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Social Movements and Space

To examine these questions, I turn to social movement and group concentration theories focusing on those that use space as an integral component. Social movements provide a framework to discuss how oppressed groups band together to form coalitions that create policy change. At its base, social movements describe the collective action of a group of individuals connected by an economic, social or political identity. Oppression or repression tends to be a commonality among social movements, such as the civil rights movement of the 1960s, feminist movement in the 1970s, and HIV/AID in the 1980s. Research suggests that social movements progress through two to three stages. First, people suffering from a common oppression create or connect through networks of organizations to build a common identity . This identity revolves around challenging stigmas, discriminatory laws, or social mores. Social groups provide another frame to discuss how oppressed persons form coalitions. Essentially, a social group is a collective of individuals who share common culture, identity, ways of life, etc. They form from social friction or difference. Sharing a trait does not necessarily create a social group, only when that trait creates an identity from shared history. Black as a skin color does not necessarily cause group cohesion. Blacks form social groups in response to repression by white racist practices (Young 1990).

Once a social group or movement identity is formed–usually with inner-movement turmoil over goals, commonalities and identity–the movement adopts new organizations, coalitions and recruits new membership . After the movement achieves success, it diffuses to other institutions or is adopted as a ‘public good’ by larger society. This adoption includes cultural symbols, language, clothing styles, etc . At this stage, the social movement may completely diffuse as the original goals are achieved; it can also evolve, using its strong connected network to align with other social movements or identities. Social movements can be very broad, including environmentalism, abortion, civil rights or perhaps religiosity. They can occur at all levels of geography and even be completely Internet based. For this work, I focus in on social movements dealing with oppression of minority groups that have a spatial, namely urban, component.

Social movements and social groups can be connected to space, if that group’s identity is socially embedded to a particular place. Table 1 relates the development of gay and lesbian community as advanced by Collins . The model progresses through four stages, emergence, consolidation, expansion and then assimilation. In the first stage, a few gay networks and small businesses like bars emerge, forming the beginnings of an identity that is attached to particular places. These spaces create gay destinations where it is safe to be gay. Castells writes that when gays became “conscious enough and strong enough to ‘come out’ collectively, they earmarked place where they could be safe together and could develop new life styles” . As a Dallas gay historian puts it: “bars were the first things that middle American men from rural areas migrated to when they arrived at the urban centers. They wanted to be absorbed into the gay culture” . Beyond consumption, bars and similar outlets allowed gays and lesbians to form relationships and networks that would have been nearly impossible outside the space. Poletta describes these places as sort of free spaces “in which people can develop counterhegemonic ideas and oppositional identities.”

Free spaces enable members of the oppressed group to meet, socialize, network and sometimes strategize about identity and societal change. In the case of gays, there may be several areas of free spaces which generally tend to locate to border vacuums ignored by a larger heterosexist society . The larger community avoids these areas, due to high crime rates or a reputation as a haven for the perverted and sexually deviant .

Table 1: Model of Gay and Lesbian Urban Social Movements

Source: Adapted from Collins, A. (2004). “Sexual Dissidence, Enterprise and Assimilation: Bedfellows in Urban Regeneration.” Urban Studies 41(9): 1789-1806.

From these spaces, gays develop a bounded solidarity or shared identity connecting residents together in the face of oppression . As identity is formed, the movement begins to consolidate into one or two key places. In San Francisco, identity was and still is socially and politically embedded in the Castro area. As a haven in larger regional homophobic and intolerant environment up to the mid 1960s, Castro served as one of several meeting places in the city. Over time, it became a centralized gay meeting place and a node for the developing gay community. Nodes can be thought of as another term for free spaces, except they have an added dimension of connectivity in social movement theory. They are places where social networks intensify creating strong interconnectedness among group’s actors and organizations .

At some point in the mid-1960s, Castells and Bailey write that Castro contained a concentrated critical mass of people that could support a thriving gay and lesbian community, able to politically challenge the heterosexual majority. Critical mass is another key tenant of social movement theory. As the movement grows by recruiting new organizations, businesses, and membership, it is able to demonstrate power. Spatial concentration of gay and lesbian identity can also cause backlash. As Bailey discusses, religious institutions, the city development regime and surrounding neighborhoods attempted to stop the development of Castro as a gay area. Social intolerance also abounded, as nearby residents in Mission and Bernal Heights perceived the developing district as a threat. Hate crimes increased rapidly during the 1970s as Castro became a “gay ghetto” .

During consolidation and then expansion phases, power manifested in San Francisco through neighborhood ownership, which translated into electoral political power for city governance. Power can also be evinced through consumption, especially if spatial concentration leads to a gay enclave that generates significant revenue in the urban economy. In Castro, these processes led to the election of Harvey Milk as the city’s first openly gay supervisor, new tolerant laws, a strong vibrant neighborhood economy and greater institutional thickness in the form of political and social organizations. Today, the Castro district is embraced as a sign of cosmopolitanism and tolerance by the city that once tried to prevent its emergence. Politicians, especially the mayor, and residents from all over San Francisco attend pride, Halloween and other gay festivals. Real estate market prices in Castro are some of the highest in the area, leading gays to financially choose Oakland and the upper and lower Haight areas, as additional places to live. Living in Castro to be safe or be out is unnecessary when the entire city is considered tolerant.

Bell and Binnie refer to places like Castro as the new pink spaces or pink economy. While these spaces have succeeded in changing political tolerance, they have also been assimilated by larger society. Rushbrook writes that queer spaces “are offered as equivalent venues for consumption at a cosmopolitan buffet in a manner that erases their individual histories and functions, as well as the differential mobilities of the bodies that inhabit them.” The implication being that queer spaces are no longer free spaces, but consumption spaces. Anyone can be ‘gay’ by consuming the gay scene.

However, places lose their history and importance as sites of resistance, instead becoming sites for economic development. Bathhouses, park scenes, and other sexually-focused institutions are replaced by domestic partnership registries and chic new urban stores and bars. Where once the larger community avoided the area, now they come in droves to consume the new urban tolerant scene. The perception of perverted is replaced with a perception of hip diversity, attracting creatives. This transition from free to consumption space signals assimilation, fueled by the success of the social movement’s political aspirations. Below is an excerpt from the San Francisco Chronicle on the question of Castro as a specific gay place:

Perhaps the central question expressed in community forums about the future of the Castro is whether gays and lesbians should assimilate into mainstream culture as they gain acceptance — or maintain a separate place. ‘Having a specific neighborhood politicians can point to, can go to and shake hands or kiss lesbian babies, has really solidified the gay vote, our political muscle,’ said longtime community activist Tommi Avicolli Mecca at a forum in November .

Castro in San Francisco is an example of how gay and lesbian urban social movements progress through four identifiable stages, emergence, consolidation, expansion and assimilation. Does this four stage model apply to other cities identified by Florida as tolerant? Moving from Castro as an example of how social movements manifest in space, I turn to Austin, TX. Florida hails Austin as a tolerant, open city. It scores high on all of his measures, even topping the list of regions with populations over 500,000. Focusing on the tolerance aspect, how did Austin become a socially, politically and residentially tolerant city? Does Austin’s history fit with social movement theories and the story of Castro?