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Afterword: They say the Centre cannot hold: Austerity, crisis, and the rise of anti-politics

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  • Ana Drago

Abstract

This afterword engages in a dialogue with the theoretical prospects opened by this Special Issue. First, it discusses how these articles show that conceptualizations such as anti-politics that aimed to organize a reading on the growing mistrust and disenchantment towards the institutional apparatus of contemporary democracies must not be equated to political voidance – I argue that these articles rather point to a profound legitimization crisis of the political-spatial consensus of neoliberal governance that, as this SI sustains, must be analyzed through the social and geographical configurations of the austerity cycle of the last decade and the situated conflict confronting it. In that sense, anti-politics redefines traditional conflict in liberal democracies, although through contradictory forms: commoning; radical protest; or ethno-nationalist extremism. And secondly, I discuss a most relevant argument that runs through the SI: analysis of anti-politics must engage with everyday spatial practices and geographical imaginaries that point where conflict arises, but also how it is being recrafted. I discuss this proposal of a spatial turn on anti-politics by interpreting it as emerging from the collapse of the aspirational narrative of neoliberalism– its promise of a global post-class conflict order succumbed as post-2008 austerity punitively targeted specific geographies, spaces and social classes, leading to a cycle of politicization organized through spatial or geographical dichotomies: North/South Europe; urban versus periurban/rural; streets versus institutions. After decades of neoliberal depoliticization of class conflict, attempts to relaunch anti-systemic political conflict seem to rely (again) on everyday spatial practices and geographical categories.

Suggested Citation

  • Ana Drago, 2021. "Afterword: They say the Centre cannot hold: Austerity, crisis, and the rise of anti-politics," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 39(3), pages 597-605, May.
  • Handle: RePEc:sae:envirc:v:39:y:2021:i:3:p:597-605
    DOI: 10.1177/2399654420981388
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Ross Beveridge & Philippe Koch, 2021. "Contesting austerity, de-centring the state: Anti-politics and the political horizon of the urban," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 39(3), pages 451-468, May.
    2. Lazaros Karaliotas, 2021. "Geographies of politics and the police: Post-democratization, SYRIZA, and the politics of the “Greek debt crisisâ€," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 39(3), pages 491-511, May.
    3. Victoria Habermehl, 2021. "Everyday antagonisms: Organising economic practices in Mercado Bonpland, Buenos Aires," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 39(3), pages 536-554, May.
    4. Maximilian Förtner & Bernd Belina & Matthias Naumann, 2021. "The revenge of the village? The geography of right-wing populist electoral success, anti-politics, and austerity in Germany," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 39(3), pages 574-596, May.
    5. David Featherstone, 2021. "From Out of Apathy to the post-political: The spatial politics of austerity, the geographies of politicisation and the trajectories of the Scottish left(s)," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 39(3), pages 469-490, May.
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    Cited by:

    1. Ross Beveridge & David Featherstone, 2021. "Introduction: Anti-politics, austerity and spaces of politicisation," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 39(3), pages 437-450, May.

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    1. Ross Beveridge & David Featherstone, 2021. "Introduction: Anti-politics, austerity and spaces of politicisation," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 39(3), pages 437-450, May.

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