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Books by Vitor Peiteado Fernandez

Research paper thumbnail of Producing Alternative Urban Spaces: Social Mobilisation and New Forms of Agency in the Spanish Housing Crisis

This book is concerned with the social mobilisation in Spain provoked by the financial crisis whi... more This book is concerned with the social mobilisation in Spain provoked by the financial crisis which started in 2008 and became the biggest economic and political crisis since the restauration of democracy in the 1970s. Intrigued by the increasing social conflict provoked by this crisis, this thesis focuses specifically on the housing movement and on its intersections with some political coalitions that won many municipalities in 2015. Drawing on ethnographic research in two local chapters of the Platform of People Affected by Mortgages (PAH) and the coalitions that won the municipalities of Barcelona and A Coruña, this thesis analyses the influence on mobilisation of two definitory characteristics of these organisations: heterogeneity and decentralisation. In reflecting about these characteristics, the thesis investigates the dynamics that lead to the creation of a “space of activism” that articulates heterogeneous local struggles capable of opposing the capitalist organisation of space. The coming together of heterogeneous perceptions of everyday life proved to be the key in this contention. Nevertheless, the cases demonstrate when challenging capitalist imposition, heterogeneity has not only to be articulated, but also assembled in new representations of everyday life. The thesis argues that these new representations need the creation of multiple differential spaces to avoid jeopardising the cohesion of heterogeneity. The way in which the connection between those spaces is made, by avoiding dynamics of rescaling, has favoured the cohesion of the groups, reduced the tensions linked to dynamics of abstraction and generated a “space of activism” based on horizontality that poses a considerable challenge for capitalism to reimpose subjection. By stressing the importance of space as the product of the confrontation between the capitalist attempts to organise space and its resistances, the research contributes to the discussion about the ways in which social mobilisation can expand by exploring the potentialities and challenges of articulating heterogeneous local struggles.

Book Chapters by Vitor Peiteado Fernandez

Research paper thumbnail of The Struggle for the Right to Housing in Spain

The Production of Alternative Urban Spaces, 2019

The economic crisis started in 2008 have showed in Spain some of its more devastating effects. Th... more The economic crisis started in 2008 have showed in Spain some of its more devastating effects. The housing crisis has concentrated the concern not only of the media and politicians, but specially of social movements. Although this housing emergency started before, the appearance of the 15M movement in 2011 spur social mobilisation and its politicisation. After the abandonment of the squares, the housing issue and specially one organisation, the Platform of People Affected by the Mortgage (PAH), have canalised and maintained the activism in the local scale. The expansion of the organisation and its relevance has revitalised the housing question as a basic need to construct a life project and as vanguard against the commodification of the urban space from its nearest scales. This chapter analyses how this re-formulation of housing rights has been developed and radicalised by PAH to the point of challenging the commodification of housing provision. The chapter is based on fieldwork carried out in two chapters of PAH: Stop Desafiuzamentos Coruña and PAH Barcelona. After the introduction, the chapter discuss two main concepts that have been central in the research of social movements: repertoire of collective action and frame analysis. Unlike most of the research that considers these two aspects quite independent or how the discourse influences repertoire, the chapter researches how actually these two aspects are intertwined, they cannot be separated and how the repertoire has in fact a great influence on the frames of mobilisation . The discursive operation has been reinforced by the development of a strong antagonist opposition to elites based on the difference between us (“people suffering the crisis”) vs. them (“bankers and politicians, who are the main originators of the crisis”). This antagonist frontier has developed an innovative repertoire of collective action which includes a wide range of actions from addressing to formal institutions to civil disobedience and house occupations, and that will influence other social movements in further scales. The chapter concludes analysing how this evolution in time has allowed encompassing different signifieds and tactics, which have favoured flexibility and transversality, fundamental for the success of the mobilisation. The main interest of this piece is that it analyses how, through the empowerment of people in risky situations, it can be created an innovative and radical conceptualisation of the right to housing, which overcomes the limitations of the legal protection by developing alternative framings of housing that even propose to limit private property in favour of the common good.

Keywords: Right to housing. PAH, antagonism, housing de-commodification, Spain, 15M.

Research paper thumbnail of The institutionalization of the right to the city: The Spanish case

Handbook of Emerging 21st-Century Cities, 2018

The ‘right to the city’ has gained momentum in the last few years as an attractive proposal to co... more The ‘right to the city’ has gained momentum in the last few years as an attractive proposal to contest neoliberal urbanism. The conceptualization created by Henri Lefebvre (1991) as a revolutionary project beyond capitalism and the state to overcome the alienation produced by the capitalist city, poses some interesting questions about the real possibilities of its implementation today, especially considering that initial rejection of state intervention. Thus this chapter investigates the potential for promoting this right from state institutions to advance towards a full revolutionary right to the city, as well as the main challenges and consequences of such efforts in the neoliberal city. To fulfill this aim, the analysis focuses on the attempts of institutionalization tried in Spain within the wave of protest started by the 15M movement, specifically the government action of Barcelona en Comú and Marea Atlántica, two civic coalitions that won the mayoralties of Barcelona and A Coruña in May 2015.
The chapter begins with describing the concept of the right to the city in Lefebvre, paying special attention to the four main intertwined features that he considers key for guaranteeing the use value defended by the right to the city over the exchange value promoted by capitalism: centrality, participation, appropriation and encounters. Subsequently this theoretical framework is used to analyze how the government action of the mentioned platforms promote these four aspects, concluding that the main constraints are posed by the legal framework and the politics of scale. Furthermore the analysis shows that the origin of these challenges and limitations are to be found in a persistent tension provoked by the process of institutionalization between two competitive sources of legitimacy ¬¬– liberal representative vs direct radical democracy – which makes it necessary to reformulate the question from asking about the mere institutionalization of the right to the possibilities of inserting it within a representative regime. Thus, the cases show how this tension affects the social movements but, more interestingly, how they also create internal contradictions within the regime, proving the potential benefits of the institutionalization to open opportunities for implementing the radical reform of the right to the city by weakening the regime’s legitimacy and stability. At the same time the institutionalization has spread and normalized the demands linked to the right, increasing their challenge to the hegemonic position of the neoliberal discourse to advance towards a full revolutionary right to the city.
Unlike the most common discussions about the topic – that is, conceptual-normative or about its role in social mobilization – this chapter directly addresses the important question of the potential and limitations of the implementation of measures advancing towards the right to the city for the creation of alternatives to current urban development and politics. Moreover the innovative practical experience of the Spanish case has generated hope for political movements all over Europe, which can make use of these lessons for future processes to advance in the construction of alternative urban environments.
Keywords: The Right to the City; Barcelona en Comú; Marea Atlántica; 15M

Research paper thumbnail of 13 myter om bostadsfrågan

En av samtidens största utmaningar är att ordna boende åt alla Sveriges invånare. Landet ska få h... more En av samtidens största utmaningar är att ordna boende åt alla Sveriges invånare. Landet ska få hundratusentals nya bostäder under den närmaste tioårsperioden. Debatten om hur det ska gå till blir alltmer laddad. Det planerade bostadsbyggandet är värt enorma summor och föga förvånande kan varje påstående ha en dold agenda.

Myter är berättelser som skapas av grupper i syfte att definiera sin identitet, genom gemensamma föreställningar och värderingar. Berättelserna ger ett ramverk för att förstå och rättfärdiga våra handlingar och världen vi lever i. Tillvaron blir uthärdlig och naturlig. Myten tränger undan andra berättelser och får dem att framstå som irrelevanta, felaktiga eller rent av dumma.
De som tjänar på bostadsmarknaden: politiker, mäklare, banker, arkitekter, byggföretag och hyresvärdar framställer således sin beskrivning om bostadsmarknaden som självklar:
Det anses oundvikligt att marknaden bestämmer; marknadspriser är ett neutralt fenomen; statliga regleringar stör den fria och goda marknaden; olika typer av regleringar kan till och med orsaka bostadsbristen eftersom marknaden annars skulle löst den; kraftig hyreshöjning efter renoveringar är oundviklig; individuellt ägande av bostäder är en god investering och smartare än att hyra; bostadssubventioner är något som tillhör det förgångna; migranter föredrar att bo i segregerade bostadsområden. Listan kan göras lång på sådana myter som egentligen handlar om något helt annat – särintressen. Myterna fyller dubbla roller, dels upprätthåller de status quo – allt är bra som det är när marknaden styr – dels uppmanar de till handling – fler avregleringar behövs.
I 13 myter om bostadsfrågan dissekerar den internationella forskargruppen CRUSH, The Critical Urban Sustainability Hub särintressenas myter om den pågående bostadskrisen. Boken etablerar en forskningsstödd diskurs som belyser bostadskrisen ur ett medborgarperspektiv. Essäerna bidrar med intellektuell eld och argument i diskussioner och debatter. Boken kan också läsas som ett rent nöje, eftersom den bygger ett nytt samtal om vårt boende.

Research paper thumbnail of Producing Alternative Urban Spaces: Social Mobilisation and New Forms of Agency in the Spanish Housing Crisis

This book is concerned with the social mobilisation in Spain provoked by the financial crisis whi... more This book is concerned with the social mobilisation in Spain provoked by the financial crisis which started in 2008 and became the biggest economic and political crisis since the restauration of democracy in the 1970s. Intrigued by the increasing social conflict provoked by this crisis, this thesis focuses specifically on the housing movement and on its intersections with some political coalitions that won many municipalities in 2015. Drawing on ethnographic research in two local chapters of the Platform of People Affected by Mortgages (PAH) and the coalitions that won the municipalities of Barcelona and A Coruña, this thesis analyses the influence on mobilisation of two definitory characteristics of these organisations: heterogeneity and decentralisation. In reflecting about these characteristics, the thesis investigates the dynamics that lead to the creation of a “space of activism” that articulates heterogeneous local struggles capable of opposing the capitalist organisation of space. The coming together of heterogeneous perceptions of everyday life proved to be the key in this contention. Nevertheless, the cases demonstrate when challenging capitalist imposition, heterogeneity has not only to be articulated, but also assembled in new representations of everyday life. The thesis argues that these new representations need the creation of multiple differential spaces to avoid jeopardising the cohesion of heterogeneity. The way in which the connection between those spaces is made, by avoiding dynamics of rescaling, has favoured the cohesion of the groups, reduced the tensions linked to dynamics of abstraction and generated a “space of activism” based on horizontality that poses a considerable challenge for capitalism to reimpose subjection. By stressing the importance of space as the product of the confrontation between the capitalist attempts to organise space and its resistances, the research contributes to the discussion about the ways in which social mobilisation can expand by exploring the potentialities and challenges of articulating heterogeneous local struggles.

Research paper thumbnail of The Struggle for the Right to Housing in Spain

The Production of Alternative Urban Spaces, 2019

The economic crisis started in 2008 have showed in Spain some of its more devastating effects. Th... more The economic crisis started in 2008 have showed in Spain some of its more devastating effects. The housing crisis has concentrated the concern not only of the media and politicians, but specially of social movements. Although this housing emergency started before, the appearance of the 15M movement in 2011 spur social mobilisation and its politicisation. After the abandonment of the squares, the housing issue and specially one organisation, the Platform of People Affected by the Mortgage (PAH), have canalised and maintained the activism in the local scale. The expansion of the organisation and its relevance has revitalised the housing question as a basic need to construct a life project and as vanguard against the commodification of the urban space from its nearest scales. This chapter analyses how this re-formulation of housing rights has been developed and radicalised by PAH to the point of challenging the commodification of housing provision. The chapter is based on fieldwork carried out in two chapters of PAH: Stop Desafiuzamentos Coruña and PAH Barcelona. After the introduction, the chapter discuss two main concepts that have been central in the research of social movements: repertoire of collective action and frame analysis. Unlike most of the research that considers these two aspects quite independent or how the discourse influences repertoire, the chapter researches how actually these two aspects are intertwined, they cannot be separated and how the repertoire has in fact a great influence on the frames of mobilisation . The discursive operation has been reinforced by the development of a strong antagonist opposition to elites based on the difference between us (“people suffering the crisis”) vs. them (“bankers and politicians, who are the main originators of the crisis”). This antagonist frontier has developed an innovative repertoire of collective action which includes a wide range of actions from addressing to formal institutions to civil disobedience and house occupations, and that will influence other social movements in further scales. The chapter concludes analysing how this evolution in time has allowed encompassing different signifieds and tactics, which have favoured flexibility and transversality, fundamental for the success of the mobilisation. The main interest of this piece is that it analyses how, through the empowerment of people in risky situations, it can be created an innovative and radical conceptualisation of the right to housing, which overcomes the limitations of the legal protection by developing alternative framings of housing that even propose to limit private property in favour of the common good.

Keywords: Right to housing. PAH, antagonism, housing de-commodification, Spain, 15M.

Research paper thumbnail of The institutionalization of the right to the city: The Spanish case

Handbook of Emerging 21st-Century Cities, 2018

The ‘right to the city’ has gained momentum in the last few years as an attractive proposal to co... more The ‘right to the city’ has gained momentum in the last few years as an attractive proposal to contest neoliberal urbanism. The conceptualization created by Henri Lefebvre (1991) as a revolutionary project beyond capitalism and the state to overcome the alienation produced by the capitalist city, poses some interesting questions about the real possibilities of its implementation today, especially considering that initial rejection of state intervention. Thus this chapter investigates the potential for promoting this right from state institutions to advance towards a full revolutionary right to the city, as well as the main challenges and consequences of such efforts in the neoliberal city. To fulfill this aim, the analysis focuses on the attempts of institutionalization tried in Spain within the wave of protest started by the 15M movement, specifically the government action of Barcelona en Comú and Marea Atlántica, two civic coalitions that won the mayoralties of Barcelona and A Coruña in May 2015.
The chapter begins with describing the concept of the right to the city in Lefebvre, paying special attention to the four main intertwined features that he considers key for guaranteeing the use value defended by the right to the city over the exchange value promoted by capitalism: centrality, participation, appropriation and encounters. Subsequently this theoretical framework is used to analyze how the government action of the mentioned platforms promote these four aspects, concluding that the main constraints are posed by the legal framework and the politics of scale. Furthermore the analysis shows that the origin of these challenges and limitations are to be found in a persistent tension provoked by the process of institutionalization between two competitive sources of legitimacy ¬¬– liberal representative vs direct radical democracy – which makes it necessary to reformulate the question from asking about the mere institutionalization of the right to the possibilities of inserting it within a representative regime. Thus, the cases show how this tension affects the social movements but, more interestingly, how they also create internal contradictions within the regime, proving the potential benefits of the institutionalization to open opportunities for implementing the radical reform of the right to the city by weakening the regime’s legitimacy and stability. At the same time the institutionalization has spread and normalized the demands linked to the right, increasing their challenge to the hegemonic position of the neoliberal discourse to advance towards a full revolutionary right to the city.
Unlike the most common discussions about the topic – that is, conceptual-normative or about its role in social mobilization – this chapter directly addresses the important question of the potential and limitations of the implementation of measures advancing towards the right to the city for the creation of alternatives to current urban development and politics. Moreover the innovative practical experience of the Spanish case has generated hope for political movements all over Europe, which can make use of these lessons for future processes to advance in the construction of alternative urban environments.
Keywords: The Right to the City; Barcelona en Comú; Marea Atlántica; 15M

Research paper thumbnail of 13 myter om bostadsfrågan

En av samtidens största utmaningar är att ordna boende åt alla Sveriges invånare. Landet ska få h... more En av samtidens största utmaningar är att ordna boende åt alla Sveriges invånare. Landet ska få hundratusentals nya bostäder under den närmaste tioårsperioden. Debatten om hur det ska gå till blir alltmer laddad. Det planerade bostadsbyggandet är värt enorma summor och föga förvånande kan varje påstående ha en dold agenda.

Myter är berättelser som skapas av grupper i syfte att definiera sin identitet, genom gemensamma föreställningar och värderingar. Berättelserna ger ett ramverk för att förstå och rättfärdiga våra handlingar och världen vi lever i. Tillvaron blir uthärdlig och naturlig. Myten tränger undan andra berättelser och får dem att framstå som irrelevanta, felaktiga eller rent av dumma.
De som tjänar på bostadsmarknaden: politiker, mäklare, banker, arkitekter, byggföretag och hyresvärdar framställer således sin beskrivning om bostadsmarknaden som självklar:
Det anses oundvikligt att marknaden bestämmer; marknadspriser är ett neutralt fenomen; statliga regleringar stör den fria och goda marknaden; olika typer av regleringar kan till och med orsaka bostadsbristen eftersom marknaden annars skulle löst den; kraftig hyreshöjning efter renoveringar är oundviklig; individuellt ägande av bostäder är en god investering och smartare än att hyra; bostadssubventioner är något som tillhör det förgångna; migranter föredrar att bo i segregerade bostadsområden. Listan kan göras lång på sådana myter som egentligen handlar om något helt annat – särintressen. Myterna fyller dubbla roller, dels upprätthåller de status quo – allt är bra som det är när marknaden styr – dels uppmanar de till handling – fler avregleringar behövs.
I 13 myter om bostadsfrågan dissekerar den internationella forskargruppen CRUSH, The Critical Urban Sustainability Hub särintressenas myter om den pågående bostadskrisen. Boken etablerar en forskningsstödd diskurs som belyser bostadskrisen ur ett medborgarperspektiv. Essäerna bidrar med intellektuell eld och argument i diskussioner och debatter. Boken kan också läsas som ett rent nöje, eftersom den bygger ett nytt samtal om vårt boende.