‘Homeless Snail’ Movement Camps on Zhongxiao East Road
無殼蝸牛運動夜宿忠孝東路
Source: Snail without a Shell Movement
From: Wikipedia
Date: Last revised April 1, 2017. Author: Collaborative editors
The “Snail without a Shell” Movement was a social movement that occurred in Taiwan on August 26, 1989, protesting the skyrocketing land and housing prices that had widened inequality and made homes unaffordable for ordinary people. In early May 1989, Li Hsing-chang — a teacher at Hsin-p’u Elementary School in Panchiao, Taipei County — and others initiated the “Association for Rescuing the Houseless.” Originally intended simply as a summer effort to draw attention from all sectors of society and relevant government bodies in a spirit of mutual aid, it elicited an enormous public response and became Taiwan’s first collective-action organisation oriented toward urban reform. It later reorganised into the “Houseless People’s Solidarity Organisation,” establishing the movement’s goals of uniting the public to bring down housing prices and rents, and actively promoting the “Ten Thousand People’s Overnight Vigil on Zhongxiao East Road” as a rallying action.
From the vigil, the organisation subsequently gave rise to “Ts’ui Mama Service Centre,” which handles housing services and community mobilisation, and to “OURs — Professionals for Urban Reform,” which actively advocates housing policy on urban issues and provides architectural planning professional services focused on a city’s history, culture, space, and community.
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