Rozbrat is a long-running anarchist self-managed social centre in Jeżyce in Poznań , Poland .
167-625: Rozbrat is based in a former paint factory squatted in autumn 1994. The name means 'to make peace and get detached from an enemy.' Rozbrat hosts many events and discussions. Different groups use the space such as a bicycle workshop, silk-screen printers , anarchist library and infoshop , a gallery, the Breaking (Ear)drums samba band and Food not Bombs . The local branch of the Federacja Anarchistyczna has been based at Rozbrat since 1997. The centre's longevity means that it
334-499: A ghost village when the plans to expand Port of Antwerp stalled. Christiania in Copenhagen , Denmark , is an independent community of almost 900 people founded in 1971 on the site of an abandoned military zone. In Copenhagen, as in other European cities such as Berlin and Amsterdam, the squatter movement was large in the 1980s. It was a social movement , providing housing and alternative culture. A flashpoint came in 1986 with
501-515: A tank-like police vehicle , a police water cannon and helicopters were used to clear a building occupied by the group Pizzeria Anarchia in Vienna. In many West European countries, since the 1960s and 1970s, there are both squatted houses used as residences and self-managed social centres where people pursue social and cultural activities. In Belgium , the village of Doel was slowly occupied by squatters and used by street artists after becoming
668-608: A basement at 238 Queen Street West and offered to take on a lease for 99 cents per year. They were evicted after eight hours. Squatting in the United States occurred historically in large numbers during both the California Gold Rush and World War II. Hoovervilles were homeless camps built across the country during the Great Depression in the 1930s. They were named after Herbert Hoover , who
835-645: A cause for numerous slums in African cities. Poor quality, unpaved streets encourage slums; a 1% increase in paved all-season roads, claims Arimah, reduces slum incidence rate by about 0.35%. Affordable public transport and economic infrastructure empowers poor people to move and consider housing options other than their current slums. A growing economy that creates jobs at rate faster than population growth, offers people opportunities and incentive to relocate from poor slum to more developed neighborhoods. Economic stagnation, in contrast, creates uncertainties and risks for
1002-404: A central aspect by residents living in slums when their communities suffer upgrading schemes or when they are resettled to formal housing. For example, it was recently proved that in a small favela in the northeast of Brazil (Favela Sururu de Capote), the migration of dismissed sugar cane factory workers to the city of Maceió (who initiated the self-construction of the favela), has been driven by
1169-514: A civil matter. Squatting in Scotland is a criminal offence, punishable by a fine or imprisonment, under the Trespass (Scotland) Act 1865 . The owner or lawful occupier of the property has the right to evict squatters without notice or applying to the court for an eviction order, although when evicting, they cannot do anything that would break the law, for example, use violence. Nevertheless,
1336-877: A civil rights march in Derry which was organised by the Derry Housing Action Committee and the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association . The march was repressed by the RUC. In 2012, activists from Occupy Belfast squatted a Bank of Ireland building in Belfast city centre and used it as a social space. Squatting in Northern Ireland was unaffected by the recent law change in England and Wales, and remains
1503-444: A combination of demographic, social, economic, and political reasons. Common causes include rapid rural-to-urban migration, poor planning, economic stagnation and depression, poverty, high unemployment, informal economy, colonialism and segregation, politics, natural disasters and social conflicts. Rural–urban migration is one of the causes attributed to the formation and expansion of slums. Since 1950, world population has increased at
1670-416: A combination of slum removal, slum relocation, slum upgrading, urban planning with citywide infrastructure development, and public housing. The UN defines slums as .... individuals living under the same roof lacking one or more of the following conditions: access to improved water, access to improved sanitation, sufficient living area, housing durability, and security of tenure It is thought that slum
1837-426: A conflict of interest, and politics prevented efforts to remove, relocate or upgrade the slums into housing projects that are better than the slums. Similar dynamics are cited in favelas of Brazil, slums of India, and shanty towns of Kenya. Scholars claim politics also drives rural-urban migration and subsequent settlement patterns. Pre-existing patronage networks, sometimes in the form of gangs and other times in
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#17327797854772004-659: A far greater rate than the total amount of arable land, even as agriculture contributes a much smaller percentage of the total economy. For example, in India, agriculture accounted for 52% of its GDP in 1954 and only 19% in 2004; in Brazil, the 2050 GDP contribution of agriculture is one-fifth of its contribution in 1951. Agriculture, meanwhile, has also become higher yielding, less disease prone, less physically harsh and more efficient with tractors and other equipment. The proportion of people working in agriculture has declined by 30% over
2171-556: A fifth of the country's population. The figure was estimated to be 15 million in 2004. In Cape Town and Durban , there have been sustained conflict between the city council and a shack dwellers' movement known as Abahlali baseMjondolo . The organisation has represented the squatters in land occupations such as the Macassar Village in 2009 and the Cape Town and Durban Marikana land occupations in 2013 (both named after
2338-617: A former shelter in Glasgow in 2021, during COP26 . In 2010, a representative of the UK Bailiff Company claimed that the number of people squatting in Wales was at its highest for 40 years. The high number of businesses failing in urban Wales has led to squatting becoming a growing issue in large cities like Swansea and Cardiff. Experts said "the majority [of squatters] are forced into the lifestyle by financial pressures." Based on
2505-630: A freeshop and had plans for a social centre, but the occupation was quickly evicted by the police and 22 people were arrested. Vatnsstigur 4 was briefly resquatted on May 7, 2009, in solidarity with the Rozbrat squat in Poland , which was threatened with eviction. Also in 2009, a group of graffiti artists called the Pretty Boys occupied Hverfisgata 34. Their intention was to make a clandestine gallery and then when they were not evicted, they legalised
2672-519: A gold mine at Tacacoma in 2015 which they said was on their ancestral land. When 200 police officers attempted to evict them, four were taken hostage and one died. In Brazil, informal settlements are called favelas ; a famous example is Rocinha in Rio de Janeiro , home to up to 180,000 people. The squats are mostly inhabited by the poorest strata of society, and usually lack much infrastructure and public services, but in some cases, already have reached
2839-489: A house put up quickly without proper permissions, a squatter's house, and by extension, a shanty or shack. From the 1960s onwards, these settlements have provided a means of housing for poor workers and new migrants arriving in cities such as Ankara and Istanbul . From the 1980s onwards, property developers have upgraded many gecekondu areas. Shortly after the 2013 Gezi Park protests in Istanbul, Don Kişot (Don Quixote)
3006-404: A judge. The Dutch government assessed the effectiveness of the new law in 2015, releasing a report giving statistics on arrests and convictions between October 2010 and December 2014. During this time period, 529 people have been arrested for the act of occupying derelict buildings in 213 separate incidents. Of the 529 arrests, 210 were found guilty. Of those convicted, 39 people were imprisoned for
3173-433: A large number of huge cities have started to appear; which means high poverty rates, crime, pollution and congestion. Lack of affordable low-cost housing and poor planning encourages the supply side of slums. The Millennium Development Goals proposes that member nations should make a "significant improvement in the lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers" by 2020. If member nations succeed in achieving this goal, 90% of
3340-663: A large police operation. At least 24 squatters were killed. After World War II many people were left homeless in the Philippines and they built makeshift houses called "barong-barong" on abandoned private land. The first mass eviction on record in Manila was 1951 and the largest was in late 1963 and early 1964 when 90,000 people were displaced. By 1978, there were estimated to be two million squatters in Manila, occupying 415 different locations. The number of squatters grew during
3507-646: A long history, broken down by country below. In developing countries and least developed countries , shanty towns often begin as squatted settlements. In African cities such as Lagos much of the population lives in slums . There are pavement dwellers in India and in Hong Kong as well as rooftop slums . Informal settlements in Latin America are known by names such as villa miseria (Argentina), pueblos jóvenes (Peru) and asentamientos irregulares (Guatemala, Uruguay). In Brazil, there are favelas in
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#17327797854773674-442: A mussel which divides the community through gender and age. Alleys and houses were planned to facilitate the working activities, that provided subsistence and livelihood to the community. When resettled, the main reason of changes of formal housing units was due to the lack of possibilities to perform their work in the new houses designed according to formal architecture principles, or even by the distances they had to travel to work in
3841-891: A place to live but also a part of larger campaign to shine a light on inequity in housing and advocate change in housing and land issues. In 2002, the New York City administration agreed to work with eleven squatted buildings on the Lower East Side in a deal brokered by the Urban Homesteading Assistance Board with the condition the apartments would eventually be turned over to the tenants as low-income housing cooperatives . In Latin American and Caribbean countries, informal settlements result from internal migration to urban areas, lack of affordable housing and ineffective governance. During
4008-506: A poor and homeless population makes use of derelict property or land through urban homesteading . According to a 2003 estimate by the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat), there were about one billion people in squatter settlements and slums. According to housing researcher Kesia Reeve, "squatting is largely absent from policy and academic debate and is rarely conceptualised, as
4175-432: A problem, as a symptom, or as a social or housing movement." In many of the world's poorer countries, there are extensive slums or shanty towns , typically built on the edges of major cities and consisting almost entirely of self-constructed housing built without the landowner's permission. While these settlements may in time become upgraded , they often start off as squats with minimal basic infrastructure. Thus, there
4342-461: A rapid growth of slums. Research in the latest years based on ethnographic studies, conducted since 2008 about slums, published initially in 2017, has found out the primary importance of labour as the main cause of emergence, rural-urban migration, consolidation and growth of informal settlements. It also showed that work has also a crucial role in the self-construction of houses, alleys and overall informal planning of slums, as well as constituting
4509-481: A resettlement area for slum dwellers residing in Manila. Philippine law distinguishes between squatters who squat because of poverty and those who squat in hopes of getting a payment to leave the property. In 1982, Imelda Marcos referred to the latter group as "professional squatters [...] plain land-grabbers taking advantage of the compassionate society". Philippines-based media and journalists refer to squatters as "informal settlers". The Community Mortgage Program
4676-465: A room with "low going-ons". In Life in London (1821) Pierce Egan used the word in the context of the "back slums" of Holy Lane or St Giles . A footnote defined slum to mean "low, unfrequent parts of the town". Charles Dickens used the word slum in a similar way in 1840, writing "I mean to take a great, London, back-slum kind walk tonight". Slum began to be used to describe bad housing soon after and
4843-399: A slum, but a slum is better than none". Insufficient financial resources and lack of coordination in government bureaucracy are two main causes of poor house planning. Financial deficiency in some governments may explain the lack of affordable public housing for the poor since any improvement of the tenant in slums and expansion of public housing programs involve a great increase in
5010-428: A sustainable formal economy that raise incomes and create opportunities, squalid slums are likely to continue. The World Bank and UN Habitat estimate, assuming no major economic reforms are undertaken, more than 80% of additional jobs in urban areas of developing world may be low-paying jobs in the informal sector. Everything else remaining same, this explosive growth in the informal sector is likely to be accompanied by
5177-525: A tax free savings account for French public. Some slums remain in the early 21st century in France, most of which are dismantled after a few months, the largest being the "Petite Ceinture" slum on the northern Paris decommissioned train tracks. New York City is believed to have created the United States' first slum, named the Five Points in 1825, as it evolved into a large urban settlement. Five Points
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5344-610: A variety of ways. Some possess two- or three-story homes built out of brick and concrete which they have inhabited for years. Geeta Nagar is a squatter village based beside the Indian Navy compound at Colaba . Squatter Colony in Malad East has existed since 1962, and now, people living there pay a rent to the city council of 100 rupees a month. Dharavi is a community of one million squatters. The stores and factories situated there are mainly illegal and so are unregulated, but it
5511-479: A £5000 fine, or both. The same year saw the first successful prosecution for squatting, resulting in a 12-week jail sentence. Section 61 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 provides police with additional power to remove trespassers when there is damage to land or property, trespassers are abusive, insulting or threatening or there are over six vehicles on premises related to squatters. In
5678-411: Is Heliópolis , with over 200,000 inhabitants as of 2018. It has been officially recognized as a regular neighborhood of the city. There are also a number of squatter buildings in the inner city, the most famous of which was a 22-storey building called Prestes Maia , whose inhabitants were ordered to leave in 2006. Various occupations in buildings and unoccupied areas in big cities, led by groups such as
5845-935: Is a British slang word from the East End of London meaning "room", which evolved to "back slum" around 1845 meaning 'back alley, street of poor people.' Numerous other non-English terms are often used interchangeably with slum : shanty town , favela , rookery , gecekondu , skid row , barrio , ghetto , banlieue , bidonville, taudis, bandas de miseria, barrio marginal, morro, paragkoupoli, loteamento, barraca, musseque, iskuwater , Inner city , tugurio, solares, mudun safi, kawasan kumuh, karyan, medina achouaia, brarek, ishash, galoos, tanake, baladi, trushchoby , chalis, katras, zopadpattis, ftohogeitonia, basti, estero, looban, dagatan, umjondolo, watta, udukku, and chereka bete. The word slum has negative connotations, and using this label for an area can be seen as an attempt to delegitimize that land use when hoping to repurpose it. Before
6012-449: Is a key characteristic of urban slums. At their start, slums are typically located in undesirable lands near the town or city, that are state owned or philanthropic trust owned or religious entity owned or have no clear land title. Some immigrants regard unoccupied land as land without owners and therefore occupy it. In some cases the local community or the government allots lands to people, which will later develop into slums and over which
6179-617: Is a method of acquiring title to property through possession for a statutory period under certain conditions. Countries where this principle exists include England and the United States, based on common law. Anarchist author Colin Ward asserts: "Squatting is the oldest mode of tenure in the world, and we are all descended from squatters. This is as true of the Queen [of the United Kingdom ] with her 176,000 acres (710 km ) as it
6346-666: Is a universal human right. In 2010, Colombia was the country with the second most internally displaced people in the world, at an estimated 4 million. This was the result of an extended civil conflict between rebels, paramilitaries, cocaine traders and the state, which left 40% of rural land without legal title. In the capital Bogotá , squatting has traditionally not been the main technique for land acquisition; people tend to purchase land legally and then subdivide or develop it illegally, creating "pirate neighbourhoods". In 1970, 45.9% of Bogotá's population lived in these pirate neighbourhoods, as compared to 1.1% who were squatting. Following
6513-553: Is also a far-right social centre, Casa Pound . This situation has so far received the approval of Italian courts, which have been reluctant to defend the owners' rights. In contrast with the dominant jurisprudence, new case-law (from the Rome Tribunal and the Supreme Court of Cassation ) instructs the government to pay damages in case of squatting if the institutions have failed to prevent it. Regarding squatting in
6680-825: Is closely linked to urbanization . In 2008, more than 50% of the world's population lived in urban areas. In China, for example, it is estimated that the population living in urban areas will increase by 10% within a decade according to its current rates of urbanization. The UN-Habitat reports that 43% of urban population in developing countries and 78% of those in the least developed countries are slum dwellers. Some scholars suggest that urbanization creates slums because local governments are unable to manage urbanization, and migrant workers without an affordable place to live in, dwell in slums. Rapid urbanization drives economic growth and causes people to seek working and investment opportunities in urban areas. However, as evidenced by poor urban infrastructure and insufficient housing ,
6847-478: Is covered in greater detail at Squatting (Australian history) . During the late 1940s the squatting of hundreds of empty houses and military camps, forced federal and state governments to provide emergency shelter during a period when Australians faced a shortage of more than 300 000 homes. In more recent times, there have been Australian squats in Canberra , Melbourne and Sydney . The Aboriginal Tent Embassy
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7014-491: Is generally considered the locale where the term originated in the 19th century, where massive and rapid urbanization of the dockside and industrial areas led to intensive overcrowding in a warren of post-medieval streetscape. The suffering of the poor was described in popular fiction by moralist authors such as Charles Dickens – most famously Oliver Twist (1837-9) and echoed the Christian Socialist values of
7181-553: Is no legal link to sewerage, electricity or water. Such settlements also exist in industrialized countries, such as for example Cañada Real on the outskirts of Madrid. Squatting can be related to left-wing movements, such as anarchist , autonomist , or socialist . It can be a means to conserve buildings or a protest action. Squats can be used by local communities as free shops , cafés, venues, pirate radio stations or as multi-purpose self-managed social centres . Adverse possession , sometimes described as squatter's rights,
7348-658: Is of the 54 percent of householders in Britain who are owner-occupiers. They are all the ultimate recipients of stolen land, for to regard our planet as a commodity offends every conceivable principle of natural rights." Others have a different view; UK police official Sue Williams, for example, has stated that "Squatting is linked to anti-social behaviour and can cause a great deal of nuisance and distress to local residents. In some cases there may also be criminal activities involved." The public attitude toward squatting varies, depending on legal aspects, socioeconomic conditions, and
7515-661: Is often deteriorated or incomplete, and they are primarily inhabited by impoverished people. Although slums are usually located in urban areas , in some countries they can be located in suburban areas where housing quality is low and living conditions are poor. While slums differ in size and other characteristics, most lack reliable sanitation services, supply of clean water , reliable electricity, law enforcement , and other basic services. Slum residences vary from shanty houses to professionally built dwellings which, because of poor-quality construction or lack of basic maintenance, have deteriorated. Due to increasing urbanization of
7682-745: Is one of three ways to access land, the other being ownership by deed or customary ownership. West Point was founded in Monrovia in the 1950s and is estimated to house between 29,500 and 75,000 people. During the First Liberian Civil War 1989–1997 and the Second Liberian Civil War 1999–2003, many people in Liberia were displaced and some ended up squatting in Monrovia. The Ducor Hotel fell into disrepair and
7849-582: Is poor. Urban informal sector is between 20 and 60% of most developing economies' GDP; in Kenya, 78 per cent of non-agricultural employment is in the informal sector making up 42 per cent of GDP. In many cities the informal sector accounts for as much as 60 per cent of employment of the urban population. For example, in Benin, slum dwellers comprise 75 per cent of informal sector workers, while in Burkina Faso,
8016-690: Is suggested that they do over $ 1 million in business every day. Other squatters are pavement dwellers , with very few possessions. Activists such as Jockin Arputham , Prema Gopalan and Sheela Patel are working for better living conditions for slum dwellers, through organisations such as Mahila Milan and Slum Dwellers International . In the 2016 Mathura clash , members of Azad Bharat Vidhik Vaicharik Kranti Satyagrahi (Free India Legal Ideas Revolutionary Protesters) who had been living in Mathura's largest public park Jawahar Bagh for two years were evicted in
8183-400: Is that part of an economy that is neither registered as a business nor licensed, one that does not pay taxes and is not monitored by local, state, or federal government. Informal economy grows faster than formal economy when government laws and regulations are opaque and excessive, government bureaucracy is corrupt and abusive of entrepreneurs, labour laws are inflexible, or when law enforcement
8350-533: Is typhus, whose ventilation is cholera; in which swarms of huge and almost countless population, nominally at least, Catholic; haunts of filth, which no sewage committee can reach – dark corners, which no lighting board can brighten. This passage was widely quoted in the national press, leading to the popularization of the word slum to describe bad housing. In France as in most industrialised European capitals, slums were widespread in Paris and other urban areas in
8517-581: Is well supported in Poznań, although its future remains precarious. Rozbrat joined with groups including Stonewall and Poznań Free from Hate to protest when Robert Winnicki , member of the Polish Parliament and then chairman of the far-right All-Polish Youth organization wanted to speak in Poznan in 2017. Rozbrat has experienced two serious neo-Nazi attacks in 1996 and 2013. The perpetrators of
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#17327797854778684-536: The Bateau-Lavoir , in Montmartre , Paris . Paris moved to legitimize some popular artist squats in the mid-2000s by purchasing and renovating the buildings for artist–residents. An example is Les Frigos . In the 2010s there have been several land squats protesting against large infrastructure projects. These are known collectively as Zone to Defend or ZAD (French: zone à défendre). The first and largest
8851-551: The Battle of Ryesgade . Another flashpoint came in 2007 when Ungdomshuset was evicted. While not technically a squat until 14 December 2006, it was a social centre used by squatters and people involved in alternative culture more generally. After a year of protests, the city council donated a new building. The Dublin Housing Action Committee (DHAC) was active between 1968 and 1971, occupying buildings to protest
9018-458: The Diggers in the 17th century. In the 20th century, squatters turned to abandoned buildings. Mass squats were organised in a number of prominent public buildings in central London, culminating in the occupation of 144 Piccadilly in 1969. The London Street Commune or "Hippydilly" garnered worldwide attention. There were estimated to be 50,000 squatters throughout Britain in the late 1970s, with
9185-626: The Haitian Revolution (1791–1804), squatters in Haiti acquired smallholdings across the country. Cité Soleil was founded in 1958 to house workers, then grew rapidly to 80,000 people in the 1980s and 400,000 people in the 1990s. It became the largest slum in Haiti, housing people displaced from other areas. There is little infrastructure and the area frequently becomes flooded. Following the 2010 Haiti earthquake , 1.5 million people were displaced. One year later, 100,000 squatters had left
9352-587: The Homeless Workers' Movement (MTST) or Downtown Roofless Movement (MSTC), have occurred. There are also rural squatter movements in Brazil, such as the Landless Workers' Movement (MST), which organise land occupations. For example, in Pontal do Paraná in the state of Paraná 112 occupations were carried out, housing 6,500 families. The Colombian Constitution of 1991 states that housing
9519-717: The Landbouwbelang in Maastricht . Land squats include Ruigoord and Fort Pannerden . On 1 June 2010, squatting in the Netherland became illegal and punishable when a decree was sent out that the squatting ban would be enforced from 1 October. Following legal challenges, on October 28, 2011, the Supreme Court of the Netherlands decided that the eviction of a squat can only occur after an intervention of
9686-516: The Lebanese Civil War from 1975 to 1990. Similarly, in recent years, numerous slums have sprung around Kabul to accommodate rural Afghans escaping Taliban violence. Major natural disasters in poor nations often lead to migration of disaster-affected families from areas crippled by the disaster to unaffected areas, the creation of temporary tent city and slums, or expansion of existing slums. These slums tend to become permanent because
9853-627: The Little Italy and Chinatown neighborhoods of New York City, through that city's campaign of massive urban renewal . Five Points was not the only slum in America. Jacob Riis , Walker Evans , Lewis Hine and others photographed many before World War II. Slums were found in every major urban region of the United States throughout most of the 20th century, long after the Great Depression. Most of these slums had been ignored by
10020-617: The Marikana massacre ). It also successfully challenged the KZN Slums Act , which sought to mandate the eviction of slums but was eventually declared unconstitutional. There have been a number of similar conflicts between shack dwellers, some linked with the Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign , and the city council in Cape Town . One of the most high-profile cases was the eviction of squatters in
10187-553: The N2 Gateway homes in the suburb of Delft , where over 20 residents were shot, including a three-year-old child. There have been numerous complaints about the legality of the government's actions. Many of the families then squatted on Symphony Way , a main road in the township of Delft, before being forced to move to a camp called Blikkiesdorp . Squatting in Sudan is defined as the "acquisition and construction of land, within
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#173277978547710354-653: The Palestinian territories . The international community considers the settlements in occupied territory to be illegal, In March 2018, Israeli settlers were evicted from a house they had illegally occupied in Hebron , a Palestinian city in the West Bank . The fifteen families had argued that they had bought the house, but the High Court of Justice ruled that they had to leave. The Israel Defense Forces declared
10521-412: The military dictatorship there was a zero tolerance policy. Nevertheless, forced by hunger and unemployment to take action, 20,000 squatters occupied 211 hectares of disused privately owned land on the periphery of Buenos Aires in 1981, forming six new settlements. They collectively resisted the eviction attempts and by 1984 had outlasted the dictatorship. The election of a democratic government led to
10688-569: The self-managed social centres of Italy . Each local situation determines the context: in England and Wales , there were estimated to be 50,000 squatters in the late 1970s; in Athens, Greece, there are refugee squats . In Spain and the USA the 2010s saw many new squats following the 2007–2008 financial crisis . The majority of squatting is residential in nature. As a phenomenon it tends to occur when
10855-543: The 1940s, when the British government started slum clearance and built new council houses . There are still examples left of slum housing in the UK, but many have been removed by government initiative, redesigned and replaced with better public housing. In Europe, slums were common. By the 1920s it had become a common slang expression in England, meaning either various taverns and eating houses, "loose talk" or gypsy language, or
11022-406: The 1950s and 1960s, many Latin American cities demolished squatter settlements and would quickly evict land invasions. In Chile , the government of Eduardo Frei Montalva (1964–1970) began to permit shanty towns and the government of Salvador Allende (1970–1973) encouraged them, but under the military junta from 1973 onwards squatters were again quickly evicted. Likewise in Argentina , under
11189-574: The 1970s and were routinely evicted. Only Epworth persisted on account of its size (around 50,000 people). After Zimbabwe was created in 1980, peasant farmers and squatters disputed the distribution of land. Informal settlements have developed on the periphery of cities such as Chitungwiza and the capital Harare . In 2005, Operation Murambatsvina ("Operation Drive Out Filth") organised by President Robert Mugabe evicted an estimated 700,000 people and affected over two million people. Israeli settlements are communities of Israeli citizens living in
11356-426: The 1980s, there were more than 300 pueblos jóvenes surrounding the capital Lima , housing over one million people. In Argentina they are known as villa miseria (literally "misery settlement"), and as asentamiento in Uruguay and Guatemala. The population of Ecuador's capital Quito grew sevenfold between 1950 and 2001. There are three types of slums in the city, namely barrios periféricos (shanty towns on
11523-401: The 1989 Velvet Revolution . Ladronka (1993–2000) became internationally famous as a hub for counter-cultural activities and anarchist organisation. Squat Milada was occupied in 1997 and evicted in 2009. Its longevity was in part due to the building not existing in the cadastre . Klinika was an occupied social centre between 2014 and 2019. These three social centres, all in Prague, were
11690-440: The 19th and early 20th centuries saw various land raids in which cottars attempted to occupy land for subsistence farming. In 1948, the Seven Men of Knoydart unsuccessfully squatted land owned by the Nazi-supporting Lord Brocket . There have been several road protest land squats such as Bilston Glen and Pollok Free State . The former premises of the Forest Café in Edinburgh were squatted in 2011 and activists occupied
11857-442: The 19th century, many of which continued through first half of the 20th century. The first cholera epidemic of 1832 triggered a political debate, and Louis René Villermé study of various arrondissements of Paris demonstrated the differences and connection between slums, poverty and poor health. Melun Law first passed in 1849 and revised in 1851, followed by establishment of Paris Commission on Unhealthful Dwellings in 1852 began
12024-424: The 19th century, rich and poor people lived in the same districts, with the wealthy living on the high streets, and the poor in the service streets behind them. But in the 19th century, wealthy and upper-middle-class people began to move out of the central part of rapidly growing cities, leaving poorer residents behind. Slums were common in the United States and Europe before the early 20th century. London's East End
12191-916: The Boulevard des Philosophes, a few blocks away from the main campus of the University of Geneva . The RHINO organisation often faced legal troubles, and Geneva police evicted the inhabitants on July 23, 2007. There were large riots in Zürich when the Binz occupation was evicted in 2013. The squatters moved to another building. During the public opposition in the 1970s, squatting in West German cities led to what Margit Mayer [ de ] termed "a self-confident urban counterculture with its own infrastructure of newspapers, self-managed collectives and housing cooperatives, feminist groups, and so on, which
12358-490: The Central African Republic, Chad and Ethiopia, they make up 90 per cent of the informal labour force. Slums thus create an informal alternate economic ecosystem, that demands low paid flexible workers, something impoverished residents of slums deliver. In other words, countries where starting, registering and running a formal business is difficult, tend to encourage informal businesses and slums. Without
12525-702: The Gezi protests and later died. Atopya was squatted in Ankara in June 2014 by anarchists, who claimed it was the city's first political squat. Squatters in Malaysia live on both privately owned and government-owned land. Some squatters have lived on land owned by national electricity company Tenaga Nasional for over five decades. Squatters in Indonesia live on both privately owned and government-owned land. For example,
12692-975: The Netherlands , the Dutch use the term krakers to refer to people who squat houses with the aim of living in them (as opposed to people who break into buildings for the purpose of vandalism or theft). Notable squats in cities around the country include ACU and Moira in Utrecht , the Poortgebouw in Rotterdam , OCCII , OT301 and Vrankrijk in Amsterdam, the Grote Broek in Nijmegen , Vrijplaats Koppenhinksteeg in Leiden , De Vloek in The Hague and
12859-1260: The Préfontaine squat in Overdale , a district of Montréal (2001), the Woodward's Squat in Vancouver (2002), the Infirmary Squat in Halifax (2002), the Pope Squat in Toronto (2002), the Seven Year Squat in Ottawa (2002), the Water Street Squat in Peterborough (2003), and the North Star hotel in Vancouver (2006). These were squats organised by anti-poverty groups which tended to be short-lived. The Woodward's building
13026-635: The Unionist councillor who had given her the house and two Catholic families who had been overlooked complained that the same councillor had scotched plans to build houses for Catholics in the Dungannon area. Several days after the woman had moved in, the Catholic squatters in the house next door were evicted. Austin Currie , then a young politician, complained both at the local council and at Stormont about
13193-565: The aid camps and were occupying land next to an official camp called Corail. On island nations such as Fiji, Kiribati and Samoa, informal settlements are known as squatter settlements. Unlike most Pacific Island countries, it is possible to sell or buy customary land in Kiribati. Zoning laws are not implemented by the government and not widely recognised by local people. On the island of Kiritimati , squatters live in both villages and on old Burns Philp copra plantations. On Rarotonga ,
13360-529: The beginning of the 19th century, there was internal migration from rural areas to cities such as Cochabamba in Bolivia. By 1951, the migrants had begun to seize land and build informal settlements . The land invasions continued despite the authorities often evicting them and from 1945 until 1976, 10 per cent of development in Cochabamba was illegal. From the 1970s the government has attempted to regularize
13527-434: The bottom of flood prone valleys, often hidden from the plain view of downtown but close to some natural water source. In cities located near lagoons, marshlands and rivers, they start on banks or on stilts above water or the dry river bed; in flat terrain, slums begin on lands unsuitable for agriculture, near city trash dumps, next to railway tracks, and other shunned undesirable locations. These strategies shield slums from
13694-804: The breakup of these two movements was born Autonomia Operaia , which was composed of a Marxist–Leninist and Maoist wing and also an anarchist and more libertarian one. These squats had Marxist–Leninist (but also Stalinist and Maoist ) ideals and came from the left wing of Autonomia. The militants of the Italian armed struggle (the New Red Brigades ) were connected to these squats. There are many left-wing self-organised occupied projects across Italy such as Cascina Torchiera and Centro Sociale Leoncavallo in Milan and Forte Prenestino in Rome. In Rome there
13861-627: The building a closed military zone and it was unclear if the Palestinian owners could regain possession. The settlers had already occupied the house and been evicted in 2012. In October 2018, Fatou Bensouda , the Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court stated that Israel's planned demolition of Bedouin village Khan al-Ahmar could constitute a war crime . Gecekondu is a Turkish word meaning
14028-678: The cities and states which encompassed them until the 1960s' War on Poverty was undertaken by the Federal government of the United States. A type of slum housing, sometimes called poorhouses, crowded Boston Common , later at the fringes of the city. Rio de Janeiro documented its first slum in 1920 census. By the 1960s, over 33% of population of Rio lived in slums, 45% of Mexico City and Ankara , 65% of Algiers , 35% of Caracas , 25% of Lima and Santiago , 15% of Singapore . By 1980, in various cities and towns of Latin America alone, there were about 25,000 slums. Slums sprout and continue for
14195-871: The city boundaries for the purpose of housing in contradiction to Urban Planning and Land laws and building regulations." These informal settlements arose in Khartoum from the 1920s onwards, swelling in the 1960s. By the 1980s, the government was clearing settlements in Khartoum and regularizing them elsewhere. It was estimated that in 2015 that were 200,000 squatters in Khartoum, 180,000 in Nyala , 60,000 in Kassala , 70,000 in Port Sudan and 170,000 in Wad Madani . Land squats occurred in what would become Zimbabwe in
14362-544: The city's three most important political squats. Starting from December 2012, Greek Police initiated extensive raids in a number of squats in Athens , arresting and charging with offences all illegal occupants (mostly anarchists). Squats including Villa Amalia were evicted. A march in support of the 92 arrestees drew between 3,000 and 8,000 people. After Villa Amalia, Villa Skaramanga and then Villa Lela Karagianni were evicted. Lela Karagianni had been squatted since 1998 and
14529-684: The country, for example Can Masdeu and Can Vies in Barcelona and Eskalera Karakola and La Ingobernable in Madrid. In the Basque Country the centres are known as gaztetxes [ eu ] . A well-known example was Kukutza in Bilbao. Squatting in England and Wales has a long history. The occupation and cultivation of untended land motivated the Peasants' Revolt of 1381 and
14696-625: The creation of charitable trusts such as the Peabody Trust founded in 1862 and Joseph Rowntree Foundation (1904) which still operate to provide decent housing today. Slums are often associated with Victorian Britain , particularly in industrial English towns, lowland Scottish towns and Dublin City in Ireland. Friedrich Engels described these British neighborhoods as "cattle-sheds for human beings". These were generally still inhabited until
14863-696: The dwellers don't have property rights . Informal land tenure also includes occupation of land belonging to someone else. According to Flood, 51 percent of slums are based on invasion of private land in sub-Saharan Africa , 39 percent in North Africa and West Asia , 10 percent in South Asia, 40 percent in East Asia , and 40 percent in Latin America and the Caribbean . In some cases, once
15030-563: The early 1980s, and attempts to relocate squatters to low-cost housing projects were made by the national government. The sites were not received well, as it moved people far away from their employment and social networks. Projects included the redevelopment of the former Smokey Mountain landfill in Tondo , the BLISS housing project in Taguig , and the establishment of Barangay Bagong Silang as
15197-542: The early 1990s, the Government of Moscow prepared to renovate buildings, but then ran out of money, meaning that squatters occupied prime real estate. By 1996, 40 percent of Tverskaya Street was rented illegally or squatted. Squatting in the Czech Republic began in its modern form when anarchist and punk activists inspired by squatting movements in Amsterdam and Berlin occupied derelict houses following
15364-589: The edge of the city), conventillos (dilapidated tenements in the urban centre) and rural shanty towns from where inhabitants commute to work in the city. An estimated 170,000 people were living in slums in 1992. In Guayaquil , Ecuador's largest city and main port, around 600,000 people in the early 1980s were either squatting on self-built structures over swamplands or living in inner-city slums. Illegal settlements frequently resulted from land invasions, in which large groups of squatters would build structures and hope to prevent eviction through strength in numbers. From
15531-541: The energy company RWE . While the majority of squatting in Germany still comes from left-wing actors there are also examples of right-wing squatting . An example for right-wing squatting in Berlin is the occupation of Weitlingstraße 122. The house was occupied by neo-Nazis in 1990, when a lot of houses in former GDR where empty. They named similar social issues as leftist squatters as their reason for squatting. The space
15698-411: The existence of transport costs implies that the best locations for a firm will be those with easy access to markets, and the best locations for workers, those with easy access to goods. The concentration is the result of a self-reinforcing process of agglomeration. Concentration is a common trend of the distribution of population. Urban growth is dramatically intense in the less developed countries, where
15865-422: The existing urban slums. According to Ali and Toran, social networks might also explain rural–urban migration and people's ultimate settlement in slums. In addition to migration for jobs, a portion of people migrate to cities because of their connection with relatives or families. Once their family support in urban areas is in slums, those rural migrants intend to live with them in slums The formation of slums
16032-647: The extra cost of having to rent more property. In the early 2000s, the government estimated that 37% of the population lived in low-income urban communities, over half of which were squatting public land or renting precariously. The National Housing Authority stated over 100,000 families were living under threat of immediate eviction. In China, informal settlements are known as urban villages . Squatter settlements occurred in Hong Kong in 1946, after its wartime occupation by Japan. After 700,000 people migrated from mainland China to Hong Kong between 1949 and 1950;
16199-437: The firm level, transport costs and the mobility of the industrial labour force. The increase in returns of scale will mean that the production of each good will take place in a single location. And even though an agglomerated economy benefits these cities by bringing in specialization and multiple competing suppliers, the conditions of slums continue to lag behind in terms of quality and adequate housing. Alonso-Villar argues that
16366-527: The first attack received jail sentences after seriously wounding a sleeping person. Squatted Squatting is the action of occupying an abandoned or unoccupied area of land or a building, usually residential that the squatter does not own, rent or otherwise have lawful permission to use . The United Nations estimated in 2003 that there were one billion slum residents and squatters globally. Squatting occurs worldwide and tends to occur when people find empty buildings or land to occupy for housing. It has
16533-423: The foreign owned tanneries and other polluting industries near Dharavi. To live, the poor built shanty towns within easy commute to work. By 1947, the year India became an independent nation of the commonwealth, Dharavi had blossomed into Bombay's largest slum. Similarly, some of the slums of Lagos , Nigeria sprouted because of neglect and policies of the colonial era. During apartheid era of South Africa , under
16700-440: The form of political parties or social activists, inside slums seek to maintain their economic, social and political power. These social and political groups have vested interests to encourage migration by ethnic groups that will help maintain the slums, and reject alternate housing options even if the alternate options are better in every aspect than the slums they seek to replace. Millions of Lebanese people formed slums during
16867-684: The former Kalisosok Prison [ id ] in Surabaya has been squatted since 2000s after being used as a prison for over 100 years. In Thailand , although evictions have reduced their visibility or numbers in urban areas, many squatters still occupy land near railroad tracks, under overpasses, and waterways. Commercial squatting is common in Thailand, where businesses temporarily seize nearby public real estate (such as sidewalks, roadsides, beaches, etc.) and roll out their enterprise, and at closing time they fold it in and lock it up, thus avoiding
17034-436: The former squatters can use their houses as collateral to secure business loans. Former squatters found that it was hard to maintain the property title over time after deaths or divorces and that banks changed their loan requirements so as to exclude them. In Nicaragua, squatting occurred after the 1972 Nicaragua earthquake . In Peru , the name given to the squatter zones is pueblos jóvenes (literally "young towns"). In
17201-860: The general populace, slums became common in the 19th to late 20th centuries in the United States and Europe. Slums are still predominantly found in urban regions of developing countries , but are also still found in developed economies. The world's largest slum city is found in Orangi in Karachi , Pakistan. Slums form and grow in different parts of the world for many different reasons. Causes include rapid rural-to-urban migration , economic stagnation and depression, high unemployment, poverty, informal economy, forced or manipulated ghettoization, poor planning, politics, natural disasters, and social conflicts. Strategies tried to reduce and transform slums in different countries, with varying degrees of success, include
17368-492: The government expenditure. The problem can also lie on the failure in coordination among different departments in charge of economic development, urban planning , and land allocation. In some cities, governments assume that the housing market will adjust the supply of housing with a change in demand. However, with little economic incentive, the housing market is more likely to develop middle-income housing rather than low-cost housing. The urban poor gradually become marginalized in
17535-400: The high land price forces some people to look for and construct cheap informal settlements , which are known as slums in urban areas. The transformation of agricultural land also provides surplus labour , as peasants have to seek jobs in urban areas as rural-urban migrant workers . Many slums are part of economies of agglomeration in which there is an emergence of economies of scale at
17702-463: The history of the company. The occupation was known simply as Das Besetzte Haus (the occupied house) and was one of the most well known actions of left-radicals of that period in Germany. A book about the occupation was published in 2012, entitled Topf & Söhne – Besetzung auf einem Täterort ( Topf & Söhne – Occupation of a crime scene ). Since 2012, Hambach Forest has been occupied by activists seeking to prevent its destruction by
17869-533: The housing crisis in Ireland. The Prohibition of Forcible Entry and Occupation Act of 1971 criminalized squatting. Squatters can gain title to land and property by adverse possession as governed by the 1957 Statute of Limitations Act. From the 1990s onwards, there have been occasional political squats such as Disco Disco, Magpie and Grangegorman . In early twentieth century France , several artists who would later become world-famous, such as Guillaume Apollinaire , Amedeo Modigliani and Pablo Picasso squatted at
18036-633: The housing market where few houses are built to sell to them. Some of the slums in today's world are a product of urbanization brought by colonialism . For instance, the Europeans arrived in Kenya in the nineteenth century and created urban centers such as Nairobi mainly to serve their financial interests. They regarded the Africans as temporary migrants and needed them only for supply of labour . The housing policy aiming to accommodate these workers
18203-433: The increasingly competitive job markets, which leads to their financial shortage. Many cities, on the other hand, do not provide enough low-cost housing for a large number of rural-urban migrant workers. Some rural–urban migrant workers cannot afford housing in cities and eventually settle down in only affordable slums. Further, rural migrants, mainly lured by higher incomes, continue to flood into cities. They thus expand
18370-480: The internal database of UK Bailiff Company, there were 100 cases of squatting in 2009, the highest for 40 years, following trends estimated by the Advisory Service for Squatters that squatting has doubled in England and Wales since 1995. As with England, from 1 September 2012, squatting in a residential building was made a criminal offence subject to arrest, fine and imprisonment. Cardiff Squatters Network
18537-671: The lack of low cost housing, unemployment and inability to access loans. In 1995, almost 70% of the population of the Nigerian capital Lagos were living in slums. The City of the Dead slum is a well-known squatter community in Cairo , Egypt. Between 1955 and 1975, the Cairo authorities built 39,000 public housing apartments but 2 million people moved there, mostly ending up in informal housing . In Alexandria , Egypt's second city, public housing
18704-733: The land where slums occupied as undeveloped land. Another type of urbanization does not involve economic growth but economic stagnation or low growth, mainly contributing to slum growth in Sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Asia . This type of urbanization involves a high rate of unemployment , insufficient financial resources and inconsistent urban planning policy. In these areas, an increase of 1% in urban population will result in an increase of 1.84% in slum prevalence. Urbanization might also force some people to live in slums when it influences land use by transforming agricultural land into urban areas and increases land value. During
18871-527: The largest island in Cook Islands , three informal settlements are inhabited by people from Manihiki , Penrhyn and Pukapuka . The 3,000 dwellers are known as squatters although they have permission to live on the customary land . In the 19th century, the British government claimed to own all of Australia and tried to control land ownership. Wealthy farmers of livestock claimed land for themselves and thus were known as squatters. This type of squatting
19038-664: The largest slums in India , used to be a village referred to as Koliwadas, and Mumbai used to be referred as Bombay. In 1887, the British colonial government expelled all tanneries, other noxious industry and poor natives who worked in the peninsular part of the city and colonial housing area, to what was back then the northern fringe of the city – a settlement now called Dharavi. This settlement attracted no colonial supervision or investment in terms of road infrastructure, sanitation , public services or housing. The poor moved into Dharavi, found work as servants in colonial offices and homes and in
19205-493: The last 50 years, while global population has increased by 250%. Many people move to urban areas primarily because cities promise more jobs, better schools for poor's children, and diverse income opportunities than subsistence farming in rural areas . For example, in 1995, 95.8% of migrants to Surabaya , Indonesia reported that jobs were their primary motivation for moving to the city. However, some rural migrants may not find jobs immediately because of their lack of skills and
19372-480: The late 1960s, people in Northern Ireland were forced to squat through both poverty and a lack of decent housing. In County Tyrone , there were allegations of unfair housing provision on the basis of politics and religion. When a house in the village of Caledon , near Dungannon , was allocated to a young Protestant woman, Emily Beattie, it caused protests. She was secretary to a solicitor who worked for
19539-483: The late 19th century, so they frequently squatted in these unclaimed and marginal spaces. The Frances Street Squats in Vancouver were a row of six buildings squatted for nine months in 1990. They were evicted in a large operation and a film was subsequently made, called The Beat of Frances Street . In recent years, there have been a number of public squats which have brought together the two main contemporary reasons for squatting – homelessness and activism. Examples are
19706-639: The local governments sometimes are unable to manage this transition. This incapacity can be attributed to insufficient funds and inexperience to handle and organize problems brought by migration and urbanization. In some cases, local governments ignore the flux of immigrants during the process of urbanization. Such examples can be found in many African countries. In the early 1950s, many African governments believed that slums would finally disappear with economic growth in urban areas. They neglected rapidly spreading slums due to increased rural-urban migration caused by urbanization. Some governments, moreover, mapped
19873-485: The local councils becoming more open to negotiation. More recently, governments have switched from a policy of eradication to one of giving squatters title to their lands, as part of various programs to move people out of slums and to alleviate poverty. Inspired by the World Bank and the thinking of economists such as Hernando de Soto , the programs aim to provide better housing and to promote entrepreneurship, for
20040-519: The major cities and rural land-based movements. In industrialized countries , there are often residential squats and also left-wing squatting movements, which can be anarchist , autonomist or socialist in nature, for example in the United States . Oppositional movements from the 1960s and 1970s created freespaces such as Freetown Christiania in Denmark, Ruigoord in the Netherlands and
20207-521: The majority (30,000) living in London. The BBC reported in 2011 that the government estimated that there were "20,000 squatters in the UK" and "650,000 empty properties". On 1 September 2012, under Section 144 of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 , squatting in residential property was criminalised by the Cameron–Clegg coalition , punishable by up to six months in prison or
20374-405: The necessity to find a job in the city. The same observation was noticed on the new migrants who contribute to the consolidation and growth of the slum. Also, the choice of the terrain for the construction of the favela (the margins of a lagoon) followed the rationale that it could offer conditions to provide them means of work. Circa 80% of residents living in that community live from the fishery of
20541-571: The new offence. In Francoist Spain migrant workers lived in slums on the periphery of cities. After the Spanish transition to democracy , residential squatting occurred in Spanish cities such as Barcelona, Bilbao, Madrid, Valencia and Zaragoza. The number of squatted social centres in Barcelona grew from under thirty in the 1990s to around sixty in 2014, as recorded by Info Usurpa (a weekly activist agenda). The influential Kasa de la Muntanya
20708-424: The only option for the urban poor. Many local and national governments have, for political interests, subverted efforts to remove, reduce or upgrade slums into better housing options for the poor. Throughout the second half of the 19th century, for example, French political parties relied on votes from slum population and had vested interests in maintaining that voting block. Removal and replacement of slum created
20875-415: The original slums valuable property, densely populated with many conveniences attractive to the poor. At their start, slums are typically located in the least desirable lands near the town or city, that are state owned, are part of a philanthropic trust, possessed by a religious entity, or have no clear land title. In cities located in mountainous terrain, slums begin on difficult to reach slopes or start at
21042-409: The place and return it to its use as low-income housing. City officials agreed to the repairs and then City Council voted to demolish the building. The cost of demolition was $ 8,900 and the cost of repairs had been projected to be $ 6,900. The North Star hotel was temporarily squatted as a protest against emptiness by the Vancouver Anti-Poverty Committee. In 2011, the "Occupy Toronto squat team" squatted
21209-497: The poor rely on. Established old slums, surrounded by the formal city infrastructure, cannot expand horizontally; therefore, they grow vertically by stacking additional rooms, sometimes for a growing family and sometimes as a source of rent from new arrivals in slums. Some slums name themselves after founders of political parties, locally respected historical figures, current politicians or a politician's spouse to garner political backing against eviction. Informality of land tenure
21376-495: The poor, encouraging people to stay in the slums. Economic stagnation in a nation with a growing population reduces per capita disposal income in urban and rural areas, increasing urban and rural poverty. Rising rural poverty also encourages migration to urban areas. A poorly performing economy, in other words, increases poverty and rural-to-urban migration, thereby increasing slums. Many slums grow because of growing informal economy which creates demand for workers. Informal economy
21543-448: The poor, rural people leaving farms for opportunity, and the persecuted people from Europe pouring into New York City. Bars, bordellos, squalid and lightless tenements lined its streets. Violence and crime were commonplace. Politicians and social elite discussed it with derision. Slums like Five Points triggered discussions of affordable housing and slum removal. As of the start of the 21st century, Five Points slum had been transformed into
21710-439: The pretext of sanitation and plague epidemic prevention, racial and ethnic group segregation was pursued, people of colour were moved to the fringes of the city, policies that created Soweto and other slums – officially called townships. Large slums started at the fringes of segregation-conscious colonial city centers of Latin America. Marcuse suggests ghettoes in the United States, and elsewhere, have been created and maintained by
21877-431: The process of urbanization, some agricultural land is used for additional urban activities. More investment will come into these areas, which increases the land value. Before some land is completely urbanized, there is a period when the land can be used for neither urban activities nor agriculture. The income from the land will decline, which decreases the people's incomes in that area. The gap between people's low income and
22044-442: The required period of time as set out in provincial limitation acts and during that time no legal action is taken to evict them, then the ownership of the land transfers from the legal owner to the squatter. Road allowance communities were settlements established by Métis people in the late 1800s through most of the 20th century on road allowances at the margins of settler society. Métis people were dispossessed from their land in
22211-536: The residents do not want to leave, as in the case of slums near Port-au-Prince after the 2010 Haiti earthquake , and slums near Dhaka after 2007 Bangladesh Cyclone Sidr . Slums typically begin at the outskirts of a city. Over time, the city may expand past the original slums, enclosing the slums inside the urban perimeter. New slums sprout at the new boundaries of the expanding city, usually on publicly owned lands, thereby creating an urban sprawl mix of formal settlements, industry, retail zones and slums. This makes
22378-585: The risk of being noticed and removed when they are small and most vulnerable to local government officials. Initial homes tend to be tents and shacks that are quick to install, but as a slum grows, becomes established and newcomers pay the informal association or gang for the right to live in the slum, the construction materials for the slums switches to more durable materials such as bricks and concrete, suitable for slum's topography. The original slums, over time, get established next to centers of economic activity, schools, hospitals, and sources of employment, which
22545-503: The segregationist policies of the state and regionally dominant group. Social exclusion and poor infrastructure forces the poor to adapt to conditions beyond his or her control. Poor families that cannot afford transportation, or those who simply lack any form of affordable public transportation, generally end up in squat settlements within walking distance or close enough to the place of their formal or informal employment. Ben Arimah cites this social exclusion and poor infrastructure as
22712-414: The situation. He then symbolically occupied the woman's house for a few hours, before being evicted by the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC). One of the policeman was the woman's brother who himself moved into the house later on. The incident quickly became a media sensation and in August the civil rights movement arranged one of its first marches, from Coalisland to Dungannon. This was followed in October by
22879-487: The slum has many residents, the early residents form a social group, an informal association or a gang that controls newcomers, charges a fee for the right to live in the slums, and dictates where and how new homes get built within the slum. The newcomers, having paid for the right, feel they have commercial right to the home in that slum. The slum dwellings, built as the slum grows, are constructed without checking land ownership rights or building codes, are not registered with
23046-425: The slum where they originally lived, which was in turn faced by residents by self-constructing spaces to shelter the work originally performed in the slum, in the formal housing units. Similar observations were made in other slums. Residents also reported that their work constitutes their dignity, citizenship, and self-esteem in the underprivileged settings in which they live. The reflection of this recent research
23213-653: The social process of identifying the worst housing inside slums, but did not remove or replace slums. After World War II , French people started mass migration from rural to urban areas of France. This demographic and economic trend rapidly raised rents of existing housing as well as expanded slums. French government passed laws to block increase in the rent of housing, which inadvertently made many housing projects unprofitable and increased slums. In 1950, France launched its Habitation à Loyer Modéré initiative to finance and build public housing and remove slums, managed by techniciens – urban technocrats., and financed by Livret A –
23380-431: The space and called it Gallery Bosnia. When the Reykjavíkur Akademían (the Reykjavík Academy) was evicted at short notice from Hringbraut 121 in November 2011, it was occupied in protest. The space, which had hosted lectures and also Iceland's trade union and anarchist libraries, was moved to another location but the occupiers were unhappy that the new use of the building would be a guest house for tourists. An art exhibition
23547-562: The squatter population was estimated at 300,000, with people sleeping wherever they could find a space. A fire at Shek Kip Mei in December 1953 resulted in over 50,000 slum-dwellers being left homeless. Rooftop slums then developed, when people began to live illegally on the roofs of urban buildings. In addition, the Kowloon Walled City became an area for squatters, housing up to 50,000 people in Hong Kong. In Mumbai , India, there are an estimated 10 to 12 million inhabitants, and six million of them are squatters . The squatters live in
23714-450: The squatter settlements and the programs have largely failed due to corruption. A fresh initiative set up in 2002 did not prevent new settlements being squatted. In the 1990s, La Paz had 48 unauthorised graveyards where the poor buried their dead. The land was squatted and there was no record of how many people were buried in the cemeteries. There are also squatters in the forest lowlands who are illegal loggers. Indigenous peoples occupied
23881-439: The structure needed for a city. As of 2004, across Brazil there were 25 million people living in favelas. After failed attempts in the 1960s and 1970s to bulldoze slums out of existence, the authorities moved towards a policy of toleration. In São Paulo , until 1972 favelas were usually demolished; after that time they were permitted, meaning that in the next decade the number of squatters rose to one million. The largest favela
24048-399: The time, which soon found legal expression in the Public Health Act of 1848 . As the slum clearance movement gathered pace, deprived areas such as Old Nichol were fictionalised to raise awareness in the middle classes in the form of moralist novels such as A Child of the Jago (1896) resulting in slum clearance and reconstruction programmes such as the Boundary Estate (1893-1900) and
24215-405: The type of housing occupied by squatters. In particular, while squatting of municipal buildings may be treated leniently, squatting of private property can often lead to strongly negative reactions on the part of the general public and the authorities. In African countries such as Nigeria , informal settlements are created by migration from rural areas to urban areas. Reasons for squatting include
24382-422: The world total slum dwellers may remain in the poorly housed settlements by 2020. Choguill claims that the large number of slum dwellers indicates a deficiency of practical housing policy. Whenever there is a significant gap in growing demand for housing and insufficient supply of affordable housing, this gap is typically met in part by slums. The Economist has observed that "good housing is obviously better than
24549-424: Was a derelict department store which had stood empty for nine years. After being evicted from the building, two hundred squatters set up a tent city on the pavement outside. The action is credited with putting in motion the eventual redevelopment of the building. The Peterborough Coalition Against Poverty (PCAP) publicly squatted 1130 Water Street, a building which stood empty after a fire. The group offered to repair
24716-435: Was a large squatting movement in the newly formed state of Austria following the First World War . Famine was a significant problem for many people in Austria and the "Siedler" (settler) movement developed as these people tried to create shelter and a source of food for themselves. The Ernst Kirchweger Haus (EKH) in Vienna was squatted as a social centre in 1990 and legalised in 2008. In 2014, 1,500 riot police officers ,
24883-443: Was a practice used by artists and musicians to acquire communal rooms and then expand into other rooms. Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union , there were many collectively organised housing occupations by families and refugees. The groups would attempt to legalise in some cases and not in others. There were also art squats, for example, in Saint Petersburg , there were Pushkinskaya 10, Na Fontanke and Synovia doktora Pelia. In
25050-420: Was formed in December 2012, to network together squatters citywide, and host "skill-share" workshops on squatting legally in commercial buildings. In Canada, there are two systems to register the ownership of land. Under the land title system, squatter rights, formally known as adverse possession, were abolished. However, under the registry system, these rights have been preserved. If a person occupies land for
25217-626: Was founded in 1992 by people who had been squatting in Freiburg im Breisgau in the 1980s to provide a way of transforming private property into collective ownership , including squats. Squatting has also been used as a tactic for campaigning purposes, such as the Anatopia project, which protested against a Mercedes-Benz test track. Squatters moved into the former factory site of J.A. Topf & Söhne in Erfurt in April 2001 and remained there until they were evicted by police in April 2009. The firm made crematoria for Nazi concentration camps . The squatters ran culture programs which drew attention to
25384-424: Was later reoccupied. The name came from the street, named for a Greek World War II resistance leader of that name. From 2015 onwards Athens has seen refugee squats in response to the European migrant crisis which are anarchist and self-organised. In 2019, several squats in Exarcheia were evicted by the Greek state. Some of the migrants evicted set up a camp outside the Parliament at Syntagma Square . There
25551-435: Was named for a lake named Collect . which, by the late 1700s, was surrounded by slaughterhouses and tanneries which emptied their waste directly into its waters. Trash piled up as well and by the early 1800s the lake was filled up and dry. On this foundation was built Five Points, the United States' first slum. Five Points was occupied by successive waves of freed slaves, Irish, then Italian, then Chinese, immigrants. It housed
25718-446: Was not well enforced and the government built settlements in the form of single-occupancy bedspaces. Due to the cost of time and money in their movement back and forth between rural and urban areas, their families gradually migrated to the urban centre. As they could not afford to buy houses, slums were thus formed. Others were created because of segregation imposed by the colonialists. For example, Dharavi slum of Mumbai – now one of
25885-551: Was occupied in 1989. In 2014, the ultimately unsuccessful attempts to evict the long-running social centre of Can Vies provoked major riots. Another long-running squat is Can Masdeu , which survived a concerted eviction attempt in 2002. Eleven occupiers suspended themselves off the walls of the building for several days. Younger squatters set up self-managed social centres which hosted events and campaigns. The 1995 Criminal Code among other things criminalised squatting, but failed to stop it. Social centres exist in cities across
26052-406: Was only 0.5% of the total housing stock, whereas informal housing was 68%. An estimated 3,500 people live in the Grande Hotel Beira in Mozambique . Informal settlements in Zambia , particularly around Lusaka , are known as kombonis . As of 2011, 64% of Zambians lived below the poverty line , whilst the United Nations predicted a 941% population increase by 2100. In Liberia , squatting
26219-442: Was organised, with a camera obscura, live music and shadow theatre. In Italy, despite the lack of official data, it appears that about 50,000 buildings all over the country are unused or abandoned and thus subject to squatting. Squatting has no legal basis, but many squats are used as social centres . The first occupations of abandoned buildings began in 1968 with the left-wing movements Lotta Continua and Potere Operaio . Out of
26386-519: Was possible due to participatory observations and the fact that the author of the research has lived in a slum to verify the socioeconomic practices which were prone to shape, plan and govern space in slums. Urban poverty encourages the formation and demand for slums. With rapid shift from rural to urban life, poverty migrates to urban areas. The urban poor arrives with hope, and very little of anything else. They typically have no access to shelter, basic urban services and social amenities. Slums are often
26553-582: Was prepared to intervene in local and broader politics". The Autonomen movement protected squats against eviction and participated in radical direct action in cities such as Berlin. The squats were mainly for residential and social use. Squatting became known by the term instandbesetzen , from instandsetzen ("renovating") and besetzen ("occupying"). Well-known contemporary squats include Køpi in Berlin and Rote Flora in Hamburg. Legalised housing projects include Hafenstraße in Hamburg and Kiefernstraße in Düsseldorf. The Mietshäuser Syndikat
26720-471: Was president of the country at the time. During the Great Recession (2007–2009) more shanty towns appeared with others squatting in foreclosed homes. During the hippie movement , squatters in New Mexico established the commune of Tawapa near the Sandia Mountains . However, they were kicked out in the 1990s because they did not have the legal rights to the land. Community organizations have abetted squatters in taking over vacant buildings not only as
26887-572: Was set up in 1972 and is a permanent protest occupation . The 2016 Bendigo Street housing dispute saw squatters successfully contesting road-building plans. The Midnight Star squat was used as a self-managed social centre in a former cinema, before being evicted after being used as a convergence space during the 2002 World Trade Organization meeting. Slums A slum is a highly populated urban residential area consisting of densely packed housing units of weak build quality and often associated with poverty . The infrastructure in slums
27054-447: Was set up in 1992, aiming to help low-income families transition from squatting to affordable housing . By 2001, around 106,000 families had found secure housing in over 800 separate communities. The trajectory of squatting in central and eastern Europe is different from that of western Europe because, until recently, countries were part of the Communist Bloc and squatting is generally not tolerated. In 1980s Soviet Russia , there
27221-405: Was squatted in the Kadıköy district. It was stated to be the city's first occupied and self-managed social centre; Caferağa Mahalle Evi (community centre Caferağa), also in Kadıköy , was squatted soon afterwards and evicted in December 2014. A place was occupied in Beşiktaş district of Istanbul on March 18, 2014, and named Berkin Elvan Student House, after a 15-year-old boy who was shot during
27388-458: Was squatted, before being evicted in 2007. Recently, over 9,000 Burkinabés were squatting on remote land and the Liberia Land Authority (LLA) has announced it will be titling all land in the country. In South Africa , squatters tend to live in informal settlements or squatter camps on the outskirts of the larger cities, often but not always near townships . In the mid-1990s, an estimated 7.7 million South Africans lived in informal settlements:
27555-423: Was the ZAD de Notre-Dame-des-Landes , which successfully opposed an airport project near Nantes. Geneva in Switzerland had 160 buildings illegally occupied and more than 2,000 squatters, in the middle of the 1990s. The RHINO ( Retour des Habitants dans les Immeubles Non-Occupés , in English: Return of Inhabitants to Non-Occupied Buildings ) was a 19-year-long squat in Geneva. It occupied two buildings on
27722-399: Was used as alternative expression for rookeries . In 1850 the Catholic Cardinal Wiseman described the area known as Devil's Acre in Westminster , London as follows: Close under the Abbey of Westminster there lie concealed labyrinths of lanes and potty and alleys and slums, nests of ignorance, vice, depravity, and crime, as well as of squalor, wretchedness, and disease; whose atmosphere
27889-518: Was used for different purposes ranging from a place to live, gather or party, to producing propaganda and planning right-wing terrorist activities. The squat dissolved at the end of 1990 because of disagreements in the heterogenous group of squatters. In Reykjavík , the capital of Iceland, there is a small tradition of squatting. In 1919, anarchists occupied a building and were quickly evicted. Squatters occupied an empty house in downtown Reykjavík on Vatnsstigur street in April 2009. The squatters set up
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