Lebanon: National Imaginaries, State Fragilities and the Shi’a Other

Abstract

Lebanon, located along the eastern Mediterranean shore, has traditionally been an important cultural crossroads between East and West. However, despite its relative ethnic homogeneity (Arab), Lebanon has often been at the centre of Middle Eastern conflicts because of its geographical positioning and its distinctively complex religious composition. Unique in the Middle East, Lebanon has 18 officially recognised religious sects and no dominant religious group. Shi’a Muslims comprise a significant portion of the Lebanese population, and Shi’a make up the majority in South Lebanon, the Beqa’a Valley and the southern suburbs of Beirut. The sectarian complexity described above has only been intensified within the context of Lebanon’s ‘weak state’, in which its governmental institutions are less powerful than many non-state actors. In particular, political movements and non-state paramilitary organisations organised along religious lines maintain considerable clout in the country (the most powerful being Shi’a-dominated Hezbollah). As a result, Lebanese politicians (and much of the population) view societal problems, politics and security issues through the lens of sectarian communal identification, while abstract notions of common Lebanese citizenship are destabilised. This chapter focuses on the ways that Shi’a youth in South Lebanon construct and negotiate their identities of nation, religion, ethnicity and gender within the local context of Lebanon’s complex sectarian balance and within the broader context of contemporary regional conflicts. In particular, the chapter explores how male and female Shi’a youth understand themselves and live their lives both as members of the Muslim majority in Lebanon and the Middle East as well as Muslim minority ‘others’ in relation to the dominant regional paradigm of Sunni Islam.