All’interno del bellissimo Ard Film Festival (https://alardfilmfestival.com/), organizzato a #Cagliari dall’Associazione Amicizia Sardegna #Palestina, parleremo di guerra, complesso militare industriale e il rapporto tra #Università e #Militarizzazione Eris Edizioni.
Questo sabato alle ore 11, Teatro Massimo di Cagliari.
Grazie a tutt* i compagn* e le compagn* che hanno contribuito a organizzare questo evento, inclusi No CPR Macomer LasciateCIEntrare Potere al Popolo A Foras – Contra a s’ocupatzione militare de sa Sardigna e la bravissima Alice Salimbeni
Inhabiting the Surrounds: Urbanity, Critique and Speculative Practice
Urban Studies Summer School organised by the Beyond Inhabitation Lab and Urban Transitions Hub
23-26 September 2024, Turin – 2-6 June 2025, Lisbon
Confirmed keynote instructors Turin: Ruth Wilson Gilmore (CUNY), Alana Osbourne (Radboud University) and Tatiana Thieme (UCL) Lisbon: AbdouMaliq Simone (University of Sheffield) and Filip De Boeck (KU Leuven)
Rationale
What does it mean to think around habitation and its struggles, in a world where every inch of the possible seems to have been colonised by the extractive and expulsive makings of racial, financial capitalism? How to assemble, and engage with, radical modalities of use-value concerning the staples of habitation – addressing housing (in)justice, the expansion of computation, the emergent multiplicity of entities forming ever-complex ecologies, to reimagine a sense of the future in the midst of a planetary crisis? How to re-approach a critique to dwelling praxis grounding it within the generative force of what AbdouMaliq Simone has named the surrounds, “a shape-shifing matrix of spaces, times, and practices that exist right now within the turbulent processes of contemporary urbanization”?
We are interested in establishing a conversation with engaged scholars tackling these questions in a number of transdisciplinary ways, and, in particular, we are keen to hear from those who transcend the remit of conventional ‘comparative’ urban approaches, and those who go beyond the rubric of liberal, Western literatures and approaches to understand geographies of struggles in a situated and politically relevant way. Grounded in the ‘collective study’ methodology of the Beyond Inhabitation Lab, and fostered by the long-standing critical tradition of urban thinking adopted by the Urban Transitions Hub, we have joined forces to provide a platform for thinking and exchange around these themes, in the form of a double-event School located in two Southern European cities (Turin and Lisbon).
Structure
Aimed at 15 selected post-doctoral scholars (max. 5 years from PhD award), the School is organised around two distinct moments:
Turin, 23-26 September 2024: the cohort of selected post-doctoral participants will join us in Turin, for a 4-day event organised around three keynote lectures from Ruth Wilson Gilmore (CUNY), Alana Osbourne (Radboud University) and Tatiana Thieme (UCL), and ample (formal and informal) time to discuss the draft paper ideas, and to debate around the theme of the School at large.
Lisbon, 2-6 June 2025: the same post-doctoral participants will join us in Lisbon, for a 5-day event organised around two keynote lectures from AbdouMaliq Simone (University of Sheffield) and Filip De Boeck (KU Leuven), a series of writing workshops with the purpose of building on the collective study initiated in Turin by discussing with the participants their drafts papers, and a day of outdoor urban explorations.
Commitment
In applying, participants commit to the production of one individual high-quality academic paper each, which will be considered for inclusion in one or more special issues arising from the School. In detail, this commitment includes:
The submission of a long abstract (800 words) at the time of application, upon which the candidate will be selected, also considering their CV
Following the Turin event, the production of a 4,000-word draft, which will have to be submitted 3 weeks in advance of the Lisbon event (drafts will be discussed by the instructors and participants during the Lisbon workshop)
Following the Lisbon event, the submission of an 8,000-word academic paper for the production of one or more special issues arising from the School, to be pitched to journals such as IJURR, Antipode, EPD (normal peer-review process will apply)
If the paper is selected by the organisers for the production of the special issue, the participant commits to following the peer-review process in a proactive and timely manner
What we offer
Leading keynote speeches and opportunity to engage with the speakers
A curated series of conversations, fostering intellectual exchange and bonding
Structured feedback provided to each of the Participants’ papers, with the intent to produce one or more insightful special issues in leading academic journals
Lunches and coffee breaks
For the Turin event: 3 scholarships of €350 each for selected applicants who could not afford to take part in the School otherwise
For the Lisbon event: 3 scholarships of €350 each for selected applicants who could not afford to take part in the School otherwise
Cost
The events are free. Transportation to the School locations, dinners and accommodation are not included; for the latter, we will suggest reasonably cheap options for both cities.
Application
We welcome participants whose proposed works are grounded both empirically and historically/geographically, and we will give priority to those writing from the margins of Anglophone academia. Particular attention will be paid to works drawing on critical-race, feminist, and queer approaches to urban habitation and/or those informed by more-than-human, materialist, political-ecological approaches.
Please note that the School is strictly in-person (no online attendance will be possible). The working language will be English.
To apply, fill out the following form by 30th April 2024. We will not accept delayed applications in any circumstance.
Or copy and paste the following URL into your browser: https://forms.gle/hxz4vfVstXaYSXmo8
Organising Committee
Convenors
Michele Lancione, Andrea Pavoni, Irene Peano, AbdouMaliq Simone
Writing coordinators
Marco Allegra, Mara Ferreri, Francesca Governa, Lavinia Pereira
Local organising committee
Turin: Silvia Aru, Chiara Cacciotti, Chiara Iacovone, Mara Ferreri, Michele Lancione, Daniela Morpurgo. Lisbon: Marco Allegra, Salomé Honório, Andrea Pavoni, Irene Peano, Lavinia Pereira, Luisa Rossini
Supported by
The event is funded by the European Research Council Inhabiting Radical Housing project (n. 851940, PI: Lancione).
It is also supported by DIST (Polytechnic and University of Turin), DINAMIA’CET-ISCTE (Lisbon University Institute), and the ICS (University of Lisbon).
If you wish to download a PDF for circulation, please click below.
Today, we had our first meeting in Turin of our new antifascist university alliance.
This is a renewed form of activism that links our anti-fascist praxis to anti-militarism and the need to defend the terrain of our universities in order to fight inside and outside them. It comes out of the increased militarization and policing of our University spaces, as well as to fight the far-right acceleration of the political and societal spheres in Italy.
I look forward to joining the Radical Urban Lab at the University of St Andrews on Monday 5th, February, as part of their week of events.
I will take part in the VIVA discussion of Rowan Milligan’s wonderful PhD thesis, and then present an excerpt of my Duke University Press book For a #Liberatory #Politics of #Home to the Lab.
Thanks to my comrade Antonis Vradis for organising!
My anti-militarist practice has brought me, for many years, to embrace the Palestinian-led Boycott, Disinvest, Sanction (BDS) campaign against the Israeli military-industrial regime and its death project (I speak of this in my recent volume Universitá e Militarizzazione). For decades, we have witnessed the relentless colonization of post-1967 West Bank territories and the caging of Palestinian life in Gaza. Now, after the ignominious Hamas attack on October 7th, Palestinians are confronted with the extreme intensification of the colonial project of Israel in Palestine.
After more than 24,000 deaths in a few months, the destruction of present and past infrastructures, the domicides of homes, and the total annihilation of consistent parts of Gaza, we need to call the Israeli State’s intervention for what it is: a genocide. This is not an elaborate left-wing ‘woke’ fantasy but the reality of the war on the ground. I report below the joint statements of many UN Rapporteurs, including Mr. Balakrishnan Rajagopal, Special Rapporteur on the right to adequate housing and Ms. Francesca Albanese, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian Territory occupied since 1967 – a must-read, to cease fire now, and then to stop this colonial occupation.
Over one hundred days into the war, Israel destroying Gaza’s food system and weaponizing food, say UN human rights experts
GENEVA (16 January 2024) – Gazans now make up 80 per cent of all people facing famine or catastrophic hunger worldwide, marking an unparalleled humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip amid Israel’s continued bombardment and siege, according to UN human rights experts.
“Currently every single person in Gaza is hungry, a quarter of the population are starving and struggling to find food and drinkable water, and famine is imminent. Pregnant women are not receiving adequate nutrition and healthcare, putting their lives at risk. In addition all children under five – 335,000 – are at high risk of severe malnutrition as the risk of famine conditions continues to increase, a whole generation is now in danger of suffering from stunting,” said the experts. Stunting occurs when young children’s growth is hampered due to lack of adequate nourishment and causes irreparable physical and cognitive impairments. This will undermine the learning capacity of an entire generation.
Nowhere is safe in Gaza. Since 9 October, Israel declared and imposed a “total siege” on Gaza, depriving 2.3 million Palestinians of water, food, fuel, medicine, and medical supplies, this against the backdrop of a 17-year Israeli blockade, which before this war made approximately half of the people in Gaza food insecure and more than 80 percent reliant on humanitarian aid.
While the majority of aid distribution is concentrated in the southern governorates, since 1 January, only 21 per cent (5 out of 24) of planned deliveries of aid containing food and other lifesaving supplies reached their destination north of Wadi Gaza. The experts are particularly alarmed about conditions in northern Gaza, where the population faces prolonged food shortages and extremely restricted access to essential resources. In southern Gaza, a large concentration of individuals resides in inadequate shelters or areas devoid of basic amenities, escalating the brutal situation.
“It is unprecedented to make an entire civilian population go hungry this completely and quickly. Israel is destroying Gaza’s food system and using food as a weapon against the Palestinian people.”
Israel is destroying and blocking access to farmland and the sea. Recent reports allege that since Israeli military’s ground offensive started on 27 October, approximately 22% of agricultural land, including orchards, greenhouses, and farmland in northern Gaza, has been razed by Israeli forces. Israel has reportedly destroyed approximately 70% of Gaza’s fishing fleet. Even with little humanitarian aid that has been allowed to enter, people still lack food and fuel to cook. Most bakeries are not operational, due to the lack of fuel, water, and wheat flour along with structural damage. Livestock are starving and unable to provide food or be a source of food. Meanwhile, access to safe water continues to diminish while the healthcare system has collapsed due to the wide-spread destruction of hospitals, significantly heightening the spread of communicable diseases.
Israel has also destroyed more than 60% of Palestinian homes in Gaza, directly affecting the ability to cook any food, and causing domicide through the mass destruction of dwellings, making the territory uninhabitable. The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs has estimated that nearly 85% of Gaza’s population — representing 1.9 million people — is internally displaced, including many who have been displaced multiple times, as families are forced to move repeatedly in search of safety.
“We have raised the alarm of the risk of genocide several times reminding all governments they have a duty to prevent genocide. Not only is Israel killing and causing irreparable harm against Palestinian civilians with its indiscriminate bombardments, it is also knowingly and intentionally imposing a high rate of disease, prolonged malnutrition, dehydration, and starvation by destroying civilian infrastructure,” said the experts. “Aid needs to be delivered to Gazans immediately and without any hindrance to prevent starvation.”
“Our alarm for the unfolding genocide does not only refer to the ongoing bombardment of Gaza but also concerns the slow suffering and death caused by Israel’s long-standing occupation, blockade and current civic destruction, since genocide advances through an ongoing process and is not a singular event.”
“The clear path to achieving peace, safety, and stability for both Israelis and Palestinians lies in the realization of Palestinian self-determination. This can only be achieved through an immediate ceasefire and the cessation of the Israeli occupation”.
The increasingly close link between universities and the military industry
By Luca Rondi – December 1, 2023
All over the world, companies in the defense sector enter into collaborative agreements with universities, at the risk of distorting the purpose of research. A phenomenon that also concerns Italy, starting with the Leonardo case
Taken from Altreconomia 265 – December 2023
“Think of when you add oil to a glass of water: if you drink it, the taste changes despite the fact that to the eye the two substances are divided from each other.” Professor Michele Lancione has no doubt: the sweet taste of research freedom has already been spoiled as more and more universities, Italian and otherwise, are interconnected with the military sphere. And in the book “Universities and Militarization,” published by Eris editions in October 2023, Lancione proceeds analytically to reconstruct why these relationships are problematic. He does so starting with an emblematic affair that concerned him personally (the department he works for at the Polytechnic University of Turin is producing maps for the controversial Frontex agency) and then widening his gaze to other collaborations of Italian and foreign universities, from the United Kingdom to Australia to the United States. We interviewed him.
Professor Lancione, let’s start with the title. What do you mean by “militarization”?
ML I mean it in the broadest possible sense, which therefore goes beyond the strictly material aspect of the term as may be the occupation of public land for military uses. I am therefore referring to that process, which we have witnessed in the West from September 11, 2001 onward, whereby what is not military is transformed into military. I start with a trivial example: how often in everyday language do we use war terminology? Words like “assault,” “firepower,” “battle.” This is the result of a paradigm shift that has fostered the spread of a culture of war and that unfortunately continues to increase, not least because of what happened first in Ukraine and then in Palestine.
You review several cases of problematic agreements between universities and companies in the military-industrial sector. Can you give us some examples?
ML First of all, we need to dispel the myth that only certain disciplines are affected by this phenomenon, even the social sciences are. In the book I bring the example of the “human terrain system” promoted by the U.S. Department of Defense to study the “human terrain” in the “War on Terror” carried out in Iraq and Afghanistan with the aim of improving outcomes. In that case the figures involved were not engineers or computer scientists but anthropologists, political scientists and geographers who were even involved on the battlefield. This is the most extreme example of where the interference of the military sphere in research has gone. The same one we find, this time in Italy, in the agreements with the Med-Or foundation and its main player, Leonardo Spa. Several Italian universities have made agreements with the company to foster, so they say, a culture of exchange and knowledge. The word “synergy” is often used: it sounds harmless but it is not, because it means bringing together worlds that previously did not talk to each other, exchanging experiences, creating social relationships. And it doesn’t matter if the purpose of the project is civilian: not least because these collaborations today are part of a troubling bigger picture.
Which one?
ML In 2022, a National Military Research Plan (NPRM) was launched by the Ministry of Defense, which aims to “increase the knowledge base of the Defense in high-tech sectors.” On the one hand there are universities and private individuals coming together for “civilian” purposes, and on the other hand a ministry offering money to do research on defense-related fields.
You have already cited Leonardo. It especially delves into his connection with the Polytechnic University of Turin, the university where you teach. Why?
ML Because Leonardo in Turin has slowly become what Fiat was in the past. An industrial partner of reference to which one becomes more and more attached. Mind you: there is nothing illegitimate, much less illegal in this. It is a genuine interest, if you will, of a university that needs the validation of a company to demonstrate the concrete results that its knowledge produces. Just as legitimate is the interest of the company that gains on two counts: it justifies its image because it collaborates with one of the most prestigious universities in the world and, above all, it has the opportunity to access knowledge that is fundamental to its business. This dynamic is trivial, but that is precisely the problem, and I would go so far as to say that it is reminiscent of Hannah Arendt’s banality of evil. Because this connection risks the university losing its nature: Leonardo works to make a profit and does not have to ask ethical questions about what it produces (making weapons is its business) but for the Athenaeum it does not. And the question we forget to ask ourselves is this. How will you, from an institutional point of view, take a stand on certain issues-I think of wars and armaments-if your partner, with whom you may have built entire areas of research and teaching, as in the case of Leonardo, which runs a master’s program at the Politecnico di Torino, feeds that same system? And the more you tie yourself financially to these entities, the more you are stuck.
Is that what happened with the “Frontex case”?
ML In my opinion, yes. One did not have the courage to get out of that agreement because it would cascade into so many others. But there is more. The contract for the production of up-to-date cartography with the European Border and Coast Guard Agency is still in force despite the fact that the Academic Senate decided to save it, twice, only with the specific provision of the inclusion of a human rights safeguard clause that committed both parties. Beyond the impossibility of checking what Frontex does with the maps, Altreconomia had discovered in February 2022 that the same clause had never even been seen by the agency, because it was not included in the framework contract, but only in the agreement between the three Italian parties in the consortium that won the tender. And it’s paradoxical: you are so overwhelmed by the flow that you are completely disinterested in the consequences of your actions: you decide to insert a clause, Frontex doesn’t even know what it is, but that’s okay.
Do these dynamics you recount happen only in Turin?
ML No, in a great many Italian universities.
The agreements, however, often, at least on paper, are for civilian purposes. Is this not enough?
ML Not only is it not enough but it is an intellectually dishonest excuse. Let me explain: when we take refuge behind the label of dual use we block any kind of discussion at the origin. After all, the Gps we have on our smartphones comes from military studies, so what’s the harm? We all use it today. But beware. I take the example of water and oil again: the entities-university and company-remain separate but the relationship that is created is very intense. And I would add: perhaps, if Leonardo did not collaborate with ninety universities and research centers around the world, it would not be the leading European manufacturer of aerospace-related armaments. For that knowledge that the university gives it (for example, on photovoltaic panels for robots sent to Mars) also gives the company an advantage on the other front. It is that exchange of knowledge we were talking about earlier. And especially of money.
How much does the economic aspect affect it?
ML A lot. Because that area is in danger of becoming a major form of funding for entire departments. And that is dangerous because if the company closes the taps, you risk not standing anymore.
Is the university, therefore, being distorted?
ML The ability to think of universities as a place where you need to take public positions on important issues has been lost. And on this abroad they are ahead of us. Rectors never take action on current events. And those who do, I think of Tomaso Montanari of the University for Foreigners of Siena, are ridiculed. But that’s his job.
Is this a problem only of the rectors?
ML Obviously not, but it affects because then in cascade everyone is more afraid. And let’s remember that in Italy the academic career is difficult and long: you are often forced to keep a low profile. For a researcher who needs the money to pay his rent, it’s complex to say no. And then I think there is also a strong organizational element: with a strong expression I once said that my colleagues are paper pushers. I mean this: if the council of a university just signs papers, lots of them in the few hours of the assembly, maybe without having read the papers in detail first, because they materially did not have time, there cannot be proper control. Neither can there be discussion.
To whom is the book addressed?
ML It can speak to many and many but I wrote it with my students in mind. I hope it is a useful tool to ask themselves questions and organize themselves to explore this issue. Especially at a time when war is ever closer to all of us.
My short book on the relationship between the academy and the military sector, available in Italian https://www.amazon.it/Universit%C3%A0-militarizzazione-duplice-libert%C3%A0-ricerca/dp/B0C44VM66Y
In Italy, for migrants who do not request asylum, or for those to whom refugee status is denied, there are the Centri di Permanenza e Rimpatrio (CPR) (lit. Permanence and Repatriation Centres, once called Identification and Expulsion Centres). In these centres − which are essentially jails from which the asylum seeker cannot leave − individuals are restrained for a maximum of 18 months, without having committed any unlawful act, beyond not having the right document to be in the country. During this time, a judge needs to decide their fate. Either the asylum request, or any other favourable solution, is accepted, or the individuals are expelled from the country. Currently there are 9 CPR across Italy, with roughly 1,000 available places.
According to a study from a prominent Italian coalition in defence of civic rights, from June 2019 to May 2021, at least 6 individuals lost their lives while being detained in one of the ten CPRs across the peninsula. Thanks to the impressive investigative work of the Association for Juridical Studies on Immigration (ASGI), we know that the conditions of life in the CPR of the city where I work, Turin, defy any imagination. In their recent report, ASGI tells stories of an man with broken legs to whom the police denies even a simple crutch, obliging him to lay down constantly; another who shows proof of a rare blood diseases when admitted to the centre, and will have to wait 49 days before receiving any medical care; or the case of a third young man, who self-declares as a minor (therefore someone who could not be detained in a CPR) but is not believed, and is kept in the centre for 95 days, without explanation before he eventually decides to cut himself on his right arm.
Self-harm is one of the only way detained individuals in the Italian CPR can make a − often ephemeral − stand. The only year, continues ASGI, for which we have data related to these practices is 2011. In the Turin CPR that year, there were “156 episodes of self-harm, 100 of which were due to ingestion of medicines or foreign bodies, 56 of which due to stab wounds”. Material living conditions in the centre are of course part of the problem. ASGI reports that “The living spaces reserved for the inmates include 50-square meter modules, including bathrooms, where seven people live, eat and sleep.” It then continues describing in full the conditions of life in such modules:
“Each bedroom has an en suite bathroom, which is accessed directly from the room itself. Between the bedroom and the bathroom there is no door, nor are there any dividing doors inside the bathroom to separate the two squat toilets from the rest of the room where there are two washbasins and a shower. In other words, a few meters separate the toilets from the nearest beds and there is no element of furniture, such as doors or at least curtains, to ensure a minimum of privacy to those who use the services. This state of affairs is unacceptable, unjustified and non-compliant in terms of security.”
The Permanence and Repatriation Centres are part of the militarisation of society, of this war that is fought on and with the body of an ‘other’, the migrant and the asylum seeker. This ‘other’ is constituted ad-hoc, as a containable figure, not only in the sense of a person who can be imprisoned, but of a subject who is made to take the political, epistemic and material charge of the struggles of this world that we cannot and do not want to face.
And so a dispossessed subject is created with systematic hatred, confined in very Italian Lagers, which are then also new ‘asylums’: total institutions for people who come in healthy and go out with the mockery of a letter of departure, mad, sick, tired. If they get out and don’t commit suicide first.
Today, a piece of important news broke: the CPR of Milan has been seized by authorities, after months in which activists have worked hard to show the conditions of life in such a space (summed up in an another excellent report by ASGI). An operator of that CPR-lager testifies:
‘Synthetically I can say that it was a real lager, not even dogs are treated like that in kennels. […] Firstly, there is widespread use of psychotropic drugs given like candy and in high dosages. During the summer it could happen that soap, although present, was not given to the inmates, so in practice showers were not taken. They were prevented from talking to the lawyers. The food was very often expired, spoiled”.
From Australia to the UK, passing now through the signed agreement between Italy and Albania, it is customary practice for Western democracies to offload migrant detention centers to third countries, and to replicate the model of the CPR away from the eyes of activists and engaged lawyers. The only possible response here is #abolition.
Here the term, following critical Black praxis, does not simply signify closure – but invokes a total overhaul of the practices through which we (Italians, in this case) legitimise our sense of home and belonging, of habitation and dwelling. As I expand upon here, what needs to be abolished is the need to constitute an ‘other’ of ‘home’ for ‘home’ to stand in the first place. It is about fighting borders and their technologies. It is about refusing the colonization of bodies and subjects. CPRs need to be closed down now, not as an arrival point, but as a departure for further, more radical struggles.
Photo: Images from the ordinance testifying to the terrible conditions at the via Corelli Cpr in Milan (il manifesto)
This weekend, we continue to talk about the relationship between #university and #militarisation, about #war, the intermingling of research and the military sector, and the ethics of university practice. This time in #Sicily!
– #Messina, Friday 1/12/23, 6:30 pm at the University of Messina with the excellent Antonio Mazzeo of the Observatory against the militarisation of schools
– #Palermo, Saturday 2/12/23, 5:30 pm at the Casa della Cooperazione with the fantastic Gabriella Palermo and Silvia di Meo (Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/6867626453297921)
