The repertoire of housing contention: the birth of the Stay Put campaign in Barcelona

Abstract

Past research in the housing-movement literature has assumed a close link between the post-2008 cycle of housing financialization and the resurgence of housing contention in many Western democracies. However, the new cycle of capital accumulation fails to explain why housing movements privilege some strategic forms of contention over others, how tactical innovations occur, and what pathways they develop after cycles of protest. This article returns to the repertoire perspective to analyse the expansion of housing protest repertoires to tenants’ activism in Barcelona. It argues that the repertoire of housing contention has mediated relations between the new cycle of housing financialization and contentious interactions between tenants and landlords in Barcelona’s private-rental sector. Employing the case of the Sindicat de Llogateres (Tenants’ Union of Barcelona) and the Stay Put campaign, this article makes a twofold contribution to explain the transmission and transformation of the established repertoire in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis.