********** VERSCHOBEN // POSTPONED********
We will postpone our event due to the ongoing public health crisis. To help mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic, we have decided it would be best not to hold it at this time. We hope to be able to reschedule at a later date, once it is safe for everyone to attend. We will keep you updated here.
Wir verschieben unser Event aufgrund der aktuellen Krisensituation. Um die Verbreitung von COVID-19 zu verlangsamen, erscheint es uns am besten, derzeit keine Veranstaltungen abzuhalten. Wir hoffen zu einem späteren Zeitpunkt einen Termin zu finden, sobald es wieder für alle Menschen sicher ist. Wir halten euch auf dem Laufenden.
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Economies at War II
This event series examines the relationship between war and the economy in West Asia and North Africa. Our second event investigates how the economy can become war itself, drawing on past and present experiences from Kurdistan-Iraq and Central Iraq. Is "the economy" the solution to the problem of war or its continuation?
Looking at different periods of Iraq’s and Iraqi Kurdistan’s history, this talk will question the strict definitional boundary between economy and war. It will therefore interrogate the usual definition of economy as a mode of production, exchange and consumption geared towards the capitalist market. It reframes ‘the economy’ as the question about “making a living” in people’s everyday life. The central question then is how does war become part or even necessary to make a living?
Three episodes of Iraq’s past and present shall be re-examined. First, the decade of international economic sanctions against Iraq from 1990 until the US-led invasion of Iraq shall be revisited. How were the economic sanctions against Iraq a continuation of war, not only on but also within Iraqi society? How has the so-called Kurdish civil war ‘sharê birakujî’ from 1994-1997 to be understood in the context of scarce resources? What does this say about the nature of war and economy?
Through the same prism we look at the sectarian tensions in post-2003 Iraq and the developing economy in which the ruling elites of Iraq had managed to create an economy subordinated to their and their international allies´ needs – leaving large parts of society behind, in central Iraq as well as in Iraqi-Kurdistan.
Finally, looking at the current protests in central Iraq, people are denouncing the decades of war and all the economic structures that allowed for war - in and on Iraq- hereby demystifying sectarianism and party politics as ideologies of war. With a persistent effort to stay peaceful, protestors are radically breaking with the past of war and economic injustice, taking ownership over their lives again. Voices from the protest squares of Iraq will join the discussion via Skype.
The event will be held in English.
Schluwa Sama is a PhD student at the University of Exeter. Through a political economy lens, her ethnographic research explores processes of (de-)valuation of agricultural life in Iraqi-Kurdistan.
Iqbal Hassan is a feminist-Marxist activist. She runs a school on feminist and economic theories in Baghdad, which aims to empower young female and male activists in their work for social justice. She will join us via Skype (Arabic with English translation).
Please register for the event here
The event is funded by the Stiftung Deutsche Klassenlotterie Berlin.
