ABSTRACT
The concept of the "right to the city" is rooted in Henri Lefebvre's theoretical explorations of cities in a capitalist world. The concept provides important insights into how cities shape contentious mobilizations and give rise to new understandings of citizenship. This chapter suggests that cities are important political spaces through which immigrant activists struggle for broader rights within receiving societies. While the leadership in Amsterdam became more open for dialog with the authorities and expressed 'modern' opinions on social and religious matters, the constituency in the city seemed to remain far more traditional and conservative in their opinions. During the 1980s and 1990s, immigrant mobilizations unfolded throughout Paris, and housing was a central arena of contention. By employing infrastructure and networks of national associations to extend the movement beyond the walls of Paris, there emerged homologous coalitions across the country, each employing structures, frames, and strategies similar to that of their parent organizations in Paris.
