The Covid-19 pandemic crisis has confirmed neoliberal capitalism’s inability to meet critical social needs. In the United Kingdom, mutual aid initiatives based on ‘solidarity not charity’ blossomed in a context of state incompetence and private sector negligence – including Scrub Hub, a network of groups that autonomously produced personal protective equipment and provided it directly to health workers. Using a convergence of autonomist and anarchist perspectives, this article examines Scrub Hub as an example of emergent autonomous political economies and considers the challenges of resisting co-optation into volunteerist hierarchies and suppression by the neoliberal state.

Punk’s resonance has been felt strongly here. Against the backdrop of the Troubles and the “post-conflict” situation in Northern Ireland, punk has provided an anti-sectarian alternative culture. The overarching conflict of the Troubles left gaps for punk to thrive in, as well as providing the impetus for visions of an “Alternative Ulster,” but the stuttering shift from conflict to post-conflict has changed what oppositional identities and cultures look like. With the advent of “peace” (or a particular version of it at least) in the late 1990s, this space is being squeezed out by “development” agendas while counterculture is co-opted and neutered—and all the while sectarianism is further engrained and perpetuated. This chapter examines punk’s positioning within (and against) the conflict-warped terrain of Belfast, especially highlighting punk’s critical counter-narrative to the sectarian, neoliberal “peace.”

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The “emotion curve” is a creative methodology that asks research participants to express in graphic form changes in their emotional responses over time, reflecting on a given time period or on a particular activity or event (in our case, music-based activities). This methodology was developed as part of our research with community music-making NGO Musicians Without Borders at their “Music Bridge” participatory music and movement training program in Derry/Londonderry, Northern Ireland. This article discusses how the “post-conflict” context of our research, and our engagement with the principles of prefiguration and participatory action research, shaped the development of this innovative methodology, paying particular attention to achieving methodological “fit” (or commensurability) with the practices, objectives, and ethos of our research partners. This creative and “fitting” (or commensurate) methodology has been the basis of a “mutually transformative dialog” with our research partners.

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