Role of Social Capital in Place Making—Pre-capitalist Spaces and Spaces in Capitalism

Abstract

The argument in this essay is driven by the sole idea of looking at places not just through their physical attributes but the process of their making vis-a-vis the forces that shape them and through the settings in which they flourish (or not). As such, space and place are read as two different entities whereby a place is a space with an assigned activity, space being the blank that cannot be termed as empty—rather it is something that holds great potential to be identified and exploited. Place is a terminology that occurs later in the hierarchy of the formation of human relations, if there is one. In this essay, I read space as the raw material for making place and consider the latter’s production and responsiveness to nature, people and context as a cultural concept. The parameters that determine the system by which place-making occurs have changed over time. This essay attempts to explore place-making in pre-capitalist and capitalist societies and how the concept of social capital, as subsequently introduced, drives this process and is morphed by it. It is a review piece that attempts at understanding Lefebvre and Burte’s take on him by introducing the concept of Social capital by Bordieu.