Learning through housing activism in Barcelona: knowledge production and sharing in neighbourhood-based housing groups

Abstract

Housing social movements, in the course of their everyday activities, continually share and produce knowledge, a process defined as learning. This paper addresses a gap in the literature on housing activism, looking at learning as a crucial domain of housing movements’ politics and practice. By looking at housing activism through the lens of theories on learning in social movements, we provide a nuanced understanding of Barcelona’s neighbourhood-based housing groups. Previously centralized in one movement (the Plataforma de Afectados por la Hipoteca), housing activism in the city is now spread into a heterogeneous network, including small and localized collectives. The paper examines one neighbourhood housing group, the Grup d’Habitatge de Sants, and its relations with other groups, scrutinizing how processes and potentials of learning unfold in four critical moments: assemblies, workshops, direct action and debates/congresses. We reveal learning as a complex and multilayered phenomenon, arguing that it is fundamental for housing activism and an essential path towards achieving housing justice.

Keywords:

• Grup d'Habitatge de Sants
• Barcelona
• right to housing
• social movements
• learning

Acknowledgements

The authors thank the editor and the anonymous reviewers for their valuable criticisms, comments and suggestions on previous versions of the manuscript. We also want to thank the interviewees for their valuable time.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mateus Lira

Mateus Lira holds a dual MSc in International Cooperation in Urban Development from the Technische Universität Darmstadt and in Sustainable Emergency Architecture from the Universitat Internacional de Catalunya. He has collaborated with different research groups, urbanism collectives and community initiatives in Brazil, Turkey and Spain. He has been a research affiliate at the Laboratori de Transformació Urbana i Canvi Global (TURBA). His current research interest centres on how knowledge is produced and shared in grassroots contestations and urban transformations, especially in housing social movements.

Hug March

Dr. Hug March, with MSc and PhD in Environmental Sciences from UAB (Spain), is an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Economy and Business and affiliated researcher of TURBA, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya. His research focus is on the political ecology of socio-environmental urban transformations. He has done extensive research on the urban political ecology and economy of the water cycle, including research on financialization and remunicipalization. He is also interested in how ICT-mediated urbanism opens up new possibilities as well as challenges concerning sustainability and social justice