Citizens against Austerity: a Comparative Reflection on Plataforma de Afectados por la Hipoteca (PAH) and Bündnis Zwangsräumung Verhindern (BZV)

Essay: Rethinking Global Civil Society and the Public Sphere in the Age of Pro-democracy Movements

“…PAH works as a network and is coordinated with other European anti-eviction platforms from Italy, Germany, France, UK, etc. Their actions, repertoires, slogans and demands are reproduced in other contexts, with clear parallels in some places (Ordóñez, Feenstra & Tormey, 2015). PAH promotes a network policy that blurs the divisions of what is local, national and transnational.…”

“…These authors stress the existence of common elements between the North-South or East-West divides as the most relevant factor. It is important to see how studies by Kaldor and Scheuw (2013), Pleyers (2013), Flesher-Fominaya (2014), Tormey (2015) and Gerbaudo The international study by Glasius and Pleyers on pro-democracy movements, consolidated as of 2011, points to a "global generation" characterised as "precarious"; capable of using a number of digital tools; and sharing slogans, concerns, repertoires of action and identities (Glasius & Pleyers, 2013, p. 549). At the same time, their work also includes, in line with other contemporary studies in the social movements field:…”

“…), and the use of new tools to share ideas and strategies. Similarly, all these movements share a concern to re-define and re-think democracy beyond its representative structure (Keane, 2013;FlesherFominaya, 2014;Tormey, 2015;Feenstra et al, 2017). In short, we face a trend in which a domestic civil society is not only revitalised but is also another trend redefining the public sphere as global "arenas".…”

“…These movements certainly foster the consolidation of alternative discourses with high resonance (Tormey, 2015). It is worth noting, therefore, the conclusions drawn by Kaldor and Selchow when they state that "unlike previous mobilisations and protests, they seem to have struck a chord in the mainstream; they generate a sense of public excitement wherever they happen" (2013, p. 79).…”

“…(Lawrence, 2013;Romanos, 2016); enhancing the relevance of new communication tools to alter classic political intermediation processes (Tormey, 2015;Subirats, 2012); influencing the mass media through media-based "hacking"; organising protests as if they were shows (Flesher-Fominaya, 2014;Micó & Casero, 2014); consolidating collective shared identities (Gerbaudo & Treré, 2015;Monterde et al, 2015;Toret, 2013); and establishing occupations as places to practice in, to experiment in and for democratic "incubators" (Postill, 2015;Gerbaudo, 2017). These are just some of the trends that define a transnational public sphere and as such it is plausible to consider that we are witnessing movements that form part of global civil society.…”