Desire Foundation organizes the Assembly for Housing Justice in Cluj within the TransEuropa Assemblies (TEA) project coordinated by European Alternatives. The activists invited to our event are committed to social public housing and/or tenant organizing. Here is a brief description of their work:
Action Logement Bruxelles, Brussels (BE)
We are residents of Brussels, workers in the housing sector, researchers and activists. We are convinced that housing should be accessible to all, and that to achieve this right, we must fight together. We want to participate in the creation of a broad front that allows residents to mobilise together. Whatever our means and our situation.
Let’s not remain isolated, let’s get together, let’s prevent evictions, let’s talk to each other, let’s show solidarity! Hungry residents and angry workers, let’s refuse to be crushed by this expensive, racist and poor quality rental market!
DAL – Droit Au Logement, Paris (FR)
Droit Au Logement (DAL) is a grassroots organisation created in 1990 in the 20th arrondissement of Paris by 48 evicted families and right to housing activists which occupied two empty buildings to provide shelter for homeless people. After two months of mobilization, all the occupants had a housing proposal. From that day on, DAL has been organizing collective actions (demonstrations, occupation of public spaces, requisition of empty buildings) with homeless people, tenants and squatters in defense of right to housing. In 1998 the Federation Droit au Logement was created for regrouping local groups of DAL all over France.
DAL stands for the end of evictions, decent and affordable housing for all, state investment on public and social housing, the application of the law for the requisition of empty buildings and vacant housing belonging to public and private actors. In general DAL aims to organize support and promote actions in defense of people facing problems with housing.
Habita, Lisbon (PT)
Habita is an association whose mission is the recognition, defence and affirmation of the right to housing and the city. We understand the right to adequate housing as a fundamental human right for the experience of all economic, social, cultural rights as well as civil and political. We also affirm the right to the city, with equal access and enjoyment to its various spaces, services and equipment and active participation in the process of its construction.
Stop Evictions, Berlin (GE)
The Stop Evictions alliance has been struggling since 2012 through many forms of civil disobedience for the right of housing. At the heart of our action is the issue of forced evictions in Berlin. In recent years displacement of people on lower incomes from the city centre has become a sad reality. The process is similar to many other cities, the speculative strategies of private owners, real estate and public housing companies who are trying to extract the maximum profit from their houses. Forced evictions have been increasing massively and finding a new house has become a challenge for many of us due to skyrocketing prices. More and more tenants are left behind in hopeless situations until the bailiffs come. Our group strives for a society based on mutual aid and solidarity, and organizes diverse and public protest against this together with those who have been affected.
FCDL, Bucharest (RO)
The Common Front for Housing Rights (FCDL) is an initiative started by people whose basic rights to housing are in danger of being breached or have already been breached. Created in Bucharest by a group of evicted persons or those living under the constant threat of forced eviction, together with relatives, friends, activists and artists – FCDL is a platform for housing activism. We address evicted persons, those who might be evicted but also: anyone supporting the right to proper housing; civic organizations; independent political groups but also media, political decision makers, local and central authorities. We understand the right to proper housing not only as a defensive move against forced eviction, but as comprising all necessary reforms which might efface various types of inequalities created by the housing market.
Căși Sociale ACUM!, Cluj (RO)
Căși sociale ACUM! / Social Housing NOW! is a civic-activist initiative that aims to problematize social housing in the city of Cluj, in the context of the drastic reduction of the public housing fund and the transformation of housing into a real estate business in recent decades, as well as limiting access to social housing precisely to people who are entitled to occupy the public housing fund.
FACILITATORS
Zenkő Bogdán
Tătăran Adrian
Zenkő has been in Cluj since 2008 with some longer and shorter breaks. She has been here as a student, cultural manager, cinema manager, festival manager, university assistant, and has always lived as a tenant.
Adi is a PhD student, writes, studies, digs through archives and occasionally edits books. He’s been living in Cluj since 2000, where he’s been studying and working, from rent to rent. He finds the city less and less welcoming.
ORGANISERS
Desire Foundation, Cluj (RO)
Since 1996, Desire has provided a collective action platform for public intellectuals, academic people, artists, and civic activists in Cluj characterized by a multicultural environment but also shaped by deep social inequalities. The Foundation offers a flexible space for critical and transformative actions in research, community building and advocacy through programmes and campaigns.
European Alternatives
European Alternatives works to promote democracy, equality and culture beyond the nation-state and imagine, demand and enact alternatives for a viable future.
TransEuropa Assemblies (TEA) project
Transeuropa Assemblies is a series of innovative citizens assemblies taking place in 7 countries, involving participants from over 15 countries in deliberation of their priorities for the European elections in 2024. These assemblies engage groups that are least likely to participate in the elections, including women, young people, racialised minorities including Roma and Sinti, unemployed people and people without further education. The assemblies have six themes: health rights, civil liberties, rights at work, environment, housing, and gender related rights. The recommendations will be used to influence the European election manifestos of the political parties, thereby working to at once Europeanise the elections and to make the elections more pertinent to the concerns of everyday citizens.