db+Hegemonic+Backdrop

What constitutes “the public” or what it means to be “in public” are contestable terms that while immediately recognizable, seem to slip between one’s fingers when interrogated for a precise definition. The public is both discursive (as in public opinion) and material (as in public space). Most discussions of what constitutes “the public” begin with Jürgen Habermas’ concept of “the public sphere.” In //The Structural Formation of the Public Sphere// (1989) Habermas describes the public as a place of rational debate and structured argument. Ideally, the public sphere is won through argumentation and not physical violence. Enlightenment notions of governance and human nature inform this view of the public sphere. It favors rationality and structure of argument over appeals to emotion or claims based in anecdotal experience. Hess (2011, 3) summarizes post-Habermasian conceptualizations of the public (that is those that define “the public” in critical response to Habermas) as, “networks of organizations and individuals mak[ing] alignments between their sectional interests and the general good by claiming to speak for the society as a whole and its “public interest”: that is, what the public is, needs, and should have.” This view is informed by the work of Bourdieu (1993) who noted that the very boundaries of public and private are in contestation all the time. Additionally the private experiences and viewpoints of individuals are key in making public arguments and swaying public opinion.

Discussion of public space follows a parallel course. Mona Domosh (1998) writes, “Scholars lamenting the loss of public space in the postmodern city depict the streets of nineteenth century as the preeminent sites of “democracy and pleasure” (Sorkin 1002:xv). Domosh goes on to compare Michael Sorkin’s romanticized notion of “authentic urbanity” and his characterization of present-day cities as “theme parks” with the work of Mike Davis (1992) and Edward Soja who describe militarized public spaces that are hostile to all except for those anointed with state-legitimated power. Domosh herself argues, through a study of mid-nineteenth century New York City that, “the democratic potential of public spaces may still be possible, even in our contemporary ‘theme parks’ If we direct careful attention towards slight, everyday transgressions” (P. 210).

All three projects look to engage in “slight, everyday transgressions” of the public and the private. Sascha Meinrath, the project director for the Open Technology Institute, the non-profit that hosts Commotion Wireless seemed to acknowledge this practice in his remarks at the annual Freedom to Connect conference in Silver Spring, Maryland in March of 2013. Meinrath is situating his own tactics within those of the twentieth century: civil society realized that the most efficacious route to better our country was through “civil disobedience. And today who we hold up as champions of that era, from Rosa Parks to Malcolm X we believe that they did the right thing by being a part of a sophisticated, nationwide, and purposeful intervention. And today, a half-century later, I would say we have a similar responsibility to push that envelope. To demand access to our public airwaves, to engage in electromagnetic jaywalking writ-large.” (Banks 2013)


 * Banks, David. 2013. “The Brilliance of Silver Spring #f2c.” // Cyborgology // . Accessed March 7. http://thesocietypages.org/cyborgology/2013/03/07/the-brilliance-of-silver-spring-f2c/.
 * Bourdieu, Pierre. 1993. // Sociology in question // . London; Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Sage.
 * Davis, Mike. 1992. // City of Quartz: Excavating the Future in Los Angeles // . 1st, First. 0. Vintage.
 * Domosh, Mona. 1998. “Those ‘Gorgeous Incongruities’: Polite Politics and Public Space on the Streets of Nineteenth-Century New York City.” // Annals of the Association of American Geographers // 88 (2) (June 1): 209–226. doi:10.2307/2564208.
 * Habermas, Jürgen. 1989. // The structural transformation of the public sphere: an inquiry into a category of bourgeois society // . Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.
 * Hess, David J. 2011. “To Tell the Truth: On Scientific Counterpublics.” // Public Understanding of Science // 20 (5) (September 1): 627–641. doi:10.1177/0963662509359988.
 * Soja, Edward W. 1989. // Postmodern geographies: the reassertion of space in critical social theory // . London; New York: Verso.
 * Sorkin, Michael. 1992. // Variations on a theme park: the new American city and the end of public space // . New York: Hill and Wang.