The Counter-Revolutionary City
A note to myself on Chapter 6 of Mark Beissinger’s fascinating The Revolutionary City, with its discussion of the myriad ways in which modern autocrats manage public space to discourage political protest.
It helps to start with those who would organize dissent. Not just any space will do. A good location satisfies three conditions: 1) it accommodates a crowd; 2) it is visible and symbolically important (typically in the capital); 3) it is easily accessible.
The autocrat’s problem is that demonstrations of regime strength are ideally held in locations that satisfy these same conditions. Tiananmen Square works equally well for military parades and anti-regime protests.
Seen this way, the autocrat’s path of least resistance is to lean on (3): restrict access to large, strategically located spaces—turn public space into state space. No protests on Red Square, thank you very much; try Bolotnaya (“Swamp”) Square instead. But that doesn’t always work. With sufficient numbers, Tahrir Square can be overtaken. So can the Maidan.
In older cities, this is a particular problem, as what were once markets and city walls are now open plazas and generous boulevards. Cities fortified against armed rebellion—in the spirit of Haussmann’s Paris—provide generous space for mass protest. Monumental squares built to glorify some prior regime invite protest against the current one.
There are a few ways out of this quandary, none of them costless.
First, rulers can change the physical infrastructure of the city itself. Few autocrats are wealthy or strong enough to remake the urban landscape entirely, but it may suffice to demolish a particular locus of revolutionary activity, such as Bahrain’s Pearl Roundabout. Alternatively, public space can be overwhelmed with commercial activity, as in St. Petersburg’s Sennaya Square—ironically, turning what was once a market back into one.
Second, they can relocate the most dangerous part of the urban population, as when the Park regime moved Seoul National University out of the central city.
Finally, they can move the capital itself. This last option buys some time before the urban population relocates to the new center of power. More important, perhaps, it offers a truly blank slate on which the regime’s security can be designed. Myanmar’s Naypyidaw is the paradigmatic example.