One Hundred Years of National Capital-Making: The Case of Bratislava, Slovakia

Buček Ján (), Plešivčák Martin and Bačík Vladimír
Additional contact information
Buček Ján: Department of Economic and Social Geography, Demography and Territorial Development, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Comenius University, Bratislava, Bratislava, Slovakia
Plešivčák Martin: Department of Economic and Social Geography, Demography and Territorial Development, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Comenius University, Bratislava, Bratislava, Slovakia
Bačík Vladimír: Department of Economic and Social Geography, Demography and Territorial Development, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Comenius University, Bratislava, Bratislava, Slovakia

Quaestiones Geographicae, 2024, vol. 43, issue 4, 49-63

Abstract: Although Bratislava is one of the youngest national capital cities in the world, we can observe a much longer process of its capital-making. We document its gradual formation as a centre of national politics and government, as well as the centre of national culture and national symbol. Bratislava confirms the impact of assumptions and experiences as a sometimes-interim capital city and regional capital within Czechoslovakia. Facing a sudden takeover of the national capital function, we document the process of national capital-making from 1993 in more detail. There were various obstacles in key political, governmental and cultural institution-building. They are demonstrated by their headquarters location search and development, as well as in the context of interurban competition. We argue that Bratislava has already concentrated the majority of political and cultural centre functions of the state capital, despite historical turbulences and accompanying constraints. We identify their location patterns and illustrate their impact on the urban physical development of the city.

Keywords: capital cities; functions; government; culture; urban development; Bratislava (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.14746/quageo-2024-0043 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:vrs:quageo:v:43:y:2024:i:4:p:49-63:n:1011

DOI: 10.14746/quageo-2024-0043

Access Statistics for this article

Quaestiones Geographicae is currently edited by Andrzej Kostrzewski

More articles in Quaestiones Geographicae from Sciendo
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Peter Golla ().