1- Introduction.
democratic protest, civil disobedience and strike action, often highlight issues that went unnoticed during periods of growth.
Since the early 1980s the influence of large commercial organisations on our cities has increased exponentially. The UK government has relied on private capital to subsidise its investment, leading to the freemarketisation of development. This process of commercialisation has left everything from schools and hospitals, to the open spaces and streets in our cities under the influence and control of business and individual self-interest.
The privatisation of our urban environment
has increased the feeling of isolation and disconnection between the inhabitants of this environment and those whose interests control it. The very idea of society is under threat from this lack of common, collective space in our cities.
The individualistic consumer driven
economy envisaged by Margaret Thatcher, who in an interview in 1987 with ‘Woman’s Own’ magazine stated that “there is no such thing as society”1, has gone fundamentally unchallenged under successive Labour and Tory
The global ‘Occupy’ movement has highlighted the somewhat ambiguous nature of much of what is considered public space in the modern city, space that is often described as ‘public’ on glossy planning applications.
The
Occupy London Stock Exchange protest, when denied entry to the privately owned Paternoster Square, set up their protest camp outside St Paul’s Cathedral.
However this space is owned by the Church of England, which
considered threatening legal action to disperse the protest.
A similar
scenario has faced the Occupy movement in numerous cities around the world and gives rise to the question; where in the contemporary city is the public space so essential to the expression of democratic freedoms? In a recent article for the Guardian newspaper Rowan Moore discusses this rise of pseudo-public space, writing about the proposed ‘London
administrations at Westminster.
River Park’, designed by Gensler on behalf of asset management company
“Publicity is the culture of the consumer society. It propagates through
various tourist attractions along the Themes and is compared by Gensler
Venus.
images that society’s belief in itself.”
consumer
society
is
described
by
John
Berger
as
being
and our image orientated culture. This seems to have allowed consumerism to penetrate every aspect of our lives to such an extent that the public places within our urban environment have silently slipped from our The dream of a better life, disseminated by advertisement,
an idea which sustains enslavement to mortgage payments and monotonous jobs, is shattered during extended periods of recession such as the current global financial crisis. 1
As Moore points out however it is the
to create the illusion of public space.
controlled by the promise of a better life delivered through advertising
control.
to the High Line in New York.
latest in a series of private owned, profit making developments that serve
John Berger Capitalist
This proposal is presented as a public park that will link
Douglas Keay, Woman’s Own
The citizens’ response to these crises,
Along with Paternoster Square
other pseudo-public spaces in London have been exposed by the Occupy protesters, Broadgate and Canary Wharf obtained injunctions preventing public protests on their property.
As Moore points out some of these
spaces were former industrial sites with no public access, so their creation as pseudo-public space is of less concern.
However areas like
Paternoster Square and the Liverpool One development where formerly public streets have been sold and are now controlled by the private sector is, I would argue, of deep concern to democratic society. Although protected from most of the Westminster Government’s privatisation of public services and utilities, with Scottish Water, Scottish NHS
6