For ‘common struggles of migrants and locals’. Migrant activism and squatting in Athens

ABSTRACT

This article analysis the socio-political form of the migrant squats, and the socio-spatial interactions they foster and generate. Drawing on empirical research, it focuses on the Athenian context where, since September 2015, political groups belonging to the anti-authoritarian and Left-libertarian movement, occupied some empty buildings to host migrants in transit through the country. From a political perspective, the squats are interpreted here as strategies of struggle to gain access to the space of the city and they also constitute instances of migrant activism and resistance to the European border regime. Moreover, migrant occupations represent practices and sites for contesting citizenship, intended as a category of political status; as such, they exceed the limits of this category and move beyond the boundaries of the nation-state, originating practices of citizenship ‘from below’, while at the same time they produce subjectivities that choose to ‘opt out’ of citizenship as a legal status. This article is situated within the contextualisation of space and autonomy. Migrant squats are looked at from the angle of the ‘gaze of autonomy’, since they are aimed both at contesting citizenship as an exclusionary feature, and at revindicating the activists’ (both migrants and non) presence in the space of city.

KEYWORDS:

• Migrants
• migrant squats
• acts of citizenship
• Athens

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Migrants in transit through Greece are directed to other European countries and, according to the Dublin Regulation, being identified would imply the risk of being transferred back to Greece. For this reason, many choose not to be identified and not to start the asylum application process in the country.

2. The hotspots are part of the system of devices created by the European Union to control the flow of migrants and to make a first selection of incoming migrants. On their arrival to the European shores, migrants are taken to those centres (located near landing areas in Greece and Italy), fingerprinted and registered, and subsequently categorised as ‘category 1ʹ or asylum seeker (liable to relocation), or ‘category 2ʹ, irregular access. For its function of an arbitrary filter, the hotspot is seen here as a way to overcome the rule of law and suspend International Refugee Law.

3. The agreement between European Union and Turkey declares Turkey as a safe country for refugees and allows Greece to return to Turkey all the ‘irregular’ migrants arriving in the country after 20 March 2016.

4. www.antiauthoritarian.gr.

5. https://en.squat.net/2016/08/27/athens-announcement-of-squat-notara-26-about-the-attack-of-august-24th/.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Valeria Raimondi

Valeria Raimondi is a PhD candidate in Urban Studies at the Gran Sasso Science Institute, Department of Social Sciences, L’Aquila, Italy. She has a Master degree in Geography and Territorial Processes (University of Bologna). Her thesis is titled “Countering the European border regime: migrants’ strategies of self-organised reception in Athens” and it investigates migrant squats as instances of border struggles rescaled in the urban context.