Occupying Shops to Defend Spaces of Livelihoods: From Tenant Shopkeepers' Fragmentation to Collective Consciousness in Urban Korea.

This article examines the formation of a collective consciousness among self-employed tenant shopkeepers in urban South Korea who face livelihood precarity due to speculative commercial real estate practices by landlords. Through ethnographic research with the tenant shopkeepers' social movement organization (SMO) "People Who Want to Run a Commercial Business with Peace of Mind" (MSM), the study highlights how the militant practice of occupying livelihood spaces—shops under threat of eviction—serves as a spatial and emotional foundation for solidarity among previously fragmented individuals. The research shows that these occupations, often met with violent repression, catalyze an antagonistic collective identity directed against speculative landlords and foster alliances with diverse urban allies, including precarious wage workers. The article further discusses the challenges and transformative potential of sustaining such collective consciousness through everyday interactions within these occupied spaces, emphasizing their role as relational incubators for bridging social, cultural, and political differences in the struggle against capitalist-driven displacement.