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The Separation Wall: A Symbol of Power and a Site of Resistance?
Author(s) -
PallisterWilkins Polly
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
antipode
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.177
H-Index - 98
eISSN - 1467-8330
pISSN - 0066-4812
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-8330.2010.00859.x
Subject(s) - resistance (ecology) , power (physics) , politics , separation (statistics) , symbol (formal) , focus (optics) , sociology , state (computer science) , political science , law , computer science , ecology , physics , machine learning , biology , programming language , optics , algorithm , quantum mechanics
This article seeks to address the joint Israeli and Palestinian activism that has developed in response to the building of the separation barrier or what I will term the “Separation Wall” and to argue that the tactics of resistance witnessed are informed by the networks of power bound up in and represented by the physical structure of the Wall. It will aim to draw connections between physical realities and the hidden relations they represent and the act of resistance by suggesting that the Separation Wall offers not only a site of resistance in a world of increasingly invisible and multi‐factorial power, but that the networks of power it represents call for specific forms of resistance. These specific forms focus on direct action over more traditional modes of claim‐making undertaken by state‐based social movements premised on a liberal understanding of representative politics.