ABSTRACT
The pursuit of securitization often operates through the geostrategic discourses of civilian policy, and it is frequently embedded in the professional techniques of urban planning and architectural design, through which the state seeks to reassert control over public spaces as part of its overall counterterrorism strategies. This chapter demonstrates how everyday spaces are manipulated as a socioeconomic and sociocultural tool in the Chinese government’s counterterrorism efforts and social governance. Specifically, drawing on both on-site observations and publicly available information, it investigates the process of making a ‘safer space’ in the context of the redevelopment of the Old Town of Kashgar, a majority Uyghur-populated city in Southern Xinjiang. It seeks to observe the interplay between the space-(re)making of the Old Town of Kashgar and the agendas of securitization in the Kashgar Old Town redevelopment project.
