Defend, disrupt, and build: Guerrilla urbanist interventions and fighting gentrification in the barrio

Abstract

This study proposes guerrilla urbanist interventions (GUIs) as a domain to analyze some seemingly more conflictual and confrontational anti-gentrification efforts in the barrio. The historic and theoretical foundation of guerrillas informs the spatial and political conceptualization of these more confrontational urban interventions. The research examines anti-gentrification efforts in Boyle Heights and Santa Ana, California through this guerrilla urbanist intervention framework and analyses data collected through interviews and participant observation, and archival data comprised of public videos, writings, and manifestos. The analysis surfaces themes of "Defense," "Disruption," and

The contradictory field of community organizing in the United States: A theoretical framework

“…These protests were covered by local and national media alike, raising questions and debate about the gentrification of the city's historically Latino working communities. These types of tactics are, as Scott would say, the "weapons of the weak" (Scott 1985); costing little financially but generating enormous uncertainty and risk for investors and city officials (Sarmiento 2021). Despite the efficacy of such tactics, they require committed activists to risk their freedom, money, and psychological and personal well-being.…”

“…In addition to radical language, insurgents employ disruptive political tactics like rent strikes, occupations, and other forms of civil disobedience (Piven and Cloward 1979). For instance, an insurgent community organization in Boyle Heights, Los Angeles aggressively protested art galleries, coffee shops, and other purveyors of gentrification in the neighborhood (Huante 2021; Sarmiento 2021; co-author, forthcoming). These protests were covered by local and national media alike, raising questions and debate about the gentrification of the city’s historically Latino working communities.…”

Focusing in on fringe urban spaces

“…And they persist in the cuts, contours, and corrugated landscapes of even the most lopsided cities. A large literature found across the social sciences and humanities has long sought to focus in on such fringe place-making, conceptualized as insurgent and guerilla urbanism (Hou, 2010; Rios 2009; Sarmiento, 2021), spaces of enduring informality (Mukhija and Loukaitou-Sideris, 2014; Roy, 2005), what I have identified as “insurgent artscapes” produced by graffiti writers and street artists (Bloch, 2019a, 2020a), or what urban architectural theorist Ignasio de Solà-Morales (1995) identifies as “terrains vague,” or vernacular remnants left over from cataclysmic capitalist development. Whatever the metaphor, what is clear is that focusing in on the fringes, as Guma (2023) argues, reveals urban spaces and practices not easily seen from the sky.…”