This research project focuses on local cultural geographies as (transformative) economic spaces.
Due to the multiple role of cultural activities as
(1) economic interactions,
(2) leisure activities
(3) and as an expression of political and social action
cultural economic spaces can be considered as liminal spaces between economic, civil and political actors (e.g. Scott, 1999; Gibson, 2003; Flew, 2010; Oakley & Ward, 2018; Belfiore, 2020; Müller & Grieshaber, 2024). Therefore, they are suitable for capturing a wide variety of pluralistic economic interactions, with potential implications for (economic) transformations towards more socio-ecological justice.
The case study of local dance festivals in Bern and in an comparable European city will be used to investigate the extent to which local (temporary) cultural economic geographies contribute to local and regional economic development. The second research focus is on existing and possible future transformative and "more-than-capitalist" practices in the context of local dance festivals. With the transdisciplinary research design of a real-world laboratory (Wanner et al., 2017; Bergmann et al., 2021), the plan is to co-create and implement a transformative dance festival concept together with practice partners.
The project is supported by the Center for Regional Development (CRED).
A detailed overview of the research design is shown in the graphic above.
