Neighborhood resistance to the urban crisis: The case of housing struggles in Carabanchel, .

Israel García1 and Jacobo Abellán23

Working-paper: Comments and critics are welcome

0. Abstract

This paper aims to visualize the new forms of urban resistance looking cushion the social impact of the crisis in . In this sense, we present the case study of Carabanchel, working-class neighborhood in the southwestern outskirts of Madrid and severely beaten by the crisis. The neighborhood of Carabanchel is a significant case of neighborhood resistance, where following the creation of the neighborhood assembly in May 2011, it has created a whole complex and extensive network of assemblies, groups and autonomous spaces that seek to counter the effects of the crisis and propose alternatives and solutions to their neighbors with solutions ranging from housing to the squatters, to supply or labor, with the creation of worker cooperatives. This case study will focus on describing the fundamental characteristics of the space of resistance created in Carabanchel neighborhood for the past two years. It will explain the autonomous social fabric created during these years as well as the services and projects offered by the network, analyze its political organization based on direct democracy and explore forms of collective action.

Keywords: urban crisis, housing movement, direct democracy, Madrid, Carabanchel.

1 Complutense University of Madrid. Activist of the housing movement in Getafe. He participates in the 15M movement and in the Morgatge Victim Plataform. Contact: [email protected] 2 Autonomous University of Madrid. Currently, his research is related to the study of the struggle for housing in Madrid. He has developed a master thesis and has published two articles on the housing movement in Madrid (Abellán, 2012, 2013). Contact: [email protected] 3 This research is being conducted as part of research projects CONTESTED_CITIES (FP7-PEOPLE-PIRSES- GA-2012-318944) and NEOLIBERAL_CITI: Re-framing urban neoliberalism and neo-liberal citizenship - enactments of resistance and practices of protest (FP7-PEOPLE-2010-RG: PERG08-GA-2010-277115) led by Professor Michael Janoschka. 1. Introduction

New local resistance networks are being developed in the Spanish cities in the context of the crisis. The struggles for housing and other resistance struggles that are taking place in Madrid and Spain represent a new phenomenon that has not been analyzed in depth from the social sciences or from urban studies. In this sense, these new struggles pose a challenge to the perspective of critical urban studies, both those related to the study of the neoliberal city and for those who seek to analyze the impact of the crisis in the urban space, but especially for interested in the study of urban social movements. This raises need to be addressed from urban studies and social sciences to study these new movements and the consequences they may have on the legitimacy of the hegemonic model developed city in recent decades, as well as proposals to build alternatives to this.

This text is a first preview of the results of an ongoing investigation initiated by the authors of a case study in the housing struggles in Carabanchel, Madrid. The aim of the research is a first approach of the housing struggles at the neighborhood level, a major territorial levels where housing movement conducts its activities. Why study the neighborhood level?, Why Carabanchel? The approach to the neighborhood scale of housing struggles allow us to understand with greater clarity and sharpness for housing movement in Madrid. It is at this level where you do most of the activities and actions as well as where most of the work develops activists and affected. Study the neighborhood scale is presented therefore essential for the study of the housing movement in Spain in general and in Madrid in particular. We have chosen the Carabanchel neighborhood because is an example of mobilization and organization in Madrid and the entire state, with different housing groups that have effectively shut down dozens of evictions and squat a block of flats. The research will seek to define and point out the main features of the movement in the neighborhood and analyze the changes and processes that are being developed.

The research is being carried out during the summer-autumn of 2013, having made during the month of July only part of the empirical work. In this regard, this working-paper represents only a preview of the first outcomes of an investigation that is still ongoing. It is just an initial draft to serve as a document for discussion and debate on the work done so far, so the comments that will made in the the Congress may be useful to improve the work of the future. The investigation will continue from October, with the completion of several interviews with activists and neighborhood residents. From the information gathered during the empirical work, the aim of the papar is to make an approach to struggles for housing in Carabanchel and present preliminary results of research. To obtain empirical material has been used qualitative methodology. First, it has carried out the technique of participant observation, participating in different assemblies, meetings and events organized by the movement. Secondly there has been a documentary source analysis documents prepared by the movement, as well as reports in the media. Third and finally have depth interviews conducted seven people / groups related to the movement. On the one hand there have been four key-informant interviews that are part of the working groups and meetings housing issues and / or that are related to the housing movement. On the other hand there have been two interviews whith people directly affected by a problem with the house. A man immigrant with a evicted-mortgage process and a woman evicted for non-payment the rent for a public house. The work is divided into the following parts. First, by way of context, will describe the model developed in Madrid city during the last decades, the emergence of the crisis in Spain and its consequences, the emergence of the 15M movement and an approach to the resistance network created in Madrid and especially in Carabanchel. Secondly, we develop a section describing the struggles for housing in Carabanchel. Third, we present the preliminary results of the research. Fourth and finally, in conclusion, will identify final valuations on the results obtained.

2. Context

Rise and fall of the “modelo Madrid”

Since 1993, until the start of the current economic crisis, Madrid is characterized by the application of a series of policies that have made the state capital an example of economic growth, employment generation, attraction of immigrants and international investors (Méndez, 2012). The success in reproduction of the capital accumulation, Madrid became the symbol of the successful Spanish model and, therefore, one of the most attractive cities for private equity investors. The Spanish model, which was based on the foundations of economic development model established during the Franco dictatorship was the creation of an ownership society, and were based in private housing construction, land liberalization and development financial sector (Ley 7/1997; Rodríguez y López, 2011), converting the massive construction of private housing in the backbone of the Spanish economic growth. We could be talking about a true “spanish way of life” (Colau and Alemany, 2012) in which the Power "is concentrated in the block of financial, real-estate and construction" Spanish. (Colau and Alemany, 12: 2012). In the particular case of the city of Madrid, governed for more than 20 years by a political party of neoliberal ideology, urban development model, promoted by the local government, has facilitated its integration into the global economy, making it a neoliberal city (Hackworth, 2006; Peck and Brenner, 2009; Janoschka, 2011). Its main characteristic tend to favor the process of capital accumulation: financialization and ownership of real estate investments, dematerialisation and specialization of metropolitan economies, flexibility and precariousness of the labor market, governance and urban entrepreneurialism (Méndez, 2012). In the case of the city of Madrid these features have gone directly to encourage urban development model based, as mentioned above, in the growth of the construction sector private housing through the implementation by the Administration, liberalizing policy, as, for example, the Land Act of the Autonomous in 2001, allowing the accumulation of land in a few hands, that is, in those of large construction companies and real estate.

The different local administrations that have governed the city of Madrid during the last two decades have been characterized by the coincidence of interests between the government and the interests of private capital. This coincidence is reflected especially in the (de) regulation where private interests were both construction and financial-banking sector. This (de) regulation had a clear objective: attracting large private equity investment, through tax incentives, labor market flexibility and the financialization of the economy. The implementation of these policies was only possible thanks to the Madrid urban management in which the local government is subject to fulfill a subsidiary function support and encouragement of private capital (Méndez, 2012). However, this form of economic growth, who claimed self-reproduction of capital accumulation by large companies, generated a lot of internal contradictions, on one side, Madrid have made an immense field for generating private profit while on the other, shows a persistent tendency to produce new social inequalities and push a considerable part of the population to precarious employment niches (Metropolitan Observatory, 2009).

The economic crisis that began in 2008 stopped short the capital accumulation process was proceeding in the model Madrid. Due to urban development model that was being generated, the financial sector had a very important role, as it was in charge of providing large loans to construction sector. For this reason, the global financial crisis will have a brutal impact on the Spanish economy and, in the Madrid urban model: the almost complete paralysis and its huge social consequences. The freezing of the Spanish economy was reflected in the explosion of the housing bubble that collapsed the process of accumulation of private capital, especially in those capital cities whose reproduction was based on the property market speculation. The bursting of the bubble will generate a number of consequences, one of the most important is the collapse of the housing market, which at the same time, and as a domino effect, exceed even the economic and social lead to serious consequences. One of the social consequences of the crisis that we can observe in Madrid is the polarization of social model and territorial segmentation. During the period of greatest accumulation of Madrid's urban development model, the local government regulated, and continuous replacing the redistributive logic for a competitive logic. (Mendez, 2012). This change in the regulatory logic generates a growing and intense social polarization between the different areas of the city: those neighborhoods that attract different capital flows against neglected neighborhoods, both private investment and public intervention now seeking to promote capital accumulation process, which will start to become areas of social marginalization. Are these territories in which they begin to develop processes of contestation and "local resistance to the urban model imposed" (Mendez, 2012).

From the “modelo Madrid” to the 15M movement

The developing crisis coupled with social cuts and economic reforms of recent governments has brought some important consequences, increased unemployment, social insecurity and labor, housing evictions, spatial segregation and poverty in many districts, causing stagnation in the development of class reproduction mechanisms (Rodriguez, 2013), increasing, thus, the bankruptcy of the political-economic system that had supported the regime of the Spanish Transition. The collapse of the housing bubble, which stopped short the process of capital accumulation, coupled with social bankruptcy, generated by this, led to the acceleration of the internal contradictions of the old regime (Rodriguez, 2013). At the same time, in several Spanish cities, urban movements have emerged seeking to combat the social consequences of the crisis and have again put social issues at the center of political debate. These movements have implemented collective actions of civil disobedience seeking to delegitimize the current legal framework, which they consider unjust and antisocial. In the same way, have set up structures of political and social organization outside the institutions and the market, relying on self- management, mutual support, assemblies and facilitating the emergence of new networks of neighborhood resistance. The economic crisis and the rise of these new urban struggles is accompanied by political and institutional crisis, visualized mainly from the emergence of the 15M movement (Rodriguez, 2013) and has led to a loss of support and legitimacy of majoritarian political parties, political institutions and to a lesser extent, of representative democracy.

In this context, Madrid has become a good example of the emergence of these new movements and urban struggles. After the arrival of the 15M movement in May 2011, many areas of the city seen emerging neighborhood assemblies and spaces seeking to counter the consequences of the crisis on issues such as housing, utilities or the privatization of public space, and move to neighborhood deliberative space generated in the camp of Puerta del . These assemblies and groups have been created, in their respective districts, an extensive network of neighborhood support and resistance against the economic crisis in a self-organized and independent of institutions and commitment to collective action strategies based on civil disobedience. Of the different struggles that have launched neighborhood assemblies include the struggle for housing and evictions. The various assemblies along with other existing platforms, such as the Platform of People Affected by Mortgages (PAH), and groups from the neighborhood associations and autonomous movement have formed an extensive network of housing struggle with ability to paralyze hundreds of evictions, squat houses and pressuring political and financial institutions, acting in turn on different levels, from the neighborhood to the supranational (Abellán, 2013).

The urban struggles and neighborhood resistance networks have turned Carabanchel in a paradigmatic example of this new urban reality in the city of Madrid. Working-class neighborhood on the southwest outskirts of the city and severely beaten by the crisis, Carabanchel is a significant case of neighborhood resistance, where following the creation of the neighborhood assembly in May 2011, it has created a whole complex and extensive network of assemblies, groups and autonomous spaces that seek to counter the effects of the crisis and propose alternatives and solutions to their neighbors with solutions ranging from housing, to food or labor, with the creation of worker cooperatives. In the empowerment of these networks has been particularly important Sociocultural Space Released and Self-Managed EKO (ESLA EKO). An old abandoned commissary for 14 years it was occupied by the People's Carabanchel district in 2012. In the absence of non-commodified cultural spaces, this building was released to house in their midst all kinds of popular activities, especially those related to cultural and social, self- managed and self-organized way by the neighborhood's social groups. Thus, the E.S.L.A. EKO became not only a space recovered by and for the neighborhood, but in the meeting place for a large part of the network nodes Carabanchel neighborhood resistance. Of all these struggles and resistances of the network, emphasizes the struggle for the right to housing and against evictions, it has acquired its own autonomy with collective assemblies and exclusively dedicated to this purpose. In a district with high unemployment and therefore a significant number of housing evictions, the fight is centered on self-organization and mobilization of the neighborhood to prevent and stop evictions, both promoted by banks as those promoted by public institutions themselves, and to find an alternative housing for those who have difficulties in accessing housing. To implement this collective action strategies, comes most notably those that are committed to civil disobedience, as stopdesahucios, or release / squatting in a building owned by a financial institution to house people evicted and with access problems housing.

3. Housing struggles in Carabanchel Neighborhood

The housing struggles in Carabanchel arose in a context in which the issue of housing was beginning to have a presence on social movements in Madrid and the Spanish State. In some Spanish cities, including Barcelona, neighborhood movements began to paralyze the first housing evictions in 2009 through the Mortgage Victims Plataform (PAH in spanish lenguage), a platform that brought together people who due to unemployment or precarious situation, they could do meet the payment of the mortgage debt that had contracted with the lender and they had to deliver housing and remain, in most cases, with a large debt. The appearance of the 15M movement in May 2011 marked a significant support to the anti - eviction movement throughout the state. In the city of Madrid in late May 2011 was officially presented the Mortgage Victim Platform of Madrid, with the same goal of the other platforms with the same name already existed in other cities of the State: halt evictions affected by mortgage and search for a negotiated solution to their situation. Meanwhile, in early June were created the first housing commissions in the newly created district assemblies and towns. These sought help neighbors who had problems with their housing, especially for those who were engaged in a process of eviction. The June 15 held the first stop-eviction action (#stopdesahucio in spanish language) in Madrid in the district of Tetuan, a popular neighborhood northwest of the city, coordinated by the group housing assembly of Tetuan and Platform of People Affected by Mortgage Madrid and with the support of activists of the 15M movement that were camping in the Puerta del Sol. This was a very massive action that had a great impact in the media and in public opinion (ElPaís, 2011), much more than other stop-eviction action that had been made previously in other cities. In this context, at the middle of July 2011, the Carabanchel housing group was born with the idea of creating a space in the neighborhood and support meeting for those residents with housing difficulties. Initially, the Assembly had not created a specific group (housing issues were integrated into the generic workgroup called "social"). But, the large number of affected people who came sented by the Mortgage Victim Plataform (PAH) or by their own way conform that the activists created exclusively a group for housing issues. According to activists, Carabanchel is one of the districts with the highest rate of evictions in all of Madrid, so it was urgent to create a special group for this purpose.

During the following months, the housing group increased thanks to the large number of affected people who came to seek help early victories pushed by the media and the impact of the movement at the state level. After two years of activity, the group has effectively shut down dozens of evictions and get a housing alternative for many residents concerned. The profile of those affected is wide and varied, but predominantly those between thirty-five and fifty who were involved in a eviction proceeding. There is also affected threatened by eviction for nonpayment of a private rent or a public house rent, but they represent a minority. Many of the victims who come to the group housing are immigrant women, mostly Ecuatorian, a very hurt by the impact of the crisis due to their vulnerability. In times of economic growth an important part of their acquired a mortgage but with the crisis many of them were unable to continue paying. Weekly meetings held in the Squat Social Center EKO get an average of 40 people, including activists and affected, reaching on many occasions to gather more than 60 people. Although initially there was a division between activists and concerned, after two years of this division has been overtaken, becoming affected many activists, becoming protagonists of assemblies and actions carried out group and responsible for their own case. The group operates mainly as an office to attend and advice the people affected by an eviction, be it private or public entity. In this sense, is "specialized" in the suspension of evictions, implementing different tools to achieve their goals. The main actions carried out are the "fixings" and pressure on financial institutions or policies of the district to avoid running the eviction. The "fixings" are that a group of activists accompanying the victim to the bank to try to negotiate the cessation of eviction, so that in this way the pressure on the director and the bank is affected more and feel more secure to negotiate. This action is complemented by actions to denounce in the neighborhood the actions of the bank, like protest at the gates of the office or the collection of signatures.

If these strategies do not work, housing group passe to the phase #stopeviction (#stopdesahucio). The #stopeviction is an action that seeks the suspension and postponement the eviction at the time of release, that is, when the clerk comes in person to the affected housing to issue the writ of garnishment. At that time, residents and activists are placed in front of the house and prevent access of the secretary and the police accompanying him. #Stopdesahucio action involves an act of civil disobedience as it entails prevent coercion through the implementation of a court order (20 Minutos, 2013a). The first eviction paralyzed in group housing was an eviction of a tenant of public housing, in mid-September 2011. The affected, who lived in a rented apartment owned by the Regional Government of Madrid, had failed to pay the monthly rent due to the loss of their jobs due to the crisis. Due to non-payment, the Institute of Regional Government Housing executed an order of eviction against the tenant. This group came to the house for help, and immediately initiated action to prevent the tenant was evicted from her home. After failing with the administrative public institution, the assembly decided to initiate the procedure for the suspension of eviction through #stopdesahucio. During these two years the Assembly has effectively shut down by this process, in any of its different phases (negotiation, pressure or # stopdesahucio) dozens of evictions, many of them achieving a negotiated solution to the situation of the affected. As of September 2013, the housing group's congress Carabanchel is a consolidated group, with strong roots in the neighborhood because of its intense activity and support of neighbors to the actions taken.

The housing group activity falls within a support network called Social Rights Network (SRN), created by the Popular Assembly of Carabanchel and grups by the Squatt Social Center EKO in early 2013, which aims to meet the basic needs of neighborhood residents on issues such as housing, food, clothing or work. The network consists of autonomous groups, which include the group calles Resources. Resources group emerged as a solution for many families in the neighborhood who have serious feeding difficulties. Several days a week group activists flock to shops and supermarkets in the neighborhood who have offered to provide free perishables in optimum condition to collect and distribute food boxes later among network members. The group meets twice a week at the EKO to coordinate and inform interested neighbors. The meetings are usually numerous, with an average attendance about thirty people. As in the housing group, the resource group activists seek to overcome the dichotomy activist - affected generating horizontal cooperation among all members through collective involvement in which all mutually benefit. In the affected group are all in need of food and all are activists. They are the beneficiaries of the foods that manage the group. A part of the Resources group within Social Rights Network is also the group of cooperatives and self-employment, collectively seeking employment solutions for neighborhood residents, the Free Trade Area, an area located in the EKO where the people can leave or take clothes, books or toys for the kids and the “Friendship shop”, an initiative that gives discounts in some shops in the neighborhood for the unemployed people. The housing group is included in the network as a group seeking to cover a basic need for neighborhood residents, as is the issue of housing and evictions. For members of the Social Rigths network, job loss or job insecurity can lead to a situation of lack of resources that can translate into the loss of housing and / or difficulty in access to basic goods such as food, clothing or school supplies. In this regard, the RDS is understood as a network of support and strength to overcome or mitigate the difficulties many families in the neighborhood are having about the situation of unemployment and insecurity caused by the economic crisis. To understand and explain the housing struggles in Carabanchel also need to understand and explain the operation of the network of which it is part.

After the consolidation of the housing group and the Social Rights Network, activists of the Squatt Social Center EKO and Popular Assembly launched in early 2013 the Squatting Office of Carabanchel. The purpose of the Squatting Office is facilitating technical and legal information to those interested in conducting individual or collective squatting in a house or a block of flats in disuse. Through Squatting Office, activists sought to offer the ability to perform a squat to those neighbors with difficulties in access to housing or had been evicted. They see squatting as a legitimate tool to get a housing alternative in situations of social vulnerability, especially with the large number of existing empty homes in the neighborhood and in the city of Madrid. The counseling takes place one day a week at the Social Centre Eko and attending an average of 5- 10 people interested, with a very varied, from young weak, as evicted families or unemployed workers. Since its inauguration the advice has served more than a hundred residents of the neighborhood and collaborated, along with the Carabanchel Assembly and Assemblies of other districts, in a squat of a empty building by thirty families in need of emergency housing. He has named this building as “Corrala La Charca”, in honor to the housing squatting movement calles “Corralas” that is taking place in Seville and other cities of Andalusia (Corrala La Utopía, 2013). This squat, apart from being an action that sought to offer an alternative housing to families and individuals in precarious situation, was all a political act that sought squatting visible as a solution to the housing problem but also denounce speculation and the commodification of housing, which had caused that many homes in Spain remain empty while many personan had trouble getting access to housing.

4. Preeliminary outcomes of the research

Following an approach to struggles for housing being developed in the neighborhood, the current point is to present the preliminary results of the research conducted in the neighborhood of Carabanchel. We will identify five traits that characterize these struggles: Their inclusion in a network of governance beyond market and institutions, the overflow of political normality, a discourse for the right to housing, social legitimacy and building new subjectivities.

a) Resistance Network and Mutual Support

The economic crisis has not only triggered unemployment, evictions, poverty ... The economic crisis has been a backlash of public administrations as huge cut backs in the budget, especially in social areas, i.e., has cut into the mechanisms of redistribution of wealth. This reflects, as we talked at the beginning of the document, the government will encourage competitive logic, leaving the redistributive. As the economic crisis a paralysis of the capital accumulation process, the government will try to re-generate economic growth or accumulation, redirecting public expenditure to sectors that accumulated capital before the crisis.

These measures impact fully on redistributive policies, from the neoliberal ideology, are a market intervention that distorts and therefore not easy to start up again the process of accumulation of capital in private hands. . Therefore, the slash or suppression of redistributive policies, provoke not only a growing part of the population is not only excluded from the labor market but, driven to poverty in the absence of intervention by institutions State. This started generating institutional neglect in neighborhoods hardest hit by the Madrid model first, and in those hit by the economic crisis later, a neighborhood solidarity networks that seek, as main objective to address the crisis and meet the needs basic.

In this regard, from the housing group and Cooperatives group created the Carabanchel Social Rights Network as a place of assembly where it seeks to solve needs:

“The social rights network is a network of mutual support in which we understand that both the market and the state, are now clearly inefficient in resolving issues as basic as food, clothing, housing or work. And so is the community organized who take in their hands the responsibility to solve them. We do not believe or hope for others to come to alleviate our problems, we have the strength and the tools to solve them. The SRN is a network where we are the sectors hardest hit by the crisis, we assume our responsibilities and we get to work on solving our own needs”.

La Indignata. Magazine by the Popular Assembly of Carabanchel. Page 1. (LA Indignata, 2013)

b) The breakdown of political normality

Spain is immersed in a deep political crisis due to a progressive loss of confidence in political institutions Spanish. As pointed out by an activist of the Network of Social Rights:

"There is political crisis because people see that all the institutions of the democracy are discredited. There are political crisis because the people does not trust justice systems, does not rely on traditional methods of participation, no trust in parliament, no trust in all, even in the media, more and more. I think there are still a lot of confidence in the system, but I identify a political crisis as institutional crisis, the monarchy, for example, who was one of the strongholds of ... everyone loved it, now the people can see that they're (The royal family) a bunch of crooks ... I think all of that 's political crisis. I think all this is a consequence of the economic crisis. It also looks like within the political and economical elite as now they are fighting among themselves. I think the end one thing eventually leads to the other. And that makes us identify less and less with those interests ... Everything is a bit related, that fewer people fall into the trap of identifying with the interests of the rich, as their own, because every time they are less reliant because more and see more what the reality of how the system works."

Interview Social Rights Activist Network

Although previously existing groups and movements that criticized the current system, it was until the arrival of the 15M movement when the current political and economic system began to lose social support. The 15M movement was formed as a movement against financial and political elites who demanded more democracy and social justice. The main slogan of the movement was "They don´t represent us" in reference to the loss of confidence of the demostraitors in the Spanish political class in particular and elites in general. The movement also carried out civil disobedience actions in which they disregarded the rules, as in the case of holding a demonstration on the day of reflection before the regional eleecions, a day in which it is prohibited to political demonstrations. This movement, which initially demanded small reforms, including the reform of the electoral law, translate their demands in a critique of political and financial institutions, assuming the role of a " dimissal process" has reached delegitimize political sistem and break the political consensus formed during the Spanish transition stage, built in the seventies (Rodríguez, 2013). While the 15M movement was the first modern mass social movement in Spain that carried a critique of political and economic system, accusing them of being at the service of a privileged minority, was from 25S movement "Occupy the Congress" when there was a proposal break with the political regime and the transition out of the 1978 Constitution. 25S Movement was a movement that sought the resignation of the main Spanish political system institutions (Parliament, Government and Head of State) and the opening of a constitutional process to break up with a regime that considered antisocial and undemocratic (En Pie Plataform, 2012). For this purpose, the movement convened different concentrations outside Spanish Parliament. The busiest and greatest media and political impact was on September 25th, 2012. After the demostrations, almost all of the groups and assemblies that were part of 15M adapted the political principles of the 25S movemente and assumed that any change should go through the improvement and the delegitimization of the existing political framework. The Assembly of Carabanchel and housing groups also took the tenets of 25S movement.

One indicator of the existence of a political crisis and the delegitimization of institutions is the rise of civil disobedience and political actions that go beyond the law. The case of Carabanchel is a case where have carried out civil disobedience actions as tools for housing struggle. The housing squats and the #stopevictions (#stopdesahucio) are commonly actions. The stopdesahucio involves disobedience of a court order through passive resistance to the action of the police and the clerk to execute an eviction. The housing squatting involves the usurpation of private property, an act punishable under the spanish penal code. Both actions are crimes punishable with the possibility of being arrested, played, fined and even jailed, although the latter possibility has not occurred yet in the Spanish State. The use of collective action strategies based on civil disobedience in the struggle for housing in Carabanchel is an overflow of legality and political disruption of the normality. Finally, the delegitimization of the political system and its forms of organization (parties, associations, unions) can also be observed through assembly choice and self-management as a form of political organization of the housing struggle collectives.

c) Discurs for the right to housing

Different housing groups in Carabanchel indicate that housing policy has been left to the logic of the market and this has meant that housing has been converted into a business, rather than a right. They note that the housing bubble, housing speculation and the difficulties they are having many neighbors are the result of the commodification of housing and that the solution is to ensure the right to housing and fight to prevent any infringement of the right, as noted by the activist:

“The objetctive of the housing bubble is look into the business, by selling homes to then justify financial transactions that generated money, not for solve the problem of housing. The point is that they have speculated whith houses, and people live in that houses, and then that's where we enter, isn´t it? To reclaim that can not speculate nor can do financial transactions with houses. That are not a share packages, are homes for the people. And that's where it connects with the movement and we say: No!”

Activist by the housing group of Carabanchel

d) The transformation of the subjectivity

Another of the features of the housing struggles in Carabanchel is the empowerment of the affected people, thar passing to participate actively in the housing struggles, integrating many of them as activists in the various neighborhood groups. As says one activist:

“In that sense, the housing group is an example of empowerment and an example for other areas we are developing. That when we plan to develop Resources group or cooperatives group, the reference is the housing group, because it is affected people space, which is fundamental. Is not a very nice space of symphatic activists who help the poor people. I think it is something that we must broken…(puts an exemple):” I come here like a Captain America and I give to you, poor, your stuff, Wow, I am so good!”. No, this is not the way. Those affected people can do it. We are working to break that difference”.

Interview activist of the Social Rights Network

It thus overcomes the division between affected and activists, resulting in a collective construction space where the horizontal commitment and mutual support, beyond assistential logics.

e) Legitimacy and neighborhood support.

The discurs against speculation and for the right to housing is generating at the same time, a process of social legitimation of squatting of empty homes to have effective the housing rigth. As one woman affected says:

Why you can not have a house? So is what you are fighting. Let's see, if I occupy a home is because I want to live in a house. You've taken one, okay, because I occupy another and now. So for this we are fighting.

Affected eviction of social housing.

The contradictions of the economic model which is based the spanish development and that the crisis is exposing is facilitating the discourse of social movements and collective struggle for decent housing is being imposed on the Spanish society against the hegemonic discourse. This process of shifting the discourse of the dominant classes by the counter-hegemonic discourse of social movements can be seen in increased social standing that have both the collective actions of civil disobedience as the legitimation of squatting.

The support received by activists is one of the characteristics of this struggle, a struggle that also has a great impact on public opinion and the media. That's how they see activists and affected the support of neighbors:

(In the first eviction) I had no support or neighbors or anyone. There was no support. It was very quiet in 2010. But in 2012 (In the eviction supported by housing group) saw how people were more supportive, more ...supported more. In this section, supported anymore, I think I have supported more in this than the other. Sure, I knew not, but, I've noticed a lot.

Affected by public housing eviction

The housing group is very popular because even people who are not as traditionally leftist, or revolutionary understand that this crisis is leaving people unemployed, banks throwing people out of their home, and all the people that seems bad. In other words, you don´t have to do anything to convince the people. So in that sense it is very good because it greatly increases the social pressure, that is, that almost everyone is on our side. Not everyone, but it is a very legitimate struggle socially, because many people also have mortgage, and if he keeps it because he has a job. When he miss the job, he will come with us.

Activist of housing group

5. Concluiding remarks

The results presented in this working-paper allow us to establish a first characterization of the struggles for housing and the resistances to the urban crisis in Carabanchel. First, it notes the importance of the scale of the neighborhood for the development of housing struggles. As noted earlier in this article, the housing movement acts on different territorial scales, being the scale the neighborhood closest to the citizen. It is in the neighborhood where they developed much of the activities of the housing struggles, such as assemblies and advisory services to the evected people, actions to halt evictions or squattings. In the same way, is in the space of the neighborhood where there is a connection between activists and neighbors, who come to the spaces provided by their geographical proximity. In this regard, it is at this level where you can visualize in a more clear connection of these struggles with urban space. Second, the struggle for housing in Carabanchel can be defined as a movement for stop evictions and search housing alternative for those affected. However, housing struggles are not an isolated movement within the neighborhood, but is embedded in a wider network consists of Social Rights Network and networks generated by the popular Assembly Carabanchel and Social Centre ESLA EKO. To understand and explain therefore the movement for housing in Carabanchel is necessary to note that this is part of a large network comprised of autonomous and self-managed assemblies, groups and platforms striving to withstand the impact of organized urban crisis and beyond market and institutions. Third, the different groups for housing in Carabanchel opt for implementing actions involving overflow legal framework and tools to ensure the right for housing, as are the actions of # stopeviction or housing squats, actions involve disobedience of a court order or the violation of private property. These policy actions should be framed within a network of mobilization that rejects existing political order and contextualized in the political crisis, social institutions and in the country. Fourth housing groups by employing a speech by "the right to housing" and against property speculation, while denouncing the model city built during the last decades. It also emphasizes the new subjectivities that activists are developing in the context of the struggle for housing, which are generating a process of collective empowerment of those affected. Finally, note that this is a strugggle that has considerable support from neighbors in the neighborhood and that all actions are supported by a large number of neighbors and meetings and meetings have continued assistance after more than two years of movement the neighborhood.

The results shown in this article show the complexity of the housing movement and the resistance struggles against urban crisis. Movements that are present in different territorial and your view are part of support networks much larger, exceeding the traditional social movement scheme. Some movements also are part of a context of an urban crisis and large institutional crisis. In this sense, from the analysis of these new movements is necessary to consider how we can re-articulate the urban studies and social movement studies to explain and understand these new resistances. These new realities have opened a new field of research that need to be covered with new empirical studies and theoretical frameworks. We present also necessary to inquire into social theory so that enable us to build new analytical frameworks. The present work is a first step in this direction. Constitutes only a first step of further investigation. One of the next challenges posed by the current work is to find a theoretical framework and a social theory that allows us to explain the struggles described.

6. Biography

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