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preparations for the exhibition...

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---
title: "Memory of the World"
mentioned_in: ["/topic/politicisingpiracy.md"]
---
# Scenarios for massive disobedience
> A public library is:
> * *·* free access to books for every member of society
> * *·* library catalog
> * *·* librarian
>
> With books ready to be shared, meticulously cataloged, everyone is a librarian. When everyone is librarian, library is everywhere.
Since 2012 [Memory of the World](https://www.memoryoftheworld.org) has been developing and publicly supporting scenarios for massive disobedience against the intellectual property regime regulating the production and circulation of knowledge in the digital realm. Its starting point was simple: that the public library is the institutional form societies have devised to make knowledge and culture accessible to all their members regardless of social or economic status.
# The public library and shadow libraries
There is a political consensus that this principle of access is fundamental to the purpose of a modern society. Yet, as digital networks have radically expanded the access to literature and scientific research, public libraries have largely been denied the ability to extend to digital ‘objects’ the kind of de-commodified access they provide in the world of print.
As the readers have been thus denied the access to knowledge due to territorial, institutional and economic divides, they have resorted to creating their own systems of access by sharing PDFs and building shadow libraries, doing for access to knowlede what public libraries were not allowed to do in the digital world.
Memory of the World is aimed at helping to fill the space that remains denied to real-world public libraries. Obviously it is not alone in this effort. There are many other shadow libraries, some more public, some more secretive, working to help people share books. And the practice of sharing is massive.
# Amateur librarianship
Memory of the World makes a case for the institution of public library and expansion of its principle of the universal access to knowledge into the digital realm. However, it also is an exploration of a distributed infrastructure for amateur librarians.
Public Library is a collection of collections maintained by amateur librarians. It draws its inspiration and builds upon the efforts of **aaaaarg**, **Library Genesis**, **Monoskop**, **UbuWeb** and **Textz.com** to create a networked infrastructure of universal access to knowledge. Memory of the World’s aim is to promote, connect and improve that infrastructure.
It does so through:
* · digitization projects focusing on politics of memory:
* · [Catalogue of Liberated Books (K_O_K)](https://kok.memoryoftheworld.org/)
* · [Praxis (digitized)](https://praxis.memoryoftheworld.org/)
* · [Herman's Library](http://herman.memoryoftheworld.org/)
* · [Otpisane (The Written-Off)](https://otpisane.memoryoftheworld.org/)
* · software development:
* · aggregation of collections at http://library.memoryoftheworld.org
* · Calibre plugin [let’s share books] (obsoleted)
* · [Accorder](https://pypi.org/project/accorder/)
* · building of DIY bookscanners
* · workflows of [digitization](https://knowledge-production.github.io/forge/tutorials/book-digitization.html) and [amateur librarianship](http://tom.medak.click/en/amateur/).
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title: "Sea-Watch"
mentioned_in: ["/topic/searescue.md"]
---
# Sea rescue
[Sea-Watch](https://sea-watch.org/en/) is a civilian search and rescue initiative helping migrants survive arguably the deadliest migration route in the world — the short stretch of the Mediterranean Sea leading from Northern Africa to South Europe. Since 2014 over 600,000 migrants have made the passage, and it is estimated that over 15,000 have perished in shipwrecks.
The Sea-Watch grew out of an initiative of volunteers who could no longer stand by watching as people were drowning. In late 2014 they banded together to acquire a 20m sea cutter and in May of 2015 the Sea-Watch I was in Lampedusa to start its first mission — helping in the Euorpean Union-coordinated sea rescue operations by conducting search for boats in distress and navigating larger ships to take people on board and bring them to a safety in European ports.
{{< figure src="/images/seawatch.jpeg" width="100%" title="Figure 1. Sea-Watch. Photo Crhis Grodotzki" >}}
# Externalisation of EU borders
Earlier in the decade, the EU was committed to helping migrants to making it to safety. Only in 2014, the Italian-led Mare Nostrum operation brought at least 150,000 migrants to Europe. However, with the refugee crisis of 2016, the EU made an about-turn, rescinding its obligations under the Geneva Convention, Charter of Fundamental Rights of European Union and other human rights norms to strike a deal with Turkey to hold back refugees.
In early 2017 this lead to an increase in crossings in the Central Mediterranean. Set on keeping the refugees outside its borders at any cost, the EU tasked the paramilitary Libyan Coast Guard to conduct search and rescue operations and bring the migrants back to Libya, where they face inhumane conditions, detention and persecution. While the externalisation of EU borders to Libya has significantly reduced the number of crossings, the dangerous actions of the Libyan Coast Guard amounting to violent pushback have, in equal measure, increased the rate of deaths.
# Criminalisation of civilian search and rescue
In May 2016 the Sea-Watch II was for the first time instructed to take the rescuees on board. With the rollback of the EU's commitment, the civilian search and rescue organisations such as SOS Mediterranée, Doctors without Borders, Jugend Rettet and Sea-Watch were the only one left to actively save people at sea. The about-turn also lead to the denial of entry to Italian and Maltese ports, where civilian sea and rescue ships could bring refugees to safety, culminating in the seizing of Jugend Rettet's Iuventa under the captain Pia Klemp in August 2017 and the arrest of captain Carola Rackete in July 2019.
# Present operations
The civilian sea and rescue organisations are [estimated to have saved 100,000 lives since 2014](https://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/The-CMR-The-deadliest-migration-route.pdf). Sea-Watch and Doctors Without Borders are the only NGOs still resisting EU's clamp-down. Currently, Sea-Watch operates a 55m Sea-Watch 3, jointly with Doctors without Borders a 60m Sea-Watch 4, a 31m Louise Michel and two reconnaissance planes Moonbird and Seabird.
Sea-Watch considers its mission only a patch applied against a symptom, whereas the real solution is political — securing a safe passage to all migrants.
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---
title: "SopraSotto - A Pirate Kindergarten"
mentioned_in: ["/topic/commoningcare.md"]
---
# Organization
**SopraSotto** is a self-organized project for early childhood care founded in 2013 in Milan and maintained by a group of parents who share a completely transformed work context compared to the previous generations. Many families that are taking part in the project – either couples or single parents, heterosexual or homosexual parents, natives of Milan or new arrivals to the city – have to face an economic precarity which has generated new needs that cannot be fully met by public models of early childhood care, since they are organized around a working population that no longer represents the majority, particularly in a large metropolis such as Milan.
{{< figure src="/images/soprasotto.jpg" width="100%" title="Figure 1. The trapezoid table can be used on its own or as a modular part of a larger table. The shape of the table enables different compositions and purposes: playing in groups, eating in a circle, drawing alone, … The handle in the middle makes it easy to move around and keeps the surface level." >}}
SopraSotto is managed by a group of parents and teachers who meet monthly and who take decisions on organizational issues, such as coordinating the maintenance and repair of the space and the projects related to the pedagogical activities.
The main characteristics of the lab are:
## Self-Management
Through the active participation of parents and coordination through contemporary communication devices, SopraSotto is entirely organized by those who use it. There are no "service" roles, but interchangeable ones, on a rotating schedule, that ensure:
- the daily organization of work;
- the feeding of children and teachers;
- the maintenance and repair of the space and its objects;
- the organization of thematic activities and workshops for children;
- administration;
- general coordination.
## An Open Environment
As a place for early childhood development and socialization, a place where the first separation of the child from parents occurs, SopraSotto was conceived as an open and accessible environment. If parents desire so, they can become an integral part of the everyday environment. This allows SopraSotto to attend not only to the child's need for growth and autonomy but also to parents' feelings about separation and their need to meet other people who are going through a similar experience. For example, if parents want to continue breastfeeding during the day or if they have time to develop a specific pedagogical thematic path in agreement with the group, SopraSotto gives them the possibility to do so.
## Embeddedness In The Neighbourhood
SopraSotto is collaborating closely with the associations and informal groups in the neighbourhood. For example, the communal garden "Isola Pepe Verde" hosts the lab during the summer, offering a play area and some contact with plants and nature, while the local GAS (Solidarity Purchase Group) network provides the first seasonal food products that the parents cook and the teachers give out to children. In addition, in a typical workshop day, kids make the trips to the market, to the library and to the craft shops.
## Food As Education
Food is considered an important element in children's education. From the selection of groceries to food preparation, parents build on each other's knowledge to enable the children to acquire a first-hand, lived and healthy relationship with food. SopraSotto chooses seasonal produce, cultivated locally, and it embraces a food philosophy that focuses not only on nourishment but also food culture.

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title: "Women on Waves"
mentioned_in: ["/topic/piratecareintroduction.md"]
---
# 1999
[Women on Waves](https://www.womenonwaves.org/) is a nongovernmental organization registered in the Netherlands founded in 1999 by Dutch physician Rebecca Gomperts to prevent unsafe abortions and unwanted pregnancies. The organization provides sexual health services and education to women in countries with restrictive laws around reproductive rights. Research has shown these restrictions mostly harm women living in poverty, survivors of domestic violence, and young people under the age of 18 who need abortion care.
This is how WoW introduces themselves on their website:
> Women on Waves aims to prevent unsafe abortions and empower women to exercise their human rights to physical and mental autonomy. We trust that women can do a medical abortion themselves and make sure that women have access to medical abortion and information through innovative strategies. But ultimately it is about giving women the tools to resist repressive cultures and laws. Not every woman has the possibility to be a public activist but there are things we can all do ourselves.
Other services offered by WoW include contraception, individual reproductive counseling, workshops, and education about unwanted pregnancy. Workshops are conducted for lawyers, doctors, artists, writers, public health care activists, as well as for women and men to learn about contraceptive practices and non-surgical, DIY abortion using RU-486.
Women on Waves are a particularly fitting figure to introduce the notion of a pirate care practice, as they utilise pirate strategies in both senses of the term: as piracy at sea and in the sense of disobedience using digital tools.
# On Waves
Women on Waves sails a ship registered in the Netherlands to countries where abortion is illegal. By harbouring the boat outside territorial waters, they are able to provide contraceptives, information, training, workshops, and safe and legal abortion services to local women who need them. They are able to do so because in international waters local laws do not apply. Applicability of national penal legislation, and thus also of abortion law, extends only to territorial waters; outside that 12-mile radius (or 2 hours sailing) off the coast of a country. It is thus Dutch law that applies on board of Women on Waves’ ship, which means that all their activities are legal.
However, in June 2009 the Dutch government changed the abortion law and claimed that the early abortion services Women on Waves used to provide legally on board the ship now fall under the criminal law. Women on Waves disagreed with this interpretation by the Dutch government. The original law has since been upheld and Women on Waves has been able to continue its activities legally. In 2018, the organization received a license to perform abortions with pills (misoprostol with or without mifepristone) on board a Dutch sailing yacht in international waters.
The ship travels with a specialized abortion doctor, a gynaecologist, and a specialised nurse so early medical abortions can be provided not only legally, buy also safely and professionally, even exceeding the highest standards for normal abortion services in the Netherlands and other EU countries.
With their ship missions, Women on Waves wants to respond to an urgent medical need but also, crucially, to draw public attention to the consequences of unwanted pregnancy and illegal abortion. Women on Waves has created enormous public interest after successful ship campaigns in Ireland (2001), Poland (2003), Portugal (2004) and Spain (2008). Women on Waves always works in close cooperation with local organizations and further supports their efforts to change the laws in their country. The campaign in Portugal catalyzed the legalization of abortion in February 2007, for instance. WoW also works with local partners to create safe abortion telephone hotlines, in countries such as Ecuador (2008) and Chile (2009).
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# Digital disobedience
As mentioned, Women on Waves embody the perfect figure of the pirate carer not only for their resourceful and effective use of international maritime laws, but also for the ways in which they use digital technologies to disobey laws that take away women’s right to bodily autonomy and informed decision making. They saw the internet as a sea too, across which they have been able to provide abortion services across borders through their sister organization, Women on Web.
## Abortion Robots
Like the other Women on Waves campaigns, the [abortion robot](https://www.womenonwaves.org/en/page/7524/abortion-robots) is using the different legalities concerning abortion in the different countries. The robot operated from the Netherlands is delivering the pills to the woman after she has been counselled by a doctor though the robot. Counselling the woman and providing the abortion pills is allowed in the country where the robot operator is based, so through the distant operation of the robot the abortion service is legal. So far Women on Waves has used the abortion robot in Northern Ireland and Poland.
## Abortion Drones
The abortion drone has been used in recent campaigns in Poland (2015) and Ireland (2016). The drone flies abortion pills from one country to women in another country. Using the different legislations and regulations it makes the reality of women in countries where abortion is restricted visible by creating access to the abortion pills. (see Figure 1)
# On Web
Women on Web is the sister organization of Women on Waves.
Founded in 2005 by Dr. Rebecca Gomperts, this Canadian non-profit organization assisting women and pregnant people worldwide to gain access to safe telemedical abortion. By using telecommunications technology, Women on Web has answered over 1 million help requests via emails and provided region- and country-specific information about safe abortion options in 22 languages.
People who need safe abortion or contraception can make an online consultation at Women on Web website. After being reviewed by medical doctors, medical abortion pills or contraceptives are provided via mail. Their help desk team accompanies women and pregnant people during all stages of the process and responds to any questions that may arise within 24 hours. Supervised by medical doctors, the help desk operates in 16 languages, including Arabic, English, French, German, Japanese, Korean, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Persian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Thai, and Turkish.
The Women on Web website is a source of reliable information and collects personal abortion experiences to allow and encourage women and pregnant people to openly explore and discuss their reproductive choices. They are committed to ensure that all women and pregnant people have access to scientific and evidence-based information on safe abortion and contraception.
The mission of Women on Web is to advocate for and facilitate access to contraception and safe abortion services to protect women's health and lives around the world. The organization works to catalyze procedural and legal change in abortion access through telemedicine, research, community outreach, and advocacy. They write:
> We strive for a world where safe abortion care is accessible for all women and pregnant people, free from shame and stigma.
## Internet Campaigns
The work of Women on Waves and Women on Web is often considered controversial and their materials have been censored by sites such as Facebook and Google.
On May 4th, Google released the results of its second Core Update of 2020. Women on Web saw a 90% drop in the website’s traffic as a result, a massive loss by comparison to previous updates and a troubling impact on abortion access. WoW have been questioning Google’s assurance that its updates are neutral and more broadly advocating for more transparency and public means to keep in check the “digital redlining” implemented by giant tech companies.
Since Women on Web website is censored in some countries, the organization also teach activists ways to bypass the blockages.
WoW has protested against the restrictions of publishing information in cyberspace, invoking Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This article states "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers."
## Safe abortion App
Despite these difficulties, WoW keeps fighting for the right to express their ideas and share information on the internet. For this reason they also created a "Safe Abortion with Pills" App, which is available for free from the Google Play store for android phones.
_The present text is based on a remix of various statements by Women on Waves and Women on Web that are available on their websites._

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title: "Bad Housing Makes Us Sick"
---
# Is there good mental health without a secure home?
# Is there good mental health without a secure home?
Relationship between housing and mental health has been a focus of many debates after 2008. Serious physical and mental health issues have been arising as a result of insecure housing, and a systematic attempt to remove vulnerable people from their homes. Most of those who get evicted or whose houses get demolished end up leaving with mental traumas. The toxic link between bad housing and bad mental health damages our lives and our relationships. Most of the people in toxic housing situations don't get any mental health support.
Relationship between housing and mental health has been a focus of many debates after 2008. Serious physical and mental health issues have been arising as a result of insecure housing, and a systematic attempt to remove vulnerable people from their homes. Most of those who get evicted or whose houses get demolished end up leaving with mental traumas. The toxic link between bad housing and bad mental health damages our lives and our relationships. Most of the people in toxic housing situations don't get any mental health support.
Instead of confronting the violent nature of contemporary housing, authorities in the European core countries have been trying to deal with mental health issues by imposing approaches that individualize the responsibility and focus on the consequences. The industry has been forming around the stressed subjects in order to reduce the consequences of suffering, acting as if bad housing is just a mental condition. In parallel, new groups and initiatives have been emerging in order to provide support based on mutual aid, do research, undertaking advocacy work, and raise awareness through events, artistic productions, and informational material.
Instead of confronting the violent nature of contemporary housing, authorities in the European core countries have been trying to deal with mental health issues by imposing approaches that individualize the responsibility and focus on the consequences. The industry has been forming around the stressed subjects in order to reduce the consequences of suffering, acting as if bad housing is just a mental condition. In parallel, new groups and initiatives have been emerging in order to provide support based on mutual aid, do research, undertaking advocacy work, and raise awareness through events, artistic productions, and informational material.
## Proposed resources
- **Read about the attempts in the UK to instrumentalise mindfulness for responsibilisation:** ![](bib:db13de19-40a1-4779-a168-021526dc9b83)
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## How to learn together
Read the proposed articles before you come to the session. Create a comic together. Discuss what you have read and create a rough draft of a script. Choose your partner and work with her on a sequence of frames. Use what you have read. Come back together. Lay out your panel so that it make sense for the reader. Share your comic with other Pirate Care Syllabus users.
---
# Kate Hardie & Tom Gillespie: *Homelessness, health and housing*
**Participatory action research in East London, December 2016**
{{< figure src="/images/homelessness_health_housing.png" width="100%" title="Figure 1. Cover of *Homelessness, health and housing" >}}
**Introduction**
Between September 2015 and April 2016, a participatory action research project was undertaken in the London Borough of Newham, examining the experiences of those facing potential or actual homelessness. This document reports on 64 structured interviews undertaken with participants who have approached Newham Council to address a housing or homelessness need within the last year. Its findings reflect extremely high levels of hidden homelessness; serious physical and mental health issues arising or being exacerbated as a result of insecure housing, and an apparently systemic attempt to remove vulnerable people from the borough.
Out-of-borough placements are not new and there is evidence from as far back as 2007 that this was a strategy that boroughs have used to cope with the growing housing crisis. However, out of borough placements have intensified steadily between 2010 and 2015 (Hancox 2015), exacerbated by the benefits cap, rising rents in London and enabled by the Localism Act (2011), which has allowed councils to discharge duty of care to homeless residents. Such out-of-borough placements are particularly high in Newham (Watt and Bernstock, 2017 forthcoming). Newham Council has the highest numbers of residents in [temporary accommodation](http://www.londonspovertyprofile.org.uk/indicators/boroughs/newham/) in London and appears also to be one of the boroughs placing the highest number of homeless people outside the capital (Spurr 2015). This research was an attempt to understand the experiences of those facing potential displacement and to develop an understanding of the human experience of the phenomenon behind the statistics.
**Executive summary**
***1. Those facing homelessness are in constant and ongoing state of flux and insecurity***
Respondents’ housing situations were extremely complex, in permanent flux and insecurity and subject to abrupt change. A to B displacement is not a sufficient way to understand the disruption that people in the study faced. Far from a linear process, it was characterized by a confusing, circular and constantly shifting sense of insecurity and instability. The terms ‘gentrification’ and ‘displacement’ are not sufficient to explain the experiences of those seeking housing and facing homelessness in the study. There is a need for activists and researchers to develop new concepts and frameworks to understand housing insecurity in the post Localism Act context, to understand how its enactment is impacting on the most vulenerable.
***2. Such insecurity has a severe destabilizing effect on mental health and capacities***
The health effects of such ongoing insecurity were both numerous and severe, incorporating both physical and mental health. Worryingly, 9% stated – in an open question about their health - that they had suicidal thoughts and 9% mentioned self-harm in the same question. While half had contacted their GP, there was also an attempt to disengage with services (often for fear of losing custody of children) which increased the vulnerability and isolation of both adults and children.
***3. Both temporary and longer-term properties provided by the state appears to bear the characteristics of ‘slum’ housing***
The temporary housing in which people are housed both within the borough and outside, is extremely poor. Moreover, even those respondents who had accepted longer term housing by moving out of London faced very poor conditions, frequently which made the housing not fit for habitation (due to the presence of children or health conditions). Out-of-area placements may be justified on the basis that they improve housing conditions, but this was not evidenced in the study.
***4. Out-of-area offers appear to be systemic***
Participants were routinely either formally offered or informally ‘advised’ to move out of the borough (58% reported out of borough offers or suggestions). A large proportion (44%) had been offered or advised to consider moving out of London altogether. Almost half of these were offered housing in Hertfordshire or Sussex, the remaining were offered housing in areas across the country, often hundreds of miles away from London. Newham does not appear to be following best practice advice from the National Homelessness Advice Service (NHAS), although this warrants further investigation.
***5. Processes are intensely gendered***
Respondents were disproportionately female (67%) and a lack of available social housing has a clear impact on mothers with children. Over half of all respondents (59.4%) have dependents – mainly children under 18. This appears to be a result of the prioritization of those in working in the labour market. This invisibilises women’s contribution to reproductive labour, makes them extremely vulnerable to cuts to housing and other benefits and compounds their relative disadvantage in the labour market.
MethodsA structured interview tool, using questions designed to elicit both quantitative and qualitative data, offering the opportunity to provide more narrative information, was designed in collaboration between housing campaigners who are at the forefront of hearing stories of homelessness in Newham (Focus E15) and the authors. This tool was piloted and amended in line with suggested changes in order to access the necessary data and to ensure completion by participants. This interview tool is available publically and free to use for all housing justice campaigners and we strongly encourage activists and researchers to adopt, adapt and amend it (email t.a.gillespie@shef.ac.uk). Peer interviewers were used to recruit participants using a number of recruitment methods. First, individuals were approached leaving council housing offices in Newham (Bridge House and East Ham). This enabled interviewers to identify individuals who were not previously known to them and who had approached Newham Council for support. Second, non-random purposive sampling was then used to interview people currently living in hostels run by Newham. While this range of recruitment and sampling methods means that a range of respondents have been included in the research, however, it should also be noted that the figures presented here are reflective of the sample collected, rather than necessarily being representative of those in general facing homelessness in Newham as a whole. Such an approach, does mean, however, that the research has captured some of the most vulnerable who would not otherwise be represented, particularly in large existing datasets or in studies focused on more established communities, such as on existing estates. In other words, the mobile nature of the research sampling faithfully reflects, and arguably better captures, the “increasingly nomadic” (Watt, cited in Ponsford, 2016) nature of homelessness in contemporary London whereby individuals and families find themselves forced into mobility.
Where possible, interviews were recorded, resulting in a total of 32 recorded interviews. The intensity of flux in people’s lives and the complications they faced brought about insecure and constantly changing housing situations which made it complex to capture data. To some degree, the complex nature of flux and insecurity was better captured through qualitative analysis of the recorded interviews. The extreme instability faced by people facing homelessness made it extraordinarily difficult to collect and analyse the data and to accurately capture people’s experiences. This was due to the sheer complexity of their situations and the various institutions involved, as well a combination of significant confusion and lack of information, poor mental health amongst some respondents, often making it difficult to generate a coherent narrative.
**Methods**
A structured interview tool, using questions designed to elicit both quantitative and qualitative data, offering the opportunity to provide more narrative information, was designed in collaboration between housing campaigners who are at the forefront of hearing stories of homelessness in Newham (Focus E15) and the authors. This tool was piloted and amended in line with suggested changes in order to access the necessary data and to ensure completion by participants. This interview tool is available publically and free to use for all housing justice campaigners and we strongly encourage activists and researchers to adopt, adapt and amend it (email t.a.gillespie@shef.ac.uk).
Peer interviewers were used to recruit participants using a number of recruitment methods. First, individuals were approached leaving council housing offices in Newham (Bridge House and East Ham). This enabled interviewers to identify individuals who were not previously known to them and who had approached Newham Council for support. Second, non-random purposive sampling was then used to interview people currently living in hostels run by Newham. While this range of recruitment and sampling methods means that a range of respondents have been included in the research, however, it should also be noted that the figures presented here are reflective of the sample collected, rather than necessarily being representative of those in general facing homelessness in Newham as a whole. Such an approach, does mean, however, that the research has captured some of the most vulnerable who would not otherwise be represented, particularly in large existing datasets or in studies focused on more established communities, such as on existing estates. In other words, the mobile nature of the research sampling faithfully reflects, and arguably better captures, the “increasingly nomadic” (Watt, cited in Ponsford, 2016) nature of homelessness in contemporary London whereby individuals and families find themselves forced into mobility.
Where possible, interviews were recorded, resulting in a total of 32 recorded interviews. The intensity of flux in people’s lives and the complications they faced brought about insecure and constantly changing housing situations which made it complex to capture data. To some degree, the complex nature of flux and insecurity was better captured through qualitative analysis of the recorded interviews. The extreme instability faced by people facing homelessness made it extraordinarily difficult to collect and analyse the data and to accurately capture people’s experiences. This was due to the sheer complexity of their situations and the various institutions involved, as well a combination of significant confusion and lack of information, poor mental health amongst some respondents, often making it difficult to generate a coherent narrative.
**Findings**
***People***
The key demographic finding is that the vast majority (97%) of respondents had one or more of the following: dependents (children under 16); health or disability needs; dependents with health and disability needs or a combination of these. While these individuals may not be considered statutorily ‘vulnerable’, it is clear that those facing the hardest edge of the housing crisis are some of the most at risk groups of people with specific sets of needs. Sometimes these needs were pre-existing, while others appeared to have been exacerbated by their housing situations. This suggests that this homelessness is affecting some of the most vulnerable sections of society.
Women were disproportionately represented in the sample, as 67% (42) were female. White (including all census defined ‘White’ categories) people make up 38.7% of those interviewed (compared to 29% of the population in Newham), while Black Asian and Minority Ethnic people made up 61.3% (compared with 71% in Newham). The vast proportion were British (70%), with 9% EU nationals 20% non-EU nationals. Most respondents (59%) have dependents (mainly children, but also elderly family members or pregnant partners). Amongst dependents, seven had a disability and 20% had a health condition.
***Housing Situations***
The majority (81%) identified as having been homeless at some point in the last five years and 86% said they had to sofa-surf. In a subjective question about their housing status, 53% identified as currently homeless and 47% as currently having a place to live and therefore either under threat of homelessness or living in ongoing temporary accommodation.
Eviction was a common experience, as 73% of respondents had been evicted at some point in the last five years, while 41% had been evicted two or more times. Reasons for eviction included rent rises, cuts to benefits leading to rent arrears and family breakdown. Private landlords, the council and family members were all identified as having evicted respondents.
Transitions into homelessness were extremely complex and were frequently constituted by multiple intersecting processes including job loss, cuts to social support, rent arrears, eviction and family breakdown.
***Disability and Health Conditions***
A significant proportion of respondents had a disability (22%) or health condition (48%) which affected their housing needs. More than half (51.9%) of the people interviewed either had an issue with health or disability themselves or had a dependent with such needs. Mental health problems constituted the most common issue amongst respondents (n=18); with diabetes (n=5); arthritis (n=4); heart conditions (n=3); high blood pressure (n=2); terminally ill, HIV positive status, pneumonia and dissociative seizures (1 each) also mentioned.
Insecurity, displacement and housing conditions had an extremely destablising effect on people’s mental health, as 89% mentioned worsening mental health as a result of their housing situation. Specifically, 66% mentioned worsening depression and 25% were suffering from insomnia.
Most worryingly, in an open question about health 9% stated that they had suicidal thoughts and 9% mentioned self-harm. This compares with 4.3% of the general population reporting suicidal thoughts in the last year in response to a direct question relating to suicidal feelings in the Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Household Survey (HCSIC 2007).
For some respondents, their experiences of homelessness led to reduced self-esteem and addiction relapses. Billy (41, white-British) who was currently street homeless, had recently been evicted from temporary housing, having originally been evicted from his father’s council house when he died. He described how being homeless had “got me back on the drugs, being homeless. If no-one cares about me, why should I care about myself?” He had refused the out-of-borough housing that he had received, as he felt it would exacerbate his substance use and remove him from key sources of support:
> They offered me a place on Harold Hill, in Es-sex... There are too many drugs down there. They said it’s the only pace. I have drug coun-seling in Newham. I don’t want to leave that and go to somewhere where there are a lot of drugs... I told them to call me when they can offer me a proper place in Newham.
For others, the conditions in which they were currently living were further exacerbating physical health problems. Bruno, 57, was the legal guardian to two children from a previous relationship in which his girlfriend had died. One child has mental health issues. Bruno worked full time as a cleaner, but couldn’t keep up rent payments when his housing benefit was stopped. He was currently living in a bed and breakfast with his family. The cramped conditions were worsening his own health:
> [I have] arthritis. [I] can’t soak, [as] I can’t use the bathroom. [I’m] diabetic, I need to be able to go to the bathroom when I need to. There are 8/9 peope in the house – I have to use a bucket in my room... I feel like I’m turning mad.
Emma (24, white-British) had similarly been living in a bed and breakfast with her two young children for over a year and a half. Reductions in income support had also led her to fall behind in paying her rent. Although she identified severe health needs as a result of her current living conditions, she did not want to report these due to fears that it would lead to the removal of her children:
> I’ve got scabs from scratching and welts all over my body, I get cold sores and rashes due to stress. I don’t want to get out of bed in the morning (depression). I don’t want to tell social services how much I’m suffering because I don’t want them to take my chil-dren away. Then they would stop my housing benefit and I would never get a property and would never get my children back.
The family had initially been relocated as a result of Olympic development in the area.
She was initially evicted by a private landlord who changed the tenancies and replaced her with higher paying tenants. Having approached numerous councils, she eventually “put myself in rehab just to get a roof over my head”. She was currently living in a hostel run by Newham Council and had had to move four times in five years. Like many others, she described her living conditions as greatly exacerbating her health conditions:
> I have asthma, chronic obstructive pulmo-nary disease and now since living in new place, early stages of emphysema. I’ve got welts all over my body which open up all the time due to the stress, I can’t stop scratching them, I’m covered in them. [It has affected my] mental health, [I am] depressed, anx-ious, suicidal.
Far from extreme cases, the examples provided above are typical of the answers provided by respondents during the structured interviews.
Only 54% of respondents had contacted their GP to discuss their health problems or housing. This is suggestive of under-reporting of health issues and appears to contradict assumptions by the Department of Health that people in temporary accommodation ‘will not generally have significant problems in accessing primary health care’ (Department of Health 2010).
The relationship between poor housing and poor health indicators is well known, including by the World Health Organisation (WHO). There is also growing recognition of a mental health crisis ushered in by austerity measures undertaken in the last eight years. This research, however, demonstrates the ways in which statutory bodies, rather than responding in order to improve health through housing, are creating and exacerbating health problems through both insecure housing and also displacement within or from London.
Budget cuts to mental health services combined with widespread displacement of people creates a perfect storm which can create new health problems and exacerbate existing conditions. This increases costs to state services (including the NHS), as well as to local authorities. Perhaps most worryingly, many people are avoiding contact with health services due to fear of the involvement of social services in relation to custody of their children. This lays the basis for health problems to worsen in the absence of appropriate care, creating more serious needs and vulnerabilities in the near and more distant future.
***Employment and Assistance***
Amongst the respondents 19% were employed, 6.3% were self-employed and 12.5% ‘other’. The remainder of the sample stated that they were currently unemployed. Current jobs included cleaning (3); office and administrative work (2); NHS receptionist (1); University counseling support officer (1); head waiter (1); school support office (1) hairdressing (1); market trader (1); and care work (1). Seven respondents were students in further or higher education.
Lisa (white-British) an 18 year old woman who currently was working part time and sofa surfing, had been evicted by her parents. She said she:
> went to Newham council, [they had] no place for me to stay because I’m not pregnant, mentally ill or elderly... I asked for B&B they refused. I said I was 18 and would be sleep-ing on park benches. They said because I’m 18 they can’t do anything, if I went five days ago I would have got help. I was 18 five days ago.
Michael (25, African-Caribbean British) was working full time as charity fundraiser for a major charity, he explained that he felt he had been given inaccurate or misleading information:
> I applied as homeless in Newham, eventually got put in a hostel. Then when I got moved to [a homeless hostel] I was told I was gonna get nominated for a place - a council place. So I was told not to bid, but that has now proved to be untrue. They told me my tenancy would be for 9 months and then I would get a 1 bed flat. Then they told me you have to be here for 2 years minimum before you get a place. Now the council has taken over the building, [a lettings agent] are putting in temporary accomodation tenants. Now all I’m entitled to is a room in a shared house.
Since 91% of the sample received some form of income assistance, the majority of people in the study were liable to being impacted by recent changes in the level of state provision and the conditionality attached to it. Almost half (49%) said that changes in assistance they received had affected their housing situation. Ahmed (26, British-Asian), had been evicted twice, the first time because he had no official contract and couldn’t keep up the rent:
> I got sanctioned last year. I missed an ap-pointment because of a funeral. I started get-ting into rent arrears because of that, with council tax. I had to put it on a credit card. At that stage I nearly got evicted due to that one sanction. The service charge and inter-est were massive. There was a 2 week period where I literally had nothing. It was difficult, I was trying to budget, but once sanctioned it was too much, really hard.
Having been told he was not a priority by the council, he was about to sleep on the streets, Newham council placed him in a hostel. He now faces eviction by the council from the temporary hostel he is currently housed in and therefore currently faces the prospect of being street homeless once more.
***Displacement and out-of-area housing offers***
A majority of respondents (58%) had either been offered housing outside of the borough or told to look for it themselves. Some respondents had been repeatedly offered housing outside of the borough over a number of years. Respondents reported being offered out of borough placements as far back as 2005, with 20% of the sample stating that they were offered housing out of borough between 2005-2008. That is, before the Coalition government, financial crisis, cuts to housing benefit and the Localism Act (2011). As such, this is a process which has been occurring for over a decade, but which has gathered pace as a result of drastic changes to social support. It is clear that out of borough offers are now systemic in Newham.
A Supreme Court ruling in 2015 meant that councils ‘must now provide evidence of a search for accommodation inside and near to their local authority for homeless households’ (Douglas 2015). However, many of our respondents appear to have been offered or ‘suggested’ to look outside both the borough (58%) and London (44%) without the relevant evidence provided to demonstrate a lack of housing inside London.
***Experiences out-of-borough***
Bethany (24, White-British) was housed in a hostel in Newham, according to her this was on the basis she would be offered a council property. After three years, Newham Council began to offer her places outside of London. Despite trying to resist these placements, she argues that she was told “if you don’t accept that, we’re not going to offer you anything else”. She eventually accepted a property in Hastings. The conditions in her new flat are extremely poor.
> When it rains and stuff... it drips through. My windows, they are so badly done they all leak, so all along the window ledge gets soaking wet. When I went to London for Christmas I was there for a couple of weeks, I came back and my sofa was soaked, my curtains were ruined, I had to get new curtains because they grew mould on them... In the kitchen, because they haven’t cleaned out the gutter-ing at the top, I’ve got mould coming there.
Despite these conditions, Bethany argues that she would accept these in order to be nearer to her family:
> I’d like to be where my family are, I’d like to be able to just ring someone and be like ‘do you want to come round for a cup of tea?... I find myself calling my mum for no reason, or I’ll make up a reason to have to ring her and speak to her, and like same for my nan – I’ll make up a reason like did you just see that thing on the telly? She’ll be like no I wasn’t watching it and I’ll be like “oh alright then”.
Placement out-of-area has further detrimental financial implications. For those in temporary accommodation, they frequently need to pay for storage for belongings or buy entirely new furniture. Constant moving also means that individuals oscillate between purchasing expensive new items and having to pay for storage. Some individuals had lost all of their belongings when they had been unable to pay for storage:
> The landlord upped the rent... My husband passed away and my immigration case was going through, it was very difficult... I was in our own place, but it got repossessed when my husband died... I found the next place myself. It was a single room for me and my son in shared accommodation... I was there for 1 year and 2 months. The rooms were empty when we arrived, had to buy every-thing, I was sleeping on the floor. Now I have had to take everything to storage when we moved to [a hostel]. It’s very expensive. I was told it would be one month, it’s been five.
Many in temporary accommodation are expected to continue to pay for utilities. Jose is living in two studio flats with his wife and four children. He was faced with bailiffs from the Hertfordshire town council, where he is currently housed by Newham Council, for unpaid council tax, as he expected to pay for both properties. Those in work often struggled to sustain their jobs, having been placed so far outside the city: ‘We have to go to London, we can’t afford it. Because they don’t take into consideration that almost half of the wages go into commuting. Are you supposed to fly to work?’ (Jose, 55, white-Portuguese). Others had had to give up their jobs as they were located too far away from their current employment. Some had explicitly been told to give up their jobs in order to accept housing outside the city. Cassandra described being forced to be permanently available to travel back into the city to attend housing appointments: ‘I don’t live temporary life even though I’m in temporary accommodation’.
Out of borough placements are also having a detrimental effect on children. Anita (17, black-Portuguese) was evicted as part of a family of seven when her landlord said that her family had built up rent arrears.
> My mum has a brand new born baby. We had to sleep at my cousin’s house - all seven of us. We came back here [to the housing of-fice], they found us a temporary house in Leytonstone. My school is Newham... I have to get up at 5 am to get to school, and so much money goes on travel.
The National Homelessness Advice Service [NHAS] is a partnership between Shelter and Citizens Advice, funded by the Department for Communities and Local Government has issued best practice advice, which includes advice to “equip families with complete info”, provision of support with travel and ensuring thorough [suitability screening](http://www.nhas.org.uk/docs/8367_NHAS_Out_of_Area_Best_Practice_Report_v21.pdf). It appears that many of these principles are not being followed, leaving individuals and families in unsuitable housing with little support in order to continue their education or employment, with severe knock-on effects on their futures as a result.
**Acknowledgements**
This study was funded by the Feminist Review Trust and Leeds Social Sciences Impact Acceleration Account in association with the ESRC. We would like to thank all of the participants who gave up their time to take part in the study and for being willing to share their stories. Dr Paul Watt (Birkbeck, University of London) provided us with sage guidance throughout the life of the project, from design to analysis. The project has greatly benefited from his expertise in this area. We are also very grateful to the strategy group of Focus E15 for their support and enthusiasm.
**References**
Department of Health. 2010. ‘Healthcare for Single Homeless People’ http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20130107105354/http://www.dh.gov.uk/prod_consum_dh/groups/dh_digitalassets/@dh/@en/@ps/documents/digitalasset/dh_114369.pdf Accessed 20 July 2016.
Douglas, D. 2015. ‘Landmark case tightens rules on out-of-borough placements’ http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/landmark-case-tightens-rules-on-out-of-borough-placements/7009151.article Accessed 18 July 2016.
Hancox, D. 2015. VICE Exclusive: The Shocking Data That Shows How Struggling Families Are Being Forced Out of London http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/dan-hancox-forced-out-of-london-data Accessed 18 July 2016.
Nadeem, B. 2008. ‘MPs calls for action on temporary accommodation’ Inside Housing http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/mp-calls-for-action-on-temporary-accommodation/6500528.article accessed 12th June 2016.
Ponsford, M. (2016) ‘Locked out by sky-high rents, London’s “nomads” fight for a secure home’, place, available at: http://www.thisisplace.org/i/?id=4d097e24-ad1c-407a-b4c7-0b4acb28cc4c.
Spurr (2015) ‘East London moves fuel out-of-London placement surge’ http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/east-london-moves-fuel-out-of-london-placement-surge/7011469.article Accessed 20 November 2016.
Watt, P. and Bernstock, P. (2017) ‘Legacy for whom? Housing in Post-Olympic East London’, in P. Cohen and P. Watt (Eds.) *London 2012 and the Post-Olympics City: A Hollow Legacy?* Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
World Health Organisation 2015. *Healthy Housing - Experts Call for International Guidelines* [online] (Geneva: World Health Organization). Available at http://www.who.int/hia/housing/en/ Accessed 9 August 2015).

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# How practicing the right to home becomes a crime?
Challenging private property with housing practices and solidarity actions to ensure that people have access to housing has been systematically discouraged by means of creating obstacles, vilification, stigmatization and juridical action. These practices have been referred to as criminalization of solidarity. Criminalization of solidarity in Europe has been soaring after the crisis in 2008. Individuals involved in the anti-eviction actions have been penalized and arrested, squatting has been illegalized in most European countries and replaced with profitable practices as property guardianship. The most severe attacks have been directed towards solidarity with migrants, including self-organized housing usually run by migrants and solidarity groups.
Challenging private property with housing practices and solidarity actions to ensure that people have access to housing has been systematically discouraged by means of creating obstacles, vilification, stigmatization and juridical action. These practices have been referred to as criminalization of solidarity. Criminalization of solidarity in Europe has been soaring after the crisis in 2008. Individuals involved in the anti-eviction actions have been penalized and arrested, squatting has been illegalized in most European countries and replaced with profitable practices as property guardianship. The most severe attacks have been directed towards solidarity with migrants, including self-organized housing usually run by migrants and solidarity groups.
## Proposed resources
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## How to learn together
Read the proposed articles before you come to the session. Collectively build the arguments pro and contra the solidarity housing movement. Split into two groups. Each group represents a group of lawyers. The first group is in favor of the solidarity housing movement. The second is against it. Each group articulates its own argument. Use what you have read. Come back together. Organize a discussion in the form of a court debate. Share your notes with other Pirate Care Syllabus users.
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# Ana Vilenica & Nemanja Pantović: 'On the frontlines of Serbia’s struggle for housing justice'
**In ROAR Magazine, October 14, 2019**
On a cold morning in the autumn of 2017, a group of neighbors, family members and housing activists rally to a call of a family in distress. They are locked inside their apartment, confronted by two goons and a lawyer representing a man who claims to be the new owner of the home. A bailiff is standing on the side, waiting for the family to sign a paper renouncing their claim on the property. Ten policemen are waiting outside the door and in the courtyard, preventing a group of housing activists from entering the stairwell.
The family had fallen into debt a few years back, but they have since managed to repay the loan. The court ignored this fact, proceeded with the foreclosure and the bailiff auctioned their flat with an estimated worth of €90.000 euros for merely €25.000.
Six hours pass, the owner of the house faints, falls to the ground and suffers an epileptic seizure lasting two hours. His wife struggles to keep the two bulky men from carrying him away. The activists call an ambulance, but the police — tired, shaken, but still following orders — won’t let the medics in. Under a barrage of insults, threats and persuasion they cave in and let them through. Seizing the opportunity, the activists slip by the weary officers and barge into the flat.
Twenty people are now squatting the flat demanding that the bailiff and the police leave. They do and so does the lawyer. It seems that the siege is over. Two hours later, someone knocks on the door. The lawyer of the new owner, escorted by hooded thugs with clubs and metal bars, has returned to finish the eviction. Seeing that people are still inside the flat, they leave after a brief exchange of threats.
The family is still living in their flat today; the eviction has been put on hold while they are fighting in the courts for the right to their home.
Their story is shared by many others — families, pensioners, single mothers, workers, refugees and war veterans who are struggling against evictions in Serbia. Over the past eight years, since the system of private bailiffs and their extended power to implement foreclosures was introduced, the constant attack on tenants and their right to housing has left many in a state of constant fear.
The crackdown on housing rights did not go unanswered. Individual acts of resistance led to a formation of a nationwide movement and an organization that stands at the forefront of the struggle for housing justice — the Roof.
**Roots of the eviction epidemic**
Before the breakup of Yugoslavia, more than 50 percent of all housing was “societal housing”, provided through workers’ monthly contributions. In the early 1990s, the need to fill up state coffers to fund the military during the Yugoslav war led to the decision to allow public companies and state institutions to sell off societal flats.
The housing fund was abolished and all forms of state and cooperative housing ceased to exist. As a result of this “transition”, Serbia today has a high percentage of home ownership — 98.3 percent is privately owned — but the owners are mostly poor and struggle to pay maintenance costs and utility bills.
Those who refused — or missed out — on the opportunity to invest in this newly-privatized real estate, struggled on the housing market that developed at the beginning of the new millennium. Stripped from life savings through inflation and unemployment, many were forced to get loans from speculative, mostly foreign banks and buy their homes from dodgy private investors that sometimes sold the same — usually unfinished apartments — multiple times.
The self-managed and state-owned construction sector faced the same bleak economic prospects as other sectors during the transition to capitalism. Construction giants such as Trudbenik and Komgrap that provided high quality flats on a mass scale were privatized and then went bankrupt.
Over 800.000 refugees, mainly Serbs and Roma, fled from neighboring states to Serbia during the wars in Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo. Since the state stopped investing in social housing, many of the refugees still live in improvised collective housing centers. Under these circumstances home ceased to be a place of refuge from the hardships of life and became another battleground of class struggle.
**Accelerating the demise of the working class**
In order to access credit in Serbia, an individual’s total assets need to be provided as collateral. In many cases this means their home. In a country of unregulated, low paid labor where 25 percent of the population lives on the brink of poverty and 7.2 percent lives in extreme poverty, privately owned houses and apartments are often the only assets available for seizure.
The eviction epidemic started with the privatization of the eviction protocol in 2011. Through legislative changes, the state introduced private bailiffs as a supposed solution to the problem of “inefficient enforcement” of court verdicts — previously done by public court bailiffs. This reform was adopted by the ruling center-right Democratic Party’s government under pressure from the European Union.
While the narrative designed for the general public was that the private bailiffs would provide working people with a quick way to collect back payments of their salaries the reality fell short of this promise.
Instead of workers from privatized and ruined factories being able to claim their redundancy pay and wages, the law only accelerated the demise of the already impoverished working class. Justice became accessible only to those who were able to pay the bailiff fee. The new enforcement system provided banks, loan sharks, utility companies, corporations and wealthy tycoons with an additional tool for the dispossession of poor and indebted members of society.
The design of the new system implies the bailiff’s personal interest in the enforcement process. Since bailiffs have the power to decide how the debt will be repaid, it often happens that they choose to sell a flat even for a relatively small debt. The bailiff is the one who assesses the value of the property and is also the one who sells it, keeping a hefty commission.
Since their services are expensive, they are not affordable for working class people. Flats and houses are sold at auctions that are often organized in obscure and isolated places. Homes are often sold at prices much times lower than the estimated market value, and there have been cases where buyers have been other bailiffs, their relatives or people close to them. Other buyers are wealthy individuals, banks and loan sharks.
Peoples’ misery doesn’t end with their flats being sold. The debtor is required to pay the enforcement fee for being kicked out of their own flat. At the end of 2017, a single mother was thrown out of a flat that she bought but subsequently lost when it was restituted to a previous owner. A bailiff who grossed €800.000 that year alone, charged them €11.000 for the cost of her enforcement “services”.
Bailiffs are assisted by the police or private security firms. Evictions often involve the forced removal of people from their homes and communities, frequent aggressive behavior and intimidation by the bailiffs, the police and private security. On more than one occasion, social service workers threatened mothers to take away their children if they failed to comply with eviction orders. In late 2018, a man’s dog was euthanized on the spot when the bailiff came to evaluate his property while he was not home.
In Serbia, the state has no obligation to protect the evicted. The institution of emergency accommodation has been abolished and there is no housing support for the homeless.
**Debt enforcement**
With the legislative changes that came into force in 2016, private bailiffs were renamed “public bailiffs” to hide the true nature of their work. Control over the bailiffs was transferred from courts to the bailiffs themselves — complaints about fraud and irregularities now are to be submitted to the ones who allegedly committed them.
This cartel of 215 “public bailiffs” established a racket through which they ruthlessly enforce debts with the assistance of the police. In addition to acting on court decisions, bailiffs also act on so-called “credible documents” from creditors — such as utility or phone company bills and debts towards banks — without prior court verdicts. At the beginning of 2019, bailiffs were tasked with enforcing more than 300.000 individual cases of debt in a country of six million inhabitants.
Today, the enforcement of debt repayments has become paramount — it can be done from dawn till dusk, under extreme weather, during holidays and without taking health and socio-economic status of the people being evicted into account. People often lose not only their homes, but also their furniture and family heirlooms, which are auctioned off. Public bailiffs also confiscate up to two-thirds of debtors’ salaries and pensions. There have been cases of illegal confiscation of social benefits and alimonies.
The privatization of the bailiff system, aimed at dismantling the so-called “debtors lobby”, gave rise to a new stratum of the middle class that is profiteering from the bailiff system — bailiffs, sales agents and auction hosts, moving companies, better-off buyers, locksmith and private security firms. Debt enforcement continues even when irregularities or frauds have been identified in the court — nothing delays the swift hand of the so-called justice of the capitalist state.
In 2017 alone, 3,736 real estate seizures were carried out, according to the Chamber of Bailiffs, while the daily newspaper Politika states that more than 3,000 families have been evicted from their apartments in the last seven years. Homelessness is being produced at the same rate of new housing blocks.
In Belgrade, over 15 percent of its nearly 700.000 apartments is vacant, while in other cities this number can rise up to 20 percent. At the same time, Serbia is the European champion in terms of overcrowded housing with more than half of the households classified as such.
**Growing repression of the housing movement**
At the beginning of 2017, several left-wing organizations and individuals founded a housing justice organization called the Roof (Združena akcija Krov nad glavom). Through community organizing, advocacy work, research, awareness campaigns, protests, bank occupations and more than a hundred anti-eviction actions, the organization has played a crucial role in shifting the ideological paradigm — evictions are no longer viewed as private affairs of indebted individuals, but as the illegitimate dispossession of ordinary people by the rich, which must be resisted.
More and more people who are struggling with housing problems are joining the movement. The main goal of the Roof is to struggle for a society where no one will be homeless, a society where the right to a home is guaranteed.
Solidarity and self-organization of people in the streets has been growing. Neighbors and co-workers are getting increasingly involved in anti-eviction actions and the state is pressuring the movement. As of now, members of the organization are faced with more than 20 individual criminal charges for obstructing police — each carrying a potential prison sentence from one to three years.
In April 2019 the police took 17 activist of the Roof who gathered in solidarity with Mandić family in Novi Sad into custody. The Mandić family had invested €40.000 in a joint construction effort together with another family who owned the land. They gave the money in advance, without a written contract, counting on the verbal agreement. Instead of honoring the agreement the landowners took the money and filed a lawsuit against Mandić family. Without written proof that they gave the money to the landowners Mandić family lost the case and were evicted from the half-finished house.
Another mass arrest took place in the summer of 2018, when police surrounded a building where 22 refugees from Kosovo, Bosnia and Croatia had been occupying empty flats for the past ten years. The Commissariat for Refugees was determined to evict them. Activists charged the police line and managed to break through to the building and block the entrance. They were all rounded up and sent to the police station. Thanks to the heroic efforts that were televised, the eviction was canceled and the Commissariat agreed to negotiate.
Last June, two activists of the Roof were attacked and brutally beaten on the university campus by two masked men. The same men had been seen plastering “Serbian Right” posters on the campus — a right-wing proxy party that does the dirty work for the ruling Serbian Progressive Party.
This attack clearly reveals the reactionary role of the various right-wing organizations that are under the direct control of the government. They serve as a tool for dealing with people who are fighting for a better and just society. This attack is an example of increased repression and the determination of the state to criminalize solidarity by all means necessary.
**"No one without a home, a home for all — now!"**
After two years of intensive street mobilizations and anti-eviction struggles, the government reacted to the mounting pressure by changing the Law on Enforcement. The law was drafted with the support of the EU, USAID and the Council of foreign investors, but without the participation of the Roof and the public, without prior public debate and quickly voted through parliament during the summer of 2019.
Instead of addressing pressing grievances with the current system of evictions, the state criminalized solidarity by implementing fines and prison sentences for “eviction obstruction”. When the law comes into force, even filming an eviction procedure will be deemed as “obstruction of the eviction process” and can land you in prison. The law also ramped up eviction costs as a way of discouraging people from resisting. This is a clear indication that the state stood up for the protection of the bailiffs’ and unscrupulous creditors’ interests.
In June 2019, as an attempt to pressure the law makers, the Roof organized a public protest under the slogan “No one without a home, a home for all — now!” The rally began with a minute of silence for Ljubica Stajić, who had committed suicide a few days before by setting her apartment on fire.
Several days later, activists of the Roof protested outside the European Union embassy in Serbia and demanded a meeting with the European Delegation chief — since EU institutions have been supporting the implementation of the law on enforcement. The EU had praised the results of the bailiffs in its report on the progress of Serbia in EU integration, and had secretly funded and organized so-called round table discussions about the law that had been closed for the general public. The European Delegation avoided a meeting with activists of the Roof in which the question of the EU’s responsibility in the process of passing this criminal law was to be raised.
Thanks to the pressure from organized resistance, evictions have become difficult to ignore; instead of giving up, more and more people choose to defend their homes by seeking help in their communities. The struggle is spreading from the capital to other cities, towns and villages and a new nationwide movement for the right of housing is within sight.
What has changed in the last two years is that the dispossessed are no longer left to their own means.

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## How to learn together
Read the proposed articles before you come to the session. Watch the film together. Organize a discussion round. Use a mind map to collectively organize your thoughts. Feed in as much detail as you can. Use critically what you have read. Include your personal experience. Share your mind map with other Pirate Care Syllabus users by downloading it on the web page.
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# Raquel Rolnik: 'The Global Financialisation on Housing'
**In *Urban Warfare: Housing Under the Empire of Finance*, Verso, 2019**
Scenes from the beginning of the twenty-first century, September 2010.
It was a cold and windy morning in Astana, the futuristic capital of Kazakhstan. After crossing a sort of plateau ablaze with the shiny creations of fashionable big-name architects, we finally arrived in a large tent to meet the hunger strikers. Lying on hammocks surrounded by signs written in Kazakh and Russian, Asian-looking elderly people were mixed with red-haired white women and middle-aged couples, taking shifts in beds and chairs. Having paid the instalments for apartments they had acquired off-plan, they were victims of construction companies that had gone bankrupt and disappeared, leaving the buildings’ skeletons unfinished and families with neither home nor money.
Astana’s hunger strikers were just the most daring among the 16,000 borrowers affected by the bankruptcy of – mainly Turkish – construction companies that had already halted 450 projects.[^1] In addition to the hunger strikers, there were also those affected by foreclosures in Almaty, the country’s historic capital and economic centre. During the years of credit boom, Kazakh banks and their clients contracted debts in both US dollars and euros, and were now struggling to pay their obligations.
In Astana and Almaty, the victims of the economic crisis, many now homeless, told us that they had been strongly encouraged by the government to buy apartments via mortgage credit certificates. (The president, Nursultan Nazarbayev, led the Communist Party during the USSR era and has been head of the government since Independence.) They also reported that the public institutions in which many of them used to work had even sponsored the sales of apartments to their employees. The group of strikers in Almaty, mostly made up of women, received me in a small apartment decorated with a banner that read: ‘Government, help your people’.[^2]
**May 2012**
We climbed the highest hill of Puente Alto, in Santiago de Chile’s metropolitan region, in order to look across the Bajos de Mena area. It is one of the neighbourhoods in which thousands of social housing projects built by private companies are concentrated. They were commercialised via an association of mortgage credit certificates and governmental subsidies to low-income borrowers. These estates have been built in Chile since the beginning of the 1980s. The view is impressive: a sea of houses and four- or five-storey buildings as far as you can see.
The housing rights activists who accompanied me pointed to Volcán II, a housing estate in the process of being demolished. They explained that this neighbourhood has become one of the metropolitan region’s most problematic areas from a social point of view: drug addiction and trafficking, domestic violence and social vulnerability.[^3]
They also showed me a 1983 document, written at the moment of the launch of Chile’s housing program. It was signed by the then minister of housing and urbanism, a man from the Chilean Chamber of Construction. In the document, he declared that the need for housing is ‘an element of social order that is translated and expressed in square metres’ and that the demand for housing is ‘a factor of economic order that is materialised in monetary quantities’.[^4]
**Autumn 2009**
The streets of Pacoima, a few kilometres away from Los Angeles, California, looked like a ghost town. In the suburban landscape of front yards reaching to the streets, signs of abandonment were everywhere: mountains of forgotten rubble; dozens of ‘For Sale’ and ‘For Rent’ signs next to mailboxes; doors and windows sealed with wood or bricks. The minister of a local church, who accompanied me in the visit, told sad stories of families who’d had to leave their homes because they could not afford the repayments on their loans. He evoked the difficulties of those who remained in the neighbourhood, struggling to survive in a town that, having lost its fiscal base, could not keep basic services running.
At the end of a street, in an old SUV transformed into a home, Roger, Mary and their young children were cooking pasta on an improvised stove: ‘We’ve lost our house and we simply have nowhere to go.’
**November 2012**
As morning broke in a neighbourhood of Bilbao in the Basque Country, cash machines and bank headquarters were covered in graffiti: ‘murderers’. It was the day after fifty-three-year-old Amaia Egaña’s suicide. She jumped from the window of her fourth-floor apartment, moments before being evicted. She had failed to pay the instalments for the bank loan that she had taken out to buy the apartment. This was the second death in similar circumstances in less than one month.[^5] Bilbao was not the only – nor the most seriously – affected city in terms of foreclosures. According to data from the Spanish judicial system, between 2007 and the third trimester of 2011, 349,438 home foreclosures were initiated in Spain. According to the same source, on each day of 2011, 212 new foreclosure processes were opened.[^6]
**1 March 2012**
In Barcelona, one of the cities most rocked by the crisis, I attend an assembly of the Plataforma de Afectados por la Hipoteca (Platform for People Affected by Mortgages). Since 2009, this social movement has worked to organise the people concerned in order to make the crisis visible, establishing support networks and lobbying for the promotion of public policies to address this situation. I listen to dozens of testimonies during the meetings: Latin American migrants who lost their jobs and could no longer pay the instalments; pensioners who, as guarantors of their children’s loans, now must hand over their own home to banks; couples who lost their home and still have huge debts … All this because, in Spain, with the drop in property prices after the bubble burst, the value that banks obtain from the sale of a house does not cover the entirety of the debt.
Moreover, if no buyer is present at the auction of the confiscated house (which happens in 90 per cent of cases), the law stipulates that the value of the property covers only 60 per cent of the total loan.[^7] As a result, in addition to losing their homes, people remain mired in debt.
**Summer 2011**
At dawn in Tel Aviv, one of the city’s most important arteries, Dizengoff Street, is filled by tents. The occupation of public spaces was part of the strategy of thousands of demonstrators – mostly young people – against the lack of accessible housing. The decade-long spiralling rise of real-estate prices had reached its peak. The lack of rental options and public housing in areas in which economic opportunities are concentrated had put housing policy at the centre of Israel’s political agenda that summer.
**August 2013**
When I entered the nineteenth-century hall of an old factory, now converted into a culture and events centre in Manchester, I remembered Friedrich Engels’s writings and thought: ‘The saga started here’.[^8]
We arrived just as the first part of the meeting was about to finish. On the walls, signs written in marker spelt out strategies and schedules for the following months. It was one of the regional meetings for the campaign against the bedroom tax – one of the coalition government’s recently implemented fiscal austerity measures that most severely affected residents of British housing estates. Our presence was announced, and anyone who felt comfortable sharing their experience was invited through to another room.
Around thirty people gathered next door. There was hesitation at first. Many of them had known each other for months, having participated together in preparatory mobilisations and meetings; however, they had never talked about their personal dramas. A middle-aged lady stood up and said that she was a professional nurse, a widow, and that she used the extra bedroom in her house to occasionally host her two granddaughters. Her daughter, addicted to cocaine, was unable to look after the children in moments of relapse. Losing the two-bedroom house would mean inability to provide this support to her daughter and granddaughters.
Another woman said she suffered from depression and, having lived for thirty years on the same estate, could count on a network of friendly neighbours to help her keep stable. Therefore, she said, she chose not to move out, despite having to pay a penalty to live alone in a two-bedroom apartment. Ashamed, she admitted that now she could hardly afford to buy food, so that, as well as resorting to food banks,[^9] she had often looked for left-overs in the estate’s bins.
Other accounts followed, but the most touching moment – at least for me – was when a young man, in an electric wheelchair and showing clear signs of a learning disability, said that he could never move away from the estate where he lived, alone, in a two-bedroom apartment. For him, daily life required a herculean effort to remain autonomous and dignified despite his extremely fragile physical and mental situation. His life was entirely based on his existence – and permanence – in that community.
**October 2010**
After walking for seventy kilometres, a forty-year-old Indian carpenter suffers a fatal heart attack. The goal of his walk was to borrow money from friends who lived in a different town, in order to pay his micro-credit debts. A report from the Indian government stated that his death was ‘due to pressure put by the micro-finance institutions for repayment’. In 2002, the carpenter had borrowed US$350 from a micro-credit institution in order to build a room in his house. His wife, working in a tobacco factory, had already borrowed US$1,100 from her employers. In 2008, he was persuaded by another micro-credit agent to borrow an additional US$330 in order to cover the previous debts. When he died, the payment of all three loans was more than twenty weeks late. This was not the first nor the last death related to micro-credit debts occurring that year in the state of Andhra Pradesh.[^10]
The scenes I have described – in places as diverse as Europe, the US, Latin America, the Middle East and Asia – are the expression and result of a long process of deconstruction of housing as a social good and its transformation into a commodity and a financial asset, which began in the first decade of the twenty-first century.
The extent and impact of this process go far beyond the financial subprime mortgage crisis that, spreading from the US since 2007, contaminated the international financial system. It is, in fact, the takeover of the housing sector by finance – the structural element of contemporary capitalism. We live under the empire of finance and fictitious capital hegemony, an era of increasing dominance of rent extraction over productive capital.[^11] The international literature on political economy of housing has termed this process ‘financialisation’, that is, ‘the increasing dominance of financial actors, markets, practices, measurements and narratives, at various scales, resulting in a structural transformation of economies, firms (including financial institutions), states and households’.[^12]
The promotion of the ideology of homeownership,[^13] already deeply rooted in some societies and more recently introduced in others, has been a central element of the new paradigm of housing. Together with the ‘socialisation of credit’, it supported a double movement: on one hand, the inclusion of middle- and low-income consumers into financial circuits; on the other, the takeover of the housing sector by global finance. This process opened a new frontier for capital accumulation, allowing the free circulation of funds throughout almost all urbanised land.[^14]
Between 1980 and 2010, the value of the world’s financial assets – stocks, debentures, private and government bonds, bank investments – increased by a factor of 16.2, while the world’s GDP increased by less than a factor of five in the same period.[^15] This pool of super-accumulation resulted not only from the profits earned by large corporations, but also from the emergence of economies such as China. This ‘wall of money’[^16] increasingly sought new fields of application, transforming whole sectors (such as commodities, education financing and health care) into assets to feed the hunger for new vectors of profitable investment. The imbalance between the size of the available financial capital and the domestic markets from which they originated resulted – mainly from the 1990s – in the search for internationalisation of investments. This environment was responsible for creating a structural scarcity of high-quality collateral. There was a wall of money as if airborne, seeking a ‘spatial fix’ (David Harvey’s concept), a place to land.[^17]
The creation, reform and strengthening of housing financial systems became one of these new fields for surplus investment, both for macroeconomics and domestic finance and for this new flux of international capital. The creation of a subprime mortgage market was one of the main vehicles used to connect domestic systems of housing finance to global markets. However, other non-bank financial instruments, as well as interbank loans, allowed local banks and other intermediaries to increase their leverage, enlarging credit availability.[^18] The entrance of global surpluses of capital allowed credit to grow beyond internal markets’ sizes and capacities, creating and inflating real-estate bubbles.
The takeover of the housing sector by finance does not represent the mere opening of another field of investment for capital. It is, in fact, a peculiar form of value storage, as it directly relates macroeconomics to individuals and families, and allows, through financing mechanisms, the interconnection of many central actors of the global financial system – such as pension funds, investment banks, shadow banking, credit institutions and public institutions.[^19]
In highly dynamic economies, including some EU countries and the US, homeownership, because of its capacity to feed growth via credit, was also responsible for propelling the rise in household consumption in a context of wage reduction and limited employment growth.[^20]
On the other hand, the public or semi-public nature of housing institutions and financial policies defines this sector as one of high political relevance.[^21] No setting-up of housing financing systems – regardless of its degree of connection to global finance – can happen without state action. Government intervention is needed not only to regulate finance, but also to build the political hegemony of the notion of home as a commodity and financial asset. Therefore, in every context that I have observed in different nation states, this movement also had significant political effects by creating and consolidating a conservative popular base, in which citizens are replaced by consumers and players in capital markets. It is in this sense that we may affirm, with Fernandez and Aalbers, that ‘This housing-finance elixir acts like a political drug.’[^22]
Finally, we must flag up the huge impact that changes in housing provision formats have over cities’ structures. Through land markets and urban regulation, the new political economy of housing also involved a new political economy of urbanisation, restructuring cities. It is not only a new housing policy, but also a redesign of cities by the expansion of an urban, real-estate/financial complex.[^23]
Thousands of mortgaged lives, the subprime victims of a decade-long credit supply boom; empty neighbourhoods, desolate cities; demonstrators occupying streets and public spaces for months; a hunger strike of proprietors deprived of their promised apartments. Some of the scenes described at the beginning of this chapter took place in the immediate wake of the 2007 US subprime mortgage crisis. After the bubble burst, the crisis quickly spread across the world, at the speed of financial products and with the intensity of the globalisation of markets to which the mortgage market was connected. It is not surprising that the first sector affected by the crisis was housing. Supplied by pension funds, hedge funds, private equities and other ‘fictional products’, housing became a fictional product itself when it was taken over by finance.[^24]
The intensity of this change can be described as a movement that transformed a ‘sleeping beauty’ – the hitherto inert, immobile and illiquid housing from the Bretton Woods period – into a neoliberal ‘fantastic ballet’, in which assets leap from hand to hand through fast and constant transactions.[^25]
That movement led to a change in the paradigm of housing policy in almost every nation on the planet. Formulated in Wall Street and in the City of London, rolled out for the first time by North American and British neoliberal politicians at the end of the 1970s and beginning of the 1980s, the change in the economic role of housing was further powered by the fall of the Berlin Wall and the free market hegemony that followed. Adopted by governments or imposed as a conditionality to access loans by multilateral financial institutions – such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) – the new paradigm is based mainly on the implementation of policies that create stronger and bigger housing financial markets, drawing in the low- and middle-income consumers previously excluded from them.
At the end of the 1970s and throughout the 1980s, in response to economic and fiscal crises, a series of policies began to dismantle the basic institutional components that sustained the welfare state systems. Among the roots of these crises, especially relevant were the drop of Fordist sectors’ profitability, the intensification of international competition, the exacerbation of deindustrialisation and mass unemployment, and the suspension of the Bretton Woods monetary system. The set of policies adopted by states after the crisis of Fordist development was generically named ‘neoliberalism’.[^26]
Despite being a general tendency, neoliberal restructuring strategies are applied to specific institutional configurations, particular socio-political power constellations, and pre-existing spatial configurations. In other words, since neoliberalism is an eminently unequal process, any perspective that ignores each country’s political and economic context has little explanatory strength.
The importance of contexts becomes clear when we examine the reforms of housing systems in different countries in that period. In general terms, there is a move to dismantle social and public housing policies, destabilise security of tenure – including rental arrangements – and convert the home into a financial asset. However, this process is path-dependent: the institutional scenarios inherited by each country are fundamental for the construction of the emergent neoliberal strategies. Neoliberal policies must be understood as an amalgam between these two moments: it is a process of partial destruction of what exists and of trend creation of new structures.
In countries such as Britain or the Netherlands, with their strong welfare state systems, the new watchword was privatisation – or even destruction – of public housing stocks, and drastic reduction of public funding for social housing. Instead, the creation of a mortgage-based financial system was stimulated in order to encourage the purchase of homes in the private market. Moreover, subsidies began to be redirected towards supply rather than demand.
This budget reduction and the demolition of public housing units also occurred in the US. However, there are significant differences. Firstly, the idea of a welfare state system was never fully implanted there. Moreover, the support for homeownership based on mortgage credit certificates has been the guiding principle of US housing policy since the 1930s. Throughout the 1980s, the building of public housing units by the state was gradually replaced by a policy of mass stimulation of home purchase via subprime credit. Everywhere, the presence of these credit certificates and the deregulation of the rental market were designed to dismantle existing options of access to housing, and stimulate home-purchase as the only pathway to a roof over one’s head. Spain is one of the paradigmatic examples of this route.
Twenty years ago, an influential World Bank report – Housing: Enabling Markets to Work – summarised this new line of thought on housing policy.[^27] This document contains not only arguments about how important the housing sector would be to the economy, but also directives to governments on how best to formulate their policies. Since the 1990s, housing financing grew radically in developed economies. In the US, UK, Denmark, Australia and Japan, for example, residential mortgage markets represent between 50 and 100 per cent of GDP.[^28]
According to another World Bank document, intended to promote mortgage markets in emergent economies, other countries have also seen an increase in housing financialisation, although at a slower pace. Residential mortgage markets in South Korea, South Africa, Malaysia, Chile, and the Baltic countries accounted for 20 to 35 per cent of their GDPs. More recently, this phenomenon arrived in other countries (China, Thailand, Mexico, the majority of EU new members, Morocco, Jordan, Brazil, Turkey, Peru, Kazakhstan and Ukraine), where residential mortgage markets represent between 6 and 17 per cent of GDP. According to the World Bank, this ‘progress’ can also be observed in some less developed countries such as Indonesia, Egypt, Pakistan, Senegal, Uganda, Mali, Mongolia and Bangladesh, ‘but not on a large-enough scale to address some of the chronic housing issues they face’.[^29]
From the old Central Asian and Eastern European Soviet Bloc all the way to Latin America, and from Africa to Asia, the takeover of the housing sector by finance has been a massive and hegemonic tendency. So much so, that a World Bank publication crowed – one decade after the launch of the housing private market manifesto referred to previously – that ‘the genie is out of the bottle.’[^30]
The mercantilisation of housing – as well as the increased use of housing as an asset integrated into a globalised financial market – deeply undermined the right to adequate housing around the world. The belief that markets could regulate the allocation of housing, combined with the development of experimental and ‘creative’ financial products, led to the abandonment of public policies that regarded housing as part of the social commons. In the new political economy, centred around housing as a means of access to wealth, the home becomes a fixed capital asset whose value resides in its expectation of generating more value in the future, depending on the oscillations of the (always assumed) rise of real-estate prices.[^31]
Like other social spheres, housing was affected by the dismantlement of basic welfare institutions and by the mobilisation of a series of policies aiming to expand market discipline, competition and commodification.[^32] These new ideas confronted the welfare systems and economic-political coalitions around housing that had previously existed in each country.
In former socialist countries, in the US and in many European countries, the privatisation of public housing and drastic cuts in state investment in social housing were combined with reductions in welfare programs and rental subsidies. These measures were accompanied by the deregulation of financial markets and by a new urban strategy, allowing domestic capital mobilisation and international capital recycling. The new tendencies had a smaller impact in less developed countries, where welfare housing systems had never existed, or were small and marginal compared to the housing needs. The global imposition of neoliberalism has been highly unequal – both socially and geographically – and its institutional forms and socio-political consequences vary significantly around the world. In each context, much depends on specific interactions between inherited regulatory landscapes and emerging market-oriented restructuration projects.[^33]
By considering the World Bank’s first document as a starting point and the 2007 subprime mortgage crisis as the first large international trigger, this first chapter of the book has mapped some of the key elements of the neoliberal perspective on housing and its impact on the right to housing in different contexts.[^34]
Through observing different countries’ housing trajectories during my mandate as the UN special rapporteur on adequate housing, I detected three forms that the process of financialisation of housing can assume, which differ from each other not only in their origin, but also in the kind of impact they have on economies, cities and people’s lives. They are: mortgage-based systems; systems based on the association of financial credit with direct governmental subsidies linked to the purchase of market-produced units; and micro-finance schemes.
As with every generalisation, these are for the most part models abstracted from the specificity of concrete situations, and not a rigorous classification. However, they allow us to understand the patterns of financialisation governing the takeover of the housing sector – in all its diversity – by the financial sector.[^35]
In the US and the majority of European countries – which had previous experience of public housing provision, and enjoyed significant economic development in the Fordist period – the development of a residential mortgage financial market was the main mechanism for the promotion of homeownership. It increasingly replaced rental systems – however regulated, provisioned or subsidised by the state – as the dominant form. It is these countries’ experience that I will analyse in the next pages.
[^1]: Raquel Rolnik, *Report: Mission to Kazakhstan*, A/HRC/16/42/Add.3, 2011, written in collaboration with Stefano Sensi. All mission and thematic reports that I presented to the UN and that are cited in the book are available on the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights’ website: ohchr.org. The identification provided after the report’s title in the Notes is the easiest way of finding the text through the website search tool.
[^2]: Olzhas Auyezov, ‘Troubled Kazakh Homeowners Protest over Foreclosures’, Reuters, 18 March 2009. Available at: in.reuters.com, accessed 4 Dec. 2014.
[^3]: Alfredo Rodríguez, Ana Sugranyes and Manuel Tironi, ‘Anexo 1: Resultados de una encuesta’, in Alfredo Rodríguez and Ana Sugranyes (eds), *Los con techo: Un desafío para la política de vivienda social* (Santiago, SUR, 2005), pp. 225–6.
[^4]: Ana Sugranyes, ‘La política habitacional en Chile, 1980–2000: un éxito liberal para dar techo a los pobres’, in Rodríguez and Sugranyes (eds), *Los con techo*, pp. 23–33; Fernando Jiménez Cavieres, *Chilean Housing Policy: A Case of Social and Spatial Exclusion?* (doctorate thesis in Architecture, Fakultät VII, Architektur Umwelt Gesellschaft, Technische Universität Berlin, 2006).
[^5]: Martin Roberts, ‘Spanish Banks to Restrict Evictions after Suicides’, *Guardian*, 12 November 2012. Available at: theguardian.com, accessed 6 Oct. 2014.
[^6]: Ada Colau and Adrià Alemany, *Vidas hipotecadas: De la burbuja inmobiliaria al derecho a la vivienda* (Barcelona, Cuadrilátero de Libros, 2012).
[^7]: Raúl Guillén, ‘Em Madri, vidas hipotecadas’, *Le Monde Diplomatique Brasil*, São Paulo, dossier n. 8, year 1 (Nov.–Dec. 2011).
[^8]: See Friedrich Engels, *The Condition of the Working Class in England* (1845) and *The Housing Question* (1872).
[^9]: Food banks stock farmers’ surplus produce and food donated by individuals. In the UK, food banks usually donate directly to the person in need, referred by social services.
[^10]: Soutik Biswas, ‘India’s Micro-Finance Suicide Epidemic’, BBC, 16 Dec. 2010. Available at: bbc.co.uk, accessed 6 Oct. 2014.
[^11]: David Harvey, *Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism* (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2014), p. 241.
[^12]: Manuel Aalbers, ‘Corporate Financialization’, in Noel Castree et al. (eds), *The International Encyclopedia of Geography: People, the Earth, Environment, and Technology* (Oxford, Wiley, 2015). Available at: academia.edu, accessed 8 Oct. 2015. See p. 3.
[^13]: Richard Ronald, *The Ideology of Home Ownership: Homeowner Societies and the Role of Housing* (New York, Palgrave Macmillan, 2008).
[^14]: David Harvey, *The Urban Experience* (Oxford, Blackwell, 1989); Ugo Rossi, ‘On Life as a Fictitious Commodity: Cities and the Biopolitics of Late Neoliberalism’, *International Journal of Urban and Regional Research*, vol. 37, no. 3 (May 2013).
[^15]: Leda Maria Paulani, ‘O Brasil na crise da acumulação financeirizada’, IV Encuentro Internacional de Economía Política y Derechos Humanos, 2010, p. 5. Available at: madres.org, accessed 6 Oct. 2014.
[^16]: Manuel Aalbers and Rodrigo Fernandez, *Housing and the Variations of Financialized Capitalism*, international seminar, The Real Estate/Financial Complex (Refcom), Leuven, 2014, mimeo, p. 1.
[^17]: International Monetary Fund, *Long-Term Investors and Their Asset Allocation: Where Are They Now?* (Washington, DC, IMF, 2011), cited in Aalbers and Fernandez, *Housing and the Variations of Financialized Capitalism*, p. 13.
[^18]: Aalbers and Fernandez, *Housing and the Variations of Financialized Capitalism*, p. 14.
[^19]: Ibid.
[^20]: Herman M. Schwartz and Leonard Seabrooke, ‘Conclusion: Residential Capitalism and the International Political Economy’, in Schwartz and Seabrooke (eds), *The Politics of Housing Booms and Busts* (London, Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), p. 210.
[^21]: Ibid. p. 209.
[^22]: Aalbers and Fernandez, *Housing and the Variations of Financialized Capitalism*, p. 4.
[^23]: The concept of real-estate/financial complex was presented to me by Manuel Aalbers. He leads research focused on the relationship between real estate, finance and the state, drawing a parallel with the US military–industrial complex. See: ees.kuleuven.be/geography, accessed 10 Aug. 2015.
[^24]: Mariana Fix, *Financeirização e transformações recentes no circuito imobiliário no Brasil* (PhD thesis in Economic Development, Campinas, IE-Unicamp, 2011); Rossi, ‘On Life as a Fictitious Commodity’.
[^25]: Schwartz and Seabrooke, ‘Conclusion’, p. 210; Philippe Zivkovic, ‘Financiarisation de l’immobilier: La réponse innovante du groupe BNP Paribas’, 2006, cited in Higor Rafael de Souza Carvalho, *A cidade como um canteiro de negócios* (Undergraduate Final Work in Architecture and Urban Planning FAU-USP, São Paulo, 2011), p. 155.
[^26]: Neil Brenner and Nik Theodore, ‘Cities and the Geographies of “Actually Existing Neoliberalism” ’, in Brenner and Theodore (eds), *Spaces of Neoliberalism: Urban Restructuring in North America and Western Europe* (Oxford, Blackwell, 2002).
[^27]: World Bank, *Housing: Enabling Markets to Work* (Washington, DC, World Bank, 1993).
[^28]: Herman M. Schwartz and Leonard Seabrooke, ‘Varieties of Residential Capitalism in the International Political Economy: Old Welfare States and the New Politics of Housing’, in Schwartz and Seabrooke (eds), *The Politics of Housing Booms and Busts*, p. 16.
[^29]: Loïc Chiquier and Michael Lea (eds), *Housing Finance Policy in Emerging Markets* (Washington, DC, World Bank, 2009), pp. xxxi–ii.
[^30]: Robert M. Buckley and Jerry Kalarickal (eds), *Thirty Years of World Bank Shelter Lending: What Have We Learned?* (Washington, DC, World Bank, 2006), p. 41.
[^31]: David Harvey, *Limits to Capital* (London and New York, Verso, 2007); *A Companion to Marx’s Capital*, 2 vols (London and New York, Verso, 2013).
[^32]: Brenner and Theodore, ‘Cities and the Geographies of “Actually Existing Neoliberalism” ’.
[^33]: Ibid.
[^34]: World Bank, Housing: Enabling Markets to Work.
[^35]: Raquel Rolnik, *Thematic Report about the Impact of Financialization on the Right to Adequate Housing*, A/67/286, 2012, in collaboration with Lidia Rabinovich.

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content/session/housingandmaintenancestruggles.md
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@ -3,9 +3,9 @@ title: "Housing and Maintenance Struggles"
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# Poor design or disinvestment?
Architectural critic Charles Jencks famously wrote that “modern architecture died in St Louis, Missouri on July 15, 1972, at 3.32 pm” when the public housing estate Pruitt Igoe was demolished. In public narratives the design was the one to be blamed for the failure of public housing. In reality, it was disinvestment that created poor maintenance, together with subsidies for individual housing loans. One of the most notorious cases of disinvestment in maintenance has been the case of the Grenfell tower in London. Due to cheap flammable cladding that was used in the refurbishment process, many working-class people lost their lives in the fire.
Architectural critic Charles Jencks famously wrote that “modern architecture died in St Louis, Missouri on July 15, 1972, at 3.32 pm” when the public housing estate Pruitt Igoe was demolished. In public narratives the design was the one to be blamed for the failure of public housing. In reality, it was disinvestment that created poor maintenance, together with subsidies for individual housing loans. One of the most notorious cases of disinvestment in maintenance has been the case of the Grenfell tower in London. Due to cheap flammable cladding that was used in the refurbishment process, many working-class people lost their lives in the fire.
Nevertheless, maintenance is not only the issue of public housing. In the private rental sector, for instance, investment in maintenance can be regarded as a sign of a new increase in rental prices. Struggles that have addressed the issue of maintenance range from rent strikes to protest and movements against gentrification. Though maintenance hasn’t been spoken about a lot in the past, it is important to recognize that it is as an important factor in housing struggles worldwide.
Nevertheless, maintenance is not only the issue of public housing. In the private rental sector, for instance, investment in maintenance can be regarded as a sign of a new increase in rental prices. Struggles that have addressed the issue of maintenance range from rent strikes to protest and movements against gentrification. Though maintenance hasn’t been spoken about a lot in the past, it is important to recognize that it is as an important factor in housing struggles worldwide.
## Proposed resources
@ -15,5 +15,61 @@ Nevertheless, maintenance is not only the issue of public housing. In the privat
## How to learn together
Read the proposed articles and look into the proposed resources before you come to the session. Organize a collective self-interview. Create a list of questions related to housing maintenance. The questions could tackle issues such as the changing situation at your housing estate, your opinions about the issues that you have read about in the proposed resources, your proposals and solutions etc. Make a round for each question. Make detailed notes. Share your self-interview with other Pirate Care Syllabus users.
Read the proposed articles and look into the proposed resources before you come to the session. Organize a collective self-interview. Create a list of questions related to housing maintenance. The questions could tackle issues such as the changing situation at your housing estate, your opinions about the issues that you have read about in the proposed resources, your proposals and solutions etc. Make a round for each question. Make detailed notes. Share your self-interview with other Pirate Care Syllabus users.
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# Charlie Clemoes,2015.‘How poor maintenance of London's social housing created the conditions for its demolition’.
**In CityMetric, https://www.citymetric.com/skylines/how-poor-maintenance-londons-social-housing-created-conditions-its-demolition-1644, accessed September 30, 2020.
{{< figure src="/images/cressingham_gardens_2.jpg" width="100%" title="Figure 1. Residents at south London's Cressingham Gardens estate protest its proposed demolition. Image: Charlie Clemoes." >}}
In housing, maintenance is more important than design: if this were more often acknowledged, then the lifespan of many social houses could be drastically extended.
But instead, their inadequacy and rapid dilapidation is typically blamed on poor design – either due to modernist architecture’s excessive social engineering, or due to the overreach of post-war local and national governments, racing to build more houses at an ever decreasing cost. To this way of thinking, post-war social housing was an unmitigated mistake and given the chance it should be replaced with something better.
The importance of maintenance could not be clearer in the case of a pair of estates in South London, both built in the 1970s under the oversight of Lambeth council’s chief architect, the late [Ted Hollamby](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Hollamby) were both highly praised upon their completion, particularly for the Scandinavian-influenced humanist architecture prevalent in the design. In the past few years, both have been under threat of demolition.
On its website, Lambeth council makes the reasonable claim that the estates need to be regenerated because the houses are in such a state of disrepair. But this raises the question of how these housing developments fall so rapidly into this state in the first place.
{{< figure src="/images/central_hill_1.jpg" width="100%" title="Figure 2. A view of the Central Hill estate. Image: Charlie Clemoes." >}}
It could be that those originally praising the estates were wrong and they were not built to last. But it could also be due to poor maintenance, which created the conditions for the demolition threat.
More than enough has been said to support the former argument: the narrative of the utopian modernist block turned sink estate is seared into popular imagination to the point where evidence is no longer required to prove it. But to support the opposing argument, there is also plenty of evidence that the estates were indeed well designed. There is evidence, too, that they have not been properly maintained.
To build both estates, Hollamby drew upon a wide array of building expertise. Notwithstanding the array of architectural talent working on both projects, he also assembled a highly skilled construction team. The structural engineer, Ted Happold, later went on to work on the Sydney Opera House and set up a firm which worked on the Pompidou Centre. Meanwhile, Cressingham Gardens’ beautiful curved brickwork required the services of a master bricklayer, who was also employed in the construction of the staircase in Hampton Court Palace.
But it doesn’t take an architectural historian to notice the high design standards Hollamby kept to: you only need to walk around the estates.
With the benefit of a bright, early-autumn weekend, it was difficult to avoid marvelling at such a thoughtful design. Both estates demonstrate a style of building that hardly features in London any more. The overall feel is more countryside than city: there is space, conspicuous quiet, and numerous passageways are completely denied to the car, so that residents are able to traverse each estate free of the impatient demands of the motorist.
There is also an intimate engagement with local topography. In Central Hill, the hillside is used to shield the estate from the noise of the road above, and both estates are barely perceptible from a distance, being so well ensconced in the landscape.
In Cressingham Gardens, front doors face each other, kitchens face the passageways and the flats are in close proximity, all the better for neighbours to talk to one another and feel more connected to the wider estate.
Despite the high density, flats are also very spacious and both estates still manage to host bountiful green space. Most of these trees are older than the estates themselves – the homes were built around them. And the estates also leverage the surrounding parks to great effect: Central Hill falls within a green corridor stretching from Dulwich Common to Norwood Park via Crystal Palace, Cressingham Gardens opens out onto Brockwell Park.
This concern for greenery has proved to be one of the major areas of antagonism in Central Hill. Originally ivy grew out of raised beds planted along every passageway covering many of the estate’s walls, offering a cheap way of greening otherwise plain light-grey buildings. Several years ago the council approached the residents asking to cut this ivy back, on the assumption that it risked damaging the building’s structural integrity. Not wishing to create unnecessary conflict, the residents obliged, unaware that the ivy would be entirely removed. Any ivy that remains has had to be fought for.
{{< figure src="/images/central_hill_2.jpg" width="100%" title="Figure 3. Central Hill again. Image: Charlie Clemoes." >}}
It is hard not to see this as a wilful erosion of Central Hill’s aesthetic value. And this feels all the more apparent in the case of waste disposal on the estate, which had gotten so bad when I visited that there was a massive pile of rubbish right at the estate’s entrance. It's not the kind of thing that you associate with an inner London borough.
But this is only the most evident problem among a catalogue of minor maintenance problems with both of the estates. Paving stones are in need of replacement and visibly unsafe, especially for older residents. None of the outside detailing looks like it has been replaced since the estates were finished. The zinc roofs of Cressingham Gardens are leaking in various places and the guttering needs to be replaced. An independent report has also noted the effect of poor tree maintenance on many non-structural and drainage problems. Together these oversights amount to a basic neglect.
So why have the estates not been properly maintained? There is an argument that their innovative design makes maintenance more difficult, requiring specialist skills and unusual materials. But this doesn’t take into account the litany of common, solvable issues mentioned above.
In fact, the reasons are much more complicated and long-term, and they reveal how political the issue of maintenance can be.
{{< figure src="/images/cressingham_gardens_1.jpg" width="100%" title="Figure 4. Protesters at Cressingham Gardens. Image: Charlie Clemoes." >}}
Estate under-maintenance is intimately linked to wider disinvestment of inner city areas throughout the 1970s and ’80s and the creeping return of development from the 1990s onwards. Throughout this time, those who remained in inner city social housing were first forgotten and then, as investment increased, deemed to be an obstacle. In the first case councils had no money to maintain their social housing stock; in the second, they had no desire to. Adding further fuel to the decline of London’s social housing was the relative economic hardship of its occupants, who have often had neither the means nor the time to take maintenance into their own hands.
But hope remains when residents can collectively organise to redress the balance. While the fight to save these two estates is ongoing, recent news has emerged that Cressingham Gardens may be saved from demolition due to a High Court ruling that the council acted unlawfully in the consultation process. At the centre of this was the removal of three options available to residents which offered the possibility of refurbishment, leaving only the options of full or part demolition remaining.
This ruling could not have been achieved without an organised residents’ campaign, pursuing a collective legal case against demolition and accompanying this with a vocal public awareness campaign. At the centre of the argument was an appeal to the financial sense of refurbishment and maintenance – helped along by several revealing FOI requests on the risible sums spent on maintenance over the years.
All this offers hope that the equally energetic campaign to save Central Hill may be able to reverse Lambeth Council’s seemingly single-minded desire for demolition. Perhaps there’s hope, too, that similar campaigns can also arrest social housing’s all too rapid transition from construction to demolition by way of under-maintenance.
*Charlie Clemoes has an in urban studies from UCL and is on the editorial staff of [Failed Architecture](http://www.failedarchitecture.com/author/charlie-clemoes/). He tweets as @clemvp.*

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# What is the politics of rental relations?
Rent. It arrives every month and it takes a portion of the value of our labour, handing it over to our landlord. Rent that is negotiated on the market is usually perceived as a question of two-way agreement between two actors in the market - landlord and a tenant. But renting a home is not the same as renting a bike or a yacht, and it should be a subject of strict regulation. States and local municipalities in some cases, enforce rent control that protects tenants against eviction and price increase. Market apologists argue against rent control by claiming that if the state and/or municipal administration push for the rent control, developers will not invest into new housing and therefore we will have a shortage. This, however, has never been proven true. As rent is taking up a large portion of our incomes, it is not surprising that tenant unions are one of the main forms of organizing. Because tenants usually don't live in the same place, organizing tenants calls for innovative tactics. In rent struggles, as our experience shows, it can prove a challenge to collectively secure something that is deemed the most fundamentally existential thing: a home.
Rent. It arrives every month and it takes a portion of the value of our labour, handing it over to our landlord. Rent that is negotiated on the market is usually perceived as a question of two-way agreement between two actors in the market - landlord and a tenant. But renting a home is not the same as renting a bike or a yacht, and it should be a subject of strict regulation. States and local municipalities in some cases, enforce rent control that protects tenants against eviction and price increase. Market apologists argue against rent control by claiming that if the state and/or municipal administration push for the rent control, developers will not invest into new housing and therefore we will have a shortage. This, however, has never been proven true. As rent is taking up a large portion of our incomes, it is not surprising that tenant unions are one of the main forms of organizing. Because tenants usually don't live in the same place, organizing tenants calls for innovative tactics. In rent struggles, as our experience shows, it can prove a challenge to collectively secure something that is deemed the most fundamentally existential thing: a home.
## Proposed resources
- **Read the basic info about what we fight for when we fight for better tenant rights:**
- **Read the basic info about what we fight for when we fight for better tenant rights:**
- ![](bib:1076eac2-ee29-40d1-b90d-88facc539c66)
- ![](bib:3ac3912f-5eab-431a-9b6e-d4b714fade67)
@ -19,4 +19,82 @@ Rent. It arrives every month and it takes a portion of the value of our labour,
## How to learn together
Read the proposed articles and look into the proposed material before you come to the session. Create together a fictional story about a renter struggle. Create different characters and determine their roles in the overall narrative. You can use one of these deeply embodied typologies: estate agent, landlord, local government representative, tenant etc. Your story could tackle issues such as the history of rent struggle in Glasgow, a 30-minute meeting of renters facing eviction in the place where you come from, description of renters' protest set in the near future etc. Use the information from the reading resources. Write it up. Share your story with other Pirate Care Syllabus users.
Read the proposed articles and look into the proposed material before you come to the session. Create together a fictional story about a renter struggle. Create different characters and determine their roles in the overall narrative. You can use one of these deeply embodied typologies: estate agent, landlord, local government representative, tenant etc. Your story could tackle issues such as the history of rent struggle in Glasgow, a 30-minute meeting of renters facing eviction in the place where you come from, description of renters' protest set in the near future etc. Use the information from the reading resources. Write it up. Share your story with other Pirate Care Syllabus users.
---
# Amee Chew & Katie Goldstein, 2019. ‘Universal Rent Control Now’
**In *Jacobin Magazine*, June 17, 2019.**
Rent control is making a comeback. Across the country, tenants and housing justice organizers are taking on the mighty real estate lobby and its political allies through a powerful escalation of legislative and electoral activity. Oregon enacted a statewide rent cap in February. In Florida, Colorado, Illinois, and Nevada, state legislators introduced bills to lift bans against rent control. And in California, despite the defeat of Prop 10 — which would have allowed the expansion of rent control — another package of legislation has been introduced that would remove state-level restrictions on rent control, make eviction protections widespread, and prevent rent gouging.
Chicago-area voters have voted overwhelmingly three times now for rent control, while in Novem­ber, the New York state senate flipped from red to blue largely on a “universal rent control” platform. Federally, Senator Elizabeth Warren has included incentives for localities to pass rent control in her new housing bill.
We face the worst renter crisis in a generation. The market has never met the needs of low-income renters, and production is [increasingly](http://www.jchs.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/harvard_jchs_americas_rental_housing_2017_0.pdf) [geared](https://www.rentcafe.com/blog/rental-market/luxury-apartments/8-out-of-10-new-apartment-buildings-were-high-end-in-2017-trend-carries-on-into-2018/) at the luxury end. The largest corporate landlords have gained an [unprecedented share](https://www.jchs.harvard.edu/blog/who-owns-rental-properties-and-is-it-changing/) of rental properties, while the deregulation of Wall Street has fueled heightened speculation. In this context, big real estate has poured [tremendous funding](https://therealdeal.com/la/2018/10/31/landlords-and-investors-spent-millions-in-effort-to-defeat-prop-10/) into public relations campaigns that allege rent control hurts renters. But powerful tenant, community, and political organizing is pushing back and demanding housing policies that are accountable to tenants' needs.
The Center for Popular Democracy, the Right to the City Alliance, and PolicyLink recently released a report, ["Our Homes, Our Future,"](https://ourhomesourfuture.org/) to highlight the critical importance of rent control. Our networks actively support tenant organizing across the country. In this report and through our affiliates' organizing, we demand that policymakers put human needs first.
Rent control matches the size and urgency of the renter crisis. Few other policies can offer meaningful relief that is as quick and
far-reaching. If rent control campaigns underway in six states and two cities succeed, [12.7 million](https://ourhomesourfuture.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/OurHomesOurFuture-2pg-Summary.pdf) renter households would be stabilized  — at little to no cost to government. If adopted nationally, [42 million](https://ourhomesourfuture.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/OurHomesOurFuture-2pg-Summary.pdf) households could be stabilized. Rent control operates by setting a predictable schedule for allowed rent increases, usually a maximum percentage. In cities where rent control already exists, it is often the [largest source](http://lghttp.58547.nexcesscdn.net/803F44A/images/nycss/images/uploads/pubs/Rent_Reg_Explainer_V6.pdf) of affordable housing. Strengthening and expanding rent control would help move us towards a more equitable, inclusive economy and society.
Jacqueline Luther, a renter in Los Angeles, puts it this way: "We need stronger rent control, to live our best lives."
{{< figure src="/images/is33-uneven-and-combined1.png" width="100%" title="Figure 1. Rent control laws by state." >}}
**A Policy That Works**
Rent control works — it effectively increases housing stability and affordability. It reaches those in need, [disproportionately](https://ourhomesourfuture.org/) [benefiting](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01944369008975755) [low-income](http://furmancenter.org/files/FurmanCenter_FactBrief_RentStabilization_June2014.pdf) [tenants](https://www.jstor.org/stable/3146080?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents), [people](https://www.jstor.org/stable/3146080?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents) [of](http://furmancenter.org/files/FurmanCenter_FactBrief_RentStabilization_June2014.pdf) [color](https://dornsife.usc.edu/assets/sites/242/docs/Rent_Matters_PERE_Report_Final_02.pdf), [immigrants](https://b.3cdn.net/nycss/6174637efe14b4c944_l2m6b8b6d.pdf), [seniors](https://www.cityofberkeley.info/uploadedFiles/Rent_Stabilization_Board/Level_3_-_General/Final%20Report%202009%20Tenant%20Survey.pdf), [women-headed](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0094119089900272)
[households](https://www.cityofberkeley.info/uploadedFiles/Rent_Stabilization_Board/Level_3_-_General/Final%20Report%202009%20Tenant%20Survey.pdf), and those with disabilities. [The stronger](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01944360008976096) [and](https://www.cityofberkeley.info/uploadedFiles/Rent_Stabilization_Board/Level_3_-_General/Final%20Report%202009%20Tenant%20Survey.pdf) [more](https://scholar.oxy.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=&httpsredir=1&article=1325&context=uep_faculty) universal controls are, the [better](https://www.smgov.net/uploadedFiles/Departments/Rent_Control/Reports/Annual_Reports/2017%20Annual%20Report%20FINAL.pdf) it is at helping the most marginalized.
Rent control is first and foremost a tool that slows displacement. It helps alleviate the churn of forced moves and evictions that plague low-income tenants. It buys time for low-income communities of color under pressure from gentrification, by countering the displacement caused by rapidly rising rents — and importantly, here it is able to intervene rapidly, before it's too late. If we instead rely on new construction, which is [overwhelmingly](https://www.rentcafe.com/blog/rental-market/luxury-apartments/8-out-of-10-new-apartment-buildings-were-high-end-in-2017-trend-carries-on-into-2018/) geared at the luxury end, to "trickle down" to promote affordability, it will be too late.
In "hot" housing markets like [San Francisco](https://web.stanford.edu/~diamondr/DMQ.pdf) and [New York City](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1080/00420980500388710), few low-income households would remain in gentrifying areas were it not forrent control and public housing. As Phara Souffrant, a Caribbean-American resident of Brooklyn and leader in the Crown Heights Tenant Union says, "It's not just about the money. It's about having a ground to stand on."
Immediately after Los Angeles adopted rent control, the share of renters who moved in the prior twelve months decreased by [37%](https://www.jstor.org/stable/3146080?&seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents), with the rates dropping most for black and Latino renters. In Manhattan, tenants in rent-regulated units were [ten times as likely](http://furmancenter.org/files/FurmanCenter_FactBrief_RentStabilization_June2014.pdf) as those in market-rate units to have lived in their homes for twenty years or more (35% compared with 3%). Similar results were seen after the Santa Monica passage of rent control.
Yet in mainstream policy circles, stability as a vital benefit of rent control is neglected. Homeowners’ role in “anchoring” neighborhoods is typically celebrated. But for renters, economists have traditionally framed rent control’s success in improving housing stability as bad — a sign of “lack of mobility” and of “inefficiency” in the allocation of housing units.
Yet for many low-income tenants, “mobility” isn’t a choice, but a violent process of displacement. In the words of Vaughn Armour, a black senior in Brooklyn and leader in New York Communities for Change’s campaign for universal rent control, “If I didn’t have rent-stabilized housing, I’d be in a shelter or in the street.”
If rent control were expanded, the [majority](https://ourhomesourfuture.org/) of beneficiaries would be
low-income. In [Los Angeles](https://www.jstor.org/stable/3146080?&seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents), low-inicome households, and black renters, gained the greatest savings after rent stabilization's passage. Rent control reaches low-income [immigrants](https://b.3cdn.net/nycss/6174637efe14b4c944_l2m6b8b6d.pdf) who are not eligible for government housing assistance. It helps slow
the displacement of [families with children](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01944369008975755).
When renters thrive, they lift up their communities. [Cost-savings](https://nationalequityatlas.org/sites/default/files/National-Fact-Sheet.pdf) on rent would give low-income renters more resources to spend, [boosting](https://ourhomesourfuture.org/) local economies. Stable, affordable housing would promote [better health](https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0190139), [educational](http://mcstudy.norc.org/publications/files/CohenandWardrip_2009.pdf) [out­comes](http://barhii.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/BARHII-displacement-brief.pdf), and [job retention](https://academic.oup.com/socpro/article-abstract/63/1/46/1844105?redirectedFrom=fulltext). It would foster [recovery](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26562123) from illness and be protective against [domestic](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0886260511423241) [and sexual abuse](http://www.downtownwomenscenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/2016DowntownWomensNeedsAssessment-web.pdf). Whereas gentrification is linked to [decreased voter turnout](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.0038-4941.2006.00371.x) among historically disenfranchised groups, stability would help enable strengthened social networks, community institutions, and democratic participation. "It's not just a renters' issue," says Adrian Leong, an organizer with the Chinese Progressive Association in San Francisco, who recognizes how vital low-income housing is to preserving Chinatown. "We all rely on rent control, to have a vibrant community."
Rent control supports undervalued reproductive, domestic, and care labor that is vital to the fabric of society. “The type of work I did, you can’t make much money — you have to do it from your heart,” shared Gwendolyn Viola Fox Bibins, a social worker, active member of the Crown Heights Tenant Union, and Caribbean-American immigrant who has lived in the same Brooklyn home for thirty-five years. “A rent-stabilized apartment allowed me breathing space,” she says, and now despite her meager savings, it ensures a place to retire. Luther, a former foster-care youth, attained her Master’s in therapy while living in rent-stabilized housing. But her sister, not as lucky to find stabilized housing, was pushed into homelessness.
{{< figure src="/images/is33-uneven-and-combined-2-611x1024.png" width="100%" title="Figure 2. Annual rent in Rent Stabilized and Non-Stabilized Units." >}}
**On “Unintended Consequences”**
The common argument against rent control goes like this: according to supply-side economics, any kind of rent regulation will dampen construction and supply. Thus, rent control’s opponents say, it will ultimately lead to a worse housing shortage, and hence, even higher rents, especially for uncontrolled units.
Crucially, rent control does not, [on balance](https://dornsife.usc.edu/assets/sites/242/docs/Rent_Matters_PERE_Report_Final_02.pdf), cause rents in non–regulated units to increase. Rent control is not the driver of speculation, gentrification, or a housing shortage. In Massachusetts, California, and New Jersey, rent control slightly [improved](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0094119006000635) [affordability](https://ideas.repec.org/p/fth/harver/1985.html) in noncontrolled units or had no [harmful effect](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264275115001122) on these rents. The [evidence](http://scholar.oxy.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1325&context=uep_faculty) shows it’s [lifting](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0094119006000635) [or](https://www.cityofberkeley.info/uploadedFiles/Rent_Stabilization_Board/Level_3_-_General/Summary%20of%20Economic%20Studies%20Part%20I.pdf) [loosening](https://www.smgov.net/uploadedFiles/Departments/Rent_Control/Reports/Annual_Reports/2017%20Annual%20Report%20FINAL.pdf) rent control that fuels skyrocketing rents across the board.
[Empirical](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264275115001122) [evidence](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1467-9906.2007.00334.x) shows that [rent control](https://www.sanjoseca.gov/DocumentCenter/View/55649) [does](https://books.google.com/books/about/Rent_Control.html?id=5AEWAQAAIAAJ) [not](https://books.google.com/books/about/Rent_Control.html?id=5AEWAQAAIAAJ) [hurt](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1467-9906.1996.tb00388.x?journalCode=ujua20) [housing](https://www.cityofberkeley.info/uploadedFiles/Rent_Stabilization_Board/Level_3_-_General/Berkeley_Rent_Control_1978-1994_1998_Planning_Dept_report.pdf) [construction](http://www.urbandisplacement.org/blog/rent-control-key-neighborhood-stabilization). In fact, the two can go hand-in-hand. Firstly, in the US rent controls don’t cover new construction anyway. But also, the housing market is more [complicated](http://dollarsandsense.org/archives/2019/0119barton.pdf) [than](http://haasinstitute.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/haasinstitute_rentcontrol.pdf) Econ 101 theory — overall market conditions and zoning have far greater influence on construction. And whereas housing debates focus largely on private construction, there’s also the option of pairing rent control with massive *public* construction to turn housing shortages into surpluses by building public and social housing, at far greater speed than the private market.
Rent control does not necessarily lead to declines in maintenance, either. While the research can appear ambiguous, it is important to distinguish improvements in buildings’ cosmetic appearance from functional maintenance that is critical to health and safety. When rent control is abolished or weakened, we’ve seen increased gentrification and the [cosmetic building improvements](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0094119006000635) associated with it. However, [studies](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1467-9906.2007.00334.x) [show](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1467-9906.1996.tb00388.x?journalCode=ujua20) that rent control had no negative impact on plumbing, an indicator of functional maintenance, or on abandonment. In Washington DC, the share of physically deficient units *declined* after rent stabilization was implemented; and rent-controlled units were even less likely to be deficient than non-controlled units, despite the latter being more expensive.
Many tenants report that rent control, combined with strong code enforcement, gives them the legal mechanisms and leverage to attain improved conditions – for example, by putting rent in escrow until landlords respond to repair demands. Without protection, tenants often fear asking for repairs, because eviction through rent increases can always be the retaliation.
Opponents say that compared to means-tested subsidies, rent control is “inefficient” at helping the needy, because any tenant gains are canceled by landlord losses. But whereas the largest corporate landlords would hardly miss $1,000, this amount is significant for low-income households. Economists’ cost-benefit analyses, which only compare dollar amounts and not their human impact, ignore such distinctions. Nor do they typically include the costs to the government or public of [homelessness](https://endhomelessness.org/resource/ending-chronic-homelessness-saves-taxpayers-money/)
and [displacement](https://www.urban.org/policy-centers/cross-center-initiatives/opportunity-ownership/projects/cost-eviction-and-unpaid-bills-financially-insecure-families-city-budgets). Rent control helps stretch limited, means-tested subsidies, which reach only a [small fraction](https://www.urban.org/research/publication/trends-housing-problems-and-federal-housing-assistance) of those in need, and with its more universal scope, can promote social equity on a larger scale.
**Vacancy Decontrol**
Rent control is most effective at keeping housing affordable for low-income tenants when it’s strong and covers as many units as possible. In the United States, rent control’s shortcomings are oftentimes due to its lack of teeth, as over the decades, landlords and their allies in office have rolled back or watered down existing regulations (e.g. by imposing vacancy decontrol).
In California and elsewhere, rent stabilization laws permit rents to be raised without restriction, back up to market-rate, each time a tenant moves out — a provision called “vacancy decontrol.” This poison pill, imposed throughout California in 1995 and increasingly inserted in rent regulations since the 1970s, has drastically reduced affordability. In Santa Monica, before vacancy decontrol, rents for 83 percent of controlled units were affordable to low-income households; after vacancy decontrol, less than 4 percent of stabilized rental units remained affordable to such households.
“High rent vacancy decontrol,” which permanently decontrols stock once rents reach a certain threshold, has caused the hemorrhage of over 155,000 rent-regulated units in New York City since 1994. What’s more, vacancy decontrol encourages landlords to find ways to force tenants out so they can raise rent without limitation.
Most [new construction](https://www.rentcafe.com/blog/rental-market/luxury-apartments/8-out-of-10-new-apartment-buildings-were-high-end-in-2017-trend-carries-on-into-2018/), even [much of what passes as](https://shelterforce.org/2017/04/25/secret-history-area-median-income/) [|affordable"](https://www.dgphc.org/2018/05/10/ami-housing-deeply-unaffordable-for-low-income-families-part-2/) [housing](https://www.dgphc.org/2018/02/22/ami-housing-deeply-unaffordable-for-low-income-families/), is [nowhere close](https://www.jchs.harvard.edu/blog/changes-in-supply-and-demand-at-various-segments-of-the-rental-market-how-do-they-match-up/) to the scale and depth of affordability [needed](http://nlihc.org/sites/default/files/oor/OOR_2018.pdf). Truly meeting renters' needs would require mass public investment in preservation and construction at all governmental levels.
{{< figure src="/images/is33-uneven-and-combined-3-850x1024.png" width="100%" title="Figure 3. Substractions from NYC’s Rent-Stabilized Housing Stock, 1994-2017." >}}
When strong, rent control can help to dampen speculation. However, truly curbing the dominance of speculative influences on rents, and ensuring broad, long-term affordability, requires that controls be paired with other interventions: massive investment in public housing and subsidies, as well as policies that limit speculative practices. Over the decades, rent-controlled stock shrinks, whether because buildings naturally age and grow decrepit, or because of removals by loophole. In order for rent control to retain its coverage over a broad portion of stock, controlled stock must be replenished through the continual inclusion of newer buildings.
Rent control preserves and deepens affordability, but by itself does not produce new units – so public construction must step in. Other policies like regulating Wall Street, public banking, vacancy taxes, and community land trusts must be employed to limit and dismantle the mechanisms of real estate speculation.
Rent control is a basis for building renter power. Movements will only grow as conditions worsen for renters, and tenants organize to protect their homes and communities. The stakes are high, and the real estate opposition is enormous – but there is great urgency for policymakers to rise to this political moment for rent control, for renters, and for a more just housing market.

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## How to work together
Read the proposed articles before you come to the session. Do a survey about squatting out of necessity. Design a questionnaire together. Split into groups of two. Go outside and do interviews with people. Do as many as you can. Come back and share your impressions with others. Compare the results. Share the interviews and results with other Pirate Care Syllabus users.
---
# X-Chris, *Squatting Is A Part Of The Housing Movement - Practical Squatting Histories 1969-2019*.
**MayDay Rooms, 2019**
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**SQUATTING: AN INTRODUCTION**
What does it mean that squatting is part of the hous-ing movement? We can say that there is a constant contest for people to find ways to live by themselves or with others in affordable and decent homes. As people don’t usually build their own homes, they are reliant on complicated political terrain of available land, finance and investment, the construction indus-try and the ideological preferences set in motion by successive governments. So living cheaply and secure-ly places you squarely in the middle of whole load of processes you have very little say in or control of. The housing movement is then anywhere and anything where people have to either fight to maintain decent homes or where people try to create alternative hous-ing less subject to the whims of the high rent and high profits of the usual housing market.
We can say that the housing movement is a single pri-vate renter fighting a ‘no-fault’ eviction or tenants of a council estate fighting against demolition and social cleansing regeneration schemes. It is also when peo-ple set up housing co-ops to control their own housing or when people occupy empty buildings because they have nowhere they can afford to live. Or what about when tenants of the New Era housing estate in Hoxton who fought off the global private equity fund West-brook who had bought their homes in March 2014. Or when students at UCL London held a five month rent strike in 2017 that won major concessions on student rents and conditions!
**All Squatting is Political**
Although the housing movement might share a common sense of ‘decent homes for all’, the actual movement is more often than not a collection of fights and struggles happening in different locations with different degrees of energy and success. In the last 40 years of the prevailing political spin of the magical property ladder that you can ascend bit by bit and the accompanying delegitimisation of public housing as a de-cent, cheap and secure home, the housing movement comes and goes in its intensity. Sometimes there are national campaigns such at those against the recent Housing and Planning Act 2016 but sometimes there are simply single sites of conflict like Clays Lane Housing Co-op in Stratford demolished, in 2007 to make way for the London Olympics.
In England, if you own a building, there are a few rules by which you have to abide, but in reality if you want to leave it empty, you can. Right now in London there are an esti-mated 20,000 homes empty for more than six months. Being able to keep your build-ing empty has been described as exercising the ‘fundamental human right of property’. It’s a bit like abstracting yourself from the society around you and all its ever-pressing needs. All of this is presented as normal, neutral and not what it actually is - a political conflict between owners and users. In some other parts of the world, a less brutal and different concept exists, that a building always has a ‘social function’. What this means is that property owners have an obligations to serve the community through a produc-tive use of what they happen to own.
In February 2013, not long after the introduction of new laws banning squatting from residential properties, homeless guy Daniel Gauntlett froze to death in Aylesford, Kent on the porch of an empty bungalow he had previously been arrested trying to open up to shelter from the cold in. It’s clear that the social function of the bungalow would be to let Daniel shelter from the cold inside rather than for it be left empty. The idea of a building’s ‘social function’ raises the question of what the priorities of the society we live in are?
Squatting, the occupation and use of empty buildings for shelter, housing or other uses, is about putting life back into buildings. There are very long and particular histories in the UK of squatting and there are also many tensions within what could loosely be called the squatting movement. Not only that, but there are sometimes other tensions between squatting and other housing struggles. Nonetheless, what follows attempts to show that historically the squatting has been an accepted part of the housing move-ment, and that especially after it’s partial criminalisation in 2012, the housing move-ment needs to embrace squatting once more as a part of resisting what is becoming the increasing impossibility of actually housing ourselves.
**Women take the space they need**
Women were at the forefront of opening up empty buildings for housing and other community uses, and as crucial protagonists of legal challenges and subsequent evic-tion resistance. This history has only really started to be written now by women who were involved at the time or by women who are researching women’s role in the squat-ting movement. One of the few older references can be found in Pat Moan’s account of her squatting days in ‘Learning to learn’ in ‘Squatting: The Real Story’ where she writes, ‘Since 1975 I have been amazed over and over by the dynamic women of the squatting movement: intimidating bailiffs, shaming police and embarrassing politicians in a direct and forceful way which most men are incapable of because they are so emotionally contained’.
In the 1970s women came together to organise the first women’s refuges to enable any woman to escape domestic violence. Chiswick Women’s Aid set up the first open-door refuge in 1972 eventually squatting 20 or so buildings to deal with the large number of women and children needing a safe home. Other refuges were squatted by women in Grimsby, Stoke, Nottingham, Guildford, Birmingham, Manchester and Glasgow. In 1975 Anne Ashby from Chiswick Women’s Aid organised the squatting of the empty Palm Court Hotel in Richmond which lasted four years as safe refuge. Making public the scale of male violence inflicted upon women, by the 80s many refuges were finally government-funded and a National Women’s Aid Federation had been formed.
Throughout the 70s and 80s women organised women-only squats to explore living together fusing housing need with feminist personal and political action. An entire women-only community came together with 50 houses in the Broadway Market area of Hackney, and in Lambeth the Brixton Women’s Centre squat in Railton Rd gave ad-vice and assistance resulting 100s of squats in Lambeth. There were lesbian squats and dyke squats, squatted children nurseries run by mums such as the Brailsford Rd creche in Brixton violently evicted twice by Lambeth Council in 1985/86 as well as the amazing one-year occupation of the South London Women’s Hospital by women to try to keep it from closing.
40 years later and the feminist group Sisters Uncut reclaimed a council home in Hackney, a shop in Peckham and empty flats of Holloway Prison against the dismantling and de-funding of women’s refuges asking a similar question that Chiswick Wom-en’s Aid had asked in 1972: How can she leave if she has no-where to go?
**SQUATTING AS A HOUSING MOVEMENT**
Although the squatting of land and housing in the UK goes back centuries, it was only in the 20th century that a modern squat-ters movement came into its own. After WW2 a wave of squat-ting began, first in empty army camps and then in empty expen-sive properties such as Duchess of Bedford House in Kensington or The Ivanhoe Hotel in Bloomsbury. A demonstration on Sep-tember 14th 1946 saw 12,000 people march behind the banner ‘Ex-Servicemen Demand Requisition Of All Empty Mansions and Luxury Flats!’. This squatting campaign was not only in response to the number of homes damaged in the war but to the wide-spread slum conditions of privately rented homes.
By 1973 there were still an estimated 100,000 empty public and private homes in London alone and 30,000 people in tempo-rary hostels or B&B accommodation and 2000 street homeless. From 1968 onwards a new squatting movement had begun. Different squatter campaigns first symbolically squatted emp-ty luxury flats at The Hollies in Wanstead and Arundel Court in Notting Hill. Then they moved to occupying empty homes in Redbridge, moving homeless families in and defending the houses physically from violent bailiffs but also legally from evic-tion. The London Squatters Campaign was thus born with loads of press and TV publicity.
In late 1969 the media went ballistic when the counter-cultural London Street Commune initiated three large empty Central London squats, the most famous being at 144 Piccadilly. Press hysteria about drug-taking layabouts tried to turn what was a rough mix of hippies and young homeless people seeking al-ternative ways of living into Public Enemy No.1. It was not a surprise that the media would sympathise with homeless fami-lies but stir up mob violence towards the Piccadilly squatters. Although there were also criticisms made of the hippy squats at the time by those squatting homes for families, at the end of the day what was happening was that people with different needs and ideas took direct action to use empty buildings for living in. From these two campaigns, the 1970s saw a mass wave of squatting, mostly concentrated in the inner cities but also ru-rally as some people sought a way out of the daily grind. This was undoubtedly a housing movement responding to a housing crisis by squatting empty homes for housing, campaigning and making demands.
**What Does the Movement Move**
Throughout the 70s and 80s squatting continued on it’s merry way with an estimated 30,000 to 50,000 people squatting in the UK at any one time. Squatters were made up of both those who were organised and promoted squatting via local groups, publica-tions and practical help and those who were occupying empty buildings on their own outside of what could be described as the squatters movement. Part and parcel of this movement was the energy and solidarity that squatters brought to different areas of London and also the political crossover that occurred when squatters involved them-selves in struggles such as claimant unions, women’s refuges, lesbian and gay rights, fighting the selling off of council houses and general community activism. The squat-ting movement consistently provided meeting spaces, cultural activities, food co-ops, cheap cafes and the attempt to create alternatives away from the daily 9-5 routine. Not only this but squatters pioneered the turning of squats into housing co-ops, mostly on a ‘short life’ basis but some are still in existence today such as Abeona Housing Co-op established in 1975 in Hampstead.
By the mid-1980s many squatters had turned to occupying the 1000s of empty local council flats that were the result of long-term disrepair due to cuts in funding and council’s mismanagement of its housing stock. With such chaos in allocations, the no-tion that squatters were jumping the housing waiting list was a nonsense. As Elgin Avenue squatters had well argued in 1975: ‘We said the ‘Waiting List’ was a political device to divide and weaken the real housing movement; homeless people are not re-sponsible for homelessness and no-one should have to wait for a home. Empty houses should be used’.
A vibrant squatting movement continued until the late 2010s despite the tougher con-ditions - quicker evictions, less and less empty buildings due to the massive gentrifica-tion of London, the clamp down on the availability of welfare benefits, the rising cost of living and stagnating wage levels. Despite media panics around travellers, rave parties, ‘foreign’ squatters and some changes in the law and rules affecting squatting in 1977, 1994 and 2001, it was only in 2012 that Section 144 of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act created a new offence of squatting in a residential build-ing. Since then, although the squatting movement has shrunk as a result of the new law, it continues still in empty commercial properties and in challenges to the law via protest squats that sprang up in connection to the sudden revitalisation of the housing movement in 2013, working with local housing groups to highlight gentrification.
**London Squatters Campaign & Family Squatting Advisory Service, 1970s**
The story of the London Squatters Campaign (LSC) in 1969 is variously told as the start of the widespread 70s squatting movement although there were many criticisms at the time of the short life licensed squats the campaign gave birth too.
People who had been active in campaigns highlighting the appalling conditions in homeless hostels got together in late 1968 to try and kickstart a new mass squatting movement, the idea of squatting first being brought up by the families they met at the hostels. With a background in direct action, LSC started off with two symbolic and short actions at The Hollies in Wanstead, luxury flats empty for over 4 years, and a Vic-arage in Leyton, empty for three years. After this they were ready to house homeless families and on February 8th 1969 four houses were occupied in Redbridge. Despite all the homes being in a redevelopment area and possibly being left empty for up to another 10 years, the Council refused to let the houses in the short-term. Instead they subjected the squatters to a protracted legal battle, used violent bailiffs to illegally evict and smashed up empty homes to prevent further squatting. Publicity for the reclama-tion of empty homes was secured when squatters fought off bailiffs on June 23rd. By July an agreement was sorted with the Council for partial rehousing for some, a review of empty homes letting policy and no more trashing empty homes but all the squatters would have to move out first. This was voted on with 2/3rds in favour and amidst some bitterness, people moved out. Despite this, much had been learnt from the experience that would go forward in some way to building a mass of licensed short-life squats.
At the same time in Lewisham, squatter activists, some from the LSC, had secured a deal with the Council for use of numerous empty properties in a redevelopment zone. For the council it was pragmatic, as the homes would have been squatted anyhow and they got to house families from their waiting list and give licenses that they hoped people would honour when the time came to give the houses back. A new part of the squatting movement was born - the licensed short-life occupation - where by 1970 the Lewisham Family Squatting Association had over 80 licensed houses. Such a model was replicated in other boroughs, usually after squatters had first occupied to get negotia-tions going or in some cases actions and protests had to be taken to force councils to see sense on their empty homes. In Southwark, squatters occupied the Town Hall, the homeless families department and the Labour Party HQ in Central London declaring ‘Southwark Labour Fights The Homeless’. It took 14 months of action to get the coun-cil to agree to hand over 30 houses. In September 1970, Family Squatting Advisory Service (FSAS) was set up with a grant from the charity Shelter and by 1973 FSAS said there were around 2500 people in licensed short-lifes across 16 London boroughs. In the same years, the number of unlicensed squatters also increased dramatically as sin-gle people needed homes too. The stage had been set and the battles of both family squatters and unlicensed squatters both intersected and departed, none the least with the question whether co-operation or conflict would produce victories for homeless squatters. Amidst some tensions FSAS ended around 1975 when the new Advisory Service for Squatters was set up in the wake of its passing.
**DO ALL ROADS LEAD TO EVICTION?**
There is probably one truism in squatting and that is that you’ll 99% be evicted from your squat and need to find a new one. How that happens (or doesn’t happen!) is down to both what you do and what they do. But it’s also entirely contextual to the times and so whereas in the 1980s you might have got one year in an empty Lambeth council flat, you may now only get two weeks in your squatted ex-pub in Deptford before you’re evicted. You might go to court with a good defence and sup-port from Advisory Service for Squatters and win an adjourn-ment. Or you get hit with a Interim Possession Order, correctly served by the owner, you have 24 hours to get out. In the worst case, you might have the owner send round some heavies or private security to hassle you out. In some ways it’s also the luck of the draw. Some property owners are happy to make a deal with you to stay until they need the building and some will just go ballistic with rage. It’s the same with the police. Usually they turn up, listen to you lay down the laws to them on squatting, make a note in their notebook and leave. Rarely but it happens, they turn up, bash the door down and illegally evict you. Squatting is an adventure but one that needs people to take care and look after each other too.
In England and Wales there is mostly a predictability to the pro-cess of squatting. People find a building they think will make a good squat and they do what they can to find out about the owner and why the building is empty. Next, the building is oc-cupied, locks are changed and the place is secured. Life goes on and then one day the owner or someone shows up with a piece of paper that says she is going to court for ordinary possession of where you are living. You prepare a defence and present this at the court and the judge makes a decision. If you get an adjournment because, for example, the legal paperwork is shonky then you win more time before the case comes up in court again. If a standard possession order is granted against you then you can expect bailiffs at some point. Often, people would ask the bailiffs when they are coming. Some people then chose to get their mates round on the day of eviction so that the bailiffs, on the advice of police who may not want to get in-volved in an unknown public order situation, would go away to come back another day. If that happens then you won’t know the new time of eviction and it’s likely to be a surprise visit early in the mooring and backed up with a bunch of police. For now, squatting in non-residential properties remains a civil matter, that is, something to be resolved in a court between you and the owner mediated by the whim of a judge. ‘Section 6’ of the 1977 Criminal Law Act still protects squatters from owners and the police just dragging you out because they don’t like your face. However the Interim Possession Order, introduced in 1994, is now more common after years of it being a bit of a rare bird. A proper IPO means you won’t even get to stay in your squat before you get to fight it in court. So it’s swings and roundabouts learnt along the way.
**And Here Are Some We Won Earlier...**
Without going into too much ancient history, people have won amazing victories through negotiation or physically resisting eviction or through both. Squatters who organise themselves, seek support from local people and groups, and campaign on many fronts (against council, property owners, in the press, in the streets etc) can win. In the 70s and 80s there were many long-term squatting communities battling eviction and homelessness who succeeded in many and varied ways. From 1972 to 1975, Elgin Avenue squatters in Maida Hill organised an extensive campaign alongside the support of local trade unions and tenants and residents organisations. Having the will to fight on the barricades meant that they could secure rehousing for families and short life homes for the rest. In 1977, 120 squatters in derelict GLC houses in Freston Rd declared the area to be Frestonia - the Free And Independent State Of Frestonia, before winning rehousing as Bramley Housing Co-op on the same site. Seymour Build-ings in Marylebone, squatted in 1975, was eventually turned into Seymour Housing Co-op when the squatters chose to make alternative plans for the buildings and take part in long negotiations with Westminster Council. The success of Seymour, itself in-spired by the earlier attempt to turn the squatted Sumner House in Bow into a co-op in 1974, was a victory as the new homes were for single people, something squatting campaigns were continually pointing out - that unlike squatting families, single peo-ple had no chance to get housed by councils. From these successes, it was common for squatters to try and turn their communities or homes into official housing co-ops. Many of these are still in operation today. But for as many victories there were more mass evic-tions of squatting communities that took place.
In 2019, we could ask the question - now that there are no longer streets of empty housing up for redevelopment nor loads of empties on coun-cil estates - where would new victories by squat-ting take place? When places are squatted now be they council estates undergoing regeneration or empty commercial buildings what kind of move-ment is being created?
**Resisting Mass Eviction in Stamford Hill, 1988**
In early 1988, Hackney Council agreed to evict 250 squatters across 97 flats who had been living for up to 4 years on Stamford Hill Estate. Like many other squatted estates in London, friendly relations existed between tenants and squatters on Stamford Hill. The Tenant’s Association supported the squatters as ‘having a right to decent hous-ing’ and pointed out the cost of the eviction (est. £300,000) could be used to do the essential repairs they’d been ‘waiting in vain’ for years to happen. Several councillors and Labour branches broke ranks saying that these were the ‘policies of despair not socialism’ but the eviction was set to go ahead with a tip off to the squatters to expect 500 police and 60 bailiffs at 5am on March 7th 1988.
Squatters and supporters had repeatedly disrupted council meetings to protest evic-tions and what they saw as a possible police riot. They were also well organised with lots of practical info sharing, block meetings, a really good ‘Open Letter to All Tenants’ distributed and a call out for support against the evictions. On the Sunday before the eviction, a mass meeting was held in one of the squats to prepare for resistance. Al-though the squatters did not want violence, they would defend their homes and so barricades were built from large refuse bins and skips. When the police came early next morning, some kids nicked a car and spectacularly burnt it at the estate’s en-trance. With resistance in full swing, 300 people saw off the eviction and the estate was police-free for two days, the squatters making sure that people on the estate could come and go or be helped with shopping and so on. Hackney council then agreed a meeting for the squatters to discuss rehousing on Wednesday morning. Predictably at the same time as the meeting, the police came en masse and evicted the squats as bailiffs dumped peoples belongings over the balconies. Police made sure that no-one could come back onto the estate to re-squat the flats, something that had been suc-cessfully pulled off by squatters after the mass evictions on Pullens Estate in Southwark in 1986. All of this to enable Hackney Council to ‘house the homeless’ as they put it despite having less that a quarter of the budgets they needed to do up the empties and squats on Pembury and Kingsmead estates still laying empty a year after eviction.
History later repeated itself as farce when Hackney agreed a new policy to reduce the number of empty properties by targeting squatters again even though of 3180 vacant homes, only 1300 were squatted. In March 1991 despite saying that it was ‘immoral and utterly futile to allocate squatted units when others on the same estate are empty’, they again evicted 30 squats on Stamford Hill Estate to house the homeless who they had still not housed in all those new empties from the evictions three years earlier in 1988.
**ORGANISING**
To squat a place to live and play in, you need to find empties. Pretty much that means walking the streets looking. Once you’ve found a likely looking empty, then the rest is up to you. Luck-ily, throughout the long history of squatting, there have been people who recognise a need to organise a basic infrastructure to act in solidarity with those looking to squat or currently in squats. Once the concept of private property is challenged, then pretty soon all the other challenges may come along at the same time: choosing to practice mutual aid between squatters so that knowledge and experience can be shared against the society at large that pushes a dog-eat-dog individualism; queer squat-ters looking for each other to run a festival like Queeruption in Brixton in 1998 or the queer House of Brag social centre in vari-ous South London empties 2013 - 2014; living rent-free for a bit means you are no longer working three precarious jobs to see yourself through college; Elgin Avenue squatters issued work to-kens for building work and campaigning that could be redeemed in the squatter-run cafe for food. Squatting enables experiments and alternatives and this is as much a part of the history as being a part of the housing movement.
The last 50 years has seen numerous practical attempts to co-or-dinate squatting at a neighbourhood basis. Think of the story of the politically complicated squatter co-ordinating bodies in the 70s such as All London Squatters, Squatting Action Council, Lon-don Squatters Union and divisions within those. The start of the minutes from the All London Squatters Meeting in November 73 are a joy of the usual squatting tensions of the time: ‘Immediate interruptions - complaints being made about the conduct of the meeting - We don’t want to be organised’. Or Brixton Squatters Aid, Camden Squatters Group, Squatters Network of Walworth all active in the 1980s with drop-in advice meetings and their own newsletters. Although the organised squatting movement goes up and down, fresh energies seem to emerge all the time. From 2010 onwards the regular Squattastic meetings brought together different local squatters groups, people and campaigns especially before squatting’s part-criminalisation in 2012. In the run up to 2012, Squatters Action for Secure Homes (SQUASH) did amazing work fighting the new law as others had earlier in 1994 in a different SQUASH flavour against changes to the criminal trespass laws. For years until 2019, the Practical Squatting nights ran every Tuesday night for one hour (alternating weekly in South and North London) as a meeting place for new squatters to get together, ask questions about things and then form squat mates to go off and open up empty buildings. Each decade things change - before there was the clumsy eviction phone tree, now there are various eviction text or whatsapp groups. Before advice was shared with how to remove steel security front doors on empty flats. Nowadays people are more likely to need advice on dealing with an internal motion sensor alarm linked directly to a security company but can also access Google Earth to see how it might be possible to get into empty buildings.
At the bottom of this political organisation of squatting is how what has been learned along the way is joined with how things are today (new laws, new court rules etc) to maintain and help squatters do their thing. Stalwart throughout this has been Advisory Service for Squatters (A.S.S.) set up in 1975 and still going strong. Reading the current 14th edition of their ‘Squatters Handbook’ is a treasure trove of squat lore, squat histo-ries and a deep encyclopaedic primer of all you need to know to get squatting. Written in an unapologetic style and rooted in the experiences of both the A.S.S collective and the thousands of squatters they have helped, the Handbook wants you to help yourself and others: ‘Finding a place’, ‘Proving it’s not residential’, ‘Dealing with security guards’, ‘Dealing with the police’ etc.
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**CRISIS AGAIN!!**
It’s common that we hear about ‘the housing crisis’. That this term is so widespread at least punctures the idea that housing and homelessness is something that just gets bet-ter or worse, abstracted from what government or global capital does. We can at least examine the idea of ‘crisis’ to start to see that any crisis is something manufactured - by government when they act or legislate for the continued privatisation of public housing or by more global interests such as investment funds, private equity companies or real estate investment trusts buying up the same public housing or ‘regenerating’ it. In a housing crisis knocking down 1000s of council homes to replace them with luxury flats bought primarily by overseas investors shows that the crisis is purely driven by market interests and profits and not just because not enough homes are being built. The crisis is not a lack of homes to live in but vested interests manufacturing a scarcity of truly affordable homes. But for those always at the hard edge of what governments and capi-talists do, this has always been a crisis whether it’s 1969, 1985 or 2019 - high rents, low wages, gentrification of communities, no rent control, land speculation, stigmatisation and demolition of council housing and so on.
In the early 70s there was a property boom where house prices were going up and many homes were left empty for purposes of speculation (that at some future point the house would be worth even more). Such speculation especially alongside government grants for refurbishing properties saw an increase in eviction of tenants. This process of eviction, speculation and refurbishment had its early beginnings in Islington where this removal of working class tenants and replacement by middle class home owners was dubbed ‘gentrification’ in 1964 by Ruth Glass. Homelessness needless to say went skyrocketing. The same era saw many working class communities overtaken by mas-sive investment in new office buildings. There were bitter campaigns against developers Harry Hyams who was behind the Centre Point building, Joe Levy’s Stock Conversion who wanted to demolish Tolmers Square in Euston and against the GLC plans for high rises in Covent Garden. Squatters were crucial adversaries in all these community bat-tles. If we consider squatters as the hidden homeless, we can see the truth of the point made by Elgin Ave squatters in 1975 about waiting lists (see page 8). Although a system is in place to house people, when local council lists are 10,000 people long but council homes are empty (as they were then) or council homes are demolished (as they are today), the idea of the list is pointless for anyone considered ‘non-priority’. Of course, priority is always given to developers plans no matter how destructive of affordable homes they might be.
By the 80s, there were tons of empty houses, both council and private. It was Hard Times with mass unemployment, major local government funding and spending cuts but at least, for some, there were student grants and the relatively easy life of dole autonomy. Put both of these together with rent-free squatting and life was for once less crisis-prone. In some circumstances it was even still possible to gain council tenancies via Hard to Let schemes, taking homes no-one on the waiting list wanted. But it was also the beginning of 1.5m council homes lost through the Right To Buy your coun-cil home. Disinvestment and deindustrialisation in the inner city eventually saw new rounds of speculation and investment pointing slowly to the onslaught of future gen-trification. Docklands, North and South of the Thames, was for a time an unregulated space with empty-ish houses and estates that enabled some kind of escape from the ravages of capitalist daily life (the 9-5 grind, ill health and anxiety, no money, nowhere to live). But these empty spaces were a strange and often invisible part and parcel of the gentrification to come, satisfying speculative development where land is bought up later for development or resale as land values rose from other urban speculation and building. Dockside Rotherhithe was called Squatters Paradise by local squatters as the London Docklands Development Corporation (LDDC) planning regime led to 100s of empty council flats. Rotherhithe Action Group Squatters (RAGS) built a ragged com-munity there in 1983 although not without tons of hassle from some members of the Downtown Tenants Association who despite the LDDC’s gentrifying plans for the estates fell for a media and Council-led witch hunt against the squatters. At the time there were over 4500 Council homes laying empty across the borough. Ironically, squatting in Ber-mondsey after both WW1 and 2, was a factor in uniting local people to fight for and win cheap local housing including some of the Downtown Estates.
**New Decade - New Crisis**
In the 2010s, the crisis looks like this: few empties, endless government cuts, austerity and disciplining the working class, student fees, precarious work and increasing zero-hour contracts and freelance gig economy labour. The gains of earlier squatting cam-paigns such as short-life co-ops have mostly been evicted by hypocritical local councils such as Lambeth. But there have been some great squats and occupations to resist the cuts and social cleansing. In September 2014, Focus E15 group of former hostel-dwelling mums and supporters opened up 4 flats on the Carpenters Estate in Stratford where tenants had been ‘decanted’ for a failed Newham Council land sell-off on the back of the Olympics. Sweets Way Estate in Barnet was occupied by housing campaigners and squatters for months in 2015 against its dubious regeneration. In Barnet and New Cross public libraries closed by councils were occupied and taken over and run by the community from 2011 to this day. Squatters from the Autonomous Nation of Anarchist Libertarians successfully oc-cupied a few residential luxury mansions in the West End in 2017 inviting in homeless people for shelter and support. Streets Kitch-en folks squatted the long empty Sofia House on Great Portland St in March 2018 as a communal place for homeless people to get out of the freezing cold. Of course, private property trumps death on the streets and Sofia House stands empty once more. Lets not fool ourselves about the ‘housing crisis’ - the crisis is permanent and we must ask - who does the crisis hit the most? That’s where we can put some of our energies.
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**SOLIDARITY IN ACTION**
Squatted buildings used as bases for local struggles have also been active against the continual gentrification of the UK’s inner cities in ways that are antagonistic to and not accommodating to gentrification processes. Squatters are not only housing themselves by self-help direct action but they are often connected to and involved in supporting the housing movement and other fights such as for better wages, to offer support for striking workers or to linking precarious wages and labour to the role of the housing market in continual disciplining of the poor and worst-off.In March 1974, two months after the short protest squatting of the empty Centre Point offices in central London, folks acting with support of All London Squatters and Family Squatting Advisory Service decided to push the housing struggle connection between empty homes and homeless people and occupied an empty luxury block at 5-7 Dover St in Mayfair for permanent housing for people and families. They said that ‘unlike Centre Point, we are a squat for keeps. We intend to stay for as long as possible and campaign for support from the labour movement’. Despite regular pickets of the own-ers and other connected bodies and the demand that Westminster Council to Compul-sorily Purchase the block, the grand experiment in ‘showing a practical way of actually housing the homeless’ was evicted after six weeks.
**Privatisation Everywhere**
By the start of the 1980s, public housing was under attack with the Greater London Council (GLC) selling off some of its properties. Various squatter and housing cam-paigns got active and a sustained campaign of squats were set in motion in part to highlight the how GLC homes were being left empty and ripe for speculation but also to encourage links between the mili-tant squatters of the day and the current more traditional tenants organisation and the labour movement. Housing Ac-tion made a fantastic protest squat of the GLC show home at the Ideal Homes Exhibition in 1979 and also luxury flats in Thurlow Park Rd, West Dulwich but also upped the ante by occupying a block of GLC homes at Ferry Lane Estate in Tottenham. The GLC had left the homes empty for two years while they prepared them for sale. Calling the squats an ‘in-stant lettings scheme’ they appealed for homeless people to turn up at any time and promised to fight for rehousing for any squatter as well as campaigning for the sale of the Fer-ry Lane homes to be stopped and let out as council homes again. Another high profile occupation was put into place by Stop The Blitz who squat-ted 50 empty houses in Redbridge in late 1978 to highlight wasteful demolitions, close to the very same streets where London Squatters Campaign had begun in 1969. Al-though both sites were evicted, the message was clear that squatters and others could resist the every widening attack on public housing. In October 1980, the Squat Against Sales campaign took over the GLC’s Kilner House in Oval to try and stop its sell off. For three months 200 people from all walks of life lived together and not always easily, but forming some kind of community. Despite support from local tenants and other campaign groups, Kilner House was evicted on the morning on 9th January 1981 by over 600 tooled up police. Another local version of the campaign was in August 1981 when Ealing Occupation Against The Sales with the help of three Asian families squat-ted homes that had been built by Ealing Council specifially to sell to private buyers.
**Gentrification Everywhere... Housing Justice Nowhere**
In the last 20 years squatters have been active against the relentless gentrification and social cleansing of many London neighbourhoods. Back in 2002 Hackney Not 4 Sale, an action group fighting against the privatisation of community resources like libraries, youth clubs and nurseries, set up a spoof estate agents in a squatted shop in Stoke Newington. Four years later and not so far away, community activists twice squatted the long-term Francesca Cafe on Broadway Market after it’s sale to a local developer. The popular Cafe had been run by Tony Platia for 30 years before his dubious eviction in 2005 and so the occupation was to protest the social cleansing of the London Fields area and to show support for Tony. Despite eviction in late December, the cafe was valiantly re-occupied and rebuilt to hold on for a few more weeks. In this time two angry local meetings were held where Hackney council were seriously grilled. By 2006, Hackney Council had sold off £225 million worth of properties for just £70 million, the majority to unaccountable developers who then gentrified the area.
The same story of social cleansing was happening via Southwark Council where their large 1000 home Heygate Estate was demolished from 2011. In November 2013 activ-ists occupied 21 Park St, a council-owned empty up for sale for £2.96 million, defying S144 of the new anti-squatting law and highlighting council sell-offs. Two local anti-gentrification squats were also taken, the first Eileen House office block in Feburary 2013 lasting six weeks and then the Elephant & Castle pub in June 2015 for a month, both sites providing meeting space, a protest base and also a chance for people to de-velop teach-ins and learn together what was happening and how to try and work with older local campaigns against ‘regeneration’.
**WHAT NEXT?**
**Squatting Is Still Illegal**
2019 and what the **** is going on? We live in interesting times, no? Did you know that the higher the market value of a home, the more likely it is to be empty: In London, 39% of homes worth £1m to £5m are underused rising to 64% of homes worth more than £5m. Of homes owned by foreign investors, 42% are empty. Whilst politicians in Parlia-ment legislate more cuts to services, more breaks to landlords and more tax-sponsored packages to boost overpriced homes built by the house building sector, here is what hap-pens on the street: In December 2018, Gyula Remes, a homeless Hungarian died after he was found outside the entrance to the Houses of Parliament. Previously in February, Marcos Amaral Gourgel, a Brazilian rough sleeper died at the entrance to Parliament. In the UK in 2017, 600 rough sleepers died on the streets. Meanwhile, councils in the UK spent £300 million in three years (2015-18) on placing homeless people in hotels and B&Bs. Yet everywhere there are cranes on the horizon as more and more expensive or luxury homes are being built.
If we can say that the squatting movement in the 1970s was, at minimum, a direct re-sponse to housing need among younger people and families - what can we say now? There should be nothing normal about empty homes, food banks, child poverty, over-crowding, unregulated private rented homes, low wages, zero hour contracts, benefit sanctions etc. but this is the manufactured political terrain we live in. As Peter Marcuse has said on homelessness but it applies just as aptly to the housing crisis: ‘Homeless-ness exists not because the system is not working but because this is the way it works’. The housing crisis is working well as a secure avenue for increased private profits. But despite the vast number of empty buildings, we cannot say that only squatting can solve the housing ‘crisis’ - not the least because we always need to think who is really is able to squat - or who is more likely to squat? We still need to fight harder for decent cheap secure housing, be that public housing, housing co-ops, community land trusts, self-build. Anything that attempts to bring housing out of the sanctity of the housing mar-ket and the profits of global investors. But how would it be to bring back a common political culture of squatting and one that is in tune with the times? It always felt like there was widespread support for empties to be used as homes and not left empty and such sympathies for squatters remain despite the media barrage that wants to destroy that common sense. But to face the housing ‘crisis’ head on could those who can squat and those who can be helped and supported in squatting organise together to open up wasted houses and other buildings and to create from this housing and new cultures of resistance?
All the histories in this publication show that squatting is both a re-sponse to what is there (recession and empties or a city of specula-tion and lack of housing) and that it can be a dynamic that pushes the political terrain, often to places it doesn’t want to go. In 1946, as in 1969 and as in 1983, things had to be tried, an experiment had to be made or nothing would change - let’s begin today!
**Squatting Is A Part of The Housing Movement: Naming The Moment**
It’s difficult to think where the squatting movement goes:
* Does it continue to fracture as each new precarious tenure comes up and each new law changes housing options - property guardians, conversions of offices to flats, emp-ty housing estates sealed shut and protected 24 hours by guard?
* Should it make a widespread campaign for the removal of Section 144 of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 which makes squatting in resi-dential properties illegal? Should it work more on a ‘Squatting is still legal’ campaign?
* Should it once again set up infrastructures of organised squatting that connect to a wide range of people who need housing and communities of support? This is not an argument for making squatting respectable to the authorities as more being an argu-ment for making squatting relevant and possible for many more people.
* Should it open up more squatted social centres again to act as advice places, social places and as antagonistic bases?
* Does it try and start a movement that is not worried about the law but from a mor-al economy of housing and homelessness occupies empty new build homes? Can a movement of the poor actually expropriate empty luxury homes and for what length of time? Can it withstand the media hysteria, seek allies and support and up its game. Has to be said that such a new squatting movement without campaigning and public support is doomed.
**What Can We Do?**
If we look at what is going on elsewhere we can see militant responses to the cur-rent political terrain. Grassroots unions like United Voices of the World, Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain, Cleaners & Allied Independent Workers Union have all been doing dogged case work and direct action to fight big employers with loads of success. Groups like Housing Action Southwark and Lambeth and the London Renters Union, based on solid member-led or-ganising and direct action are amazingly inspiring. There are also dozens of great local anti-gentrification and regeneration campaigns fighting hard and not afraid of reclaiming buildings in that struggle. It’s possible to open up places to live as well as re-claiming nurseries, libraries, health centres, community centres for continued use by communities. All of these strands could come together to plot and plan in solidarity with each other linking squatting for housing with low wages, the hostile envi-ronment for migrants, against the Right and fascism, to support benefit claimants. All of the above would seek to bring a strong but decentralised housing movement to fruition that includes initiating, supporting and defending squatting. Could be good!

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# Universal care or charity?
The system of public housing as it was established in the mid 20th century had to be dismantled and privatized to make way for financialization of housing and proliferation of debt via housing loans. Even though the systems of public, that is social housing, are different from country to country, they were all designed to offer an alternative to the market-based housing provision. One of the prevailing models of dismantling the public housing system was the politics of the so-called right-to-buy that originated in the UK in the 1980’s and was transferred to many other countries. This means that social housing stock has been sold off to tenants living in them. The programs were dubbed as one of the most ingenious conservative revolutions. By making the tenant the individual owner of property - workers were supposed to become proprietors. To paraphrase General Franco’s Minister of housing in 1954, such strategies turn the nation of workers into the nation of owners. Struggles for social housing range from collective anti-gentrification action of tenants, rent strikes as well as the transnational demands for abolishing the neoliberal idea that the market can provide us with housing and demanding more investment into public housing stock. These struggles teach us that the right to housing, similar to the right to health protection, should be understood as the universal care established through the systematically arranged program of solidarity.
The system of public housing as it was established in the mid 20th century had to be dismantled and privatized to make way for financialization of housing and proliferation of debt via housing loans. Even though the systems of public, that is social housing, are different from country to country, they were all designed to offer an alternative to the market-based housing provision. One of the prevailing models of dismantling the public housing system was the politics of the so-called right-to-buy that originated in the UK in the 1980’s and was transferred to many other countries. This means that social housing stock has been sold off to tenants living in them. The programs were dubbed as one of the most ingenious conservative revolutions. By making the tenant the individual owner of property - workers were supposed to become proprietors. To paraphrase General Franco’s Minister of housing in 1954, such strategies turn the nation of workers into the nation of owners. Struggles for social housing range from collective anti-gentrification action of tenants, rent strikes as well as the transnational demands for abolishing the neoliberal idea that the market can provide us with housing and demanding more investment into public housing stock. These struggles teach us that the right to housing, similar to the right to health protection, should be understood as the universal care established through the systematically arranged program of solidarity.
## Proposed resources
**Read about the myth of meddling state:**
**Read about the myth of meddling state:**
![The myth of meddling state by Peter Marcuse.](bib:f6f7d1a4-882b-409b-aaf9-d8ef8b551ec4)
**Read about the situation in the ex - socialist countries:**
![](bib:bf24f062-a58c-4105-9418-35dbce461532)
**Checking out how we fight the myth that market is the only solution for our housing problems:**
![](bib:43e92f23-af8b-4d7e-9eee-609df5fb1ab7)
**Watch a film about iconic Pruitt - Igoe Myth:**
[The Pruitt-Igoe Myth](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CAfACI7LBY)
## If you want to know more
**Read about the iconic rent strike in public housing estate Pruitt Igoe:**
![](bib:adeb4fef-732d-4a34-8993-0120210b2ef1)
**For in-depth reading about mainstream narrative about global finance pushing the State out of housing production check out:**
![](bib:468edffc-22eb-41b3-9df2-29844c305ee0)
## How to learn together
Read the proposed articles before you come to the session. Watch the film together. Organize a discussion round. Make dictionary entries to collectively organize your thoughts. Feed in as much detail as you can. Use what you have read. Use your personal experience, including what you know about your family and your friends. Share your Dictionary with other Pirate Care Syllabus users.
---
# Ana Vilenica: 'Contradictions and Antagonisms in (Anti-) Social(ist) Housing in Serbia'
**In *ACME An International Journal for Critical Geographies* 18(6), 1261-1282, 2019. Retrieved from https://acme-journal.org/index.php/acme/article/view/1731**
**Introduction**
Housing is an important battlefield of struggles for social justice. The Serbian housing system is built on complex Yugoslav housing histories and an anti-socialist housing 'transition' that occurred after the 1990s, when housing became, to a large extent, a for-profit domain. In this process, many people became 'losers' of the privatisation and subsequent financialisation of housing and the lack of adequate social housing provisions. Contemporary social housing in Serbia is a segment of the institutionalisation of (capitalist) social order (Fraser, 2016:163) that emerged as an effect of a global neoliberal anti-socialist transition and its neo-colonial implications. Today, social housing in Serbia does not ensure decent, affordable, and secure housing and accordingly fails to provide social justice to marginalised groups who are affected by capitalist expropriation. By betraying the promise of social housing through the relativisation, political use, and suppression of social justice (Kuljić, 2018:361), social housing produces a toxic patchwork of geographies of isolated and indebted populations made dependent by mechanisms of responsibilisation and racism.
Yet, there is still a particular confusion regarding social housing that has emerged, as one cultural activist put it, from the clash between Yugoslav experience and the aggressive,rapid changes during the last decades. 'We see that nothing works, but we still cannot believe that the system is not there for us.'[^1] In order to underline the anti-social nature of social housing provision in peripheral capitalism, and instead of using the term social housing—which promises justice to those deprived of housing—I will introduce the notion of (anti-)social(ist) housing, which underlines its negation. Legal adviser Danilo Ćurčić came to a similar conclusion at a meeting with tenants in Kamendin in 2015: 'I am thinking often about how the social housing system doesn't exist. You are living the negation of that system. When everything is summed up, it's the complete opposite to it.'[^2]
The anti-social nature of social housing will be analysed using the case of Kamendin, the biggest social housing project by the City of Belgrade, geographically situated in Zemun Polje on Belgrade's outskirts. Kamendin is a symptom and a materialisation of (anti-)social(ist) housing in Serbia, which includes technologies of segregation, the production of debt slavery, and racism. In 2013, after an outburst of racist protest in the settlement against Roma newcomers—organised mostly by their white neighbours from nearby neighbourhoods—the mainstream media reporting in newspapers such as *Večernje Novosti*, *Politika*, *Alo!*, and others created a smokescreen that led to confusion and disorientation regarding the events and the real problems in the settlement. In parallel to the outburst of racism, a number of social tenants were facing eviction due to accumulated debt that emerged because of structural problems in the benefits system and (anti-)social(ist) housing provision.
Together with analysing the institutionalisation of (anti-)social(ist) housing, I will look at different resistance strategies. I will show how tenants left by the state to fight violence using their own devices employed the support of human rights NGOs and cultural organisationsin order to fight the state and change the narratives about their struggle. The main focus will be on the Kamendynamics project — which started one year after the racist protest and was established by cultural activists Nebojša Milikić and Tadej Kurepa, connected to Cultural Centre Rex in Belgrade — and on the play *How does fascism not disappear? Zlatija Kostić: I sued myself*, both carried out in collaboration with a group of tenants. These activist art projects are attempts to construct alternative understandings and meanings of social problems in the neighbourhood. They contribute to housing struggles as they improve the understanding of the (anti-)social(ist) housing “transition”and challenge dominant knowledge production by mainstream media.
This article is the result of research that was conducted from 2015 to 2019. The data was collected through ethnographic fieldwork. The reported material is based on participant observation, numerous conversations with residents of Kamendin, local housing experts, and NGO workers involved in activist work in the neighbourhood, and media reports and policy analyses. I observed three public meetings of tenants, one meeting in the neighbourhood, and made four on-site visits to observe the situation. The Kamendynamics project and the performance were analysed on the basis of audio recordings, visual material, and discussions with the actors involved in the project. In May 2015, as a member of Who Builds the City group I took part in organising a meeting in Belgrade, which gathered groups and individuals active in housing struggles in Serbia, including tenants of Kamendin. At the time, I also had a chance to observe and discuss issues about organising regarding Kamendin. In June 2018, I organised the conference *Art and housing struggles: Between art and political organising* at London South Bank University, where Nebojša Milikić from Cultural Centre Rex and Zlatija Kostić, a tenant from Kamendin, presented their collaborative work.
This research is theoretically framed by the current debate on “transition,” post-socialism, peripheral neoliberalisation, and social housing crises, including segregation, the racialisation of space, responsibilisation, tenants’ resistance, and housing activism. The study tackles the contradictions of Serbia’s social housing provision system not as a technical problem but as a political-economic problem (Madden and Marcuse, 2016:4). It combines an ethnographic account of social housing alongside in-depth readings of the economic, cultural, and social forces related to the conditions of specific spaces and subjects.
This paper contributes to scholarship on social housing in Eastern European cities by looking at mechanisms of segregation, the creation of public debt, and race and racism in Eastern Europeansocial housing. It provides empirical knowledge about local mechanisms, including the role of artistic activism in shaping narratives about social housing, and hopefully contributes to the anti-eviction struggles that lie ahead for tenants in Kamendin as well as anti-segregation and anti-racist housing struggles, including struggles for social housing in Eastern European cities and beyond.
The remainder of this article is structured as follows. First, I discuss of the emergence of the (anti-)social(ist) housing in Serbia. Social housing in Serbia plays out not only at the meso level and through state policy and politico-economic arrangements, but also at the macro level of international EU arrangements. Next, Iempirically analyse contradictions in the social housing project Kamendin in Belgrade by looking at segregation, debt slavery, responsibilisation, and racism.I discuss the micro level of shared assumptions, normative conceptions, and forms of knowledge. I consider social housing as both a material and a symbolic dynamic, connecting local issues with broader socio-political dynamics. In the third section, I will look at how attacks on social housing are resisted. I will discuss attempts of tenants and their allies to resist and fight back against systemic housing violence in the long and exhausting battle. The main focus will be on the potentials of cultural production for bringing out counter-narratives about social housing in Serbia. In the conclusion, I will reflect on the main findings in the light of the need to change the direction of “transition” towards new, socially just possibilities.
**(Anti-)social(ist) housing in Serbia**
Throughout the world, the social aspect of housing is suffering from attacks and defeats in the overwhelming process of housing “transition” that emerged as the effect of the global post-socialist condition (Fraser, 1997)and the outbreak of housing financialisation (Aalbers, 2017; Mikuš, 2019; Rolnik, 2019). Housing “transition” in Serbia emerged as part of the global tectonic changes in the organisation of capital and culture that began in the second half of the twentieth century and triumphed after 1989. Social housing in Serbia was created on the ruins of the Yugoslav societal housing system, which organised housing for Yugoslav workers more or less successfully until the 1990s. The academic literatures describes the period after the 1990s in ex-Yugoslav states largely as post-socialism and an unfinished or failed transition to capitalist political, institutional, economic, and socio-spatial standards (Kovacs, 1999; Tsenkova, 2009; Hegedus, Luz and Teller, 2013; Lux and Sunega 2013, Neducin and Krklješ, 2017). The process of “transition” in housing effectively meant the abolition of socialist institutionalisation, and with it the exorcism of class justice from the housing system. What we face today is a residual form of social housing based on legal justice, dosed and imposed through controlled procedures, which cannot effectively respond to the needs of the population and accordingly serve social justice. Although social housing, through legal documents, promises housing for all those who are not able to procure housing on the market, in practice it creates deprivation, marginalisation, expropriation, and repression.
In this article, I insist on the notion of anti-socialist transition as an overturned insight into post-socialist transition in order to call things by their right name. In the transitology discourse, the term transition has been used in order to describe the self-compliant and logical process of “transition” in former socialist countries from the totalitarian, backward, and rigid system of socialist production and reproduction into democratic, standardised, advanced, and modern capitalism (Kirn, 2017:47). Nevertheless, “transition” did not form part of a standardised version of capitalism but of a tectonic change in the overall organisation of capitalism and its culture globally (ibid:3). Specific forms of “transition” have been emerging in Western capitalist countries as well as in the East. In housing, it took the form of phasing out the social(ist) elements from the housing sector. In the UK, for example, this process included teachers’ right-to-buy in the 1980s and has reached new heights today with processes of regeneration by demolition and the social cleansing of working-class people from the central parts of London (Watt, 2017: 1–9). In ex-Yugoslav countries, “transition” did not start in 1989, as Gal Kirn has shown (Kirn, 2017:46).3The history of Yugoslavia is the history of post-socialist discontinuities within socialism under the influence of changes in global dynamics. These post-socialist discontinuities were followed by the transition to civil war in 1990, led by national(ist) elites. This led to the nationalisation of spaces in national-state-building processesand their subsequent privatisation, including the replacement of class justice with de-economised national and philanthropic justice, and resulted in Yugoslavia and its socialist housing experimentdisappearing. What emerged was a new, anti-socialist, peripheral, financialised, and neoliberal housing model, with neo-colonial implications, similar to the one that was spreading in different rhythms globally.
On an ideo-political level, social justice was the leading imperative (Kuljić, 2018:329) in Yugoslav “socialism,” which was never fully implemented. The Yugoslav socialist experiment in housing saw adequate housing for all as a pre-condition for the general development of society, which was supposed to lead to the total liberation of each individual. The new housing provision system was based on the principles of socialist self-management established in the 1950s. After WWII, initial partial nationalisation of the housing stock was carried out in the cities (1958). From 1956 onwards, workers had to allocate a percentage of their income to a common housing fund, with the perspective of gaining the right to use a socially owned apartment. The right to housing was connected to one’s work status in a country based on a never fulfilled ideal of full employment. However, in practice, the housing system was caught up in numerous contradictions and difficulties, including austerity measures imposed by the IMF in 1980, which led to a decline in the production of socially owned flats and to the parallel existence of massive informal housing and proto-market relations (Krstić, 2018:147).
In Belgrade in the 1980s, social property in housing barely exceeded 50 per cent of the overall housing stock (Vujović, 1987:97, quoted in: Archer, 2016:10). The housing shortage was especially severe in the big cities because of rural-to-urban migration. This created phenomena of tolerated informal housing construction as well as “hidden homelessness,” namely people living in substandard and precarious conditions, many as renters (Tsenkova, 2009:29). The main dividing line in society was between those who had a housing right of occupancy (stanarsko pravo)4and those who did not (Archer, 2016:9). One’s housing status depended on aset of parameters, including family status, years of employment, health condition, rank in the company or institution, etc., which materialised in one’s position on the ranking list. Nevertheless, employment criteria favoured groups of workers with a higher education and informally the higher ranked in a company and – frequently coinciding – those with a party membership card. Yugoslav enterprises were responsible for the construction and distribution of apartments. After 1950, the position of one’s enterprise in Yugoslavia’s more and more market-oriented economy was of prime importance – for various reasons, some companies were able to generate more income and, especially after the economic reforms in the mid-1960s, gained more and more rights to decide about housing distribution.
With the final disintegration of socialist Yugoslavia in the 1990s and the nationalist wars, the framework based on social justice was lost in pursuit of the promise given by Western democracy and full-scale entrepreneurial capitalism. With the expropriation of social property, the economic and political framework that defined “us” as a society, and with it the possibility to formulate collective interest, has fallen apart. In the field of housing, social property first had to be converted into state property by unconstitutional laws, and then the apartments were sold to the users of the residential rights. This process produced the so-called losers of the transition, who were not in a position to turn users’ rights into private ownership (mostly because they were renting on the private market or because they were the users of housing that was for other reasons non-eligible for privatisation). The privatisation of housing by its users for low prices cemented inherited inequalities and – together with restitution on property nationalised after WWII (Bodnaŕ, 2001:7) – created the basis for a new anti-socialist project. Similar to other Eastern European countries, today Serbia is a country with a high home ownership rate (Tsenkova, 2009:124); around 98 per cent in 2011 (RZS, 2017). Housing is to a large extent a for-profit domain, with home ownership as an ideal, where the dictates of the market have blocked access to social justice (Kuljić, 2018:283). The response to the challenge of defining new social housing politics was moved from an approach based on the principles of collectivism (and solidarity) to an approach based on efficiency in providing housing solutions to those who cannot compete on the market (Petrović, 2013:246, etc.). According to the 2011 census, less than 0.9 per cent of 2.4 million inhabited units was social housing (Vuksanović-Macura, 2017:70). This shows that social housing is currently in a residualised state (Petrović, 2013:256; Tsenkova, 2009:161). The essence of this system is the decentralised competition of various types of justices that focus on different groups of those in housing need. In effect, social housing serves to a large extent as a decoration of anti-socialist neoliberal democratic relativism. This new social (housing) justice has been normalised by the discriminatory legal positivism of national justice[^5] and by means of EU tactical philanthropy (characteristic for the relationship between the centre of capital and its periphery), which serves as a material surrogate of social justice (Kuljić, 2018: 297; 303). This surrogate of social justice has also generated its by-products in the face of the increased capacities of “soft social housing,” including slums and new unethical housing solutions like social housing in metal container settlements.Strategic donations coming from the EU had a large influence on the articulation of social housing policy in Serbia. In this way, the boundaries of the EU work both within and outside its territory (Sardelić, 2018:491). After the fall of Milosevic in the 2000s, the social security system was “re-stabilised” with funds from the World Bank and the IMF (Vuković and Perisić, 2011, quoted in Schwab, 2013:10). In the following years, as a candidate for EU membership, Serbia had to comply with the imposed EU neoliberal standardisation. The neoliberal reforms led to decentralisation, minimal institutional intervention, flexibilisation, and the creation of temporary social housing networked regimes. This included the establishment of a new model based on municipal agencies, with 15 million euros in donations from the Italian government through the Settlement and Integration of Refugees Programme (SIRP) carried out between 2005 and 2008 (Vuksanović-Macura, 2017). The EU was interested in investing in Serbia’s social infrastructure because of the regulation of migration. Social housing on the periphery has been treated as a pull factor that can be used to control unwanted migration to countries of the old core.
For more than twenty years, Serbia’s housing legislation was scattered over numerous inadequate legal documents that gave way to a patchwork of solutions (Petrović, 2013:250) that were unable to respond to actual needs. By relying on project-based social housing construction and foreign donations, the Serbian state has failed to create stable and sustainable financial resources (Čolić-Damjanović, 2015:171) and create coordinated housing construction for the poor. The privatisation mechanism created a so-called “privatisation trap,” a form of social norm promising that all public tenants will be given the right-to-buy (Lux and Sunega, 2013:310). That created expectations that social housing would be temporary, and wouldsubsequently be expected to be turned into privately owned housing. Social housing projects in Serbia are usually mediated through municipal housing agencies or different NGOs. At the level of towns and the municipality, criteria for the allocation of social housing and property uses are based on local regulations and regulations that can be adapted to the requirements of donor agencies that finance the construction of apartments. “In Belgrade, there are at least five systems of social housing at work,” explained Danilo Ćurčić, at that time legal adviser from YUCOM – the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, at the event organised by Cultural Centre Rex in 2015: “In one building from one project, people are paying 1000 RSD [8.5 EUR] rent and in the block nextto it from another project, they don’t pay anything.”[^6] This temporary project-based, networked regime of social housing proved to be inefficient because of its disregard of the local context, its fragmented and uncoordinated actions due to the absence ofpolitical will to solve the problems on the long-term, and its non-compliance with its assigned role in adopted policies (Vuksanović-Macura, 2017:73).
There is no official estimate of the need for social housing and no documentation that would give a clear idea of who has the lowest income and how much of their income they can spend on rent and utilities. Nevertheless, thanks to EUROSTAT data for 2016, we know that more than half the population lives in overcrowded households; that for more than 71 per cent of households in the Republic of Serbia, housing expenditures presents a great burden; that 17 per cent are exposed to a severe housing burden; and that 70 per cent would be eligible to claim help from the state, according to EU standards (EUROSTAT, 2019). The trouble with the social housing challenge in Serbia is precisely the failure to define in clear terms who the beneficiaries of housing provision should be (Petrović, 2013:249–250). According to the Social Housing Act from 2009, all those who cannot resolve their housing needs on the market because of social, economic, and other reasons have the right to social housing. Recently, this ambiguity got normalised on a symbolic and legal level by eliminating the very word “social housing” from the latest Housing Act (Law on Housing and Building Maintenance from 2016) and replacing it with the ambiguous term “housing support.” “The term social housing has a negative connotation. Many people need housing support but they don’t want to feel like social cases.”said an architect who took part in drafting the new Housing Act.[^7] This circumstance made it possible for the focus of social housing provision to shift from those who need it the most, namely the poor, to those on middle and lower-middle incomes who cannot compete on the market. Besides providing housing to the middle-income groups, the state also subsidised housing loans for this group, thus decreasing banks’ risks and interest income (Damjanović and Gligorijijević, 2010:49; Petrović, 2013:254 etc.). For the 18,290[^8] of those registered as homeless in 2011 (Bobić, 2014), this implies very slim chances of obtaining adequate housing. Special housing programmes have been created, targeting mostly refugees from the wars in 1990s and internally displaced persons (IDPs) (Petrović, 2013:251–252).[^9] Other vulnerable groups were targeted occasionally, in some cases with evident pressure from European institutions – whose goal was to prevent unwanted migration, especially from the Roma population.
In order to alleviate the permanent housing crises, the (anti-)social(ist) housing regime in Serbia has developed a tolerance towards informal housing for the urban poor. Slums or “unhygienic settlements” (as they are called by the mainstream media and representatives of authorities) are “soft social housing” – the tolerated informal housing that emerged after WWII and escalated in the 1990s with the influx of refugees, IDPs, and those deported from EU countries of mostly Roma origins (Schwab, 2013:9–12).[^10] Those living in slums only occasionally come into authorities’ view, and this is mostly when they find themselves in the way of a profitable development plan. From 2009 to 2012, in the face of new urban regeneration project(s), slum dwellers were treated by city officials as communal municipal waste blocking the development of the city (see “Protest Roma zbog rušenja naselja,” 2009).
During this period, violent mass evictions of slum settlements in profitable locations became one of the imprints of (anti-)social(ist) housing in Serbia. These evictions were induced by a big communication infrastructure project of significance to the EU[^11] and a sports event, the 2009 Summer Universiade, which was intended to create a “new and better” image of Serbia, and which enabled new profitable investments.[^12] The new (anti-)social(ist) housing solution for tenants of slums was found in the form of container settlements. Ex-tenants of the informal settlements, with address registration in Belgrade, were rehoused in five settlements scattered over the outskirts of Belgrade, where 14 m2 metal containers became the new form of transitional social housing for the surplus population the state wanted to get rid of.[^13] The container settlements became places for the resocialisation of Roma, a condition of earning their right to social housing (Schwab, 2013:49–57).[^14] In the years to follow, a few lucky container dwellers became tenants in social housing programmes[^15] as a result of pressure applied by the European Investment Bank.[^16] As has been shown, social housing in Serbia is an outcome of structural processes, including privatisation, dispossession of the poor, migration management, and the racialisation of cities. These processes became powerful organising forces of the conditions of the “absence of society” (Buden, 2012: 92). New (anti-)social(ist) housing emergedas a residualised field, where different groups compete for a roof over their heads within a fragmented and uncoordinated project financed by foreign donations. This process, as I will show in the example of social housing project Kamendin, has resulted in segregation, indebtedness, and racial conflicts and created irreconcilable antagonisms rather than smoother opposites.
**Contradictions in the social housing project Kamendin**
The Kamendin project started in 2003. By 2016, 622 flats for social rent had beenbuilt (Čolić-Damianović, 2015: 350), representing 80 per cent of all social flats constructed by the City of Belgrade at the time (ibid.). Kamendin is a satellite type of settlement, situated on two plots of land: Kamendin 1 and Kamendin 2. It was built in a peri-urban part of Belgrade, 17 km from its centre, far from any places of work. Kamendin has come into public focus when local newspapers started reporting on mass protest against Roma tenants in Zemun Polje:
> The inhabitants of Zemun Polje have been campaigning for days against families of Roma origin who live in social apartments in the settlement of Kamendin, due to whom they do not feel safe in their own home. They pointed out that Zemun Polje, once a quiet neighbourhood, has become unsafe because their basements have been robbed, their neighbours enter their terraces, they burn containers, dump garbage and do not take care of hygiene, which caused mange to occur – forty citizens got sick within the previous two months.
> The residents of Zemun Polje are asking the city and the state to solve the problem urgently, otherwise they will protest again and “take things into their own hands.” They also demanded that all those who threaten the safety of the settlement and the health of children leave Kamendin (Perović, 2013.).
This sensationalist report says little about anti-social elements of social housing in Kamendin. Furthermore, it creates a smokescreen that conceals the problems that people have been facing in Zemun Polje, as one cultural activist said to me.[^17] If this is not the whole picture, what are the problems of Kamendin then?
**They threw us all there:Social housing and segregation**
Through a public competition, a number of Roma families displaced in container settlements have been moved in the city apartments in Kamendin.
> In 2011–2012, Roma placed by the City of Belgrade in the container settlements have been moved into apartments in Kamendin for the first time in greater numbers. This relocation has been fuelled by the pressure from international and local organizations on the City administration to provide a solution, due to the catastrophic conditions in the container settlements, and the need to find a permanent housing solution for the displaced people. Thus, the City of Belgrade has squandered a competition for social housing, to which families from the container settlements applied in significant numbers. In this (applying) they were assisted by the city administration and some NGOs. Participation of these families in the competition was possible because the City of Belgrade had previously made changes to the rules for potential users of social housing, where priority was given to social and housing vulnerability (over the previous criteria, such as years of service and education). Overall, the Roma from container settlements were not privileged when applying for and moving into flats in Kamendin. They were (unfortunately) the poorest and the most vulnerable of all, which made them easily reach the top of the housing allocation rankings.[^18]
Unlike some other settlements, where Roma were moved into one block of apartments, in Kamendin, Roma were successively moving into apartments with other ethnic groups (Vuksanović-Macura, 2017:81). A major characteristic of this settlement is that 80 per centof its tenants belong to so-called socially vulnerable individuals: those displaced from slum settlements, severely disabled people, and people in need of care and assistance whose household incomes is less than 60 per cent of the national average. This created a high concentration of poor and unemployed people (Čolić-Damianović, 2015: 351). “They threw us all there together: children from foster homes, heavily disabled, people with mental health issues, internally displaced people, Roma, we who worked ourentire lives,” the tenant told me in a conversation.[^19]
In Kamendin, segregation was imposed (Marcuse, 2002) on the tenants. They were deliberately selected according to specific socio-economic criteria used to determine their right to live there. The criteria according to which these people were selected, their subsequent inability to pay bills, and the long-term unemployment of many turned the area into a ghetto of the excluded (Marcuse, 1997:232–233; Wacquant, 1993). Although a significant number of Romatenants already went through a process of forced “resocialisation” in the container settlement, according to tenants, policing continued in their social flats. Tenants reported that representatives of the Centre for Social Services and representatives of the Office for Collaboration with Users of Social Housing keep invading their homes through unannounced visits in order to regulate their behaviour. “It is not right for civil servants to come and spy on us, yell at us and drive our friends from the house.”[^20] Residents were never consulted about their housing preferences and needs (Vuksanović-Macura, 2017:81). In this way, they ended up living in a ghetto with an integrated corrective function.
Due to their characteristics, segregated social housing projects very often prove to be spaces that generate conflicts and public protest. The beginning of construction work in 2003, as reported in Zemunska hronika, was marked by a conflict of interest between a group of citizens from Zemun Polje and municipal authorities responsible for the project. In collaboration with the local community council, Zemun’s citizens formed a crisis headquarters in order to express their protest against the new social housing project in close proximity to their homes (Zemunska hronika,2003). Citizens expressed discontent because they were not consulted in the planning process. They asked officials to improve their living conditions and not exacerbate them by increasing the population. Protesting citizens claimed to have enough of “their own Roma” in need of adequate housing and that they did not need unfortunate people from other places. Crisis headquarters organised mass protests in Zemun Polje, including road blocks and obstructing the construction site. The protest wave was interrupted by the murder of prime minister Zoran Đinđić and the subsequent declaration of a state of emergency, which included a ban on public gatherings, protests, and strikes. Antagonism towards the poor and racialised tenants of Kamendin continued throughout different phases of the project, which is still in progress.
Spatial segregation mechanisms through social housing have to be seen as a political project of a peripheral state that structurally gave up on the social justice project based on equality; a statethat has embraced extreme class divisions and racism as its mode of functioning. Although segregation was not eradicated on the territory of Yugoslavia, there was a will to change some of its implications, mostly by means of new high-rise housing construction that was supposed to house residents of different educational profiles (Čaldarović, 1975:58–66). Today, housing segregation in Serbia is an effect of housing and social policy, speculations on land value, growing economic inequality, the residualisation of social housing, and structural and cultural class and race mechanisms.The Kamendin project shows how the segregation of the lower social strata on the periphery has increased through means of social housing. Regardless of the size of the problem, the segregation issue has not been on the political agenda in Serbia.
**If I knew, I would never have moved into this flat: Social housing and debt slavery**
The problems for Kamendin’s tenants surfaced when they realised that the state provided them with flats whose maintenance they could not afford. The very conditions to apply for these flats included a household not exceeding 23,000 RSD [~195 EUR]. The Centre for Social Welfare invited future tenants to apply for flats whose monthly costs would not exceed 3,000 RSD [~25 EUR]. But this turned out to be the monthly rent only. There are two main models of social housing programmes in Serbia: social housing for rent (from 2004) and social housing in protected conditions (from 2002). The users of the first type of social housing pay preferential rent and all housing costs, while users of the second type of social housing benefit from various social services. Instead of offering tenants social housing in protected conditions, the authorities misled most of the supposed beneficiaries in their explaining of the conditions they would find themselves in. “I feel deceived,” a tenant in debt told me, “I was told that the rent was 2,000 [17 EUR] and then it turned out that the total expenses are in excess of my income.”[^21] Many tenants had similar stories: “If I knew about this, I would have never moved into this flat. My bills were twice as small in the flat that I was renting in Vračar.”[^22] What contributed to the confusion, whether intentionally or not, is that the words “stanarina” or “naknada” were used in the contracts, which refer in everyday language to all expenses of the flat except electricity bills. People living on the street, in informal slums, or containers, as some explained, were too eager to get decent housing to check the variety of meanings in a contract that was presented to them as a hugely merciful act by the authorities. On top of rent and market price utility bills, they had to pay a property tax on social housing introduced in the amendments on theProperty Tax Law in 2014 (Ćurčić, 2015). Moreover, the trouble with the welfare system in Serbia is that those who are able to work receive welfare support for nine months a year (Zakon o socijalnoj zaštiti, 2011), but have to pay their bills the entire year. In the course of months and years, many tenants inevitably accumulated debt because of their inability to pay the utility bills. “When the state thinks poverty is asleep, you still have to pay the bills,” Danilo Ćurčić said, in conversation with tenants.[^23]
Using the right to evict tenants who fail to pay their utility bills for three consecutive months, the City of Belgrade and “Infostan” (the municipal utilities company) sued a number of people, aiming at debt collection or eviction. According to the local initiative that organised the endangered tenants, up to a hundred families were exposed to such measures. For those who constantly failed to pay the electricity bills, a cut-off was the final step. Cultural activists told me that they met a single mother with four kids in Kamendin living without electricity in the flat, and her case was not unique (many people refused contact and meetings with activists but informed neighbours and members of the local initiatives).[^24] This situation reveals the utter violence of the social housing system. Under the excuse of care, the state was taking part in the ghettoisation of social tenants and their further marginalisation, and burdened them with unexpected debt. Up to the present day, the tenants of the Kamendin social project live under a permanent threat of losing the roofs over their heads, and many of them have no means of sustaining themselves as their income is blocked due to their debts. As the representative of a local organisation for social and economic rights told me in a conversation we had in 2019, the families who have debts with Infostan are now essentially without a contract, since the old contracts expired and the City is unwilling to extend new agreements with those who do not pay regularly.[^25]
Until the beginning of 2019, there was only one attempt of eviction, which tenants stopped by blocking the execution by the executors, as several tenants reported in informal conversation.[^26] There are many reasons for this lack of eviction, including tactical postponement, and the structural incapacity of local authorities to implement violent measures. During the local election campaign held in 2012, the Serbian Progressive Party (Srpska napredna stranka) formally promised to continue supporting poor citizens.Representatives of the SPP (SNS) informally spread some sort of vague guarantee that there will be an alternative solution for the people endangered by evictions in exchange for votes, according to tenants.[^27]
Bureaucratic debt itself has to be seen as a specific form of systemic violence that harms vulnerable groups (Degirmenciogluand Walker, 2015). The debt of Kamendin’s tenants is framed as individual or personal, but there is very little that is personal about this individualised form of structural inequality. This debt was produced by the aggressive, class-based, and racist policing of the population and was illegitimate from the very start. The debt of those in social housing arrangements in Serbia is a consequence of the overall politics of social housing, including the constant transfer of responsibility, the non-harmonisation of social legislation, the absence of political will to organise the sector of social housing, the absence of so-called social cards (socijalne karte) that would show how much the users of social housing are able to pay, and a general state of austerity in the social sector. “If this contract is not proved to be void, we are really in a lifelong problem. They are sitting on our social benefits and on our pensions,”said a concerned resident in a conversation with a little hope expressed.[^28]
**I am ashamed in thousand ways: Governing by responsibilisation**
In addition to policy measures that induced responsibilisation, widely spread public narratives affected attitudes and reasoning around the situation in Kamendin. The first articles about problems in Kamendin appeared in newspapers in 2012, when they reported on the decision of the Housing Commission for the Allocation of Social Housing (following a proposal of the Secretariat for Social Protection) to terminate contracts with tenants who accumulated debt. According to an article in Večernje Novosti, the City Administration proposed to those who were unemployed and who had accumulated debt to apply for jobs in the publicsector (Počinju iseljenja iz Kamendina?, 16.10.2012.). From thirty-two people who applied, only one accepted the job, as a representative of the City told the media (ibid.). The families were also offered to settle their debt in instalments.As the journalist reported, some of the debtors signed a debt repayment contract but did not comply again, or paid new bills, while refusing to settle the old (ibid.).
Official statements and media narratives of this type indicated that the debt was caused by the irresponsibility and laziness of tenants. This ideological campaign is a standardised part of the neoliberalisation of subjects, which are now supposed to take full responsibility for aspects of their lives that were previously seen as unproductive and burdens-for-the-advancement-of-society collective/socialist concerns. The discursive production related to Serbia’s social housing problems has a strategic importance in individualising and personalising responsibility andreproducing a system based on profound inequality. In this way, structurally produced and basically illegitimate debt is internalised/individualised and thus legitimised, although the people taking part in this arrangement did not have any power over the development of the situation they ended upin. “I am ashamed in a thousand ways for bringing myself into this situation,”[^29] said a tenant in an interview.“It is all about my bad choices,”[^30] she underlined.
One of the dominant narratives towards the end of Yugoslavia talked about societal propertyas “everyone’s and no one’s.” Problems in society were interpreted in the light of the absence of an efficient base for responsibility. That base was supposed to be created by the introduction of private ownership. In the residential sector, this new “responsibility” was introduced by pushing the users of residential rights into home ownership. The anti-socialist privatisation of housing and the dismantling of societal property in Serbia helped the state get rid of the expensive management and maintenance of properties by transferring it to a majority of poor owners. In social housing, the absurdities of this new responsibilisationcan be seen, among other things, in the tax on social housing. This “social tax,” “tax on poverty,” or “solidarity tax” has been introduced for the purpose of filling budget holes, together with a number of controversial decisions such as the reduction of pensions and compulsory socially useful work for all able-bodied recipients of welfare assistance (Ćurčić, 2015). This shows how society and higher authorities transferred responsibility for solving their own problems and the problems of the state budget to communities and individuals, which has become an important mechanism of peripheral housing governmentality.
**I have nothing against Roma, but...: Social housing and racism**
In November 2013, a new and more aggressive dimension was added to the campaign intended to prepare the terrain for the eviction of “undeserving beneficiaries” in Kamendin. Following rumours that an epidemic ofmange had appeared among schoolchildren in the local primary school, residents of nearby buildings started demanding the eviction of Roma residents (Perović, 2013). Serbian daily newspapers immediately started to report on an inflaming and “threatening toget out of control” mass protest against members of the Roma population (Skenderija and Ljutić, 2013.). Representatives of citizens in the protests blamed their neighbours, the Roma settled in the Kamendin social housing project, for the spread of the disease, for a petty crime epidemic, for prostitution, drug dealing, and state robbery, and for having no respect for the culture of communal living. Protestors called on the authorities to stop any further settlement of Roma residents in the area and to evict those who do not follow tenancy rules and hygienic procedures.This is how one of the tenants protesting against his Roma neighbours described the situation for the daily newspaper *Večernje Novosti*:
> I have nothing against Roma, nor do I hate them! But the ones who moved in here are completely unsocialised. Because of them, we cannot keep the windows open; they are entering and stealing. They’re robbing the shops, they are violent, but there is also prostitution and drug dealing. It is not enough that theydo not pay for utilities, electricity, nothing (Skenderija and Ljutić, 2013).
These kinds of statements based on racialising poverty were followed by public calls for violence and lynching and by expressions of hatred and intolerance. Many Roma tenants reported having been threatened and forced to hide in their homes during these events (Skenderija and Ljutić, 2013).The discourse employed in this case is not new. Discriminatory stereotypes about Roma are deep-seated in Serbian society (Simeunović-Bajić, 2013). Members of the Roma community are widely perceived as being unemployed, parasites on state resources, bending human rights laws to gain benefits, and always already cheating the system, whereas in fact, the system itself was designed to fail them. On top of this, there is a widespread denial that the expression of intolerance towards Roma is racism. During the racist protest in Kamendin, some white inhabitants claimed that they themselves as having become an endangered category when the vulnerable tenants settled (Skenderija and Ljutić, 2013). The word racism was widely seen as invented to serve the interests of the Roma, who supposedly get more privileges and benefits from the state than the white majority.
Race is very much a spatial issue and an axis of exclusion (Fassin, 2017:XII; Picker, 2017). In Serbia, the racialisation of Roma has become a measure of Serbian whiteness and ethnic purity, and racism against Roma has become functional to spatial segregation in the country. In the last decade, in parallel with informal Roma settlements, social housing has become a new site of racial segregation and violence. The 2013 events created a new situation around issues in Kamendin that allowed the media and officials to ascribe all tensions to a problem of coexistence arising from so-called cultural differences. This representation situated the political debate around the coexistence problem and was to a large extent misleading: not only did it obscure the state’s responsibility for creating a segregated neighbourhood for the poor and pushing tenants into debt slavery, but it also contributed to redefining class-based social fragmentation in cultural terms. For the activists engaged in this case, who took the time to understand the situation, it was clear that the protests were used by the government to support their attempts to remove “undeserving beneficiaries” from their homes.[^31]
**Resisting attacks on social housing**
The “death of the social” (Trnka and Trundle, 2014:140) in (anti-)social(ist) housing has not remained unanswered. Dwellers of Kamendin have been trying to cope with injustices by using what is at their disposal: human rights NGOs, cultural organisations, and their own capacities to confront the legal system and fight back.
The racial outburst of violence in 2013 provoked a wave of humanitarian and philanthropic responses from different state and civil society actors. Several NGOs have publicly condemned the racial riots and called for an immediate response by the state (Perović, 2013.). Apart from providing the conditions for a larger police presence in the neighbourhood, the state did nothing essential to solve this conflict and improve the living conditions in Zemun Polje. It left tenants to their own devices in coping with the structural and symbolic violence. Moreover, several tenants whom I had a chance to speak with during a visit to Kamendin in 2017 reported that the ruling party used their situation to exert pressure on them during the last presidential elections. Tenants were intimidated by representatives of the ruling right-wing, neoliberal SNS party by phone and pressured to vote for Aleksandar Vučić, the Serbian prime minister who was at that time running for president.[^32]
Although the state has been working on confusing tenants, infantilising and blackmailing them, groups of tenants have been organising to fight back. Some of those forced into the bureaucratic battlefield in time became amateur experts in housing legal matters. Together with other tenants, they pressure city authorities and various institutions in charge of juridical, social-welfare-related, and political aspects of the problem by writing complaints and petitions and organising small-scale protests. “We must put pressure on the City to null and void these contracts. Then the debt will have to be written off as well,” a tenant told me during the so-called housing question event in Cultural Centre Rex.[^33] Several human rights NGOs, such as Praxis, A11, the initiative for economic and social rights, YUCOM – Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, and legal experts in socio-economic rights dedicated themselves to supporting individual tenants in the legal fight against evictions and unlawfully accumulated debt.
> The serious problem in this case is that you are complaining to the same institution that you have signed your contract with. You sign the contract with the City of Belgrade and they get to decide about the termination of the contract. When you complain, they are again the ones who get to decide on the legality of the termination of the contract. After the decision of the Mayor, you don’t have a right to legal protection anymore.[^34]
This is how an expert in socio-economic rights explained the situation to me during the same event. An additional problem in this situation is sudden transfers of responsibilities between institutions that have been happening in a non-transparent way. The responsibility for social housing, according to a representative of A11, has recently passed from the Secretariat of Social Protection to the Secretariat for Property and Legal Relations.[^35] What is obvious to tenants, legal experts, and activists alike is that social housing in Serbia does not serve its purpose, at least not the purpose we expect it to have: to protectthose who need support the most. These fragmented and defensive responses, which work with consequences rather than causes, are condemned to somehow endure in this long and exhausting battle, without much chance of success.
All these activities of individuals and institutions contained many moments that looked decisive, hopeful, or hopeless to the actors involved. At the end, however, exhaustion served as a tactic of draining the physical and mental energy of those affected. It seems that this is how the system creates its hostages.Tenants are still hoping that appeals will bear fruit in order to save them from eviction, which would mean going to some of the newly established slums or, as a seemingly better option, returning to containers. As an inevitableresult of these continuous struggles and tensions, more and more people report physical and mental health problems. This experience of profound subjective suffering materialises, as tenants report, in depression, anxiety, and other severe conditions. “Howmany people have died by now? No one is reporting about that. How many people got sick of those that came here healthy? How long will we endure the terror of the City management? We don’t owe them anything. They owe us for maltreatment and causing severe anguish,”[^36] a woman said during a meeting in Kamendin organised by Cultural Centre Rex in 2015.
**How does fascism not disappear? Engaging by means of art**
Thanks to their long-term engagement with tenants of Kamendin, activists from Cultural Centre Rex in Belgrade are among their most visible public allies. During the last decades, art has played a significant role in urban struggles. It has been functionalised in processes of gentrification and social cleansing and instrumentalised as a “regeneration” factorin socially deprived arias (Phillips and Erdemci, 2012). On the other hand, artists have been struggling to maintain their position as critical agents in urban struggles by giving a voice to the deprived and creating alternative narratives to those produced in the mainstream. A year and a half after the protests in Kamendin, a group of cultural activists working at Cultural Centre Rex, with a long-term interest in housing, started the project Kamendynamics. These empirical and artistic works recalled the capacity of cultural production and the role that it can play. In this very case, instead of reinforcing the sources of division and alienation among individuals and groups.
According to initiators Nebojša Milikić and Tadej Kurepa, the project emerged with the aim of understanding the actual social relations behind the spectacularised narratives produced in the media.[^37] In order to reveal the roots of a politics that proclaims poverty to be rooted in cultural differences and individual preferences, they started a year’s long research project. Project Kamendynamics gradually grew into a struggle for supremacy in the interpretation against the absolutely toxic language that has taken root in and about Kamendin. This activist research started with a survey and individual talks and interviews that included tenants and stakeholders. The collected information and mapped questions were used as a framework for two public seminars named Hot potato 1 and 2, which followed the outcomes of interviews and small-scale discussions that the group of activists realised in Kamendin in June and July 2015. The seminars were an attempt to articulate broader social problems and thus outline a context for particular problems in the settlement of Kamendin as well as for individual problems of tenants. This attempt included a public analysis of the facts about the flaws and failures of social housing and welfare politics as well as political mechanisms and media manipulations.
In one room, the seminar gathered those in debt, those unhappy because of a lack of hygiene, and those who took part in racist protests. The tense atmosphere during both seminars showed the desperation and anger of tenants trapped in a hopeless situation as well as the complex relations among those living in and around Kamendin. There were voices who directed their anger towards the system that divided the tenants into payers and debtors and towards the inefficient welfare system, as well as those who blamed noisy, uncultivated neighbours and an inefficient police system.
The seminars were conceived as a means of setting up a framework to push publicly against a story that serves the interests of elites and intervene with a new one that serves the interests of the people who are the reason that the neighbourhood exists in the first place (mostly the poor). In order to share ideas for confronting and changing dominant narratives, the project introduced a new form of thinking by means of visual art. As an attempt to make sense of all personal stories and policy facts collected during the research and discussions, the moderators of the project, with the help of visual artist Vahida Ramujkić, came up with a drawing for the “reverse side of the building.” The drawing was presented to seminar participants as an explanatory model that could be, if accepted by most of the interested actors, realised as a mural in one of the buildings in the settlement.[^38]
The drawing is based on a four-class model society, resembling a four-floor building, including the pauperised working class, those with a middle-class consciousness, and the comprador bourgeoisie serving the interests of the neo-colonial peripheral management of troika and big capital. The poor tenants of Kamendin are positioned at the very bottom of the building. They are presented as carrying the entire institutional apparatus from government officeto NGOs on their backs (a class that the initiators of the project in Kamendin themselves obviously belong to), including that of media and people who protested against Roma tenants. On the top floor, one can see well-dressed politicians holding the rooftop with both of their hands. Those are comprador elites that are used to transfer messages and pressure from the EU, IMF, and ECB to those whose lives they manage. EU institutions and politicians are on the very top. They are separated from the rest of thebuilding by barbed wire. Their role is to oversee the efficacy of social housing in Serbia, serving as a “pull factor” meant to control migrations. The lower parts of the building are represented as a dynamic structure, with individuals from each floor trying to climb the ladder and reach the next one. What we see on the drawing is a struggle, not peaceful coexistence. The “reverse side” actually revealed that the social housing system in Serbia is deployed on a grid of the “class pyramid,” based on economic and ideopolitical domination and subordination. This drawing is a clear attempt to bring class analyses back into the housing issue in order to undermine the analyses based on the ethnification and culturalisation of problems.
In parallel with the development of the idea for the public mural as a means to explain and talk about the class character of conflicts in Kamendin, another seminar in Cultural Centre Rex became the platform for articulating problems in Kamendin. Conceived as a public reading of the autobiographical narrative of tenant Zlatija Kostić, this seminar opened up questions of the historical relational effects of our structural differences and the gradual subsequent construction of individual guilt as a means of transferring social responsibility.Zlatija Kostić claimed in the survey conducted by a cultural activist (engaged in research for the project Kamendynamics) to be ready to sue herself for the hopeless situation she has put herself and her daughters in, due to the decisions that she has made during her lifetime. This paradoxical demand found its detailed articulation in a staged version of an imaginary court case performed under the title *How does fascism not disappear? Zlatija Kostić: I sued myself*.
The performance text was initially prepared by Zlatija Kostić and then gradually developed and finalised in collaboration with project moderators and other tenants from the settlement. The stage was set on September 20, 2016, at Cultural Centre Rex, as part of The Speech Programmes. The scarce scenography indicated the outline of a court room, a resemblance that was referred to in the introduction to the performance, as was an imaginary institution called the Basic Court for Human Rights in the Belgrade Municipality of the Zemun Settlement Kamendin. The audience witnessed the court hearing about “... the case of Zlatija Kostić from Kamendin, Belgrade, against Zlatija Kostić from Kamendin, Belgrade.” Zlatija (who appeared in front of the court as herself) accused the defendant Zlatija (who appeared in front of the court as an incarnation of Zlatija in her twenties) for ruining her life and the lives of her children with a series of mistakes and bad decisions that she made during her lifetime.
The performance narrative includes autobiographical takes and analytical comments meant to create a historical-materialist setting for Zlatija’s story. Consequently, what is felt as individual guilt is revealed in this narrative as an outcome of systemic problems emergingin socialist Yugoslavia and during the so-called transition, showing how workers were robbed of social property and put in a situation of permanent dependency on inadequate (literally and materially disappearing) state apparatuses. This play is intended to encourage people to develop insights about their own lives, but it is also committed to the deeper roots of the problem, to insights into how cause leads to consequence, and to how to influence, shape, and understand the driving forces of contemporary housing regimes in Serbia. This is not a performance about the self, but it is about the self-definition of identity construction (Spry, 2011), the limits of personal accountability, and the state as a domain of un-freedom.
At a time when public debate seemsto articulate a rhetoric of exclusion, this play, which is unusual in a Serbian context, crucially provides explanations that illuminate the true roots of social fragmentation. The court set-up, where witnesses, experts, and the audience spoke from their own political and societal experience seemingly lit up – at least for two hours – the collective political imagination. People from the audience were voicing pros and cons of the presented claims and standpoints, even commenting further like some experts or passing witnesses, bringing the event to a kind of forum-theatre ending. “I am the generation of the claimants. The accusations are correct. Young Zlatija was wrong. She didn’t think enough about herself and her family, she believed the state. That’s whyshe should be declared guilty!” said a man from the audience. A woman, a lawyer by profession, mentioned the example of the neighbourhood Stepa Stepanovic in Belgrade, where tenants have reportedly been facing similar problems. Many talked about the fact that it is possible to tax social housing and evict poor people from social flats. Many accusations of the state were formulated, including the conclusion that the legal state is only legal when it has benefits. Among the attempts to clarify different issues, there was also an attempt to formulate a proposal for collective direct action: “The next time when the executors show up, we should all come and force the state to reformulate the system.”
Unfortunately, the play was performed in Serbia only once. In an interview conducted in 2017, Zlatija Kostić told me that there were around twenty people in the audience, some of them family members of people from Kamendin that were involved in reading, and others people that she did not know. At the beginning, the seminars and the play were relatively isolated but important attempts to produce counter-narratives about social housing in Serbia. Today, together with other actors in the housing movement – including the anti-eviction movement The Joint Action: Roof over the Head (The Roof) – Cultural Centre Rex continues to bring up this issue in order to include it in a larger process of politicisation that has been taking part in the last two years around epidemics of eviction due to debt after the state has given new powers to private-public executors. But that is a story for another paper.
**Conclusion**
In light of the main findings of this study, it could be concluded that social housing in Serbia has an anti-social nature. It is a product of anti-socialist neoliberal poverty governance at the EU and local levels. The new accumulation of capital through speculation on land value created conditions in which land for social housing had to be located on the periphery and on the very frontier of social life in cities. Repressive forms of social housing in combination with a repressive welfare system produce pauperised, stigmatised, and segregated urban areas.Social housing promises assistance to all those who cannot obtain housing on the market but, in reality, keeps the numbers of those that should be on the waiting lists suppressed (Petrović, 2013:246). The lucky minority of those in need that actually manage to obtain an apartment in public ownership are threatened by debt slavery and class-and race-based regulatory violence. In order to obscure this situation, institutions use different legal and symbolic mechanisms that function to cheaply hide the most visible victims of neoliberal housing contradictions. The risks and contradictions of a system that institutions and society produce are subjectivised, individualised, and racialised. Media narratives, responsibilisation,and racism are operationalised by the state’s “hygienic governmentality” and directed against an “abject population” accused of threatening the common good (Berlan 1997:175, quoted in: Tyler, 2013:38). Mina Petrović argues that this housing regime is ambivalent (Petrović, 2013:244). This article, however, shows that it is not ambivalent but extremely anti-social, because it does not provide decent, affordable, and secure housing. Instead, it produces spatial segregation, racism, debt slavery, and evictions. Moreover, the state has been utilising the enslaved position of segregated and indebted social tenants to collect votes and maintain its powerful position through pressure and blackmail. Also, the EU has provided funds and turned a blind eye on human rights violations in order to secure social housing in Serbia that is supposed to keep unwanted Roma migrants within the borders of Serbia.
Mainstream narratives that co-constructed the situation in Kamendin employed a particular angle that blamed Roma people for having no respect for the culture of communal living. It is not that racism and disrespect for the culture of communal living are not the problem. The problem is that without a structural approach, every analysis tends to stay stuck in easy-to-manipulate identity politics and individual choices related to the mythology of “equal opportunities.” The analysis performed through the Kamendynamics project and the play I sued myselfshowed that racism and the formation of “identity politics” are important factors, but they can obfuscate the deeper socio-economic vectors of division on which they are predicated. The approach developed in theseprojects is an important contribution to analyses of social housing issues in Serbia, as they shift the understanding of housing and open up the process of “transition” to other possibilities.
Resistant practices emerge and converge. Our task is to think about how to bring in new elements and nurture the old ones and prepare them for their lives outside their current (art, activist, or academic) institutional and geographic forms. One thing is certain: resistance practices cannot properly function in isolation and they have to be permanently accountable to those in the interests of whom their actors claim to work.
**Acknowledgements**
I would like to thank to all the tenants of Kamendin that I had a chance to meet with and talk to. I would like to thank the anonymous peer reviewers, ACME editor Marieke Krijnen and my dear friends and colleagues Nebojša Milikić, Danilo Ćurčić, Anja Buchele, Svetlana Rakočević, Lee Barham, Vittorio Bini, Ugo Rossi, and Zlata Vuksanović-Macura who have read, commented on, and/or proofread this paper in different phases.
**Funding**
The research for this article has been conducted within the framework of the European Commission’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship grant for the research project HOUSEREG, agreement No.707848 (2016-2018).
[^1]: Conversation with a cultural worker, Belgrade, April 2017.
[^2]: Hot potato: What is the social problem in Zemun Polje?, Cultural Centre Rex, Belgrade, June 6, 2015
[^3]: In the book chapter “A Critique of Transition Studies on Postsocialism or How to Rethink and Reorient 1989?” Gal Kirn returns to the Althusserian concept of the aleatory and contingent processes of history in order to show that Yugoslav socialism has itself been a transitional form that has constantly shifted between capitalist and communist elements.
[^4]: Other English terms in use are: specially protected tenancy and occupancy-tenancy rights.
[^5]: Or a set of contested legal regulations and restrictions without reference to social consideration.
[^6]: Hot potato: What is the social problem in Zemun Polje?, Cultural Centre Rex, Belgrade, June 6, 2015.
[^7]: Conversation with an architect, Belgrade, October 2015.
[^8]: These are homeless people registered in the 2011 census. In Serbia, this is not an official register of homeless people.
[^9]: Even among those registered as IDPs, discrimination was/is significant. As the representative of A11 – The initiative for economic and social rights – told me in a conversation, conditions for getting a flat in the special programs have been privileging ethnic Serbs, while for example Roma, Ashkali, and Egyptians had much less access to these programs.
[^10]: Roma had an unequal housing status in Yugoslavia, largely due to their positionas low-qualified workers (Vujović, 2017). The anti-socialist period accelerated their downward mobility, while the increasing pauperisation of the majority population led to a widespread perception of any provision to Roma as a privilege at the expense of the Serbian majority (Petrović, Berescu, and Teller, 2013:109). Poverty itself became racialised and crystallised into discrimination of Roma people. Those in disadvantaged situations are now seen by the white majority populationas parasites, depleting public resources to their advantage (see comments under Skenderija and Ljutić, 2013). Nevertheless, from 6,410 social flats in Belgrade in 2011, only 134 – or 2 per cent – were inhabited by Roma (Macura and Samardžić, 2017:52). Many Roma tried to find better living conditions abroad, where host countries treat them as temporaryand deportable visitors (Sardelić, 2018:491). In order to comply with demands for joining the EU, Serbia had to sign an agreement on the readmission of all those who were not granted asylum. In the course of the Schengen visa liberalisation process, thousands of people, mostly Roma, were deported to Serbia. For many of them, the only way to resolve their housing situation was to move into one of the slum settlements.
[^11]: The most disadvantaged population living in slums, mostly Roma, became the first victim of the “soft social housing” cleansing project that started in 2009 in preparation for the reconstruction of the Gazela bridge as part of works on the Pan-European corridor X, a communication infrastructure project of European interest. In this endeavour, the City of Belgrade, together with European Investment Bank, created a new type of governmentality over Roma tenants in an attempt to jointly manage the fulfilment of credit (Schwab, 2013:41). Inadequate attempts to rehouse Roma were followed by continuous racist rejections and demonstrations by local white residents of potential neighbourhoods for Roma families’ new homes (Amnesty International, 2010).
[^12]: For this occasion, the city of Belgrade entered into a private-public partnership – with a company owned by local tycoon Miroslav Miškovoć and with the Hypo-Alpe Adria bank – in order to build a new business-residential complex to accommodate Universiade athletes, whichwas intended for sale after the event was over (see Vilenica and kuda.org, 2013: 12–13).
[^13]: Those without an address in Belgrade were deported to the official places of residence stated in their personal documents.
[^14]: Rules in container settlements were based on stereotypes regarding the Roma people’s ways of life, which they were supposed to change, from hygiene to family planning.
[^15]: “The majority of the families have now been moved outfrom the container settlements. Few have been moved to socialhousing; about sixty families. Others received houses in rural areas all over Serbia, and several received construction materials. They were part of the “social housing” program if we see the purchase of the rural homes as one of the social housing models. However,they are not tenants but owners” (Email exchange with Dr Zlata Vuksanović-Macura, September 2019).
[^16]: “The European Investment Bank, which co-financed the reconstruction with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, announced in March 2010 that it was not satisfied with the Roma displacement and that the contractor Roads of Serbia should pay back a tranche of 10 million euros if a sustainable housing solution for the displaced Roma was not found” (Ombudsman, 2012).
[^17]: Conversation with a cultural activist, Belgrade, May 2016.
[^18]: Email exchange with Dr Zlata Vuksanović-Macura, September 2019.
[^19]: Interview with a tenant, Belgrade, May 2017.
[^20]: Hot potato: What is the social problem in Zemun Polje?, Cultural Centre Rex, Belgrade, June 6, 2015.
[^21]: Conversation with a tenant, Belgrade, April 2017.
[^22]: Hot potato: What is the social problem in Zemun Polje?, Cultural Centre Rex, Belgrade, June 6, 2015.
[^23]: Ibid.
[^24]: Conversation with a cultural activist, Belgrade, April 2017.
[^25]: Conversation with a representative of A11, Belgrade, May, 2019.
[^26]: Conversation with tenants, Belgrade, March 2017, and conversation with a representative of A11–Initiative for Economic and Social Rights, Belgrade, May, 2019.
[^27]: Conversation with tenants, Belgrade, March 2017.
[^28]: Conversation with a tenant, Belgrade, April 2017.
[^29]: Interview with a tenant, Belgrade, March, 2017.
[^30]: Ibid.
[^31]: Conversation with a cultural activist, Belgrade, April 2017.
[^32]: Conversation with tenants, Belgrade, April 2017.
[^33]: Conversation with a tenant, Belgrade, October 2015.
[^34]: “Hot potato: What is the social problem in Zemun Polje?” Cultural Centre Rex, Belgrade, June 6, 2015.
[^35]: Conversation with a representative of A11, April 2019.
[^36]: Hot potato: What is the social problem in Zemun Polje?, Cultural Centre Rex, Belgrade, June 6, 2015.
[^37]: Public presentation of the Kamendynamics project, Project Actopolis, Belgrade, May 2016.
[^38]: Meanwhile, during 2016–2017, the developmentof the concept for a mural was continued within the frame of the project ACTOPOLIS, where further consultations in Kamendin, involved NGOs and governmental institutions, were realised and documented. The drawing and documentary materials, named Kamendynamics, were exhibited along with many newly collected interpretations, reactions, and proposals related to the meaning and function of such a possible intervention in the local public space.
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# Is the use of technology in housing neutral?
Over the last decade(s), rapidly shifting technological landscapes have combined with the trends of financialization affecting the housing in myriads of ways. Although technology as such is represented as neutral, it is not neutral and has significant implications on the social and economic relation, including the impact it has on the financial accumulation, where extraction is facilitated by use of technology, and the housing governance where technology obscures human agency.
Over the last decade(s), rapidly shifting technological landscapes have combined with the trends of financialization affecting the housing in myriads of ways. Although technology as such is represented as neutral, it is not neutral and has significant implications on the social and economic relation, including the impact it has on the financial accumulation, where extraction is facilitated by use of technology, and the housing governance where technology obscures human agency.
Digital technology, in particular, comprises a terrain struggle over housing that has been emerging as central in the last couple of years. Proposed resources will help in opening the discussion about the politics of digital technologies in the domain of housing, about new forms of accumulation through tech, and about new terrains of struggle in which a confrontation is aimed at the effects of technology.
Digital technology, in particular, comprises a terrain struggle over housing that has been emerging as central in the last couple of years. Proposed resources will help in opening the discussion about the politics of digital technologies in the domain of housing, about new forms of accumulation through tech, and about new terrains of struggle in which a confrontation is aimed at the effects of technology.
## Proposed resources
- **Read about the impact of different tech practices on housing:**
- ![](bib:0cc1ba64-f961-45bb-b98d-c1215a68061d)
- **Read about the impact of different tech practices on housing:**
- ![](bib:0cc1ba64-f961-45bb-b98d-c1215a68061d)
- ![](bib:b54290a4-1d9e-4756-8164-a008191df20e)
- **How to use tech in housing struggles:**
- **How to use tech in housing struggles:**
- [Housing Data Coalition](https://www.housingdatanyc.org/)
## How to learn together
Read the proposed articles before you come to the session. Split into smaller groups. Each group has to choose one project of Housing Data Coalition and look into it closely. Make notes. Come back together and report back what you have learned. Discuss the differences in the impacts of technology that you have mapped. Write down the questions that you were unable to answer. Share your notes with other Pirate Care Syllabus users.
---
# Erin McElroy: Disruption at the Doorstep
**In *Urban Omnibus*, November 06, 2019**
{{< figure src="/images/01_Atlantic-Plaza-Towers.jpg" width="100%" title="Figure 1. The entrance to Atlantic Plaza Towers. Photo by Amy Howden-Chapman" >}}
In 2018, many of the rent-stabilized tenants at the two-building, 718-unit Atlantic Plaza Towers received notice from their landlord, Nelson Management, that their wireless [key-fob](https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2010/10/tech-etymology-key-fob/64638/) entrance system would be replaced with biometric facial recognition technology. Even though they had been required to submit photos of themselves in order to obtain fobs in the first place — and despite the presence of other surveillance systems throughout the complex, including multiple CCTV cameras — tenants were informed that this new system would ensure their safety by keeping keys out of the hands of "the wrong people." Marketed as the True Frictionless™ Solution, this new facial recognition system was developed by the Kansas-based company
StoneLock, which serves up to [40 percent of Fortune 100 companies,
along with several government entities](https://www.stonelock.com/news/press-release-news/stonelock-unveils-next-generation-of-biometric-identity-management-solutions-at-gsx/).
This is the first publicly known instance of StoneLock endeavoring to
deploy its facial recognition product in a New York City housing complex, though biometric technology, developed by other companies, has already been installed in residences throughout the city, such as the [Knickerbocker Village](https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2569327/It-never-forgets-face-Manhattan-apartment-building-uses-facial-recognition-entry.html) affordable housing complex in the Lower East Side. Not coincidentally, StoneLock's first foray into residential facial recognition will be put to use in surveilling predominantly Black women tenants, many of whom have questioned Nelson Management's decision to test the company's product in in Brownsville, Brooklyn, as opposed to [one of the landlord's other properties](https://nelsonmanagementgroup.net/nmg-portfolio/) in a more affluent area of the city.
{{< figure src="/images/StoneLock_Heatmap.jpg" width="100%" title="Figure 2. Screenshot of a proprietary, facial recognition “Identity Heatmap” created by Stonelock’s True Frictionless™ Solution. The product uses “near-infrared wavelengths… invisible to the eye… to generate unique biometric metadata” displayed as an anonymized multi-colored figure." >}}
Like dozens of other surveillance systems being rolled out in multifamily residences, commercial buildings, and industrial complexes globally, StoneLock's True Frictionless™ Solution is part of a burgeoning class of property technology, or [proptech](https://www.publicbooks.org/uploading-housing-inequality-digitizing-housing-justice/) for short (also called real estate technology, or realtech). The last several years have seen a proliferation of proptech companies and platforms reshaping multiple domains of urban life, including the provision, consumption, and management of residential space. Often, proptech entails some configuration of artificial intelligence (AI), the Internet of Things (IoT), machine learning, user dashboards, software, data harvesting, and hardware. It can be difficult to categorize its multiple genres, particularly as many are combined, but proptech can be roughly taxonomized as rental housing management (tenant screening, payment, and maintenance), smart home development, keyless entry surveillance systems, sharing economy platforms, virtual reality-based home sales and rentals, tenant matching, and property database platforms. While aligned with "smart city" rhetoric, proptech makes explicit that private property relations are at the heart of its technological innovations, with companies in this sector catering to landlords (both private and public) who seek to automate the management of their portfolios.
My interest in these emerging technologies, and their often-negative impacts, comes out of longstanding tenant organizing efforts that I have been involved with in the San Francisco Bay Area and in Romania. It is also inspired by research undertaken by a digital cartography collective, [the Anti-Eviction Mapping Project (AEMP)](https://www.antievictionmap.com/), which I cofounded in 2013 in San Francisco (and which now maintains chapters in New York City and Los Angeles as well). Across multiple cities, I have witnessed and analyzed
how real estate and technology platforms often work in conjunction to [displace and target poor and working-class tenants of color](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/24/us/politics/facial-recognition-technology-housing.html). Proptech extends this tendency, while also signaling the merger of two leading global industries, Big Tech and Real Estate, that hinge upon the
accumulation of property — data and land, respectively. Proptech collapses these two property regimes, leading to the heightened dispossession of people long targeted by both.
{{< figure src="/images/WorstEvictorsMap_Brownsville_v2.jpg" width="100%" title="Figure 3. Detail of Brownsville from the New York City's (https://www.worstevictorsnyc.org/map) Worst Evictors Map produced by the Anti-Eviction Mapping Project in partnership with The Right to Counsel NYC Coalition and JustFix.nyc." >}}
**Frictionless Fictions**
At a recent proptech conference I attended near Wall Street, aficionados
of the technology used the word "friction" a dozen times, always likening it to a slowness or hindrance to be overcome through technical means. "Frictionlessness," on the other hand, implies ease, cost cutting, and the ability to capitalize upon the consumer desires of young, affluent people --- for instance, smart buildings, fast internet, and integration with delivery services. As Robert Nelson (the owner of Nelson Management and a self-described "tech geek") [proclaimed](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/28/nyregion/rent-stabilized-buildings-facial-recognition.html) to his tenants by way of a flyer: "Your daily access experience will be frictionless, meaning you touch nothing and show only your face. From now on the doorway will just recognize you!" And as StoneLock [advertises](https://www.stonelock.com/news/press-release-news/stonelock-unveils-next-generation-of-biometric-identity-management-solutions-at-gsx/), their products (including, of course, the True Frictionless™ Solution) will provide users with "frictionless access," so that they "just GO!" A key corollary to "frictionlessness" in proptech parlance is "safety." Ari Teman, a former comedian and engineer who created the "virtual
doorman" system [GateGuard](https://gateguard.xyz/), which utilizes facial recognition, has [defended](https://therealdeal.com/issues_articles/big-brother/) proptech by advocating that "surveillance can make you feel safe," and suggested that his product enables tenants to keep illegal subletters
and unwelcome people from entering their building.
{{< figure src="/images/04_GateGuard_screenshot.jpg" width="100%" title="Figure 4. Screenshot from an animated promotional video for GateGuard." >}}
Yet proptech's "frictionless" and "safe" qualities come at the cost of
accountability to its users and the public. Beyond causing discomfort
and concerns about privacy, proptech presents novel threats to the
safety and stability of vulnerable tenants. GateGuard has been installed
in roughly 1,000 residential buildings throughout New York City,
although Teman (like other proptech developers) has refused to publicize
these locations. Likewise, during a City Council hearing I attended in
October 2019, city agencies (including the Department of Information
Technology, Department of Buildings, and Department of Consumer and
Worker Protection) claimed to have neither any knowledge of where
residential facial recognition is installed, nor the capacity to map it.
And though the purpose of this hearing was to discuss requirements for
businesses and residences to disclose their use of "biometric identifier
technology," and to provide physical keys to tenants if requested, it
has become clear that while proptech maintains an opaque public profile,
most people monitored by these technologies don't get the option of
consenting to being a test subject.
{{< figure src="/images/05_Knickerbocker_Village_and_Lower_Manhattan_-_altered_article-width.jpg" width="100%" title="Figure 5. The Knickerbocker Village housing complex, which adopted a facial recognition entrance system in 2014. Photo by jqpubliq (via Wikimedia Commons)" >}}
In 2014, entrances throughout the twelve-building Knickerbocker Village
complex — regulated by New York State Homes and Community Renewal (HCR), the state's affordable housing agency — [were outfitted with FST21 SafeRise](https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2569327/It-never-forgets-face-Manhattan-apartment-building-uses-facial-recognition-entry.html), a facial recognition product created by former Israel Defense Forces Major, General Aharon Farkash. During the City Council's hearing, one Knickerbocker Village tenant named Christina Zhang recounted stories of how this system has been implemented in her building. For one, the technology often simply fails to work properly, forcing tenants to line up and dance in front of the cameras, hoping that their movements will inspire recognition. But of greater concern, the complex's tenants — 70 percent of whom are Asian, and many of whom are immigrants — have no idea what the data being collected from them is used for, and have expressed fears for their biometric information ending up in the hands of the NYPD or ICE, both of which are known to use [facial recognition](https://www.wsj.com/articles/lawmakers-set-their-sights-on-facial-recognition-11559700360?mod=article_inline) and [surveillance technologies](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/02/magazine/ice-surveillance-deportation.html) to identify suspects and track undocumented people.
{{< figure src="/images/06_Tranae-Moran.jpg" width="100%" title="Figure 6. Tranae Moran, a tenant activist from Atlantic Plaza Towers, at the City Council's October 2019 hearing on facial recognition and biometric data collection. Photo by Erin McElroy" >}}
Several tenants from Atlantic Plaza Towers testified at this hearing as well, voicing unease about proptech's harvesting of biometric data. Yet efforts to organize against the use of facial recognition had been brewing in the Brownsville complex for over a year. In 2018, when Nelson Management announced the installation of the True Frictionless™ Solution via paper mailings, many tenants were left in the dark. A prior stipulation had required residents be photographed in order to receive mailbox keys, and some had refused this request. In response, five tenants, all Black women, convened in the lobby of one of the buildings on an October morning to inform their neighbors in person about StoneLock's system. Soon after, these women received notice from Nelson
that they had been recorded by the lobby's half-dozen, 360-degree cameras, and were incorrectly informed that their ["loitering" was illegal](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/28/nyregion/rent-stabilized-buildings-facial-recognition.html) and would have to stop. A follow-up announcement of the impending facial recognition system was then made public, listing the name of every tenant and their apartment number in the building. One tenant named Anita, who had been flyering in her building, decried this incident during the City Council hearing: "Privacy be damned!"
Resident [Fabian Rogers](https://symposium.ainowinstitute.org/fabian-rogers), who has been on the frontlines of the campaign against facial recognition, also described his experience living with the technology: "I had many concerns as a tenant, and security was not one of them. It was the landlord's concern, and it was imposed on me. I already feel well enough surveilled with all the cameras and key fobs that exist. I kind of feel like a criminal even though I pay my rent on time." Beyond taking issue with the security theater of facial recognition, tenants expressed little faith in Nelson's claim that their biometric data would remain secure, and speculated that, if facing threat of eviction, this information could be potentially used against them in housing court. For these reasons — and because StoneLock's system will give the company
access, without tenants' consent, to nearly 5,000 new faces with which test its algorithms — Atlantic Plaza Towers tenants have been advocating for a ban on facial recognition in the city altogether.
{{< figure src="/images/07_fabian-rogers.jpg" width="100%" title="Figure 6. Fabian Rogers and other Atlantic Plaza tenants testifying at the City Council’s hearing on facial recognition and biometric data collection. Photo by Erin McElroy" >}}
These tenants realize the technological changes being imposed upon them are not for their benefit, but for the “frictionless” experiences and “safety” of future gentrifiers yet to arrive. Atlantic Plaza Towers was built for middle-income families as part of the state-run Mitchell-Lama program in the 1950s, and it remains relatively affordable today, having just gained rent stabilization status two years ago. Yet with the ongoing gentrification of Brownsville and increased number of evictions, affordable housing and services are increasingly harder to come by. As Anita observed, “Tenants have so many issues that need to be addressed, but now we’re dealing with this . . . So poor people like me can’t live here anymore. I’m pissed at what’s going on. So many people in the neighborhood are being pushed out . . . Please consider this a tragedy waiting to happen.”
**The Property of Data**
While the struggle at Atlantic Plaza Towers has drawn public attention to how proptech can amplify tenant insecurity, the database systems that proptech hardware feeds into and supplies with new information, biometric and otherwise, remain obscure. For instance, Ari Teman's GateGuard has the ability to integrate with one of his company's other products, PropertyPanel.xyz, a proprietary database and dashboard platform for New York City landlords to use in acquisitions and property management. PropertyPanel.xyz allows purchasers to gather an array of information about buildings, and to "[target](https://propertypanel.xyz/)" properties based upon value, debt, rent stabilization, ownership, air rights, size, and other criteria. Purchasers can also obtain alerts to violations and complaints, communicate with building staff, screen vendors, and are given the option to integrate PropertyPanel.xyz with yet another Teman product, [SubletSpy](https://subletspy.com/), which monitors Airbnb tenants for potential infractions. Upon purchase of GateGuard, landlords
and property managers consent to Teman accessing "any property of yours, digital or real world, in any method, for any purpose," including for the purposes of plugging data into PropertyPanel.xyz. No other clarifying information is given as to how this data may be used, or how it might facilitate the training of biometric algorithms.
{{< figure src="/images/08_PropertyPanelxyz.jpg" width="100%" title="Figure 7. Screenshot of a PropertyPanel.xyz dashboard demo." >}}
Before inventing this suite of interconnected proptech products, Teman
first created the startup [Friend or Fraud Inc.](https://angel.co/company/friend-or-fraud), which developed software to verify internet users' identities through video-analyzing machine vision, replete with breath and heartrate monitors. Today, he employs a team of workers across the US, Israel, and Eastern Europe who assist 100 landlords and property management companies in New York City, Miami, Chicago, and Los Angeles. Teman first invented SubletSpy in 2014 following an Airbnb experience in which, after renting his New York apartment on the platform, he returned to find the remnants of a well-attended sex party. Teman filed a complaint to Airbnb, but rather than resolving the matter, this action landed him on a "bad tenant" database, making it nearly impossible to find a new apartment in the city.
These inscrutable databases are often compiled by third-party "[data brokers](https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/bjpx3w/what-are-data-brokers-and-how-to-stop-my-private-data-collection)," who supply a vast number of individuals' personal information to landlords, marketers, and government agencies. In some instances, these brokers operate public platforms such as
[MyLife.com™](https://www.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/9te7fs/mylifecom_has_a_profile_on_me_with_identifying/) which gathers information from Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Gmail, Yahoo, AOL, Outlook, school yearbooks, Ancestry.com and more to assign "reputation scores" to [a claimed 325 million "verified identities."](https://www.accesswire.com/537395/MyLife-Launches-Online-Homeservice-Marketplaces-Reputation-Score-Dual-Profile-Rating-Solution-to-Enhance-Safety-and-Trust) Other prominent data brokers such as Oracle, Experian, and Equifax buy and sell personal information related to a renter's credit history. Recently, it was [revealed](https://twitter.com/RayRedacted/status/1173295266830700556?s=20) that Experian offered to raise users' FICO scores in exchange for credit card passwords, allowing the company to scan a user's purchase history into their databases and sell this information to third parties. Not only is credit reporting often discriminatory ([particularly in regards to mortgage lending](https://www.theroot.com/redlining-2-0-how-banks-block-black-homebuyers-1823083306)
and rental payment history — an issue amplified during the 2008 subprime crisis), but like information brokerage at large, it [alienates
and reduces](https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1160&context=usp_fac) individuals into disaggregated data points. There have also been numerous instances of personal and biometric data being [sold](https://www.fastcompany.com/90310803/here-are-the-data-brokers-quietly-buying-and-selling-your-personal-information)
(and occasionally [hacked](https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/aug/14/major-breach-found-in-biometrics-system-used-by-banks-uk-police-and-defence-firms)) by third parties without consent or even the knowledge of the individual supplying the data.
Proptech companies such as [Avail](https://www.avail.co/) and [Cozy](https://cozy.co/) (both marketed to small-scale, individual landlords) have entered into this space as well, developing digital products and platforms for the express purpose of screening tenants. CoreLogic, headquartered in California, has developed one of the most comprehensive residential database and tenant screening systems, with records spanning 50 years, 145 million parcels, and 99.9 percent of US property records. Their access to arrest records spans over 70 percent of the US's population centers, and interfaces with law enforcement
agencies throughout the country. Updated every 15 minutes, this system includes over 80 million booking and incarceration records from roughly 2,000 facilities. CoreLogic also sources and returns data from the FBI and other federal agencies, promising to enable landlords in identifying "terrorists." Furthermore, the company's Registry CrimSAFE product bundle advertises its ability to seamlessly implement landlord policies, and "optimize" Fair Housing compliance. Yet, since releasing CrimSAFE, CoreLogic has been faced with a lawsuit over its algorithm which, according to the Connecticut Fair Housing Center, "disproportionately disqualifies African Americans and Latinos." Meanwhile, much of the data being mined by CoreLogic, especially that maintained by law enforcement, [is plagued with inaccuracies and racial biases](https://www.nyulawreview.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/NYULawReview-94-Richardson-Schultz-Crawford.pdf).
While it is unclear exactly which database system Teman appeared on, it is clear that, as a wealthy white man, he is not the type of person generally profiled by proptech database bundles. But in response to his own blacklisting, rather than getting involved in racial or data justice work, Teman chose instead to invent SubletSpy. Thus, Ari Teman, himself once a victim of proptech platforms and databases, weaponized tenant profiling technology for his own personal gain.
**The Struggle Against Data-Driven Discrimination**
While they may not have Teman's resources, housing and technology justice advocates and their allies have been pushing back against proptech's embedded biases and racist effects. In May 2019, Brooklyn Legal Services (BLS), a legal non-profit representing Atlantic Plaza tenants in their struggle against surveillance, [composed a letter](https://www.legalservicesnyc.org/storage/PDFs/%20opposition%20to%20facial%20recognition%20entry%20system%20app.pdf)
to HCR noting that facial recognition indicates a dramatic shift in Nelson's prior practices of landlordism. One BLS lawyer, Samar Katnani, has further [argued](https://ny.curbed.com/2019/7/29/8934279/bill-ban-facial-recognition-public-housing-brooklyn-nyc) that "the ability to enter your home should not be conditioned on the surrender of your biometric data, particularly when the landlord's collection, storage, and use of such data is untested and unregulated.
{{< figure src="/images/09_City-Council-Hearing.jpg" width="100%" title="Figure 8. A group of tenants from Atlantic Plaza Towers and BLS lawyers at the City Council hearing on facial recognition and biometric data collection. Photo by Erin McElroy" >}}
Meanwhile, scholars at New York University's [AI Now Institute](https://ainowinstitute.org/) (an interdisciplinary research center dedicated to studying the social implications of advanced technical systems, of which I am a part) also wrote an expert [letter](https://ainowinstitute.org/dhcr-amici-letter-043019.pdf) in support of the tenants, describing how facial recognition systems for residential entry are bound to fail in accurately identifying tenants of color, women, and gender minorities. Numerous studies have shown that machine learning algorithms, disproportionately built and trained by white men, discriminate on the basis of gender and race, with women of color misclassified with error rates of [nearly 40 percent](https://ainowinstitute.org/AI_Now_2018_Report.pdf), compared to [one to five percent](http://proceedings.mlr.press/v81/buolamwini18a.html) for white men. AI systems, particularly for facial recognition tools, rely upon machine learning algorithms trained with data. Physiognomic labels related to hair, skin, facial structure, and more are codified into racial and gender classifications, echoing [19th-century, pseudoscientific ideas about race and eugenics](https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2019/4/19/18412674/ai-bias-facial-recognition-black-gay-transgender). And while facial recognition algorithms have been shown to be largely inaccurate in identifying women and Black people, it is still Black people being targeted most by them, and stopped and subjected to searches in facial recognition databases by police, often resulting in false positive identifications. This has led cities such as San Francisco, Oakland, and Somerville to recently ban the use of facial recognition by government agencies altogether.
The pressure applied by Atlantic Plaza Towers tenants has helped paved the way for Brooklyn-based Congresswoman Yvette Clarke to introduce a bill in the US House of Representatives named "[No Biometric Barriers to Housing Act](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1w4ee-poGkDJUkcEMTEAVqHNunplvR087/view)" that would prohibit facial, voice, fingerprint, and DNA identification technologies in public housing. The bill would also require the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to report on biometric systems used in federally-assisted public housing in the last five years. Despite these potential legislative gains for public housing tenants, HUD has recently proposed [alarming alterations](https://ainowinstitute.org/ainow-cril-october-2019-hud-comments.pdf) to the 1968 Fair Housing Act (FHA) --- an offspring of the civil rights era outlawing housing discrimination against people of color. The Fair
Housing Act requires local governments that receive HUD funding [to address segregation, disinvestment, and displacement in their communities](http://calreinvest.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Disrupting-Displacement-Financing.pdf). But as investigative reporters Aaron Glantz and Emmanuel Martinez [write](http://revealnews.org/article/can-algorithms-be-racist-trumps-housing-department-says-no/), under new proposed regulations, a company accused of discrimination in housing "would be able to 'defeat' that claim if an algorithm is involved." In this way, the "[gentrifier-in-chief](https://abolitionjournal.org/in-the-time-of-trump-housing-whiteness-and-abolition/),"
president of the "[real estate state](http://societyandspace.org/2019/05/01/review-forum-capital-city-by-samuel-stein/)," has made himself the new vanguard of racist proptech algorithms.
Following the October 2019 City Council hearing on facial recognition, New York City agencies may implement changes to mitigate facial recognition's impacts. But as the tenants of Atlantic Plaza Towers eloquently made clear, their demand is not for band-aid mitigations, but for a ban on facial recognition in New York City. The presence of already-existing security measures made tenants in Atlantic Plaza Towers feel policed in their homes long before their landlord introduced the possibility of facial recognition. Against the backdrop of gentrification, the insinuation of criminality and evictability are often used to maintain what Brenna Bhandar (citing legal scholar Cheryl Harris) calls the "[whiteness of property](https://www.dukeupress.edu/Assets/PubMaterials/978-0-8223-7146-5_601.pdf)." According to Bhandar, the ownership of property in places marked by the histories of colonialism and the slave trade is rooted in a "[modern racial
regime](https://www.dukeupress.edu/Assets/PubMaterials/978-0-8223-7146-5_601.pdf)" dependent upon the dispossession of real property and data. Proptech has the potential to accelerate both forms of dispossession through the non-consensual mining of, and capitalizing upon, people's intimate data
— what can be described as "data colonialism" — which [updates processes of settler colonialism](http://press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/n2140/pdf/book.pdf?referer=2140) and [occupation](https://antipodeonline.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/6-andrea-miller.pdf) for the digital age. Yet it also sits upon a thick palimpsest of older property schemas and the information systems supporting these regimes. One could trace proptech's lineage back to the earliest moments of settler colonialism and the technologies it employed to gather data, map land, and dispossess Indigenous populations, or more recently to the [redlining](https://dsl.richmond.edu/panorama/redlining/#loc=15/40.757/-74.002&city=hudson-co.-nj) of communities of color during the mid-20th century. Given the potential for racist abuses in the future, and the inability of the city, landlords, and proptech companies to make transparent where and how new, "frictionless" tools function, a ban is the only just future — friction-filled as it may be.
> This research has received support from the British Academy's Tackling the UK's International Challenges program. The author would like to thank the brilliant tenants of Atlantic Plaza Towers for their organizing work and analysis, and the AI Now Institute and Rashida Richardson for feedback and support in writing this article.
**Erin McElroy** is a postdoctoral researcher at New York University’s AI Now Institute focusing on proptech and technologies of gentrification. Erin is also a cofounder of both the Anti-Eviction Mapping Project and the Radical Housing Journal. Erin received a PhD in Feminist Studies from the University of California, Santa Cruz for a project on race, technology, and dispossession in postsocialist Romania, and continues to organize with housing justice collectives in both the US and Romania today.

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.h-10 {
height: 2.5rem
}
.h-full {
height: 100%
}
.m-auto {
margin: auto
}
.mt-1 {
margin-top: 0.25rem
}
.mr-1 {
margin-right: 0.25rem
}
.mb-1 {
margin-bottom: 0.25rem
}
.mt-3 {
margin-top: 0.75rem
}
.mt-4 {
margin-top: 1rem
}
.max-w-xs {
max-width: 20rem
}
.max-w-4xl {
max-width: 56rem
}
.min-h-full {
min-height: 100%
}
.object-cover {
object-fit: cover
}
.opacity-50 {
opacity: 0.5
}
.focus\:outline-none:focus {
outline: 0
}
.overflow-auto {
overflow: auto
}
.overflow-y-auto {
overflow-y: auto
}
.p-1 {
padding: 0.25rem
}
.p-2 {
padding: 0.5rem
}
.p-6 {
padding: 1.5rem
}
.py-1 {
padding-top: 0.25rem;
padding-bottom: 0.25rem
}
.px-1 {
padding-left: 0.25rem;
padding-right: 0.25rem
}
.px-3 {
padding-left: 0.75rem;
padding-right: 0.75rem
}
.px-4 {
padding-left: 1rem;
padding-right: 1rem
}
.pt-1 {
padding-top: 0.25rem
}
.pr-1 {
padding-right: 0.25rem
}
.pb-1 {
padding-bottom: 0.25rem
}
.pl-1 {
padding-left: 0.25rem
}
.pt-2 {
padding-top: 0.5rem
}
.pr-2 {
padding-right: 0.5rem
}
.pb-2 {
padding-bottom: 0.5rem
}
.pl-2 {
padding-left: 0.5rem
}
.pt-3 {
padding-top: 0.75rem
}
.pr-3 {
padding-right: 0.75rem
}
.pt-4 {
padding-top: 1rem
}
.pr-5 {
padding-right: 1.25rem
}
.pt-6 {
padding-top: 1.5rem
}
.fixed {
position: fixed
}
.absolute {
position: absolute
}
.relative {
position: relative
}
.sticky {
position: sticky
}
.inset-x-0 {
right: 0;
left: 0
}
.top-0 {
top: 0
}
.bottom-0 {
bottom: 0
}
.fill-current {
fill: currentColor
}
.table-auto {
table-layout: auto
}
.text-left {
text-align: left
}
.text-center {
text-align: center
}
.text-right {
text-align: right
}
.text-black {
color: #000
}
.text-white {
color: #fff
}
.text-gray-800 {
color: #2d3748
}
.text-motw-red {
color: #ff0000
}
.text-motw-blue {
color: #007bff
}
.active\:text-red-200:active {
color: #fed7d7
}
.text-sm {
font-size: 0.875rem
}
.text-base {
font-size: 1rem
}
.text-lg {
font-size: 1.125rem
}
.text-xl {
font-size: 1.25rem
}
.italic {
font-style: italic
}
.not-italic {
font-style: normal
}
.underline {
text-decoration: underline
}
.hover\:underline:hover {
text-decoration: underline
}
.select-none {
user-select: none
}
.align-top {
vertical-align: top
}
.visible {
visibility: visible
}
.whitespace-no-wrap {
white-space: nowrap
}
.w-4 {
width: 1rem
}
.w-1\/4 {
width: 25%
}
.w-1\/12 {
width: 8.333333%
}
.w-9\/12 {
width: 75%
}
.w-11\/12 {
width: 91.666667%
}
.w-full {
width: 100%
}
.z-40 {
z-index: 40
}
.z-50 {
z-index: 50
}
@media(max-width: 599px) {
.monocle\:hidden {
display:none
}
.monocle\:h-8 {
height: 2rem
}
.monocle\:max-w-xs {
max-width: 20rem
}
.monocle\:px-0 {
padding-left: 0;
padding-right: 0
}
.monocle\:px-2 {
padding-left: 0.5rem;
padding-right: 0.5rem
}
.monocle\:px-4 {
padding-left: 1rem;
padding-right: 1rem
}
.monocle\:pr-1 {
padding-right: 0.25rem
}
.monocle\:pr-2 {
padding-right: 0.5rem
}
.monocle\:pr-3 {
padding-right: 0.75rem
}
.monocle\:text-xs {
font-size: 0.75rem
}
.monocle\:text-sm {
font-size: 0.875rem
}
.monocle\:text-xl {
font-size: 1.25rem
}
.monocle\:text-2xl {
font-size: 1.5rem
}
.monocle\:w-1\/3 {
width: 33.333333%
}
.monocle\:w-1\/6 {
width: 16.666667%
}
.monocle\:w-full {
width: 100%
}
}
@media(min-width: 600px) and (max-width: 767px) {
.phone\:hidden {
display:none
}
.phone\:h-8 {
height: 2rem
}
.phone\:max-w-xs {
max-width: 20rem
}
.phone\:px-0 {
padding-left: 0;
padding-right: 0
}
.phone\:px-2 {
padding-left: 0.5rem;
padding-right: 0.5rem
}
.phone\:px-4 {
padding-left: 1rem;
padding-right: 1rem
}
.phone\:pr-1 {
padding-right: 0.25rem
}
.phone\:pr-2 {
padding-right: 0.5rem
}
.phone\:pr-3 {
padding-right: 0.75rem
}
.phone\:text-right {
text-align: right
}
.phone\:text-xs {
font-size: 0.75rem
}
.phone\:text-sm {
font-size: 0.875rem
}
.phone\:text-xl {
font-size: 1.25rem
}
.phone\:text-2xl {
font-size: 1.5rem
}
.phone\:w-1\/2 {
width: 50%
}
.phone\:w-1\/3 {
width: 33.333333%
}
.phone\:w-1\/6 {
width: 16.666667%
}
}
@media(min-width: 768px) {
.phablet\:hidden {
display:none
}
.phablet\:float-right {
float: right
}
.phablet\:p-6 {
padding: 1.5rem
}
.phablet\:pl-2 {
padding-left: 0.5rem
}
.phablet\:w-1\/2 {
width: 50%
}
.phablet\:w-1\/3 {
width: 33.333333%
}
}
@media(min-width: 1024px) {
.tablet\:w-1\/4 {
width:25%
}
}
@media(min-width: 1280px) {
.laptop\:w-1\/6 {
width:16.666667%
}
}
@media(min-width: 2048px) {
.suv\:text-sm {
font-size:0.875rem
}
.suv\:w-1\/12 {
width: 25%
}
}
.hamburger-icon.svelte-18c4dj9 {
height: 0.7em;
background: linear-gradient(to bottom, #fff 0%, #fff 20%, transparent 20%, transparent 40%, #fff 40%, #fff 60%, transparent 60%, transparent 80%, #fff 80%, #fff 100%)
}
.motw-bookmark.svelte-18c4dj9 {
border: 1.2em solid red;
border-right-color: white
}
.motw-bookmark.svelte-18c4dj9:active {
color: #fed7d7
}
tr.svelte-cty6wm:nth-child(odd) {
background-color: #e7e7e7
}
th.svelte-cty6wm {
color: #2d3748;
background-color: #a7a7a7
}
td.svelte-cty6wm {
vertical-align: top;
padding-left: 0.25rem;
padding-right: 0.25rem;
padding-top: 0.5rem;
padding-bottom: 0.25rem
}
a.svelte-cty6wm:hover {
text-decoration: underline;
text-decoration-color: red;
font-weight: bold;
cursor: pointer
}
.modal.svelte-xjoc7v {
height: 100%;
width: 100%;
position: fixed;
z-index: 50;
overflow: auto;
display: flex;
background-color: rgba(0,0,0,0.7)
}
.cover.svelte-xjoc7v {
background-color: #fff;
border-color: #fff;
border-width: 2px;
border-top-width: 8px;
border-left-width: 8px;
min-height: 4em;
background-image: url("data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns%3D%22http%3A%2F%2Fwww.w3.org%2F2000%2Fsvg%22%20viewBox%3D%220%200%2063.5%2084.7%22%20height%3D%22320%22%20width%3D%22240%22%3E%3Cpath%20d%3D%22M5.292%205.292h52.917v74.083H5.292z%22%20fill%3D%22%23e0e0e0%22%20paint-order%3D%22stroke%20fill%20markers%22%2F%3E%3Cpath%20d%3D%22M10.6%2010.6h42.3v63.5H10.6z%22%20fill%3D%22%23c0c0c0%22%20paint-order%3D%22stroke%20fill%20markers%22%2F%3E%3Cpath%20d%3D%22M15.8%2015.8h31.8v53H15.8z%22%20fill%3D%22%23a0a0a0%22%20paint-order%3D%22stroke%20fill%20markers%22%2F%3E%3C%2Fsvg%3E");
background-repeat: no-repeat;
background-size: cover
}
.candilist.svelte-14w2vqu {
max-height: 16em
}
.showCandidates.svelte-14w2vqu {
display: block;
border-color: #ff0000;
border-bottom-width: 4px
}
.zeroBottomBorder.svelte-14w2vqu {
border-bottom-width: 0
}
.modulo1.svelte-14w2vqu {
background-color: #fff
}
.modulo0.svelte-14w2vqu {
background-color: #e7e7e7
}
.cover.svelte-18010u {
min-height: 16em;
background-image: url("data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns%3D%22http%3A%2F%2Fwww.w3.org%2F2000%2Fsvg%22%20viewBox%3D%220%200%2063.5%2084.7%22%20height%3D%22320%22%20width%3D%22240%22%3E%3Cpath%20d%3D%22M5.292%205.292h52.917v74.083H5.292z%22%20fill%3D%22%23e0e0e0%22%20paint-order%3D%22stroke%20fill%20markers%22%2F%3E%3Cpath%20d%3D%22M10.6%2010.6h42.3v63.5H10.6z%22%20fill%3D%22%23c0c0c0%22%20paint-order%3D%22stroke%20fill%20markers%22%2F%3E%3Cpath%20d%3D%22M15.8%2015.8h31.8v53H15.8z%22%20fill%3D%22%23a0a0a0%22%20paint-order%3D%22stroke%20fill%20markers%22%2F%3E%3C%2Fsvg%3E");
background-repeat: no-repeat;
background-size: cover
}
.showlist.svelte-24i4z8 {
border-bottom-width: 4px;
border-color: #ff0000;
display: table;
z-index: 60
}
.hidelist.svelte-24i4z8 {
display: none
}
.dropdown-li.svelte-24i4z8 {
background-color: #fff;
padding-top: 0.25rem;
padding-bottom: 0.25rem;
padding-left: 0.75rem;
padding-right: 0.75rem;
white-space: nowrap;
color: #2d3748
}
.dropdown-li.svelte-24i4z8:hover {
border-bottom-width: 2px;
border-color: #ff0000;
font-style: italic;
font-weight: 700;
padding-left: 0.5rem;
padding-bottom: 0.25rem
}
li.svelte-24i4z8:nth-child(odd) {
background-color: #e7e7e7
}
/*# sourceMappingURL=bundle.css.map */
@page {
size: 830mm 3200mm;
}
html {
font-family: IBMPlexMono, Courier New, monospace;
font-size: 3em;
}

609
exhibition/css/motw_print.css Normal file
View File

@ -0,0 +1,609 @@
/*!normalize.css v8.0.1 | MIT License | github.com/necolas/normalize.css*/
html {
line-height: 1.15;
}
body {
margin: 0
}
main {
display: block
}
a {
background-color: transparent
}
b {
font-weight: bolder
}
img {
border-style: none
}
input {
font-family: inherit;
font-size: 100%;
line-height: 1.15;
margin: 0
}
input {
overflow: visible
}
[type=checkbox] {
box-sizing: border-box;
padding: 0
}
template {
display: none
}
p {
margin: 0
}
ul {
list-style: none;
margin: 0;
padding: 0
}
html {
font-family: system-ui,-apple-system,BlinkMacSystemFont,segoe ui,Roboto,helvetica neue,Arial,noto sans,sans-serif,apple color emoji,segoe ui emoji,segoe ui symbol,noto color emoji;
line-height: 1.5
}
*,::before,::after {
box-sizing: border-box;
border-width: 0;
border-style: solid;
border-color: currentColor
}
img {
border-style: solid
}
input::-webkit-input-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input::-moz-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input:-ms-input-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input::-ms-input-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input::placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
table {
border-collapse: collapse
}
a {
color: inherit;
text-decoration: inherit
}
input {
padding: 0;
line-height: inherit;
color: inherit
}
img,svg {
display: block;
vertical-align: middle
}
img {
max-width: 100%;
height: auto
}
.bg-CoconutCream {
background-color: #f2f6d5
}
.bg-AuChico {
background-color: #996561
}
.border-CoconutCream {
border-color: #f2f6d5
}
.border-b-8 {
border-bottom-width: 8px
}
.cursor-pointer {
cursor: pointer
}
.block {
display: block
}
.flex {
display: -webkit-box;
display: flex
}
.table {
display: table
}
.justify-between {
-webkit-box-pack: justify;
justify-content: space-between
}
.font-vg5000 {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans
}
.font-playfair {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans
}
.font-bold {
font-weight: 700
}
.h-full {
height: 100%
}
.leading-none {
line-height: 1
}
.mx-4 {
margin-left: 1rem;
margin-right: 1rem
}
.mb-1 {
margin-bottom: .25rem
}
.mt-4 {
margin-top: 1rem
}
.mb-4 {
margin-bottom: 1rem
}
.mb-6 {
margin-bottom: 1.5rem
}
.mt-8 {
margin-top: 2rem
}
.mb-12 {
margin-bottom: 3rem
}
.p-1 {
padding: .25rem
}
.px-1 {
padding-left: .25rem;
padding-right: .25rem
}
.pt-2 {
padding-top: .5rem
}
.pt-3 {
padding-top: .75rem
}
.pr-4 {
padding-right: 1rem
}
.pt-6 {
padding-top: 1.5rem
}
.pb-6 {
padding-bottom: 1.5rem
}
.pb-8 {
padding-bottom: 2rem
}
.pt-16 {
padding-top: 4rem
}
.pt-32 {
padding-top: 8rem
}
.static {
position: static
}
.sticky {
position: -webkit-sticky;
position: sticky
}
.top-0 {
top: 0
}
.text-CoconutCream {
color: #f2f6d5
}
.text-xs {
font-size: .75rem
}
.text-base {
font-size: 1rem
}
.italic {
font-style: italic
}
.z-10 {
z-index: 10
}
@font-face {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular;
font-weight: 400;
src: url(../fonts/PlayfairDisplay-Regular.woff)format('woff')
}
@font-face {
font-family: vg5000-regular;
font-weight: 400;
src: url(../fonts/VG5000-Regular_web.woff)format('woff')
}
body {
padding-top: 3rem;
padding-left: 3rem;
padding-right: 3rem;
}
img {
padding-top: .5rem;
padding-bottom: .5rem
}
h1 {
font-size: 1.875rem;
-webkit-column-break-after: avoid;
-moz-column-break-after: avoid;
break-after: avoid
}
h2 {
font-size: 1.5rem;
-webkit-column-break-after: avoid;
-moz-column-break-after: avoid;
break-after: avoid
}
h3 {
font-size: 1.25rem;
-webkit-column-break-after: avoid;
-moz-column-break-after: avoid;
break-after: avoid
}
blockquote {
font-style: italic
}
p {
padding-bottom: .5rem;
line-height: 1.25
}
article ul {
position: relative;
list-style-type: none;
margin-left: 0;
padding-left: .75rem
}
article ul li:before {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
color: #996561;
font-size: .75rem;
left: 0;
position: absolute;
padding-top: .5rem;
padding-bottom: .5rem;
content: "•"
}
article li {
padding-left: .5rem
}
a {
color: #996561
}
a:hover {
text-decoration: underline
}
.edit-button {
border-bottom-width: 4px;
border-color: #f2f6d5;
padding-left: .25rem;
padding-right: .25rem;
background-color: #996561;
margin-bottom: .5rem;
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
color: #f2f6d5
}
.edit-button:hover {
background-color: #f2f6d5;
color: #996561;
border-bottom-width: 2px;
border-color: #996561
}
.title-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 2.25rem;
color: #996561
}
.title-pretext {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1rem;
color: #996561
}
.content-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #29102f
}
.sidebar-title {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1rem;
color: #996561
}
.sidebar-list {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #996561
}
.logo {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #996561;
padding-top: .5rem
}
.ddmenu .sidebar-title {
cursor: pointer
}
.ddmenu input {
display: none
}
.ddmenu .hiddendiv {
padding-bottom: .25rem;
display: none
}
.ddmenu input:not(:checked)~.hiddendiv {
display: block;
padding-bottom: 1rem
}
#TableOfContents {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #996561;
margin-left: -.5rem
}
#TableOfContents ul {
margin-left: .5rem
}
#TableOfContents li:before {
content: "> "
}
@page:first {
@bottom {
content: none;
}
}
@page {
margin-bottom: 5mm;
@top {
color: #996561;
font-size: 1rem;
font-family: 'VG5000-Regular';
content: -moz-element(topic);
content: element(topic);
}
@bottom {
color: #996561;
font-size: 0.5rem;
font-family: 'VG5000-Regular';
content: "▒▒ 🐟 ▒ ▒▒▒ 🐙 ▒▒▒🏃 ▒▒☄▒ PAGE: " counter(page) " ▒ ▒▒▒▒ ⚡ ▒🔍▒ ☠ ▒ ▒▒▒";
}
}
@page topic:first {
@top {
content: none;
}
}
@media print {
body {
background-color: #f2f6d5;
color: #29102f;
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans
}
.runningTopic {
position: running(topic)
}
.topic {
-webkit-column-break-before: page;
-moz-column-break-before: page;
break-before: page;
page: topic
}
.title-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 4rem;
color: #996561;
margin-bottom: 5rem
}
.title-pretext {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.5rem;
color: #996561
}
.topic-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 2.25rem;
color: #996561;
margin-bottom: 5rem
}
.topic-pretext {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.5rem;
color: #996561
}
article ul li:before {
content: ""
}
.toc::after {
text-align: right;
float: right;
content: target-counter(attr(href url),page,decimal-leading-zero)
}
}
.md\:flex-row {
-webkit-box-orient:horizontal;
-webkit-box-direction: normal;
flex-direction: row
}
.md\:w-full {
width: 100%
}
@page {
size: 850mm 4350mm;
}
html {
font-size: 4em;
background-color: #f2f6d5
}
footer {
padding-top: 100mm;
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: .75rem;
color: #29102f
}
.printheader {
height: 40mm;
}
.spacer1 {
padding-top: 1000mm;
}
header {
padding-bottom: 3rem;
}
.ddmenus {
padding-top: 2rem;
}
article li {
list-style-type: none;
}
blockquote {
padding-left: 1rem;
font-style: normal;
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
}
blockquote:before {
content: open-quote;
color: #996561;
font-size: 2em;
line-height: 0.1em;
margin-right: 0.1em;
vertical-align: -0.1em;
}
blockquote:after {
content: close-quote;
color: #996561;
font-size: 2em;
line-height: 0.1em;
margin-left: 0.1em;
vertical-align: -0.1em;
}
blockquote p {
display: inline;
}

600
exhibition/css/soprasotto_print_1x3m.css Normal file
View File

@ -0,0 +1,600 @@
/*!normalize.css v8.0.1 | MIT License | github.com/necolas/normalize.css*/
html {
line-height: 1.15;
}
body {
margin: 0
}
main {
display: block
}
a {
background-color: transparent
}
b {
font-weight: bolder
}
img {
border-style: none
}
input {
font-family: inherit;
font-size: 100%;
line-height: 1.15;
margin: 0
}
input {
overflow: visible
}
[type=checkbox] {
box-sizing: border-box;
padding: 0
}
template {
display: none
}
p {
margin: 0
}
ul {
list-style: none;
margin: 0;
padding: 0
}
html {
font-family: system-ui,-apple-system,BlinkMacSystemFont,segoe ui,Roboto,helvetica neue,Arial,noto sans,sans-serif,apple color emoji,segoe ui emoji,segoe ui symbol,noto color emoji;
line-height: 1.5
}
*,::before,::after {
box-sizing: border-box;
border-width: 0;
border-style: solid;
border-color: currentColor
}
img {
border-style: solid
}
input::-webkit-input-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input::-moz-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input:-ms-input-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input::-ms-input-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input::placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
table {
border-collapse: collapse
}
a {
color: inherit;
text-decoration: inherit
}
input {
padding: 0;
line-height: inherit;
color: inherit
}
img,svg {
display: block;
vertical-align: middle
}
img {
max-width: 100%;
height: auto
}
.bg-CoconutCream {
background-color: #f2f6d5
}
.bg-AuChico {
background-color: #996561
}
.border-CoconutCream {
border-color: #f2f6d5
}
.border-b-8 {
border-bottom-width: 8px
}
.cursor-pointer {
cursor: pointer
}
.block {
display: block
}
.flex {
display: -webkit-box;
display: flex
}
.table {
display: table
}
.justify-between {
-webkit-box-pack: justify;
justify-content: space-between
}
.font-vg5000 {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans
}
.font-playfair {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans
}
.font-bold {
font-weight: 700
}
.h-full {
height: 100%
}
.leading-none {
line-height: 1
}
.mx-4 {
margin-left: 1rem;
margin-right: 1rem
}
.mb-1 {
margin-bottom: .25rem
}
.mt-4 {
margin-top: 1rem
}
.mb-4 {
margin-bottom: 1rem
}
.mb-6 {
margin-bottom: 1.5rem
}
.mt-8 {
margin-top: 2rem
}
.mb-12 {
margin-bottom: 3rem
}
.p-1 {
padding: .25rem
}
.px-1 {
padding-left: .25rem;
padding-right: .25rem
}
.pt-2 {
padding-top: .5rem
}
.pt-3 {
padding-top: .75rem
}
.pr-4 {
padding-right: 1rem
}
.pt-6 {
padding-top: 1.5rem
}
.pb-6 {
padding-bottom: 1.5rem
}
.pb-8 {
padding-bottom: 2rem
}
.pt-16 {
padding-top: 4rem
}
.pt-32 {
padding-top: 8rem
}
.static {
position: static
}
.sticky {
position: -webkit-sticky;
position: sticky
}
.top-0 {
top: 0
}
.text-CoconutCream {
color: #f2f6d5
}
.text-xs {
font-size: .75rem
}
.text-base {
font-size: 1rem
}
.italic {
font-style: italic
}
.z-10 {
z-index: 10
}
@font-face {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular;
font-weight: 400;
src: url(../fonts/PlayfairDisplay-Regular.woff)format('woff')
}
@font-face {
font-family: vg5000-regular;
font-weight: 400;
src: url(../fonts/VG5000-Regular_web.woff)format('woff')
}
img {
padding-top: .5rem;
padding-bottom: .5rem
}
h1 {
font-size: 1.875rem;
-webkit-column-break-after: avoid;
-moz-column-break-after: avoid;
break-after: avoid
}
h2 {
font-size: 1.5rem;
-webkit-column-break-after: avoid;
-moz-column-break-after: avoid;
break-after: avoid
}
h3 {
font-size: 1.25rem;
-webkit-column-break-after: avoid;
-moz-column-break-after: avoid;
break-after: avoid
}
blockquote {
font-style: italic
}
p {
padding-bottom: .5rem;
line-height: 1.25
}
article ul {
position: relative;
list-style-type: none;
margin-left: 0;
padding-left: .75rem
}
article ul li:before {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
color: #996561;
font-size: .75rem;
left: 0;
position: absolute;
padding-top: .5rem;
padding-bottom: .5rem;
content: "•"
}
article li {
padding-left: .5rem
}
a {
color: #996561
}
a:hover {
text-decoration: underline
}
.edit-button {
border-bottom-width: 4px;
border-color: #f2f6d5;
padding-left: .25rem;
padding-right: .25rem;
background-color: #996561;
margin-bottom: .5rem;
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
color: #f2f6d5
}
.edit-button:hover {
background-color: #f2f6d5;
color: #996561;
border-bottom-width: 2px;
border-color: #996561
}
.title-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 2.25rem;
color: #996561
}
.title-pretext {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1rem;
color: #996561
}
.content-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #29102f
}
.sidebar-title {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1rem;
color: #996561
}
.sidebar-list {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #996561
}
.logo {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #996561;
padding-top: .5rem
}
.ddmenu .sidebar-title {
cursor: pointer
}
.ddmenu input {
display: none
}
.ddmenu .hiddendiv {
padding-bottom: .25rem;
display: none
}
.ddmenu input:not(:checked)~.hiddendiv {
display: block;
padding-bottom: 1rem
}
#TableOfContents {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #996561;
margin-left: -.5rem
}
#TableOfContents ul {
margin-left: .5rem
}
#TableOfContents li:before {
content: "> "
}
@page:first {
@bottom {
content: none;
}
}
@page {
margin-bottom: 5mm;
@top {
color: #996561;
font-size: 1rem;
font-family: 'VG5000-Regular';
content: -moz-element(topic);
content: element(topic);
}
@bottom {
color: #996561;
font-size: 0.5rem;
font-family: 'VG5000-Regular';
content: "▒▒ 🐟 ▒ ▒▒▒ 🐙 ▒▒▒🏃 ▒▒☄▒ PAGE: " counter(page) " ▒ ▒▒▒▒ ⚡ ▒🔍▒ ☠ ▒ ▒▒▒";
}
}
@page topic:first {
@top {
content: none;
}
}
@media print {
body {
background-color: #f2f6d5;
color: #29102f;
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans
}
.runningTopic {
position: running(topic)
}
.topic {
-webkit-column-break-before: page;
-moz-column-break-before: page;
break-before: page;
page: topic
}
.title-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 4rem;
color: #996561;
margin-bottom: 5rem
}
.title-pretext {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.5rem;
color: #996561
}
.topic-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 2.25rem;
color: #996561;
margin-bottom: 5rem
}
.topic-pretext {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.5rem;
color: #996561
}
article ul li:before {
content: ""
}
.toc::after {
text-align: right;
float: right;
content: target-counter(attr(href url),page,decimal-leading-zero)
}
}
.md\:flex-row {
-webkit-box-orient:horizontal;
-webkit-box-direction: normal;
flex-direction: row
}
.md\:w-full {
width: 100%
}
@page {
size: 1000mm 3000mm;
}
html {
font-size: 3.7em;
background-color: #f2f6d5
}
footer {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: .75rem;
color: #29102f
}
header {
padding-bottom: 3rem;
}
.ddmenus {
padding-top: 2rem;
}
article li {
list-style-type: none;
}
blockquote {
padding-left: 1rem;
font-style: normal;
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
}
blockquote:before {
content: open-quote;
color: #996561;
font-size: 2em;
line-height: 0.1em;
margin-right: 0.1em;
vertical-align: -0.1em;
}
blockquote:after {
content: close-quote;
color: #996561;
font-size: 2em;
line-height: 0.1em;
margin-left: 0.1em;
vertical-align: -0.1em;
}
blockquote p {
display: inline;
}
body {
padding-top: 2rem;
padding-left: 3rem;
padding-right: 8rem;
}

608
exhibition/css/wow_print.css Normal file
View File

@ -0,0 +1,608 @@
/*!normalize.css v8.0.1 | MIT License | github.com/necolas/normalize.css*/
html {
line-height: 1.15;
}
body {
margin: 0
}
main {
display: block
}
a {
background-color: transparent
}
b {
font-weight: bolder
}
img {
border-style: none
}
input {
font-family: inherit;
font-size: 100%;
line-height: 1.15;
margin: 0
}
input {
overflow: visible
}
[type=checkbox] {
box-sizing: border-box;
padding: 0
}
template {
display: none
}
p {
margin: 0
}
ul {
list-style: none;
margin: 0;
padding: 0
}
html {
font-family: system-ui,-apple-system,BlinkMacSystemFont,segoe ui,Roboto,helvetica neue,Arial,noto sans,sans-serif,apple color emoji,segoe ui emoji,segoe ui symbol,noto color emoji;
line-height: 1.5
}
*,::before,::after {
box-sizing: border-box;
border-width: 0;
border-style: solid;
border-color: currentColor
}
img {
border-style: solid
}
input::-webkit-input-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input::-moz-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input:-ms-input-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input::-ms-input-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input::placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
table {
border-collapse: collapse
}
a {
color: inherit;
text-decoration: inherit
}
input {
padding: 0;
line-height: inherit;
color: inherit
}
img,svg {
display: block;
vertical-align: middle
}
img {
max-width: 100%;
height: auto
}
.bg-CoconutCream {
background-color: #f2f6d5
}
.bg-AuChico {
background-color: #996561
}
.border-CoconutCream {
border-color: #f2f6d5
}
.border-b-8 {
border-bottom-width: 8px
}
.cursor-pointer {
cursor: pointer
}
.block {
display: block
}
.flex {
display: -webkit-box;
display: flex
}
.table {
display: table
}
.justify-between {
-webkit-box-pack: justify;
justify-content: space-between
}
.font-vg5000 {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans
}
.font-playfair {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans
}
.font-bold {
font-weight: 700
}
.h-full {
height: 100%
}
.leading-none {
line-height: 1
}
.mx-4 {
margin-left: 1rem;
margin-right: 1rem
}
.mb-1 {
margin-bottom: .25rem
}
.mt-4 {
margin-top: 1rem
}
.mb-4 {
margin-bottom: 1rem
}
.mb-6 {
margin-bottom: 1.5rem
}
.mt-8 {
margin-top: 2rem
}
.mb-12 {
margin-bottom: 3rem
}
.p-1 {
padding: .25rem
}
.px-1 {
padding-left: .25rem;
padding-right: .25rem
}
.pt-2 {
padding-top: .5rem
}
.pt-3 {
padding-top: .75rem
}
.pr-4 {
padding-right: 1rem
}
.pt-6 {
padding-top: 1.5rem
}
.pb-6 {
padding-bottom: 1.5rem
}
.pb-8 {
padding-bottom: 2rem
}
.pt-16 {
padding-top: 4rem
}
.pt-32 {
padding-top: 8rem
}
.static {
position: static
}
.sticky {
position: -webkit-sticky;
position: sticky
}
.top-0 {
top: 0
}
.text-CoconutCream {
color: #f2f6d5
}
.text-xs {
font-size: .75rem
}
.text-base {
font-size: 1rem
}
.italic {
font-style: italic
}
.z-10 {
z-index: 10
}
@font-face {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular;
font-weight: 400;
src: url(../fonts/PlayfairDisplay-Regular.woff)format('woff')
}
@font-face {
font-family: vg5000-regular;
font-weight: 400;
src: url(../fonts/VG5000-Regular_web.woff)format('woff')
}
body {
padding-top: 3rem;
padding-left: 3rem;
padding-right: 3rem;
}
img {
padding-top: .5rem;
padding-bottom: .5rem
}
h1 {
font-size: 1.875rem;
-webkit-column-break-after: avoid;
-moz-column-break-after: avoid;
break-after: avoid
}
h2 {
font-size: 1.5rem;
-webkit-column-break-after: avoid;
-moz-column-break-after: avoid;
break-after: avoid
}
h3 {
font-size: 1.25rem;
-webkit-column-break-after: avoid;
-moz-column-break-after: avoid;
break-after: avoid
}
blockquote {
font-style: italic
}
p {
padding-bottom: .5rem;
line-height: 1.25
}
article ul {
position: relative;
list-style-type: none;
margin-left: 0;
padding-left: .75rem
}
article ul li:before {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
color: #996561;
font-size: .75rem;
left: 0;
position: absolute;
padding-top: .5rem;
padding-bottom: .5rem;
content: "•"
}
article li {
padding-left: .5rem
}
a {
color: #996561
}
a:hover {
text-decoration: underline
}
.edit-button {
border-bottom-width: 4px;
border-color: #f2f6d5;
padding-left: .25rem;
padding-right: .25rem;
background-color: #996561;
margin-bottom: .5rem;
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
color: #f2f6d5
}
.edit-button:hover {
background-color: #f2f6d5;
color: #996561;
border-bottom-width: 2px;
border-color: #996561
}
.title-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 2.25rem;
color: #996561
}
.title-pretext {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1rem;
color: #996561
}
.content-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #29102f
}
.sidebar-title {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1rem;
color: #996561
}
.sidebar-list {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #996561
}
.logo {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #996561;
padding-top: .5rem
}
.ddmenu .sidebar-title {
cursor: pointer
}
.ddmenu input {
display: none
}
.ddmenu .hiddendiv {
padding-bottom: .25rem;
display: none
}
.ddmenu input:not(:checked)~.hiddendiv {
display: block;
padding-bottom: 1rem
}
#TableOfContents {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #996561;
margin-left: -.5rem
}
#TableOfContents ul {
margin-left: .5rem
}
#TableOfContents li:before {
content: "> "
}
@page:first {
@bottom {
content: none;
}
}
@page {
margin-bottom: 5mm;
@top {
color: #996561;
font-size: 1rem;
font-family: 'VG5000-Regular';
content: -moz-element(topic);
content: element(topic);
}
@bottom {
color: #996561;
font-size: 0.5rem;
font-family: 'VG5000-Regular';
content: "▒▒ 🐟 ▒ ▒▒▒ 🐙 ▒▒▒🏃 ▒▒☄▒ PAGE: " counter(page) " ▒ ▒▒▒▒ ⚡ ▒🔍▒ ☠ ▒ ▒▒▒";
}
}
@page topic:first {
@top {
content: none;
}
}
@media print {
body {
background-color: #f2f6d5;
color: #29102f;
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans
}
.runningTopic {
position: running(topic)
}
.topic {
-webkit-column-break-before: page;
-moz-column-break-before: page;
break-before: page;
page: topic
}
.title-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 4rem;
color: #996561;
margin-bottom: 5rem
}
.title-pretext {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.5rem;
color: #996561
}
.topic-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 2.25rem;
color: #996561;
margin-bottom: 5rem
}
.topic-pretext {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.5rem;
color: #996561
}
article ul li:before {
content: ""
}
.toc::after {
text-align: right;
float: right;
content: target-counter(attr(href url),page,decimal-leading-zero)
}
}
.md\:flex-row {
-webkit-box-orient:horizontal;
-webkit-box-direction: normal;
flex-direction: row
}
.md\:w-full {
width: 100%
}
@page {
size: 850mm 6800mm;
}
html {
font-size: 4em;
background-color: #f2f6d5
}
footer {
padding-top: 100mm;
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: .75rem;
color: #29102f
}
.printheader {
height: 40mm;
}
header {
padding-bottom: 3rem;
}
.ddmenus {
padding-top: 2rem;
}
article li {
list-style-type: none;
}
blockquote {
padding-left: 1rem;
font-style: normal;
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
}
blockquote:before {
content: open-quote;
color: #996561;
font-size: 2em;
line-height: 0.1em;
margin-right: 0.1em;
vertical-align: -0.1em;
}
blockquote:after {
content: close-quote;
color: #996561;
font-size: 2em;
line-height: 0.1em;
margin-left: 0.1em;
vertical-align: -0.1em;
}
blockquote p {
display: inline;
}
.drone {
padding-bottom: 500mm;
}

559
exhibition/exhibition_print.css Normal file
View File

@ -0,0 +1,559 @@
/*!normalize.css v8.0.1 | MIT License | github.com/necolas/normalize.css*/
html {
line-height: 1.15;
}
body {
margin: 0
}
main {
display: block
}
a {
background-color: transparent
}
b {
font-weight: bolder
}
img {
border-style: none
}
input {
font-family: inherit;
font-size: 100%;
line-height: 1.15;
margin: 0
}
input {
overflow: visible
}
[type=checkbox] {
box-sizing: border-box;
padding: 0
}
template {
display: none
}
p {
margin: 0
}
ul {
list-style: none;
margin: 0;
padding: 0
}
html {
font-family: system-ui,-apple-system,BlinkMacSystemFont,segoe ui,Roboto,helvetica neue,Arial,noto sans,sans-serif,apple color emoji,segoe ui emoji,segoe ui symbol,noto color emoji;
line-height: 1.5
}
*,::before,::after {
box-sizing: border-box;
border-width: 0;
border-style: solid;
border-color: currentColor
}
img {
border-style: solid
}
input::-webkit-input-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input::-moz-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input:-ms-input-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input::-ms-input-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input::placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
table {
border-collapse: collapse
}
a {
color: inherit;
text-decoration: inherit
}
input {
padding: 0;
line-height: inherit;
color: inherit
}
img,svg {
display: block;
vertical-align: middle
}
img {
max-width: 100%;
height: auto
}
.bg-CoconutCream {
background-color: #f2f6d5
}
.bg-AuChico {
background-color: #996561
}
.border-CoconutCream {
border-color: #f2f6d5
}
.border-b-8 {
border-bottom-width: 8px
}
.cursor-pointer {
cursor: pointer
}
.block {
display: block
}
.flex {
display: -webkit-box;
display: flex
}
.table {
display: table
}
.justify-between {
-webkit-box-pack: justify;
justify-content: space-between
}
.font-vg5000 {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans
}
.font-playfair {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans
}
.font-bold {
font-weight: 700
}
.h-full {
height: 100%
}
.leading-none {
line-height: 1
}
.mx-4 {
margin-left: 1rem;
margin-right: 1rem
}
.mb-1 {
margin-bottom: .25rem
}
.mt-4 {
margin-top: 1rem
}
.mb-4 {
margin-bottom: 1rem
}
.mb-6 {
margin-bottom: 1.5rem
}
.mt-8 {
margin-top: 2rem
}
.mb-12 {
margin-bottom: 3rem
}
.p-1 {
padding: .25rem
}
.px-1 {
padding-left: .25rem;
padding-right: .25rem
}
.pt-2 {
padding-top: .5rem
}
.pt-3 {
padding-top: .75rem
}
.pr-4 {
padding-right: 1rem
}
.pt-6 {
padding-top: 1.5rem
}
.pb-6 {
padding-bottom: 1.5rem
}
.pb-8 {
padding-bottom: 2rem
}
.pt-16 {
padding-top: 4rem
}
.pt-32 {
padding-top: 8rem
}
.static {
position: static
}
.sticky {
position: -webkit-sticky;
position: sticky
}
.top-0 {
top: 0
}
.text-CoconutCream {
color: #f2f6d5
}
.text-xs {
font-size: .75rem
}
.text-base {
font-size: 1rem
}
.italic {
font-style: italic
}
.z-10 {
z-index: 10
}
@font-face {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular;
font-weight: 400;
src: url(../fonts/PlayfairDisplay-Regular.woff)format('woff')
}
@font-face {
font-family: vg5000-regular;
font-weight: 400;
src: url(../fonts/VG5000-Regular_web.woff)format('woff')
}
html {
font-size: 5em;
background-color: #f2f6d5
}
body {
padding-top: 3rem;
padding-left: 3rem;
padding-right: 3rem;
}
img {
padding-top: .5rem;
padding-bottom: .5rem
}
h1 {
font-size: 1.875rem;
-webkit-column-break-after: avoid;
-moz-column-break-after: avoid;
break-after: avoid
}
h2 {
font-size: 1.5rem;
-webkit-column-break-after: avoid;
-moz-column-break-after: avoid;
break-after: avoid
}
h3 {
font-size: 1.25rem;
-webkit-column-break-after: avoid;
-moz-column-break-after: avoid;
break-after: avoid
}
blockquote {
font-style: italic
}
p {
padding-bottom: .5rem;
line-height: 1.25
}
footer {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: .75rem;
color: #29102f
}
article ul {
position: relative;
list-style-type: none;
margin-left: 0;
padding-left: .75rem
}
article ul li:before {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
color: #996561;
font-size: .75rem;
left: 0;
position: absolute;
padding-top: .5rem;
padding-bottom: .5rem;
content: "•"
}
article li {
padding-left: .5rem
}
a {
color: #996561
}
a:hover {
text-decoration: underline
}
.edit-button {
border-bottom-width: 4px;
border-color: #f2f6d5;
padding-left: .25rem;
padding-right: .25rem;
background-color: #996561;
margin-bottom: .5rem;
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
color: #f2f6d5
}
.edit-button:hover {
background-color: #f2f6d5;
color: #996561;
border-bottom-width: 2px;
border-color: #996561
}
.title-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 2.25rem;
color: #996561
}
.title-pretext {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1rem;
color: #996561
}
.content-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #29102f
}
.sidebar-title {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1rem;
color: #996561
}
.sidebar-list {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #996561
}
.logo {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #996561;
padding-top: .5rem
}
.ddmenu .sidebar-title {
cursor: pointer
}
.ddmenu input {
display: none
}
.ddmenu .hiddendiv {
padding-bottom: .25rem;
display: none
}
.ddmenu input:not(:checked)~.hiddendiv {
display: block;
padding-bottom: 1rem
}
#TableOfContents {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #996561;
margin-left: -.5rem
}
#TableOfContents ul {
margin-left: .5rem
}
#TableOfContents li:before {
content: "> "
}
@page {
size: 850mm 4000mm;
}
@page:first {
@bottom {
content: none;
}
}
@page {
margin-bottom: 5mm;
@top {
color: #996561;
font-size: 1rem;
font-family: 'VG5000-Regular';
content: -moz-element(topic);
content: element(topic);
}
@bottom {
color: #996561;
font-size: 0.5rem;
font-family: 'VG5000-Regular';
content: "▒▒ 🐟 ▒ ▒▒▒ 🐙 ▒▒▒🏃 ▒▒☄▒ PAGE: " counter(page) " ▒ ▒▒▒▒ ⚡ ▒🔍▒ ☠ ▒ ▒▒▒";
}
}
@page topic:first {
@top {
content: none;
}
}
@media print {
body {
background-color: #f2f6d5;
color: #29102f;
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans
}
.runningTopic {
position: running(topic)
}
.topic {
-webkit-column-break-before: page;
-moz-column-break-before: page;
break-before: page;
page: topic
}
.title-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 4rem;
color: #996561;
margin-bottom: 5rem
}
.title-pretext {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.5rem;
color: #996561
}
.topic-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 2.25rem;
color: #996561;
margin-bottom: 5rem
}
.topic-pretext {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.5rem;
color: #996561
}
article ul li:before {
content: ""
}
.toc::after {
text-align: right;
float: right;
content: target-counter(attr(href url),page,decimal-leading-zero)
}
}
.md\:flex-row {
-webkit-box-orient:horizontal;
-webkit-box-direction: normal;
flex-direction: row
}
.md\:w-full {
width: 100%
}

559
exhibition/exhibition_print_4em.css Normal file
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@ -0,0 +1,559 @@
/*!normalize.css v8.0.1 | MIT License | github.com/necolas/normalize.css*/
html {
line-height: 1.15;
}
body {
margin: 0
}
main {
display: block
}
a {
background-color: transparent
}
b {
font-weight: bolder
}
img {
border-style: none
}
input {
font-family: inherit;
font-size: 100%;
line-height: 1.15;
margin: 0
}
input {
overflow: visible
}
[type=checkbox] {
box-sizing: border-box;
padding: 0
}
template {
display: none
}
p {
margin: 0
}
ul {
list-style: none;
margin: 0;
padding: 0
}
html {
font-family: system-ui,-apple-system,BlinkMacSystemFont,segoe ui,Roboto,helvetica neue,Arial,noto sans,sans-serif,apple color emoji,segoe ui emoji,segoe ui symbol,noto color emoji;
line-height: 1.5
}
*,::before,::after {
box-sizing: border-box;
border-width: 0;
border-style: solid;
border-color: currentColor
}
img {
border-style: solid
}
input::-webkit-input-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input::-moz-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input:-ms-input-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input::-ms-input-placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
input::placeholder {
color: #a0aec0
}
table {
border-collapse: collapse
}
a {
color: inherit;
text-decoration: inherit
}
input {
padding: 0;
line-height: inherit;
color: inherit
}
img,svg {
display: block;
vertical-align: middle
}
img {
max-width: 100%;
height: auto
}
.bg-CoconutCream {
background-color: #f2f6d5
}
.bg-AuChico {
background-color: #996561
}
.border-CoconutCream {
border-color: #f2f6d5
}
.border-b-8 {
border-bottom-width: 8px
}
.cursor-pointer {
cursor: pointer
}
.block {
display: block
}
.flex {
display: -webkit-box;
display: flex
}
.table {
display: table
}
.justify-between {
-webkit-box-pack: justify;
justify-content: space-between
}
.font-vg5000 {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans
}
.font-playfair {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans
}
.font-bold {
font-weight: 700
}
.h-full {
height: 100%
}
.leading-none {
line-height: 1
}
.mx-4 {
margin-left: 1rem;
margin-right: 1rem
}
.mb-1 {
margin-bottom: .25rem
}
.mt-4 {
margin-top: 1rem
}
.mb-4 {
margin-bottom: 1rem
}
.mb-6 {
margin-bottom: 1.5rem
}
.mt-8 {
margin-top: 2rem
}
.mb-12 {
margin-bottom: 3rem
}
.p-1 {
padding: .25rem
}
.px-1 {
padding-left: .25rem;
padding-right: .25rem
}
.pt-2 {
padding-top: .5rem
}
.pt-3 {
padding-top: .75rem
}
.pr-4 {
padding-right: 1rem
}
.pt-6 {
padding-top: 1.5rem
}
.pb-6 {
padding-bottom: 1.5rem
}
.pb-8 {
padding-bottom: 2rem
}
.pt-16 {
padding-top: 4rem
}
.pt-32 {
padding-top: 8rem
}
.static {
position: static
}
.sticky {
position: -webkit-sticky;
position: sticky
}
.top-0 {
top: 0
}
.text-CoconutCream {
color: #f2f6d5
}
.text-xs {
font-size: .75rem
}
.text-base {
font-size: 1rem
}
.italic {
font-style: italic
}
.z-10 {
z-index: 10
}
@font-face {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular;
font-weight: 400;
src: url(../fonts/PlayfairDisplay-Regular.woff)format('woff')
}
@font-face {
font-family: vg5000-regular;
font-weight: 400;
src: url(../fonts/VG5000-Regular_web.woff)format('woff')
}
body {
padding-top: 3rem;
padding-left: 3rem;
padding-right: 3rem;
}
img {
padding-top: .5rem;
padding-bottom: .5rem
}
h1 {
font-size: 1.875rem;
-webkit-column-break-after: avoid;
-moz-column-break-after: avoid;
break-after: avoid
}
h2 {
font-size: 1.5rem;
-webkit-column-break-after: avoid;
-moz-column-break-after: avoid;
break-after: avoid
}
h3 {
font-size: 1.25rem;
-webkit-column-break-after: avoid;
-moz-column-break-after: avoid;
break-after: avoid
}
blockquote {
font-style: italic
}
p {
padding-bottom: .5rem;
line-height: 1.25
}
article ul {
position: relative;
list-style-type: none;
margin-left: 0;
padding-left: .75rem
}
article ul li:before {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
color: #996561;
font-size: .75rem;
left: 0;
position: absolute;
padding-top: .5rem;
padding-bottom: .5rem;
content: "•"
}
article li {
padding-left: .5rem
}
a {
color: #996561
}
a:hover {
text-decoration: underline
}
.edit-button {
border-bottom-width: 4px;
border-color: #f2f6d5;
padding-left: .25rem;
padding-right: .25rem;
background-color: #996561;
margin-bottom: .5rem;
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
color: #f2f6d5
}
.edit-button:hover {
background-color: #f2f6d5;
color: #996561;
border-bottom-width: 2px;
border-color: #996561
}
.title-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 2.25rem;
color: #996561
}
.title-pretext {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1rem;
color: #996561
}
.content-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #29102f
}
.sidebar-title {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1rem;
color: #996561
}
.sidebar-list {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #996561
}
.logo {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #996561;
padding-top: .5rem
}
.ddmenu .sidebar-title {
cursor: pointer
}
.ddmenu input {
display: none
}
.ddmenu .hiddendiv {
padding-bottom: .25rem;
display: none
}
.ddmenu input:not(:checked)~.hiddendiv {
display: block;
padding-bottom: 1rem
}
#TableOfContents {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.25rem;
color: #996561;
margin-left: -.5rem
}
#TableOfContents ul {
margin-left: .5rem
}
#TableOfContents li:before {
content: "> "
}
@page:first {
@bottom {
content: none;
}
}
@page {
margin-bottom: 5mm;
@top {
color: #996561;
font-size: 1rem;
font-family: 'VG5000-Regular';
content: -moz-element(topic);
content: element(topic);
}
@bottom {
color: #996561;
font-size: 0.5rem;
font-family: 'VG5000-Regular';
content: "▒▒ 🐟 ▒ ▒▒▒ 🐙 ▒▒▒🏃 ▒▒☄▒ PAGE: " counter(page) " ▒ ▒▒▒▒ ⚡ ▒🔍▒ ☠ ▒ ▒▒▒";
}
}
@page topic:first {
@top {
content: none;
}
}
@media print {
body {
background-color: #f2f6d5;
color: #29102f;
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans
}
.runningTopic {
position: running(topic)
}
.topic {
-webkit-column-break-before: page;
-moz-column-break-before: page;
break-before: page;
page: topic
}
.title-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 4rem;
color: #996561;
margin-bottom: 5rem
}
.title-pretext {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.5rem;
color: #996561
}
.topic-text {
font-family: playfairdisplay regular,sans;
font-size: 2.25rem;
color: #996561;
margin-bottom: 5rem
}
.topic-pretext {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: 1.5rem;
color: #996561
}
article ul li:before {
content: ""
}
.toc::after {
text-align: right;
float: right;
content: target-counter(attr(href url),page,decimal-leading-zero)
}
}
.md\:flex-row {
-webkit-box-orient:horizontal;
-webkit-box-direction: normal;
flex-direction: row
}
.md\:w-full {
width: 100%
}
@page {
size: 850mm 4000mm;
}
html {
font-size: 4em;
background-color: #f2f6d5
}
footer {
font-family: vg5000-regular,sans;
font-size: .75rem;
color: #29102f
}

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13
themes/piratecare/layouts/_default/baseof.html
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@ -14,6 +14,19 @@
<a class="edit-button" target="_blank" href="{{ $gitUrl }}"> ? </a>
</div>
{{ end }}
<div class="printheader"></div>
{{ if eq (printf "%s" .Page.File) "annex/womenonwaves.md" }}
<div class="drone">
<div class="dronespacer1"></div>
<figure>
<img src="../../images/169.png" width="100%">
<figcaption>
<h4>Figure 1. The abortion drone has been used in recent campaigns in Poland (2015) and Ireland (2016). The drone flies abortion pills from one country to women in another country. Using the different legislations and regulations it makes the reality of women in countries where abortion is restricted visible by creating access to the abortion pills.</h4>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<div class="dronespacer2"></div>
</div>
{{ end }}
{{- partial "header.html" . -}}
<main class="lg:flex mb-4 pt-2 justify-between md:flex-row">
<aside class="lg:w-2/5 pr-4 pt-16 lg:sticky lg:top-0 lg:static h-full mb-6 md:w-full">

7
themes/piratecare/layouts/annex/list.html Normal file
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@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
{{ define "main" }}
<div class="sidebar-title mb-1 pb-8">▒▒ all annexes:</div>
{{ range .Data.Pages }}
<div><a class="sidebar-list text-base" href="{{ .RelPermalink }}{{ if eq hugo.Environment "offline" }}index.html{{ end }}">> {{ .Title }}</a></div>
{{ end }}
<div class="pb-8"></div>
{{ end }}

39
themes/piratecare/layouts/annex/single.html Normal file
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@ -0,0 +1,39 @@
{{ define "sidebar" }}
<div class="leading-none mb-12">
<span class="title-pretext">annex ⦚ </span><span class="title-text pt-6">{{ .Title }}</span>
</div>
<div class="ddmenus">
{{ if ne (trim .Page.TableOfContents "\n") "<nav id=\"TableOfContents\"></nav>" }}
<div class="ddmenu">
<input id="toggly-toc" type="checkbox" >
<label for="toggly-toc" class="sidebar-title" tabindex="1">▒▒ table of contents ▽</label>
<div class="hiddendiv">
<div class="mt-4">
{{ .Page.TableOfContents }}
</div>
</div>
</div>
{{ end }}
<div class="ddmenu">
<input id="toggly-isin" type="checkbox">
<label for="toggly-isin" class="sidebar-title mt-4 mb-1" tabindex="1">▒▒ mentioned in ▽</label>
<div class="hiddendiv">
<ul class="mt-4">
{{ $currentSession := . }}
{{ range $currentSession.Params.mentioned_in }}
{{ with $.Page.GetPage . }}
<li><a class="sidebar-list text-base" href="{{ .RelPermalink }}{{ if eq hugo.Environment "offline" }}index.html{{ end }}">↖ topic ⦚ {{ .Title }}</a></li>
{{ end }}
{{ end }}
</ul>
</div>
</div>
</div>
{{ end }}
{{define "main" }}
<article>
<div class="content-text">{{ .Content }}</div>
</article>
{{ end }}

1
themes/piratecare/layouts/shortcodes/raw.html Normal file
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@ -0,0 +1 @@
{{ .Inner }}

4
themes/piratecare/layouts/topic/single.html
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@ -3,7 +3,7 @@
<div class="leading-none mb-12">
<span class="title-pretext">topic ⦚ </span><span class="title-text pt-6">{{ .Title }}</span>
</div>
<div class="ddmenus">
{{ if ne (trim .Page.TableOfContents "\n") "<nav id=\"TableOfContents\"></nav>" }}
<div class="ddmenu">
<input id="toggly-toc" type="checkbox" >
@ -39,7 +39,7 @@
</ul>
</div>
</div>
</div>
{{ end }}
{{define "main" }}