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Robbing Thieves: Bank robbery between radical direct action, self-interest and mere survival in post-revolutionary Lebanon

RobbingThieves

RobbingThieves

Two years after the Thawra, Lebanese depositors are resorting to radical tactics: Faced with desperate economic circumstances, rather than taking to the streets, citizens have taken to robbing banks to retrieve some of their own savings. This project explores these forced asset recoveries and the meanings projected onto perpetrators and their actions. Through a combination of event data, discourse analyses and primary interviews, it seeks to understand the social demographics, motivations and tactics behind the bank holdups, and to explore how they substantiate or break with heroising or vilifying discourses. Are the holdups symptoms of a revolutionary repertoire shifting to new contentious arenas or are they merely expressions of self-help in a financial crisis?