Marginal gentrifiers, networks of mobilization and new contentious collective identities. The struggle for housing in post-austerity Lisbon

Abstract

If literature has stressed the role of marginal gentrifiers in bringing resources to the areas where they move, apart for relevant exceptions, the potentialities and limits of their contribution to urban struggles has not been systematically addressed. This article assesses the role of these newcomers in the defence of the right to housing in post-austerity Lisbon focusing on their interaction with established activist networks. Resorting to a multi-method approach and an interactionist social movement framework, our study is supported by event analysis, 22 interviews, ethnographic observation and a questionnaire-survey. Our findings show that interactions between marginal gentrifiers and previous housing players helped to consolidate the local activist arena and contributed to the emergence of new urban collective contentious identities. Nevertheless, this contribution seems partially affected by further displacement waves in the context of growing gentrification and touristification, which have threatened the survival of resistance networks. The case of Lisbon can help illuminate similar processes in contexts highly impacted by gentrification and touristification.

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