VIOME

Police attacks Viome's "Caravan of Struggle and Solidarity" after a fruitless meeting with vice-minister

Workers of two recuperated factories announced they will camp outside the Ministry of Labour in Athens, in protest of the authorities' stance. Minutes later, they were attacked by the police.

Workers of the occupied self-managed factories of Viome, in Thessaloniki, and Roben, in Veria, along with supporters from all over Greece, have started their "Caravan of Struggle and Solidarity" to Athens on the afternoon of Thursday 31 June, to protest the inactivity of the government and its unwillingness to legalise the operation of the two recuperated companies. read more »

Who is opposed to self-management and why?

This controversy illustrates the difference between the defeated world of ideology and the vibrant and outward-looking world of action that strives to disengage from the dominant relations.

The venture of the self-managed VIOME in Greece has come face to face not only with the enemies of self-management “by nature and by stance”, i.e. the ruling class and the state, but also with the communist and anti-capitalist forces of the left, including the anarchist movement. Despite their differences, these forces seem to agree to the fact that within capitalism, self-management can be nothing more than a kind of workers’ “self-exploitation”, a form of a “collective capitalism”. From this perspective, not only has self-management nothing to offer in the direction of social emancipation,  but –even worse– it “absolves” capitalism of its obligation to create jobs and guarantee the welfare of all workers. read more »

VIOME Workers' Cooperative

Located in: Thessaloniki, Greece | Produces: Natural detergents and soaps

VIOME is a building materials factory in Thessaloniki, Greece, which was abandoned by its owners at the peak of the Greek crisis, in 2011. Subsequently it was occupied by its workers, and has been producing natural detergents under workers' control since 2013. 

Legal status: The workers formed a cooperative in April 2014. As of December 2015 there is an auction process for the liquidation of the company assets.  read more »

Experiences: 

Social Waste - "At utopia's fiesta"

A video clip by Greek militant hip-hop collective Social Waste, filmed at the recuperated factory of VIOME.

Captions available in English, Spanish, Italian, Greek. read more »

Occupy, Resist, Produce – VIOME

The third in a series of short documentaries on the recuperated factories of Europe.

VIOME is a building materials factory in Thessaloniki, Greece, which was abandoned by its owners at the peak of the Greek crisis, in 2011. Subsequently it was occupied by its workers, and has been producing natural detergents under workers' control since 2013. Despite being an emblematic and inspiring struggle, today VIOME is under imminent threat of eviction. read more »

Recuperating Work and Life

As the economic crisis deepens and governments—instead of providing support—respond with more austerity, people throughout the world are not only resisting but increasingly creating their own solutions in multiple spheres of life. Work is an especially difficult area around which to organize if the government refuses to aid the unemployed or underemployed, and yet it is also one where some of the most innovative solutions are arising. read more »

A call for support of the struggle of VIOME

Against the imminent threat of liquidation, the workers of VIOME appeal for international solidarity.

Dear solidarity supporters, we invite you to stand beside us, to support every effort of the workers to make the forces of production autonomous from the capitalist class, a class which anyway has delocalised all production abroad. We invite you to support the operation of the factory, since we, the workers, have declared that we are not leaving, that our lives are now linked to this factory. read more »

Take back the factory: worker control in the current crisis

The economic crisis that began in 2008 has put workers’ control and workplace democracy back on the agenda in the countries of the northern hemisphere.

During the first decade of the current century, factory occupations and production under workers’ control seemed to be limited mainly to South America, with a few exceptions in Asia. It was beyond the imagination of most workers and scholars in industrialized countries that workers would or could occupy their companies and run them on their own. Nevertheless, the crisis that started in 2008 put workers’ control back on the agenda in the northern hemisphere. In the course of the current crisis, factory occupations occurred throughout Europe, especially in France, Italy and Spain, but also in other countries, including Switzerland and Germany, and in the US and Canada. read more »

May Day: workers of the world unite and take over - their factories

Guardian 1st May 2015

The liberal UK newspaper, the Guardian - in a special article for May Day 2015 - has recognised "the fast-developing phenomenon" of fabricas recuperadas  that around 15,000 workers in more than 300 workplaces have taken over following attempted closure by capital.  Examples in France,Spain, Greece, Argentina and Turkey many detailed on this site are discussed.  This site, along with autogestion.coop and the Marseille meeting, get a mention on the online version although not in the print.    read more »

Workers' "Caravan of Struggle and Solidarity" to Athens

Autonomous and horizontal workers’ movements in Greece embarked on a caravan to Athens to remind the SYRIZA government of the base from which it arose.

Workers’ movements and their supporters from throughout Greece have embarked on a caravan to speak with, and demand from, the new SYRIZA government. They are asking for concrete support for their struggles, each of which is based on self-organization and horizontality. Saturday April 4th marked the first day of a caravan, which will travel to various towns throughout Greece, meeting with and gathering other workers in struggle in each location, who will then all make their way to Athens. read more »

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