RENT STRIKE: Housing Activism in the Pandemic
Channel: Black Rose Books
Date: 2020-04-28

RENT STRIKE: HOUSING ACTIVISM IN THE PANDEMIC
An international discussion about the rent strike during the coronavirus pandemic with authors and activists from Ottawa, Los Angeles, and the UK.

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We were already suffering from a housing crisis, with landlords and banks jacking up the rents and doing mass evictions. And that was before the pandemic. With the global economy now in lockdown, many people simply cannot pay their rent. Yet the capitalists expect to keep raking in massive profits while we struggle to survive. 

More and more, tenants are collectively organizing to fight back. In the growing calls for a rent strike, many are withholding their rent simply so they can eat as well as a pressure strategy to push for a suspension of payments of rent, mortgages, and utilities. Other activists are demanding that homes should be provided for all, and are opening up vacant housing to allow the unhoused to safely quarantine. At the heart of such organizing is a vision of housing as a human right, democratically controlled and not for profit, rather than as a commodity. 

In partnership with Pluto Press, It's Going Down, and Sub.Media, Black Rose Books is pleased to announce the first event in its Radical Livestream Series. Join us for this live event, and send in your questions and comments for the speakers to nathan@blackrosebooks.com or in the comments of the livestream.

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SPEAKERS:
Josh Hawley, Sloane, Sam, and Lily are housing activists involved with Keep the Rent Ottawa rent strike group. Josh Hawley is also co-editor of "Villages in Cities: Cooperative Housing, Community Land Ownership, and the Milton Parc Story", published by Black Rose Books (50% off the ebook for this talk! Go to: payhip.com/BlackRoseBooks). Josh and Lily are also involved in the Herongate Tenant Coalition, fighting to save a poor and majority immigrant Ottawa neighbourhood from the biggest mass eviction in modern Canadian history.

Swift, Yaya, B, and Jazmin are members of the L.A. Tenants Union (Northeast Local), and the autonomous group called Defend Northeast LA. They collaborated with the Reclaiming Our Homes Coalition in the action to open up vacant publicly-owned homes, in order to help them quarantine during the pandemic. Defend Northeast Los Angeles focuses on tenant organizing and fighting against gentrification using direct action and visual media, in collaboration with other autonomous orgs in LA. Twitter: @defendnela @latenants @nelo.latenantsunion 

Ben Tippet is a UK-based educator, activist, and author of "Split: Class Divides Uncovered", published by Pluto Press. He is currently doing a PhD at the University of Greenwich, researching the causes of wealth inequality in the UK. He is a researcher for The Transnational Institute and has written for Novara, Stike! and Economy. Twitter: @BenTippet

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50% DISCOUNT!! For the occasion of this online event, we are offering a 50% discount on the eBook of "Villages in Cities: Cooperative Housing, Community Land Ownership, and the Milton Parc Story", co-edited by Joshua Hawley and Dimitrios Roussopoulos. Visit our Black Rose Solidarity eBookshop where you can get new free eBooks each week, 50% discounts on our other eBooks, and make a donation to support our work in this difficult time. https://payhip.com/BlackRoseBooks