“Hanging Out,” Creativity, and the Right to the City: Urban Public Space in Russia before and after the Protest Wave of 2011–2012
Keywords:
contested space, creativity in social movements, post-socialist transformation, public space, 2011–2012 Russian protest movement
Abstract
The article discusses issues of urban public space in Russian cities within the context of the 2011–2012 anti-electoral fraud protests.
The role of urban public space and its contestation has been central to the debate around the worldwide Occupy movement, but it is important to contextualize the protest movements in terms of national and local developments in the uses of public space. Therefore, the article focuses on post-socialist transformations of public space in the Russian cities of Saint Petersburg and Moscow. Representations and perceptions of public space are examined via media analysis (including mass
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Allen, John (2006). “Ambient Power: Berlin’s Potsdamer Platz and the Seductive Logic of Public Spaces.” Urban Studies 43.2: 441–455.
Andrusz, Gregory (2007). “Wall and Mall: A Metaphor for Metamorphosis.” In The Ur- ban Mosaic of Post-Socialist Europe: Space, Institutions, Policy, ed. Sasha Tsencova and Zorica Nedović-Budić, 71– 90. Heidelberg, N.Y.: Physica.
Bikbov, Alexander (2011). “Introduction.” Laboratorium 3.3: 14–17. http://soclabo.org/ index.php/laboratorium/article/view/263/620.
Boym, Svetlana (1994). Common Places: Mythologies of Everyday Life in Russia. Cam- bridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
Brenner, Neil, and Nik Theodore, eds. (2002). Spaces of Neoliberalism: Urban Restructuring in North America and Western Europe. Oxford: Blackwell.
Burgers, Jack (2000). “Urban Landscapes on Public Space in the Post-Industrial City.” Journal of Housing and the Built Environment 15.2: 145–164.
Calhoun, Craig (1992). Habermas and the Public Sphere. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.
Calhoun, Craig (2005). “Constitutional Patriotism and the Public Sphere: Interests, Identity, and Solidarity in the Integration of Europe.” International Journal of Pol- itics, Culture, and Society 18.3–4: 257–280.
Certeau, Michel de, Luce Giard, and Pierre Mayol (1998). The Practice of Everyday Life: Living and Cooking, Vol. 2. Trans. Timothy J. Tomasik. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
Chuikina, Sof’ia (2003).”Imidzhi Peterburga v presse (1998–2003)” [Images of Peters- burg in the press (1998–2003)]. In Sankt-Peterburg v zerkale sotsiologii, ed. V.V. Kozlovskii, 59–79. Saint Petersburg: Sotsiologicheskoe obshchestvo im. M.M. Ko- valevskogo.
Engel, Barbara (2006). “Public Space in the Blue Cities in Russia.” Progress in Planning 66.3: 147–237.
Fraser, Nancy (1992). “Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy.” In Habermas and the Public Sphere, ed. Craig Cal- houn, 109–142. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.
Gleb Suvorov, “Obshchestvo anonimnykh revoliutsionerov” [A society of anonymous revolutionaries], Slon, March 20, 2012. http://slon.ru/russia/obshchestvo_ anonimnykh_revolyutsionerov-765700.xhtml.
Gladarev, Boris (2011). “Istoriko-kul’turnoe nasledie Peterburga: rozhdenie obshchest- vennosti iz dukha goroda” [Petersburg’s cultural and historical legacy: the birth of the public from the spirit of the city]. In Ot obshchestvennogo k publichnomu [From the communal to the public], ed. Oleg Kharkhordin. Saint Petersburg: Eu- ropean University Press, 69–304.
Graham, Stephen, and Alessandro Aurigi (1997). “Virtual Cities, Social Polarization, and the Crisis in Urban Public Space.” Journal of Urban Technology 4.1: 19–52.
Habermas, Jürgen (1974). “The Public Sphere: An Encyclopedia Article (1964).” Trans. Sara Lennox and Frank Lennox. New German Critique 3: 49–55.
Harvey, David (2011). “The Party of Wall Street Meets its Nemesis.” Verso Books Blog, October 28. http://www.versobooks.com/blogs/777-david-harvey-the-party-of- wall-street-meets-its-nemesis.
Harvey, David (2003). “The Right to the City.” International Journal of Urban and Re- gional Research 27.4: 939–941.
Hollis, Leo (2013). “Cities Belong to Us.” Aeon Magazine, July 18. http://www.aeonmag-azine.com/living-together/cities-thrive-when-public-space-is-really-public.
Ippolitov, Arkadii (2007). “Evropa na bullshit’e. Peterburgskie kartinki” [Europe on bullshit: pictures of Petersburg]. Russkaia zhizn’, October 12. http://www.rulife. ru/old/mode/article/317.
Jansen, Stef (2001). “The Streets of Beograd: Urban Space and Protest Identities in Ser- bia.” Political Geography 20: 35–55.
Kurennoi, Vitalii (2012). “Derevnia v gorode. Urbanisticheskaia revolutsiia v Rossii ne zavershena” [The village in the city: the urban revolution in Russia has not been finished]. Novaia Gazeta, April 9. http://www.novayagazeta.ru/comments/52041. html.
Leitner, Helga, Jamie Peck, and Eric S. Sheppard, eds. (2007). Contesting Neoliberalism: Urban Frontiers. New York: Guilford Press.
Levinson, Aleksei (2012). Prostranstvo protesta. Moskovskie mitingi i soobshchestvo goro- zhan [The space of protest: the Moscow rallies and the community of city dwell- ers]. Moscow: Strelka Press.
Lofland, Lyn H. (1998). The Public Realm. New York: Aldine de Gruyter.
Low, Setha (1997). “Urban Fear: Building the Fortress City.” City & Society 9.1: 53–71. Magun, Artemy (2011). “Communisme qui est, communisme à venir.” In L’idée du com-munisme, ed. Slavoj Žižek and Alain Badiou, 169–198. Paris: Lignes.
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Mitchell, Don (1995). “The End of Public Space? People’s Park, Definitions of the Public, and Democracy.” Annals of the Association of American Geographers 85.1: 108–133. Mitchell, Don (2003). The Right to the City: Social Justice and the Fight for Public Space. New York: Guildford Press.
Nielsen, Finn Sivert (2004). The Eye of the Whirlwind: Russian Identity and Soviet Nation- Building. Quests for Meaning in a Soviet Metropolis. http://www.anthrobase.com/ Txt/N/Nielsen_F_S_03.htm.
Sennett, Richard (2012). “The Occupy movements have dramatised questions about public space: Who owns it? And who can use it?” LSE: British Politics and Policy Blog, October 10. http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/archives/27607.
Stanilov, Kiril (2007a). “Democracy, Markets, and Public Space in the Transitional Societies of Central and Eastern Europe.” In The Post-Socialist City, ed. Kiril Stanilov, 269–283. Dordrecht: Springer.
Stanilov, Kiril, ed. (2007b). The Post-Socialist City: Urban Form and Space Transforma- tions in Central and Eastern Europe after Socialism. Dordrecht: Springer.
Strategicheskii plan (1998). Strategicheskii plan Sankt-Peterburga [Saint Petersburg strategic plan]. Saint Petersburg: Proektnoe biuro “Strategicheskii plan dlia Sankt-Peterburga.”
Trubina, Elena (2012). “Protesty i goroda” [Protests and cities]. Russkii zhurnal, March 11. http://www.russ.ru/Mirovaya-povestka/Protesty-i-goroda.
Whyte, William H. (1988). City: Rediscovering the Center. New York: Doubleday.
Zhelnina, Anna (2011). “‘Learning to Use Public Space’: Perception of Urban Spaces in the Post-Soviet Context.” Paper presented at the Annual RC21 Conference, The Struggle to Belong: Dealing with Diversity in 21st Century Urban Settings, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, July 7–9. http://www.rc21.org/conferences/amster- dam2011/edocs/Session%2012/RT12-1-Zhelnina.pdf.
Zhelnina, Anna, Anisia Khokhlova, Elena Tykanova, and Oleg Pachenkov (2012).“Kak realizovat’ ‘pravo na gorod’?” [How can the “right to the city” be realized?]. Gaid- ar-Klub, March 19. http://club.gaidarfund.ru/articles/1162.
Published
2014-06-25
How to Cite
Zhelnina, A. (2014). “Hanging Out,” Creativity, and the Right to the City: Urban Public Space in Russia before and after the Protest Wave of 2011–2012. Stasis, 2(1). Retrieved from https://stasisjournal.net/index.php/journal/article/view/70
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Articles
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