Gathering&Talk “Squatting, Social Centres and DIY Music and Radio Culture in London”

An abstract.

Despite appearing as a clean and business friendly city on the face of it, London is also a place with a continuous cultural undercurrent, acting as a counter movement to the overtly capitalistic nature of much of what is visible and experienced by its inhabitants. This counter culture is consistently having to evolve and reinvent itself in attempt to keep one step ahead of forces which seek to undermine and disperse forms of collective mobilisation in order for them to be replaced by an outlook which favours outright individualism.

To contextualise in a wider sense, when we refer to England as a nation with London as the economic and political centre, despite a number of attempts by some key figures throughout history we are essentially referring here to a place where no overarching revolution has taken place in around 1000 years of history and indeed the lineage of the same monarchy has been retained for this entire period. Despite this somewhat depressing fact, during the period post the year 2000 there have been a number of movements of various shapes and sizes which have gained notoriety and provided a platform for an alternative discourse. I will now proceed in taking a look at some of the key developments which have taken place in London during this period.