Autonomous geographies for radical politics
An interesting paper (though the language is quite heady), by Jenny Pickerill and Paul Chatterton, which examines the use of the internet for radical politics and introduces the concept of Autonomous Geographies.
From the abstract:
“This paper’s focus is what we call ‘autonomous geographies’ – spaces where there is a desire to constitute non-capitalist, collective forms of politics, identity and citizenship. These are created through a combination of resistance and creation, and a questioning and challenging of dominant laws and social norms. The concept of autonomy permits a better understanding of activists’ aims, practices and achievements in alter-globalisation movements. We explore how autonomous geographies multi-scalar strategies that weaves together spaces and times, constituting in-between and overlapping spaces, blending resistance and creation, and combining theory and practice. We flesh out two examples of how autonomous geographies are made through collective decision-making and autonomous social centres. Autonomous geographies provide a useful toolkit for understanding how spectacular protest and everyday life are combined to brew workable alternatives to life beyond capitalism.”
More from the same authors.
