Shami 29changes in both the internal and external relations of the movement with
regards to a changing national and regional context. Political assassina-
tions, street demonstrations and war with Israel marks the pivotal events
triggering Hizbullah’s transformation—and with it the transformation of
the domestic Lebanese landscape.
iven that this volume is largely a result of the SSRC conference G
held in Beirut, it is fitting that its case studies, which begin with the sec-
ond section, should start with Haugbolle’s essay on Lebanon and close
with Alagha’s. In many ways, Alagha’s account applies Haugbolle’s recom-
mendation to “read between the lines” and illustrates the ways in which
the post-conflict “reconstruction” of the national public sphere is itself
riddled with conflict. At the same time, however, and despite the latent
and manifest violence associated with Hizbullah’s ascendency in Lebanese
national politics, the constant commitment and recommitment by vari-
ous parties to achieve a modicum of national consensus is all the more
remarkable given its elusiveness and fragility.
Publics, politics and participation
The authors variously draw upon Habermas, Arendt, Foucault, Gramsci,
and many other recent theorists in developing their understandings of
the public sphere in the Middle East and North Africa region. As empha-
sized above, the integrative promise of the concept of public spheres brings
together diverse literatures and topics. However, this should not be at the
expense of analytical clarity. The literature often shows slippages between
concepts: most noticeably between “public sphere” on the one hand and
“civil society” and “public space” on the other. In addition, the terms “pub-
lic” and “political” and “national” and even “urban” are often conflated. The
problem with such slippages is not just analytical fuzziness but also that
some important qualities of each type of institutional form and political
practice are lost when merged with one other. These chapters show that
public spheres as an analytical framework helps distinguish and explore
three aspects of societal forms and practices, which cross-cut the sections
of the volume, namely (1) the spatial formations of the public, or spaces of
publicity; (2) the formation of publics as process and emergent forms of
publicity; and (3) the multiple institutionalizations of political participation.