Squatting Days

Freiburg im Breisgau: October 18-29, 2019. Do-It-Together: squatters convention, festival and other resistances

We would like to invite you to extend the summer in Freiburg and participate in the squatting days, to celebrate the birthdays of the KTS and the InfoShop and to come together for a libertarian outlook.

Freiburg is a small town in the southern part of the black forest, where official maps draw the borders between Switzerland, Germany and France. It is a friendly region between the Rhine nuclear power plants, major economic logistic points and the armament industry of the black forest and which lends itself well to various subversive activities. Moreover, winter does not arrive as quickly as in the rest of the republic. Our squatting days want to focus on housing and gentrification issues, but we find ourselves in times where struggles and resistance can only be effective through an intersectional approach and squats represent only a part of the necessary anti-fascist, feminist and anti-capitalist struggles.

For quite some time now, the same ugly developments have been taking place everywhere: the presence of cops and surveillance is increasing, the freed spaces are reduced or expelled. In the past months, the “die WG” (Create Living Spaces) campaign has managed to make a lot of noise around these issues of the neoliberal city and social exclusion. We want to continue this fight during the days of action.

The KTS, the local autonomous centre, is the last big self-managed space in southern Germany. Creating new spaces is becoming more and more difficult, especially in view of the current political situation. The two squatted houses in Gartenstrasse 19 (since the spring of 2010) are currently threatened with eviction, seven openings since December 2018 have been quickly evicted. Since Kommando Rhino and Sand-im-Getriebe were cleared, there are still no new “Wagenplatz” (see note below) despite a growing need. In addition, the contract for the Schattenparker ‘Wagenplatz’ ends in September. For us, the struggle for more self-contained places in the city is far from over. We want to put these issues forward during the days of action and fight for new living spaces!

We want to be active and develop solidarity practices and to support the squatting actions of the last months. We want to encourage each other and strengthen our bonds. Threatened projects like Liebig 34 or Rozbrat and many others need support – practical support. In recent years dozens of squats and social centres have been evicted all over Europe. The resistance against these evictions was very localized and often far too silent. It is time to to bring the question of organisation to the forefront again!

more info: kts-freiburg.org | diewg.noblogs.org | radar.squat.net

¹ In Germany and Switzerland common housing project, where people live in self-managed caravans and mobile homes.

Longer Version

Squatting Days Freiburg: October 18-29, 2019. Do-It-Together: squatters convention, festival and other resistances

Get out!

For quite some time now, the same ugly developments have become apparent here, like everywhere else: the presence of cops and surveillance is increasing, the freed spaces are reduced or expelled. In the past months, the “die WG” (Create Living Spaces) campaign has managed to make a lot of noise around these issues of the neoliberal city and social exclusion. We want to continue this fight during the days of action.

The KTS, the local autonomous centre, is the last big self-managed space in southern Germany. Creating new spaces is becoming more and more difficult, especially in view of the current political situation. The two squatted houses in Gartenstrasse 19 (since the spring of 2010) are currently threatened with eviction, seven openings since December 2018 have been quickly evicted. Since Kommando Rhino and Sand-im-Getriebe were cleared, there are still no new “Wagenplatz” (In Germany and Switzerland common housing project, where people live in self-managed caravans and mobile homes) despite a growing need. In addition, the contract for the Schattenparker ‘Wagenplatz’ ends in September. For us, the struggle for more self-contained places in the city is far from over. We want to put these issues forward during the days of action and fight for new living spaces!

We want to be active and develop solidarity practices and to support the squatting actions of the last months. We want to encourage each other and strengthen our bonds. Threatened projects like Liebig 34 or Rozbrat and many others need support – practical support. In recent years dozens of squats and social centres have been evicted all over Europe. The resistance against these evictions was very localized and often far too silent, from Villa Amalias via the Klinika to the ADM. It is time to to bring the question of organisation to the forefront again!

From protest to resistance

We do not want to stand idly by and watch this state of growing repression. In addition to networking anarchist spaces and structures, we want to be practical, because we must develop concepts for a creative and effective resistance against the destruction of our open spaces. We invite you to make the activities as varied as possible. In times of increasing attacks from the right and the capitalist mainstream, we want to strengthen a debate about the self-defense and social relevance of our centers and places.

Our actions thus inevitably focus on repression, because as the past few years have shown, there is a trend in social and security policy towards designating all resistant structures and individuals as threats. The unseen aftermath of the G20 manifesting itself as house searches and convictions, the censorship of the left-wing radical portal Indymedia ‘Linksunten’ – all these attacks have also hit Freiburg hard. The expansion of the (police) authorities and their powers, the open right-wing politics of supposedly moderate parties and the open cooperation with and promotion of fascists by state institutions – all this can only strengthen our anti-authoritarian and anti-fascist convictions. We also want to make this aspect of resistance the object of our protest and send solidarity behind the walls of prisons, ever further, for a society that no longer needs prisons.

Uncommercial culture from ‘Linksunten’

For decades, autonomous centres and occupied houses have been relevant platforms for the development of unique cultural scenes. The absence of state control gives rise to relatively large freedoms and often the breeding ground for subversive politics. This become apparent as musicans, theatres, bike kitchens, graphic artists, screen printing, free shops, films, graffiti, readings and parties – all this becomes tangible in Freiburg.

Within the framework of the Autonomous Cultural Days, which will take place from 16 to 26 October, there will be numerous concerts, performances, workshops and meetings at the Autonomous Centre, and the Cultural Week will also become visible at other locations. Anyway, there will be plenty of rock’n’roll, hip-hop, street art, direct action, lectures, gigs, a night dance demo – get in touch if you plan to contribute something to the cultural explosion.

For us, free spaces for left-wing radical culture and politics are places where all living beings can move without discrimination on the basis of gender, skin colour, sexuality, money or other inequalities constructed by society. Because forms of oppression are commonplace in our society, it is important to create and maintain spaces in which they are not accepted, but discussed and reflected upon. They should make it possible to live out one’s own identity.The quest for such a “free space” in the midst of capitalist reality remains a utopia; it depends on everyone how successful we can and want to make the days. In any case, there will be structures for awareness and out-of-action and a setting that is as participation-friendly as possible . We want to create a self-determined freedom and a platform for dealing with different ideas, to initiate encounters, to network and to develop perspectives together.

Lets go: lets Do It Together

The principle should work in such a way that in Freiburg the infrastructure for activities such as workshops, concerts, film screenings and street art, lectures and parties as well as direct actions and you can use these for your ideas. Occupations and the defense of our spaces are more than just fun for us. It is a necessary practice of resistance, which are more relevent to society the better we organise.

Throughout history, but also in the present, the position of the property question and the occupation of spaces have repeatedly become important focus points, where useless large-scale projects have been prevented, neighbourhood networks strengthened and built up, politics appropriated and the capitalist logic of living space broken through. We want to build structures that are based on solidarity and through which the city first develops its political meaning, namely to be determined by those who want to live in it and not by the interests of the market. Together we are strong – let’s get the city back!

The Squatting-Days are not a consumer spectacle but a D.I.Y.-Festival and come to life through everyone’s initiative! Everyone is invited to take part in the organization and to contribute to making it a constructive event, So this is the invitation to all chaotic and autonomous forces to participate in the convention.

Let us know your plans and ideas at squattingfreiburg(@)riseup.net (PGP keys here) so that we can coordinate the program.

Please forward the invitation and bring yourself and your crew to Freiburg. Celebrate with us some libertarian, creative, subversive and solidarity-filled days in Freiburg!

more info: kts-freiburg.org | diewg.noblogs.org | radar.squat.net