Construir la ciudadanía colectivamente: prácticas urbanas de una asamblea popular en Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Abstract

Traditional ideas about citizenship in their liberal conception emphasize the role played by the individual as the holder of rights and duties. These ideas have been strongly questioned by various currents of thought and from some fields of studies, such as urban studies. In this paper we seek to contribute to these debates by analyzing the urban practices of a popular assembly in the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires (CABA-Argentina). These practices are enmeshed in disputes between the old and the new, the public and the private, and the visible and invisible, configuring citizenships that promote ways of understanding and building more participatory and democratic cities. We analyze the activities of “making visible” and activism in relation to the homelessness problem as well as the Assembly’s intention of building an urban habitat anchored in the decommodification of the city and in collective projects. We conclude that this case testifies to the construction of citizen experiences that have great potential to displace the individualistic corset with which citizens’ rights are usually defined and defended.