This Special Issue collection in Third World Quarterly (TWQ) (Everyday informality and governance dynamics in crisis situations and beyond) offers a fresh perspective on how societies handle crises. It shows that when major changes in politics, society, or the economy take shape, they can dramatically affect the way countries and communities are governed.
Instead of viewing people as passive observers, we emphasise how the active participation of
ordinary citizens help influence decisions that affect their daily lives. By observing how people
organise informally (outside official channels), it becomes possible to offer a deeper
understanding of their impact across several areas. From people’s migration choices to their
role in cross-border trade, political mobilisation and organisation, the selection of energy options
and certain market interactions, people display the ability to forge new ways of conducting
matters.
When government systems falter, people often step in to create their own solutions. These
grassroots responses typically emerge in “informal” spaces – areas where people act
independently because state services are either inadequate or entirely absent.
Such informal initiatives demonstrate remarkable human ingenuity and resilience, particularly in
the Global South, where communities develop creative ways to cope with state failure of partial
absence. While some might exploit these regulatory gaps for personal gain, these informal
systems often complement or substitute for formal institutions in meaningful ways.
Understanding these spontaneous, citizen-led solutions can inform more effective policies and
governance approaches.
About the Special Issue Guest Editors
Abel Polese is a researcher, trainer, writer, manager and fundraiser. He is the author of “The SCOPUS Diaries and the (il)logics of Academic Survival: A Short Guide to Design Your Own Strategy and Survive Bibliometrics, Conferences, and Unreal Expectations in Academia”, a reflection on academic life, research careers and the choices and obstacles young scholars face at the beginning of their career. He also writes blogs on science management such as “The unsustainability of the “pay-as-you-go” publishing model”. Abel is an Associate Professor of informality in the School of Law and Government at Dublin City University. His main research focus is on informal governance, with regional specialisation in Eurasia.
Joseph P. Helou is assistant professor of Department of Political and International Studies at the Lebanese American University (LAU). He has previously held lecturer positions at LAU and other academic institutions where he taught globalization, international political economy, the politics of the global south and Middle East politics, among others. Helou’s research focuses on several political-economic and governance related fields. He is interested in governance matters, broadly construed. His research investigates state governance and informal governance in developing countries.
Helou’s research explores the impediments to the Western-centric model of the state’s Weberian monopoly of control in developing countries. He examines the impact of multiple political, social and economic factors on state governance. He explores how regimes in consociational models, e.g., sectarian practices, contribute to fragility and volatility that challenge the state’s enforcement mechanisms in several sectors.
Third World Quarterly (TWQ) regularly publish Special Issues(SIs), which are collections of papers centered around a theme of topical interest and are organised and led by subject experts who take on the role of Guest Editor/s. Visit our Special Issue page to find out more.
