ABSTRACT
The last three decades have produced signicant changes in what Harvey (1989a) calls ‘the urban process’. Many Western cities have been restructured as places of consumption as well as places to live and work in which cultural and heritage assets are show-cased and turned into commercial products that are integrated into the fabric of central public spaces. Urban centres are also subjected to branding strategies aimed at attracting tourists while promising that a particular town or city will provide a uniquely exquisite location in which to do business and a ‘quality of life’ that meets service class workers ‘lifestyle’ aspirations. Initiatives such as these are seen in the urban studies literature (Meethan 1997; Atkinson 2003; Bayliss 2004) as particularly interesting features of many post-industrial cities’ economic development aspirations, where, because of ‘the collapse of the industrial base of their cities and the rise of the service sector, city decision-makers [have] prioritized economic development and turned to the arts and culture as one area with considerable potential’ (Bayliss 2004, 818). Not only post-industrial cities are affected; many ‘heritage cities’ (Urry 1995) are subjected to the same commercial forces and are turned into themed ‘time machines’ that offer heritage experiences for consumers by urban managers keen to attract a diversity of investment capital while fending off increased competition from a plethora of cultural spaces opening up to the ‘tourist gaze’ (Urry 2002).
