Citizenship Utopias in the Global South

Henri Onodera is a University Lecturer in Global Development Studies at the University of Helsinki.Martta Kaskinen is a PhD Researcher in Global Development Studies at the University of Helsinki.Eija Ranta is an Academy of Finland Research Fellow at the University of Helsinki.

Citizenship Utopias in the Global South offers a timely and engaging work that combines critique with action. This compelling volume that models transnational scholarship, portrays how citizen activists from Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia imagine, reinvent, and challenge reactionary and unjust forms of power. Through “imaginative forms of creative activism” they strive to overcome the disillusionment of contemporary politics. Chapters on digital communications, new youth movements, anti-corruption campaigns, anti-racism, non-violent strategies, to name a few, convey how people join forces to forge alternative futures grounded in dignity and justice. A valuable addition to the work on new youth movements, political change, and alternative activism in the Global South.Linda Herrera, Professor of Education Policy, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, USA In the era of post-pandemic dystopias, this book offers a myriad of citizens’ utopias emerging from the Global South. It collects the voices of young feminists, ecologists, anti-racists, pacifists, queer individuals, students, and trade unionists from a dozen countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, who engage to build micro-utopian communities from below. Lessons for a period of old fears and new hopes. Carles Feixa, Professor of Social Anthropology, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain

• 1. Citizenship utopias in the Global South: Emerging activisms, re-imagining citizenshipsPART I: Activism in times of disillusionment2. Activist contestations in contemporary socio-political change making in Kenya3. Disavowing politics: An alternative way of doing politics for young Algerians4. Communication in coronavirus crisis: A case study of communication practices of activists in Johannesburg in the COVID-19 pandemic5. The Chilean awakening in a global decade of social movementsPART II: Decolonising the state6. Everyday citizenship and decolonising utopias in Cotacachi county, Ecuador7. Black feminist and anti-racist activism: Past and present of struggles for racial justice in Cuba8. Higher education under neoliberalism: A perspective from South African student activists9. Fighting for racial equality: Hope, disillusionment, and perseverance in post-revolutionary TunisiaPART III: Re-imagining citizenships 10. Governing through corruption: Young men, the state, and citizenship in interior Tunisia11. Imaginaries of social change in Algeria: Nonviolent acts of citizenship of the autonomous trade union activists12. “Carrot and stick”: Cooperative citizenship and the pedagogic state in Vietnam13. Hindu nationalism or collaborative social justice? The role of queer communities in furthering democracy in India14. Afterword: Citizenship Utopias in an Age of Polycrises?