Arrival cities under occupation? Political economies of urban consolidation and rural migration in the contemporary West Bank

This talk explores the arrival city framework in the context of occupied Palestine, beginning with a consideration of the ways that markets and immigration are treated in that framework. Next, it introduces ethnographic material on ordinary Palestinians' relationships to a particular massive housing development being built in the West Bank, and the increasing stratification between Palestinians in urban (as well as new, potentially-urban) and rural areas. New forms of political, social, and economic imagination integrate Palestinians into a vision of the future formed through privatization and market creation, and led by private developers and the Palestinian Authority. Yet not everyone is equally integrated. What does the Palestinian case - one characterized by unevenness, differentiation, and equalization at different geographical scales - tell us about the arrival city model? This talk asks, what do social capital, ambition, privatization, or immigration mean under stifling structural political conditions?