In this blog post, Olaf Tietje shows how the current popular protests against mass tourism in Barcelona (Spain) are linked to the dissatisfaction of the residents of the Raval district. The transformation of the welfare state and the touristification of parts of the city are severely restricting the opportunities for social participation. Against this background, the residents of the Raval are partly organising their own structures of participation.
As is currently evident from the diverse protests that are taking place in Spanish tourist strongholds, many people in Spain are dissatisfied with the impacts of mass tourism. Activists are organising protests in the Balearic Islands, the Canary Islands, and on the mainland against how cities and landscapes are being transformed and adapted to the needs and demands of tourists. In many places, these transformations mean that residential spaces are converted into tourist apartments or that hotel complexes dominate squares and urban landscapes. In the Catalan capital of Barcelona, in the north of Spain, the effects of mass tourism are particularly evident in the districts of the city centre. Frequented by many tourists, these areas have seen their cityscape changing significantly in recent decades. This would not necessarily be bad – after all, tourism is also an important source of income for the city. However, the transformation of entire neighbourhoods also means that people are being displaced and that their living conditions are deteriorating, especially in terms of housing.
Raval is Barcelona’s somewhat down-at-heel centre, next to the port. The area has been redeveloped and turned into a hotspot of tourism. It is home to the famous Rambla – the more than one-kilometre-long promenade in the centre of Barcelona – and is directly adjacent to the port and the city beach. Due to its proximity to the port, the neighbourhood has long been inhabited by immigrants, mainly from Morocco. Restructuring since the mid-1990s has not been focused on improving the quality of life of the quarter’s residents, but on making it more attractive for tourists. With the construction of the new Rambla and the expansion of the port, the number of tourists increased continuously.
Once notorious for its crime and neglect, the Raval neighbourhood in Barcelona has in recent decades become a centre of culture and tourism. The area has experienced an ambivalent evolution, marked by contrasts. This transformation has been driven by several factors, including public investment in urban regeneration projects, the creation of cultural institutions such as the Museum of Contemporary Art (MACBA) and the Centre for Contemporary Culture of Barcelona (CCCB), as well as the rise of alternative art and music scenes and the influx of young, creative residents. Despite these changes, the Raval remains a place of diversity and social challenges.
However, gentrification has led to rising rents that have financially burdened many long-time residents and created tensions between new and established communities. Residents of the neighbourhood are confronted with social inequality and exclusion. They face discrimination in access to housing, wage labour and public services, which has exacerbated their social and economic exclusion. Gentrification and rising property prices have further marginalised low-income residents, leading to their displacement and a loss of affordable housing. The district’s residents are in an ongoing struggle for social justice and equality. This situation underlines the need for an inclusive urban development policy that prioritises the needs of all residents, regardless of their socio-economic status.
Linked to the neoliberalisation of social security systems in Spain – including in the wake of the global financial crisis of 2007/08 – social movements have developed various practices to address the direct effects of the dismantling of welfare state achievements. Drawing on these experiences, neighbourhood unions have developed in recent years to provide advice and support in various parts of the city. In Raval, for example, the local neighbourhood union has occupied an abandoned building and set up a community centre. There, activists offer advice if the mortgage or rent can no longer be paid, organise food, sports activities and a self-organised nursery.
The community centre in the occupied building provides a space for the residents of Raval to oppose the practices of exclusion. Residents become activists who look at individual problems together trying to find collective solutions. This self-organised infrastructure allows the neighbours to participate in social life. Through the collective practices, the neighbours in the district themselves become activists and thus establish a local participation infrastructure that simultaneously becomes an infrastructure for welfare provision. This type of collective search for solutions is linked to having a sense of belonging to the district. This connection between participation and belonging crystallises in the neighbourhood union and points to a possible consolidation of the self-organised infrastructure. This is also observable in the context of other self-organised community centers in Barcelona, such as La Cinètika, an autonomously organised cinema and cultural centre or the neighbourhood-organised Can Batlló with its many different manifestations.
However, it also becomes clear that at this level, participation is not guaranteed. Rather, it depends on coincidental conditions. Neighbourhood unions don’t exist in every barrio of Barcelona and the spaces of self-organised community centres are contested. Not everywhere abandoned buildings can be turned into new community spaces, and not in every place neighbours come together to collectively solve problems. The neoliberalisation of social security systems, combined with the touristification of living spaces and their gentrification, exacerbates social inequality and exclusion. It shifts opportunities for participation into the individual proximity of people. With a lack of quality-of-life urban spaces become mere spaces of capital accumulation. The dissatisfaction with these conditions is reflected in the recent protests described above.
All articles posted on this blog give the views of the author(s), and not the position of the Department of Sociology, nor of the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Image credit: Dr Olaf Tietje
