scholarly journals Youth Activism in Political Squats between Centri Sociali and Case Occupate

Societies ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 77 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlo Genova

Nowadays a lot of research describes most young people as barely interested in politics, expressing little trust in political institutions and far from any forms of institutional political participation. Moreover, most of the engaged youth are involved in forms of participation described as more civic and social than political, weakly ideological, more and more often digital and developed in virtual space, and usually experienced as one among several components of everyday personal lives. The article explores youth activism in political squats because it is a form of participation which, in countertendency, is political and radical in its aims and strategies, explicitly ideologically inspired, strongly rooted in physical places, and often quite central in everyday personal lives. The text is based on research conducted in the city of Turin (Italy) by means of qualitative interviews, participant observation and document analysis. Four main interconnected thematic dimensions are considered: Individuals’ biographical paths and meanings of activism; distinctive lifestyles and cultural sensitivities among the activists; collective narratives about contemporary society and possibilities of social change; patterns of intervention and forms of organization. On the basis of these analyses, the article maintains that this form of activism can be usefully interpreted as a real lifestyle, which has an explicit and intense political sense, but which young activists also connect with a much wider, more differentiated set of meanings.

2020 ◽  
Vol 76 (3) ◽  
pp. 753-767
Author(s):  
Kathy Carbone

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to report the results of an ethnographic study that used object biography with an archival collection of police surveillance files, the Police Historical/Archival Investigative Files, housed at the City of Portland Archives & Records Center in Portland, Oregon.Design/methodology/approachDocument analysis, participant observation, semistructured interviews, and object biography were conducted over four years, from 2013 to 2017.FindingsUsing object biography with the Police Historical/Archival Investigative Files uncovered numerous personal and public relationships that developed between people and this collection over several decades as well as how these records acquired, constructed, and changed meanings over time and space.Originality/valueThis paper argues that the biography of objects is a useful way for studying the relationships records form, the values people assign to them, and how people and records mutually inform and transform one another in shifting contexts of social lives. Recognizing records as having social histories and applying object biography to them contributes to and grows the greater biography and genealogy of the record and the archive—a genealogy important not only for discovering something about the lives of those who create, encounter, steward, and use records and archives but about our shared human experience.


2018 ◽  
Vol 36 (5) ◽  
pp. 812-830 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tom Gillespie ◽  
Kate Hardy ◽  
Paul Watt

This article reflects on an occupation led by single mothers to contest the destruction of social housing in post-Olympics East London. In the process, it argues for a more gendered theorisation of the urban commons. Drawing on auto-ethnography, participant observation and qualitative interviews, the article argues three central points: First, that the occupation demonstrates the gendered nature of the urban commons and the leadership of women in defending them from enclosure; second that the defence of an existing urban commons enabled the creation of a new temporary commons characterised by the collectivisation of gendered socially reproductive activities; and third that this commoning has had a lasting impact on housing activism at the city scale and beyond. This impact is conceptualised as an ‘Olympic counter-legacy’ that is characterised by the forging of new relationships and affinities, the strengthening of networked activism and circulation of tactics between campaign groups.


2015 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 160
Author(s):  
Yuli Kurniyati ◽  
Bening Hadilinatih

<p>Areas Based Economic Empowerment Program (Program Ekonomi Berbasis Kewilayahan/PEW) is a program designed to focus on the learning process and empowercommunities through local economic institutions to shore up the economy of thecommunity itself. This study aims to: 1). Knowing the PEW Group self-reliance inorganizing services to members in order to regionally based economic empowerment.2). Identifying the factors management, member participation and partnership thathinder or support the PEW Group self-reliance and self-reliance opportunities for effortsto develop a support group for regionally based economic empowerment, 3). Formula tepolicy recommendations for the city authorities to develop and implement a model ofselfreliance development PEW group as a regionally based economic empowerment strategy in the city of Yogyakarta. This research is qualitative research, the research took place in the townYogyakarta. The collecting data techniques used were: study documentation, participant, observation, in-depth interviews, and focus group discussion (FGD). In the first studywere: 1). Evaluating Performance PEW Group 2). Identify factors inhibiting andsupporting self-sufficiency Group 3). Self-Supporting analyze PEW Group 4). Early formulation compile policy recommendations group. The research development model of self-reliance. Year II study is 1). Self-Supporting Group to develop a model based onthe results of Phase I study 2). Validation conduct joint FGD Stakeholder Model through3). Develop Model Self-Supporting Implementation Handbook. Results showed that the level of self-reliance menilitian PEW group is still low. This isreflected in the level of independence that is still low, both in terms of independence inthe administration, self-reliance and independence in the management of the assets. PEW group of selfsufficiency level is still low, due to several factors, namely: (1) Capacity Board PEW Group is still low (2) The lack of participation of members of the Group, and (3) lack of stakeholder support. Another factor that still require serious treatment that can increase self-reliance PEW Group is a factor Assistance Group Implementation and Monitoring and Evaluation during implementation is still lacking.</p>


Author(s):  
Amanda Cabral ◽  
Carolin Lusby ◽  
Ricardo Uvinha

Sports Tourism as a segment is growing exponentially in Brazil. The sports mega-events that occurred in the period from 2007 to 2016 helped strengthen this sector significantly. This article examined tourism mobility during the Summer Olympic Games Rio 2016, hosted by the city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. This study expands the understanding of the relationship between tourism and city infrastructure, therefore being relevant to academics, professionals of the area and to the whole society due to its multidisciplinary field. The existence of a relationship between means of transportation and the Olympic regions as well as tourist attractions for a possible legacy was observed. Data were collected from official sources, field research and through participant-observation and semi structured interviews. Data were coded and analyzed. The results indicate that the city was overall successful in its execution of sufficient mobility. New means of transportation were added and others updated. BRT's (Bus Rapid Transit) were the main use of mass transport to Olympic sites. However, a lack of public transport access was observed for the touristic sites.


Author(s):  
Trude Fonneland

In the introduction, the outline of the chapters is presented, and the context for the study of contemporary shamanisms in Norway is drawn. The chapter provides an outline for why I have chosen to examine the field of shamanism in Norway through interviews, participant observation, and document analysis. I argue that the project, although obviously not exhaustive, nor even representative of the contemporary setting, represents a rare opportunity to study a late modern religious tradition in the process of evolution.


Author(s):  
Grazia Sveva Ascione ◽  
Federico Cuomo ◽  
Nicole Mariotti ◽  
Laura Corazza

AbstractIn the attempt to foster circular economy (CE), cities are increasingly adopting urban living labs (ULLs) as sites of co-production aimed at testing alternative solutions based on the reuse of products, reduction of consumption and recycling of materials. Taking this perspective, our study adopts an exploratory research design to discover the pragmatic implications emerging from a case study. The City of Turin joined proGIreg, a European project that entails the regeneration of former industrial districts by means of nature-based solutions (NBS). Ranging from aquaponics to green roofs, seven NBS have been experimented in Turin, which rely on the use of natural systems to tackle social, economic and environmental challenges efficiently and sustainably. Among them, the most promising is related to the production and test of the ‘new soil’, a blend obtained by mixing earth materials coming from construction sites with compost, zeolites and mycorrhizae. The case herein presented is interesting to analyse for the multi-stakeholder management setting used, where public institutions, private companies, research institutions, citizens and associations collaborated in the co-creation and testing phase of the NBS. Consequently, the data collected through participant observation and direct interviews allow researchers to describe multi-stakeholders’ dynamics and how they work. Thus, this paper narrates a micro-contextual experience while providing a critique. Results include an analysis of the unique combination of different stakeholders, which strongly impacted on the management and the effectiveness of the entire project. By consequence, the paper offers both theoretical contributions to the relational branch of stakeholder theory and practical evidence in demonstrating the importance of the relational branch of the theory over a more traditional transactional view.


2005 ◽  
Vol 48 (2) ◽  
pp. 87-109 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ivor Chipkin

Abstract:This article considers a burgeoning literature on Johannesburg from the perspective of the sorts of questions it asks about the city. There is a substantial and lively literature on questions of poverty and equality, class and race. These studies are strongly informed by the idea that the mechanisms that produce such inequalities are key to understanding the nature of Johannesburg as a city: in terms of how its economy works and how political institutions function, but also in terms of what sort of city Johannesburg is and can be. I consider sociological and economic studies of the inner city that try to account for demographic shifts in the inner city and for processes of social and physical degeneration. I review urban anthropologies of inner-city society, considering in particular new forms of social and economic organization among inner-city residents. Related to these, I discuss debates among scholars about the prospects for governing the city, paying special attention to the consequences for such readings on partnerships. I also discuss an emerging literature, critical of that above, which seeks to shift analysis of the city toward studies of culture and identity. These literatures do not simply approach the city through different disciplinary lenses (sociology or economy or anthropology or cultural studies) . They come to their studies from different normative perspectives. For some, the key political question of the day is one about social and political equality in its various forms. For others, it is about the degree to which Johannesburg (or Africa) is different from or the same as other places in the world. This paper has tried to bring to the fore the political (and not simply policy) consequences of these different views. It concludes not by seeking to reconcile these perspectives, but by suggesting a way of retaining a commitment to equality and justice while not reducing them simply to questions of economy. At stake, I argue, are questions of democratic culture and of sociability.


2021 ◽  
Vol 33 (4) ◽  
pp. 152-170
Author(s):  
Alex Blue V

This article explores the use of sound, lyrics, and performance as tools for spatial reorientation and reimagining, identity formation and affirmation, and counternarrative or counterarchive in a rapidly gentrifying contemporary Detroit, Michigan. Two discrete, yet discursively linked case studies are presented—performances by the same artist in two different spaces—that exhibit various modes of “flipping,” slang that can refer to multiple transformative practices in contemporary Detroit. These practices include the use of overdetermined spaces, or spaces that have been declared abandoned or vacant, for something other than their original intent—i.e. using a decommissioned automobile plant as a music video set; sampling, which can be understood as using sonic components from previously recorded songs in the creation of new hip-hop beats; buying homes in a state of disrepair, fixing and reselling them at large profits; and inverting meaning itself, via slang or coded language. Additionally Black techniques of sounding and performance are illuminated, with a focus on echo as a mode of co-creation. These various practices are all responses to the growing wave of gentrification that gains momentum in the city daily. The analysis draws primarily from ethnographic research conducted from 2016 to 2018, culling data from participant observation, recorded interviews, informal conversations, field notes, lyrical and video analysis, and the analysis of mediated accounts, both print and online. As the analysis shows, the strategies utilized by artists in Detroit ensure that no matter how much the spaces in Detroit continue to change, and no matter how much an attempt is made to provide racially curated space through various forms of violence, you’re only ever a block from the ‘hood.


2018 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 163-176
Author(s):  
Katarina Rukavina

The paper analyses the concept of space in contemporary art on the example of Suprematist Composition No. 1, Black on Grey by Kristina Leko from 2008. Referring to Malevich’s suprematism, in December 2008 Leko initiated a project of art intervention in Ban Jelačić Square in Zagreb, where she intended to cover in black all commercials, advertisements, signs and names of various companies. This poetic intervention, as the artist calls it, was intended to prompt people to relativise material goods in the pre-Christmas period. However, despite the authorisation obtained from the city authorities, the companies concerned refused to remove their respective advertisements, be it for only for 24 hours, so this project has never been realised. The project, however, does exist in the virtual space, which is also public, and continues to act in the form of documentation. The non-feasibility of the intervention, or rather its invisibility on Jelačić Square, makes visible or directly indicates the ordering of the powers and the constellation of values in the social sphere, thus raising new questions. Indeed, in this way it actually enters the public space, sensitising and expanding it at the same time.


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