Category Archives: Blog
Ida Susser: The Value of a Left Culture in Combating Worthlessness
Let me first say that I have been waiting for Don Kalb’s new book for a long time! Kalb has been a leading theorist of the growth of the Right in Eastern Europe and elsewhere for many years. Many of us have heard him speak with an overarching and comprehensive vision of the conjunctures and […]
Sharryn Kasmir: Marxian Intimacy
Don Kalb first sent me Value and Worthlessness: The Rise of the Populist Right and Other Disruptions in the Anthropology of Capitalism in manuscript form. I had read most of the chapters in their original publications and welcomed the chance to revisit familiar arguments and scenes. What I did not anticipate was the emotional force […]
Jaume Franquesa: For an anthropology of capitalism
Having the opportunity to say a few words about the work of an esteemed colleague and an intellectual reference like Don Kalb is a rare privilege. Value and worthlessness: The rise of the populist right and other disruptions in the anthropology of capitalism is a fantastic book, worthy of discussion and celebration. It compiles some […]
Stefan Voicu: Huffing and Puffing with a Marxist Anthropologist
This text is not about the huffing and puffing you would expect. Although Don Kalb is Dutch, his new book, Value and Worthlessness: The Rise of the Populist Right and Other Disruptions in the Anthropology of Capitalism is about a different kind of huffing and puffing. Kalb borrows this expression from E.P. Thompson to foreground […]
Zoha Waseem: Creeping Digital Authoritarianism and (In)Security in Pakistan
Over the past decade, Pakistan has been steadily expanding its digital security, policing, and surveillance architecture, which is sensorially and materially altering how security is experienced and enacted. The expansion has occurred through an assemblage of securitising narratives, non-transparent deployment of internationally procured smart policing technology used for urban surveillance, and state lawfare targeting digital […]
Katharina Lange: Uses of the Past by Representatives of Syria’s tribal groups (asha’ir) – the Wulda example
On December 8, 2025, a brief video video was disseminated on You Tube, X and other social media to mark the first anniversary of the overthrow of the Asad regime. For just over three minutes, it showed a speech delivered by an older man wearing a black headband (‘agal) with a red-checkered headcloth and a […]
Iqra Anugrah and Rachma Lutfiny Putri: A Revolt that never was? On the aftermath of the 2025 Indonesian protests
Political upheavals can feel like riding a roller coaster – exhilarating at the beginning, full of adrenaline rush, until it suddenly stops. This is what happened to the biggest protests against Prabowo administration and its erratic policies in late August-early September last year (Anugrah and Putri 2025). Mass arrests of protesters (including dissenting netizens), declining […]
Maria Kastrinou and Salam Said: How to kill a country: Feeling history in scenes of pillage
We write at a time of genocide, war, and the feeling that whoever has the more guns can do whatever they want. We ask how different forms of violence — physical, symbolic and economic — undo the fragile infrastructures of coexistence and national belonging. We are scholars of Syria, coming together from different disciplines: Maria […]
Zoya Masoud: Of Exclusive Victimhood and its Competitive Narratives in Post-Assad Syria
In this contribution, I investigate continuities and ruptures across various patterns of exclusive victimhood in Assad- and post-Assad Syria. Having been born and spending the first 24 years of my life in Damascus, I witnessed the peaceful demonstrations that erupted in 2011, the subsequent outbreak of war in 2012, and its repercussions. Since 2015, I […]
Antonio De Lauri: The Trump Administration: Theology into Statecraft
One of the most troubling features of Trump-era politics is not simply nationalism, authoritarian style, or contempt for institutions. It is the extent to which large parts of the administration and its surrounding ecosystem have normalised a form of religious absolutism, especially in its Christian Zionist variant, as a legitimate basis for public policy. This […]