South of the equator, in Argentina, the art of knitting has developed into something that extends far beyond comfort and nostalgia. In a cooperative located in one of the poorest areas of Buenos Aires, it has become a means of survival.

Virtually everyone in the city has heard of Villa 31 de Retiro, the name of the infamous neighborhood conjures up images of extreme poverty and need. Its vast area is situated alongside the main highway that rounds Argentina’s capital, nestled beside the train tracks originating from the central train station that shares part of its name.

The make-shift shacks – home to over 120,000 people – are clearly visible to drivers as they cruise by. Along the horizon above the villa is the modern city skyline: tall, shiny buildings with names like Microsoft, Daimler-Chrysler, and the luxury Sheraton Hotel, contrast sharply with the destitution below.

Emma Almirón, a passionate and humble activist, has been working with the people of Villa 31 since the 1970s. She began her work with Father Carlos Mujica, a Catholic priest whose teachings, words of hope, and consciousness-raising among the poor were interpreted by predecessors of the brutal dictatorship that controlled Argentina from 1976 until the early 1980s as subversive behavior. Leading up to that context, Father Mugica was shot and killed by a paramilitary agent in May of 1974. His legacy lives on as a symbol for inspiration – his life and passion has been commemorated through books, documentary film and a colorful mural that decorates a wall at Villa 31.

The life-endangering atmosphere of the 1970s and 80s in Argentina forced Emma to put her solidarity work on an abrupt hold and go into exile. Once she was able to return to her country, Emma went back to Villa 31 and found that some of the people she had formed relationships with back in the 70s were still there. Problems remained unchanged, and in some respects, worsened.

In the wake of the severe economic crisis that rocked Argentina in 2001, Emma continued her work with the Villa and tried, together with the community, to come up with some kind of opportunity that would allow people to make at least enough pesos to feed themselves and their families – an activity that would also allow them to continue growing as individuals, and as a group. Once they realized that many of the women of Villa 31 knew how to knit, the idea to form a cooperative was born.

They started slowly, meeting every Thursday in what Emma describes as a tin “container”, a metal structure that normally houses the community kitchen. As its construction suggests, it’s hot as an oven in the summer and with no insulation, difficult to keep warm in the winter. In the beginning, only a small group of women would meet – showing each other the kinds of stitches they knew and the various things they could make. As the momentum grew, more and more women started appearing, and Emma began creating a network of friends from outside the community who volunteered to offer further support.

By Emma’s invitation, advanced knitters with a genuine interest in helping the community grow came to the Villa from fashionable neighborhoods like Recoleta and Barrio Norte and began teaching the women how to perfect the finished product and add new stitches to their repertoire. For those who had never knit before, introductory lessons were offered as well. Vicente Barros, from the Instituto Movilizador de Microemprendimientos (Institute of Microenterprise Mobilization), helped form the cooperative from a legal standpoint. To formalize the operation, the group went to the Credicoop and opened a joint bank account. The women from Villa 31 wore their best dresses, and were ecstatic. It was the first time many of them had ever stepped foot into a bank.

Another friend who joined the group was Mary Tapia, a well known designer from Buenos Aires, who was able to sell her designs – turned into a reality by the women of Villa 31 – to the Italian company, Fatto a Mano (Handmade). For each sweater the women are paid between $15 and $30 pesos (the equivalent of roughly $5 to $10 U.S. dollars). They average between two or three completed sweaters a week each, depending on the complexity of the design and their individual skill level. Petrona Fleitas of Villa 31 admits, “I haven’t had work for ten years. What I make now allows me to feed my eight children." [2]

A central theme is cooperativismo – or cooperativism, a word that doesn’t seem to exist in English, but implies the concept of working together as a community. Emma is straightforward when she says that work at the cooperative is never easy – there’s always someone who feels they’ve been left out, that they are doing more work than the others and so on. In essence, Thursday classes serve as an open forum, to make sure everyone is operating on the same page and with the same goals in mind.

Emma is hesitant to tell her personal story, about how she became involved with the Villa and her current role. Her conversation naturally winds back to the stories about other individuals that together make the cooperative happen. She tells about how stunned they were when a journalist from a national newspaper came and interviewed them – they were even more amazed when they saw their pictures and story in print, quoting things they themselves had said. That is exactly the kind of inspiration that Emma celebrates, an external source of legitimacy that lets the women know what they are doing is good for their pockets – but more importantly, it is good for their sense of self-worth.

“Here, everything was really fragmented…the idea was that they [the women of Villa 31] would run the cooperative. So they are building it while they work. That’s what gives them energy. They see that they can create something different and free themselves from fate, from misery, from being immobile in the face of circumstances that constantly oppress them.” [4] Emma emotionally referenced one of the women of the cooperative who said the whole process has enabled her to finally feel like a human being.

The weekly meeting place is available only on Thursdays. Otherwise, the women work from home while taking care of small children and tending to other household chores in a place with few conveniences. Emma smiles when she tells about a few of the husbands who have started to learn how to knit at home, in secret. Some of them have recently started to join the meetings where training for both novices and experts is offered by volunteers. Hardship and the search for paid employment have slowly taken precedence over macho customs that traditionally view knitting as a woman’s domain. Awareness that a role reversal was created via their work makes the men’s company even more appealing.

Other themes that the Thursday classes highlight are basic values like self-respect, dignity, and the idea that another world is possible. Emma believes in the creation of a new Latin America that stands up to inequality. She tells about how before the crisis in 2001, many Argentines thought they were in Europe – that widespread poverty were only problems in places like Bolivia and Peru. After more than 50 percent of the population went below the poverty line in Argentina in less than two months (on top of the significant number of people who were already there), it’s hard to deny that hardship is more prevalent than not. Argentina has essentially been “Latin Americanized”, in quick and painful form.

Given the socio-economic situation in Argentina, opportunities in the traditional workplace are virtually non-existent for a large percentage of the population. Like Mujeres Artesanas, there is a large movement of cooperatives taking shape that includes other cooperatives within Villa 31 and beyond. People are motivating to find their own way, their own work and their own source of dignity. Stories abound about fábricas tomadas, or fábricas recuperadas – factories, that due to the crisis were forced to close, are now being taken over, or “recuperated”, by the workers themselves. They are going to work like they always did, effectively becoming their own managers and foremen. By going through the old books, they are restarting relationships with former clients, and are working intensely to keep once defunct businesses in operation.

This kind of venture has not been easy. In many cases, the owner of a former company contacts the authorities and tries to push the workers out – usually by force. But their spirit and energy is hard to keep down. In May of 2003, the umbrella organization, Movimiento Nacional de Empresas Recuperadas (MNER, or National Movement of Recovered Enterprises) was formally created, which represents roughly 180 companies and over 10,000 workers in Argentina today. These businesses represent the industrial sector (supplying tractors, cars, and other heavy equipment), textile manufacturing, the food industry, and so on. With the slogan, “Occupy, Resist, and Produce”, the mission of the MNER is to lobby for laws that incorporate this new mode of work and social exchange. Other options are simply not available.

The instances of fábricas recuperadas differ in many ways from the experience of Mujeres Artesanas, most clearly in the fact that the women of Villa 31 have built something where before there was nothing at all. But the energy is the same. Millions of people in Argentina currently exist outside of the system, on the margins of society. With the government being weighed down by international pressures concerning its enormous public and private debt, cooperatives like Mujeres Artesanas and others are doing what they can to pick up where the system has fallen short.

"I remember when I was eleven years old and I started knitting with my grandmother in Jujuy. Then I watched how others knitted at school. Since I like knitting, and crocheting even more, I started to make curtains, tablecloths, bedspreads…It was always my dream to have my own loom. I had one when I came from Jujuy, but I lost it, and haven’t been able to buy another one since." [1] – Gabriela Irusta, Villa 31

The cooperative didn’t have a formal name until they started gaining recognition in the local press. Now, La Cooperativa de Mujeres Artesanas de la 31 (Cooperative of Women Artisans of Villa 31), boasts between 20 to 25 women at a given time.

Their first order from Italy has since been satisfied, and one from Quebec is underway. Smaller sales to high-end retail stores around the upscale neighborhoods of Buenos Aires have also been made. Emma stresses the importance of finding clients consistent with the cooperative's mission – the quality and style of the product line sells itself.

"We are a new social actor, generating a new consensus. Facing the failure of Argentine company management, we have the capability to replace individual effort for the collective, as the crisis demands. In the name of our flag, we promote workers as a solution through self-management, moving from social conflict to productive consensus." [5]
– José Abelli, MNER Leader

Endnotes:
Author’s Note: All sources were translated from the Spanish by T. Kearney.
Almirón, Emma. Personal Interview. March 25-26, 2004.
1. Sonia Santoro, “Tejidos y Tramas” (Knits and Weaves), Página 12/Las 12, 8, December 5, 2003.
2. Daniela Fajardo, “Made in La Villa”, Paratí, 68, August 29, 2003.
3. Santoro, 9.
4. Santoro, 8.
5. Stancanelli, Pablo. “Empresas recuperadas y autogestionadas. Apropiarse de la fuente de trabajo” (Recovered and Self-Managed Companies. Adapting Oneself to the Work Source), Le Monde Diplomatique/Le Diplo, Number 38, Southern Cone Edition, August, 2002.