Africa protest in
Durban In African countries such as
Nigeria, informal settlements are created by migration from rural areas to urban areas. Reasons for squatting include the lack of low cost housing, unemployment and inability to access loans. In 1995, almost 70% of the population of the Nigerian capital
Lagos were living in slums. The
City of the Dead slum is a well-known squatter community in
Cairo, Egypt. Between 1955 and 1975, the Cairo authorities built 39,000 public housing apartments but 2 million people moved there, mostly ending up in
informal housing. In
Alexandria, Egypt's second city, public housing was only 0.5% of the total housing stock, whereas informal housing was 68%. An estimated 3,500 people live in the
Grande Hotel Beira in
Mozambique. Informal settlements in
Zambia, particularly around
Lusaka, are known as
kombonis. As of 2011, 64% of Zambians lived below the
poverty line, whilst the
United Nations predicted a 941% population increase by 2100. (Liberia)|alt=Abandoned porn|thumb|right In
Liberia, squatting is one of three ways to access land, the other being ownership by deed or customary ownership.
West Point was founded in
Monrovia in the 1950s and is estimated to house between 29,500 and 75,000 people. During the
First Liberian Civil War 1989–1997 and the
Second Liberian Civil War 1999–2003, many people in Liberia were displaced and some ended up squatting in Monrovia. The
Ducor Hotel fell into disrepair and was squatted, before being evicted in 2007. Recently, over 9,000
Burkinabés were squatting on remote land and the Liberia Land Authority (LLA) has announced it will be titling all land in the country. In
South Africa, squatters tend to live in informal settlements or squatter camps on the outskirts of the larger cities, often but not always near
townships. In the mid-1990s, an estimated 7.7 million South Africans lived in informal settlements: a fifth of the country's population. The figure was estimated to be 15 million in 2004. It also successfully challenged the
KZN Slums Act, which sought to mandate the eviction of slums but was eventually declared unconstitutional. There have been a number of similar conflicts between shack dwellers, some linked with the
Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign, and the city council in
Cape Town. One of the most high-profile cases was the eviction of squatters in the
N2 Gateway homes in the suburb of
Delft, where over 20 residents were shot, including a three-year-old child. There have been numerous complaints about the legality of the government's actions. Many of the families then squatted on
Symphony Way, a main road in the township of Delft, before being forced to move to a camp called
Blikkiesdorp.
Squatting in Sudan is defined as the "acquisition and construction of land, within the city boundaries for the purpose of housing in contradiction to Urban Planning and Land laws and building regulations." These informal settlements arose in
Khartoum from the 1920s onwards, swelling in the 1960s. By the 1980s, the government was clearing settlements in Khartoum and regularizing them elsewhere. It was estimated that in 2015 that were 200,000 squatters in Khartoum, 180,000 in
Nyala, 60,000 in
Kassala, 70,000 in
Port Sudan and 170,000 in
Wad Madani. After Zimbabwe was created in 1980, peasant farmers and squatters disputed the distribution of land. Informal settlements have developed on the periphery of cities such as
Chitungwiza and the capital
Harare. In 2005,
Operation Murambatsvina ("Operation Drive Out Filth") organised by President
Robert Mugabe evicted an estimated 700,000 people and affected over two million people.
Middle East Israeli settlements are communities of
Israeli citizens living in the
Palestinian territories. The
international community considers the settlements in
occupied territory to be illegal, In March 2018, Israeli settlers were evicted from a house they had illegally occupied in
Hebron, a Palestinian city in the
West Bank. The fifteen families had argued that they had bought the house, but the
High Court of Justice ruled that they had to leave. The
Israel Defense Forces declared the building a closed military zone and it was unclear if the Palestinian owners could regain possession. The settlers had already occupied the house and been evicted in 2012. In October 2018,
Fatou Bensouda, the Chief Prosecutor of the
International Criminal Court stated that Israel's planned demolition of Bedouin village
Khan al-Ahmar could constitute a
war crime.
Gecekondu is a Turkish word meaning a house put up quickly without proper permissions, a squatter's house, and by extension, a shanty or shack. From the 1960s onwards, these settlements have provided a means of housing for poor workers and new migrants arriving in cities such as
Ankara and
Istanbul. Shortly after the 2013
Gezi Park protests in Istanbul, Don Kişot (Don Quixote) was squatted in the
Kadıköy district. It was stated to be the city's first occupied and self-managed social centre; Caferağa Mahalle Evi (community centre Caferağa), also in
Kadıköy, was squatted soon afterwards and evicted in December 2014. A place was occupied in
Beşiktaş district of Istanbul on March 18, 2014, and named Berkin Elvan Student House, after a 15-year-old boy who was shot during the Gezi protests and later died. Atopya was squatted in Ankara in June 2014 by anarchists, who claimed it was the city's first political squat. Some squatters have lived on land owned by national electricity company
Tenaga Nasional for over five decades. Squatters in Indonesia live on both privately owned and government-owned land. For example, the former in
Surabaya has been squatted since 2000s after being used as a prison for over 100 years. In
Thailand, although evictions have reduced their visibility or numbers in urban areas, many squatters still occupy land near railroad tracks, under overpasses, and waterways. Commercial squatting is common in Thailand, where businesses temporarily seize nearby public real estate (such as sidewalks, roadsides, beaches, etc.) and roll out their enterprise, and at closing time they fold it in and lock it up, thus avoiding the extra cost of having to rent more property. In the early 2000s, the government estimated that 37% of the population lived in low-income urban communities, over half of which were squatting public land or renting precariously. The National Housing Authority stated over 100,000 families were living under threat of immediate eviction. Squatter settlements occurred in
Hong Kong in 1946, after its wartime occupation by Japan. After 700,000 people migrated from
mainland China to
Hong Kong between 1949 and 1950; the squatter population was estimated at 300,000, with people sleeping wherever they could find a space.
Rooftop slums then developed, when people began to live illegally on the roofs of urban buildings. In addition, the
Kowloon Walled City became an area for squatters,
housing up to 50,000 people in Hong Kong. In
Mumbai, India, there are an estimated 10 to 12 million inhabitants, and six million of them are
squatters. The squatters live in a variety of ways. Some possess two- or three-story homes built out of brick and concrete which they have inhabited for years. Geeta Nagar is a squatter village based beside the
Indian Navy compound at
Colaba. Squatter Colony in
Malad East has existed since 1962, and now, people living there pay a rent to the city council of 100 rupees a month.
Dharavi is a community of one million squatters. The stores and factories situated there are mainly illegal and so are unregulated, but it is suggested that they do over $1 million in business every day. Other squatters are
pavement dwellers, with very few possessions. Activists such as
Jockin Arputham,
Prema Gopalan and
Sheela Patel are working for better living conditions for slum dwellers, through organisations such as
Mahila Milan and
Slum Dwellers International. In the
2016 Mathura clash, members of Azad Bharat Vidhik Vaicharik Kranti Satyagrahi (Free India Legal Ideas Revolutionary Protesters) who had been living in Mathura's largest public park Jawahar Bagh for two years were evicted in a large police operation. At least 24 squatters were killed. After World War II many people were left homeless in the
Philippines and they built makeshift houses called "barong-barong" on abandoned private land. The first mass eviction on record in
Manila was 1951 and the largest was in late 1963 and early 1964 when 90,000 people were displaced. In 1982,
Imelda Marcos referred to the latter group as "professional squatters [...] plain land-grabbers taking advantage of the compassionate society". The
Community Mortgage Program was set up in 1992, aiming to help low-income families transition from squatting to
affordable housing. By 2001, around 106,000 families had found secure housing in over 800 separate communities.
Central and Eastern Europe . The trajectory of squatting in central and eastern Europe is different from that of western Europe because, until recently, countries were part of the
Communist Bloc and squatting is generally not tolerated. • In
Moldova, homeless people live in state-run shelters or squatter camps. Squatters in
Centro 73, Moldova's first squatted, self-managed social centre, attempted to prevent the historical building's demolition, but were quickly evicted and given another building for art events. • The oldest squat in Poland,
Rozbrat, was founded in 1994 through the occupation of a former paint factory in
Poznań. There are also squats in
Białystok,
Gdańsk,
Gliwice,
Warsaw and
Wrocław. • In
Slovenia, the capital
Ljubljana has an occupied former military barracks called
Metelkova and the recently evicted former bicycle factory called
Rog. •
Croatia has social centres such as the former Karlo Rojc barracks in
Pula and (AKC) Medika in
Zagreb. • In
Serbia, shacks to be built as second homes or Roma people occupy buildings. A large Roma informal settlement called
Cardboard city was evicted in 2009. In 1980s
Soviet Russia, there was a practice used by artists and musicians to acquire communal rooms and then expand into other rooms. Following the
dissolution of the Soviet Union, there were many collectively organised housing occupations by families and refugees. The groups would attempt to legalise in some cases and not in others. There were also art squats, for example, in
Saint Petersburg, there were Pushkinskaya 10, Na Fontanke and Synovia doktora Pelia. In the early 1990s, the
Government of Moscow prepared to renovate buildings, but then ran out of money, meaning that squatters occupied prime real estate. By 1996, 40 percent of
Tverskaya Street was rented illegally or squatted.
Squatting in the Czech Republic began in its modern form when
anarchist and
punk activists inspired by squatting movements in Amsterdam and Berlin occupied derelict houses following the 1989
Velvet Revolution.
Squat Milada was occupied in 1997 and evicted in 2009. Its longevity was in part due to the building not existing in the
cadastre.
Klinika was an occupied social centre between 2014 and 2019. These three social centres, all in Prague, were the city's three most important political squats. Starting from December 2012,
Greek Police initiated extensive raids in a number of squats in
Athens, arresting and charging with offences all illegal occupants (mostly anarchists). Squats including
Villa Amalia were evicted. A march in support of the 92 arrestees drew between 3,000 and 8,000 people. After Villa Amalia, Villa Skaramanga and then Villa Lela Karagianni were evicted. Lela Karagianni had been squatted since 1998 and was later reoccupied. The name came from the street, named for a Greek World War II
resistance leader of that name. From 2015 onwards Athens has seen
refugee squats in response to the
European migrant crisis which are anarchist and self-organised. In 2019, several squats in
Exarcheia were evicted by the Greek state. Some of the migrants evicted set up a camp outside the Parliament at
Syntagma Square. There was a large squatting movement in the newly formed state of
Austria following the
First World War. Famine was a significant problem for many people in Austria and the "Siedler" (settler) movement developed as these people tried to create shelter and a source of food for themselves. The
Ernst Kirchweger Haus (EKH) in
Vienna was squatted as a social centre in 1990 and legalised in 2008. In 2014, 1,500 riot
police officers, a
tank-like police vehicle, a police
water cannon and helicopters were used to clear a building occupied by the group Pizzeria Anarchia in Vienna.
Western Europe In many West European countries, since the 1960s and 1970s, there are both squatted houses used as residences and
self-managed social centres where people pursue social and cultural activities.
Christiania in
Copenhagen,
Denmark, is an independent community of almost 900 people founded in 1971 on the site of an abandoned military zone. In Copenhagen, as in other European cities such as Berlin and Amsterdam, the squatter movement was large in the 1980s. It was a
social movement, providing housing and alternative culture. A flashpoint came in 1986 with the
Battle of Ryesgade. Another flashpoint came in 2007 when
Ungdomshuset was evicted. While not technically a squat until 14 December 2006, it was a social centre used by squatters and people involved in alternative culture more generally. After a year of protests, the city council donated a new building. The
Dublin Housing Action Committee (DHAC) was active between 1968 and 1971, occupying buildings to protest the housing crisis in Ireland. The Prohibition of Forcible Entry and Occupation Act of 1971 criminalized squatting. Squatters can gain title to land and property by adverse possession as governed by the 1957 Statute of Limitations Act. From the 1990s onwards, there have been occasional
political squats such as Disco Disco, Magpie and
Grangegorman. In early twentieth century
France, several artists who would later become world-famous, such as
Guillaume Apollinaire,
Amedeo Modigliani and
Pablo Picasso squatted at the , in
Montmartre,
Paris. Paris moved to legitimize some popular artist squats in the mid-2000s by purchasing and renovating the buildings for artist–residents. An example is
Les Frigos. In the 2010s there have been several land squats protesting against large infrastructure projects. These are known collectively as
Zone to Defend or ZAD (French: zone à défendre). The first and largest was the
ZAD de Notre-Dame-des-Landes, which successfully opposed an airport project near Nantes. , in a former hospital
Geneva in Switzerland had 160 buildings illegally occupied and more than 2,000 squatters, in the middle of the 1990s. The
RHINO (, in English:
Return of Inhabitants to Non-Occupied Buildings) was a 19-year-long squat in Geneva. It occupied two buildings on the Boulevard des Philosophes, a few blocks away from the main campus of the
University of Geneva. The RHINO organisation often faced legal troubles, and Geneva police evicted the inhabitants on July 23, 2007. squat, 16 April 2009 During the
public opposition in the 1970s, squatting in West German cities led to what termed "a self-confident urban counterculture with its own infrastructure of newspapers, self-managed collectives and housing cooperatives, feminist groups, and so on, which was prepared to intervene in local and broader politics". The
Autonomen movement protected squats against eviction and participated in radical direct action in cities such as Berlin. The squats were mainly for residential and social use. Squatting became known by the term , from ("renovating") and '
("occupying"). Legalised housing projects include Hafenstraße in Hamburg and Kiefernstraße in Düsseldorf. The Mietshäuser Syndikat was founded in 1992 by people who had been squatting in Freiburg im Breisgau in the 1980s to provide a way of transforming private property into collective ownership, including squats. Squatting has also been used as a tactic for campaigning purposes, such as the Anatopia project, which protested against a Mercedes-Benz test track. Squatters moved into the former factory site of J.A. Topf & Söhne in Erfurt in April 2001 and remained there until they were evicted by police in April 2009. The firm made crematoria for Nazi concentration camps. The squatters ran culture programs which drew attention to the history of the company. The occupation was known simply as ' (the occupied house) and was one of the most well known actions of left-radicals of that period in Germany. A book about the occupation was published in 2012, entitled
Topf & Söhne – ''
(Topf & Söhne – Occupation of a crime scene''). Since 2012,
Hambach Forest has been occupied by activists seeking to prevent its destruction by the energy company
RWE. While the majority of squatting in Germany still comes from left-wing actors there are also examples of
right-wing squatting. An example for right-wing squatting in Berlin is the occupation of Weitlingstraße 122. The house was occupied by
neo-Nazis in 1990, when a lot of houses in former
GDR where empty. They named similar social issues as leftist squatters as their reason for squatting. The space was used for different purposes ranging from a place to live, gather or party, to producing propaganda and planning right-wing terrorist activities. The squat dissolved at the end of 1990 because of disagreements in the heterogenous group of squatters. In
Reykjavík, the capital of Iceland, there is a small tradition of squatting. In 1919, anarchists occupied a building and were quickly evicted. Squatters occupied an empty house in downtown Reykjavík on Vatnsstigur street in April 2009. The squatters set up a freeshop and had plans for a social centre, but the occupation was quickly evicted by the police and 22 people were arrested. Vatnsstigur 4 was briefly resquatted on May 7, 2009, in solidarity with the
Rozbrat squat in
Poland, which was threatened with eviction. Also in 2009, a group of
graffiti artists called the Pretty Boys occupied Hverfisgata 34. Their intention was to make a clandestine gallery and then when they were not evicted, they legalised the space and called it Gallery Bosnia. When the Reykjavíkur Akademían (the Reykjavík Academy) was evicted at short notice from Hringbraut 121 in November 2011, it was occupied in protest. The space, which had hosted lectures and also Iceland's trade union and anarchist libraries, was moved to another location but the occupiers were unhappy that the new use of the building would be a guest house for tourists. An art exhibition was organised, with a camera obscura, live music and shadow theatre. In Italy, despite the lack of official data, it appears that about 50,000 buildings all over the country are unused or abandoned and thus subject to squatting. Squatting has no legal basis, but many squats are used as
social centres. The first occupations of abandoned buildings began in 1968 with the left-wing movements
Lotta Continua and
Potere Operaio. Out of the breakup of these two movements was born
Autonomia Operaia, which was composed of a Marxist–Leninist and Maoist wing and also an anarchist and more libertarian one. These squats had
Marxist–Leninist (but also
Stalinist and
Maoist) ideals and came from the left wing of Autonomia. The militants of the Italian armed struggle (the New
Red Brigades) were connected to these squats. There are many left-wing self-organised occupied projects across Italy such as
Cascina Torchiera and
Centro Sociale Leoncavallo in Milan and
Forte Prenestino in Rome. In Rome there is also a far-right social centre,
Casa Pound. This situation has so far received the approval of Italian courts, which have been reluctant to defend the owners' rights. In contrast with the dominant jurisprudence, new case-law (from the
Rome Tribunal and the
Supreme Court of Cassation) instructs the government to pay damages in case of squatting if the institutions have failed to prevent it. Following legal challenges, on October 28, 2011, the Supreme Court of the Netherlands decided that the eviction of a squat can only occur after an intervention of a judge. The Dutch government assessed the effectiveness of the new law in 2015, releasing a report giving statistics on arrests and convictions between October 2010 and December 2014. During this time period, 529 people have been arrested for the act of occupying derelict buildings in 213 separate incidents. Of the 529 arrests, 210 were found guilty. Of those convicted, 39 people were imprisoned for the new offence. social centre in Barcelona|alt=Exterior of squat In
Francoist Spain migrant workers lived in
slums on the periphery of cities. After the
Spanish transition to democracy, residential squatting occurred in Spanish cities such as Barcelona, Bilbao, Madrid, Valencia and Zaragoza. The number of squatted social centres in Barcelona grew from under thirty in the 1990s to around sixty in 2014, as recorded by
Info Usurpa (a weekly activist agenda). Another long-running squat is
Can Masdeu, which survived a concerted eviction attempt in 2002. Eleven occupiers suspended themselves off the walls of the building for several days. Social centres exist in cities across the country, for example
Can Masdeu and
Can Vies in Barcelona and
Eskalera Karakola and
La Ingobernable in Madrid. In the
Basque Country the centres are known as . A well-known example was
Kukutza in Bilbao. , London
Squatting in England and Wales has a long history. The occupation and cultivation of untended land motivated the
Peasants' Revolt of 1381 and the
Diggers in the 17th century. In the 20th century, squatters turned to abandoned buildings. Mass squats were organised in a number of prominent public buildings in central London, culminating in the occupation of 144 Piccadilly in 1969. The
London Street Commune or "Hippydilly" garnered worldwide attention. There were estimated to be 50,000 squatters throughout Britain in the late 1970s, with the majority (30,000) living in London. The BBC reported in 2011 that the government estimated that there were "20,000 squatters in the UK" and "650,000 empty properties". The same year saw the first successful prosecution for squatting, resulting in a 12-week jail sentence. Section 61 of the
Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 provides police with additional power to remove trespassers when there is damage to land or property, trespassers are abusive, insulting or threatening or there are over six vehicles on premises related to squatters. In the late 1960s, people in
Northern Ireland were forced to squat through both poverty and a lack of decent housing. In
County Tyrone, there were allegations of unfair housing provision on the basis of politics and religion. When a house in the village of
Caledon, near
Dungannon, was allocated to a young Protestant woman, Emily Beattie, it caused protests. She was secretary to a solicitor who worked for the Unionist councillor who had given her the house and two Catholic families who had been overlooked complained that the same councillor had scotched plans to build houses for Catholics in the Dungannon area. Several days after the woman had moved in, the Catholic squatters in the house next door were evicted.
Austin Currie, then a young politician, complained both at the local council and at Stormont about the situation. He then symbolically occupied the woman's house for a few hours, before being evicted by the
Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC). One of the policeman was the woman's brother who himself moved into the house later on. Squatting in Northern Ireland was unaffected by the recent law change in England and Wales, and remains a civil matter.
Squatting in Scotland is a criminal offence, punishable by a fine or imprisonment, under the
Trespass (Scotland) Act 1865. The owner or lawful occupier of the property has the right to evict squatters without notice or applying to the court for an eviction order, although when evicting, they cannot do anything that would break the law, for example, use violence. There have been several
road protest land squats such as
Bilston Glen and
Pollok Free State. The former premises of the
Forest Café in Edinburgh were squatted in 2011 and activists occupied a former shelter in Glasgow in 2021, during
COP26. In 2010, a representative of the UK Bailiff Company claimed that the number of people squatting in Wales was at its highest for 40 years. Experts said "the majority [of squatters] are forced into the lifestyle by financial pressures." Based on the internal database of UK Bailiff Company, there were 100 cases of squatting in 2009, the highest for 40 years, following trends estimated by the
Advisory Service for Squatters that squatting has doubled in England and Wales since 1995. As with England, from 1 September 2012, squatting in a residential building was made a criminal offence subject to arrest, fine and imprisonment.
North America In Canada, there are two systems to register the ownership of land. Under the land title system, squatter rights, formally known as adverse possession, were abolished. However, under the registry system, these rights have been preserved. If a person occupies land for the required period of time as set out in provincial limitation acts and during that time no legal action is taken to evict them, then the ownership of the land transfers from the legal owner to the squatter.
Road allowance communities were settlements established by
Métis people in the late 1800s through most of the 20th century on
road allowances at the margins of settler society. Métis people were dispossessed from their land in the late 19th century, so they frequently squatted in these unclaimed and marginal spaces. The
Frances Street Squats in Vancouver were a row of six buildings squatted for nine months in 1990. They were evicted in a large operation and a film was subsequently made, called
The Beat of Frances Street. In recent years, there have been a number of public squats which have brought together the two main contemporary reasons for squatting – homelessness and activism. Examples are the Préfontaine squat in
Overdale, a district of
Montreal (2001), the
Woodward's Squat in
Vancouver (2002), the Infirmary Squat in
Halifax (2002), the Pope Squat in
Toronto (2002), the Seven Year Squat in
Ottawa (2002), the Water Street Squat in
Peterborough (2003), and the
North Star hotel in Vancouver (2006). These were squats organised by anti-poverty groups which tended to be short-lived. The Woodward's building was a derelict department store which had stood empty for nine years. After being evicted from the building, two hundred squatters set up a tent city on the pavement outside. The action is credited with putting in motion the eventual redevelopment of the building. The Peterborough Coalition Against Poverty (PCAP) publicly squatted 1130 Water Street, a building which stood empty after a fire. The group offered to repair the place and return it to its use as low-income housing. City officials agreed to the repairs and then City Council voted to demolish the building. The cost of demolition was $8,900 and the cost of repairs had been projected to be $6,900. In 2011, the "Occupy Toronto squat team" squatted a basement at 238 Queen Street West and offered to take on a lease for 99 cents per year. They were evicted after eight hours.
Squatting in the United States occurred historically in large numbers during both the
California Gold Rush and World War II.
Hoovervilles were homeless camps built across the country during the
Great Depression in the 1930s. They were named after
Herbert Hoover, who was president of the country at the time. During the
Great Recession (2007–2009) more shanty towns appeared with others squatting in foreclosed homes. During the
hippie movement, squatters in
New Mexico established the commune of
Tawapa near the
Sandia Mountains. However, they were kicked out in the 1990s because they did not have the legal rights to the land. Community organizations have abetted squatters in taking over vacant buildings not only as a place to live but also a part of larger campaign to shine a light on inequity in housing and advocate change in housing and land issues. In 2002, the New York City administration agreed to work with eleven squatted buildings on the
Lower East Side in a deal brokered by the
Urban Homesteading Assistance Board with the condition the apartments would eventually be turned over to the tenants as low-income
housing cooperatives.
Latin America and the Caribbean In
Latin American and
Caribbean countries, informal settlements result from internal migration to urban areas, lack of affordable housing and ineffective governance. During the 1950s and 1960s, many Latin American cities demolished squatter settlements and would quickly evict land invasions. Inspired by the
World Bank and the thinking of economists such as
Hernando de Soto, the programs aim to provide better housing and to promote entrepreneurship, for the former squatters can use their houses as
collateral to secure business loans. Former squatters found that it was hard to maintain the property title over time after deaths or divorces and that banks changed their loan requirements so as to exclude them. In
Peru, the name given to the squatter zones is
pueblos jóvenes (literally "young towns"). In the 1980s, there were more than 300 pueblos jóvenes surrounding the capital
Lima, housing over one million people. The population of Ecuador's capital
Quito grew sevenfold between 1950 and 2001. There are three types of
slums in the city, namely barrios periféricos (shanty towns on the edge of the city), conventillos (dilapidated tenements in the urban centre) and rural shanty towns from where inhabitants commute to work in the city. An estimated 170,000 people were living in slums in 1992. From the beginning of the 19th century, there was internal migration from rural areas to cities such as
Cochabamba in Bolivia. By 1951, the migrants had begun to seize land and build
informal settlements. The land invasions continued despite the authorities often evicting them and from 1945 until 1976, 10 per cent of development in Cochabamba was illegal. From the 1970s the government has attempted to regularize the squatter settlements and the programs have largely failed due to corruption. A fresh initiative set up in 2002 did not prevent new settlements being squatted. There are also squatters in the forest lowlands who are illegal loggers. Indigenous peoples occupied a gold mine at
Tacacoma in 2015 which they said was on their ancestral land. When 200 police officers attempted to evict them, four were taken hostage and one died. in Rio de Janeiro In Brazil, informal settlements are called
favelas; a famous example is
Rocinha in
Rio de Janeiro, home to up to 180,000 people.
The squats are mostly inhabited by the poorest strata of society, and usually lack much infrastructure and public services, but in some cases, already have reached the structure needed for a city. As of 2004, across Brazil there were 25 million people living in favelas. After failed attempts in the 1960s and 1970s to bulldoze slums out of existence, the authorities moved towards a policy of toleration. There are also a number of squatter buildings in the inner city, the most famous of which was a 22-storey building called
Prestes Maia, whose inhabitants were ordered to leave in 2006. Various occupations in buildings and unoccupied areas in big cities, led by groups such as the
Homeless Workers' Movement (MTST) or Downtown Roofless Movement (MSTC), have occurred. There are also rural squatter movements in Brazil, such as the
Landless Workers' Movement (MST), which organise land occupations. For example, in
Pontal do Paraná in the state of
Paraná 112 occupations were carried out, housing 6,500 families. The
Colombian Constitution of 1991 states that housing is a universal human right. This was the result of an extended civil conflict between rebels, paramilitaries, cocaine traders and the state, which left 40% of rural land without legal title. In 1970, 45.9% of Bogotá's population lived in these pirate neighbourhoods, as compared to 1.1% who were squatting.
Cité Soleil was founded in 1958 to house workers, then grew rapidly to 80,000 people in the 1980s and 400,000 people in the 1990s. It became the largest slum in Haiti, housing people displaced from other areas. There is little infrastructure and the area frequently becomes flooded. Following the
2010 Haiti earthquake, 1.5 million people were displaced. One year later, 100,000 squatters had left the aid camps and were occupying land next to an official camp called Corail.
Oceania On
island nations such as Fiji, Kiribati and Samoa, informal settlements are known as squatter settlements. Unlike most Pacific Island countries, it is possible to sell or buy
customary land in Kiribati. Zoning laws are not implemented by the government and not widely recognised by local people. On the island of
Kiritimati, squatters live in both villages and on old
Burns Philp copra plantations. In the 19th century, the British government claimed to own all of Australia and tried to control land ownership. Wealthy farmers of livestock claimed land for themselves and thus were known as squatters. This type of squatting is covered in greater detail at
Squatting (Australian history). During the late 1940s the squatting of hundreds of empty houses and military camps, forced federal and state governments to provide emergency shelter during a period when Australians faced a shortage of more than 300 000 homes. In more recent times, there have been
Australian squats in
Canberra,
Melbourne and
Sydney. The
Aboriginal Tent Embassy was set up in 1972 and is a permanent
protest occupation. The
2016 Bendigo Street housing dispute saw squatters successfully contesting road-building plans. The Midnight Star squat was used as a self-managed social centre in a former cinema, before being evicted after being used as a convergence space during the 2002
World Trade Organization meeting. == See also ==