Squatting, commons and conflict: a discussion of squatting's challenges to the commons (original) (raw)
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The Squatters’ Movement in Europe: Commons and Autonomy as Alternatives to Capitalism
International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 2015
This book owes a debt, first, to all the SqEK members who participated in the meetings and online debates. Most of our ideas became more fruitful thanks to this collective way of combining our local and personal work, with the critical sharing of our perspectives. Second, nonactive SqEK members but activists within the different squatting scenes of the cities where we met, who attended some of our meetings or hosted us, or guided our visits to particular squats, also contributed to our reflections with their valuable insights and experiences. Also, in different stages of the production of this book the editors have been helped, specially regarding the language supervision, by some SqEK participants beyond or independently from their individual contributions to the chapters and boxes. Above all, E. T. C. Dee was in charge of the final style overview, but we are also very grateful to
Squatting Cycles in Barcelona: Identities, Repression and the Controversy of Institutionalisation
M.A. Martínez López (ed.), The Urban Politics of Squatters’ Movements, 2018
Squatting in the metropolitan area of Barcelona is analysed here by distinguishing protest cycles and larger sociopolitical contexts. We identifythe different social movements related to squatted social centres (SSCs) and, in the most recent time period, housing struggles. Why have SSCs hardly been institutionalised? How have squatting practices evolved throughout the years? We argue that specific political opportunity structures (POS) help explain the different tactics and orientations adopted by the squatters in four consecutive stages covering the period 1977–2013. In particular, legislative changes led to the first change, new forms of global mobilisations influenced the transition from the second cycle to the third, and the emergence of social movements at the national level was the most relevant context at the two final stages. Throughout the entire trajectory of the squatters’ movement, severe state repression narrowed their political opportunities. POS can be described according to six dimensions on which political opportunities may vary. These include (a) the degree of openness of the institutional political system to social movements, (b) the stability of political elites’ alignment, (c) alliances between movements and elites, (d) propensities towards repression of movements, (e) the wider protest cycles at play, and (f) policies responding to movements’ demands (Brockett 1991; Diani 1998; Kitschelt 1996; McAdam 1998; Tejerina 1998). These structures of the political environment can either encourage or discourage collective action. We interpret how the squatters’ movement interacted with the POS by identifying the factors that influence squatters’ strategies while focusing on the continuity of practices, which are related to the dimensions of the POS but not determined by them (Flesher Fominaya 2014; Munck 1997). If structural factors affect activists’ choices, we should also consider the content of these choices and the decision-making processes (Piazza and Genovese 2016, p. 292). Thus, we argue that movements evolve through continuous experimentation and reflexive refinement of political ambitions and organisational forms (Haiven and Khasnabish 2014, p. 15). Although the chapter shows that heterogeneity is characteristic of squatting, we argue that this complexity can be tentatively simplified into three components. The okupa movement refers to the opening, self-management and defence of SSCs. The housing movement, mainly represented by the Plataforma de Afectados por la Hipoteca (PAH, Platform for People Affected by Mortgages), occupies buildings with different purposes and tactics than the okupa movement. A third strand bridges territorialised struggles and more moderate social movements who use squatting to obtain access to space from institutions in order to create legal social centres. In the following sections we also discuss the configuration of these identities along the five cycles of mobilisation.
Ecological Economics, 2020
In this manuscript, we explore the potential benefits and challenges of the interaction between urban movements and the commons in the urban context, within their political and social framework. The reclaiming and con- solidation of buildings that belong to the City Council to create community centres managed by local residents are analysed as commons, using a multiple case method with a combination of quantitative and qualitative techniques. The findings show that urban movements use strategy and experience to contribute to the struggle for obtaining management of the commons. Once the facilities have been granted to local residents, the com- mons have the potential to nourish urban movements and to promote solidarity among local residents and movements. Moreover, the involvement of urban movements in the management of the commons leads to greater participative governance, and encourages debates about alternative civic models. Even though local policies that promote and protect the commons represent an opportunity for them to grow, the agreements established with the city council can limit the capacity for the commons to become alternative spaces for re- inventing the city.
How and why do squatting movements rise, fall, and rise again all over the Europe? The Urban Politics of Squatters' Movements is the systematic attempt to answer these crucial questions, providing rich insight into squatting practices within a geographically broad and historically deep perspective. The authors of this collection, all involved in the Squatting Europe Kollective network (SqEK), explore nine European cities that have been sites of enduring squatting movements from 1960 until today, shedding light on cycles of protests, waves of mobilizations , and processes of institutionalization. Big metropolitan areas scattered in all Europe (Rome, Berlin, Paris, Madrid, Barcelona, and Copenhagen) are analyzed along with smaller urban areas (Seville, Rotterdam, and Brighton); this allows authors to retrace common features between northern and southern towns as well as between cities with different size. With variegated empirical materials and comparative perspective that seeks to gather different cases together, the volume edited by Martínez is a challenging, stimulating contribution to the field of urban and social movements studies. In all the cases squatting implies the use of a building (for living or for performing activities) without the consent of the owner (Pruijt, 2013) but it occurs through different rhythms, forms of expressions, goals, and performances. The book accounts for all these specificities without renouncing to inscribe them into
In, against, beyond and through the State. Limits and possibilities of Urban Commons in Barcelona
PhD Thesis - IUAV, Regional Planning and Public Policy; UAB, Politics, Policies and International Relations , 2018
In the last few decades the category of Common has re-emerged to draw a path of emancipation from capitalism without the State, reviving the thesis of autonomist Marxism. In this path, the Commons are autonomous social practices that produce emancipation, namely The Common, and through which The Common can be instituted. However, autonomist Common’s theories are characterized by a certain reticence to address how emancipation can take place without the State. Considering that the relation with the State in contemporary Western society is ineludible, the research aims to assess the role of the State in the autonomist Common’s emancipatory project. The analysis is set in the urban environment focusing on the relation between Urban Commons and the (local) State. The thesis hypothesizes that Urban Commons may need the support of the (local) State and this may flank the production of The Common with its own production of emancipation: The Public. Adopting a relational approach to the analysis of the case of Barcelona, the thesis demonstrates that Urban Commons need the (local) State. Many of them need the resources and the recognition of the (local) State, despite these may affect their autonomy, and all of them would benefit from a further support of the (local) State in terms of regulation, public policies and planning. However, despite the (local) State could theoretically flank The Common widening the spectrum of emancipation, it does not appear to do so. When the (local) State meets The Common it tends to replace it with The Public, and The Public tends to hinder and spatially marginalise The Common. Hence, Urban Commons should continue their struggle for autonomy. However, they should also struggle to obtain forms of support from the (local) State, preventing the latter from limiting their autonomy, transforming The Common into The Public, maintaining the hegemony of the production of emancipation and spatially marginalizing The Common. The thesis concludes sustaining that, as sustained by the autonomist Commons theories, the Common’s emancipatory project can be constructed without taking over the State but it cannot avoid to securing forms of support from the State.
Partecipazione e Conflitto, 2015
This article analyses continuities and discontinuities across time in Italy in the use of direct social actions, defined as forms of action that focus upon directly transforming some specific aspects of society by means of the very action itself, instead of claiming something from the state or other power holders. In doing this, this article offers two main illustrative hypotheses. First, that direct social actions represent a significant part of the repertoire of contention - at least in Italy - and that while they tend to be less visible than protest actions, they should still not be overlooked and treated like something “new” every time they resurface. Second, this article claims that the socio-economic context plays an important role in influencing the extended use of DSAs: if the supply of these forms of action by political actors is constant across time, what changes is the demand, that in times of economic hardship tends to characterise a broader constituency. We conclude by ...
Commons: Practices of Spaces and Social Change
2014
The debate about common pool resources and the commons is not new (as demonstrated not only by the very well-known researches by E.Ostrom but also an article of Ciriacy-Wantrupp and Bishop in 1975, however their role in today political context has changed and the topic is becoming more and more relevant. In fact in various European Countries several are the specific actions oriented to the protection and the care of the commons. However the political and juridical content remains to be defined, especially for its interaction with the concepts of public and private. In certain domains the political and theoretical thinking about the commons is stronger than in others, therefore the contribution they can offer to the debate is particularly interesting. In this perspective the study focuses on urban spaces and the role played by social movements in their definition. In fact no legislation in Europe recognizes the commons as a legal category and most of the social and political thinkin...