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Ethnic Conflict, Cross-Community Practices & Transversal Assemblages (Transversal Politics)
Start date: Aug 1, 2010, End date: Jul 31, 2013 PROJECT  FINISHED 

The research aims at the elaboration of a philosophy of transformative action for ethnically segregated, conflict-ridden societies, in order to explain the challenge posed by existing practices of cross-community cooperation. This new approach to ethnic conflict draws on the tradition of transversal critical thought and on Gilles Deleuze & Félix Guattari’s (D&G) theory of assemblages. It focuses on the revitalisation of radical agency and conceives cross-community practices (CCPs), assembled by subjects (individuals and groups) and objects (cultural and spatial) in divided societies such as Northern Ireland, Israel, and Australia among others, as producing alternative political spaces by challenging segregated forms of life and actual power relations. Objectives: 1. To explore the concept of transversality in Western critical thought through the lens of ethno-cultural conflict: 1a. To examine the genealogy of transversality through the oeuvres of M. de Certeau, F. Guattari, G. Deleuze, and M. Foucault and of contemporaneous interpreters of the concept. 1b. To explore the articulation of the concept in these texts in relation to social struggles and in the context of divided societies. 1c. To articulate a revisited concept of transversality appropriate for the theorising of ethno-cultural conflict. 2. To explore the applicability of D&G’s theory of social assemblages for ethno-cultural conflict. 3. To place the notions of transversality and assemblage within the context of ethno-cultural conflict and the politics of segregation. 4. To connect between transversality, assemblage and the politics of CCPs in divided societies using existing published research on case-studies. 5. To assemble a theoretical framework for comparative analysis of CCPs in divided societies. This research offers a new perspective on major socio-political challenges of 21st Century and a better understanding of how difference is expressed and defended within the multi-ethnic context.
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