Dataset on infrastructural contestation in Greece (2008-2017)

The recent financial crisis has disturbed the smooth operation of infrastructural systems and hence challenged their role as guarantors of the social contract between citizens and the state. The “infrastructural gap” caused by the financial crisis, the ongoing urban expansion around the globe and the technological changes has turned infrastructures into a contested public domain. The extreme austerity measures and cutbacks in public infrastructure and the subsequent political delegitimizing that occurred in Greece exemplify this phenomenon. Our dataset concerns the mapping of events of socio-political contestation on the various types of infrastructure that occurred in Greece between 2008 – 2017.

The data have been collected in the context of the infra-demos project who studies the relationship between infrastructure change, citizens’ participation and socio-technical innovation. The list of our sources include datasets from previous ethnographic and social research, national and local media outlets, social movements’ communication platforms and social media. Our dataset is composed by four sectors: a. a chronological indicator of the date of each event and its duration, b. the kind of socio-political action, c. the type of infrastructure and d. the type of infrastructural contestation.