Marianne Potvin, a PhD student at the urban planning department at Harvard University visited Bourj Al Shamali on Wednesday 5 August 2015.
Marianne studies the intersection of humanitarianism and urbanism, and her aim for her Harvard-sponsored research in Lebanon was to learn and document how different aid agencies are dealing with the challenges of providing assistance in densely urbanised areas, and how (and if) they are using and developing new tools and programmes to help them in this task.
We were super excited that Marianne decided to include us in her research, as one of the case examples she wanted to study, especially as we are particularly interested in her exploration of new linkages between the notion of “humanitarian space” and the idea of a “right to the city” for refugees. During her visit to the camp, she interviewed Abu Wassim, and then with Firas and Mustapha walked around the camp as they explained the mapping work carried to date.