A Better Life for Whom: Oil, Political Economy, and the Terrain of Political Contestation in Lebanon, 1920-1975.

Une séance dans le cadre du séminaire Middle East and North Africa Scientific Community (MENASC) 

A Better Life for Whom:
Oil, Political Economy, and the Terrain of Political Contestation in Lebanon, 1920-1975.

How do transnational infrastructures shape the production of national political and economic space? How do infrastructures redistribute agency and imbue political-economic projects with momentum? This project investigates how transnational “infrastructures of oil” – sociotechnical assemblages designed to transport oil, to enable the exchange of other commodities via petroleum-powered transportation technologies, and to absorb and direct flows of capital derived from oil – shaped the political, economic, and environmental history of Lebanon. Between 1920 and 1946, French colonial authorities built oil pipelines, oil ports, refineries, and highways that linked the new national space of Lebanon to Western Europe and the Arab east via flows of oil and other commodities. From Lebanon’s independence in 1946 until the outbreak of civil war in 1975-6, Lebanese elites attracted further investment in oil infrastructures as well as flows of capital from oil-exporting states into Lebanon’s banking and real estate sectors. But while elites used infrastructure projects to engineer Lebanon’s political and economic order, these infrastructures also reshaped the terrain of oppositional politics by creating opportunities for disruptive strikes, acts of sabotage, and other tactical blockages of flow.

Intervenant :
Zachary Davis Cuyler, doctorant, New York University

Discutant :
Eric Verdeil, Professeur des universités, Ceri-SciencesPo

Responsables scientifiques : Laurence Loüer, Sarah Daoud, Aghiad Ghanem, Nouri Rupert, Sarra Zaïed