Dramaturgies of dissent: the spatial politics of squatting in Berlin, 1968

This paper builds on an emergent scholarly interest in the political geography of the contemporary city. If recent struggles over the meaning of urban space testify to the interarticulation of neo-liberal norms with an increasingly revanchist approach to local governance, the main aim of the paper i...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Social & cultural geography 2011-05, Vol.12 (3), p.283-303
Main Author: Vasudevan, Alex
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
architecture and performance
architecture et performance
Arquitectura y Representación
Berlin
Berlín
Bienes Públicos Urbanos
Cities
communes urbaines
Derechos a la Ciudad
Dissent
droits de la ville
Federal Republic of Germany
Governance
Housing
Human Body
Local communities
mouvements sociales en Allemagne
Movimientos Sociales en Alemania
Occupational Roles
Ocupación Ilegal
Political geography
Politics
Resistance
rights to the city
Social Movements
social movements in Germany
Squat
Squatters
Squatting
Urban Areas
urban commons
Urban space
Citations: Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:This paper builds on an emergent scholarly interest in the political geography of the contemporary city. If recent struggles over the meaning of urban space testify to the interarticulation of neo-liberal norms with an increasingly revanchist approach to local governance, the main aim of the paper is to acknowledge various attempts to contest these developments. More specifically, it seeks to highlight the role and significance of the German Hausbesetzerbewegung (squatter movement) from the 1960s onwards. Despite a growing body of literature on the role of '1968' as a watershed moment in the evolution of new social movements in West Germany, there remains little empirical work on the role of squatter movements within a broader matrix of protest and resistance. To what extent was the squatter movement in West Germany successful in articulating a creative reworking of the built form and urban space more generally? In what way were these counterclaims to the city performed? And how were these alternative cartographies organised at the level of the everyday? The paper proposes to answer these framing questions with particular reference to Berlin's squatting scene and longstanding struggles since the late 1960s over architectural space, ecological practice and 'insurgent' forms of citizenship.
ISSN:1464-9365
1470-1197
DOI:10.1080/14649365.2011.564734