Where Is Culture in Rome? - Global Rome: Changing Faces of the Eternal City - page 230

tion to speculation, glocal resistance to capitalism and consumerism, queer spac-
es and the emergence of new urban forms and identities, and alternative modes
of economic production and exchange. social centers have complex histories and
participate as nodes in larger networks that connect the local to the global. The
centers represent vital engines for both cultural and political life in italy's urban
centers; any attempt to grasp urban change must take their presence into serious
account. The aims of this chapter are: (1) to introduce the reader to the develop-
ment and complexity of social centers; (2) to analyze the particular experience of
such centers in Rome; (3) to discuss some of the political trends that frame this
experience; and (4) to engage with relevant theoretical approaches that support
our analysis of this phenomenon.
The origins of social Centers
The Christian Democrat party, which held power uninterruptedly from 1948 un-
til the early 1990s, steered the country's transition to the post-fordist economy
against great odds, not least of which was the emergence in the mid-1960s of a
strong antagonistic movement which advocated an alternative approach to mo-
dernity by stoutly opposing capitalism, consumerism, and a hierarchical orga-
nization of society (balestrini and moroni 1997). in the mid-1970s, evidence was
mounting that the political hegemony of the Christian Democrats was about to
be broken. in 1974, the more reactionary sections of society were defeated in an
antidivorce referendum; the italian Communist party was gaining votes; and, for
the first time, there seemed to be some possibility of a left-wing government com-
ing to power. all the same, in 1976, the italian Communist party chose to form
an alliance with the Christian Democrats, the so-called “historic compromise,”
which resulted in three years of national coalition governments. The first genera-
tion of social centers arose within this context in the latter half of the 1970s, when
part of the antagonistic movement dropped practices of institutionalized conflict
and adopted more radical forms of struggle, including armed protest (Virno and
hardt 1996). a long series of pro-housing initiatives led thousands of people in
Rome, milan, and bologna to become squatters in unused apartments (lotringer
and marazzi 2007). The collective needs of young proletarians and women, the
marginalization of entire neighborhoods in metropolitan areas, and the diffu-
sion of heavy drugs were some of the issues tackled by the italian antagonistic
movement. one of its major groups was autonomia, a patchy federation of spon-
taneously formed collectives which mobilized thousands of people from 1976 on-
ward and had its major hubs in Rome, padua, milan, and bologna. workplaces,
factories, universities, and schools were the scene of protests against the italian
establishment as well as the Communist party and the major leftist trade union
(CGil, or Confederazione Generale italiana del lavoro).
The more distant origin of social centers can be traced back to working-class
organizations that emerged at the end of the nineteenth century, such as mu-