Selected texts translated from Lèse Béton, a publication from the ZAD, 2010-2012, exploring the history and context of Europe`s largest land defense struggle. The zine’s two introductions, one by the translator and one by the original creators of Lèse-Béton are reproduced below. For Those Who Don Know: Translator’s introduction The Zone à Défendre, or the ZAD, is an area of about 2000 hectares in western France, near Nantes, in the town of Notre-Dame-Des-Landes. Since the 1970’s, elites in the (...)
Zone A Défendre
Tritons crété-e-s contre béton armé
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Latest update : 19 October 2021.
Ce site recueille des voix du mouvement d’occupation. Des voix plutôt que la voix : nous sommes une multitudes de groupes et d’individus avec des idées communes mais aussi beaucoup de différences.
Dans cette rubrique vous trouverez :
des textes (écrits ici ou ailleurs)
des témoignages
des récit de la Chat Teigne
des réflexions de fond
le fameux journal "Lèse Béton"
des tracts
des liens vers des articles et des sites
voir plein d’autres choses...
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Articles in this section
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Call out for testimonies/ stories from the struggle
20 January 2013
During the week organised by the inhabitants, resisting against the airport and its world, we would like to collect pieces of the memory of this struggle. Because history is not the priviledge of a few university professors, Because right here, right now, we are making history by our resistance, Because we must not rely on the official history, which is the history of the state, to keep traces of our fight, Because it is up to us to share our memories and to collect oral memories (...)
La ZAD is not a story that is told, it is a story that is lived
18 January 2013
La ZAD is not a story that is told, it is a story that is lived. You are sleeping, this is a dream. After an hour and a half on the road, we arrive at Notre-Dame-des-Landes. We park in a small parking lot, across from the town hall. A graffitied road sign loudly proclaims “ZAD”; we are not very far. If, regarding urbanisation, the acronym ZAD means “Zone d’Amenagement Differé”(Zone of Deferred Development), for us it takes different meanings. The 2000 hectares upon which Vinci plans to (...)
Story of an Accordion in La ZAD
18 January 2013
Last March, my uncle passed on after a long sickness; “c’était un chic type”; before he died, he expressed his desire to pass on to me his accordion, which had accompanied him for a long time, and his wish that I play the day of his funeral a waltz that he would especially appreciate. Some months later, I made the important encounter of four zadistes, one of whom, G, was an accordionist. On the 17th November, the evening of the demonstration that brought together 40,000 people, I was (...)
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Since mid November, a non mixed group of women, lesbians and transsexuals have been meeting up every week. The need for a feminist dynamic on the ZAD already existed, but it has become much more pronounced over the past few weeks. We are faced more than ever with aggression, confrontations and sexist and homophobic behaviour. Deep questions have been discussed at each meeting. We, a small group of inhabitants of the ZAD feel the need to define the political basis on which we want to (...)
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About the struggle in Notre Dame (des Landes) and its forms: test of perspective The situation : An airport project is threatening a territory rich in biodiversity, enhanced by generations of farmers, who begins the struggle against this project. Some farmers, some persons continu to live and settle on the area. On invitations from the previous ones, some abandoned houses, land left fallow are occupied and cultured, some constructions are made, par young and less young persons, with life (...)
A week of activities in la Châteigne from the 27th of december to the 3rd of january
23 December 2012
A week of activities in la Châteigne proposed by the Kulon Progo building team —from the 27th of december to the 3rd of january 2013— The building team of the Kulon Progo sleeping will organise the first week of presidio in the Châteigne. The Châteigne is the place to organise for the struggle against the airport and the system which support it on the zad. ’Presidio’ means inviting the ’comités locaux’ and other groups to hold and propose some activities to do in the place from (...)
Reflections on the future of the ZAD and the airport
10 December 2012
For three years, activists, farmers and local residents of the ZAD (Zone d’Aménagement Différé - Deferred Development Zone) have been resisting the development of an international airport in Notre-Dame-des-Landes in Western France by occupying land expropriated by the state on behalf of the Vinci Corporation. The zadistas rebaptized the ZAD Zone à Défendre (Zone to be Defended), moved into abandoned homes, self-built houses or cabins, and have been using these 2000 hectares of wetlands (...)
Friends from here, friends from elsewhere,
6 December 2012
We, the evicted and those threatened by eviction, inhabitants resisting the airport project and its world, want to thank you. To thank you for coming from the neighboring villages of Vigneux and from Turin, from Rennes and from Brussels to participate in this struggle today to rebuild together the material basis necessary to continue resistance on this land. To thank you for having made this struggle your own, by organizing gatherings, by wheat-pasting, by holding meetings in your (...)
Hawk? Handsaw? Who knows?
1 December 2012
Hawk? Handsaw? Who knows? I do like living in France. Adopting the mental pose of a curious anthropologist studying in wonderment the hidden codes of the natives is a remarkable aid to sanity. When things don’t seem to be going my way, I relax and content myself with noting the difference in our assumptions. Culture is, after all, just a convention of shared madnesses. Vive la difference! But this relaxed attitude slips a little when I contemplate the issue of the proposed airport at (...)
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