as a physical location and crucially as emotional and imagined spaces of the mind. The familiar can often be used as an emotional and cognitive resting place as opposed to a space from which the unfamiliar, the surprising and the unknown can be explored. Resistance to new states of minds takes place in many places (metaphorical and actual) and through many states of mind. In short, there are responsibilities involved in writing a narrative and these are unavoidable. I do not know what to think and I cannot discern the ‘reality’ of my fears as I grew up with, and imbibed, the belief that the Muslim Brotherhood are the enemy. My disappointments are of course not my own as I am filled with the disappointments of previous generations. These ghosts of the past whisper, they have presence – demanding love, justice, healing. These ghosts are noisy and insistent making it near impossible to listen to or even know one’s own thoughts. 2. Mourning the Past? Shards and hauntings persist through and within the socio-political spheres and these shards may appear as small splinters but the consequences of their internalisations and perpetuations impact profoundly on subjectivities. Postcolonial theory works on a double edge of attempting to understand what occurred and yet these understandings are continually haunted and shadowed by the imagination of what might have been. There is an important axis of understanding which focuses on working towards uncovering memories, acts of resistance and complicity, and holding in mind what might have been, so that a different imaginative reckoning with the past can be made. The past is intangible but with tangible effects. History is a burden as it persists in the present, is full of emotional textures and has to be endured. Within a psychoanalytic framework the present is made up of memories and perceptions from the past. Furthermore, the past is ambiguous as historical material is always over-determined and multi-layered. The past has a tenacious grip for as Adam Phillips points out that which we think of as lost is never ‘quite as lost as we fear or indeed hope’. 4 Fathers are inevitably folded into our most profound psychic investments and desires for reparation. Judith Butler explores how fathers enable their children to gain subjectivity and are essential as the route into the socio-political order. 5 Further, as Susannah Radstone argues that through identification, the son must resemble his father. 6 The problem with identification is that it can lock human beings into the past and into connections that should be refused if a different socio-political order is to be made. Identifications and loyalties are needless to say over determined. While the past is unavoidably Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ omnipresent there is the persistent attempt to avoid repetition and the responsibilities embedded in passing on narratives. In Hisham Matar’s novel Anatomy of a Disappearance, a son frequently asks his father for stories and information about his father’s history and his father deflects the questions. The son understands these deflections as his father honouring his mother’s wishes who once said to her husband: “don’t transfer the weight of the past on to your son”. He retorted “you can’t live outside history”…“We have nothing to be ashamed of. On the contrary”. After a long pause the mother responded “Who said anything about shame? It’s longing that I want to spare him. Longing and the burden of your hopes.” 7 It is frequently unclear and certainly requires thought which aspect or feature of a narrative is to be passed on. Passing a narrative on can both provide a point of necessary reflection and simultaneously can also be the point where, as Rose writes, thinking stops: ‘out of respect, humility or fear of our own failure, is required to stop’. 8 Melancholia can be, if not always is, tenacious, stubborn, and hideously resilient as a mindless state of melancholic loss dominates. Radstone points out all mourning must pass through the father and must be felt, thought through and experienced – in the name-of-the-Father. 9 Crucially, however, how can the work of mourning occur and be lived through, when ‘it is fathers who have littered the path with so many dangerous splinters and shards’. 10 Much of what has to be mourned is enigmatic but deeply felt nonetheless. Mourning needs to occur in relation to what has been and as importantly what never was and never will be. Repetition, should perhaps cause anxiety and provoke concern. Repetition: emotional, social, political may be more prevalent than we are willing to acknowledge in the relentless drive to assert our differences from previous generations, the insistence on progression and the avowal of our separation from previous generations. There are, regrettably, more similarities than we are often willing to recognise and realise. My generation’s tears and my father’s generation’s tears seem to me to be full of loss, as the tears express loss of opportunity and the absence of hope and promise of a society based on equality of opportunity and a society where gross poverty is eradicated. There are always tears (crying) and tears (as in gaps) in living a life. The present can be unbearable. Resistance, in the psychoanalytic meaning of resisting the new, the unknown and the surprising is frequently a response to the intolerable. As Rose writes, for Freud ‘resistance was a psychic reality that blocked the passage of the psyche into freedom. One of the mind’s best defences, it cuts subjects off from the pain and mess of inner life’. 11

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__________________________________________________________________ Resistance and repetition can be the paths of least resistance for as Rose writes if ‘in political vocabularies, resistance is the passage to freedom, for psychoanalysis, it is repetition, blockage, blind obeisance to crushing internal constraint’. 12 I cannot, and should not, continually return responsibility to previous generations as I am disappointed in the Left’s incapacity to make a difference [and I consider myself a member of the broad left and I am disappointed in myself as well as others for our failure to make a difference]. For psychoanalysis resistance ‘is the mind at war with itself, blocking the path to its own freedom and with it, its ability to make the world a better, less tyrannical, place. 13 Disappointment circulates: the younger generation are rightly disappointed in my generation for not doing more and not ensuring an effective socio-politicaleconomic future. To be honest I am bewildered as to why we did not do more and perhaps more to the point: why did we pass on suffering? There are resounding silences about the compulsion to repeat – and our attraction to repetitious destructiveness and our complicities, for all our talk of resistance and heroic endeavour, our willingness to capitulate to exploitative power and hierarchy. Facing up to the past, to present responsibilities, to how one is formed is never easy, nor straightforward as the more laden the past, the more painful the process of remembering. It can be argued that one issue is for men to remember as if memory can deliver a more promising present and future. It is too easy to reach for a position that an active life of the mind necessitates an active memory through which the past is known, mediated and guarded against. Luisa Passerini, however, argues that to remember something the self has to know that something is absent, forgotten indeed 14 but to forget, you have to forget that you have even forgotten. 15 But remembering in a postcolonial context requires remembering the humiliation and shame of our fathers and grandfathers. I wonder if what we cannot tolerate is the vulnerability of our Egyptian fathers [this may be a universal question] and what we cannot tolerate is the knowledge of the precariousness of their status and power under colonial rule which in Egypt finished 60 years ago. So we are bound in an emotional web which paralyses thinking as we are not able to bear the vulnerability of our forefathers that lies alongside our wish to redeem them. In any case, our need to disavow that we share similar socio-political conditions leads to the assertion - that we are not like that, because after all – we are over it. But above all – perhaps what we cannot forgive is our father’s and grandfather’s weaknesses. So we repudiate them, perhaps we hate them for their fragilities and we assert that we are alive – active – and point to the continuing demonstrations in Egypt as a reassurance that ‘we are alive’ but also that resistance is active and perpetual. A sense of aliveness, of being active and attempting to make a difference is of course important – vital even – for being a responsible citizen. There, is however and I am asserting this, a world of difference between thoughtful resistance based on judgement and will and declaring that we are

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__________________________________________________________________ resistant which is based on refusal and denial of what has been and what is/has been internalised. 3. Living with Shadows: Inhabiting the Present In The Life of the Mind, Hannah Arendt explores mental life and focuses on thinking, willing and judging as three crucial aspects of human functioning. 16 Arendt’s account centres on being a morally accountable agent who is responsible, thoughtful and capable of action and judgement. 17 Judgement for Arendt is never final, but always must by necessity be woven through with thought and will. In turn each of these terms must co-exist through an interlinked chain so will (which I understand as another word for action) must lead to thought that in turn must be woven through judgement. I keep the words – thinking, willing and judging – as verbs as I want to convey the active nature of this important triad of terms and more importantly because I think there is no, and nor should there be, easy resting places for thinking, willing and judging. Following Arendt, I am proposing that political authority is gained through persistent thought and judgement and that it is only through a stringent exploration of public life can a polity based on social justice be created and sustained. Judgement, action/will and thought are essential requirements for a different social order to be made and sustained. Remorse haunts and should not be sloughed off through banal clichés such as ‘I had no choice’, ‘I did not know’, ‘what else could we have done’. Responsibility depends on many aspects: thought and judgement primarily, which involves importantly judgement about one’s actions or indeed lack of action and intervention. After all, as Rose reminds us, it takes a great deal of energy and activity to achieve passivity and I would add thinking and judgement do require energy, time, reflection, troublesome confrontations but it also takes effort not to think and to avoid judgement. 18 My generation, I insist, is accountable and the younger generation are understandably indignant at best and angry that we did not do more. It is not enough to resort to resigned helplessness as if that gets out of our moral quagmire and our hopelessness. Regret and remorse cannot, and should not be, avoided no matter how painful the confrontation. Ross Poole asks pertinently how can we respond to the injustices of the past and make reparation and attempt to repair the claims for recognition, love and nurture. 19 Turning towards Freud, Poole asks why remain attached to the lost object and rather breezily posits the question: why not simply find another? What is lost is precisely that - lost - and cannot be found or re-gained, cannot be recaptured or known. Rather paradoxically being haunted may be a means of avoiding such a loss. Why not treat the presence of the past as analogous to the presence of ghosts and simply do without them? 20 Ghosts can act as reminders, maybe rebukes and can come to life to remind us of our responsibilities but we should not idealise ghosts who may not always tell the truth and in any case we do have to consider the possibility that some things are left concealed. Ghosts maybe a Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access

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__________________________________________________________________ moral demand from the past and while they must be given a hearing we also sometimes must disobey them just as we must defy our fathers to find our responsibilities, desires and hopes. We have to live with shadows. Shadows work away within and external to us, they persist; and while we have to recognise their persistence we need to take responsibility for the effects of their presence. They cannot be dismissed because we wish them away. It is perhaps always about love, ambivalent and fraught as it can often be, but responsibility can be, should be, about following through to different, more engaged socio-political relationships.

Notes Hannah Arendt, The Life of the Mind (New York: Harcourt Inc, 1978). Malathi Dealwis, ‘Tracing Absent Presence’, in States of Trauma: Gender and Violence in South Asia, eds. Piya Chatterjee et al. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), 238-256. 3 Daniel Mendelshon, The Lost: In Search for Six of the Six Million (London: Harper Collins, 2007). 4 Adam Phillips, ‘What Can You Know’, The London Review of Books 29.8 (2007): 20-22. 5 Judith Butler, The Psychic Life of Power (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997). 6 Susannah Radstone, The Sexual Politics of Time: Confession, Nostalgia, Memory (London: Routledge, 2007). 7 Hisham Matar, Anatomy of a Disappearance (London: Penguin Books, 2012). 8 Jacqueline Rose, The Last Resistance (London: Verso, 2007). 9 Radstone, The Sexual Politics of Time. 10 Ibid. 11 Rose, The Last Resistance. 12 Ibid. 13 Ibid. 14 Luisa Passerini, ‘Memories between Silence and Oblivion’, in Contested Pasts: The Politics of Memory, eds. Kate Hodgkin and Susannah Radstone (London: Routlege, 2003). 15 Jacqueline Rose, ‘Response’, in Freud and the Non-European, by Edward Said (London: Verso, 2003), 63-79. 16 Arendt, The Life of the Mind. 17 Ibid. 18 Rose, ‘Response’. 1 2

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__________________________________________________________________ Ross Poole, ‘Two Ghosts and an Angel: Memory and Forgetting in Hamlet, Beloved and the Book of Laughter and Forgetting’, Constellations 16.1 (2009): 125-149. 20 Poole, ‘Two Ghosts and an Angel’. 19

Bibliography Arendt, Hannah. The Life of the Mind. New York, London: Harcourt Inc., 1978. Butler, Judith. The Psychic Life of Power. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997. De Alwis, Malathi. ‘Tracing Absent Presence’. In States of Trauma: Gender and Violence in South Asia, edited by Piya Chatterjee, Manali Desai, Parama Roy, 238256. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. Matar, Hisham. Anatomy of a Disappearance. London: Penguin Books, 2012. Mendelsohn, Daniel. The Lost: In Search for Six of the Six Million. London: Harper Collins, 2007. Passerini, Luisa. ‘Memories between Silence and Oblivion’. In Contested Pasts: The Politics of Memory, edited by K. Hodgkin and S. Radstone, 238-240. London: Routledge, 2003. Phillips, Adam. ‘What Can You Know’. The London Review of Books 29.8 (2007): 20-22. Poole, Ross. ‘Two Ghosts and an Angel: Memory and Forgetting in Hamlet, Beloved and the Book of Laughter and Forgetting’. Constellations 16.1 (2009): 125-149. Radstone, Susannah. The Sexual Politics of Time: Confession, Nostalgia, Memory. London: Routledge, 2007. Rose, Jacqueline. ‘Response’. In Freud and the Non-European, by Edward Said, 65-79. London: Verso, 2003. Rose, Jacqueline. The Last Resistance. London: Verso. 2007.

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__________________________________________________________________ Amal Treacher Kabesh lectures at the School of Sociology and Social Policy (University of Nottingham, UK). She researches on the relationship between the Middle East and the ‘West’ specifically Egypt and the UK. Her book Postcolonial Masculinities: Emotions, Histories and Ethics is published by Ashgate (2013).

Amal Treacher Kabesh and James Arvanitakis - 978-1-84888-347-5 Downloaded from Brill.com11/09/2020 12:11:08PM via free access