Debats. Revista de cultura, poder i societat

Presentation of the first monograph, ‘City, Creativity, and Cultural Practices

Ricardo Klein — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Presentation of the first monograph, ‘City, Creativity, and Cultural Practices

Understanding Bottom-Up Territories of Culture in Unequal Cities

Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

‘Contestation’ is a term often used to describe various kinds of conflict in 21st-Century urban areas. Yet Urban planning literature lacks a cultural approach to such resistance — an oversight that this paper seeks to redress. We argue that the concept of ‘contested territories of culture’ plays a key role in the informal construction of urban areas, highlighting them as heterogeneous drivers of ‘contestation’ and the fight for rights in Latin America’s inequality-riven cities. The authors use two methodological approaches to define said ‘contestation’: (1) contextual analysis of
the literature on the concept of ‘territories’ to discover their cultural character, and (2) ethnographic analysis of a case study on Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The example of the Realengo Flyover Cultural Center, a cultural appropriation of a leftover site under a flyover on Rio’s outskirts, shows the complexity of improvised, bottom-up squatting through cultural activities. The study reveals the need to understand these territories in order to draw up more equitable public policies and urban plans. It also highlights that such territories are both culturally rich and socially vulnerable.

Artists against tourism gentrification: analysing creative practices of resistance in Porto

Inês Barbosa, João Teixeira Lopes, Lígia Ferro — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

We examine how artists’ work has been used to fight gentrification in Porto (Portugal) over the last five years. After mapping agents, projects, and initiatives, the paper selected six artists from different areas, and who work on housing and city rights- related issues. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with the artists, and their practices and discourse were analysed to discover their views on the city’s transformations and the role Art and artists play in highlighting them. The interviews also revealed dilemmas and contradictions, such as: the tension between celebrating Porto’s identity and avoiding tourism-phobia; the risks of Art being exploited for financial or political gain; the difficulty of striking a balance between artistic freedom and
independence on the one hand, and funding and recognition on the other. One of the paper’s findings is that such challenges reflect the precarious state of The Arts and Culture in Portugal today.

Mobility, Ephemerality and Tourist Economies: Graffiti Running Tours in León Guanajuato

Caitlin Frances Bruce — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

In this paper I explore the creation of a running tour showcasing commissioned Graffiti Art, or Urban Art, in León Guanajuato, Mexico. Founded in 2017, the tours are part of a larger economic and cultural shift away from the city's agricultural and industrial roots. Since the 1990s, León has
pursued global city status while still trying to claim connections to “tradition.” Creative practices such as Urban Art help cultivate an attractive urban image. I argue that the tours dramatize three issues at the heart of both creative cities discourse and the challenges and the frictions that occur in institutionalizing graffiti, namely: mobility, ephemerality, and economy.

Towards a new radar. Urban art and neighborhood identities in Buenos Aires

Mercedes González Bracco — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

In recent years we have seen huge growth in Urban Art worldwide. Many works highlight its link to city marketing, as a strategy that ties in with others in the global competition to attract investments. However, it is also possible to find other growth-drivers stemming from identity issues in terms of marking a place as one’s own. On this last point, this paper analyzes how Street Art is intertwined with local identity, reorganizing neighborhood space and imageries associated with it in Argentina’s Capital, Buenos Aires. An anthropological approach (which includes observations and interviews, as well as a survey of the literature, press and social networks) is taken to reveal the various needs, expectations and strategies served by
community murals.

The cultural sector in the context of cultural change in local settings in Europe

David Márquez Martín de la Leona — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Social changes are not always instantly taken up or fully reflected in the cultural sector. This gap sparks tensions that can lead to a crisis. This paper builds a theoretical framework to grasp how the cultural sector can transform such change into cultural actions and policies. After
analysing current models and paradigms of public policies in Europe, the author proposes a dynamic, four-vector model to address cultural change. The paper suggests avenues for future cultural action, stressing the local sphere as the most promising one for implementing new policies. The model provides a sound basis for evaluating arguments — a feature that is likely to foster its adoption at the local level.

From Cultural Facilities to The Cultural City Model. Key lessons from Valencia’s Faller Art City [CAF] project

Tony Ramos Murphy, Pau Rausell-Köster, Chema Segovia Collado — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This paper reviews the idea of cultural facilities with a view to broadening our grasp of the role culture plays in today’s cities. In developing our argument, we first give a brief overview of the management and governance of major cities in Spain since the restoration of democracy, stressing
the role played by cultural facilities. We then reflect on cultural facilities, situating them within the framework of the Cultural Democratisation Model — a public policy paradigm whose major limitations and shortcomings need to be addressed. Our proposed alternative is ‘The Cultural City’ framework, which provides conceptual tools for reorienting and reconnecting cultural and urban policies. This framework recognises the city as an artefact with three basic functions: Repository, Interface, and Stage, and puts citizens’ cultural rights and needs first. The paper takes the case of the Strategic Plan for the Fallas Art City [CAF] to exemplify the scope offered by The Cultural City model. The case studied reveals a cultural strategy for fostering urban transformation, and a productive environment based on The Arts, creativity, and innovation. To this end, the project stresses cultural access, a collaborative locus of experience, encounter, and collaboration. The final goal of this approach to greatly broaden citizens’ cultural rights.

#(Trans)Feminist Movement #COVID-19. From Territorial to Virtual Dialogue in Cultural / Artistic Experiences in Argentina and Spain

Marcela A. País Andrade — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This paper analyses the narratives, practices and strategies articulated in (trans) Feminist artistic/cultural experiences in Argentina and Spain seen in the context of COVID-19 from three dimensions: Ethical, Aesthetic, Political. It is framed within a socio-anthropological research study that was carried out between June 2020 and June 2022. The study charted the tensions and agreements between (trans) Feminist social movements and the daily practices of various artists and people holding management positions in the cultural field in Argentina and in Spain. The findings cover: (1) the ethical implications of resisting, challenging and negotiating expected socio-cultural practice; (2) a community’s ways of being and doing; (3) resignification of the senses of the cultural and the generic as spaces of the everyday and of political experimentation (re)producing different ways of tackling and shaping the world; (4) grasping the intersections between The State and citizens’ rights in specific communities; (5) new ways of doing Social Research in the cultural field.

Government Matching of Cultural Crowdfunding: An exploratory comparative analysis of the Spanish and Swedish cases

Anders Rykkja, Lluís Bonet Agustí — Mon, 18 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Over the last decade, crowdfunding has become a major way to fund and develop creative projects. This is why regional governments in many European countries have begun to support crowdfunding platforms as providers of technology. Governments offer various kinds of support, including match-funding, which, as its name suggests, supplements crowdfunding campaigns with public monies. However, there is a dearth of academic research on cultural crowdfunding and public-private partnerships. This paper uses a qualitative methodology to come up with a conceptual model for governmental support and collaboration with cultural crowdfunding platforms. It also gives two case studies of public-private partnerships that support crowdfunding initiatives in Spain and Sweden. The lack of support and intervention mechanisms may suggest that regional and local governments still see crowdfunding as a marginal way of financing those cultural projects that cannot access other sources of funding.

Presentation of the Special Issue: “A Decade of Contestation? Social Revolts in the Geography of Global Capitalism”

Rommy Morales-Olivares, Pablo Rivera-Vargas, Eduardo Alvarado Espina — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Presentation of the Special Issue: “A Decade of Contestation? Social Revolts in the Geography of Global Capitalism”

#AbortoLegalYa [Legal Abortion Now] — Digital activism for legal abortion in Argentina, 2018-2020

Luisina Ferrante, Victoria Alvarez — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

For the first time in Argentine history, a Bill on the Voluntary Interruption of Pregnancy was
introduced in the National Congress (parliament) in 2018. The debate marked a turning point in the political agenda of Feminism at both the national and regional level. Hitherto, most Feminist
movements had focused their political action on street protests/camp-outs/occupations, training
youth, sparking public debates, and packing the political platforms of parties to advocate the
legalisation of abortion. Although the Senate finally rejected the Bill in 2018, in 2020 Alberto
Fernández introduced a new Bill on the 17th of November 2020, which was passed by the Senate on the 30th of December. This paper first briefly summarises Argentina’s Feminist movement’s struggle to legalise abortion. To this end, we analyse the records and collaborative coverage by the media and civil society organisations in Argentina between 2018 and 2020. We focus on: how digital, social and political territories were ‘occupied’; what Feminist practices were used to make the long-standing #AbortoLegalYa [Legalise Abortion Now] movement visible from different perspectives
and tracks; what discourse and media strategies were used to put the issue in the limelight and to
span the demands made by broad sectors of society. Finally, we focus on the digital activism
carried out to cover the debate in social networks and various digital
platforms, with special stress on real-time updates in the Spanish language Wikipedia entry between 2018 and 2020.

New Social Movements in Times of Conservatism and Austerity: Analysis of the political process of educational mobilisation in The Balearic Islands (2013-2015)

Lluís Parcerisa, Antoni — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

During the 2011-2015 legislature, the education sector in The Balearic Islands was shaken by
root-and-branch proposals for educational reform that combined draconian austerity policies and an
ambitious plan that questioned the existing linguistic model. Efforts to push through these reforms
led to the emergence of new collective actors and networks, and disputes that culminated in the
calling of an open-ended strike in the education sector. This paper analyses the path of and
reasons for the success of the social mobilisation against said reforms. At the theoretical level,
the research is guided by the political process approach, which considers the ideas and structural
factors driving collective action. Methodologically, the case study follows the process-tracing
approach and is based on 20 semi-structured interviews with key actors and on document analysis.
The findings show that frame-bridging, together with the combination of diverse collective action
repertoires, played key roles in
the social movement’s success.

What’s happening in Bolivia? From the botched 2019 elections to MAS’ triumphal return in 2020, and beyond

Clayton Cunha Filho — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

After winning three presidential elections in a row — 2005 (53.74%), 2009 (64.22%) and 2014
(61.36%) — Evo Morales only got 47.08% in the controversial 2019 election, where he was undermined
by accusations of fraud by opponents and international observers. The upshot in 2019 was his
overthrow amid street protests, police mutinies and intervention by the Armed Forces. However,
almost exactly a year later his party —MAS — won 55.1% of the votes and returned to power on the
Luis Arce and David Choquehuanca ticket. What seemed then like a triumphant return of Bolivia’s
only party with real ties to broad swathes of society would soon be riven by divisions when
selecting candidates for the ‘departmental’ [regional] elections in March 2021. Evo Morales’ return
from exile in November 2020 and his efforts to stay in charge of the party, and above all to
hand-pick candidates himself, led to major internal rifts and electoral defeats. This paper
analyses the reasons for the overthrow of the hitherto unbeaten former President and his party, as
well as for MAS’ swift return to power. In doing so, we focus on the party’s relations with its
social bases and its dwindling political support during its long, uninterrupted spell in office. It
also delves into the transitions of the current period and the impact the political reshuffle in
the wake of the 2021 departmental elections may foreshadow for the party’s future.

Berta Cáceres, Agency and Resistance: A Feminist-indigenous interpellation of the Capital / Life crisis

Judith Muñoz-Saavedra, María Soledad Ascencio Cortés, Zoila Madrid Rossel — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This article explores the relationship between and the intersection of Feminist agencies and
indigenous women’s resistance movement strategies in Mesoamerica by focusing on Honduran indigenous
activist Berta Caceres Flores, who was murdered in 2016. Caceres’s speeches as leader of the
Honduran Civic Council of Popular and Indigenous Organisations (COPINH) between 2009 and 2016 are
analysed through the lens of three key topics: Agency; Resistance strategies; Grassroots-indigenous
Feminism. The methodology used in this paper builds on Sociological Discourse Analysis (SDA) and
highlights the structure of discourse based on categories such as the context of production and its
interpretation as a social practice. The study’s findings lead to the idea that Caceres’ discursive
position embodies the junction between indigenous resistance and Feminist agencies, which is to say
the grassroots defence of land and body as a response to the Capital-Life crisis and the
commodification of common goods. The paper also questions Neo-Liberalism’s hegemonic narrative as
it showcases subjective proposals forming part of resistance to colonial capitalist power. These
subjectivities are expressed in practices based on ‘commons’, care, reciprocity, community life
linked to nature, and the priority given to life’s reproductive cycle.

Social Revolt in Chile: A political counter-hegemony challenging the Neo-Liberal narrative?

Eduardo Alvarado Espina, Rommy Morales-Olivares, Pablo Rivera-Vargas — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

On the 18th of October 2019, Chile began undergoing the biggest political and social upheaval since
the one that ended the Pinochet dictatorship. This upheaval slowly gave way to a process of
impeachment of the traditional institutions of The State. This paper looks at the political
dimension of the ensuing social revolt and its scope in the Constituent itinerary agreed on the
15th of November 2019. It seeks to answer the question of whether the mass movement was the
expression of a political counter-hegemony challenging the Neo-Liberal order. To this end, it draws
on the main theoretical currents questioning the fit between democracy and Neo-Liberalism,
especially Chantal Mouffe's ‘antagonistic’ notion of ‘the populist moment’. In practical terms, it
analyses, on the basis of past political and electoral behaviour, two cleavages that tie in with
the emergence of the populist moment, that of elite/people and parties/ independents. From the
analysis of the electoral data covering the last thirty years and that bearing on the results of
the 2021 election of the members of the Constituent Convention, it is concluded that political
weariness is mirrored in the two cleavages defining the populist moment. Moreover, there was a
strengthening of the various political forces that saw themselves as anti-Neo-Liberal.

From the Wave of Protests in October 2019 to Constitutional Change: The political significance of social mobilisations in Chile

Manuel Antonio Garretón, Rommy Morales-Olivares — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

The paper examines the causes of Chile’s October 2019 wave of protest and the path taken in the
relationship between institutional policies and social mobilisations, and that led to the 2020
referendum for a New Constitution. It is based on a hypothesis on the transformation of society and
the configuration of democracy in its cultural and political dimensions. The key question posed is:
To what extent can the two main problems be solved?, to wit: (1) finding a new social-economic
order to replace the model imposed during the dictatorship (“Neo-Liberalism with Chilean features”)
—a model that was tweaked by the Concertación and the Nueva Mayoría Centre-Left coalition
governments (Garretón, 2012; Mayol, 2013; Atria; 2013); (2) coming up with new kinds of links
between politics and social movements, offering scope for going beyond the classic model and for
marking a radical break
with the past, as in Chile’s case.

The collective resistance of Afro-Colombian women surviving victims in Colombia: A counter-hegemonic bet

Alba Lucía Cruz Castillo, Diego Fernando Barragán Giraldo — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Colombia’s 2011 Victims and Land Restitution Act opened a political space in which the voices of surviving victims were considered in the reconciliation and reparation hearings. In connection with the aforementioned Act, the paper sets out the experiences of a counter-hegemonic political group of Afro-Colombian women surviving victims. To this end, a general summary is given of the place occupied by these victims in Colombia’s internal armed conflict. It goes on to illustrate several initiatives that paved the way for Afro-Colombian Movements in their quest for reparations. Said initiatives show the need to think hard about reparations in ways that respect local ancestral strategies for healing and making amends. Here, such strategies not only need to take account of the damage and harm arising from armed conflict but also the ethnic-racial historical dimension — something that goes beyond the scope of the Act. A decolonial methodological approach is adopted and is based on two emblematic cases. The paper reveals the organisational experience of surviving Afro-Colombian women victims. Their collective initiatives place counter-hegemonic bets on various concepts of reparation. These initiatives reveal a social movement whose resistance came up with new alternatives for action on the Colombian armed conflict in relation to the remedies available under the Act.