Talk:Self-managed social center

(Redirected from Talk:Autonomous social center)
Latest comment: 3 years ago by BD2412 in topic Requested move 10 November 2020

centri sociali ¶ needs sources edit

The italian is the more rooted and widespread movement of autonomous social centers in Europe and also the world, with Rome as it's pulsing heart with more than 51 center active and occupied as per october 2018. Rome also has the largest occupied space of this kind in Europe, FORTE PRENESTINO, occupied since 1987, with his 13 acres of space this occupied military fort is a hub of multicultural activities and home to the largest italian festival of printed art (CRACK). The centri sociali of the most important cities across the whole country such as LEONCAVALLO in Milan, PEDRO in Padua, ASKATASUNA in Turin, CPA in Florence, OFFICINA 99 in Naples, are occupied from a minumum of 15 to 30 years. Due to this these places count now several generations of activist who changed over the years as well as being deeply rooted in the neighborhoods they are in. Some of them have some type of deal with local authorities, still, these places mostly remain outlaw and off the grid and police is never allowed inside. Most italian centri sociali may offer a wide range of services (unless most of the nort european squat) to their communities including legal counseling and language courses for immigrants, gyms as well as team sports (an entire parallel movement called palestre popolari connected to centri sociali see popular gym with courses about boxe and other fighting sports exponentially growing in the last few years), reharsal rooms, bars and restaurants, typography etc. Services and events at centri sociali are offered usually at accessibe low costs or often for free.

Hi @WizoHC, do you have reliable, secondary sources for this info, from newspapers or magazines with editorial oversight? Wikipedia requires these types of sources to verify claims. czar 23:43, 28 October 2018 (UTC)Reply

RiP UK Social Centre Network page edit

I'm really saddened to see UK Social Centre Network got merged into this page. I wouldn't have minded if the information contained in the table and the details on various projects had been inserted here, but that isn't the case. Loads of decent information has been lost. And there doesn't even seem to have been a discussion about it!? Mujinga (talk) 23:40, 23 March 2019 (UTC)Reply

it's back Mujinga (talk) 09:19, 15 April 2019 (UTC)Reply

Developing this page edit

I think this page is a good start but needs a lot of work. Here's a few suggestions:

  • The coverage of Social centres in the United Kingdom is so low as to be nonexistent, only 121 Centre is mentioned by name
  • Centres that are referred to and have their own wikipages eg Autonomous Centre of Edinburgh are not linked which seems weird
  • The merge that trashed the infoshops page lost quite a lot of information. For example this diff shows that the following projects with their own wikipages were mentioned before and now are not:
Projects now unmentioned
ABC No Rio
Boxcar Books
Camas Bookstore and Infoshop
Civic Media Center
Coffee Strong
Firestorm Cafe & Books
Internationalist Books
The Old Market Autonomous Zone
Spartacus Books
  • The recently renamed infobox at the bottom of the page is now supposed to sync with this page, but lists lots of projects which are not mentioned. Indeed adding them would be a great way to get rid of the US bias in the article

Mujinga (talk) 09:36, 15 April 2019 (UTC)Reply

(1) You're welcome to edit the page, though I'd be mindful of its scope: (2) This page is an overview of the concept, not a listing of every instance. It's only worth mentioning specific venues if the sources invoke the venue to make a specific point about the concept in overview. There is a category page for anyone who needs a listing of every instance. (3) The point of the navbox (not infobox) is to navigate between pages—the navbox itself does not become justified by mentioning more of its items within the main article. (4) re: "trashed", anyone who views that diff can see the unsourced state of that article. I've already asked you kindly to drop this invective. czar 10:13, 15 April 2019 (UTC)Reply
  • 1 well yes you are also welcome to edit, in fact you created the page but didn't put in the info then, that's why i need to point it out now. don't you think Social centres in the United Kingdom should at least be linked? you didnt reply on the US bias .. let's hope some other people will edit and make the article more balanced
  • 2&3 well, my point is that those projects are now not present AT ALL (not in the page and not in the box) whereas they were originally
  • 4 in light of the previous point, "trashed" seems the right word to use to me, since useful encyclopaedic information has been deleted. "drop this invective"? i'm actually pretty good natured but if something frustrates me i will say so. Mujinga (talk) 09:43, 17 April 2019 (UTC)Reply
There is no deadline and no obligation for anyone to write the entire article overnight. re: US bias, I'm not seeing the issue. There at least as many sentences dedicated to UK and Canadian social centers/infoshops/free skools as there are to those in the US. re: Social centres in the United Kingdom should at least be linked, you recently recreated that article, so you know the answer for why it wasn't linked. re: mentioning those social centers in prose, my point remains that in an overview article, the only reason to mention a specific venue is when it makes a larger point about the topic concept as a whole. Otherwise it is sufficient to leave the individual instances listed in their individual category. re: "trashed", no, this is the wrong word because it is tendentious. Assumption of good faith is foundational to WP's editing community and you've already been admonished for not showing it. No, I didn't pejoratively "trash" any content that warranted keeping, and if you want to edit collaboratively, certainly you can think of a more reconciliatory way to communicate your disagreement. czar 10:48, 17 April 2019 (UTC)Reply
first off i am impressed you can accuse me of being tendentious today whilst throwing around words like abysmal. WP:OUCH comes to mind. further, i do not consider myself monished in the slightest, your buddy didn't even familiarise themselves with the matter at hand. anyhoo i don't intend on taking the bait.
so to return to the matter at hand, the point is that information that was previously on the infoshop page which was "merged" to this page is now not present at all, not even in the box. the page about social centres in the UK was also "merged" here with an almost total loss of information, although at least some projects are in the box, although my argument is that this is not enough. i hope that this time round you understand this. i am not a mindreader but i am guessing you are taking this personally because you made this page, that would be unfortunate. i do hope you'll notice my original comments were not addressed to you at all, but rather made on the talk page of the article to help improve it. AGF goes both ways.
Mujinga (talk) 16:25, 17 April 2019 (UTC)Reply
There is a difference between describing the state of an article's sourcing and characterizing another editor's actions.

the point is that information that was previously on the infoshop page which was "merged" to this page

The edit summary explains why the article was redirected, not merged. (Same for Social centres in the United Kingdom.) No one has said that the content was "merged" besides you. I recovered any reliable sources that could be useful, but otherwise the content needed to be rewritten from scratch for the repurposed scope. Moreover, this common sense action should be obvious to anyone reading through the prior state of that article and its sourcing.
Don't gaslight me. The moment you made this about "trashing" other articles—a smear you have repeated in multiple other talk pages now—your condescension was not directed at anyone else. If you actually want to improve the article, I've responded to all of your suggestions, but I don't find their assumptions sound. czar 10:20, 18 April 2019 (UTC)Reply
Gaslighting? What a truly unpleasant thing to say Mujinga (talk) 10:49, 2 August 2019 (UTC)Reply

Developing this page 2 edit

There seems to be quite a bad case of WP:OWN going on here. I've recently made some edits to improve the page, cleaned up the behind the scenes mess and removed the improve tag. Now I see the frontside edits have been mostly reverted, for spurious reasons. Content moved to Infoshops has been replaced again here leading to unnecessary duplication, the infant list of notable projects has been booted to a list presumably with the hope that it will then be deleted, summaries linking to other pages have been deleted. Not for the first time on wikipedia I'm observing a problem where someone with little knowledge uses one or two sources to create an article which may correspond to how they see the world but doesn't really represent how things are, especially globally. I actually don't really like the phrase 'autonomous social centre' but i've been prepared to let that slide as a loose catch-all term as long as the page reflects that these self-managed projects are multipurpose and always responsive to local contexts and needs. However, what we basically have here is a protected page of twaddle with undue weight focusing on infoshops and free schools. I've done my best to purge - Western anarchists have long created enclaves in which they could live their societal principles of non-authoritarianism, mutual aid, gifting, and conviviality in microcosm being probably my favourite remaining example. Mujinga (talk) 11:09, 2 August 2019 (UTC)Reply

I don't like the phrase "autonomous social center/re" either, but it's the most prominent phrase used by secondary sources for the encompassing concept. I'd respond on points, but as I've already said in above sections, in other talk pages, and now in reply, I'm not sure who your audience is—as you've been so condescending to me, I clearly can't be it. Yes, infoshops and free schools are clear components of the "autonomous social center" superset, thus warranting their weight of coverage as components. My edit summaries offer reasonable rationales for my actions as they have for years across many other articles. I'd be happy to elaborate in good faith but won't respond to future messages as caustic as the one above. czar 20:21, 3 August 2019 (UTC)Reply
Hi Czar, how nice you took it upon yourself to answer me again. My intention here is to develop the page, not to converse with you, hence the section heading. We are now on version2 because of the debacle above which ended up in the serious allegation you made that I was gaslighting you.
I am of course not addressing only you, if i wanted to do that I'd use your talkpage (although i can't say that goes very well), instead i am addressing future editors who will hopefully improve this page (and not be immediately reverted by you). It's already proved pretty much impossible to work with you here for the reasons I gave above, just as at Social centres in the UK and anarchist archives, so I'm actually fine with ignoring your hostility and arrogance. Unfortunately you seem to carry that attitude with you for years already so i don't think it's likely to change.
However, I do now have to pick you up on one thing though. What secondary sources are you referring to regarding your usage of 'autonomous social centre/center'? Out of the 13 references on this article, I can find the phrase in only one source, namely Noterman & Pusey. And they are misquoting Atton. This doesn't seem a strong basis for your claim to have found a common name, especially when there are more obvious choices available. Mujinga (talk) 15:06, 9 August 2019 (UTC)Reply

Requested move 1 October 2019 edit

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.


Autonomous social centerSelf-managed social centre – Multiple secondary sources describe this phenomenon as ’self-managed social centres.’ The descriptor ’autonomous social centre’ is not backed up by the sources in the article or indeed in the broader relevant literature Mujinga (talk) 14:05, 1 October 2019 (UTC) --Relisting. Sceptre (talk) 18:49, 15 October 2019 (UTC)Reply

The pages for “social centre” on wikipedia are a bit of a mess, since the term ‘social centre’ refers to different things in different places. Nowadays social centre redirects to community centre, which certainly needs some work. Anyway that’s a different issue, just stated here for context.

I propose this page is renamed Self-managed social centre and I’ll give my rationale below. The move would then also rename the connected list to List of self-managed social centres, a list which should really be on this page until it is built up enough to stand on its own two feet.

I have already made this page move, unfortunately it was immediately reverted. I’ve asked several times now for secondary sources to explain why the page should be called by ‘autonomous social centre’ but the debate has become acrimonious and I haven’t seen any sources so here we are.

Social centres are known by different names in different places, in my experience ‘autonomous social centre’ is indeed used by a few projects and other names are also used such as resource centre, action centre, anarchist centre and so on. ‘Self-managed social centre’ crops up frequently in different countries. However, it’s better of course to go to the secondary sources.

As i have already said in discussions above, the term ‘autonomous social centre’ (henceforth ASC) can be found in only one source currently used in the article, namely Noterman & Pusey, and they seems to be misquoting from Atton (another source) since he doesn't use that phrase himself. The name ‘self-managed social centre’ (henceforth SMSC) on the other hand is mentioned by Casaglia, Lacey, Piazza, Pusey and Trapese. That’s five out of the current references. This already provides compelling reason for a namechange.

Maybe we should also look further afield, so let’s look at a sampling of the broader relevant literature by different authors from different places:

  • Colau - Mortgaged Lives - social centre not mentioned at all
  • Martinez & Bernados - 'The Occupation of Squares and the Squatting of Buildings: Lessons From the Convergence of Two Social Movements' - SMSC
  • Owens - Cracking the Movement - social centre not mentioned at all
  • Pusey - 'Social Centres and the New Co-operativism of the Common' - SMSC
  • Starecheski - social centre not mentioned at all
  • Steen et al - City is Ours - both ASC and SMSC mentioned

So a quick review of the literature from various countries seems to back my assertion that 'self-managed social centre' (SMSC) is the most frequently used common name over and above the ambiguous use of plain old 'social centre.' I have many of these books and journal articles on my bookshelf so I'm happy to go deeper here but I don't see the need right now.

Finally, let’s check 'self-managed social centre' against WP:NAMINGCRITERIA:

  • Recognizability – I hope my reasoning above has made this clear
  • Naturalness – The title is one that readers are likely to look or search for and that editors would naturally use to link to the article from other articles. Such a title usually conveys what the subject is actually called in English. - this is tricky because social centres go by different names but worldwide 'self-managed social centre' is the most often used term
  • Precision – The title unambiguously identifies the article's subject and distinguishes it from other subjects - yes!
  • Conciseness – The title is no longer than necessary to identify the article's subject and distinguish it from other subjects - we do need to differentiate this sort of social centre from other community centres, the 'self-managed' part does that perfectly
  • Consistency - The title is consistent with the pattern of similar articles' titles - yup, this page is parent to Self-managed social centres in the United Kingdom and Self-managed social centres in Italy

  • This is solely a matter of what natural disambiguation sources use most often to distinguish these spaces from other social/community centers. In my reading of the sources, "autonomous" was far more often the qualifier than "self-managed," which I mainly saw used in relation to the specific Italian movement (translation of centri sociali autogestiti/centri sociali occupati e autogestiti). But in English-language sources, "autonomous" was far more often used as the disambiguator when discussing the English-language movement (USA, UK, etc.) as an outgrowth of the "autonomous movement"/"autonomous network" and with relation to prominent examples such as the Autonomous Centre of Edinburgh. Here are the examples, including from the authors cited above:

    There are numerous examples of the links between autonomous centers across Britain (p. 294)
    The Anarchist Teapot therefore served as an infoshop, if we use the Infoshops Network’s (n.d.) definition: Infoshops (autonomous centres, reading rooms, free cafes—call them what you will) are a little piece of anarchy in action. Run by collectives, often from squatted premises, they provide autonomous space for people to meet, chat, and—not surprisingly!—obtain in-formation. (p. 296)
    — Lacey, Anita (August 2005). "Networked Communities: Social Centers and Activist Spaces in Contemporary Britain". Space and Culture. 8 (3): 286–301. doi:10.1177/1206331205277350. ISSN 1206-3312. Note that the sole mention of "self-managed" here is in relation to the Italy—otherwise "autonomous" is much more prominent.

    This article will use interviews with participants, as well as the authors own experience in the movement, in order to link the creation of social centres and autonomous spaces with the concept of the common(s). It argues that the production of social centres and autonomous spaces creates new commons which embody experimental and prefigurative demonstrations of self-management and are examples of the new cooperativism in practice. (p. 177)
    Social centres and autonomous spaces are a more recent development along this trajectory. Social centres and autonomous spaces have a rich history across Europe. (p. 178)
    Squatting and autonomous spaces were also an important part of the anarcho-punk counter-culture here in Britain during the 1980s. Spaces opened during this period, sometimes called “autonomy clubs,” including the Autonomy centre in Wapping, the Autonomous centre of Edinburgh (ACE), and the Station in Gateshead. (p. 179)
    Social centres are self-managed “autonomous spaces.” (p. 176)
    — Pusey, Andre (2010). "Social Centres and the New Cooperativism of the Common". Affinities: A Journal of Radical Theory, Culture, and Action. 4 (1): 176–198. OCLC 744314571.

    Autonomous spaces: There's a storm brewing in every teacup. (n.d.). Do or Die!, 8, 130-132.

  • Sources such as Casaglia and Piazza (mentioned above but note that both are literally adjacent articles in the same journal) solely use "self-managed" in relation to the Italian translation. But when quoting literature from outside Italy, Piazza says:

    Also Martìnez (2012) has included the squatted Social Centres inside the wider squatters’ movement—involving also squatted houses, non-squatted autonomous Social Centres, rural squatting and tactical squatting like the occupation of squares—in which they play a key political role.
    — Piazza, Gianni (March 2018). "Squatting Social Centres in a Sicilian City: Liberated Spaces and Urban Protest Actors". Antipode. 50 (2): 500. doi:10.1111/anti.12286. ISSN 0066-4812.

And those were just looking at the sources invoked in the requested move. (And happy to pull from the additional sources in the bibliography if other editors aren't able to retrieve.) When I compiled and read the sources on first draft of this article, "autonomous" was most often the term used to disambiguate this type of social space from others. When "autonomous" and "self-managed" were used as direct synonyms, "autonomous" was more prominently used as the qualifier for the center/space. On balance, if "autonomous space" is preferable over "autonomous social center," I could also see that being supported by the spirit of the sources. czar 12:29, 11 October 2019 (UTC)Reply
  • This is not a question of disambiguation it is a question of WP:NAMINGCRITERIA. And if a name is going to used on wikipedia to title an article, it needs to be used in reliable secondary sources. Preferably in those actually used in the article. All that seems logical to me.
  • If people care to dig into the sources they will see there are a whole range of disambiguating terms used for these social centre projects such as radical / anarchist / libertarian / autonomous and self-managed. We could all go through texts highlighting various words. My point is that we need an article which has a name actually used in secondary sources. Self-managed social centres is a descriptor used by the five articles which I mentioned above and which actually appear in the article. What we seem to be establishing here is that the distinct phrase autonomous social centre is verging on original research since it is rather seldom used in the literature.
  • Vague references to the term ‘autonomous’ don’t help much and regarding the Pusey article Social Centres and the New Cooperativism of the Common are frankly disingenous. The first line of Pusey’s abstract for this article reads: In recent years a network of self-managed social centres has been spreading across the UK and further afield. Further, the phrase self-managed social centre actually appears in the text. Nowhere in the article does the distinct phrase autonomous social centre appear.
  • If this article has a name it needs to be based on sources. Surely that is obvious. Yes Italian scholars have used the phrase (Casaglia, Mudu, Piazza), so have British ones (Pusey), Spanish ones (Bernados & Martinez) and Australian ones (Lacey).
  • As regards autonomous spaces well that is a very vague term which could be applied to a squatted free shop, an infoshop (what Lacey is talking about in the quote given above - infoshops are a different phenomenon) or a huge zone such as the ZAD NDDL or Freetown Christiania or Metelkova or Slab City, California. I don’t think that is a good way to describe this specific phenomenon, it doesn’t really work considering WP:NAMINGCRITERIA. Autonomous spaces might still be an interesting article to have on wikipedia in its own right, if more reliable secondary sources were found. Mujinga (talk) 11:53, 16 October 2019 (UTC)Reply
  • Oppose as proposed on its face as a violation of a WP policy, WP:RETAIN. "Center" should not be switched to "centre" without a very good reason. Red Slash 05:42, 30 October 2019 (UTC)Reply

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Requested move 10 November 2020 edit

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Moved as proposed. There is a consensus supported by reasonable evidence for the advantage of the proposed title, including consistency with existing subtopic titles. The center/centre debate is the subject for a separate discussion. BD2412 T 04:10, 3 February 2021 (UTC)Reply

Autonomous social centerSelf-managed social center – The name "self-managed social center" is used by five sources referenced in this article, whereas "autonomous social center" is only used by two. Globally, "self-managed social center" is the more frequently used term and per WP:COMMONNAME Wikipedia "generally prefers the name that is most commonly used (as determined by its prevalence in a significant majority of independent, reliable English-language sources)". Moreover, per WP:NAMINGCRITERIA "self-managed social center" would obviously be a better parent to the articles Self-managed social centres in the United Kingdom and Self-managed social centres in Italy. Mujinga (talk) 11:02, 10 November 2020 (UTC) Relisting. BD2412 T 18:55, 24 December 2020 (UTC)Reply

Agree that the article title should be changed to reflect the more widely-used term, given not only the amount of sources, but how other related articles have been labelled. Although I do think the phrase "Autonomous social center" is also used frequently enough that it should be included as an alternate in the lead section. This would look something like:

Self-managed social centers, also known as autonomous social centers, are self-organized community centers in which anti-authoritarians put on voluntary activities.

Grnrchst (talk) 15:23, 13 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
  • Oppose. Nothing has changed since the last discussion above. It is not a more widely used term. No additional sources have been added or proposed. I showed last time how "autonomous social center" and variants (e.g., "autonomous space") are the common name in the most prominent sources. "Self-managed social center" is predominantly used with social centers in Italy, based on its translation from Italian. All in all, "autonomous" is the most common descriptor used here. czar 21:40, 14 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
  • Comment regarding the oppose, I'm just not finding sources giving the precise term "autonomous social centre". To add to the five sources already in the article using "self-managed social centre", I can offer:
  • Regarding Spain, Webb says in their book Coding Democracy: "the name for this type of center is Centro Social Okupado Autogestionado (CSOA) meaning 'Occupied Self-managed social center' (page 306) and the term is also used in for example Squatters in the Capitalist City: Housing, Justice, and Urban Politics
  • Regarding France, in the book La ville conflictuelle: Oppositions – Tensions – Négociations, Auclair and Desponds write "Il y a quelques années, les membres de l'Espace autogéré des Tanneries, ancien squat conventionné par la Mairie de Dijon, avaient entendu parler d'un projet immobilier sur la parcelle occupée par le lieu." - Espace autogéré translates to self-managed social centre
  • Regarding Denmark, Krøijer discusses "self-managed social centres" in their English-language book Figurations of the Future on pages 8, 67, 68 and 80
  • Regarding USA, Toupin's article in Contention Journal is entitled "An Open-Air Self-Managed Social Center Called Occupy". https://doi.org/10.3167/cont.2013.010102
  • Talking on a philosophical level in their book Posthuman Urbanism: Mapping Bodies in Contemporary City Space, Shaw discusses taking "the self-managed social centre as a model of the TAZ" page 160
  • I'm fine with Grnrchst's suggested compromise and happy to supply more sources if needed Mujinga (talk) 19:59, 17 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
Here is an accounting of sources within the article:
  • Amster, et al. 2009: "social centers", "squatted social centers"
  • Atton 1999; Atton 2010: "information centre", "squatted anarchist centres", "free spaces"
  • Casaglia 2016: [in reference to the Italian CSOA] "self-managed social centre"
  • Downing 2000: "social centers"
  • Franks & Kinna 2014: "autonomous spaces – squats, camps, social centres"
  • Hodkinson & Chatterton 2006: "social centres movement", "autonomous spaces"
  • Piazza 2018: "social centres", "... movement"

    Martìnez (2012) has included the squatted Social Centres inside the wider squatters’ movement—involving also squatted houses, non-squatted autonomous Social Centres, rural squatting and tactical squatting like the occupation of squares—in which they play a key political role.
    — Piazza 2018, p. 500

    • n.b. p. 504 shows how the Italian squat names (proper nouns) like CSOA and CSA translate the "A" ("Autogestito") as "self-managed", again this is primarily in relation to Italian social centers. In English-speaking regions like the UK, "autonomous" is more prevalent in the UK, both in social center names (e.g., Autonomous Centre of Edinburgh) and sources (e.g., Martinez 2019, Hodkinson & Chatterton 2006).
  • Klein 2001: "social centers"
  • Lacey 2005: "autonomous spaces", "social centers"
  • Pusey 2010: "social centres movement", "Social centres are self-managed 'autonomous spaces'." "social centres and autonomous spaces", "a network of self-managed social centres", "autonomy clubs" (Britain 1980s), "During this period [1990s], spaces rarely called themselves 'social centres,' opting more often for 'infoshop' (for example 56a in London) and simply 'squat cafe' (e.g., Cookridge Street cafe in Leeds). Recently, however, there has been a newer wave of spaces established, explicitly identifying as 'social centres' ..."
  • Shantz 2010: "collective social centers", "social centers", "autonomous groups", "@-zones", "anarchist community centers"
  • Shantz 2011: "anarchist spaces", "community spaces or infoshops", "A-zones", "anarchist heterotopias"
  • Haworth/Noterman & Pusey/Shantz 2012: "autonomous social center", "social centers"
  • Ward 2003: "autonomous groups"
As discussed last time, the predominant turn of phrase (or common name) is "social center", both overall and in the most prominent sources on the topic (Pusey, Shantz). Since this phrase is ambiguous (i.e., could refer to community center, see also Downing 2000 fn 29), it needs disambiguation. Looking to the sources, the most commonly used term across the literature is "autonomous", hence "autonomous social center" as the natural disambiguation. "Social center movement" could be another natural disambiguation but isn't used as often as "autonomous". Per the sources above, these spaces have been referenced by many names but it is certain that "autonomous" is far more prevalent than "self-managed" in the English-language literature when referring to the global movement. It's fine to mention alternative names in the lede per @Grnrchst but I'd recommend referring to "self-managed" only in reference to Italy. Do mind that the subarticles are labeled as they are after being renamed by the nominating editor. czar 20:32, 21 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
  • I am baffled by the weakness of this response. It seems to confirm that "autonomous social centre" is not well used in the sources at all. Per WP:NAMINGCRITERIA we need a precise and concise name, so surely we should not be ignoring the wide and global use of the term "self-managed social center". Further, the "accounting of sources within the article" largely manages to avoid mentioning the sources using the precise term "self-managed social centre", so I'll add them here (actually it's six not five):
  • Talking about the UK, Pusey says in "Social Centres and the New Cooperativism of the Common": "In recent years a network of self-managed social centres has been spreading across the UK and further afield."
  • The UK-based Trapese Collective's book Do It Yourself: A handbook for changing our world has a chapter entitled "How to set up a self-managed social centre" (ISBN 9780745326375).
  • Talking about Italy, Piazza employs "self-managed" 12 times as well as using the precise phrase
  • Casiglia begins "The article takes into consideration the spatialised action of self-managed Social Centres in Northern Italy over the last 20 years".
  • Lacey uses "self-managed social centre" when discussing social centres in the UK.
  • In discussing radical pedagogies, Noterman and Pusey (ISBN 9781604864847) also use "self-managed social centre" Mujinga (talk) 12:21, 24 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
Those are one-off mentions of a term that, as I said above, is mainly invoked in reference to Italy. It is not the most common/widely used term for most of the world and especially our English-speaking general audience who, again, as I said above, often use the term "autonomous" as in "autonomous space" or "autonomous zone" to refer to these centers/spaces.
Though it's hard to believe that you're genuinely "baffled" by a policy-based rationale unchanged from the last year and prior, when I originally wrote and titled this article from over a dozen sources, here is one last attempt to summarize: "Social center" is the common name, with "autonomous space" as a close second, not "autonomous social center" and not "self-managed social center". I went through the pains of a full source assessment to make this crystal clear. The above mentions in bold (which, by the way, is gratuitous—please undo this unjudicious use of bolding) are one-off/cherry-picked examples that are not representative of the literature as a whole. Since the common name for this topic is in use, the preferred option is natural disambiguation: to slightly modify the common name to a less ambiguous (yet less preferred) title that still maintains its recognizability and naturalness, per the naming criteria. The best blend of the terms used most often for this topic is "autonomous social center", combining the terms used most often to identify the topic: "social center" and "autonomous space". Another such option is "social center movement", which does not use the common term "autonomous" but still naturally disambiguates the common name. "Self-managed social center", however, is almost exclusively invoked in relation to Italian social centers (it is a translation from Italian) and is neither recognizable (the name most people will call it) nor natural (reflecting what it's usually called) for much of the English-speaking world, our general audience, so it is not a good option. Less preferable than natural disambiguation is to just use another term. "Autonomous space" would be the best such option since it and its variants are used far more often for American and British social centers than "self-managed". This is as simple as I can put the rationale I've offered since the beginning. If for some reason you disagree, that disagreement is already noted, so please give other editors the space to participate. czar 22:09, 25 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
We are slowly getting somewhere! I thought for a moment there was a policy based argument there but there isn't since you simply persist in claiming the term "self-managed social center" is only used in Italy, which at this point in the debate is a bizarre assertion. No evidence has been provided that you have reviewed the secondary sources in general. I did that and showed that scholars in the UK, Australia, Spain, Denmark, USA and yes Italy are using the term "self-managed social center." I've offered up over ten sources now, if that is cherry picking then what is taking the phrase "autonomous social center" which is used by precisly two sources and doing a "full source assessment" of the cites already on the article, which pretends the term "self-managed social centre" is used in a couple of sources on the article, when it is actually used in SIX.
I'd also ask you to engage with the argument, rather than attacking the person making it. On this page alone you have made the unsubstantiated claim I am gaslighting you and now you are saying my use of bolding is "unjudicious", although when you do it, it's totally fine. Editors are telling you that globally "self-managed social centre" is more widely used, you yourself admit that "autonomous social center" is little more than WP:SYNTHESIS, so I do now know where you stand on this as the page creator. Please do remember that as WP:OWN says: "No one, no matter how skilled, or how high-standing in the community, has the right to act as though they are the owner of a particular page." Mujinga (talk) 14:39, 1 December 2020 (UTC)Reply
Sorry, I don't think this is going anywhere. My argument is really straightforward and as succinct as it's going to get for anyone who cares to read it. I disagree with the rest of your assessment, both the characterizations and read of sources. I see nothing in the quoted policies that applies to this discussion. "Self-managed social center" is not more widely used than the examples I cited in this discussion and the last. I'd recommend letting others participate at this point. czar 03:22, 6 December 2020 (UTC)Reply
  • Support sources quoted by both czar and Mujinga confirm that "self-managed social center" is more common term than the current name. (t · c) buidhe 04:45, 21 December 2020 (UTC)Reply
  • Support per argument above. But IMO, "self-managed social centre" is more common spelling than "self-managed social center" given that more source referred as "centre" rather than "center" unless it is US publication. 36.68.186.36 (talk) 02:08, 26 December 2020 (UTC)Reply
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.