Tiananmen square and the politics of place

Abstract

Abstract Present-day Tiananmen Square (Beijing) is the product of two distinct but intertwined spatial traditions. The Square, its morphology and its monuments historically have embodied the hegemonic political power of the Chinese state. Its ‘symbolic geography’ also incorporates a tradition of dissent or rebellion through its association with popular movements which have appropriated this space, and the orthodox tradition it represents, as the geographical focus of oppositional political practice. The power of oppositional movements rests on their ability to appropriate ‘the space of the other’ and transform it in ways which articulate their own political vision. However temporary this process of detournement may be, it leaves its permanent mark on the geography of the place that is the physical object of struggle. Through this ongoing dialectic, space is continuously produced and transformed. The paper reviews the relevant geographical literature on space, place and politics, then sketches the morphological evolution of the Square and the multiplicity of political meanings concretized in it. It examines the spatial practice of 20th century oppositional movements, focusing particularly on the struggle for Tiananmen Square in 1989, to demonstrate the extraordinary power of apparently ‘placeless’ political movements over the production and definition of space.