This letter is being sent from the Social Center Rog in Ljubljana and the Slovenian node of the 15 October movement (#15o) in solidarity and common struggle. Our recent visit to IVI during the preparatory meeting for the convergence on Frankfurt in May was another networking opportunity with other autonomous spaces that develop self-organized structures and activities which are one of the important pillars of the struggle against the imposed logic of capital.

We were informed of your precarious status and current struggle to maintain the premise. In the organization of space, and desire for a location that allows us to organize community and reproduce ourselves autonomously, we face a common struggle. Like you, we struggle with the 'owner' of our premise (in this case the municipality of Ljubljana). This struggle, imposed by a process of gentrification and finacialization of our cities and communities, does not reflect the multiple realities seeking forms of expression, legitimacy and reproduction. Moreover, it tries to suffocate them ruthlessly by fitting them into pre-formed realities in order to maximize profitability. Through gentrification and predetermined structures imposed on our space, we are forced into equally predetermined and impoverished relationships and forms. These realities give us no autonomy in our choices of how to live, how to express ourselves and control over our reproduction. In addition to this, the powers making choices over our lives also directly profit from this control. Financial markets find new sites of expropriation, cities find new investors, and so on. Yet in return we receive no income. It only privatizes everything around us, further reducing access and dividing us into categories.

It is absolutely outrageous and inexcusable that public institutions, like the university, enable the transfer of opened and common spaces (developing contents aimed at public good) into the hands of private investors for the purpose of private profiting. It is even more controversial when they do it without any dialog with the users of the premises and without acknowledging all the energy and time invested in functioning of the space and developed projects that are opened to all. Autonomous spaces present one of the rare realities building horizontal, open and inclusive society from below in our cities. That is why they have to be preserved by all means necessary. All attempts of their closures can be read as nothing less than complete capitulation of public authorities to capital.

In solidarity and common struggle!
Social Center Rog;
#15o Slovenia.