A24 - Crises de territoires, territoire en crise 3/3

Territories, at different scales, are subject to disruptive phenomena of all kinds, with growing effects, which put societies and actors to the test. These difficulties, in turn, compromise the configuration of territories as well as the way to consider and represent them. The crises themselves have a territorial dimension as a way to determine territories of the crisis, that is to say, areas of intervention to deal with these disturbances. Crisis management must take into account existing territorial configurations, starting with political and administrative divisions along with borders liable to put them to the test and to force us to rethink inter-territoriality and relations between territories and between scales, which is an event that occurs locally with systemic effects at different scales or somewhere else. What representations and what knowledge of the territory are mobilized to deal with these crises? How is the territory redesigned, planned, developed according to these difficulties? How do crises put territorial governance to the test? This workshop will propose communications that will compare case studies of Tunisia, Algeria and Peru as well as theoretical reflections questioning the governance of territories and territorialization in crisis. The latter is for researchers a moment to reveal vulnerabilities, development issues and power relations.

Salle: D16

Responsable: Mourad Ben Jelloul, Université de Tunis

Discutante : Hend BEN OTHMAN, IRMC

The Covid pandemic19 put to the test the complex governance of metropolitan territories between the different levels of government, the participation of civil society, and the more prominent intervention of emergency actors, particularly the security forces. This paper is part of a doctoral research and compares the mobilization of security forces in the metropolitan environment of Peru and Tunisia during the crisis generated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Actors generally intervene in crisis situations, their primary role in both countries was to manage the maintenance of order and, consequently, to enforce health measures resulting in the control of the territory in crisis. (quarantines, restrictions on movement, curfews, etc.).  These actors also carried out actions that usually concern health actors, as their visibility in the space increased and helped to reconfigure it. In both countries, their role contributes to new power relationships at the national level, either temporarily (in Peru) or more permanently (in Tunisia).  However, differences between the two countries appear, in particular their relationship with civil society, a relationship that questions the place of these two institutions within the social and political history of these two countries as well as their contemporary representations. 

Power relations between the state and local communities have not changed much in post-revolutionary Tunisia despite the start of the decentralization process materialized by the entry into force of the Local Government Code. The economic and security crisis has not been conducive to a reduction in the political and administrative control of the State over local power, despite the pressure exerted by international donors. Central and regional state structures tend to preserve the essence of the old state and security system. In this communication, the accent will be placed on two aspects of the crisis of governance which characterize the relations between the State and the local communities: The first pertains to the conflict which opposes the communes to the government as to the texts of application of CCL. The second is related to the instruments of control of municipal territories in the field of town planning. Through these two questions, the analysis will focus on the power relations between state structures and local authorities and their impact on the functioning and governance of local territories.

Today the territory is no longer reduced to an agglomeration of activities, nor to a simple receptacle, but as an active element, a resource in itself, therefore an element with perception less inert than one would think. Furthermore the territory, as a pivotal actor, must be able to enhance the internal resources of a desired endogenous development even with the contribution of exogenous projects. Hence, the need to invent new roles for public institutions, especially local ones, in the implementation of territorial development strategies. In this perspective, decentralization is a regional planning policy aimed at establishing a new configuration of the exercise of power. This power is characterized by a disengagement of the State from part of its functions. It consists of a transfer of certain skills and resources essential to their progress, from the central State to the local authorities. This paper attempts to approach the link between decentralization, attractiveness and the methods of designing a territorial project with the aim of local development of Algerian local authorities. 

The island of Djerba located in the South East of Tunisia is a territory endowed with an individualism and specificities of its own. The harmony and balance that had long characterized this island were weakened in the context of significant social and territorial dynamics and restructuring. Economically unstable, this territory is currently experiencing an imbalance in its various natural and anthropogenic components, reinforced by territorial fragmentation, dissociated management and environmental fragility. Understanding the island territory through the focal point of crises means placing it within the framework of a cross-cutting approach combining social, environmental and economic issues. The objective of this communication is to reflect on the management of crisis situations at the level of “sensitive” territories by re-examining the methods of governance deployed and the strategies implemented by the different categories of actors. This approach is part of the new socio-political contexts emanating first from a crisis on a national scale (social demands, political crisis, etc.) then from a health crisis on an international scale.