Citizen Management Public Spaces: New Ways of Public-communitarian Management in Zaragoza (Spain)

Abstract

Analysis of urban governance models becomes evident the different attitude among cities in light of the possibility of meeting new ways of local public management. Most notably since the crisis of 2008 this was made clear in different European cities when several social actors began to claim the so-called “public-communitarian management”. One of the fields where the implementation of this type of management has been raised most frequently is that of the social centres. The article proposes the term “citizen management public spaces” in referring to these experiences. The research focuses in the city of Zaragoza (Spain) analysing two particularly relevant cases and based in a qualitative methodology including the conduct of 30 in-depth interviews with members of the local government team, councillors of the opposition parties, municipal technicians and advisers as well as the different social actors involved in the centres management. Conclusions highlight that while the opening to this management typology raises tensions and problems of varied nature, it does mean an opportunity to bring in the reform of the state agenda the citizen demand of greater participation and local institutions democratization.