Palestine’s managed precarity: EU governance, the denial of democratic agency, and the foreclosure of resilience

This article examines Palestine as a paradigmatic case of managed precarity and analyses how European Union (EU) governance contributes to its reproduction. We conceptualize managed precarity as a condition in which political vulnerability becomes institutionalized through governance practices that sustain administrative functionality while constraining democratic agency and sovereignty. While Israel’s occupation is the primary structural driver of Palestinian precarity, we focus on how EU governance operates within, and helps stabilize, this political order. Drawing on over 20 expert interviews conducted in 2024-25, alongside policy documents and secondary literature, we show how EU financial assistance, security-sector reform, and diplomatic practices translate normative commitments into stabilization-oriented governance that prioritizes institutional continuity over political transformation. We distinguish ontological insecurity from precarity, arguing that EU practices contribute to transforming the former into the latter. We further demonstrate how managed precarity narrows the conditions for Palestinian resilience understood as collective self organization and democratic agency.