Text regarding the situation in Exarcheia
Exarcheia finds itself in a moment of existential crisis. However, while most groups are focusing on the external forces that threaten the neighborhood, they are ignoring some of the internal conditions that have helped bring us to this point.
While gentrification proceeds apace and the police occupy the neighborhood, direct action and intervention in order to transform the material socio-spatial conditions of the neighborhood have been discarded for mere performative actions.
For example, despite ample foreknowledge that state forces were coming to the square, the slew of assemblies purporting to “defend” Exarcheia made no move to prohibit this act. Months before the event, the decision was made (with no hesitation) to simply surrender the square and then hold a demo. The discussions in the lead-up revolved mainly around organizational concerns, such as where to meet, what time to hold an assembly, etc. Once the metal sheets were installed and the police permanently stationed, members of the movement then engaged in a series of fruitless performative acts, including some that contained elements of self-indulgent martyrdom.
Two comparisons come to mind here. First, there is a particular emphasis on ephemeral acts over enduring social structures (more akin to Bey than Bookchin). Second, the infamous quote from Ulrike Meinhof seems apt, “Protest is when I say I don’t like this. Resistance is when I put an end to what I don’t like.”
It would appear that there is little dynamic vision or creativity left within the Exarcheia movement. Rather, there is a basic playbook that consists of a few limited, tired actions: marches, microphone demos, flyers, and events that bare no discernible difference from typical public or private ones, apart from the fact that they are “self-organized.”
Hence, there is a singular focus on form at the expense of content.
What we mean is that despite the self-organized form, the content does nothing to destabilize the conditions that threaten the neighborhood, as it is largely congruent with the standard fare of the general public and that of a typical pacified, gentrified neighborhood, with sporting events, popular bands, and endless events for children, not to mention the effective privatization of Parko Navarino for near exclusive use by young families.
Exarcheia has typically been celebrated by the movement (in a very postmodernist fashion) as a space of political and social fermentation amongst a multiplicity of actors, with no grand, overarching goal … no attempt at forming a comprehensive plan for what Exarcheia could or should become. Within this framework, groups were very good at defining what they were against (cops, state, mafias), but not very good at defining what they were for, other than the concept of self-organization itself.
In theory, this left opportunity for future radical development, but in practice, this reluctance (or inability) on the part of the movement to define a larger goal for the neighborhood has left an absence, and in that absence, state, capital, and hipster entrepreneurs have been able to fill it with their own meanings, ideals, and goals: the state with the metro, a heavy police presence, and the closure of squats and self-organized spaces, all in order to tame Exarcheia and mold it into an acceptable image akin to any other neighborhood in the center of Athens; capital with property investment and luxury apartments; and hipster entrepreneurs by taking advantage of the “alternative” reputation of the neighborhood in order to open cafes and shops that succeed in attracting a whole new class and clientele to the neighborhood.
Regarding the state, the movement has put itself in the unfortunate position of now requiring a change in government and subsequent change in policy (such as removing the 24/7 police occupation or reinstating university asylum) in order to provide even the opportunity for some kind of action against the metro works or the permanent retaking of Gini. Regarding the rest (and gentrification in general), there appears to be even less of a plan of action. Perhaps this is due in no small part to the fact that (as rumor has it) certain hipster entrepreneurs are attending certain assemblies, and some assembly members are profiting from Airbnb.
To be sure, Exarcheia has faced several periods of crisis in the past, and there have been several moments where people have predicted the “death” of Exarcheia. And while the current moment seems qualitatively different from, and more severe than, any other that has preceded it, perhaps the movement can once again weather the storm and emerge to begin a new era. However, it is also possible that in order to do this, the Exarcheia movement must recognize that the typical strategies employed thus far have reached the limits of what they can accomplish, and thus the movement must reckon with its contradictions, revise and expand its playbook, and proceed to develop some larger vision of what a truly radical Exarcheia should look like (perhaps more like Bookchin than Bey).
In the meantime, our assembly will engage in small, surreptitious, unorthodox, yet targeted direct actions, aimed not at spectacle, but at chipping away at the growing hegemony of the hipster and rentier classes. We will not, for the time being, call open assemblies, as we fear that they will simply be infiltrated by the ineffective proposals of the dominant groups.
Assembly Against the Gentrification of Exarcheia