Jean-Paul Baldacchino is Professor and currently Head of the Department of Anthropology at the University of Malta and the Director of its Mediterranean Institute. He is a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Mediterranean Studies, which he formerly edited, and is on the board of the Australian Journal of Anthropology.

'May you live in interesting times' was made famous by Sir Austen Chamberlain. The premise is that 'interesting times' are times of upheaval, conflict and insecurity - troubled times. With the growing numbers of displaced populations and the rise in the politics of fear and hate, we are facing challenges to our very 'species-being'. Papers in the volume include ethnographic studies on the 'refugee crisis', the 'financial crisis' and the 'rule of law crisis' in the Mediterranean as well as the crisis of violence and hunger in South America.