Public sphere, the broadest of all and most commonly the domain of philosophers, political thinkers, and legal scholars, deals with the extents and limits of public space as a discursive, political space more often than not focusing on communicative aspects. Public realm, although somewhat interchangeable with public sphere, is most commonly associated with symbolic communication and spatial practices, and thus with the sociology of the publics. Nancy Fraser builds her thesis by critically examining the Habermasian conceptualization of the public sphere. She discusses the formation of a bourgeois public sphere in early modern Europe and how it led to the formation of public opinion, the consensus about the common good, and its ability to hold the state accountable. New, more critical, post-bourgeois definitions of public realm thus become critical in “expanding our capacity to envision democratic possibilities beyond the limits of actually existing democracy.”.