Category Archives: Blog

Heiko Henkel, Sindre Bangstad, and Bjørn Enge Bertelsen: The politics of affect: Anthropological perspectives on the rise of far-right and right-wing populism in the West

This is the first part of a panel held during the 2017 American Anthropological Association Annual Meeting in Washington, DC. The second part is freely available to all readers in the most recent issue of Focaal here. Over the past decade, the dramatic ascendance of ethno-nationalist and right-wing populist movements and projects has been reshaping […]

Focaal Volume 2019, Issue 83: The anthropology of austerity

We are pleased to announce that the latest issue of Focaal – Journal of Global and Historical Anthropology has recently published and is available online at www.berghahnjournals.com/focaal.

Luisa Steur: A Women’s Wall against the fascist menace in Kerala? Some less-comfortable observations

On New Year’s Day, the world was treated to the spectacle of a 640-kilometer-long “Women’s Wall” in Kerala (South India). This human chain of more than five million women stretched the length of the state, making a spectacular statement for the “renaissance values” of women’s equity and rational thinking. Progressive organizations linked to Kerala’s Communist […]

Kristóf Szombati: Protesting the “slave law” in Hungary: The erosion of illiberal hegemony?

In recent weeks, Hungary has again made international headlines. This time, it was a popular movement born out of resistance to the latest rewriting of the labor code—which the ruling Fidesz party had already modified in 2011 to the benefit of employers—that made the news. On 12 December, amid chaotic scenes in the National Assembly […]

Joshua Clover: The roundabout riots

Much has been written about the gilets jaunes and their relation to both politics, of the left and the right, and historical waves of labor unrest. In this article, Joshua Clover argues that the gilets jaunes are in fact a texbook example of a contemporary riot and may be best seen as an early example of […]

Agnieszka Pasieka: Who is afraid of fascists? The Polish independence march and the rise of the (far?) right

“Polish leaders marched with the far right” was perhaps the most common description of the massive demonstration that took place in Warsaw on National Independence Day, 11 November. Press worldwide expressed astonishment and indignation over the fact that the Polish president, accompanied by politicians from the right-wing populist Law and Justice (PiS) party, decided to […]

Victor Albert: Brazil’s Homeless Workers’ Movement is an assertive social work organization

On 21 October, Jair Bolsonaro, the now president-elect of Brazil, made an announcement via his smartphone that was transmitted to crowds of supporters gathered in São Paulo: “Criminals of the MST [Landless Workers’ Movement], criminals of the MTST [Homeless Workers’ Movement], your actions will be classified as terrorism.” This was delivered as part of a […]

Cemile Gizem Dinçer and Eda Sevinin: Migration, activist research, and the politics of location: An interview with Nicholas De Genova (part 2)

The second part of this interview with Nicholas De Genova moves into an analysis of the so-called refugee crisis since 2015 and possibilities for militant academic research that challenges the increasingly hard-right consensus in Europe and beyond. The first part is published here and traces De Genova’s intellectual biography, the question of militant research, his […]

Cemile Gizem Dinçer and Eda Sevinin: Migration, activist research, and the politics of location: An interview with Nicholas De Genova (part 1)

In Turkey, especially after the Syrians’ arrival following 2011, the field of migration studies has more or less confined itself to mainstream discussions such as integration, social cohesion, data collection, and so on. At this point, the work of Nicholas De Genova and the wider literature on the autonomy of migration open up a new […]

Flávio Eiró: On Bolsonaro: Brazilian democracy at risk

Picture a street handcraft market in a touristic village called Porto de Galinhas in Pernambuco, Northeast Region of Brazil. A few days before the second round of the 2018 presidential elections on 28 October, I observed the following conversation on the market. “You can vote for him, don’t worry, he won’t kill gay people,” says […]