The Scale of Public Space: Taksim Square in Istanbul

This article aims at following the traces of the transformation of public sphere in Turkey through its manifestations on urban public spaces with the case study of Taksim Square. In this attempt, the article illustrates how Taksim square, as a public space, has been shaped by struggles between different ideologies, discourses, political decisions and daily activities taking place at personal, interpersonal, local, national, supranational and global scales. Through this way this article also aims at understanding how these contestations at different scales are affecting people, individually and collectively, from daily life practices to political integration. The article also discusses that our daily life practices and preferences are political decisions and our participation in public sphere occurs through those daily actions of the personal spheres. Therefore, the article suggests that a paradigm shift is needed in the design and production of the built environments that will facilitate the coexistence of multiple counter publics.


Introduction
Today the role of public spaces in the exchange of ideas and creation of public opinion has started to be discussed extensively.
Public spaces such as Tahrir Square in Egypt, Sintagma Square in Greece, the buffer Zone in Cyprus, or the Azadi Square in Tehran have more than what they occupy as physical spaces. Images reflecting those huge urban areas with millions of people inside are circulating all over the world through news agencies or social media, as the messengers of new social orders or new regimes.
Those images help to create and sustain a feeling of strong resistance and solidarity through the representation of the materialization of political ideas with real people and real places in them. Although it is impossible to deny the power of thousands of people interwoven together occupying that space cannot be ignored. In the end, all those images shared in digital media illustrate real people and real places (Parkinson, 2012).
These political activisms on urban spaces are becoming visible by the help of internet, and media at a global scale. They illustrate the collective resistance of certain people at certain locations, which might have global impacts at other localities. Although they do not represent WKH ´LGHDO VSHHFK FRQGLWLRQµ WKDW +DEHUPDV suggests as the rule of public sphere they are probably the utmost reflections of public opinion (Habermas, Lenox, & Lenox, 1974). And again, in contrast with Habermasian ideal of public sphere, which is related with public opinion and manifested in language, these activisms are highly visible through their existence on urban spaces (Parkinson, 2012 Having the idea that public spaces constitute an indispensable part of public life, and play an important role in the formation of public opinion, this article aims at following the traces of the transformation of public sphere in Turkey through its manifestations on urban public spaces with the case study of Taksim Square in Istanbul. In this attempt, the article tries to understand the changing meanings attached to the square as a major public space, not only at urban scale but also at personal, interpersonal, national and global scales. Therefore, the article looks at the ways how the square has been formed, used, transformed and appropriated by different ideologies, discourses, political decisions and daily life activities of different groups. It also looks at the ways how political and ideological pressures are materialized at urban spaces and how these materializations are being contested through different forms of public expressions ranging from collective protests to daily life activities and preferences in the use of urban space. The article aims to understand whether or not these contestations open the way for new forms of public spheres, which might be called as multiple counter-publics with reference to Nancy Fraser, and whether or not the physicality of the urban space in terms of inscription of meanings and transformation of those meanings through appropriation of the space, has impacts on this formation of new types of public spheres.

Imagination of a Modern Nation State
The foundation of the Turkish Republic as a new nation-state in 1923 was a break from the imperial Ottoman past through a modernization project. One of the most important aspects of the nationhood was constructing a Turkish citizenship within defined boundaries (Secor, 2004). This modernization project was inspired by the Western norms, and paralleled by secularization and homogenization of the country (Kasaba, 1997

Urban Interventions in Taksim
According WR d×QDU WKURXJK WKHVH LQWHUYHQWLRQV on the urban space, the new regime was not only constructing its power and authority in front of its constituency, but also representing itself in Empire underwent reform movements in its institutional system and this was also reflected on the urban pattern of the capital city, Istanbul (Baykal, 2000). Pera, with a concentration of non-Muslim population was a model for the urban renovation projects. Therefore, it developed with a more modern face and with western living style. The barracks buildings were also representative of the modernization efforts of the military system. Therefore, Pera was symbolizing modenization attempts of the empire.

Taksim Square as the National Symbol of the Republic
One of the most important steps transforming Taksim area into a national space was construction of a monument at its center. The the establishment of the square as a national public space, spatializing the idea of Turkish nationalism, which also determined the boundaries of the public sphere of the early republican period. As much as it has been a place for official ceremonies of the state, the square has also been a place of contestation, due to high public visibility that it provides for any political activity. This national establishment of the public sphere, and its definition of the urban space, had also affected the daily life and face to face interactions at this specific urban location.

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The most grievous occasion which Taksim Square had witnessed took place on the celebrations of May 1 in the year 1977. In the protests of workers and leftist groups 33 people were killed. Five of them were killed by fire opened from surrounding buildings. As the panicked protesters were trying to escape from the area, panzers headed towards the crowd and another 28 people died under the panzers. The case has not been solved yet, since the people in charge of these attacks have not been determined. However, many leftist organizations claimed that illegal armed forces, which had developed against leftist organizations within NATO countries and which ZHUH LQ SUHSDUDWLRQ WR WKH PLOLWDU\ FRXS G·pWDW LQ 1980 in Turkey, were in charge of these assaults (Baykan & Hatuka, 2010). After that incident, Taksim became a symbol of struggle for leftist groups and union organizations, and for a period of more than 30 years, they have fought to gain control over this square against security forces, which try to prevent the celebrations of May 1 by using gas bombs, batons and probations. Finally, in 2010, 33 years after the Taksim Square Massacre, the governor of Istanbul allowed May 1 celebrations to take place in Taksim square (Baykan & Hatuka, 2010). In 2013, the square was once more closed to May 1 celebrations due to ongoing construction work of Taksim Pedestrianization Project (Bianet, 2013), and from that year on the square is still close to May 1. Taksim

Taksim Square Pedestrianization Project and the Gezi Protests
Since November 2012 there has been a frantic construction work in Taksim  This project has raised a respectable amount of public debate, and even facilitated the establishment of an activist group named Solidarity for Taksim composed of civil society organizations, professional chambers and political organizations and also including a number of individual academics, architects, urban planners, students, activists, artists, journalists and writers. These individuals and groups objected the project due to its top-down application process, underlining the inappropriateness of the car underpasses; difficulties of reaching the square for pedestrians; the loss of the identity of the square and collective memory of the city. Last but not least, destruction of Gezi Park, one of the few remaining green areas of Taksim and rebuilding the Artillery Barracks building for commercial purposes constituted an important concern (Mimarist). Despite all these critics, the project has been approved by Istanbul Greater Municipality and the pedestrianization of the square is on its way towards completion úVWDQEXO Greater Municipality).
In addition to pedestrianization of the square, demolition of Gezi Park and reconstruction of Artillary Barracks building with new functions was a part of the project. During the construction works, there were protests and demonstrations against the project, especially focusing on protection of Gezi Park from demolition. On 27th of May 2013, the bulldozers started demolishing the trees in the park. Around 50 activists including architects, planners and artists gathered to stop this demolition and they camped in the park, however, next morning they were evacuated by police forces, their tents were torn down and burnt by the police (Mimarist). In the following few days, police attacks by tear gas and water cannons continued. Especially with the heavy-handed police attacks on the dawns of 30th and 31st of May 2013, the protests had spread to all over Turkey, including millions of protestors marching on the streets (Atam, 2013).
As the police attacks continued, the protestors started to develop tactics to overcome those attacks. As a result of brutal violence during the last few days of May, and 1st of June, there were millions on Taksim Square, and the police was retreated from the park and the square. Protestors, including people from different EDFNJURXQGV SROLWLFDO JURXSV ZRUNHUV· XQLRQV civil society organizations, football team members or people who are not attached to any political ideology or group, started to establish barricades on the streets opening to Taksim and Gezi Park area using pavement stones, police shields, trash cans, burned police buses, or any available material they could find, in order to prevent police cars entering the Gezi Park and Taksim Square area. Meanwhile, Gezi park started to turn into a big commune with tents, an infirmary, food and medicine supply ]RQH DQ RSHQ OLEUDU\ D FKLOGUHQ·V DUHD Everything was free in this area, and everybody was working voluntarily for others. All materials like food, medicine, books, were supplied from supporters in Istanbul, and all over the world through internet. Many activities were organized in Gezi during those days, such as meetings, yoga classes, dervish swirling, workshops with children, reading corners and piano recitals. This was a temporary autonomous zone, which was short lived physically, but still enduring mentally (Bulut, 2013;Postvirtual, 2013).
Such kind of big scale urban interventions not only change the physical appearance and functioning of the places in which they are being applied. They also inscribe new meanings to the urban space, through modifying the existing uses, social relations, and memories attached to the place. Any kind of intervention in Taksim square carries a specific meaning due to the political, historical and social significance of the square. It has been a place of representation, struggle, contestation and spectacle throughout its history, especially since the beginning of Turkish republic. It has served as a place for constructing the national identity; establishing a spectacle for the global gaze; claiming unheard and unfulfilled demands and contesting over new forms of identities and representations. Those political actions and claims have found their spatial reflections on the square, creating a vibrant image of the square changing from a global spectacle to a national stage of ideology and power, from an urban transportation node WR D SODFH IRU EHFRPLQJ SROLWLFDO $NS×QDU *•P•ü %D\NDQ +DWXND Büyüksaraç, 2 <•FHO +DWLSRùOX

CONCLUSION
Those examples illustrate that on the one side, the city, with its public spaces, is a crucial site for seeing others and being seen by others, meeting with new perspectives, voicing claims or objections and becoming political. Therefore they are sites through which public sphere, as the media, institutions, or mind sets of other people, can be accessed, and manipulated. This struggle is not only about a claim to represent different identities but a claim to existence by representation and redefinition of those identities.
On the other side, the city can also become a place of exclusion and segregation with hegemonic and normative strategies that shape the physical space. However, those exclusionary practices are disrupted through several tactics and manoeuvres of daily life practices. Public sphere and public space are being challenged, contested, re-imagined, de-constructed and reconstructed over and over again. These activities collectively construct and reveal an alternative logic of public life. Multiple counter publics, as suggested by Nancy Fraser suggests already exist at different scales (Fraser, 1990).
A new language is needed to create a common ground that allows new modes of communication and openneVV WR RWKHU·V perspectives, so that those multiple public spheres may continue to co-exist. Therefore, the idea of public sphere should not be limited with national, international, global or urban scales, but the creative opportunities of other scales such as personal spheres, inter-personal spheres, local spheres, neighborhood spheres need to be underlined in formulating new logics of public life. So here, the main question is, what could spatial disciplines suggest for the cultivation of such a language and common ground for communication?