Regimes of austerity

Abstract

This article discusses the European wave of contention catalyzed by the financial market crash of 2008/9 and the subsequent imposition of austerity measures by governments across the continent. It develops two central arguments. First, it argues that we need a clearer and more sharply differentiated understanding of the operation of austerity as a social and political phenomenon than can be accounted for by reading the crisis of austerity as a solely material set of grievances. Second, it dissociates austerity into a series of interconnected regimes, which are fiscal, ideological, political, and civic. In so doing, I show how the material aspects of austerity are intimately tied to the ideational, institutional, and spatial enclosures they create, enabling us to see more clearly how the practice of austerity is intimately tied to the progressive dismantling of collective democratic space. The transformative potential of anti-austerity mobilizations accordingly lies in their capacity to develop an alternative moral economy grounded in new forms of solidarity and sociability, whether in workplaces or in the civic squares. Keywords Austerity; strikes; occupations; pro-democracy movements; enclosure Following the subprime lending crisis and subsequent financial market crash of 2008/9, governments Congress (TUC) called 'the biggest strike in a generation', in protest against public sector pension reforms; 1 in November 2012, the European Trade Union Conference staged '14N', an unprecedented 'European Action Day' of transnational, cross-sectoral, and simultaneous strikes in six countries, supported by union rallies and demonstrations in a further seventeen countries (Dufresne 2015, pp.151-3). Mass protests were not restricted to southern and western Europe. Economic crisis, structural adjustment and public sector reform generated remarkable mobilizations in the Balkans and Central-Eastern Europe: in Slovenia, a country of two million people, 150,000 workers in the public and private sectors participated in a collective walk out against wage cuts in 2008, and 100,000 public sector workers organized a general strike in February 2013 (Musić 2013); Varga (2015) reports that, variously, in the Czech Republic, 'Stop the Government!' protests that started in 2010 culminated in April 2012 with a demonstration mobilizing 120,000 people, the largest since 1989; in Poland, the largest trade union confederations (including Solidarity) organized a general strike in Silesia, with 100,000 steel, mining, energy, and transport workers taking part; and in Romania, unions mobilized 750,000 public sector workers in a general strike in October 2009, 50,000 supporters for a demonstration in the centre of Bucharest in May 2010 (here again, the largest since 1989

Organizing Solidarity Initiatives: A Socio-spatial Conceptualization of Resistance

“…In addition, state responses to social movements are increasingly characterized by measures that seek to confine the expression of resistance (Butler, 2015). These responses range from a surge in repression policies to significant new constraints on the freedom of assembly and the exercise of civil liberties (Hayes, 2017). For example, Amnesty International (2012) has described the excessive use of force by the Greek police during protests as 'repeated' and 'routine'.…”

“…These responses range from a surge in repression policies, to significant new constraints on the freedom of assembly and the exercise of civil liberties (Hayes, 2017). For example, Amnesty International (2012) These sites of resistance encourage creative collaborations and interventionary political action and demonstrate the importance of embedding situated instances of resistance in translocal solidarity movements that mobilize collective action.…”

Contesting Actually Existing Austerity

“…Anti-austerity political parties and social movements across Europe, including the PAH, show us that being against austerity is to oppose neoliberalisation and inequality as well as being for more direct forms of democracy (see Flesher Fominaya 2015, Hayes 2017. As much as actually existing austerity has been damaging for millions of people across Europe, austerity as a word has helped to enable the growth of anti-neoliberal political forces in several countries.…”

“…Throughout the post-2008 period austerity has been critiqued on multiple grounds, including that it is not achieving its stated aims (Guajardo et al 2014); that it is a fundamentally flawed idea that will necessarily worsen the problems that it is supposed to solve (Konzelmann 2014); that it is having devastating effects on public health (Karanikolos et al 2013, Legido-Quigley et al 2013; that it entrenches gender inequalities and disproportionately affects already disadvantaged groups of women (Griffin 2015, Montgomerie andTepe-Belfrage 2016); and even that it constitutes the end of democratic capitalism because capitalism no longer provides enough for enough people to sustain it democratically (Schäfer and Streeck 2013, Streeck 2014. Political contestation of austerity has taken many forms in this period, including the 15M, or Indignados, protests in Spain in 2011 (Hughes 2011, Castañeda 2012; an increase in various forms of anti-austerity social movement activity across Europe (Della Porta 2015, Giugni and Grasso 2015, Bailey et al 2016Flesher Fominaya 2017, Hayes 2017; the rise of new anti-austerity parties in Greece and Spain (Kioupkiolis 2016, Ramiro andGomez 2016); and the relative success of the Labour Party on an anti-austerity platform in the 2017 UK General Election (Berry 2017).…”

Comparing protests and demonstrators in times of austerity: regular and occasional protesters in universalistic and particularistic mobilisations

“…Material grievances are perhaps the starting point for mobilisation against austerity measures (Hayes, 2017), but these are socially constructed and apparently, in this construction, the perceptions of the political system and organisational embeddedness are critical to move participants into one type of demonstration or the other.…”