The Conditions of the Working Class in 1960s Beirut: Fire and Everyday Struggles in Karantina

In this paper, I examine the spatial processes of class formation within informal urban spaces. To do so, I consider Karantina in the 1960s, an outgrowth of one of the oldest refugee camps in the world situated in northeastern Beirut, Lebanon. I focus on the struggles of those living in precarious informal shacks, known as tanaké, who repeatedly fought against arson likely instigated by local landowners seeking to evict them. This analysis underscores the decisive role material conditions play in fostering class consciousness among a diverse population, primarily composed of factory and informal workers, as they assert their “right to the city”. I argue that these galvanising confrontations, experienced as recurrent displacement by fire, catalysed a political struggle that transformed this group from a class-in-itself into a class-for-itself. A socio-spatial analysis of the material living conditions of the working class, defined by everyday struggles, is essential to understanding political subjectivity.