Right to the City: Meet your working group

Right to the City (Public Space and Urbanism, Housing, Water & Energy)

This theme brings together different aspects of the configuration of the city: Public Spaces & Urbanism, Housing, Tourism, Water & Energy and Culture. Understanding the Right to the City as a collective and bottom-up creation of a new paradigm can help to provide an alternative framework to re-think cities and human settlements on the basis of social justice, equity, democracy and sustainability. The workshop will discuss processes of commercialization and privatization of public and common goods and resources; how commons can create forms of democratic urban management; and how re-municipalization processes of urban infrastructures can be linked to the commons discourse. It will also consider the policy frameworks for commons that can be implemented, how spaces can be collectively used for the common good and what kind of legal and economic frameworks are needed to stabilize communing practices.

There is a great diversity of experiences and interests within the group. Proposals include trans-local collaboration to develop perspectives on: urban rights, cultural ecosystems for integration within the city, commons-based housing plans, fighting gentrification and damaging tourism, among others. There is emphasis on sharing examples and tools and promoting the connection of practitioners, researches, professionals, and citizens with project initiators and grassroots actors. Participants draw from experiences including the redevelopment of brownfields and vacant properties, the creation of political platforms and public campaigning and engagement, and construction of community gardens and other spaces as learning environments for communing. Given the wide range of interests and backgrounds, for this theme we can also imagine a mix of general discussions and more specific working spaces, to be decided by the participants themselves, either in organizational process before the meeting or in situ.

I am curious where non exploitative social enterprises can come into the commons paradigm enabling ecosystems bottom up with a capital impulse. If remunicipalization takes place, the space to intervene might be more or might be less. One thing is for sure: the roles and collaborations are changing. Small scale bottom up initiatives are beautiful, but they are embedded in a wider landscape of facilities either hosted by gov (funded by the market / economical motors at hand) or by (social) enterprises that are not only extractive all together. I think it's time to step in and look at both: enhancing the bottom up structures and democratizing as well as new centralization schemes taking place over collaboration in the first place (verticals based on digital platforms / democratizing the voices of citizens) and new economical motors or ways to enhance the entire ecosystem wherein bottom up initiatives and commoning can take place.

Hello everyone!
From the Global Platform for the Right to the City we are interested in promoting solidarity and mutual support among initiatives that foster the Right to the City. We couldn't agree more with Amanda's point on the need to enhance the commons and social economy ecosystem. We are looking forward to share experiences and build alliances and a shared agenda with other Right to the City supporters in Madrid.

Hi, my name is Pedro Aibéo and framed around the right to the city, I am working on "Architectural Democracy": http://architecturaldemocracy.com/. Also relevant to this topic and at a more hands on approach I am building co-housing in Finland, renovating old schools: http://www.svartsaskola.com/

Hi I am Hanne, I am taking part in several citizen initiatives in Brussels that each in their own way look to develop our city as an urban commons. Different approaches are at experimented in relation to the Jospahat site in Brussels; making a collectively written proposal for the to-be-developed neighbourhood as 'quartier en bien commun' for which we lobby with the involved public stakeholders (Commons Josaphat), and temporary use that we see as the base from which the transition to a commons neighbourhood should be made (Josaph'Aire).

We are struggling to gain recognition, especially from the public owner and developer. While we are slowly building up our connections with the local residents (that launched a petition against the future development projec) we look to maintain a constructive approach. However, we are reaching the limits of this hope for a public-civic cocreation. There are many beautiful things going on that have been set up thanks to a great energy from citizens, but we feel fatigue and demotivation coming up as we rely on voluntary efforts, limited ressources. How can we strengthen ourselves and assure the continuation of our work while respecting our ambition to be constructive toward the public institutions? How can we professionalise without losing our roots and respecting the voluntary contribution? How do we find to means for this (economic moters)? How can we continue to keep dreaming and constructing (manifesting) urban commons while are struggling with bureacracy, political desinterest, market forces etc.

Further more, from my professional 'casquette' I am looking into the feminine approach wihtin the commons-oriented spatial design processes and management process (notions of care, sensitivity, commonplace activities, nurturing, etc)

https://commonsjosaphat.wordpress.com/commons-josaphat/#English
https://www.facebook.com/josaphaire/
https://www.kuleuven.be/wieiswie/en/person/00100882

Hi all. With regards to the topic, my perspective and activity is in the context of the CHT hackbase [1] or live-in hackerspace. Currently, the project is developing and practicing its second hackbase typology [2] - a series of experimental nomadic camps in Lanzarote, Canary Islands, with heavy focus on producing commons (as both equipment [3], and processes, for example [4]), varieties of what could be called post-property inhabitation, and patterns in organizing ad-hoc groupations of people that are not communities. The project sees itself as a new type of a subsistence institution/lifestyle mechanism.

Also related is the "hacking housing" pad [5].

[1] https://totalism.org

[2] https://totalism.org/e2h.php?_=hackbase-type2

[3] https://totalism.org/e2h.php?_=stuff

[4] https://totalism.org/e2h.php?_=roles

[5] https://totalism.org/e2h.php?_=hacking-housing

Brief skim of your info here, very impressive, new to me, great that people are trying to organise this. Inspiring to know about, would join if I was younger, starting again. Supporting from the sidelines. Cheers. Anna

Hello everyone! I'm Melissa - originally from New Zealand, I'm now living in Berlin and pursuing a practice-based PhD through the NTUA in Athens under the supervision of Stavros Stavrides. I'm trained and have worked as an architect, and my research/practice focus is commoning space: dismantling the neo-liberal subjectivity to collectively reclaim the right to the city.

I am also on the board of an organisation called Agents of Alternatives which, at current, functions primarily as a digital space to facilitate local and translocal connections between researchers, practitioners, grassroots activists, citizens and policy-makers. We hope to promote and support practices aimed at positive societal change amongst citizens, neighbourhoods and communities. Under the AoA umbrella, I have co-created local initiatives, alongside collaborators and local residents, such as Kiezacker, a pop-up money-free neighbourhood academy in Neukölln, Berlin. We also have a group that is currently developing a concept - and looking to secure a space - for a commons lab in our neighbourhood where we can engage in research as a practice of commoning and build commoning practices with the local community.

I am interested in feminist autonomist Marxist perspectives, whereby commons are imagined and developed not simply as a third space imbricated with market and state; but, rather as a growing ecosystem with the potential for autonomy and self-reproduction that can push against the pressures of market/state. However, the reality is that commoning practices exist and develop within these state and market environments (unless they become enclaves of alterity), and I believe it is critical to understand the local implications/relationships. I am interested in when/where/how relationships with state/market can foster and/or damage the autonomy and self-reproductive capacities of commons. Where are the leverage points vis-a-vis the various opportunities and constraints? And, how can we connect and common across boundaries (local and translocal) to build a stronger ecosystem?

Hi everyone! This is Alvaro, representing Habitat International Coalition (HIC http://www.hic-gs.org/) and also member of the Global Platform for the Right to the City. HIC is the global network for the right to habitat and social justice, being this Habitat and territorial approach one of our fundamental pillars that goes beyond the narrower urban focus put in place by many states and international bodies. Looking forward to meeting you all, sharing our global work and learning from your local and global experience.
Cheers,

Mapping workshop about Right to the City & Urban Commons. Difficulties and strategies to overcome them #ecamadrid