Rand Makarem

Rand is a Ph.D. candidate in Urban and Regional Planning at the University of Michigan with a research focus on urban governance practices in cities in conflict or post-conflict. She is interested in understanding how urban space in contested cities is shaped and governed by non-state actors that operate within political and sectarian milieus and how that affects the livelihoods of disenfranchised communities. 

Her current dissertation research looks at the mechanisms by which sectarian non-state actors govern space within Lebanon’s splintered and fragmented sovereignty. She looks at how this governance materializes at the level of service provision, crisis management and population management to better understand these actors and the futures that they  envision and imagine. 

Prior to embarking on her Ph.D., Rand worked as a researcher at the American University of Beirut, questioning how the urban dimensions of cities affect refugee’s livelihood and the subsequent meaning of work to them. Specifically, she explored how cities are shaped, and how the different policies implemented at the national level hinder or expedite the chances of refugees, especially women, to participate in the workforce.

Rand completed her undergraduate degree in Architecture at the Lebanese American University (2018) and a Master in Community and Regional Planning with a focus on post-disaster recovery at The University of Texas at Austin (2022).