Imagine that for reasons of life, you lose your job, or your family, or any financial support you may have. And you end up finding in an extreme situation: you sleep on the streets, collect garbage, or ask for alms in a corner of a street. With all that this entails, in addition, government does not help you, the local government will fine you because what you’re doing is an “uncivil behavior”. What you think is survive, for them is a crime. You’re not poor for them, or yes, but you will be treated like a criminal. A poor criminal.
This happens in Barcelona. The Draft of the Ordinance of Measures to Promote and Ensure Peaceful Coexistence of 2005 was designed to regulate the uncivil behavior. Is considered uncivil, for example, paste posters on the walls, drinking on the street, or playing in some areas of the city. If we look at that draft, we see that there is a title: “Other behaviors in public spaces: occupation of public space by adopting forms of begging”, which describes as “uncivil” certain actions, such as sleeping in the street or begging. We can continue reading, and other titles also clarify that it is uncivil washing clothes in public spaces, sleeping in the street or prostitution. The City Council seems unwilling to relate these behaviors with poverty, but simply are actions that difficult that the city can shine.
We often have a permanent suspicion of the victims of poverty, we blame their situation and accuse them of lazy and parasites. That’s what Albert Sales (2014) says, and argues that the cause of this is the neoliberal model of the current management of poverty. This, according to Sales (2014) have allowed the removal of the social care of that collectives from the public administration, and the delegation to social entities. In addition, they use the penal system, repression and punishment to finish with poverty, or to hide poverty to the city.
The capitalist model tells us that the success or failure, wealth and poverty are the consequences of a personal choice (Tinessa, 2008). Thus, we reject other social or environmental causes that may influence the outcome. And for this reason, this unfounded idea capitalism has curdled in our minds. The poor it is because it has sought, and we don’t want to help them. The logical consequence is that the state doesn’t take care of what they think they have responsibility, and that is exactly what is happening right now.
Public administration ignores that problem and delegates that social care to social entities. The task of social assistance is increasingly seen as voluntary. Those affected by poverty can no longer claim a right to state (or council, in this case), but should seek help from a volunteer organization, such as NGOs.
The fact that Barcelona has a large number of tourists every year justified the actions of this ordinance against the poor, and they suffer police and criminal harassment (Sales, 2014). Vagrants, hawkers, prostitutes and other groups are treated as groups that do not want to rejoin society. We can see that there is a big difference between, for example, Barcelona (or Spain) and Sweden. In Sweden there is a program that prevents anti-social behaviors from the citizens, and the state has a very important role. On the other hand, as we said before, in Spain there is the thought that their situation their own responsibility.
With measures such as that ordinance propose, with its sanctions and police interventions, they don’t attack the causes of poverty, but only have the interest to hide them. Behind the Beautiful Barcelona there is another one, the Dirty Barcelona, and it seems that the administration doesn’t want it to disappear, it just want to hide it. The poorest groups are still there, and we might ask ourselves whether the City Council really helps them to improve their situation, as stated in the draft of the ordinance we have talked about. At the moment, it seems that only the good will of voluntary organizations and individuals can relieve some suffering of those who suffer poverty. Only if when the society and government understand we have to work together to turn our cities more equal, we will be able to change the reality.
Bibliography
Ajuntament de Barcelona (2005). Projecte d’ordenança de mesures per fomentar i garantir la convivència ciutadana a la ciutat de Barcelona.
Government offices in Sweden. Social services in Sweden. Available at: http://www.government.se/sb/d/15473/a/182986 (seen 21st March, 2015)
Sales, Albert (2014). El delicte de ser pobre. Setmanari La Directa. Available at: https://albertsales.wordpress.com/2014/04/23/cuando-ser-pobre-es-un-delito/ (seen 21st March, 2015)
Tinessa, Giulio (2008). Marginados, minorías e inmigrantes: criminalización de la pobreza y encarcelamiento masivo en las sociedades capitalistas avanzadas. Documentación social. Universidad de Comillas.
Social Policy UPF 
I’m totally agree with your blog post. As a citizen I can understand that some of that ordinances can be good to promote some standards of living in the city, but in my opinion that problem just can be solved by coordinting two areas. In first instance I think we should make our own reflexion and put ourselves in the skin of those who are passing through those moments in order to be more tolerant’s and supportives. In second instance the real fact that can really help to solve those problems is the intitutional mark, i think its just a matter of will, as the councils have their own budget it’s just about put it them and try to solve that. As we have seen with will we can try to fix it and learn from those countries that have developed more policies in that area, like as you said the case of Sweden.
congrats! 😉
Terming certain actions as “uncivil” can have a dehumanizing effect on the homeless, and can also reflect the perspective that legislators and even the population have on this group. Although Barcelona is a city that hosts a large number of tourists every year, ignoring or punishing the problem rather than resolving it seems counterproductive, especially because as the situation worsens, more resources will have to be invested if politicians eventually decide to aid the easing of homelessness. Even though it may be difficult to solve the problem in the short-term, handling this issue now rather than later leads to long-term sustainability. Ignoring the problem as it worsens will only lead to increased costs by the state, especially in times of economic crisis. If states begin handling social issues in a time of relative economic stability (though it may not seem stable at the time), they will not be as heavily impacted during times of instability, and can provide for their citizens.
I definitely agree with your opinion and your thoughts. “Criminal” homelessness is not only a problem in Barcelona but a topic with increased importance in a lot of parts of Europe. It is a problem of ideology. The widespread ideas of neoliberalism are poking fears for everyone who is not adequate for our capitalist society and therefore homeless people are treated like criminals. In a lot of cases poverty is not a consequence of personal choices but just bad luck in life.
Last time I read an article about a 35 year old man who had to care for his sick mother because his father died some months ago. He lost his job because of looking after his mother and didn’t have income anymore. In the end, his mother died, he had to sell the house because of the debts and ended on the street because of a lot of misfortunes in the last year. This case shows that everyone can be effected of moving into poverty, hence, governments who don’t feel responsible for taking care of homeless people, don’t fulfil the task that should be expected from a welfare state.
Although a lot of NGO’s and voluntary citizens do their best, they don’t have the same power as a government could have. It is a shame, that governments prefer hiding poor people than offering them help by concentrating on the causes of poverty like the housing and employment situation etc. Rethinking is necessary in order to build more solidarity for them on the part of citizens and to create a movement who also supports rights of homeless people.
Claudia, I would like to develop your concept of victims of poverty. I think the term which you are looking for is victim blame: Blaming the poor for their own tragedy. This concept is usually used in order to describe the labour exploitation of women, but from my point of view it can be reproduced in this case: Specially in Spain, women work exactly as much as men, but receive a lower income for that. Needless to say, they usually do the chores therefore, they are doubly penalised. On top of that, instead of supporting women and trying to put their income and rights at the same level as men, some people finally said that the problem are women because of their laziness. Simply because their gender condition, and hence, criminalizing women. According to you, putting pressure, and making you responsible for everything in this life is far from being fair. You have to take into account some factors such as the context (crisis, rate employment), the power of the trade unions and others.
Related to neoliberal arguments, in fact, Neoliberalism sets out some powerful argument about fighting against poverty. Let me give you an example: Imagine that you are walking on the street and you see beggars on the same corner every morning of your life, this will probably make you annoyed and irritated. That’s why, not only social democracy can justify public intervention to reduce poverty, but also the Neoliberals.
I wouldn’t finish the comment without congratulating you on your interesting blog post. Likewise, I would like to invite you to read my blog post “Workfare vs. poverty or Workfare vs. Poor”.
The City Council considers as an uncivil behavior sleeping in the streets and because of that the Ordinance of Measures of 2005 regulates this uncivil behavior. The local government in this case has a simplistic view about the uncivil behavior considering the fact that people who sleep in the streets are criminals. The legislation regulates this actions in this Ordinance created to Promote and Ensure Peaceful Coexistence.
How can the local government regulate an specific legislation without promoting measures to stop the poverty in the streets? This argument is not taking care about the uncivil actions, this argument defends the inequality. This legislation is defending the hypocrisy of local government who relates the effects of the poverty with the uncivil behaviors.
I agree with your vision about the lack of the State’s action in a situation where there is a risk in our welfare mediterranean state. What happens when we loose our job, and family members?
We live in a Mediterranean welfare state and We can see in the Esping Andersen’s theory that in the mediterranean systems the state plays a subsidiary role in the social stratification and inequality and the family constitutes a network.
The problem is structural, not coyuntural, we are seeing the effects of an economical crisis and because of that the response has to be global in terms of social and economic structures, the response of this situation is in the social movements. We can see the paradigmatic case of the PAH in Barcelona. This movement echoing the strategies developed against evictions. In the words of Ali Gulbol, neighbor of this social movement in Barcelona, “the fight has just begun”.
Claudia, I absolutely agree with your argumentation. Unfortunately such a trend towards anti-homeless measures and laws that criminalize homelessness, true to the motto “out of sight, out of mind”, instead of addressing the underlying causes, is recognizable in many cities around the world.
It is quite interesting that local governments still pursue the same strategy although many studies found out, that providing lasting solutions like housing and individual support to solve the precarious situation of homeless people is much cheaper than investing in police men, health care and jails.
Like you also worked out the underlying problem is, that we value people along their economic contribution within our capitalistic thinking. Everyone who doesn´t make his contribution will be excluded and marked as being lazy.
The fact, that this thinking is still widespread within society showed a survey conducted in 2011 in Germany which found out, that between 30% and 38% of the respondents thought, that homeless people are indolent and unpleasant and should be removed from the pedestrian zone.
This situation only can be changed if a legal basis will be created which guarantees homeless people an accommodation to sleep and also individual support in form of social assistance.
Moreover a reintegrative process within society and the employment market is necessary. To know the extent of accomodations and help that must be provided, a general system could be introduced to collect all homeless people. Such a system for example is already used successfully in Finland, Denmark and Sweden.
That´s the reason why local governments can´t delegate social care to voluntary institutions. They don´t have the capacity nor the means to help all homeless people either in the short or the long term.