RC21 CONFERENCE 2013
Resourceful cities
Berlin (Germany), 29-31 August 2013
Humboldt-University Berlin, Institute for Social Science, Dept. for Urban and Regional Sociology
Autonomous urban movements: socio-spatial structures and political impacts
The field of urban movements is usually a marginal one among both social movements scholars and urban sociology. Due to the different waves of movements and the different urban contexts and historical shifts, continuous attention should be paid to comparative and in-depth analysis. In this call we would like to focus on urban movements which are able to keep a high degree of autonomy from the State and market forces, although we would like to encourage research on this key issue of 'relative autonomy'. Institutional relationships with managers, officials, political parties and formal organisations are also relevant dimensions in order to understand the different degrees of autonomy. Examples of autonomous movements may be squatters, critical mass cyclists, urban gardeners, anti-privatisation campaigns and, to some extent, the 'occupy' initiatives.
In particular, we think there is a lack of research on two aspects: a) the kind of social and spatial structures behind to, or coexistent with urban movements so that we can offer well grounded explanations of their emergence and development; b) the different political impacts that urban movements have in urban policies, in the local political culture, in other social movements and in their own evolution. Are urban movements capable of changing the neo-liberal city? What kind of both complex social networks and urban matters are involved in the actions taken by urban movements? How different or similar are urban movements in the same city or country? What is the global political relevance of locally-attached movements? Therefore, we welcome proposals which stress any of the above dimensions. In case of submitting papers dealing with a single initiative or case of struggles, please make sure to put it in context with other similar cases and conditions that allow us to conceive a movement and not simply an isolated experience.
Session Organizers
Prof. Miguel A. Martínez López, University Complutense of Madrid, Departamento Sociología II. Facultad de Ciencias Políticas y Sociología. UCM. 28223 Madrid. E: miguelam@cps.ucm.es
Armin Kuhn, PhD Student at the University of Potsdam Postal Adress: Richardstraße 110 12043 Berlin, E: armin.kuhn@reflect-online.org
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