Under Construction

“Based on years of ethnographic research, Under Construction is a magnificent and thorough exposition that describes the ambivalence and hope invested in construction projects in Ethiopia. Construction, Daniel Mains demonstrates, is a vital location at which relationships between states and citizens are grounded. While they are powerful gatherings of technology and finance, construction projects are also precarious and full of danger. In exploring the tensions that are intrinsic to construction projects, Mains effortlessly brings together theorizations of historical materialism, vital materialism, and affect theory to produce a dazzling and clear account of how construction is incrementally and yet fundamentally transforming the political landscape of cities of the global South.” - Nikhil Anand, author of Hydraulic City: Water and the Infrastructures of Citizenship in Mumbai

“Under Construction stages urgent interventions into development and governance, citizen and state, Afro-optimism and neoliberal pessimism in order to depict the complexities of infrastructure in Africa. Daniel Mains's work makes clear that the relationships between infrastructure, state, labor, and modernity are variable and contingent—sometimes smooth, often sticky and fraught—while making a compelling case for Ethiopia as a rich site for theoretical and ethnographic attention.” - Charles Piot, author of The Fixer: Visa Lottery Chronicles

“[This] book offers an interesting account of the potential tensions between material infrastructure and human infrastructure and gives insight into processes of economic and urban development in Ethiopia.”

"This study by Mains should be accepted with gratitude, and welcomed as a huge contribution to Ethiopian studies of urban development." - Fasika Gedif, African Studies Quarterly

"Under Construction''s strength is in its historical depth and social political contextualization presented in clear language. Theoretical arguments are well-presented and empirically supported, linking well with topical development literature. The book is valuable to both development practitioners and students of anthropology of development." - Elias Madzudzo, International Social Science Review

"Under Construction makes an important contribution not only to the field of the anthropology of development but also to urban development, at a time when many studies in Ethiopia have been placing more emphasis on rural communities. Daniel Mains, while basing his empirical evidence on the selected urban projects which appear to be perpetually under construction, shows that the process of construction has changed the relationship between citizens and the state, and not always for the better." - Gemechu Admassu Abeshu, African Studies Review

"The book represents an important contribution to the field of infrastructure within anthropology and beyond. . . . Under Construction represents a seminal contribution to this field of study." - Felipe Fernandez, Anthropologica

"Under Construction raises enduring questions about the politics, economics, and affects of public works projects around the globe as process, promise, and probable letdown." - Christina Schwenkel, City and Society

“Offering a much-needed ethnographic investigation into the lives, livelihoods and labour relations that inhabit construction work in contemporary urban Africa, Under Construction contributes significantly to current debates and scholarship in urban studies, infrastructure, international development, and African Studies.” - Pauline Destrée, Anthropological Notebooks

“Provides an unusual and particularly compelling engagement with affect theory, encouraging us to pay as much attention to the breeze through the open door of the Bajaj and the dust coating our skin as we do to the politics of infrastructural development.” - Michael Crawley, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute