Water, Political Ecology, and Urban Studies

Journal Name: AAG Review of Books

In this paper, I explore a prognostic modality of environmental politics I call risk in retrospect. I do so by examining conflicts that are not just over the ability of state science to know and govern the future, but... more abstractIn this paper, I explore a prognostic modality of environmental politics I call risk in retrospect. I do so by examining conflicts that are not just over the ability of state science to know and govern the future, but also its failure to have been able to do so in the past. I begin by discussing the 2009 earthquake that hit the Italian city of L'Aquila and then turn to a similar case in Colombia, both of which reflect the constitutive relationship between political authority and foresight. I then trace the strong historical precedent for this type of political situation in Colombia by discussing a key cultural referent – Gabriel García Márquez's 1981 book, Chronicle of a death foretold – as well as the convergence of two catastrophic events during one week in November 1985 that were both seen, in their aftermath, as 'tragedies foretold'. I conclude by considering what it would mean for prognosis to become the terrain on which citizens engage in political relationships with the state.

Colombia, Environmental Politics, Risk Management, Natural Disasters, and Temporality

Journal Name: Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute

Security and risk have become central to how cities are planned, built, governed, and inhabited in the twenty-first century. In Endangered City, Austin Zeiderman focuses on this new political imperative to govern the ... more abstractSecurity and risk have become central to how cities are planned, built, governed, and inhabited in the twenty-first century. In Endangered City, Austin Zeiderman focuses on this new political imperative to govern the present in anticipation of future harm. Through ethnographic fieldwork and archival research in Bogotá, Colombia, he examines how state actors work to protect the lives of poor and vulnerable citizens from a range of threats, including environmental hazards and urban violence. By following both the governmental agencies charged with this mandate and the subjects governed by it, Endangered City reveals what happens when logics of endangerment shape the terrain of political engagement between citizens and the state. The self-built settlements of Bogotá’s urban periphery prove a critical site from which to examine the rising effect of security and risk on contemporary cities and urban life.

Urban Politics, Colombia, Security, Risk Management, Urban Governance, and 2 more

Publisher: Duke University Press

Climate Change, Climate Change Adaptation, Political Anthropology, STS (Anthropology), Cities, and 1 more

Journal Name: Public Culture

This article examines popular politics under conditions of protracted precarity in the rapidly expanding port-city of Buenaventura on Colombia’s Pacific coast. It begins by identifying the intersecting economic, ecolo... more abstractThis article examines popular politics under conditions of protracted precarity in the rapidly expanding port-city of Buenaventura on Colombia’s Pacific coast. It begins by identifying the intersecting economic, ecological, and political forces contributing to the precarity of life in Buenaventura’s intertidal zone. Focusing on conflicts over land in the waterfront settlements of Bajamar (meaning “low-tide”), it then describes the efforts of Afro-Colombian settlers and activists to defend their territories against threats of violence and displacement. In doing so, they must navigate historical legacies of ethno-racial politics as well as formations of liberal governance and their multicultural and biopolitical logics of vulnerability and protection. The socio-material conditions of the intertidal zone, and in particular the figure of submergence, are used to illuminate the forms of political life in Colombia’s future port-city. The struggles of Afro-Colombians to contest violent dispossession in Buenaventura reflect the racialized politics of precarity under late liberalism.

Multiculturalism, Violence, Urban Politics, Political Ecology, Colombia, and 7 more

Journal Name: Antipode

This essay examines the influence of uncertainty on how contemporary cities are planned, built, governed, and inhabited. This influence is demonstrated through the analysis of various domains of urban planning and gov... more abstractThis essay examines the influence of uncertainty on how contemporary cities are planned, built, governed, and inhabited. This influence is demonstrated through the analysis of various domains of urban planning and governance (disaster, security, energy, and transportation) across four cities of the global South (Bogotá, Karachi, Accra, and Johannesburg). In each city, uncertainty is produced by historical conditions and productive of future possibilities.

Urban Planning, Governance, Cities, Uncertainty, and Infrastructure

Publication Date: 2015

Publication Name: Public Culture

Anthropology, Urban Studies, Risk Management, STS (Anthropology), Urban Governance, and 1 more

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Publication Date: 2015

Publication Name: Modes of Uncertainty: Anthropological Cases, edited by Limor Samimian-Darash and Paul Rabinow

Future Studies, Violence, Colombia, and Ports

Publication Date: Apr 30, 2015

Publication Name: Cultural Anthropology Hot Spots

Climate Change, Colombia, Security, Urban Studies, Displacement, and 1 more

Publication Date: 2014

Publication Name: Governing Urban Futures, Urban Age Newspaper

Publication Date: Jun 2014

Publication Name: Current Anthropology