Book Review: Review of Governing Affect: Neoliberalism and Disaster Reconstruction

Abstract

don’t they just move somewhere else?” is a question often asked about people who live in floodplains and other risky locations exposed to natural hazards. The potential reasons are numerous and complex, but the question disregards the processes that make places meaningful to people and constrain their mobility. Governing Affect: Neoliberalism and Disaster Reconstruction contributes a unique set of explanations to this conversation about post-disaster recovery and community resettlement. Anthropologist Roberto Barrios uses rich interview and observational data from four communities to clarify the mechanisms by which neoliberalism manifests in post-disaster contexts. Even in cases where communities are not relocating, Barrios reveals the processes that dictate why a reconstructed community is never quite the same place. This important text maps out the forces—from government policies to survivors' social ties—that influence how communities change after a disaster, whether they rebuild in place or relocate altogether. What defines recovery after a disaster? How is it experienced emotionally by survivors? These are guiding questions Barrios takes up in the course of ethnographic research with four communities affected by various catastrophes. Barrios impressively traces common elements of recovery efforts across four disparate post-disaster settings: rural Honduras after Hurricane Mitch, New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, small-town Illinois after flooding along the Mississippi River