Squatting London: The Politics of Property

Squatting in London has a rich and diverse history. Today, squatters live a marginalised, stigmatised and criminalised existence, yet they persist. Behind the glittering façade of shiny new buildings, London is a network of vacant offices, boarded-up shops and dilapidated pubs that host some of the city's poorest and most determined citizens, exiled and increasingly pushed to the margins.

Squatting London is an account of the real lives of the city's squatters: their ambitions and struggles. Squatting is a challenge to the logic of property which underpins the city. By finding refuge, staying put, creating spaces and participating in counter-cultures, squats are political acts. They sit in direct opposition to the speculation, gentrification and regeneration that controls London today.

From wasted office blocks transformed into a life-saving homeless shelter, to temporary art exhibitions and raves; from an empty doctor's surgery, to a library closed by cuts; from mutual aid networks set up during the pandemic, to restaurants, shops, offices and pubs - Squatting London is an alternative, underground and rebellious ethnographic account of a city you thought you already knew.

Dr Samuel Burgum is Senior Lecturer in Sociology at Birmingham City University. He is the author of Occupying London: Post-Crash Resistance and the Limits of Possibility, and is Principal Investigator on an ESRC-funded project, 'Narrow Margins', which focuses on the criminalization of trespass and the squeeze upon marginalised communities in England and Wales.

Travel, maps and parking info

University of York, Law and Management Building (Heslington East), Ground Floor. From the main entrance, head straight down the corridor in front of you. The room is on the right.

Host or Publisher Department of Sociology