Territorial Euthanasia

Territorial Euthanasia: Forensic Anatomies of a Designed Death in Italy's Inner Areas Can a territory be diagnosed as terminal? Disguised as territorial euthanasia, state policies treat Italy's Inner Areas as bodies in "chronic decline". What if this slow death is not natural but designed? Drawing on Saskia Sassen's expulsions, Achille Mbembé necropolitics and the discourse from collective Riabitare l'Italia, this thesis critiques the naturalization of the death of the territory/body. Through the case study of Molise, the research engages with data of infrastructure withdrawals, official policies documents and visual archival material to build an alternative forensic forum. By navigating the friction between the phantom and the phantasmagoric, this thesis aims to cut through nostalgia and hyper-aestheticization to challenge the sense of prescribed inevitability, seeking a re-theorization of the territory/body. Can a territory reclaim its right to die? Or to live?