...support other activist groups, this direct action group squatted in a house in a slowly gentrifying neighborhood and created a lively counter-public sphere. The squatters were evicted from the building after three months, but this direct action succeeded insofar as it drew attention to, and raised critical awareness of, the housing crisis in Toronto. It also questioned the dominant ideology about what is public and what is private, and laid open the contradictions of a neoliberal political framework that takes many forms. In this sense, though OCAP responded with direct actions to place-specific conditions, it raised questions that transcend the local level. Therefore, this direct action group can be situated within the context of anti-poverty and anti-homelessness groups and within the broader scope of social movements fighting against global capitalism.

In this article, we describe and analyze the Pope Squat as a direct action to resist privatization processes in Toronto and an attempt to build a broad-based coalition capable of combating policies that drive neoliberal urbanism. We then discuss public and private space, describe Toronto's housing policy and the gentrification process there, and detail the story of the Pope Squat. We argue that the housing crisis for low-income people in Toronto results from the dominant ownership model, (1) which allows speculation and is based on a legalistic understanding of space, and from the rediscovery of urban downtown living in the form of a condominium boom. As part of a neoliberal agenda, diminishing housing options for low-income people are the consequence.

Public or Private?

What is public and what is private can be defined in very different terms. In the case of land, the capitalist model is based on the understanding that all land--a limited good--can be partitioned off and turned into a commodity, which then responds to the mantra of supply and demand, expressed in a fluctuating exchange value. Though not all land is directly part of the capitalist logic of property value, now, under the regime of neoliberalism, public land is increasingly understood to be a commodity with a defined exchange value. A current example in Canada is a proposal to give away public land within a national park for private-sector condominium developments. Enraged by this selling out of the public to private investors, over 1,000 people protested on a cold, rainy day in Montreal in April 2006. In contrast, the use value of land is much more important in many non- and pre-capitalist societies. It is most clearly defined by First Nation People, who understand land as a common good, for everyone currently alive and for future and past generations.

The hegemonic understandings and practices relating to property affect legal deliberations, social discourse, and government interventions. In Unsettling the City: Urban Land and the Politics of Property, Nick Blomley points to the dominant approaches to property, which "assume that ownership rights are created at one moment in time and immutable thereafter. However, it is useful to recognize that property is not a static, pre-given entity, but depends on a continual, active 'doing.' Property is therefore an enactment, or a communicative claim to others" (2004: xvi).

In this sense, property is the articulation of an ownership practice upon land, and like space, it is socially constructed, necessitating the cooperation of actors and institutions to enforce and reproduce it. Ownership, or claim, to these spaces is enacted in a number of material practices, such as land use and zoning maps, deeds, titles, signs, and regular use. However, claims to ownership are also enacted through storytelling, or the transformation of space in place (Hayden, 1997; Chamberlin, 2003).

The state's regulation of land use has been legitimized through a history of urbanization. When resources needed to be allocated, the state was charged with the responsibility of organizing this allocation. Like other industrialized nation-states, Canada developed a welfare state policy that functioned as a safety net and as a pacifier for the fragile members of its society. In the global economy, however, land, and in this sense space, is exposed to the practices of global marketing strategies and this regulation is far from synonymous with welfare distribution. This is particularly clear in cities, where we can witness an increased degree of polarization (Fainstein, Gordon, and Harloe, 1992). Most notably, this is seen in rising land prices and the cost of housing, resulting in substandard housing for low-income groups and an increase in homelessness and gentrification (Smith, 1996; Hackworth and Smith, 2001).

Economic restructuring on a global scale left its imprint on cities such as Toronto, where manufacturing relocated to other areas and left behind vast inner-city areas that were no longer used for producing goods. These abandoned spaces, often located in the city center, were almost forgotten as sites for reinvestment. Described as "liminal space" (Zukin, 1991), and more recently as "indeterminate spaces" (Groth and Corijn, 2005), they were claimed by a variety of people. Squatters (Blackwell and Goonewardena, 2004), plus young adults and artists--the classical pioneers of gentrification--were attracted to this area by a mixture of the aesthetics of abandoned warehouses, the close proximity to the center, the thrill of living outside the norm, and the low cost of housing. Planners and policymakers rediscovered the inner city as a site for good urban and regional planning, fighting sprawl, and contributing to the environmental protection of the city's outskirts, while foregrounding the positive side of city life, particularly its cultural and social aspects. Policies appear to be driven by questions of sustainability, but competitiveness on the part of cities for position within the global economy is the engine behind the renewed attention inner cities are receiving. Competitiveness is increasingly gauged by the cultural amenities that a city offers. This strategy partly involves repopulating the inner city with people from the "creative class," as well as with young professionals, by supporting the building boom of condominium towers and arts districts in the downtown core (Lehrer and Laidley, 2006). In Toronto, associated policies include rezoning former industrial land into mixed-use areas and active support for global and local investors to build condominiums. This has spurred the redevelopment of designated areas of the city and focused on the aesthetics of the landscape to attract an affluent, upwardly mobile middle-class population into the downtown core. This repopulation strategy is believed to create employment and spur the economy, but it also leaves out large parts of the current inner-city population.

The relation between the social production of space and property rights is also important. As argued elsewhere (Lehrer, 1998), major changes are taking place in the way in which space is produced, perceived,...

NOTE: All illustrations and photos have been removed from this article.



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