IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/cityxx/v16y2012i3p299-312.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Athens in the Mediterranean 'movement of the piazzas' Spontaneity in material and virtual public spaces

Author

Listed:
  • Lila Leontidou

Abstract

Mediterranean cities are carrying Gramsci's concept of spontaneity into the 21st century through massive social movements after the 'Arab Spring'. This paper explores the ways in which the material and virtual cityscape interact with socio-political transformation during the 'movement of the piazzas' in Athens, Greece. After a discussion of the importance of urban informality, porosity and land-use mixtures for social cohesion, of creeping ghettoization in some enclaves and of the perils of urbicide, we proceed to an analysis of grassroots action in Athens in comparison with different cities of the Mediterranean and beyond. Social movements are placed in their respective local and global context--their recurrent material landscapes and their cosmopolitan virtual spaces of digital interaction. This analysis leads to reflections on the possible role of popular spontaneity in democratization and in European integration at the grassroots level, against the onslaught of neoliberalism and accumulation by dispossession.

Suggested Citation

  • Lila Leontidou, 2012. "Athens in the Mediterranean 'movement of the piazzas' Spontaneity in material and virtual public spaces," City, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 16(3), pages 299-312, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:cityxx:v:16:y:2012:i:3:p:299-312
    DOI: 10.1080/13604813.2012.687870
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/13604813.2012.687870
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/13604813.2012.687870?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Lazaros Karaliotas, 2017. "Staging Equality in Greek Squares: Hybrid Spaces of Political Subjectification," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(1), pages 54-69, January.
    2. Marilena Simiti, 2014. "Rage and Protest: The case of the Greek Indignant movement," GreeSE – Hellenic Observatory Papers on Greece and Southeast Europe 82, Hellenic Observatory, LSE.
    3. Athina Arampatzi, 2017. "The spatiality of counter-austerity politics in Athens, Greece: Emergent ‘urban solidarity spaces’," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 54(9), pages 2155-2171, July.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:cityxx:v:16:y:2012:i:3:p:299-312. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/CCIT20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.