Acts of Enclosure and Acts of Dissent: The Case of Greece in an Era of Austerity

Laina, Dimitra (2023) Acts of Enclosure and acts of dissent: the case of Greece in an era of austerity. PhD thesis, University of Leeds.

Abstract

This practice-led research examines the modes of operation of enclosures with a spatiotemporal focus on Greece in an era of prolonged austerity. Artworks and practices, resulting from a research stay in Greece and developed on-site, provide the conduits for the examination of phenomena of grabs of land and land-associated resources in the country. Specifically, this thesis presents two cases of artistic inquiry. The first case concentrates on the operations of the Hellenic Republic Asset Development Fund (HRADF), the entity responsible for carrying out the privatisation plan stipulated by the Structural Adjustment Programmes enforced since 2010 in Greece. This research critically broadens its scope to address the neoliberalisation processes currently unfolding in Athens and spatial contestations against urban enclosures. The second case examines water-grabbing processes in Stagiates, culminating in the village’s forced separation from the natural spring source “Krya Vrysi” since 2020. The research documents the lived contestation between acts of enclosure and commoning and the village’s grassroots struggles for the protection of the earthly commons. This artistic research and practice evolve as a radical art of inquiry that seeks to identify and advance points of rupture with the given, hierarchical and exclusionary societal order and aims to enact and project potentialities of social emancipation.