This is about an open-ended project of video documentation about the self organizedproccesses to fight for the rights of “sin papeles” migrants in Spain. When the new Law of Extranjería started working, 23th of January 2001, a group of people with and without papers initiated a Encierro in Vallekas, South of Madrid, with two objectives:

- Ask the Spanish Government the regularization of the immigrants and the derogation of the Law.

- Mobilize the society and start up a campaign of civil disobedience against the Law of Extranjería.

“Paulina y Tu” as a video production organization was there from the very beginning as a part of the Encierro doing a systematical documentary work from february to the end of the Encierro.

In a challenge to the prohibition of association anticipated by the new norm the Encierros of Madrid were a continuity of Encierros by all the national territory, in Valencia, Murcia, Almería, Huelva, etc. and mainly in Barcelona, where this movement took much force, and where much people was radicalized; hundreds of encerrados in 10 churches, more than 700 immigrants.

The Sin Papeles from the Encierro de Vallekas, met in daily assemblies, decided to demand the participation in the negotiation: they must be the "Sin Papeles", to those who the Law prohibits to meet, to be associated and to defend its basic rights, that negotiate with the Government the solution to their situation.The political parties, unions and ONG´s will have to play a role of support, pursuit and guarantee of the negotiations, but never to usurp protagonism to the affected ones.

For the first time in the history of the inmigrants in Spain a social movement has been constructed through assemblies in which we participated actively, a movement headed by the inmigrants and coordinated through the Coordinadora Estatal de Inmigrantes con y sin papeles, with Encierros, hunger strikes, protest marches, demonstrations... Still being the Encierro an extreme form of fight, nonfree of conflicts, the daily experience based on the respect and the collective sense over the prevailing individualism in our society, has been a success, as much as for each of us as for the rest of the assembly.

In the basic dynamics of the Encierro, the assemblies, the pressence of “Paulina y Tu” videocameras was then a part of the landscape and was not disturbing to anyone. By the way, most of the people recording in “Paulina y Tu” work in different areas of more or less formal economy, so the times and schedules of recording implied working usually till 12 pm or later.

The assemblies coverage was completed with an exhaustive interview proccess where lots of personal info was received making the whole approach something more concrete and political on another level.

This Encierro did not have at any moment a passive character. In this work of visual documentation is reflected how the assemblies organized themselves, open assemblies of all nights, where it has voice and vote all the one that it wants to participate, although those who wasn´t permanently in the Encierro. Those assemblies were supported by diverse subcommissions, some of them were dedicated to the feeding, others to the relations with the outside or to organize protests, to inform to the press and the TV.

Also the “actions” through which the Encierro was known and present in spanish public life were covered, giving ourselves the chance therefore of providing the mainstream media with footage they could use in their programs. A remarkable aspect of the video coverage was the way the material was eventually used to reinforce dynamics whenever the proccess was getting too tense.

Tensions coming from the diverse possitions held by people with and without “papeles”: people who had a politically more inmediate approach to the targets of the encierro and people who thought it could be convenient taking more risks and making a more radical stance. Finally these tensions led to a divission of the encierro: most of the “sin papeles” left and went on with their encierro having a weaker coordination with the rest of the encierro.

“Paulina y tu” went to this “sin papeles” second encierro and kept working with them till the very last day, when a proccess was opened which led to the “regularización” of some 80% of the people of this encierro. “Paulina y tu” has not had any contact with any other group doing a similar work in the other Encierros.

The documentation in video was also destined to work in the schools like a didactic unit to give the information concerned with this Law in the schools, retired associations... Every day we could tape actions which were carried out inside and outside this space; activities like readings of poetry, movies screenings, lunches with typical plates from Peru or Brazil. .. representatives of the art and the culture joined us to sign a common manifesto and to publish it in the national newspaper EL PAIS, also the neighbours of the district turned upside down participating in the activities and contributing with kilos of food. One of the decisions of greater effect made by the encerrados of Vallecas, was a demonstration that passed by the center of Madrid requesting papers for all. That Sunday, 40.000 people said “No human being is illegal.Not to the Ley de Extranjería” and carrying the banner “REGULARIZACIÓN ". The number of participants surpassed the best expectations. In the musical festival organized by the Assembly of Encerrados of Madrid, a campaign of civil disobedience was set, promoting the autoinculpación, that counts on the support of actors, directors and writers, like Pedro Almodóvar and the Nobel Jose Saramago.

So far, “Paulina y Tu” is looking forward to considering the edition and further distribution of the footage as an open proccess, being clear though about how diffciult it is finally working with big groups of people.