Sharing public space. The conflicting realities of access and marginalization
Exclusion from public spaces is often seen as being the result of revanchist urban policies aimed at attracting gentrifiers and tourists at the expense of marginalized groups. This article examines conflicts around access to public space in a residential neighborhood in Montréal and makes the argument that exclusion and marginalization in fact take different forms in modern societies. A review of the different realities of public spaces and the conditions that impact on investment in socio-spatial position enables us to better understand the mechanisms of exclusion from public spaces. The review shows how residents’ strategies to reappropriate public spaces change the value attached to those spaces, and lead to a parallel emergence of a “softer” repression of members of marginalized groups. In its conclusion, the article draws attention to new forms of power now being exercised in defining public spaces, through the control of topological references.