Female consciousness and social activism: a gender análisis of the Plataforma de los Afectados por la Hipoteca de Barcelona

Abstract

This thesis examines the role of women in the Plataforma de los Afectados por la Hipoteca de Barcelona (PAH BCN), a movement fighting for the right to housing. While the female presence in the PAH BCN has been noticed mostly in the media, there is still a need to understand from a gender perspective their participation going beyond the question of representation and paying attention to the voices of these women, their experiences, and daily routines in the movement in order to contextualize the PAH with previous women´s and urban movements in Barcelona during the early democratic period. The research explores how the presence of women in the PAH BCN contributes (or not) to existing discussions about the influence of women´s movements in proposing new visions (and transformations) of the city. In order to analyze the specific role of women in the PAH, this research relies in a literature that discusses how women have been appropriating and transforming urban spaces through political engagement and by doing that, these women become political actors motivated by a female consciousness at the same time that they build a collective identity in order to self organize around the discussion of gender needs. In order to understand the specific experience of women in this gender mixed social movement the research adopts a qualitative approach based in primary methods to collect data: in-depth semi-structured interviews and systematic observation. The results will show the important role women are playing in the PAH BCN, even if it is a mixed gender movement.