Governmentalities of Urban Crises in Inner‐city Athens, Greece

Abstract

Through the notion of "conjuncture" this paper explores the interplay of urban crises that have been unfolding in the city of Athens during the past 7 years (2008)(2009)(2010)(2011)(2012)(2013)(2014). By focusing on specific "critical moments" that have significantly influenced the narratives, discourses and subsequent policies concerning "Athens in crisis", it examines a number of intertwined approaches and tactics that shaped the governmentality of such crisis. These approaches and tactics, that work in tandem, include emergency-driven policies and politics; politics of fear that occasionally transform into geographies of fear; processes of defining the "public" and "public enemies"; and redefinitions of (il)legalities. Yet, they have repercussions on people, places and politics. In this context, certain issues are deemed critical or urgent while others do not or are even obscured. Περίληψη: Μέσω της έννοιας της "συγκυρίας", το άρθρο αυτό διερευνά τις αλληλένδετες αστικές κρίσεις που εξελίχθηκαν στην Αθήνα τα τελευταία 7 χρόνια (2008-2014). Εστιάζοντας σε "κρίσιμες στιγμές" που επηρέασαν ουσιαστικά τις αϕηγήσεις, κυρίαρχους λόγους και πολιτικές που αϕορούν την «Αθήνα σε κρίση» εξετάζει τις διαπλεκόμενες τακτικές και προσεγγίσεις που διαμόρϕωσαν τη διακυβέρνηση αυτών των κρίσεων. Αυτές οι αλληλεπιδούμενες τακτικές περιλαμβάνουν πολιτικές και μέτρα "έκτακτης ανάγκης", πολιτικές και γεωγραϕίες του ϕόβου, διαδικασίες καθορισμού του "δημοσίου" αλλά και των "εχθρών" του και επαναπροσδιορισμούς του (α)νομου. Έτσι, σ'αυτό το πλαίσιο, κάποια ζητήματα κρίνονται ως σημαντικά ενώ άλλα αγνοούνται ή και αποκρίπτονται. Όμως οι τακτικές αυτές, όπως και τα συνεπακόλουθα μέτρα, έχουν σημαντικές επιτπώσεις σε ανθρώπους, τόπους και πολιτικές.While crisis has been a recurrent situation in different times and places around the world, the beginning of the twenty-first century has witnessed a surge in the occurrence of events described as crises (Harvey 2012). Regarding the recent crisis, its prevalent analytical aspect has been the economic-financial one. However, it becomes increasingly difficult to understand the current situation without challenging the notion of crisis or crises and their economic-ness which, as Clarke (2010) observes, is both assumed and reproduced. The dominance of the economicfinancial nexus has set the frame, not only of analysis, but also of plausible measures to resolve the crisis. Thus, other, equally important dimensions of the crisis (such as its political, moral and social ones) are obscured (Clarke 2010; Hall and Massey 2010) while other issues are ignored until the economic "emergency" is resolved.The prevailing debates about the recent crisis have focused on the national (or occasionally on the regional) scale where the (assumed) roots of the crisis can be traced and where key decisions concerning the "public" as a whole are taken. Yet, cities have been prevalent terrains for the manifestations of this crisis and for

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