http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13604813.2013.815450
Hello Everyone:
We're almost at 1,000 page views. I can just taste it. We're oh so close. I'll write, you read, that simple. Today, I'd like to start using this space to work out some ideas for my first entry for plaNYourCity
(http://www.planyourcity.net). My thoughts are contributing posts that cover current urban trends. Given that I've already posted a few blogs on what's going on in Turkey and other parts of the world, I thought that this might be the way to go. I recently found this article by Mehmet Bariş Kuymulu a doctoral candidate in Anthropology at City University of New York Graduate Center, "Reclaiming the right to the city: Reflections on the urban uprisings in Turkey" published on June 25, 2013, which offers some reflections on the urban rioting in Turkey. Mr. Kuymulu analyzes the path of the social mobilization stemming from Gezi Park to the larger geographical scales or the urban, the national, and beyond, situating the rioting in Istanbul within the conceptual background of the right to the city, a term coined by Henri Lefebvre during the Paris riots of 1968. Further, Mr. Kuymulu argues that if this revolutionary energy is be channeled into more lasting social change, then the Kurdish and Labor movements, the historically two major drivers of Turkey's democratization, need to catch up with the people in the streets.
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Henri Lefebvre
transnationaleverydaylife.com |
In 1968, Marxist philosopher Henri Lefebvre argued that the globalization of urbanization and the role of the unique urban process in the the accumulation of capital were precipitating a crisis that could not be overtaken by the crisis of industrial capitalism. This caused Mr. Lefebvre to concentrate on 'the urban' as a focal point of resistance and activism for claiming 'the right to the city,' implying the right of urbanites to radically transform the forces of production and use of urban space. The idea of the right to the city grew from the 'cry and demand, rising out of the streets and had currency in the politics unfolding in other cities. Thus, in the midst of the protests stemming from Gezi Park, one has to ask, what does reclaiming the right to the city look like?
Let's back up for second and recall that the protests started over saving Istanbul's last remaining green space from being paved over and turned into a mall or "something else." The protests actually began as a rather modest 'occupy style' peaceful resistance. However, when the bull dozers entered the park near midnight, I might add without permits or warning, the activists quickly organized via the social media sites, calling for more people to join them. They were successful and for three days, the primary goal of the protesters was stopping the demolition of the park. Basically, from the beginning, the resistance was organized as an opposition to an urbanism that places capitalist interests above the ordinary folk. Doesn't sound like much has changed since Paris 1968. However, Mr. Kuymulu notes that while its urban agenda was, from the start, the scale of resistance against a neoliberal authoritarianism, confined to the limits of Gezi Park, it was expressed on a city-wide scale. Further, the opportunities for expanding to a greater scale were already there.
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Gezi Park
azadolu.com |
Let's look at the opportunities. First, the destruction of the Gezi Park in favor of a shopping mall was never presented a singular project by the Justice and Development Party (AKP) in government. Razing the park was part of a larger project-euphemistically called 'urban transformation,' whose goal was the radical transformation of one of the most iconic urban squares in Turkey-Taksim Square. Additionally, the AKP led government had already past legislation in 2012, presumably for disaster preparation, that would allow the government to legally raze and rebuild any building at risk in the event of natural or man-made disaster-an overwhelming part of urban Turkey. This would present the whole country as a prime target for gentrification. If a program of capital accumulation through real estate construction and gentrification enabled the resistance to jump scale easily at the urban and national scale, then it still bore the burnt of the government and police response.
The act of collective mobilization, through the social media sites, succeeded in gathering tens of thousands of individuals into the square. Mind you, this all accomplished over the internet and through mainstream media. What followed was nothing short of a battle for space. Riot police used every available violence to shoo protesters from the square. However, this caused the multitudes to pour into the streets and other demonstrations in solidarity soon followed. Thus, what started out as an act of historic preservation, quickly became a platform for airing long held grievances. A veritable Pandora's box was now wide open
The initial resistance, organized at the park, now had a clear agenda-reclaim the right to the city of ordinary Istanbullular (residents of Istanbul; Istanbulu-singular) who rely on use value in the city and to place that above the right to a city of capitalist developers who wish to redefine the city as the loci of commercial activity and capital accumulation. However, I ask, hasn't Istanbul historically been about commercial activity and capital accumulation? I mean, it was the Western terminus of the Silk Road and the capitol of the fabulously wealthy Byzantine and Ottoman Empires. Perhaps the promise of Ataturk Kemel so long ago went bust and transformed into a second coming of the fallen imperial rule.
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Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan
world.time.com |
Nevertheless, as the resistance to the neoliberal authoritarian AKP government leaped to a greater platform, the primary political agenda shifted from a clear right to the city to civil rights and individual collective freedoms. Mr. Kuymulu postulates, if the government had not ordered the violent police crackdown and, instead, withdrawn the project, whether or not the massive mobilization that turned an otherwise small-scale protest would have become a full-scale urban uprising that spread throughout the country? Maybe, maybe not. I believe even at the small-scale, urban protests often become public fora for other protests. If you look at the Occupy Wall Street Movement, what started out as protest over social and economic inequality quickly became a staging ground for other grievances. John Rossant, the chairman of the New Cities Foundation, claims that uprising in Istanbul and other cities as well as the Arab Spring are linked. The overcrowded, poorly organized cities become breeding grounds for discontent. In the case of Turkey, the callous dismissal by Prime Minister Erdogan of the protesters as 'looters' and subtle insertion of Sharia in a primarily secular nation, provided further fuel to the fire.
In short, 'the city' and the right to the city can be seen as shorthand for the increasingly urbanizing globe we live. The question becomes will the rights of ordinary folk, the everyday users of the city be trumped by the proverbial one percent who focused on capital accumulation?
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