Dis-locating public space: Occupy Rondebosch Common, Cape Town

Myriam Houssay-Holzschuch and Emma Thébault

Environment and Planning A, 2017, vol. 49, issue 3, 555-571

Abstract: We argue here that public space research might benefit theoretically from the Southern Turn in urban studies. Our first objective is theoretical and methodological: unpack the idea of public space to make it suitable beyond its original location. Détienne’s work on Comparing the Incomparable , combined with Staeheli and Mitchell’s notion of “regimes of publicity†offer the theoretical tools for such a displacement. We end up thinking about public space as various, context-specific configurations of loosely structured, juridical, political, and social elements that take on new shapes and are prone to partial dislocation when dis-located. We test this model by displacing it to a piece of vacant land—Rondebosch Common in Cape Town. In so doing, we deal with our second objective: offering a detailed empirical analysis of the Occupy Rondebosch Common 2012 events, which relates to broader public space debates in contemporary, liminal, South Africa.

Keywords: Public space; Southern Turn; Cape Town (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:envira:v:49:y:2017:i:3:p:555-571

DOI: 10.1177/0308518X15603985

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