The Art of Bypassing: Students’ Politicization in Beirut

Abstract

This article explores how students experiment with politicization in contemporary Beirut. The objective is to refine the understanding of the interplay between memorialization, identification and politics in the Lebanese context. Based on ethnographic material and qualitative interviews, the article argues that politicization, defined as a twofold process of collectivization and conflictualization, is shaped by interactional positioning between students. It relies on identification along patterned storylines framing the cognition and recognition of the self and others. Largely dependent upon affective and memorial dynamics, these experiences of politicization become constitutive for students’ understanding of identity boundaries within the Lebanese plural society.

Notes

1. A total of 43 institutions, most of them established after the end of the Lebanese wars in 1990. In 1991, Lebanon counted 7 universities and 15 institutes. In the year 2000, there were 24 universities and 19 institutes.

2. Article 10 of the 1990 Lebanese Constitution – originally adopted in 1926 – states: ‘Education is free insofar as it is not contrary to public order and morals and does not interfere with the dignity of any of the religions or creeds. There shall be no violation of the right of religious communities to have their own schools provided they follow the general rules issued by the state regulating public instruction.’

3. Although no data are available, both my interviews and observations on site highlighted this fact. A proportion of these Muslim students come from the expatriated Shiite communities living in French-speaking West Africa.

4. See, for the academic year 2011–12: http://www.aub.edu.lb/main/admissions/Documents/Tuition-2011.pdf [April 2015].

5. In 2008, amid rising political strain, the council of the LU decided to ban elections in an attempt to defuse the tensions among students.

6. I here use the concept of ritual as an analytical device, defined as normalized and recurring symbolic behaviour through which ‘beliefs about the universe come to be acquired, reinforced, and eventually changed’ (Kertzer, 1988: 9).

7. Sources: Office of Student Affairs, AUB (fieldwork October‒November 2010).

8. Figures from fieldwork observations and consultation of the minutes of the elections, USJ, faculty of Economics, November 2009.

9. The general rule is a duality between the partisan organizations and their often informal student groups. This is mainly due to legal reasons as the law forbids those below the age of 20 joining a political movement.

10. A group style refers to ‘recurrent patterns of interactions that arise from a group’s shared assumptions about what constitutes good or adequate participation in the group setting. … Group styles, like collective representations, … are patterned and relatively durable’ (Eliasoph & Lichterman, 2003: 737).

11. Baabda is the location of the presidential palace. Seat of Michel Aoun’s power in 1988–90, the palace became the centre of the mobilizations in support of his cause.