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The spatiality of a social struggle in

Greece at the time of the IMF
a

Regina Mantanika & Hara Kouki

a

Department of Social Science , University Paris 7

School of Law, Birkbeck College , University of London E-mail:

Published online: 30 Aug 2011.

To cite this article: Regina Mantanika & Hara Kouki (2011) The spatiality of a social struggle in
Greece at the time of the IMF, City: analysis of urban trends, culture, theory, policy, action, 15:3-4,
482-490, DOI: 10.1080/13604813.2011.596324
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13604813.2011.596324

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CITY, VOL. 15, NOS. 3 4, JUNE AUGUST 2011

Alternatives

The spatiality of a social

struggle in Greece at the time
of the IMF
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Reflections on the 2011 mass migrant

hunger strike in Athens
Regina Mantanika and Hara Kouki
The E110 billion bailout offered to the Greek government in May 2010 by the so-called
troika (comprising of the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank and
the European Union) was not only the largest of its kind in Western history to date, it
also marked the entrance of Greek society into a period of extreme turmoil, with profound
changes in the standard of living and the everyday reality of large segments of the population. The countrys extensive public sector saw wage reductions, pension decreases and
tax rises. In the private sector mass lay-offs and redundancies became widespread, as did
wage reductions and renegotiations of labour contracts.
Against this turbulent backdrop an extraordinary event would soon take place in the
cities of Athens and Thessaloniki. In early 2011, the beginning of the largest mass
hunger strike on European soil saw 300 undocumented migrants, mostly of Maghrebi
origin, demand the legalisation of all undocumented migrants in the country.
Regina Mantanika and Hara Kouki, Athens-based researchers and activists, trace the
chronology of the strike in the city by looking at the series of different spacesboth
public and privatethat took turns in hosting it: the Law Faculty of the University of
Athens, in which the migrants were quickly made unwelcome; the private mansion in
which they found shelter and finally, the public hospitals to which many of them were
transferred and in which they ended their strike. Mantanika and Kouki offer us the
preliminary findings of their research on these spaces dynamics, the way in which they
interacted with the strike and how the strike itself transformed some of these spaces in
return.
I can hardly think of a more appropriate topic and paper with which to launch my term
as editor of the Alternatives section of City, a section set to engage and discuss with groups
and individuals who are developing alternative urban visions and practices. Here we
have an extraordinary such example: the practice of a small number of people who nevertheless forced us to rethink the distinctions between private and public, between local and
foreign, between a struggle for life and for death. In a historical conjuncture where alternatives are desperately sought but seldom found, where the public retreats in the face of the
private, tracing the spatiality of this newly encountered social struggle is a much needed
and rewarding exercise.
Antonis Vradis, Alternatives Editor
ISSN 1360-4813 print/ISSN 1470-3629 online/11/03 40482 9 # 2011 Taylor & Francis
DOI: 10.1080/13604813.2011.596324

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Introduction

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n May 2010, the Greek state entered a

E110 billion bailout agreement with
the International Monetary Fund
(IMF), the European Union (EU) and the
European Central Bank (ECB). The austerity measures taken in the wake of the
bailout have been followed by sharply
increasing unemployment figures, a significant deterioration of average living conditions for many and a significant shift in
the countrys political landscape: the
extreme-right party of Chrysi Augi
(Golden Dawn) was elected for the first
time at local authority level, in Athens. In
March 2011, the freshly named Ministry
of Citizen Protection (previously known
as the Ministry of Public Order, administering the states policing and intelligence
services) announced plans for the construction of a protective wall along Greeces land
border with Turkey. The aim of its construction, as announced, was to deter the
rising number of undocumented migrants
from crossing the border and inundating
the countrys urban centres and the
capital, Athens, in particular.
Within this context a group of 300
migrants, permanently settled in the island
of Crete where they worked undocumented
and therefore without any labour rights,
took the extraordinary decision to commence a mass hunger strike to demand the
legalisation of all undocumented migrants
living in Greece. This social struggle was
unique in achieving a massive migrant participation and in articulating a maximalist
demand (some could say impractical or
utopian) that challenged the inefficiency of
the migration policies of the Greek state,
opening up the agenda to issues that had
not previously been debated often in public.
The present paper does not aim to
present a comprehensive outline of the
migrant hunger strike and its participants,
or to judge its importance or impact on
national policies, public opinion or the
migrants status in Greek society. Rather,

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the paperforming part of ongoing fieldwork researchaims at this preliminary

stage to trace this social struggle through
its differing spatialities as articulated in
the 43 days of its duration. We examine
the symbolisms and practicalities of the original decision for the hunger strike to be
hosted in a public, university space (the
Law Faculty of the University of Athens);
the forced movement of the strikers to a
private space soon thereafter, and the continuation and culmination of the strike scattered across the hospitals where the strikers
were taken for treatment toward its end. In
focusing on these three places that hosted
the hunger strike, we aim to understand
how these gathered diverse individuals, political demands, national and international
solidarity, actions and words, but also
doubts, hostile reactions and official/media
attacks. We have divided the paper into
three parts that correspond to the shifting
spatiality of the hunger strike through time,
and so we illustrate the formation of those
different spaces that eventually elevated this
social struggle into a focal point of reference
in the countrys political arena.
(1) On 24 January 2011, 300 migrants
arrived at the Faculty of Law in the University of Athens, where they had decided
to commence the hunger strike. Having
chosen the city of Thessaloniki as the
second locus of their struggle, 50 of them
travelled there to settle at the Labour
Centre of the city. From the beginning,
two decision-making assemblies were
formed, one of the hunger strikers and
another of those in solidarity.
We are migrant men and women, refugees
from all over Greece. We came here to escape
poverty, unemployment, wars and
dictatorships. Whether by regular or irregular
entry, we came to Greece and are working to
support ourselves and our families. We live
without dignity, in the dark shadow of
illegality. We ask for the legalization of all
migrant men and women, we ask for the same
political and social rights and obligations as
Greek workers. Support our struggle! We do

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not have any other way to make our voices

heard, to raise awareness of our rights. Three
hundred (300) of us will go on hunger strike in
Athens and in Thessaloniki on the 25 January
2011. We would rather die here than allow our
children to suffer what we have been
through.1

The original official reaction to the strike

was summarised in the declaration of the
Ministry of Internal Affairs: there is no
chance or possible frame of a massive criteria-free legalization of foreign people who
have entered and live in the country illegally.2 This was in line with the migration
policy of the Greek state in recent years: the
doctrine of zero tolerance3 reflected in
increasingly repressive policies forcing undocumented migrants to a continuous wandering, a precarious living and an inescapably
illegal status.
Why was the Law Faculty chosen as a
locus of the hunger strike? Under Greek
law, and due to a tradition of struggles
tracing back to the dictatorial (1967 74) era,
university premises enjoy asylum status
and are off limits to police unless specifically
invited by university authorities or if a lifethreatening crime is being committed. Moreover, the so-called historic building of the
Law Faculty, which was not being used for
academic purposes at the time as it was
undergoing renovation, is a space that has
hosted some major social struggles in the
past; a place where medical and legal
support as well as civil protection would be
provided to those on strike; a place in the
very centre of the city next to other important
public buildings and a focal point for hundreds of people passing by daily. Even
before the migrants arrival in Athens, the
Law Faculty was already deemed to be an
appropriate space in the city centre for
hosting a mass hunger strike of undocumented migrants in need of public visibility, as
well as protection.
It is easy to understand the high symbolism
of this space by simply looking at both corporate and state television and press coverage,

which persistently focused on the location of

the hunger strike, rather than the substance of
its demandswhich nevertheless were recognised as just by many.4 Many intellectuals,
journalists and people in the streets could
not but acknowledge and denounce the
harsh conditions under which those migrants
had to live; and yet this was not enough, in
most peoples eyes, to legitimise their presence and illegal status in such a symbolically
charged building. For the first time in Greek
territory foreigners occupy a university at the
expense of the educational process transforming it to the base from where they will
project their demand.5 Thirty-five university
professors, echoing a considerable part of
public opinion, denounced in public the
occupation of the Law Faculty by migrants
as an abhorrent abuse of the sacred and
public space of the Law Faculty and as a contributory factor to the collapse of democratic
institutions in a country already deep in
crisis.6 This included individuals from the
countrys popular Left, who started worrying
that such an occupation could endanger academic asylum and affect domestic movements hosted there.7 Repression and
injustice were denounced, but these people
could still not be publicly visible, let alone
occupy a space of their own. It seemed
that those legally non-existent and publicly
unseen could deserve public opinions and
official representatives sympathy, but they
could not quite become part of the body
politic of the country.
We got used lately to the idea that there were
some miserable people around our
neighbourhood. They started getting more
and more, occupying more places, approaching
our houses, our abandoned storehouses, our
garbage, our windows. We were afraid that
they would intrude into our house. And, one
day, all of a sudden, we saw them sitting in the
middle of our living room. They wanted to die
in our living room. That was too much. They
could die of hunger in the streets, in packed
flats, in camps, on traffic islands; we could live
with that, at the very end we could turn in the

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other direction, but not in front of our eyes.

But not in our living room, you could go and
die elsewhere. Go and die elsewhere.8

Aided by media coverage that largely

ignored the fact that the migrants were on a
hunger strike and shifted the emphasis
towards their illegal status, the Rector of the
Law Faculty decided to revoke the universitys asylum status on 27 January and to effectively expel the migrants from the Faculty
space. On hearing that the police were preparing to enter the building, a significant number
of people started gathering in the area, while
much media coverage predicted that another
round of the December 2008 unrest could be
possible.9 Inside the Law Faculty negotiations
had already started between the Rector and
the universitys legal representatives on the
one hand and the hunger strikers and some
people in solidarity with them on the other.
(2) In the small hours of the third night of the
hunger strike, on 27 January 2011, the strikers left the Law Faculty building. Together
with people who were with them in solidarity, they moved to another central Athens
building (privately owned),10 to be known
as Ypatia, where they would continue their
strike.
When the migrants arrived at Ypatia, all
eight rooms of the mansion were locked. The
heating was off and the building was freezing
cold. The toilets were inoperative and filled
with luxury furniture that had been removed
from the corridors. There was no water.
Around half of the hunger strikers were
allowed to lie on the floor of the corridors
and the rest were left outside on the lawn in
front of the building. Tents were gradually
erected to host them outside the building
during some particularly cold and rainy
days. Organising solidarity actions was also
difficult, if not impossible; there was no
space for assemblies, organising mobilisations, dispersing information or becoming
visible in the city.11 All this was in sharp contrast to the Faculty of Law, a place that could
turn the hunger strike into a public event and a

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central political issue and incorporate it in a

series of political struggles. The inappropriateness of the new private space seemed to prejudge the strikes invisibility and quick demise
from the public sphere.
Therefore, the people who had been standing in solidarity with the hunger strikers were
faced with mounting difficulties and questions on how to continue their struggle
beside the migrantsafter all this turmoil,
should they articulate a political discourse
on their own,12 should the public debate
revolve around the expulsion from the Law
Faculty as an indication of xenophobia,
should they look for another place to host
this complicated strugglehow could they
continue their actions from such an inappropriate and private space? Debates, discussions, feelings of defeatism, however, were all
superseded and silenced by the migrants own
insistence on their hunger strike being the
only space of struggle, obliging those in
solidarity to remain in Ypatia.
We, the 250 migrant hunger strikers, are not
what has been presented by the media; that is,
those poor, impoverished, without house, job
and clothes migrants etc. We already have
homes, families and jobs in the towns we left
behind. We are not looking for
accommodation here in Athens; we just came
to fight . . . for our regularization, for our
rights and for decent living conditions.13
The war of lies which flooded the media
during the early days of the hunger strike at
the Law faculty has now come to an end; the
misleading discussion about academic asylum
is now put aside; even some ministers admit at
this point that some of our arguments are just;
it is about time, thus, for our just demand for
legalisation to be heard loudly.14

And yet, the striking images of living conditions in the Ypatia building circulating in
the press and the victimisation of the hunger
strikers allowed the issue to remain topical.
The violent exposure of the 300 hunger strikers to inhuman conditions could not be overshadowed just because Ypatia was a big and
luxurious private mansion.15 Groups and

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CITY VOL. 15, NOS. 3 4

individuals in solidarity with the hunger

strike started gradually but insistently gathering inside and outside Ypatia, patrols ending
up in conversations with migrants and solidarity people, among friends and others
meeting for the first time, debates taking
place among a heterogeneous composition of
people who did or did not belong to a political
grouping, whose common point of reference
was their meeting in situ, at Ypatiathese
were what gradually created the space of the
hunger strike. It transformed a private build
ing into a public scene of fermentation. At
the same time, workers and trade unions,
student and teachers unions, professional
associations and antiracist groups, artists,
journalists and intellectuals started expressing
their support by issuing public declarations or
in press conferences.16 Local councils, including that of Thessaloniki, issued statements of
support.17 More and more people and organisations, including those hesitant at first, started
affiliating with this struggle, some by discovering common ground between migrants
and local workers. Typical of the latter is a
letter of support written by the Association
of Translators Editors Proofreaders:
Greek professional translators (or editors or
proofreaders) did not until recently have much
in common with illegal migrants. They were
separated by what seemed to be an unbridgeable
gap created by decades of prosperity in our
country. However, the times are changing and
the gaps are bridged in ways that are all too
tangible, all too ordinary, no matter how many
fences may be raised to perpetuate the sham of
differencesdifferences which disappear by the
day. We feel the need to respond to the appeal for
solidarity issued by the Assembly of Solidarity
with the Hunger Strikers, by stating that within
this misleading climate of polarised opinion that
has been created these last few days we stand
firmly on the side of the hunger strikers. In the
face of exploitation, poverty, misery, and
persecution, we are all equal, we are all
foreigners. And we are all rightful claimants to
the same immunity.18

The same seemed to apply on an international

level, since from the very beginning

organisations, professional associations,

intellectuals, politicians and individuals inundated the tiny space of Ypatia with their
messages of solidarity and declarations of
support.19
You are fighting for what Europe will
become. Those who ignore or oppose you are a
real threat to the European legacy of universal
emancipation. In our times of nationalist
xenophobia, movements like yours offer a
hope that emancipation is not a dead word.
(Slavoj Zizek)20

Actions of solidarity by organisations and

independent groups all over Greece, Europe
and elsewhere21including texts, banners,
talks, dissemination of information, concerts,
occupations, interruptions of streets and
public services, and international days of
actionmade evident the inseparable links
between irregular migrants and the international working class. Growing support
came also from intellectuals and artists who
regarded the 300 hunger strikers as pioneers.
What the hunger strike had achieved by this
phase was to transform a small private building in a hardly visible corner of Athens into a
broad platform of mobilisation and generate a
new urban point of reference. People gathering there daily with the hunger strikers
enacted a dynamic that transcended the

place of the struggle and magnified Ypatia,

which would gradually and unexpectedly
expand beyond its limited space to contain
actions and words of solidarity from around
the world. This network of support created
a site of resistance that would keep on
growing once its location began to disperse
to hospitals around the country.
(3) During the 32nd day of the hunger strike,
on 25 February 2011, 13 hunger strikers
were transferred to hospitals, while some of
them had already been hospitalised since
the 28th day following fainting episodes.22
On the 34th day, 19 more people were transferred to various hospitals, while on the 39th
day the number of those under medical care
in hospitals rose to 81 in Athens and 17 in

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Thessaloniki.23 On the 43rd day the number

of migrants who had been transferred to
hospital rose to more than a hundred.24
According to the doctors attending the
hunger strikers, great weight loss, electrolyte disorders and fainting episodes, required
the daily transportation of strikers to hospitals since at any moment there could be very
serious incidents risking permanent damage
to vital organs such as the heart, kidneys and
liver.25
In this way, the site of the struggle started to
shift to hospitals around the city, while solidarity also started taking different forms.
More and more anonymous people were
present at the hospitals in order to ensure
that doctors would not act against the
hunger strikers will. Instead of remaining in
Ypatia patrolling outside the mansion or
talking with the migrants and the rest of
those in solidarity, people stated their availabilityindividually, in couples or small
groupsby accompanying the hunger strikers wherever they were transferred. At the
same time, hundreds of anonymous letters
of support, declarations and mobilisations of
solidarity from across the country and the
world were sent to the hospitals and returned
to Ypatia.26 At this third stage of the hunger
strike its cartography would denote Ypatia
as the centre and the hospitals as the periphery
of the social struggle we are examining.
Since the first days at the Law Faculty solidarity was challenged through the victimisation of the migrants and the criminalisation
of those that brought them here. Seen from
this perspective, migrants were perceived as
victims of extremist groups that used them in
order to create social unrest and for their
own interests.27 On the eighth day of the
hunger strike persecution calls were addressed
to six people from the solidarity committee
and the Rector of the University of Athens
as guilty of trafficking, transferring of illegal
migrants and occupying the building of the
Law Faculty.28 In the following days, more
persecution calls would come. As Ypatia was
creating its own public space and solidarity
unexpectedly occupied new sites all over

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Greece and abroad, certain state representatives and media aimed at criminalising the solidarity movement, accusing it of preventing the
migrants from eating and leading them to
death.29 While at first the site of confrontation
was the building of Ypatia as a whole, at this
stage it moved specifically to the migrants
bodiesand the responsibility over them.
Attacks were also made on the migrants
themselves. Their misery was contagious, a
threat to public health and the citys purity,
a tragedy that transformed the Ypatia
mansion into an infection bomb, as stated
by the Minister of Health.30 The hunger strikers were being conceptualised by the state in
terms of purity and impurity. There were
those who lived in misery, who could
provoke unrest, making visible what should
not have become so and which could infect
the city and disturb the social fabric. They
could only be recognised as victims, dirty
and illegal, that had been led by others or
were awaiting deportation.31 Paradoxically
enough, at the same time media also tried to
present migrants as intentionally provoking
social unrest, creating an atmosphere of Islamophobia. The actions and practices of the
migrants are suspicious, subversive and
dangerous for the nation. We will repeat it
again and again . . . it is not about people
immigrating, it is about a mass movement of
a Muslim population.32
Yet the true case was that those previously
invisible had appeared in the public sphere
and claimed their space. In the last days of
the hunger strike, governmental representatives entered into direct negotiations with
the hunger strikers. They seemed to recognise
them as subjects whose demands did not
sound absurd any longer. The discussion for
a new legalisation process opened up at a
time when Greece featured in the headlines
of press across Europe only by reference to
illegal migration, detention camps, deportations, border patrols and fences that would
detect and prevent migration to Europe.
The hunger strikers managed to reverse
these terms and to become visible. On the
44th day (9 March) the hunger strike ended.

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CITY VOL. 15, NOS. 3 4

The governments decision to meet part of the

demands of the 300 migrants on hunger strike
proves that the only lost struggle is the one
that is not taken on. It also shows to all
working people that the government of the
EU, IMF and European Bank Memorandum
is not invincible. A strong militant spirit and
broad social solidarity can bring tangible
results. It is obvious that it will take a long
and hard struggle to lift the Apartheid
against foreign workers living in Greece and
Europe. However, there should be no doubt
that the dedication of the 300 opened a new
path of hope.33

Conclusion
On the third day of the hunger strike, 34 university professors had demanded the lifting of
academic asylum and the removal of the
migrants from the Law Faculty by declaring
the following:
The abuse of the Law Faculty by groups of
any kind, even if we share some of their
demands, simply cannot go on. Thankfully,
due to actions of the State and Rectors, legality
was maintained, the building was peacefully
evacuated and the migrants were transferred
to another place. Humanitarian concern is
among the priorities of our system of
government; however, the total collapse of
democratic institutions, including that of the
Public University, is causing harm to the most
vulnerable, the most impotent people of our
society and the migrants themselves.34

From the Law Faculty, which had seemed

like a place that could bring to the fore all the
aspects of a broad mobilisation for a massive
hunger strike, migrants were thus transferred
to the private mansion of Ypatia, an invisible
spot in the capital that would most probably
condemn them to invisibility. The very essence
of their social struggle, however, managed to
overcome the constraints put on them by such
a limiting place, coupled with solidarity
actions from within and around the world, a
mobilisation network that became even more

evident in the hospitals throughout the city,

where many of the migrants were subsequently
transferred. In this sense, therefore, the hunger
strike can be considered to have achieved a
victory. Even if its sole demand was not satisfied, the 300 strikers and those in solidarity
managed to re-frame Ypatia as a public space
of social struggle, to become visible and to act
as political subjects creating a momentum in
the countrys central political life.
Two months later, in May 2011, a racist
pogrom-like action broke out in the centre
of Athens under the pretext of the coldblooded murder of a 44-year-old Greek
man as punishment for a minor theft. This
escalated into a situation where at least one
migrant was stabbed to death and at least 17
others injured, mostly from stabbings. A
number of police officers in the vicinity of
the events (in the north part of the city
centre of Athens, along the Patision Avenue
axis) were accused of tolerating the attacks,
which were carried out largely by members
of the Golden Dawn, the extreme-right political group now represented in local government. The question at issue was, once again,
not how to cope with the issue of migration
in itself, but to confront the presence of a
rising number of illegal people in despair
down town and clear the city centre from
their unpleasant image.35 In the case of the
Law Faculty, as articulated by the university
professors, the question was not whether
there must be asylum or rule of law, but
who would have access to those values
within the context of a democratic country.
In the case of the most recent pogroms,
the question was who would have the right
to appropriate the capitals landscape.
In these times of crisis, therefore, spatiality
keeps emerging as a focal axis around which
issues of identity and citizenship are violently
debated, but sometimes also meaningfully
re-framed. The 300 migrants and the people
standing in solidarity with them demanded
their political representation and subjectivity
through bringing to the fore issues and people
previously invisible and creating in situ
relationships of community. Within this

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context, the mass hunger strike of 2011 may

serve as an important reference point in
re-appropriating spatiality; through their
social struggle, these people may have
managed to re-enact the city and themselves.

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Notes
1 Statement of the Assembly of Migrant Hunger
Strikers on 23 January 2011, http://
hungerstrike300.espivblogs.net/2011/01/23/
statement-of-the-assembly-of-migrant-hunger-strikers
(this URL as well as the following URLs cited in the
notes were last accessed on 15 March 2011).
Myrto Anthypatopoulos unpublished dissertation
Politikes gia ti Metanastefsi kai Koinonika Kinimata
Iperaspisis ton Dikaiomaton ton Metanaston. To
Paradeigma tis Apergias Peinas ton 300
(Migration Politics and Social Movements for
Migrants Rights: the case of the 300 Migrants
Hunger Strike), March 2011, has been a useful
guide for drafting this chronicle of the strike.
2 Statement of the Minister of the Interior G. Ragousis
on 25 January 2011, http://www.inews.gr/141/
ypes-den-yparchei-kamia-prothesi-mazikis-kaiadiakritis-nomimopoiisis-allodapon.htm
3 Reinforced surveillance of entry by land at the
Greek Turkish border and blocking departures by
air or sea. Alongside Athens airport, Patras and
Igoumenitsa are among the countrys leading
departure gates, quoted in Migreurop report
2009 10: European BordersControls,
Detention, Deportations, http://www.migreurop.
org/IMG/pdf/rapport-migreurop-2010-en_-_2121110.pdf. Greek state policies are compounded
by European migration policies of emergency that
tend to approach migration as a threat.
4 Ksilonontas to Asulo (Tearing Apart the Asylum),
Ethnos, http://www.ethnos.gr/article.asp?catid=
12197&subid=2&pubid=52416976
5 Aparadekth Praktikh (Unacceptable Practice), Ta
Nea online, 25 January 2011, http://www.tanea.
gr/default.asp?pid=2&ct=1&artid=4614795
6 Epistoli Paremvasis gia ta Gegonota tis Nomikis
apo 34 Panepistimiakous (Letter of Intervention
Concerning the Law Faculty Incidents Signed by 34
University Professors), Ta Nea, 28 January 2011,
http://www.tanea.gr/default.asp?pid=2&ct=
1&artid=4615467
7 Ch. Papachristou, Asulo (Asylum), Ta Nea, 25
January 2011, http://www.tanea.gr/default.
asp?pid=2&ct=8&artid=4614790
8 Old Boy, Mpikan sto Saloni mas kai Chezoun
(They Entered our Living Room and Shat on It), 27
January 2011, http://old-boy.blogspot.com/
2011/01/blog-post_27.html

GREECE

AT THE TIME OF THE

IMF

489

9 A. Papahelas, Oi Opadoi ths Vias (Fans of

Violence), Kathimerini, 27 January 2011, http://
www.kathimerini.com.cy/index.php?pageaction=
kat&modid=1&artid=37156&show=Y
10 Phorum, Ypatia: Idioktitis kai Diaplekomena
(Ypatia: The Owner and Interlocking Interests), 18
March 2011, http://www.phorum.gr/viewtopic.
php?f=52&t=204001
11 Clandestinenglish, The Greek State Tortures
Hunger Strikers, http://clandestinenglish.
wordpress.com/2011/01/30/the-greek-statetortures-hunger-strikers/; Prwtovoulia Allhlegguhs
stous 300 Apergous Metanastes, Deltio Tupou 11h
Mera Apergias Peinas (Solidarity Assembly to the
300 Migrant Strikers, Press Release 11th Day), 4
February 2011, http://bit.ly/khoLTG
12 This comment, as well as others to follow, are based
on participant observation.
13 Apofash Suneleushs Apergwn Peinas (Decision of
the Assembly of the Hunger Strikers), 27 January
2011, http://bit.ly/eTH13V
14 Anakoinwsh twn Apergwn Peinas Metanastvn
(Statement of the Migrant Hunger Strikers), 5
February 2011, http://bit.ly/iVSPK9
15 M. Thermou, Ena Palataki Gia Tous Metanastes (A
Small Palace for the Migrants), To Vima, 30 January
2011, http://www.tovima.gr/politics/article/
?aid=381278
16 For the trade unions that supported the hunger strike
see: http://bit.ly/jh5l2C; for the migrant
communities and antiracist groups see: http://bit.
ly/m8rBKk; for artists see: http://bit.ly/mptvvZ; for
student unions see: http://bit.ly/jVaq7n; for
political groups and organisations see: http://bit.
ly/iqDgHA
17 For local councils and groups that supported the
hunger strike see: http://bit.ly/l1HwgS; Psifisma
Dhmotikou Sumvouliou Thessalonikhs (Resolution
of the Local Council of Thessaloniki), 17 February
2011, http://bit.ly/iLxdJW
18 For Association of Translators Editors
Proofreaders, Solidarity with the Struggle of the
Migrants, 4 February 2011, http://www.smed.
gr/2011/02/solidarity-with-struggle-of-migrants.
html
19 For solidarity from abroad see: http://bit.ly/ifjZ9D
20 Slavoj Zizek, 18 February 2011, http://
hungerstrike300.espivblogs.net/2011/02/18/
slavoj-zizek-douzinas/
21 For actions of solidarity see: http://bit.ly/iJctJO, for
example, Call for a European Coordinated
Solidarity Action for the 300 Migrants Hunger
Strikers in Greece on Monday, March 7, 3 March
2011, http://hungerstrike300.espivblogs.net/
2011/03/03/european-day-solidarity-actions/;
Drash Allhleguhs sto Berolino (Action of Solidarity
in Berlin), 8 March 2011, http://hungerstrike300.
espivblogs.net/2011/03/08/drash-allhlegguhsberolino/; for an exhaustive reference of actions of

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solidarity see: Diadrastikos Xarths ekdhlwsewn
Allhlegguhs (Interactive Map of Actions of
Solidarity), http://hungerstrike300.espivblogs.
net/2011/02/14/map/
See Medical Report, 25 February, http://bit.ly/
inMXN9 and Statement of the Solidarity Initiative at
the press conference on 18 February, http://
hungerstrike300.espivblogs.net/2011/02/18/
press-conference-of-solidarity-initiative-for-the-300migrant-hunger-strikers-18-2/
98 Migrants Hunger Strikers to Hospital,
Demonstration in Solidarity, Friday 4 March,
Solidarity Initiative to the 300 Hunger Strikers,
http://bit.ly/gUxpck
Se Nosokomeia Perissoteroi apo 100 Metanastes
Apergoi Peinas (More than 100 Migrants
Transferred to Hospital), Eleftherotypia, 8 March
2011, http://www.enet.gr/?i=news.el.
article&id=257438
Statement made by the President and Vice-President
of the Pan Hellenic Medical Organization on 5
March 2011, http://hungerstrike300.espivblogs.
net/2011/03/05/anakoinosi-proedrouantiproedrou-iatrikou-syllogou/
More than 100 emails by individuals from all over
the world reached the following address
ypografes.allilegyi.stin.apergia@gmail.com
expressing their solidarity with the hunger strikers in
the hospitals (from 25 February to 9 March 2011).
Domestic groups and little extreme groupings that
dogmatize either on the left or on the right exploit
this situation so as to create a confrontational
climate and they think that this way they create a
migrant movement . . . and they hope they will
achieve also other things by feeding hate and
debate. But it would be better not to challenge, as
they are now doing occupying the Faculty of Law . . .
they will the first to lose if control is lost, Ant.
Karakousis, I Proklisi tis Nomikis (The Challenge of
Faculty of Law), To Vima, http://www.tovima.gr/
opinions/article/?aid=380446
Ston Eisaggelea gia tin Ypothesi tis Nomikis (To the
Attorney General Concerning the Issue of the
Faculty of Law), 3 February 2011, http://www.
real.gr/DefaultArthro.aspx?page=arthro&id=
43885&catID=3
See, for instance, Sinefthisan dio Simparastates
(Two Persons in Solidarity were Arrested), Ethnos,
8 March, http://www.ethnos.gr/article.
asp?catid=11424&subid=2&pubid=56698950
Statement made by the Minister of Health,

31

32

33

34

35

Andreas Loverdos, 14 February 2011, http://bit.

ly/irOvh8
At the same time, during a discussion at the
municipal council on 23 February the mayor of
Athens proposed a resolution according to which
migrants were asked to stop their hunger strike in
order to enter into dialogue. It is interesting to note
the fact that in introducing the issue, the mayor
referred to recent incidents of hooliganism, clearly
implying that the hunger strike was also an episode
of social unrest. The resolution was not finally
approved. See extracts http://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=amxgT7DQPZ4
Skai TV news, 4 March 2011, http://www.
youtube.com/watch?v=UYzRTvhZmKc&feature=
player_embedded#at=192
Statement of the Solidarity Initiative, 9 March
2011, http://hungerstrike300.espivblogs.net/
2011/03/09/the-vindication-of-the-300-migrantshunger-strikers-is-a-hope-for-the-whole-society/
Epistoli Paremvasis gia ta Gegonota tis Nomikis
apo 34 Panepistimiakous (Letter of Intervention
Concerning the Law Faculty Incidents Signed by 34
University Professors), Ta Nea, 28 January 2011,
http://www.tanea.gr/default.asp?pid=2&ct=
1&artid=4615467
Michalis Katsigeras, Ektos politevmatos (Beyond
the Regime), Kathimerini, 11 May 2011, http://
news.kathimerini.gr/4dcgi/_w_articles_ell_1_11/
05/2011_441739; Pretenteris Giannis, Mas
Piran tin Athina (They took from us Athens), Ta Nea,
11 May 2011, http://www.tanea.gr/default.
asp?pid=2&ct=136&artid=4630465;
G. Pouliopoulos, Prosopa kai Tragodies sto Kentro
tou Fovou. Ena western Diadramatizetai
Kathimerina sto Kentro tis Athinas (People and
Tragedies in the Centre of Fear. A Western is Daily
Taking Place in the Centre of Athens), To Vima, 15
May 2011, http://www.tovima.gr/politics/
article/?aid=400685

Regina Mantanika, PhD candidate, Department of Social Science, University Paris

7. Email: reginamanta@yahoo.com
Hara Kouki, PhD candidate, School of Law,
Birkbeck College, University of London.
Email: harakouki@gmail.com