Les Tanneries, Dijon, France

After nine years of continuous occupation, and despite a legal occupation contract with the city government, the "Tanneries" squat in Dijon is currently facing eviction for the development of a huge private medical center, which also endangers the local public health system. This is part of the current wave of repression across European Union against well-established autonomous social centers: many have been evicted in the past year. The Tanneries are a major support center for social movements in Europe, and are the People's Global Action Infopoint in France.

Latest News:

Espace Autogéré des Tanneries (fr)

Translations:
AZ "Les Tanneries" in Dijon räumungsbedroht (de) | Defensem l'espai autonom "Les Tanneries" (ca) | Defendamos el centro social okupado autogestionado "Les Tanneries" (es) | Francia : Les Tanneries no se dejarán desalojar! (es) | Les Tanneries gune autonomoa defenda dezagun (eusk) | Dijon: Les Tanneries non si lasceranno sgomberare! (it) | Дижон, Франция: Защитим свободное пространство "Кожевенный завод" - "Les Tanneries"! (ru)

Dernières nouvelles de la lutte pour l'Espace Autoréré des Tanneries (fr)
Català | Deutsch | Español | Euskara | Italiano

The Tanneries writes:

After nearly 10 years of existence, the squatted autonomous space "Les Tanneries" (in Dijon, France) is being threatened by a private medical complex, facilitated by the city council.

We have just learnt that Dijon's city council had started negotiations to sell our occupied social centre and its surroundings to developers, and we need to act quickly. This is why we have written the following statement, explaining why and how we will struggle for the very existence of our free space.

After a first protest gathering and an occupation of the city hall meeting in Dijon, as well as a number of support e-mails from around the world, the council has slightly backed up, saying they will consider putting our space aside from the building plans. However, there's no way we can take that for granted; not if we don't maintain pressure, and prepare to act whenever we face another alert.

To all those you have been supporting us in the last few days, we want to say: "thanks for the amazing strenght and support you gave us". We still incite you all to voice your discontent to the municipality, by letters, telephone or e-mails:

Mairie de Dijon,
M. François Rebsamen
place de la Libération
21000 Dijon, France
(+33|0)-380-745-151)
E-mail: francois.rebsamen@ville-dijon.fr

We need to maintain the pressure, and take the time to create a wider mobilisation. Thanks again, and be ready!

* * *

Without any public consultation, but with the typical secrecy that typically accompanies hot topics during electoral periods, the "socialist" city council of Dijon is making decisions that could lead to the end of the autonomous space "Les Tanneries", a self-managed political, social, cultural centre that was squatted in 1997 and since then has become an important node for anarchist organizing and radical activism throughout France and Europe. Needless to say, we won't let the council carry out their plans!

We have known since the beginning that we would have to maintain a permanent vigilence, despite the no-eviction agreement we obtained from the council in 2002 after years of fighting. In early March 2007, after hearing persistant rumours about threatening projects, we got in touch with the council and asked for explanations. In spite of repeated queries by mail and telephone, we were denied any answer. Two days ago, we got the confirmation from a trustworthy but unofficial source, that the city council had sent a written proposal to the "Générale de Santé", offering them the whole piece of land where our space is located for the construction of a 25-acre-wide private medical complex by 2009.

While public healthcare services are being threatened by neo-liberal privatising strategies in Europe, will the Dijon city council encourage a "two tiered" health system?

Does it want to contribute to the monopoly of Générale de Santé, the biggest European private health multinational corporation (1.741 billion euros of profit in 2006, 10% of the transnational being owned by Vivendi) by offering them land that is close to the city centre, almost in front of the public hospital? The Générale de Santé would thus seize this great opportunity to close its nearby hospitals rather than renovating them.

Despite its propaganda for "participative democracy", the city council did not ask us or anyone else from the neighbourhood before proposing the deal which not only threatens us, but would also decide upon the future of a whole part of town.

* * *

Why support Les Tanneries loud and clear?

The council's policies are already threatening the independant theater "L'Eldorado", as well as the squat called "Le Toboggan". By planning to shut down "Les Tanneries", the council will ostensibly confirm that the so-called "socialist" party wants France to be a police state without places of resistance, experimentation and popular culture.

"Les Tanneries" hosts a concert hall for do-it-yourself bands and miscellaneous performances, a housing collective and some anarchist affinity groups, a hacklab for developing free software and running alternative servers, a free-shop, a space for mecanics and a bike-repair workshop, rehearsal rooms and silk-screening facilities, a meeting space, an organic garden, an alternative media center, a squatters' helpdesk, a library, diverse ecological constructions, dozens of collectives, associations, and local and international networks that use the space to organise gigs, info-nights, actions, skill-shares, meetings and projects...

While public cultural spaces run with the help of huge grants, and private ones thanks to businesses and sponsors, hundreds of people come weekly to "Les Tanneries" to create a truly independent culture and indulge in all kinds of activities for free or on a "sliding-scale" basis. To preserve its freedom, "Les Tanneries" has always been run without any kind of subsidies nor any employees.

In a country where self-managed structures are almost always repressed and therefore fragile, "Les Tanneries" is one of the very few long lasting projects of this kind. Hence it has become a resourceful place and a crucial part of an autonomous, activist and counter-cultural scene in Europe.

"Les Tanneries" is about putting radical social views into practice and about providing tools for people to experience their ideas. We try to break down the borders between our "personal lives" and the "political world" - an attempt at organizing in formal horizontal fashion, against authoritarian and hierarchical structures.

We want to build things ourselves and change our own lives by challenging domination, racism, sexism and homophobia - in the streets, as much as within our own walls. Most importantly, we want to do it now, rather than wait for some D-day that might not come.

However, "Les Tanneries" doesn't want to be a "nice and friendly" alternative that won't shove established powers too violently, nor does it want to be some tolerated folklorical zoo that would prove the democratic goodwill of council leaders. We're here to struggle and change the world, naturally!

Still, we don't fantasize about standing on the fringe of society. Contrary to the cynical mainstream political norm, experiences such as ours are showing it is possible to practically challenge capitalism and authority without electoral speeches. Throughout its existence, "Les Tanneries" has proved that it is not only realistic, but also relevant to self-organise without institutions. We also believe that we've demonstrated that our project is not just the delirious utopia of a bunch of kids who will change their minds when they grow older.

"Les Tanneries", just like all these places standing against the world surrounding them, is unique in its way, and yet bound to the history of so many. It sprang out of the dreams, collusions and affinities, encounters and combativity of hundreds of people. Carved within its walls are the joys and angers, rages and passions, adventures and emotions of several generations.

* * *

# Our project can't be moved or destroyed;
# It must stay in the neighbourhood!

Whatever the new urban development plans for the neighbourhood might be, we will struggle to preserve what we've been building here for ten years and to ensure that the project as a whole can carry on. It is perfectly possible, considering how much available space there is around "Les Tanneries". With a real political will from the City Hall, suitable solutions can be found.

Thanks to everyone for their support, and thanks for the series of pressure actions that were done before "Les Tanneries" got an end to city harassment in 2002. Five years later, we're ready to start fighting again to defend this space and build a new network of resistance based upon the contacts, experiences and complicities that we've made over the years. Not only is "Les Tanneries" deeply-rooted locally, but it is also part of a larger community whose affinities know no borders. Be it through support actions around the world, or by coming to "Les Tanneries" to physically defend the place against eviction, we expect this extended family to mobilize with us!

Let's hope leaders will keep in mind the long days and nights of demonstrating and rioting that paralysed the Danish capital in the last weeks, as well as the number of radical actions that happened all over Europe in support of our friends in Ungdomshuset. Just like theirs, our struggle is a global fight for self-organised spaces and nodes of subversion to carry on and extend all over Europe.

While we're very likely to call for solidarity actions in the future, we want to start with a warning campaign, and incite you to write to Dijon's city-hall to say that you want "Les Tanneries" to carry on existing where it is. If you want to be informed of support actions and demonstrations, send us your e-mail or phone number at tanneries at squat dot net.

We'll defend, we'll resist, because we have the rage to do it!

Dijon, March 24th 2007,
Espace autogéré des Tanneries,
http://squat.net/tanneries/
tanneries at squat dot net

Other recent housing rights news in Europe
Expulsions à Grenoble (fr) | Cachan: Socialist mayor threatens to evict homeless immigrants | Madrid: Manifestación por una vivienda digna (es)

***Readers are invited to describe or add links to the stories of their own local housing-rights and land-use struggles in the comments to this story.***

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