How to Claim the Right to Housing and the City: Take Over, Take Back, and Take It to the World

This session has two parts: 1) exploration of world-wide actions to claim the right to housing, and 2) a skill-building workshop on taking over/taking back housing. Part I will be led by the Coordinator of the International Alliance of Inhabitants (IAI), with members on 6 continents, and representatives of the US Alliance of Inhabitants (USAI). By the end of this session, the participants will understand the need for and possibility of a global effort to secure the rights to housing and to the city; we expect to emerge with a concrete plan for travelling the road to the World Assembly of Inhabitants, which will be held in conjunction with the World Social Forum in Dakar in 2011. Part II will be led by the national organizers of the Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign (PPEHRC) and Take Back the Land (TBTL); the coordinator of the International Alliance of Inhabitants will describe similar efforts of those who have been actively claiming the right to housing elsewhere in the world. In this “how to” session, participants will explore the tactic of taking over (or taking back) vacant homes and land as part of an overall strategy and learn the basic skills for conducting successful actions. We will examine the theories behind the actions, as well as the multiple approaches used in the USA and around the globe.