ABSTRACT
Public space is a key element for sustainable urban development. Despite its broad and context-specific meaning, public space is a common good, meant to be open, inclusive, and democratic, a fundamental human right. Public space deals, more and more, with inequalities, poverty, and conflicts, especially in the Global South, as a result of rampant urbanization and top-down decision-making processes that are guided by economic issues, huge real-estate investments, and privatization trends.
The New Urban Agenda (NUA) adopted at the Habitat III conference in Quito (2016) fosters public space as a human dimension of the urban context, able to provide opportunities of interaction and sharing, fostering civic identity and social cohesion, following the UN’s (2016b) imperative to “leave no one behind.” Since 2012, the United Nations Human Settlements Program (UN-Habitat) has promoted public space as an asset for more compact, connected, and socially inclusive cities by consolidating knowledge, approaches, and methodologies on public space for local governments. This work is being carried out through policy guides, capacity building, knowledge sharing, advocacy work, and actual implementation. Despite these efforts, public space remains a low priority in many cities’ urban agenda.
