[extract …] ‘Squatter’ is a term which can only truly be understood within a specific political context. In the purportedly neutral wording of Webster’s dictionary, a squatter is ‘one that settles on land without right or title or payment of rent’. The essential phrase here is ‘without right’, for the specific meaning of the term requires the conceptualization of boundaries or limits by the legal system under consideration. It is this which gives the term its political meaning.

As a label to be applied to low-income residents of self-help housing, ‘squatter’ has fulfilled the needs of both the political left and right, although for different reasons. Those on the right - including most urban administrators, many politicians and any real estate developer who covets land occupied by squatters - stress the importance of the rule of law to the operations of society. From this perspective, squatters are those who are living beyond the pale. The significance of this view from a juridical standpoint is that once specific groups of people in any society are interpreted to be living outside the law, the application of law can become unequal and arbitrary (Gilbert, 1990). Under such circumstances, the state fails to provide protection to its citizenry as a whole, and instead serves the needs of only particular classes within society. This point becomes particularly salient in societies such as those of many third world cities today, where ‘squatter colonies’, in their myriad local variations, make up large proportions - occasionally majorities - of urban populations.

Those on the left, in championing the interests of the urban poor, also prefer the term ‘squatter’ - with its implication of people living outside the law - so as to make the point that the state itself is excluding or disenfranchising whole classes of its citizenry. From this view, the urban squatter is an heroic figure, fighting against all odds and operating outside the oppressive system of the market economy in order to secure a place for self and family in the city. If access to the city is so essential to the well-being of the elite classes, why should this access be denied to the masses? The contrary idea, that the urban poor might be buying and selling land from one another, rather than merely wresting it away from evil landlords or an uncaring state, undercuts this heroic image (Smart, 1986). Those on the left would prefer to avoid the slightest appearance that the poor are exploiting one another in their struggles to obtain a scarce resource: space in the city