Illuminating radical spatial imaginaries: Counter-mapping urban environmental justice struggles for the city yet to come

Abstract

Urban greening is not a neutral intervention on the social fabric. Critical analyses of the green city often concentrate on greening's top-down, hegemonic, and large-scale manifestations while neglecting the role of social movements. Aiming to address this gap, we ground discussions of “urbanized nature” within discussions of radical spatial imaginaries, concentrating on their performativity. We propose “counter-mapping” as an engaged methodology, developed with local activists, to illuminate radical green imaginaries. Examining 13 environmental justice struggles in Barcelona, we find place imaginaries to be tied to preserving unique sites, linking historical trauma to fears of future spatial fixes, and projecting inclusive, liveable neighborhoods as ideal futures. This study underscores the importance of comprehending how resistance to the prevailing “green-paradox” manifests in local contexts. Through this exercise, we might help make clearer the axes of common/divergent imaginaries and forge alliances, dialogues, and reflection among local movements and decision makers in Barcelona and beyond.

Keywords

Spatial imaginary counter-mapping urban environmental justice scholar-activism green gentrification

Introduction

It is now a well-established premise that urban greening, or urban green infrastructures¹, are imbued with power relations (Anguelovski et al., 2019; Diep et al., 2022; Finewood et al., 2019; Wachsmuth and Angelo, 2018). This stance is reflected, for example, in the growing Urban Environmental Justice (UEJ) literature which outlines and examines processes of “green gentrification” (Anguelovski et al., 2021; Anguelovski and Connolly, 2024; Quinton et al., 2023; Rigolon and Collins, 2023), highlighting the uneven geographies of power upon which green infrastructure developments play out. Increasingly so, the discursive power of (urban) greening—its social meanings and imaginaries of the future—is also being examined as deeply defining its power-laden (material/economic) nature. Such studies are outlining, for example, the relationship between “green branding” of cities or neighborhoods and unjust green urban (re)development (Garcia-Lamarca et al., 2021; Lewartoska et al., 2024; Shokry et al., 2022). The scholarship weaving together the material ramifications and discursive power of urban greening now understands urban greening to be a social imaginary—what Angelo conceptualizes as urbanized nature (Angelo, 2019b)—“of nature as an indirect, moral good that can be mobilized by a range of actors for very different normative visions of society” (Angelo, 2019b: 647).

This “green social imaginary,” in its hegemonic imaginative expression, is increasingly deployed within entrepreneurial and economic growth strategies as part and parcel of neoliberal urbanism (Matheney et al., 2021; Neidig et al. 2022; While et al. 2004)–referring to an urban policy model that prioritizes market-driven approaches, privatization, and deregulation to promote economic growth and competitiveness in cities. A predominately neoliberal logic has been shown to be permeating “smart city approaches” (March and Ribera-fumaz, 2016), cultural policy (Rius-Ulldemolins et al., 2016), the introduction of nature-based solutions (Armstrong et al., 2022; Kotsila et al., 2021) and other green and gray infrastructures (Wachsmuth and Angelo, 2018) as well as policies around tourism following COVID-19 lockdowns (Higgins-Desbiolles, 2020). In all approaches, designers, planners and policy makers articulate claims highlighting that such ways of urban greening are aiding a transition toward “sustainability” or the “green transition”—that is as responses to climate impacts. However, greening is not a neutral intervention on the social fabric and often results in pockets of “green privilege” (Argüelles, 2021), whereby socially vulnerable residents are excluded from new green amenities they fought for as part of an environmental justice agenda (Anguelovski et al., 2018: 417).

How then are powerful and increasingly established urbanized natures, which lead to a range of social, environmental and climate injustices, being contested and subverted? Despite the increasing scholarship tracing the material ramifications of the discursive power of mainstream ideas around urban greening, counter and subaltern imaginaries to the growing green orthodoxy have been given less attention (see Oscilowicz et al., 2023). If urban greening is indeed a social imaginary which is being operationalized by various actors for different normative visions of society, then focusing on radical manifestations of urbanized nature - or those imaginaries which aspire for a society that continuously builds and evolves its institutions (Castoriadis, 1987)—may offer a way to chart progressive and emancipatory transformations from within existing conditions (Swyngedouw, 2023: 38). In other words, shifting our focus away from “urban greening” in its top-down, large scale, hegemonic manifestations toward the non-hegemonic, radical imaginaries of UEJ movements may help “ … to contribute to the realization of [just] sustainable futures” (Temper et al., 2018: 747).

Here, we propose engaging more deeply with the literatures on radical imaginaries. In this endeavor, attention to space is shown to be integral to uncovering alternatives to instituted society (Asara, 2020; Khasnabish, 2008; Stoetzler and Yuval-Davis, 2002). In the proceeding sections, we thus outline a shift from operationalizing the social imaginary—a concept increasingly critiqued as having become “vague and catch all at the cost of clarity” (Delanty, 2021; Varvarousis, 2019)—to the spatial imaginary, centralizing the intimate relationship between imaginaries and their spatiality (Watkins 2015). This paper, then, lays out a framework to uncover and analyze the processes of urbanized/-ing nature in its non-hegemonic, radical forms by uncovering and analyzing how urban environmental justice movements are contesting top-down urban greening initiatives through the performance of spatial imaginaries.

In order to visualize these spatial relationships, we propose “counter-mapping” urban socio-environmental struggles and alternatives from below. This is done in close collaboration with local activists, as an engaged methodology to make visible radical green imaginaries. In doing so, we ask: what radical imaginaries and intersecting needs does counter-mapping reveal vis-à-vis the green (neoliberal) city orthodoxy? While other forms of “mapping” have been undertaken related to environmental (in)justices (Da Rocha et al., 2018; Keeler et al., 2022; Pedregal et al., 2020; Temper et al., 2015; Wilson et al., 2015), our approach strays in its movement away from the mapping of hard infrastructures—be it green infrastructures or environmental pollutants - toward the mapping of radical spatial imaginaries and their performances. Through our mapping strategy, we aim to bring critical urban environmental justice scholarship in closer contact with not only critical urban sociology (Angelo, 2021) and critical geography (Davoudi, 2018; Davoudi & Brooks, 2021; Watkins, 2015) but also budding research on the transformative potential of radical social movements (Apostolopoulou et al., 2022; Temper et al., 2018).

In the next section we outline the hegemony of the modern “green social imaginary” and its related and resulting materialities. Following calls for a deep analysis of localized manifestations of the hegemonic green imaginary in urban planning (Angelo, 2019a; Long, 2016) we then outline the appropriateness of grounding Angelo's (2019b) conceptualization of urbanized nature within discussions of spatial imaginaries, paying specific attention to their performativity (Watkins, 2015). In this way, we also respond to calls to understand the role of social movements (Angelo, 2019a: 9) vis-à-vis the deployment of the green city, looking at the strategies that activists have used overtime and their emergence in view of the spatial and historical characteristics of a neighborhood (Anguelovski, 2015: 704).

Moving forward, we outline our operationalization of “counter-mapping,” including a brief overview of 13 case studies of environmental justice struggles within the city of Barcelona which constitute the basis of our methodological approach and analysis. While no singular imaginary exists across a single street, a neighborhood, or the city, we uncover thematic tendencies wherein place imaginaries are strongly linked to the preservation and protection of unique places, how histories of trauma are related to fears of future spatial fixes, and how livable and inclusive neighborhoods are being projected as idealized futures.

The dominance of the green social imaginary and its materialities

In their recent book “Green as Good: Urbanized Nature and the making of Cities and Citizens,” Angelo (2021) provides a rich historical analysis of urban greening and reveals how “nature” has long been communicated as a “cure” to urban ills—providing a novel lens through which to think through “nature and the city.” A key facet in the fostering of this paradigm is the transformation of nature from a direct or substantive good to a morally or spiritually beneficial asset, or an indirect good². By transforming nature into an indirect good, or a moral desire, greening becomes wrapped within the language of universality, wherein “green” becomes beneficial to all and in the same way through a “natural” trickle-down effect process. Lastly, Angelo reveals how “green” has been and continues to be an “aspirational” good, which is deployed to communicate visions of idealized futures through new conceptions of urban sustainability, often associated with the creation a new bourgeoisie—with its own set of behaviors, tastes, and practices (Baviskar, 2020). Importantly, although this “green as good” narrative may find distinct meanings for different groups, green is always “good” and the “winning” imaginary—that which prevails and becomes dominant—is based on power differentials.

With the growing dominance of this idealized green future, Angelo and others have argued for the need to conduct in-depth analyses of localized manifestations of the green imaginary in urban planning (Angelo, 2019a; Long, 2016) as to connect various scales of urban transformation. Neidig et al. (2022), for example, offer a historical outlining of urban greening's role in “building early shared goals in a context of violent political conflict … ” and its use in supporting hopes of “becoming a green pioneer internationally … ” in the context of the 2012 European Green Capital of Vitoria-Gasteiz (Basque Country, Spain). This before the later depoliticization of green and sustainability discourses in the city. Greening is thus shown to have evolved from merely a political fix to a sustainability fix. By doing so, a once socially useful imaginary has been captured by the logics of neoliberal growth as part of competitive urbanism agendas and may end up endangering democratic participation in decision-making—a participation that was first essential in the rolling out of the green agenda (Neidig et al., 2022). This is not a story unique to the city of Vitoria-Gasteiz, calling for further examination of the injustices arising from local manifestations of an internationally hegemonic (green social) imaginary.

The dominance of this imaginary and its immaterial power is increasingly informing the urban green branding practices of different urban development models—such as the postindustrial green city, the smart green city, or the green resilient city (Burnham et al., 2017). This green branding is then reinforced by “green awards” such as the European Green Capital and World Green City awards (Rosol et al., 2017; Matheney et al., 2021; Baró and Anguelovski, 2021), creating idealized standards to which cities must grow to or fear being “left behind” (Roy, 2011). The potential of immaterial power has recently been recognized within the (urban) environmental justice literature (Anguelovski et al., 2020; Temper et al., 2018) noting how imaginaries “manifest in specific material, technological, resource, and infrastructure and influence guiding standards for new urban greening interventions” (Anguelovski et al., 2020: 9) Similarly, Angelo (2019b) highlights how the imaginary of “green as good” “literally made new forms of moral action possible … [which were then] materialized in urban space” (p. 665). As highlighted by (Taylor, 2002, “the social imaginary is not a set of ideas; rather it is what it enables, through making sense of the practices of society” (p. 91).

But while the analysis of imaginaries provides a novel and insightful form of analysis for understanding the reach, embodiments, and meanings of green urbanism, the literature maintains a focus on the role of the state and capital while having little interaction with how this or different and alternative, perhaps less dominant, green imaginaries are performed by urban dwellers and social movements. In this way, making “the tales that people tell of urban greening” visible could “play a central, yet often overlooked role in advancing praxis” (Anguelovski and Connolly, 2021: 9). Take for example the relationship between the urban green branding outlined above and processes of “green gentrification” (GG) - or “the exclusion, marginalization, and displacement of economically marginalized residents” which has been shown to follow “the implementation of environmental or sustainability initiatives” (Pearsall and Anguelovski, 2016: 2). While an important and growing literature, less attention is paid to how social movements are utilizing their immaterial power to resist such processes of GG or to create alternatives (see Oscilowicz et al., 2023).

Can resistance to green gentrification be put in the same category as earlier EJ movement's resistance to the unjust situating of environmental toxins in communities of color? Or does resistance to contemporary urban green injustices manifest with a different purpose and vision behind them? While overlaps have been shown to exist, Pearsall and Anguelovski (2016) “also find a number of different strategies, such as leveraging environmental regulations and policies and taking an active role in neighborhood planning processes, collaborating with ‘gentrifiers’, and advocating for complementary policy schemes” (p. 2). Despite this growing area of research, Anguelovski et al. (2019) point out areas where much attention needs to be placed, such as “risks of cooptation, demotivation over time, and competing goals and conflicts between social organizations and environmental groups” (p. 6). Fostering a frame through which to analyze how resistance to the growing “green paradox” is enacted and performed within and throughout a specific location is thus a necessary endeavor and one we undertake below.

Moving from the “social imaginary” to “radical spatial imaginaries”

To understand grassroots resistance to neoliberal urban greening, we propose engaging in a deeper conversation with the literatures on social and spatial imaginaries. In this section we contribute to the following three key points: distinguishing between the social and spatial imaginary; distinguishing between the social and the radical imaginary; and comprehending the causality between thoughts, images, texts, and material change. We argue here that the operationalization of “radical spatial imaginaries,” as held by EJ groups, requires a clear distinguishing from the concept's dominant use. Furthermore, we follow Walker (2009) and Leitner et al. (2008) in arguing for refined attention to the role and relationship of multiple spatialities of movements for radical transformation and conceptualizations of justice. This exercise is necessary as there exist growing critiques against the expanding use of the “social imaginary” in the social sciences—where the term is argued to have become “vague and catch-all … at the cost of clarity” (Delanty, 2021: 290) which has “ … hindered the formulation of a robust analytical framework to explain diverse empirical case studies” (Varvarousis, 2019: 494).

From the social to the spatial imaginary

A spatial imaginary differs from a social imaginary in that the former's “meanings are directly related to spatiality … ”—or “ … any property relating to or occupying space … ” (Wei, 2015: 6)—“ … while [the latter] may not be” (Watkins, 2015: 2015 italics own). In other words, spatial imaginaries are “ … cognitive frameworks, both collective and individual, constituted through the lived experiences, perceptions, and conceptions of space itself” (Wolford, 2004: p. 410). The scale of a spatial imaginary may vary from the home to the city or region up to the nation state, the supranational level and beyond. Importantly, scholars highlight how spatial imaginaries are strongly connected to processes of “othering” (Davoudi, 2018; Taylor, 2002; Watkins, 2015)—meaning that “they give us a sense of how one place differs from another, how different places fit together, how to navigate through space and what to expect from the spatiality of our everyday lives” (Davoudi, 2018: 101). It also serves to anchor the dominance and inspirational capacity of one urban model over others, and social hierarchies where some groups are privileged or rendered privileged, visible, and accepted parts of spaces over others who become excluded. Crucially, as Massey (2005) highlights, “places do not have single, unique ‘identities’; they are full of internal differences and conflicts,” or in other words, competing imaginaries may be uncovered within the same place. Crucially, Watkins (2015) highlights the importance of delineating between three types of spatial imaginaries - namely (i) place imaginaries, (ii) idealized space imaginaries, and (iii) spatial transformation imaginaries (see Figure 1).

Figure 1.

“Feedback loop” of performative spatial imaginaries (simplified)

It is our belief that if one is to aptly respond to calls for deeper analysis into the localized manifestation of the green imaginary in urban planning (Angelo, 2019a; Long, 2016), we must understand how this imaginary is constructed and enacted in relation to its spatiality. In doing so, we may move beyond the social imaginary's vagueness toward the construction of a robust analytical framework to explain the diversity, complementarity, and tensions between case studies in place (Delanty, 2021; Varvarousis, 2019).

From the social to the radical imaginary

Using the words of Castoriadis (1987), a hegemonic social imaginary can be understood as the institutionalized imaginary, while the radical imaginary can be seen as an institutionalizing imaginary. Attention to space has been shown to be integral to uncovering alternatives to the instituted society. Here, the work of Stoetzler and Yuval-Davis. (2002) has been central in elaborating the relationship between space and radical imaginaries (Asara, 2020). Building upon Stoetzler and Yuval-Davis's work, Khasnabish (2008) defines the radical imaginary as:

the ability to imagine life and social institutions not as they currently exist but as that which might be brought into being, the radical imagination is situated in place(s) and emerges from the process of building alternatives and ‘acting otherwise’ in alternative spaces of social reproduction, spheres of values, and social cooperation. (p. 153–157)

This differentiation resembles Fraser's (1995) distinction between affirmative and transformative change which has been deployed within EJ literature (Temper et al., 2018) but moves beyond in highlighting the importance of space in transforming the instituted society.

In the literature bridging the social imaginary and urban greening, Angelo. (2021) clearly recognizes that a social imaginary must not only “reaffirm the status quo … ”—referring to the existence of “radical green imaginaries”—however, they aim to “primarily document greening in its top-down, large-scale, and hegemonic moments” (p. 22). Our analysis then aims to uncover and communicate greening in its bottom-up, small-scale, radical manifestations—or in its “Otherness”—arguing the uncovering of the lines upon which difference is drawn to be essential in unmasking injustice (Andreucci and Zografos, 2022; Stanley 2009).

Radical spatial imaginaries as insurgent practices

Lastly, we must understand how imaginaries materialize in urban change. An emerging research area relates to exploring the performativity of spatial imaginaries. This approach “criticizes a purely representational view of discourse that essentializes materiality and views actors as outside the field of discursive power” (Watkins, 2015: 517)³ to reveal how “spatial imaginaries not only enable and legitimize material practices through representation … [but] are also enacted and maintained by these practices (Davoudi, 2018: 103) (see Figure 1). Importantly, embedding imaginaries within the social practices of movements, “sets [the concept] apart from other concepts such as frames, values, or ideologies” (Asara 2020: 5) while placing actors within the discourses they produce (Watkins, 2015).

Operationalizing the frame of performativity within spatial imaginary research closely resembles García-Lamarca's (2017) conceptualization of “insurgent practices”—or “collective socio-spatial and political nexus of actions, consisting of both doings and sayings that enact equality and disrupt the dominant production of space, creating possibilities to generate new urban meanings and relations contrary to institutionalized ones and against the interests of dominant powers” (p. 5). In this way, “[t]hinking through insurgent practices can thus help repoliticize space” (García-Lamarca, 2017: 7)—a much needed task as the hegemonic green imaginary has depoliticized public space through the transformation of urban nature into an indirect good which is framed as a universal good for all (Rosol et al., 2017; Swyngedouw, 2023).

Our point then is to place Angelo's (2019b) conceptualization of urbanized nature within analyses of grassroots resistance to contemporary processes of green urban (re)generation through the lens of “green radical spatial imaginaries.” To summarize, we position ourselves as part of a shift toward studying the varying forms of spatial imaginaries, as related to urban greening, with specific attention paid to the insurgent practices of UEJ movements. This is to say that in order to unpack and explore the tensions between orthodox imaginaries of urban greening and marginalized visions of radical green urban transformation, it is helpful to uncover the discourses, actions, and mobilizations embodied and performed by grassroots social movements and their acts of contestation. In order to ground this discussion, we next outline how counter-mapping is an appropriate methodology to explore these performances and their relationships.

Methodology

Various approaches to “counter-mapping” have taken hold throughout the years—ranging from critical GIS (Pavlovskaya, 2018), community mapping (Parker, 2006), participatory mapping (Emmel, 2008) public participation GIS (Brown et al., 2020), indigenous mapping (Wainwright and Bryan, 2009), and more. Approaches to counter-mapping maintain several underpinning currents—mainly that counter-mapping is seen as a tool for “upset[ing] power relations” (Harris and Hazen, 2006: 115), to provide a voice to marginalized groups in relation to governments (Dalton and Mason-Deese, 2012), and to proliferate ways of visualizing and realizing new possibilities. Emphasis is placed on the process itself of counter mapping—meaning that maps are never “ontologically secure” (Kitchin and Dodge, 2007: 333) and continuously reflect the emergence of new conflicts as raised by evolving groups and the evolutions of existing conflicts—among others. We believe the act of counter-mapping—by social movements and/or researchers—to represent the performance of a radical spatial imaginary in that it aims for the creation of something new and is at once a product and the producer of spatially bound imaginaries (Cobarrubias, 2009; Davoudi, 2018; Kidd, 2019) throughout (urban) space.

The process of mapping

In this study, the mapping process emerged following an online event co-organized on 27th October 2020. Following an initial purposeful sampling of well-known EJ struggles in Barcelona led by our team, researchers (10) and activists (17) in Barcelona came together to discuss and build collective strategies in resisting green gentrification and advancing environmental justice in a city like Barcelona. This led to ongoing discussions with social movements and critical media coverage, culminating in the initiative of mapping EJ struggles throughout the city.

From this point, we initiated the mapping process through a snowball sampling of civic mobilizations, resistance, and conflicts linked to urban greening in Barcelona at the time when this project began, in 2020. We attempted to include a wide-range of interventions (citizen-driven tree planting; community gardens; protests against green public space loss due to tourism, commercial, and/or green gentrification; mobilization for new green space/health centers) across socio-economic neighborhood characteristics throughout the city. This paper represents a snapshot of the map at a moment in time when we reached a diversity of cases which allowed for a fair and diverse representation of civic activism around urban nature in Barcelona - that is at the end of 2022. An overview of each case can be found in Table 1.

Table 1.

Overview of environmental justice struggles throughout Barcelona.

Case	Neighborhood	Urban form	Struggles / drivers of injustices	Civic associations	Choice of strategy	Outcomes
Barceloneta touristification	Barceloneta	Low-rise, densely populated coastal neighborhood	Gentrification, touristification, real estate speculation	L’Òstia, Plataforma en Defense de la Barceloneta, Assamblea de Barris per Decreixement Touristic	Awareness raising and public actions to contest mass tourism	“Tame down tourism” measures by city hall; “micro-alternatives” by residents i.e., Sardineta community garden
Bon Pastor—“Barcelona of the Future”	Bon Pastor	Working class, peripherally located	Loss of cultural heritage, (green) gentrification, eviction, lack of citizen engagement in decision making	Fem Bon Pastor, Sindicat d'Habitatge de Sant Andreu	Alliance building, direct action	Ongoing struggle against ConrenTramway development plans
Eixample Respira	Eixample	Middle- upper-class, grid style, car dominated, centrally located	Air pollution, noise pollution	Eixample Respira	Mapping air pollution hotspots, demonstrations	Struggle ongoing, Eixample district home to four new “green axes” (updated supperila plan)
Vallcarca's Avinguda	Vallcarca	Low-middle class, multi-ethnic, community-driven	Gentrification, loss of cultural heritage, destruction of housing	Vallcarca Som Barri, AAVV Gràcia Nord-Vallcarca, Plataforma d’Afectades per l’Eix Verd	Creation of civic platforms, direct action	Plan paused, new plan from city hall coming in future
Vallcarca's social housing struggles	Vallcarca	Low-middle class, multi-ethnic, community-driven	Loss of housing	AAVV Gràcia Nord-Vallcarca, Assemblea de Vallcarca,	Alliance building, direct action, creation of civic platforms, guerrilla gardening	Collectivization and recovery of Farigola Sqaure; creation of community gardens; struggle continues
Gracia's tree project	Gracia	Low rise, densely populated, intense gentrification, lack of green space	Loss of cultural heritage, tree removal, gentrification, real estate speculation	Salvem l'alzina i les casetes del carrer Encarnació	Occupation of property, campaigning for heritage status of space	Heritage status given; space protected under public ownership;
La Fira o la Vida	Sants-Montjuïc	international-fair centered-economy	Housing inequalities, lack of green space, touristification	La Fira o la Vida	Creation of citizens platform, direct action,	Ongoing struggle
La Vanguardia Garden	Poblenou	Post-industrial, working class, intense gentrification, coastal	Touristification, (green) gentrification,	#Hortalavanguardia, Ens Plantem, L’Ateneu de La Flor de Maig, Associació de Veïns i Veïnes de Poblenou	Squatting of municipal area between two major hotels, guerilla gardening	Bulldozed in 2020 to serve as front lawn of the hotel Voraport; neighbors given small plots for gardening
Poblenou Superblock	Poblenou	Post-industrial, working class, intense gentrification, coastal	(Green) gentrification	Ens Plantem, Observatori de Poblenou, Taula Eix Pere IV	Blocking evictions, reporting large scale interventions, modify and promote alternatives to 22@ plan	Struggles continue, rules of 22@ plan continue to be big obstacle
Passatge de Morenes	Poblenou	Post-industrial, working class, intense gentrification, coastal	Loss of cultural heritage, (green) gentrification, housing inequalities	El veïnat del Passatge de Morenes	Creation of neighbor led assembly, hiring of lawyer, media events, holding public events in street	City Council rejected redevelopment plan and houses given “protection” status
El Raval health center	El Raval	City center, densely populated	Health inequalities, privatization of public space	Plataforma CAP Raval Nord Digne	Occupy abandoned chapel, collection of signatures, street demonstrations	New health center to open in 2025; Ongoing battle to preserve public space amid nearby museum expansion.
Tres Turons Park	El Carmelo	Working class, high immigrant population, dense	Loss of cultural heritage, loss of housing, lack of citizen involvement in decision making, touristification	Dignitat Tres Turons, Plataforma d’habitatges afectats dels Tres Turons (PHATT)	Squatting of homes, guerilla gardening, creation of civic platform, call for study of cultural heritage	As of March 2023, the struggle is ongoing
La Prosperitat	La Prosperitat	Working class, peripherally located, vast social networks	Historical underinvestment in services, public space, and greening	Associació de veïns i veïnes de Prosperitat, Ateneu de Nou Barris, Casal (Joves) de Barri La Prosperitat	Creation of networks fighting for ecological and climate refuge, care, and equipment	Conversion of car park into neighborhood space (hosting Casal de Joves), new public complex for library and auditorium, continued struggle for more green space

Upon case identification, we contacted the leaders or spokesperson of each case and conducted oral interviews with 1–2 additional members or participants in that case. The focus of these semi-structured interviews was on the history of the conflict/struggle, the neighborhood dynamics and overall city politics, the governmental, private and grassroots actors involved more directly, and the claims and demands of the movements as well as how these connect to social and environmental justice. Additional video interviews were conducted to create short web documentaries. These were made publicly accessible to increase the influence of our research in the local community, to offer easily shareable content for social movements, and to establish an online repository of stories from urban socio-environmental struggles narrated by their own protagonists. Interviews were then triangulated with secondary data analysis and visual/video data to write up a case study report and “conclude” the mapping process for each case study. Secondary data collection consisted in newspaper clips, social media threads, public videos or other multimedia tools, and websites related to the case and the broader neighborhood change dynamics in which the case is inserted, which included documents from the last 10–15 years. The map is publicly available at (https://storymaps.arcgis.com/collections/008137197bd7411f88e7125018005ac9?item = 1) (see Figure 2) whereby each case includes a short description in English and Catalan, an accompanying video (when available), and links to the grassroots organizations around it.

Figure 2.

Example of online version of EJ struggles map.

Lastly, we build our data collection for this article from an event our research team co-organized and held at the self-managed community and neighborhood space Can Battló situated in the neighborhood of Sants-Montjuïc on 30th of November in 2021. At this event, the map was presented to civic associations, researchers, and community members alike—both represented and not represented in the map (with approximately 70 persons in attendance). The goal of the event was to seek expert-driven validation, feedback, and complementary or counter analysis from residents and civic groups themselves regarding case analysis, representation, and mapping, as well as further input on next steps.

Analyzing the cases and their contents

The goal of this comprehensive and systematic round of comparative analysis was to explore the 13 cases included in the map and to find thematic similarities and differences between spatial imaginaries, how they are performed and how these performances influence material change and further spatial imaginaries. The reports embedded within the map were analyzed in two phases—firstly a line by line reading with an open coding process which led to the creation of a codebook and secondly, a thorough coding of the reports using the same codebook for all cases. To analyze the videos embedded in the map, we performed content analysis through which we aimed to uncover patterns in narrative content.

Results: radical spatial imaginaries and their performances

Our results are divided into three sections, each representing a type of spatial imaginary based on all data sources used in this study (see Figure 3). Each section describes the discursive representation of a spatial imaginary, the performances materializing it, and how these practices influence further imaginaries. We illustrate each theme with relevant EJ neighborhood case studies, showing that case studies can represent multiple spatial imaginaries. By examining these three types, we reveal thematic motivations, tactics, and projections within neighborhoods and the city, providing actionable data for decision-makers and a tool for empowering and building alliances in EJ struggles in Barcelona and beyond.

Figure 3.

Feedback loop of spatial imaginaries based on Barcelona EJ struggles (own elaboration).

Place imaginaries for preservation and protection

Social movements in Barcelona have historically emerged through neighborhood associations (Calavita and Ferrer, 2004) which have organized around strong connections to place. Analysis of contemporary EJ struggles in the city reveals strong connections to places activists defend as unique in Barcelona's urban fabric. An activist from Plataforma CAP Raval Nord Digne states El Raval has unique characteristics, citing its multicultural diversity, history of marginalization, lack of green space, and community organizing challenges due to many undocumented residents. In El Carmel, self-constructed houses within what activists consider a park make it an “indispensable corner of the city,” suggesting the city should emulate this neighborhood. In a similar vein, the cases barates⁴ (cheap houses in English) of the neighborhood of Bonpastor have become a symbolic piece of the neighborhood, its residents’ history and pride with “[t]heir specific urban shape and their peculiar history allow[ing] a popular culture distinct from that of the rest of the city to be maintained there” (Portelli 2015: 120).

This last example shows that activists view these places as unique not only due to their built environment, but also because of their demographic makeup and history of place-based struggles. In La Prosperitat, a strong social fabric stems from past community mobilizations that brought new public spaces and services, like Ateneu Popular 9 Barris and Plaça Angel Pestaña. Contemporary struggles here build on historically intersectional environmental justice activism, often led by women, resulting in almost all neighborhood services and infrastructures being products of past struggles (Amorim-Maia et al., 2023). These range from late 1970s protests against contaminating factories to current efforts for new green spaces as climate refuges for vulnerable groups. In La Barceloneta, the collective identity is tied to historical demographic, cultural, and economic preservation in view of mass tourism and gentrification in centric districts of Barcelona(Cocola-Gant and Lopez-Gay, 2020). With an economy traditionally based on fishing and harbor jobs, recent anti-touristification efforts focus on protecting the area's distinct socioeconomic and demographic makeup against tourism's negative social and environmental impacts.

Place imaginaries held by civic associations often counter other, non-place-based interpretations. In Bonpastor, the resident-driven “distinct culture” around self-built houses persists against city hall’s view of these homes as “obsolete” and “uninhabitable.” The Col·lectiu Repensar Bonpastor notes this stigmatization, mostly by municipal teams in the 2000s and early 2010s, inhibited residents from fully rejecting the “modernization” project, which threatened to evict them rather than lift them from poverty (Lawrence-Zuniga, 2015). This place-based imaginary, however, has influenced the recent municipal team (Colau 2016–2023), leading to the rehousing of most families and the creation of a cultural center to preserve Bonpastor's memory and working-class struggles. A similar, unresolved conflict is unfolding in Tres Turons, where self-constructed homes by immigrants in the 1920s and 1960s are seen by activists as a distinct cultural heritage, but the city hall views them as “illegal settlements.” This clash arises from the “Pla de Tres Turons” which, since 1953⁵, aims to create Barcelona's new “green lung” involving the destruction of nearly 300 homes and the creation of a new large park connecting various existing green spaces. The preservation of places like Bonpastor, La Prosperitat, Barceloneta, and Tres Turons is rooted in historical memory and contests hegemonic views of green spaces as benign, place-improving interventions (Figure 4).

Figure 4.

Perimeter of proposed Parc dels Tres Turons.

These imaginaries of uniqueness and preservation are embodied through the insurgent practices of those involved in the struggles. In Tres Turons, activists have occupied empty homes, reinforcing the area's status as an “indispensable corner of the city,” claiming to be more sustainable and connected to nature than many affluent areas of Barcelona. Their actions, including street protests, the formation of the Plataforma d’habitatges afectats dels Tres Turons (PHATT), and community mapping events, have garnered support from other civic associations and neighborhood members, leading to meetings with Barcelona City Hall in Spring 2023. Activists in Tres Turons draw on the successful mobilization by Salvem l'alzina i les casetes del carrer Encarnació in Gràcia, where they secured communal ownership and architectural heritage status for two historic houses and a garden with a 200-year-old holm oak tree. Inspired by this, activists in Tres Turons seek to have their self-constructed houses included in Barcelona's catalog of architectural heritage, “com van aconseguir en Gràcia” (as they achieved in Gràcia).

These examples highlight that social movements do not merely express their place imaginaries through textual, vocal, or visual representations but importantly through insurgent practices of occupying space, forming collectives (internal to the neighborhood) and associations (throughout the city), gathering signatures, press campaigns, and meeting with members of the city hall to advocate for their goals. These performances, especially thanks to video and social media materials produced to disseminate struggles, then ripple through the social fabric of Barcelona, amplifying the struggle, garnering further support and debate, as well as influencing struggles in other areas of the city as well as the City Hall. Place imaginaries hence help us uncover the strong relationship between uniqueness and preservation or protection. The calls to preserve and protect the architectural patrimony, the existing social fabrics and socio-natures in the city emerge in a context of the continuous infrastructural development, touristification and modernization in Barcelona over the last decades, representing a different model of urban being and becoming which is intimately connected to radical and locally grounded visions of nature. A model which promotes a desire to see lasting, meaningful places and reflects a desire to live meaningfully and “to stay put”. As an activist from La Vanguardia Garden, a previously occupied community garden, puts it:

One of our purposes is not only to plant but to make roots in a place because if we’re going to change the model where people come and stay at an Airbnb or hotel for just one week then everything will just be very … temporary. It's not just about doing something while you are here, it's also about doing something that lasts, for the neighborhood, something that isn’t tourism.

Spatial transformation imaginaries: historical traumas, contemporary struggles, and future fears

While place imaginaries draw upon the uniqueness of place in the struggle for protection and preservation, spatial transformation imaginaries draw upon collective histories of trauma and struggle which influence contemporary struggles against fears of future spatial fixes (Figures 5 and 6). Spatial transformation imaginaries are often multiple and competing, as they rest upon various temporal scales which foster emotive responses to histories of spatial change. As we have just seen, the framing of place as unique and its connection to preservation and protection are strongly related to shared stories of past, current, and future transformations of space. In a city which “ … has undergone profound transformation in the last 30 years” (Blanco, 2009: 355) the transformation of urban space is an ever present, embodied experience of the city's residents. Intrinsic to spatial transformation imaginaries are “[i]deas of inevitability, ‘othering’ different ideas about what has been, is, or may come” (Watkins, 2015: 513).

Figure 5.

Activist in former La Vanguardia Garden with new four star “Hotel Paxton” in background.

Figure 6.

Current state of space as of 24 April 2023 with Hotel Paxton (right) and three-star “Hotel Voraport” (center-left) (photo by Austin Matheney).

To uncover thematic spatial transformation imaginaries in Barcelona, one need look no further than it's flagship green urban intervention, the Superilles. The first Superilla was introduced in Poblenou in 2016, not originally a project of the city hall (Anguelovski et al., 2023). Activists link this intervention to the 22@ development plan, introduced in 2000, which, according an activist of the civic platform #Observatoris dels barris del Poblenou, aims to demolish large portions of Poblenou to create a district of offices and hotels, theoretically promoting a new technology-based economic model. However, this plan had a perverse impact on the area. Considered the “Catalan Manchester” in the 19th century, Poblenou has historically been a working-class neighborhood, with strong anarchist and antifascist movements throughout the dictatorship (1939–1975) and was subjected to significant transformation since the 1992 Olympics While the Superilla is seen as a necessary improvement, activists fear it will lead to gentrification, a growing reality as Poblenou faces strong green gentrification trends (Anguelovski et al., 2018). Activists have also mobilized to save informal greenspaces like La Vanguardia Garden, which was demolished in 2022 for hotel developments.

Similar fears of gentrification are present in Bonpastor, where a new Superilla is planned through a public-private partnership between the city hall and ConrenTramway—a Spanish real estate, investment, and asset manager firm—which bought the 90,641 square meter Bonpastor Mercedes-Benz factory in November 2018. Lifelong residents worry about how this transformation will affect their cost of living, social fabric, and cultural identity (Oscilowicz et al., 2020; Planas-Carbonell et al., 2023). While here we see similarities between two places, we also find competing spatial transformation imaginaries within neighborhoods.

In the neighborhood of Vallcarca, we identify shared visions of how the neighborhood has transformed historically amidst divergent imaginaries of how the barri should change moving forward. Since 2002, a plan for a new green avenue, as part of the 1976 General Metropolitan Plan (PGM), was originally set to require the demolition of housing and other living spaces. The Vallcarca Som Barri (VSB) civic association labels this plan an “obsolete form of urbanism,” while the AAVV Gràcia-Nord Vallcarca (AAVV) views it as necessary. These competing visions are influenced by the 1976 PGM, which aimed to demolish Vallcarca's historic center and build a rapid transportation road, leading to physical decay, resident exodus, and land devaluation, starting a period of rent gap production in the neighborhood (Antunes et al., 2020).

VSB members fear the new green avenue will bring more destruction, speculation, and expulsion. In contrast, AAVV members, often older residents involved in Spain's transition to democracy, see it as a way to bring formal green spaces that “clean and dignify” the neighborhood and raise property values. Their imaginary of spatial transformation is not only influenced by the history of demolition and decay in the neighborhood but by the squatting of empty and decaying buildings, including the collectivization of unused plots of land for urban gardens, bicycle workshops, and other community infrastructures by other community members, which AAVV frames as “denigrating” the neighborhood's image and prosperity. The case of Vallcarca then, vividly illustrates how a shared memory of historical spatial transformation can result in and foster diverging imaginaries of the transformation among activists who represent different traditions and generations in the city and experienced different forms of urban negligence and abandonment.

As with place imaginaries, spatial transformation imaginaries are enacted and reproduced through various performances by activists and civic associations in response to city plans and visions. These include forming bottom-up networks (Anguelovski, 2015) space occupation, and direct actions like street protests and art. However, the transformation of space includes additional tactical choices by civic associations and neighborhood members. In Poblenou, many civic associations have united to propose amendments to the 22@ development plan, viewing it as a barrier to fostering a solidarity-based economy rather than one focused on economic growth. Similarly, in Vallcarca, the Assemblea de Vallcarca, formed in 2012 and later uniting with Vallcarca Som Barri, collaborated with local and international architects to reformulate the 2002 plan⁶. This led to the creation of the Plataforma d’Afectades per l’Eix Verd (People Affected by the Green Axis). The reformulation, partially approved in 2018, resulted in the recovery and collective ownership of Farigola Square and other buildings, like the community center La Fusteria, around the historically affected Nucli Antic. The opposing spatial transformation imaginary held by the AAVV has been performed similarly, with the group joining seven other associations to appeal the postponement of the 2002 plan. While performances of spatial transformation imaginaries are similar to those of place imaginaries, they often draw on histories of destruction, decay, and rebuilding to oppose specific spatial transformations.

In many of the socio-environmental struggles we analyzed, trauma is also a process activists share and mobilize around. As Gregory (1995) highlights, spatial imaginaries often indeed transmit social anxieties or shared fears of the future. Within struggles for EJ in Barcelona, the emotions expressed by activists are strongly connected to embodied histories of trauma due to past spatial transformations throughout the city. Histories of destruction and decay are giving way to contemporary processes of speculation and gentrification which drive fears of future displacement largely at the hand of “green urbanism,” while also renegotiating spatial transformation imaginaries. As a veïna (neighbor) of Passatge de Morenes—a cul-de-sac of small homes due to be bulldozed through the 22@ plan—expresses, trauma is a mobilizing resisting force against green gentrification and displacement:

All this started to change about 18 years ago, when they began to tear things down and build hotels and luxury housing … There are no workshops anymore, in the whole block there are only 21 neighbors left. But the situation is the same across all of Poblenou, people are being pushed out and nothing can be done about it … We are fighting to be able to live here and keep the neighborhood's history, the alleys, the small homes … the neighborhoods essence will be completely lost.

Idealized spatial imaginaries for inclusive and livable neighborhoods

How then are activists and civic associations performing their idealized visions for their unique yet transforming spaces? Moving forward we last aim to understand how these actors express “how the purported characteristics of [a specific] place are representative of certain idealized spaces (Watkins, 2015: 512). While closely related to place imaginaries, analyzing idealized place imaginaries entails a movement toward analyzing the prescriptive projections “which [suggests] not only how things are and ought to be, but also how they will be” (Davoudi, 2018: 9). This form of imaginary is the dominant form of “green social imaginary” discussed and analyzed within the urban environmental justice literature and critical urban sociological literature at large, albeit in its hegemonic and top-down expression (Angelo, 2021; Anguelovski et al., 2020; Neidig et al., 2022). These works have made great strides in outlining how this form of spatial imaginary is manifested and materialized through initiatives like “green awards,” representing top-down and one-size-fits-all projections of what “urban green” ought to resemble. The idealized place imaginaries of activists, then, run counter to the “green” and “global” image of Barcelona in a variety of ways.

Idealized place imaginaries are easily recognized within the manifestos of some EJ movements. Eixample Respira, a neighborhood platform founded in 2019 within the car-centric and heavily polluted Eixample district, highlights the daily impacts of pollution on residents’ health, especially children. They emphasize the volume of cars, air contamination, and its tragic impact on human health in discursive materials, graphics, images, and figures shared on social media (see Figure 7). This frames the neighborhood's imaginary as dystopian. However, Eixample Respira quickly outlines what a transformed and idealized (utopian) Eixample would look like through images and posters shared on social media, calling for “more clean air, more tranquility, more green, more space, more community, more neighborhood, more commerce, more equality, more people, less cars!” (see Figure 8).

Figure 7.

Still from mini-documentary of the case Poblenou Superblock. Subtitles are from a local activist explaining new green spaces, found at the entrances to new “call centers,” acting more as private, open air space that many residents to not feel comfortable using.

Figure 8.

Activists in Vallcarca protesting to “save the old core of Vallcarca: Barcelona is not for sale!” source: https://twitter.com/AVallcarca.

Similar idealized visions of future space are expressed by activists of La Fira o La Vida (The Fair or Life). Founded in 2019 and consisting of diverse social, neighborhood, and environmental groups, La Fira o La Vida proposes that the fairgrounds—27 hectares of land between Plaça de Espanya and Montjuïc—be opened up to the neighborhood rather than amplifying Barcelona's touristic attraction. The initiative calls for creating a green corridor reaching Plaça de Espanya with thousands of public housing units, nurseries, civic centers, and plazas (see Figures 9 and 10).

Figure 9.

Flyer from Eixample Respira demanding a stop to contamination with statistics of health impacts and necessary measures for Barcelona to meet European standards for air pollution levels. Source: https://www.eixamplerespira.com/ca/index.html.

Figure 10.

Image used by Eixample Respira claiming the daily life at Aragó street. Source: Twitter Eixample respira.

In both cases, civic associations lay out their vision of an ideal spatial configuration with diverse social and green spaces, creating a different form of green neighborhood. One where housing, green spaces, civic centers, and jobs come together to produce a more equitable green city. These proposals echo EJ struggles depicted in traditional EJ studies, where residents fight for a revitalized neighborhood through just sustainabilities (Agyeman et al. 2016; Anguelovski 2014) (Figures 11 and 12).

Figures 11 and 12.

Proposed changes to La Fira by activists of La Fira o La Vida (left, current urban form, right, proposed changes including green corridor and public housing).

Again, it is important to highlight that these idealized place imaginaries are not merely representational but manifest a spirit of contestation. While Eixample Respira shares images and texts on social media, they also engage in direct action, blocking streets, calling for reduced traffic, organizing actions with residents, schools, and family associations, and launching a map showing air pollution levels throughout the city. These performances have strongly influenced the city hall, which, as of 2023, has implemented three new Eixos Verds (pacified green ways), an updated version of the Superilla, throughout the heavily trafficked and polluted Eixample district. These actions have not only materialized in Barcelona but also inspired movements across Spain, such as the Bicibus movements, where residents collectively cycle to schools with their kids. Similarly, La Fira o La Vida has engaged in direct action, blocking access to the city's fairgrounds (La Fira) and creating a citizen platform proposing alternatives to the city hall's plans, envisioning a socially equitable green district. In this way, activists and civic associations are not merely voicing their discourse but embodying it by re-negotiating their spatial imaginaries with those of others throughout the city and beyond (Figure 13).

Figure 13.

La Fira o La Vida activists engaging in direct action (upper banner, that's why we are on strike, lower banner, the work continues).

Discussion

In this paper, we asked: what radical imaginaries and intersecting needs does counter-mapping reveal vis-à-vis the green (neoliberal) city orthodoxy? First, our analysis contributes to the growing critical literature on the green city and offers an analysis from below, focusing on the contestation of municipal priorities and discourses—highlighting a non-hegemonic imaginary of greening which is collaborative and bottom-up while also being ever-evolving, incomplete and continuously emerging. By incorporating a three-pronged analysis of the insurgent practices of spatial imaginaries, we bring to the forefront the role of space and the processual nature of contentious politics (Asara, 2020; Leitner et al., 2008; Stoetzler and Yuval-Davis, 2002). Lastly, our analysis adds to an evolving EJ literature which aims to engage in new tools and methodologies, new ways of seeing and communicating at the intersection of research and civic activism which aims to fight against injustices playing out in real time through the creation of supportive tools.

Our analysis shows how and what imaginaries are materializing throughout the urban fabric of Barcelona along with their further repercussions. It reveals thematic tendencies throughout the city of how place imaginaries are strongly linked to preservation and protection of unique places, how histories of trauma are related to fears of future spatial fixes, and how livable and inclusive neighborhoods are projected as idealized futures. We were also able to uniquely understand the interlinking of these three spatial imaginaries in relation to the neoliberal green city through the performative actions of activists and civic associations, which the critical literature on urban green planning is increasingly zooming in (see Oscilowicz et al., 2023). The performances of spatial imaginaries outline the creation of bottom-to-bottom networks (Anguelovski, 2015)—seen as crucial to social movements (Leitner et al., 2008) —as well as the re-negotiation of spatial imaginaries through these performances. As these renegotiation processes ripple throughout Barcelona and beyond, we recognize the multi-scalar nature (both temporal and spatial) of EJ struggles (Pellow, 2018) as well as the spatiality of (in)justice(s) (Walker, 2009). Fostering a conceptual and methodological toolkit which reflects and responds to this is then integral in moving EJ scholarship forward.

From an epistemological and methodological standpoint, the Barcelona EJ struggles map provides a spatial representation of where green not only “is” but also where and how green is contested, desired, created, and planned for. In this way, it is a map of instances, of expressions, of the tensions that exist around greening. Rather than documenting “a” conflict, the map engages with the history of how and why each of these cases have been and continue to be in conflict—as with any socio-ecological process or process of urban change. It looks at not only “what” happened in each case but analyzes the narratives of the people involved in these struggles aiming to better understand what unites them.

This represents a “counter”-mapping not only because it maps/describes something that has not been mapped before (how people imagine, perceive, desire, value different forms and aspects of urban greening) but also because it specifically engages with the imaginaries of those on the front line of struggles surrounding urban justice. Importantly, by doing this analytical exercise, we might help make clearer the axes of common/divergent imaginaries and thus forge alliances, dialog, and reflection among the local movements, activists, and decision makers in Barcelona and beyond. Furthermore, by incorporating Watkins (2015) call for a three-pronged analyses of performative spatial imaginaries, we are able to provide a diverse, comprehensive, and comprehensible conceptual toolkit through which analyses and discussions may revolve.

To be certain, our study is not without its limitations. For this paper, the map only consists of 13 EJ struggles, which is in no way a full picture of Barcelona's EJ activism. As this paper is being written, further EJ struggles are unfolding throughout the city. Furthermore, 12 of the 13 cases are still ongoing. In this way, this paper only reflects a tiny snapshot in time of a broader map of EJ struggles which we cannot cover in its entirety and is constantly evolving. Additionally, the map we selected to produce does not capture the opposing imaginaries within neighborhoods (as seen in Vallcarca). However, we believe that these 13 struggles are representative of the variety of counter-discourses and imaginaries against the green city in Barcelona and include civic mobilizations that are both more isolated and in conversation with one another.

While we recognize the uniqueness of Barcelona and its history of strong, neighborhood-based social movements, we believe this framework to be transferable to a wide range of urban settings worldwide. The primary goal of this conceptual framework is to understand residents’ relationships to place in both its discursive and material manifestations, emphasizing the direct relationship between the two. By focusing on this interplay, we assert that the framework can be applied across various urban contexts. This assertion is grounded in the fact that the framework does not introduce novel concepts but rather responds to scholarly calls to integrate all three types of spatial imaginaries into a single analysis, in contrast to most studies that focus on just one. Therefore, analyzing spatial imaginaries is not unique to Barcelona's urban fabric. Additionally, as demonstrated in the case of Eixample Respira, examining the performativity of spatial imaginaries in one location can reveal connections between different geographies and scales of the green transition.

Furthermore, we believe this framework is not limited to analyzing “acts of contestation” from environmental justice movements but can also be a powerful tool for uncovering competing imaginaries within a space, as seen in the case of Vallcarca. In the current context of an emancipatory paradox, where right-wing, populist, and reactionary ideals are gaining traction (Blühdorn et al., 2022), it is crucial to examine the spatial imaginaries of those who oppose concepts like the 15-min city through conspiratorial narratives or harbor anti-immigrant sentiments regarding the use of green spaces (Stanfield and van Riemsdijk 2019). By understanding both sides and revealing the lines along which differences are drawn, we will be better equipped to identify and address injustices in the green city.

Final thoughts

If cities can indeed play a central role in combatting the climate crisis (Castán Broto and Robin 2020) and urban greening is indeed a vehicle for larger social change, then better understanding and highlighting “the systemic, multi-dimensional and intersectional approach inherent in EJ activism is uniquely placed to contribute to the realization of equitable sustainable futures” (Temper et al., 2018: 747). In Barcelona, we discover how place imaginaries are strongly linked to preservation and protection of unique places, how histories of trauma are related to fears of future spatial fixes, and how livable and inclusive neighborhoods are projected as idealized futures. Collectively, these acts of contestation aim to visualize and defend a non-hegemonic imaginary of urban greening. While contemporary urban greening in Barcelona continues down the hegemonic, neoliberal/growth-oriented path, the performed radical imaginaries of social movements for EJ in Barcelona aim to build upon a divergent and collective path of bottom-up organizing around care for human and more-than human worlds through democratic means. While being in dialog with existing institutions, these movements call for non-reformist reforms and are in contestation to hegemonic growth-laden forms of inhibiting, mercantilizing, and touristifying space.

In this way, we join comrades both near and far—EJ Atlas (Temper et al., 2015), CREATE Initiative (Keeler et al., 2022), The Anti-Eviction Mapping Project (Maharawal and McElroy, 2018)—in calling for the continued counter-mapping of EJ struggles and illuminating radical imaginaries through emerging tools and methodologies. Our emphasis here has been placed on not only the counter-mapping of EJ struggles but also the fostering of a frame through which to analyze diverse struggles for just environmental futures through the lens of performative spatial imaginaries from below. Creating databases of these spatially bound imaginaries, with both intense localism and wide-spreading global reach, registers these realities while leaving little excuse for decision makers not to act. Several of Barcelona's key urban greening projects have indeed responded to the claims of civic activists, including those in the heavily contaminated and trafficked Eixample district—although this area is also one of the wealthiest districts in the city.

With the recent ousting of Barcelona's progressive city hall in the May 2023 elections, the city faces the potential reversal of its urban greening interventions, an increase in privatization, speculation, car, port, and air traffic, and decreases in public participation in decision making procedures (as seen in recent decisions from local tribunals in September 2023 requiring the municipality to dismantle some of the city's recent urban greening initiative (e.g. the Eix Verd Consell de Cent)). It is ever more pressing, then, for academics to build coalitions with EJ movements throughout the city and to use our privileged positions to fight against the injustices playing out in real time. As the climate crisis accelerates and conservative and right-wing governments are increasingly elected throughout the world, it is imperative for academics to produce radical and novel science to support the fight for cities which are truly green and just.

Highlights

Counter-mapping insurgent practices of EJ movements as engaged approach to understanding role of social movements vis-á-vis the green city.

Place imaginaries help us uncover the strong relationship between uniqueness and preservation or protection.

Spatial transformation imaginaries tap into shared histories of trauma and resistance, shaping modern battles against anxieties of future spatial fixes.

Livable and inclusive neighborhoods are projected as idealized futures.

Footnotes

Author's note

Austin Matheney is also affiliated with Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats (ICREA), Barcelona, Spain; Filka Sekulova is also affiliated with Institute of Environmental Science and Technology (ICTA), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB), Barcelona, Spain; Barcelona Lab for Urban Environmental Justice and Sustainability (BCNUEJ), Barcelona, Spain; Emilia Oscilowicz is also affiliated with Barcelona Lab for Urban Environmental Justice and Sustainability (BCNUEJ), Barcelona, Spain.

Acknowledgments

We thank Amalia Calderón-Algerlich, Ana Cañizares, Santiago Gorostiza, Franziska Link, Clara Calabuig Martínez, Jolena Pang, and Aina Planas-Carbonell for their energy and time put into the construction of the Barcelona UEJ struggles map. Deep and heartfelt gratitude goes out to the dedicated activists and tireless social movements whose unwavering commitment to justice and equality has not only paved the way for our work but continues to inspire and guide us.

Declaration of conflicting interests

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The authors disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This work was supported by the Agència de Gestió d'Ajuts Universitaris i de Recerca (grant no. 2022 FI_B2 00131), the Department of Research and Universities of the Generalitat of Catalonia (grant no. 2021 SGR 00975), the European Research Council Grant (no. GA678034), the Joint Programming Initiative Urban Europe (COOLSCHOOLS project), the María de Maeztu” Programme for Units of Excellence of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation’ (grant no. CEX2019-000940-M), and the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (grant no. IJC2019-040934-I).

ORCID iDs

Austin Matheney

Panagiota Kotsila

Notes

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