On 27 June 2023 a 17-year-old boy, Nahel Merzouk, is shot dead by the police in Nanterre, a suburb north of Paris (France). The same night collective violence erupts: cars burn down, buildings are set on fire and there are heavy clashes between young people and the police. The unrest spreads across the French Republic and lasts for 8 days.

The death of Nahel was not a one-off incident, but part of a longer history of suburban unrest in France’s marginalized suburbs. It was a déjà-vu. A tragic play that has been staged multiple times over the past four decades. Although the play has been performed in different forms, at different locations, and by different actors, it has remained loyal to a script in three acts.

In this talk I will bring you to the disadvantaged suburbs (banlieues) of France and disaggregate this three act drama. Drawing on ethnographic research I will show how the cycle of car burning protests and police brutality is rooted in the structural violence of a socially and spatially divided society.

Luuk Slooter is an Assistant Professor Conflict Studies at Utrecht University. His research focuses on urban uprisings, violence, policing, polarization and spatial segregation. He conducted ethnographic research in the French banlieues and disadvantaged neighborhoods in the Netherlands. He obtained his PhD from Utrecht University (the Netherlands) and the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (France). His book publications include ‘The Making of the Banlieue: An Ethnography of Space, Identity and Violence’ (Palgrave, 2019) and ‘Geweld’ [Violence] (Athenaeum, 2021 – in Dutch – co-authored with Prof. Jolle Demmers).

Luuk Slooter is currently visiting Professor at UCLA’s Center for European and Russian Studies (Dutch Studies Program).

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