Degrowth refers to a radical politico-economic reorganisation that leads to smaller and more equitable social metabolisms. Degrowth posits that such a transition is indispensable but also desirable. However, the conditions of its realisation require more research. This article argues that critical agrarian studies (CAS) and degrowth can enrich each other. The Agrarian Question and the Growth Question should be addressed in concert. While degrowth should not fall into the 'agrarian myth', CAS should not embrace the 'myth of growth', even when green and socialist. Ideas of one philosopher and four agrarian economists are presented, with illustrations from Bhutan, Cuba and North America, hoping to offer a preliminary research agenda for 'agrarian degrowth'.

Research assistants have long been central to ethnographic practice, yet the conventions of academic labor have left their roles under-stated and obscure. The implications, we opine, are both theoretical and practical. Writing research assistants back in to our collective considerations of the method does more than simply fill a lacuna in the 'reflexive turn'. It opens windows onto a radically transformed field of ethnographic practice. Today, the 'field' appears neither where nor what it used to be. Ethnographers are exploring ever-new terrains-many of them emergent, unstable, and dangerous. These endeavors, in turn, are prompting new kinds of research relationships. Against this backdrop, the time is now for a critical reappraisal of the players of contemporary ethnography. Venturing a new calculus of reflexive thinking, this Introduction engages the research assistant to revisit core ethnographic concerns-among them: research in dangerous places; the ethics of ethnographic labor; the shifting differentials of 'academic vs. native' expertise; and the socially produced nature of the 'field' itself. As the articles and Introduction of this special issue show, research assistants unsettle conventional understandings of what ethnography is and can be. Readmitted to the conversation, they provide a unique look into ethnography's current state of play-and glimpses of the method's future possibilities.

Addressing life in borders and refugee camps requires understanding the way these spaces are ruled, the kinds of problems rule poses for the people who live there, and the abilities of inhabitants to remake their own lives. Recent literature on such spaces has been influenced by Agamben's notion of sovereignty, which reduces these spaces and their residents to abstractions. We propose an alternate framework focused on what we call aleatory sovereignty, or rule by chance. This allows us to see camps and borders not only as the outcomes of humanitarian projects but also of anxieties about governance and rule; to see their inhabitants not only as abject recipients of aid, but also as individuals who make decisions and choices in complex conditions; and to show that while the outcome of projects within such spaces is often unpredictable, the assumptions that undergird such projects create regular cycles of implementation and failure.

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