ABSTRACT
More than a decade ago, David Harvey observed that the contemporary restructuring of urban spaces has been accompanied by changing economic and cultural practices in cities (Harvey 1990). In this context, Sharon Zukin (1995) noticed a symbolic economy of cities shaped by those who want to achieve financial benefit or advantages in the competition of cities. In a similar vein, Lash and Urry (1994: 64) have stated: 'Economic and symbolic processes are more than ever interlaced and interarticulated ... The economy is increasingly culturally inflected and ... culture is more and more economically inflected' (see also du Gay and Pryke 2002 for the culturalization of the economic sphere and the economization of the cultural). And Mark Gottdiener declared that the production of signs is elementary for entrepreneurial success, because symbolic value seems more important for economic success than commodity value (Gottdiener 2001). As a result of these accounts urban scholars should concentrate on the development of empirical instruments which make it possible to analyze symbolic processes as part of the urban condition. In this sense – and in order to understand the economic and symbolic, as well as discursive processes – we have to look at both the sphere of production and the sphere of consumption of themed urban landscapes, since both the production and consumption of urban places and spaces are actively constructed by economic and political, as well as social and cultural, practices.
